Is Educational Reform about the Destination or the Process?
October 4th, 2011
As a consultant providing professional development, I often wonder how educational reform always has a feeling of urgency. Don’t get me wrong; I am not in favor of slow, uneventful reform, which makes our students wait for change. What I am wondering comes in the form of a question. Is reform about the destination or the process? Follow along as I compare educational reform to life…
When we die, do people share stories of the unfortunate death or do friends spend time remembering the times of life? I think about my own personal life and the items I would celebrate rarely are condensed into one single event. I celebrate my children for all of the great moments together and watching both of them develop and grow. It’s not about the day they leave my home, it’s about the time we have together! In the words of Garth Brooks, “There's two dates in time that they'll carve on your stone and everyone knows what they mean. What's more important is the time that is known in that little dash there in between.”
Enough rambling! The point of my discussion argues that school reform is a process of development and growth. I believe that no matter the outcome of a reform movement, the process of understanding and implementation will always create professional development and meaningful change. Take for instance the current national movement of the Common Core Standards. Many schools are scrambling to simply complete a curriculum map that shows they are doing what is expected and not taking time to truly understand the purpose of the Common Core. The common Core is most meaningful when teachers explore, map, argue, and create relevant units of curriculum using the Common Core. This time collaborating will always create more change than a district curriculum specialist mapping the standards and handing it down to teachers for implementation.
In closing, I would ask all teachers to celebrate changes and school reform by arguing, debating, discussing, and celebrating the process of implementation. This will create meaningful change that will directly impact your students.
Posted in Uncategorized | Comments (0) » |
(0 ratings)
Ending the School Year…
June 1st, 2011
As I watch teachers wrap-up the school year with students, I have seen wonderful ideas to consider.
1. Reflection - humans natural reflect on events and process throughout life. It is even more obvious when these life events are important. A great way to conclude a school year is to provide opportunities for students to reflect on both academic and personal growth. Some examples include; looking back at pre and post tests, looking back on sample writings, grades throughout the year, and initial goals set. Often, teachers provide opportunities for students to share personal points of growth including feedback on the processing of learning within a classroom.
2. Academic Celebrations - everyone enjoys a good celebration. By giving students an opportunity to share highlights, successes, and even examples of personal growth in relationships, the classroom family has an opportunity to celebrate the year.
3. Study Trips - No, I am not talking about days out of class doing NOTHING. End of year study trips are an opportunity for students to "give back". End of the year study trips can be used to work with organizations that need support. It can also be an opportunity to leave a "mark" on life in a meaningful way.
As your year comes to a close, take time to reflect, celebrate, and give back. After all, the students you served over the past year will no doubt remember your class for something 
!
Have a great summer!
Posted in Uncategorized | Comments (0) » |
(0 ratings)
Measuring Student Engagement
May 11th, 2011
Engagement is key focus for instruction. It has recently become even more of a focus Nationally. For those of you that know me and my personal passion, this is great news for me!!! I want to reiterate the importance of student engagement. Without an active involvement, it is impossible for learning to happen! I wanted to provide a structural description for the term and give educators a system for analyzing engagement throughout a lesson.
What is engagement? Well, for starters, it is another one of interpretable terms currently being used in education that has numerous definitions but is rarely agreed upon as a community. I believe that engagement is the critical staring point for the process of learning! Engagement is easily felt but difficult to assess. Let’s define the term and then provide tools that help engage all learners.
Engagement is the number of students actively involved in each and every classroom task. Engagement can and does change for every event throughout an instructional day and should be analyzed for ALL events in a lesson. Engagement is important enough that educators must analyze the number of students involved in EACH task in a given day.
It is important to look at each of the events in a classroom and work to increase the number of students actively involved in all of those events in order to achieve maximum engagement for a lesson. Let’s provide a sample lesson as an example:
SEE ATTACHED FILE!
In closing, the goal of this discussion is not to place blame or create a sense of accomplishment/failure but is intended to provide educators with a new way of thinking. I would invite each of you to assess your student tasks in order to identify moments of weak and strong student engagement. This assessment will help in finding new strategies that increase the number of students actively involved in ALL of your daily tasks.
