January 14th, 2010 | Category: Teacher Tips | Tags:

We have officially entered the absurdly long, bleak stretch between winter break and spring break. Many of us arrive at school while it’s still dark outside and find the sun dipping below the horizon by the time we leave. Despite the dreary weather and kids who are cooped up inside all day, this can actually be one of the most productive times of the school year. Your routines are well established, you know your students and their needs, and there are probably fewer interruptions to the school day than in the fall or spring.

Most teachers are starting a new marking period sometime in January, so spend a few minutes taking a big picture look at what the quarter holds for you. Try using a calendar to map out the coming marking period. Do a web search for “calendar template” and you’ll find plenty of options out there that you can save on your computer and type into.

As you do your long-term planning, remember to mark these important features on your calendar. Look for anything that impacts students’ time in class or your own workflow.

• Holidays when there is no school (Come on… Presidents’ Day!)
• Teacher work days/ Professional days
• Partial school days or other days with limited instruction
• Assemblies, festivals, pep rallies, field trips and other days with interrupted instruction
• Days devoted to state/district testing or test preparation
• Days devoted to school-wide testing, such as elementary reading assessment
• Due dates for interim grades, report cards, or parent/teacher conferences
• Due dates for making recommendations for next year’s courses
• Your personal commitments (Family visiting for the weekend? Don’t collect an essay on Friday!)
• Time you can keep clear on your calendar spend getting ahead (If needed, can you come in early every Tuesday? Stay late on Thursdays? Block out one Saturday a month to spend grading papers at a coffee shop?)

Now that you can see the big picture of the next few months, it’s easier to schedule in due dates for tests, projects, portfolios, etc. at times when students will be in class and you will have time to grade and provide quick feedback.

If you save a version of the calendar before inputting your personal and classroom information and email it to your colleagues for them to use as well, I guarantee you’ll be the most popular person in the teachers’ lounge today!

–Claire Lambert

January 6th, 2010 | Category: Newsletter | Tags: Better PD, Robyn Jackson

Here is Robyn’s Latest Newsletter Article:

I was talking to a friend and colleague over the holiday break about my frustration with most professional development models. You know the kinds of experiences I’m talking about – the sit and get, spray and pray deals most of us have had to endure perched atop those really uncomfortable cafeteria stools or crammed into the media center aimlessly flipping through a stack of handouts or secretly completing a crossword puzzle while desperately wishing I was in my classroom grading papers and praying for 3:30 when they would unlock the doors and set us free. I’ve always hated those days and work very hard not to deliver the same kind of professional development when I conduct workshops and yet, there were several times in 2009 when I came very close to providing or participating in someone else’s providing the very same kind of experience.

There has got to be a better way.

And in 2010, I am looking to find it. So I am throwing down the Professional Development Gauntlet: If I cannot deliver a professional development experience that is worth more to teachers than spending the same amount of time grading papers, I won’t offer it.

You see, I started Mindsteps not because I wanted to get in on the professional development gravy train. I started Mindsteps because I believed that there was a better way to help teachers. I have never understood why we use such bad teaching practices to show teachers how to be better teachers. I want every teacher to become a master teacher, to reach every child in his or her classroom and to have a ball doing it. I love teaching so much that I want everyone in this profession to love it. And I am convinced that can’t happen if we continue to teach teachers in the same ways we always have. So, I am going to stop trying to improve the old model.

I am going to build a new one.

The old model doesn’t work and I am no longer satisfied with trying to tweak it. I think if we are going to do what’s right for kids and provide every one of them with a quality education we have to start and end with a master teacher in every classroom. That’s a scary idea to a lot of people. Whenever I declare that any teacher can become a master teacher with the right kind of support and practice, I always face skepticism. People think it isn’t possible and they are right as long as we continue to provide the kinds of training we are currently providing. If we are really going to make a difference for teachers, for the quality of their teaching and the quality of their lives in the classroom, we have got to start by dramatically overhauling the kind of support and practice we provide them.

