Things I am Thinking About

Since our last class I have been thinking about several things that came up in the presentation and the discussion. Rachel & Ashley's presentation was great. It got me thinking about the way I physically organize my classroom. For the past few years I have primarily used table groups ALL the time. However, that may not be the betting setting for all students to learn. This year I have a lot of students who have told me - I need to sit facing forward. I also have noticed many students who are highly distractible when they are sitting in a table group. I feel I arragned my room this way because it is the politically correct way to arrange it, it looks like we are doing cooperative learning if you (or an administrator) were to walk in for one minute. However, I have come to realize that just because the students are sitting in a group does not mean they are cooperative working. And when we are working in groups, having 2 desks between students is not conducive to whisper or low voices that are needed, so I usually move kids around the room anyway - like to the book corner, or sitting at the reading table. Maybe I don't need my desks in groups just to have it look like I do cooperative learning. I think I am going to be brave and try something different in January. If I seat my students in pairs, they have someone to work in partners with. Also they can turn around and easily be a group of 4 when needed, and they will be much closer to each other, so they can actually hear each other when they are working in groups. I have used table groups for so long, it seems strange to do something else, but I am going to try it.

I keep rereading parts of the book Teach Like a Champion, because I really like many of the strategies. Some I was already doing, so it feels like a pat on the back. Other strategies I have started using with more frequency this year include the Cold Calling and No Opt Out. The strategy I need to practice more is Right is Right. I am the teacher who often rounds up. I can't seem to stop myself. Even this week I have caught myself doing that. I don't know if it is because I am in a hurry because time is limited, so I feel I have to push through and not slow down to get every part. I need to keep working on this with oral responses. I am much better at Right is Right when students are writing down answers, particularly for reading response.

At Bats...I have had a lot of discussion with other teachers about the concept of At Bats. I feel like in math (facts) especially, students need a lot of at bats. But I feel if we do that, I am doing contrary to what I have been told is good teaching in math. For example, to learn subtraction with regrouping students need lots of at bats. Our math program does not provide for lots of at bats. I have even been told lots of practice is detrimental because it is boring. Yet it seems like more and more students are going through elementary school not being comfortable subtracting with regrouping. Or even comfortable with basic subtraction facts. I feel guilty if we practice, guilty if we don't. There seems to be no middle ground. Practicing math facts is low level tasks, but won't students be more successful on higher level skills in upper grades if they come with a strong foundation? And please don't think math facts is all I do, just because I happen to think it is important. I teach math out of the box, I teach the standards, and we practice story problems daily.

Motivation

Drive By Daniel Pink could be one of the most interesting books I've read. If any of you out there havent read it, I challenge you over the next few months to read it (on top of all that we already do).

This book contains insight into the world of motivation. What makes you and I different when completing a task. It poses many questions as to how and why we are teaching the way we teach when we all know that sitting in a desk for 8 hours a day is nothing but brain cells getting in the habit of not firing. What this book does not do however is give us a solution to how to motivate our students more.

Here is the connection I've made thus far (only 3 chapters in). People are either born with an intrinsic ability to be motivated and excited about things they are interested in, and the other half of us are not born with this ability. Thus, why the use of insentives has come into the coorporate world. Also why the government is flirting with the idea of Teacher insentive Funds which would pay teachers based on performance. Here is my question, how do we get those students to be motivated to learn that lack the intrinsic motivation? Yes, we can make the content matter to them, and yes we can be the performers up in front of the classroom ( we are competing with the x-box afterall) and yes we can give treats. But at the core of me, I feel like its a switch that has got to be in the home. If we want our students to be motivated to learn, learning has to be important to them.

All in all, I am beginning to realize that my role of a teacher through reading Teach Like a Champion, Drive and other teacher related materials is that it is my job to not only teach content, manage behavior, teach specific skills, teach life skills, but to now also teach students how to be motivated, to be successful in order to pass the benchmark exams that rachel is refers to in her post. Phew! We have alot to accomplish, good thing were all so dedicated!

Shortest Path

I have been spending a lot of time thinking about our discussion last week about Shortest Path.  In case you don't remember I was having a hard time fitting together the ideas of teaching using "the most direct route from point to point" and teaching through inquiry and asked for help.  Kim suggested (as  I remember it) that Lemov means to teach with college readiness in mind, that we should teach the things students need to be successful in college in the most efficient manner possible.

In addition to reading Lemov I am also currently making slow progress through Yong Zhao's (U of O prof.) Catching Up or Leading the Way: American Education in the Age of Globalization.  In what I have read of Zhao thus far he attributes The United States' success in so many things (research, business, tech, etc) during the last century to an educational system that encourages creativity and individuality.  He explains that while we try to copy the Asian style of standards and testing that folk in China are trying to copy our old system of education so that they can "Lead the Way."  That's right!  He actually says that standards are a problem - or at least that they aren't the solution to all of our problems.  It is instead more important that (once students have the basics, I would assume) they are inspired, motivated, and interested in something.  That something will vary greatly from student to student.

So what of physics or chemistry do students need to be successful in college?  For a lot of folk the answer is probably nothing. Similarly I learned nothing about art, European history, welding, or the French language in high school and college went very well for me.  I still believe these are important subjects.

At what point do we stop focusing on standards and the minimum necessarily and start focusing on inspiration, excitement, on just being well rounded and being happy?  What if one of my students is destined to be the next great aerospace engineer given the right experiences and I skip out on talking about terminal velocity and air resistance calculations because it isn't needed by all my students?