So how do you give more swings?

So how do you give more swings at the bat? Most of my teaching experience has been at the middle school level with some high school teaching mixed in for good measure. I have had little experience as a teacher in the elementary level. So I will offer some ideas at the MS and HS level if you have some suggestions at the elementary level, I would love for you to share them.

If we had all the time in the world, this might not be such a big issue. Just take your time, offer various practice opportunities of different degrees of complexity. But most of us these days meet with our students for four or five class periods a week. Most of us have state mandated curriculums that must be completed by schools end (in reality about a month before schools end when the tests are given). Time is always and issue and we must be come very efficient in our teaching. A way to break out is to extend the classroom through the use of an online class web page. Whether you use Edline or Moodle or your own webpage you can provide your students with another look at the course material.

What do you post to these classroom extentions? You can place your notes, so students who could not follow the class lecture may be able to review it again. You can place any presentations you make to class, students can then review them again at their own pace. You can have a wiki or forum where students can post questions whenever they occur to them and get answers at any time. You can video tape a lab, or create a screencast or podcast of the leacture or class activities. Teachers can post a list of alternative reading or websites for further information. Additional questions or practice problems can be posted. These resources can be of different content and skill levels based on the different learners in a class. There can be links to online activities, games, simulations and tutorials. In our district we subscribe to United Streaming, teachers could post a list of suggested videos and students could go the United Streaming to view them.

Ideally as teachers discovered new things the list of links and resources would grow. As a teacher gave their assessments through out a unit, they may prescribe some of the resources or activities for a student to work on based on the result of an assessment. Once a list of resources is availalble the teacher can more easily provided the correct material for a student who has difficulty reading and the one who is in need of enrichment. What would be even better is if teachers shared what they already have in place, the list would take no time to create.

More Swings at the Bat

I recently had a conversation with a good friend and colleague of mine; he is a very smart man and knows his stuff. We were discussing how to meet the needs of the varied children in the classroom. We both believe that all children learn, and that they come to the classroom with different skills and experiences, and they have different rates of growth. He has a good metaphor for this "some children just need more swings at the bat." As classroom teachers we need to figure out how to give those students more swings. As teachers we are responsible for providing opportunities for ALL our students to achieve success, it is not about "teaching to the middle and hope for the best" anymore. We need to make sure they all succeed. This can seem an overwhelming task with all the time constraints of the classroom, all the things that need to get done. A favorite saying around a hall I used to work on was "so much to do so little time." But it is not about working harder it is about working smarter. It is about knowing your students well and knowing the goals of your instruction. This may mean a re-working of what we do, but if we take it one unit/standard at a time and work together, over time we will have a more effective way of meeting the needs of all our students.

Below is a suggested way to look at refining what we do.

Step 1: Define the learning objectives: We have tools to help us be more effective these days. We have a clear curriculum set before us - the state standards (I work in Massachusetts) - these standards come with exemplars of what to teach, as well as, access to all the previous test questions. A teacher or department should start here. What are the curricular goals and objectives; to what depth do we need to teach? What do our students need to learn? These need to be clearly laid out and understood. This is the foundation of any good instruction, clearly defined goals and objectives.

Step 2: Determine what your students know: As a teacher I found a pre-assessment very helpful. It allowed me to focus on what my students were bringing to the classroom. We can then compare that to where they need to be. This helps focus our teaching. We will not waste precious time reteaching what they already know and it allows us to fill in the gaps of those in need. This knowledge helps us to develop a more effective and efficient plan and process of instruction.

Step 3: Frequent checks/Assessments: Whether we use formal formative assessments or an informal quick quiz at the beginning of class, we need to check the progress of our students frequently. Are they getting it, do we need to reteach something, are there any misconceptions creeping into the picture, are we moving to fast, to slow, who needs more swings at the bat?

Step 4: Re-Evaluate and Modify: Based on the information collected above we need to reassess the progress of instruction. What changes need to be made to facilitate success for ALL our students? Do we need to provide a little one-on-one for a few students, maybe adjust future lessons to reflect the outcome of the formative assessment? Should students be regrouped, assignments or readings modified for a few? Good teaching requires us to look at the information we have and to make adjustments as we move along.

Good teachers know these things and do these things everyday. They use their creative side, their finely tuned art of teaching to find ways to give each child "a few more swigs at the bat."

We can not do it alone!

In my last entry I commented that “what they [students] needed were options.” As teachers we need lots of options as well. We can not create all the “options”. We need to collaborate, share and communicate. We need to do this together. We need to be members of the learning community. We can not work in isolation. We need to model how knowledge is created, a sharing and building of ideas in community. Whether we talk face-to-face or through the web tools of today we need to share, share and share again. What we need is WE.

Web Tools, Universal Design and Differentiated Instruction

I’ve been thinking…. Whether we are intellectually gifted or just struggling along, we all learn. We just all do not learn the same way. Everyone single one of us approaches a learning situation with different knowledge, experiences and strategies. We do not learn and grow at the same rate, or acquire the same depth of understanding. But, we all learn.

So how does the classroom teacher prepare to facilitate the learning of the 100 plus unique individuals they meet each day? How do they take into account all the different educational needs of these students (not to mention the social and emotional needs as well, but that is a whole other issue)? As a classroom teacher I struggled with it each day. I could reach some, but others I just could not find the method or strategy that would foster success. I constantly needed to remind myself that learning takes place with in the learner. My role was to provide learning experiences and opportunities for my students to interact with the curriculum so they can build knowledge for themselves. They need to make the connections, to build the web of information that is their own knowledge base. What they needed were options.

Universal Design and its cousin, Differentiated Instruction, are all about providing options; see it, hear it, write it, make it, speak it….learn it. The more ways we interact with the content, the more options we have to create and express our understanding, the more likely it is that meaningful learning will take place. We want our students to create a web of information for themselves. There is no better place for this then the World Wide Web. The web tools of today give us so many options for accessing information and expressing our understanding of information. The learner has access to so many forms of presentation. We can do some good old fashion reading of websites, blogs, and Wikis. We can watch streaming video from commercial vendors such as United Streaming or teacher posted videos of lessons. We can view screencasts, photocasts and traditional PowerPoint presentations. We can listen to a wide variety of podcasts and audio postings. Students can create and publish such a large variety of material using these very same tools. Students and teachers can work collaboratively with so many others to create meaning and understanding. The web and the web tools of today provide the ultimate in Universal Design and Differentiated Instruction.

The following are just a quick list of some examples:

A screencast by Jean-Claude Bradley on Podcasting, sceencasting and Blogs.

A virtual lab,Net frog from the Curry school of education

Just a small section of the webcasts found at NASA