I want professional development that:

• invites teachers to co-create the learning and influence the direction of how we spend our time together
• is customizable so that teachers have several access points and can move through the experience at their own level
• is practical so that teachers have ideas and tools they can use immediately but can also customize so that they are more relevant to each teacher’s context and students
• models the same teaching principles we expect teachers to use with their students
• is meaningful and lasts longer than the experience
  actually improves the way that we teach and think about teaching

It’s an ambitious list that I am sure will grow and change over the next few months as I begin this journey. And if I am really honest, this is a scary thing to do. It means that I am now accountable to you and it also means that in my attempts to create a new way of providing professional development, I will make some mistakes. Publicly. But I am tired of the same ole, same ole.

I think you deserve better.

I also want to make it clear: I am not beating up my colleagues who provide professional development. I understand how easy it is to get sucked into the old model of providing PD. Many of the conditions are frankly outside of our control. We come in for a day or two and then leave hoping that somehow that brief amount of time has made a difference. I have been sucked into that model as well. But I want something better for the teachers I serve and I am inviting my colleagues to join me in reaching for it. In fact, I will be engaging my colleagues in conversations about how we can create a new model of professional development that honors teachers and our profession. I cannot solve this problem alone. I need their help.

I also need your help. What kind of professional development would be most useful to you? What kinds of experiences would dramatically improve your practice? Go ahead and dream big here. I can’t do this without you. I invite you to leave your comments and ideas here. I will check in with you each month and let you know how we are doing.

Please take time to comment and let’s build something better together.

December 21st, 2009 | Category: Classroom Strategies | Tags: student motivation

As the holidays approach, many of us throw our typical eating habits out the window and start a week or two of reckless (and delicious) overload. For breakfast I had a bowl of fiber cereal and several of those sugary candy orange slices. That counts as a fruit, right?

Pretty soon I’ll surely come to my senses and make a New Years resolution to eat more healthfully. I know it’s good for me, but it is always hard to keep up my motivation to stick with it.

While you enjoy that second helping of pie this winter break, remember that even for grown ups it’s sometimes challenging to make a habit of doing what you know is good for you. As you begin a new semester with your students in January, try borrowing a few ideas for motivation from the healthy lifestyle New Years resolution to support the habits that lead to success in your classroom.

• Celebrate results. When students complete their work or study effectively for an assessment, try writing them a note, sending an email home, or catching them for a quick conversation to reinforce the connection between their hard work and their classroom success.

• Help students set incremental goals. If a student ended last quarter with a poor grade or many missing assignments, take a few minutes to work with the student to set a few achievable goals for improvement – perhaps moving up a letter grade, writing down the homework assignment each day, or coming in for extra help once a week. You can always set new goals once the student makes progress.

• Exercise with a friend. You might be tempted to skip your trip to the gym, but probably not if you know a friend is meeting you there. Help students find a homework or class work buddy – someone to check in with a couple of times a week to compare notes on how they’re managing their work. Peer accountability takes very little time on your part and helps form positive bonds for your students.

• Lead by example. As students move through the grades they are increasingly responsible for their own time management, but those skills are rarely taught in class. Share with students how you manage your own work – do you make a to-do list and check off each item? Come to work half an hour earlier to get a head start on busy days? Block out time first thing Saturday morning to work and then reward yourself with an activity you really enjoy?

• Use easy external motivators. A few years back I tried a weight loss program that I tracked on-line. Every time I lost 5 pounds, a little star popped up on my profile. I didn’t necessarily do the work of losing the weight just to get the star, but I honestly felt great whenever a new one appeared. No matter how old (or cool) your students are, they will still like recognition for their work. Consider using a star chart in class for students who complete their homework or come prepared, or write a note of recognition to give to a student who is making progress. As you clean up the holiday aftermath at your house, consider making a classroom prize box. I used to have one filled with things like discarded fast food kid’s meal toys, a free Frisbee I got at a concert, little lotions from hotels, a calendar from my bank, etc. When students turned in their homework they could put their name on a slip of paper in a bucket and every Friday I drew a name for a trip to the prize box. My eighth graders loved it, and my non-teacher friends and family started saving their desirable clutter to refill my prize box.

Have more motivational ideas of your own? I hope you’ll post them here!

– Claire Lambert

December 8th, 2009 | Category: Newsletter | Tags: Robyn Jackson

Here is Robyn’s latest article from Mindsteps’ December Newsletter. To subscribe to the newsletter, click here.