Posted in Uncategorized | Comments (0) » |
(0 ratings)
Classroom Management, A Proactive Approach
March 14th, 2011
The single biggest concern that I hear from educators focuses on classroom management. I hear this request often enough that it deserved another posting. I would like to offer a comparison of classroom management to 2 real-life events; visiting a Doctor and car repair.
A visit to a Doctor usually happens for a reason, fever, nausea, pain, or…I’ll stop there☺. A visit to the doctor usually begins with a set of routine checks followed by a conversation about “symptoms”. After tests and collaboration, the Doctor will offer a diagnosis along with a recommended remedy to cure the cause of the problem. Most visits will end with a statement, “if symptoms don’t improve, please reschedule a visit.” When vehicles begin to “act up” or even worse, stop all together, it validates a trip to a mechanic. For those of us who try to do everything ourselves, we make a trip to the local auto parts store☺. This trip begins again with a conversation about symptoms and diagnostic tests. Once a potential “cause” is identified, the cause of the problem is repaired and symptoms stop. In both cases, the approach is the same:
1. Look for trends and potential causes 2. Research symptoms to identify causes 3. Work to resolve the cause of the problem 4. Check for resolution and repeat if necessary
In classrooms, educators strive to resolve the problem by using a reactive approach. The most common reactive approach is to simply “remove the problem”! We often confront the student and then remove them from the class. Occasionally, we call parents or have students take an action to prove what they did was “wrong”. The problem with this approach is that it only works for the students that are afraid of the punishment. Usually, these are the “good students”. Imagine if a Doctor used the same approach. One would leave the office visit missing limbs, organs, or even worse, an entire section of a body. Imagine visiting the Doctor for a migraine.
The point of this post is for educators to consider managing a classroom using a proactive approach by using the following steps:
1. Look for trends and potential causes 2. Research symptoms to identify causes 3. Work to resolve the cause of the problem 4. Check for resolution and repeat if necessary
I realize that this process is ongoing and can be challenging. This approach t is NOT as easy as removing the problem altogether. The teacher can feel vulnerable due to the fact that there is no ONE solution. The critical point is that once the cause of the problem is addressed, the problem will always vanish, well, at least temporarily. Don’t misunderstand me, it is important to have rules, procedures, and measures of accountability but these items alone will never address the real causes of classroom management. It is most important for teachers working with classrooms of “non-committed learners” to consider this approach. Non-committed learners aka, “at risk” (I don’t like this label because all humans are at risk) rarely respond to threat or fear. That is why they are labeled “at risk”.
In closing, consider seek to find the causes of your classroom management concerns by collaborating with colleagues, consultants, friends, or administrators in order to create a diagnosis and treatment. This approach will be longer lasting and create an opportunity for your students to be successful learners.
Posted in Uncategorized | 3 Comments » |
(0 ratings)
Student Engagement and Behavior Challenges
October 19th, 2010
Student engagement is the single most important factor in student achievement. As I visit classrooms, I see students engaged in the learning process. Engagement often appears in the form of eager students who are often impulsive about participating in the learning. Often students are screaming answers at the teacher, are difficult to transition out of projects, and sometimes I even see students dancing, running, and singing in a classroom. My challenge for educators comes in the form of a question – is this “bad” behavior? I often see teachers who feel like “students are not focused” or “kids won’t listen”. Well, I argue that the opposite is true. Kids ARE listening and are so engaged in the learning that they can not be transitioned. I understand that this can feel bad as a teacher. So, for whatever reason we as educators feel concerned, I would ask that we stop and look around. The goal of facilitating learning is to engage students so that they love learning so much that you may “never get them back”! Truth is, it is a good thing☺.
Posted in Uncategorized | Comments (0) » |
(0 ratings)
| ||
calendar
| M | T | W | T | F | S | S |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| « Oct | ||||||
| 1 | ||||||
| 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 |
| 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 |
| 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 |
| 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 |
| 30 | 31 | |||||
