“Figuring out how to help our middle school students be successful is very important.”
• This commenter couldn’t say it any better. We must find the tools to put into students hands to help them understand the learning and to engage them and make them eager for the information we have for them. The diagram below shows how students respond when we use certain instructional practices. Which are the most effective? Where do you as teachers want to be?
“Your blog is very well-written! I also think you bring a very valid point up by stating that if you are not interested it will be unsuccessful. Great job!”
• Thank you for your kind words. I believe that in anything we do, if we are not interested we already prepare ourselves for failure in whatever endeavor it may be. One peer from my cohort was surprised by the challenges that most interns were experiencing were teacher resistance – that is most likely a cause of not being interested in the change being presented. I also mentioned to them that some are just teacher leaders, others aren’t. I hardly ever receive resistance from teachers who are ready to impact their teaching and to help students be more successful rather than making excuses why something is not working.
“I am positive that I could have benefited from someone in your position when I first began teaching and sometimes even now when I am at a loss of what to do with certain TEKS, etc. I am interested in seeing how your year comes along. I know as a classroom teacher, we often get in a rut and we do tend to give out an excessive amount of worksheets - sometimes from lack of knowledge of how to use a hands on approach with certain skill areas. Good luck!”
• I love what I do and love working with willing teachers because they do want fresh ideas. It’s tough when I get to the reluctant teachers and the teachers who see me as just an evaluator who is out to get them and knit pick the negative. The curriculum is my favorite part. As I change over to just 3 campuses this year because we added additional coaches, I'm looking forward to building relationships by assisting more with questions about the standards rather than jumping straight into classroom walkthroughs. Your comment is just proof that not only do the new, first year teachers benefit from my position, but sometimes it is the veteran teachers that need our support, if not more.
“As teachers we are sometimes un aware of the ineffectiveness of teaching relying only on worksheets. In our Montessori curriculum we teach students from the concrete to the abstract providing them with hands on learning. Education is changing rapidly and the state has issued us as educators a mandate TEACH WITH MORE RIGOR!!! We can't be effective teachers and expect our students to excel if we're watering down instruction with meaningless worksheets.”
• Last week I trained a group of teachers on using Thinking Maps. For at least 20 minutes we debated on why Thinking Maps are not graphic organizers. When I was finally able to get them to give me a chance and at the end of the day if they still didn't believe me, we could continue the debate. By the time the afternoon session came and I had them applying Thinking Maps to their own grade level content I kept hearing comments such as, "My kids can't do this!" One teacher in particular that had started the earlier debate I asked, "But they could do graphic organizers?" It was like a light bulb came on - she got it!! We can't keep saying, "our kids can't do this." We have to give them the tools they need to dig deeper into their learning. After a brief conversation when we all came back, they finally understood why Thinking Maps are a thinking tool to put in the hands of the kids and why they provide a deeper level of understanding. It's not a context but a thought process which is where we hinder so many students because we keep falling back on, "I've always done this, they can do this, they can't do the higher rigor stuff" i.e. watering it down. To say I was stressed out from the morning thinking I wouldn't get through to them would be an understatement, but I could not have asked for a better "ahha" moment from the teachers. They wanted to know if all the teachers in the district would be required to take the training!
* Two of the above comments came from my blog and two from the discussion board. While the two blog comments did not lead to revisions on my action plan, I did realize some areas that needed to be included on my plan based on the discussion board comments and from reviewing other peers plans. One revision I made based on the discussion board comments was “Lunch and Learn.” Lunch and Learn is short sessions to share effective instructional practices so that teachers have fresh ideas to implement in their classroom. By modeling one quick practice through a 15-20 minute session while they eat lunch, they can take that back to their classroom to use in instruction. It is one practice, not multiple as they receive in a more formal staff development setting. Another revision I am making to my plan based on reviewing other blogs is to survey my teachers on what they feel are their strengths and weakness are and to gain an understanding of their knowledge and experience of Marzano’s Framework of Effective Instructional Practices.
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