Have you played a video game recently?  Maybe you play a little solitaire or free cell on your computer to unwind after a particularly stressful day, or you are addicted to bubble breaker and bejeweled on your mobile phone. Perhaps you were the PacMan champion in your day or you secretly rule in Guitar Hero or Halo. No matter how difficult, complex, challenging, or frustrating, there is something about video games that’s just plain addictive

Lately I have been wondering why we can’t seem to  make learning in school as addictive as video games. Why is it that students are willing to engage in complex and difficult tasks in a gaming environment but resist doing so in the classroom?  Why is failure motivating in a video game but devastating on a test?  Why is it that learning is fun during a game but boring in class?  What’s the secret?

I don’t know that I have “cracked the code” entirely here, but I do know that if we really want to make learning more addictive and our lessons more compelling, here are five things we should learn from video games:
 
1.  Video games integrate a variety of skills.  Students don’t learn one skill and then another until they have the repertoire of skills they need.  They are asked to synthesize a range of skills and use them to solve increasingly more complex problems.  School on the other hand teaches discrete skills and tests students on how well they have mastered an individual skill or small group of skills.  Rarely are students asked to synthesize their skills to solve problems.  If we want lessons that are more compelling, we have to stop focussing on merely teaching discrete skills and give students a opportunities to integrate and synthesize what they learn.
 
2.  Video games allow students to solve challenging and complex problems immediately.  You learn how to play the video game by playing the game.  There is no passive sitting on the sidelines while you watch an expert perform.  In the game, you jump right in.  Gamers have to develop hypotheses for the best way to solve problems according to the game’s logic and rules and they have to test these hypotheses and develop new ones within the game space.  They don’t have to wait until they happen upon the right answer before they can play.  It is the act of playing that allows them to learn how to solve problems effectively.  All too often, the exact opposite happens in the classroom where students are asked to get good at something before they are allowed to do it.  Students might become more actively involved, more invested in their own learning, and develop better problem-solving skills that were transferable to other situations if they were allowed to develop and test their own hypotheses as they learned. 
 
3.  Video Games allow customization. Players can create their own avatars, choose the attributes of their characters, and in some cases build their own environment.  They can decide where they want to go in the game space and how they want the game to proceed.  They can make decisions on how to play the game that are best for them within the parameters of the game.  All of these these choices mean that each person’s experience playing the game is unique.  In school, students are rarely offered the chance to make meaningful choices that influence how they will learn.  If we really want students to take ownership over their own learning, then we have to give them a sense of agency and shared control.  We have to structure the learning environment so that they can customize it to meet their own needs.
 
4.  Video games do an excellent job at scaffolding. Players can play a game before they are good at the game.  They don’t have to wait and practice drills and demonstrate competence before they begin playing.  They are thrown right in and learn the game as they are playing it.  When they get stuck, they can access the supports that are built right into the game or ask other, more experienced players. The more they play, the better they get.  Video games also have different levels and each level presents a challenge that is just beyond the skill of the player. At each level, players learn how to solve problems until they can do so routinely and automatically. As players get better at one level, they proceed to a new level with a new set of challenges that require them to integrate their old skills with new ones to reach a new and deeper level of mastery.  This cycle of repetition and new challenge helps players develop expertise rather quickly.  In school, the opposite often happens where struggling students have to languish at lower levels until they demonstrate competence.  School would be much more engaging for struggling students if they received the supports they needed during the learning process, in real time so that they could keep up with what was happening in the classroom and progress to the next level of learning.
 
5.  Finally, video games make failure motivating.  Learning a new game can be tough, but each time a player fails the player learns something that he can use to make his performance better next time.  Video games keep the play just outside of a player’s level of competence so that while they are challenging, they are also doable.  Video games take the stigma and sting out of failure.  Failure is an integral part of the learning process and everyone expects to fail several times before they succeed.  Each time you fail in a video game, you get immediate feedback that shows you how to learn from your failure and do things better the next round. Failure becomes just another event in the learning process rather than an evaluation of your learning process.  In school however, failure is not a part of a learning process; it is a signal that the learning process has gone wrong somehow.  Students don’t routinely get the opportunity to learn from their failures and try again in school.  While they often get feedback that tells them that they have failed, they don’t get immediate feedback from their failure that shows them how to do better next time.  In school, failure is not a natural part of the learning process; it is something to be avoided at all costs. Thus video games encourage risk taking in ways that school does not.

For ways to make your lessons as compelling as video games, check out the December TIP Sheet here
-Robyn R. Jackson

November 30th, 2009 | Category: Classroom Strategies | Tags:

For most of us, only a few weeks remain in the marking period.  Secondary teachers probably have exams arriving in the next couple of weeks while elementary teachers may be feeling their time slipping away due to special holiday programs and end-of-unit assessments. Rather than “running out of time” during the last few days before winter break – or leaving so many things due the day before vacation that your time off is consumed by grading – take a few minutes to plot out your remaining December classes on a calendar and mark the due dates for your must-do assignments and assessments.

You might want to compare the school calendar to your personal calendar.  Guard your quality of life in this busy month by trying to schedule long stretches of grading or intensive preparation for times that you don’t have personal or family commitments.  If you’re wondering how you’ll pack everything in, consider some of the following ideas for condensing and consolidating the volume of work while still meeting your objectives for the unit.

• Review early: Who says the unit has to be over to begin reviewing for the test or exam? If you provide a review packet, consider breaking it into pieces. Go ahead and give students the review materials for the content you have already taught. This way they can begin studying early (and avoid last minute cramming) and you can get ahead of the end-of-semester crunch.

• Consolidate: Does your class usually read three separate stories to practice three distinct reading strategies? Look for a single story or article that will allow students to practice all three strategies. The time you save covering more material can be focused on working with the strategies in greater depth.

• Tier your homework: If students usually complete 20 problems for homework – and you spend your time during or after class grading them – consider creating tiered homework assignments. This strategy works best for practicing concrete skills like math or science computation, grammar assignments, foreign language verb conjugations, etc.  In the last 10 minutes of class give a very short (4-5 question) formative assessment that covers the content of tonight’s homework. For students who get everything right, give minimal practice and a challenge application or extension. These students clearly get it, so they can self-check with an answer key the next day. For students who miss a couple of problems, provide review and practice.  They can self-check homework with an answer key and help one another or identify a few problems as a group for which they would like teacher assistance. For students missing nearly all of the material, provide homework that focuses on building understanding of the concept and spend most of the time the next day you would normally spend on checking homework with the whole class providing reteaching to this group.

Have other ideas for getting the most bang for your instructional buck during the December crunch? Post them here!

–Claire Lambert

November 27th, 2009 | Category: Classroom Strategies | Tags:

Whether students are missing classes in December due to illness or travel, you’re bound to have more than a few absences throughout the month. Consider creating an Absent Work Folder system either on a bulletin board or crate in your classroom. When you hand out new assignments or return papers, put a copy (with the student’s name) in the absent work folder for anyone who isn’t there. With older students, you could even have a classroom helper do this job. Then when a student returns, anything he or she missed is in one spot and can be found without help from you!

–Claire Lambert

November 23rd, 2009 | Category: Classroom Strategies | Tags:

In keeping with the Thanksgiving theme this week, take a moment to consider what you’re thankful for in your teaching career. I’m guessing for most of us it isn’t test prep, grading on the weekends or writing college recommendations that makes us thankful, but forming meaningful connections with students and seeing young people grow in our care.  This could be the perfect week to take a few minutes out for community building in your classroom. Sometimes community building activities are dismissed as too fluffy, off-topic or a waste of time, but consider that when students in a class feel connected to the teacher and to each other they may be more likely to help a neighbor, work effectively with a group, take academic risks and develop a positive self-concept.

Here are a few ideas of community builders that don’t require a lot of time or planning, are easy to adapt for your grade-level or student population, and  build a sense of interdependence in the classroom.

• Group Résumé – Have students work together in groups of 4 or 5 to create a poster-sized résumé of their combined skills, talents and experiences. For example, all together students may have strengths in math, science, basketball, scrapbooking and babysitting. They may have 6 brothers and 5 sisters, 3 dogs and 4 cats. They may speak 4 languages and have traveled to 6 different countries. Choose résumé categories that make sense for your age group and student population. Post the résumés or have students share out.

• Thank you notes – give each student – and the teacher — a few index cards or small squares of paper and have them write anonymous thank you notes to their classmates and teacher. Don’t include any names, only the things they’re thankful for. Read or post the cards so students can see “thanks for explaining the homework when I called you” “thanks for asking me to be in your group when I was alone” and “thanks for handing back papers while I helped a student.”

• Positive Attributes — Provide a word splash with 20 or more positive character traits. Have students choose two or three that best describe themselves. Then put them in small groups and ask other group members to choose a few words from the list to describe each of their team members. Students discuss to find overlap and hear from their team mates about what makes them special.

• Man on the Street Interviews – Pick up a toy microphone (or imagine your classroom stapler is a microphone) and let students interview each other about what they’re thankful for. Even better, build connections by having students talk with a partner in advance and then share for the group what their partner is thankful for. So you might get to hear

Reporter: This is Tiffany, she’s a first grader, and she is thankful for her big sister. Tiffany tell us more about that.

Tiffany: I’m thankful for my sister because she shares her markers and she saves a seat for me on the bus.

Reporter: Thanks for talking with us, Tiffany.

Have other ways to build community while giving thanks in your classroom? Post them here!

–Claire Lambert

November 18th, 2009 | Category: Classroom Strategies | Tags:

Once in a workshop I heard a teacher describe a group of five or six kids in her elementary class as “the gorillas” – the crew that always raised their hands and emitted a low “oooh-oooh-oooh” until they were called on.  The gorillas can be wonderful when they keep the discussion moving and reassure us that the lesson is working, but there are probably other students in the class who rarely or never raise their hands who either know the answer or would benefit from working through it with the teacher.  Teachers often resist calling on students whose hands are not raised for fear of embarrassing them or putting them on the spot if they are unprepared or don’t have the right answer.

Next time your lesson calls for problem-solving, making inferences, or dealing with complexity, consider using the Numbered Heads Together strategy in order to increase the diversity of voices in your classroom (and perhaps give the gorillas some practice listening to their peers). Put students in small groups of three or four – students sitting close by are fine – and have them number off so that each student in every group has a number from 1-3 or 1-4. Students will know their own numbers, but the teacher won’t know who has each number.  Students work together to complete the short activity or practice from your lesson and each student makes sure she has captured and can explain the group’s responses. Then the teacher can randomly select a number – the 2s for instance – and whoever is member #2 in each group reports out on the answer or group’s process for finding a response.

The strategy allows students to engage with peers, practice their responses in a small group first, and talk to the whole class with the confidence of representing a group rather than being on their own.

Quick tips: if you are using groups of 4 but one group has only 3 students, have student #1 also be #4.  If one group has an extra student, let two students share a number and answer together if their number is called.  Feel free to switch up your number anytime – if the 2s in your first two groups have already thoroughly answered the first question, switch it up to the 4s to address the next item.

Claire Lambert

November 16th, 2009 | Category: Classroom Strategies | Tags:

I’ve been reading and thinking a lot lately about formative assessment and have heard from teachers who embrace it and from those who are still struggling to find a place for it within their curriculum and teaching style.  As an adult, I’m noticing that “real-life” formative assessment is all around us. Whether you’re checking the treadmill display to see your calorie count half way through your work out, taking a friend shopping with you for a special occasion outfit, or tasting something on the stove before it’s done, you’re participating in formative assessment – essentially checking along the way to make sure you’re on the right track and allowing time to correct your course if you’re headed in the wrong direction.

We hear a great deal about what formative assessment does for teachers in terms of providing data to track student progress and inform instruction. But could there be more to it? Does formative assessment also teach a “soft skill” to our students about the importance of checking their own understanding before the due date rolls around?

Think back to your own days as a student. Did you ever walk out of a test thinking “I just bombed that!” or “I didn’t realize that would be on the test!” Remember that sinking feeling that your grade was going down the tubes or that you would have to do some creative explaining to your parents? How might life have been different if a week before the test your teacher had given a short practice quiz, an example written response, or a blank map for you to complete?

I often hear teachers who are grappling with formative assessment express concern that it breeds laziness in students or spoon-feeds them what will be on the test. But consider how those same short, low-stakes formative assessments – especially those that students can be involved in scoring and revising – could focus a student’s studying or give her a heads-up that she doesn’t know something as well as she thinks she does. Wouldn’t it be great for students to leave a test without that sinking feeling – and for you to grade the test without the sinking feeling of your own?

Please join in the blog discussion with examples of how you involve students in formative assessment, how you’re trying to make formative assessment work for your class, or the roadblocks standing in your way.

–Claire Lambert

November 10th, 2009 | Category: Newsletter | Tags: Robyn Jackson

Here is Robyn’s Latest Newsletter Article.  You can subscribe to our Free Monthly E-Newsletter by clicking here.

After a year of resisting, I finally drank the apple-flavored kool-aid and bought an iphone. I had read about its brilliant design but was entirely unprepared for its simplicity. Now I suppose the folks at Apple could have sent me a questionnaire in order to discern my likes and dislikes and used that information to figure out what I wanted and needed in a phone. And I guess they could have sent someone out to interview me to determine my telephone and texting habits and the gone back to the factory and built a phone to my exact specifications. But Apple didn’t focus on trying to build a phone designed just for me. In fact, it did just the opposite. Rather than offering an array of colors, the phone comes in only 2 – white and black. Instead of offering an array of built-in applications, it offers just a few basic programs loaded into the phone. Instead of trying to offer an array of phones to meet my needs, Apple offers just one.

But this phone does meet my needs exactly. I can buy a cover for the phone in any color and design I can imagine. I can download any additional software I need from entire app store filled with applications not built by Apple but by its customers. Although I bought the same phone that anyone else can purchase, I have the opportunity to make it uniquely my own. I was able to customize it to fit my needs.

Later that week, I was following the Twitter edchat on my iphone about Differentiated Instruction while I was waiting for a plane I began to think that maybe Apple could teach us a thing or two about teaching. For years we have tried to differentiate our instruction, often creating several different lesson plans to meet the needs of more of our students. Often we miss several students’ needs and wear ourselves out in the process. I wondered what if instead of differentiating our lessons for students, we created lessons that were customizable? What if we taught like an iphone?

Stay with me now. I promise you that I haven’t turned into Steve Jobs’ evangelist. The brilliance of the iphone’s design is that it can be customized to meet the individual needs of each us. Apple doesn’t bother creating apps it thinks we might use, instead, it offers us the users an opportunity to build our own. Apple doesn’t try to anticipate my needs. Instead, it built a phone that is flexible enough that I can make it fit my needs.

In the days of DVR’s that allow you to watch TV when and how you want, and Pandora radio that lets you create your own radio station customized to your tastes and preferences, it is hard for many students to sit and get lessons that are pitched to the nebulous middle. And, even when we attempt to get to know our students’ individual likes and dislikes, learning strengths and weaknesses, backgrounds and dispositions and create lessons that address all of these, trying to do so for every child every day is next to impossible and we often settled for superficial connections or just give up entirely.

Maybe instead of differentiation, we should focus on building lessons that are flexible enough that each student can find a way to access the curriculum. Maybe instead of trying to guess what our students may need, we should teach students how to show us what they need in ways that can be quickly addressed by the supports available in the classroom. Maybe instead of trying to adapt our lessons to meet each student’s need, we should create lessons that students can customize themselves.

Differentiation focuses too much on individualization rather than customization. We are trying to meet the individual needs of students rather than showing them how to meet their own needs. We are building individual lessons for each student instead of building lessons that are flexible enough so that all students can access them.

Differentiation presumes that we know what is best for students and puts the onus of meeting their needs on us. But what if we enlisted our students to partner with us to figure out what they needed instead? If we did, we would create a shared learning space where we can work with our students to help them get what they need from our classes. We would also show student how to leverage the currencies they bring with them to the classroom to access the curriculum in the way that works best for them.

Imagine what would happen in this kind of classroom! Students would be more engaged because they would be actively involved in creating and monitoring their own learning. Students would also feel more comfortable because they are learning how to leverage their backgrounds and currencies in order to access the curriculum. Learning would take place at a much deeper level because students are learning how to learn and how to take the curriculum and adapt it to their own contexts. Rigor and relevance would naturally increase, and because students and teachers are co-creating the learning experience, relationships would thrive.

I know, I know. Creating this kind of classroom is really hard at first. It requires really understanding your curriculum, flexibility, and the time to create and implement. And, thinking about teaching this way requires a real shift in our thinking. The TIP sheet this month has some ideas for getting started and in the next few months on our blog, in this newsletter, and on our site, we will be posting new resources and offering new workshops that provide step-by-step guidance for moving towards customization instead of individualization. Stay Tuned.

Robyn R. Jackson