Teach Children Well

Wednesday, July 16, 2014

Teach Children to Collaborate

Collaborating while learning to garden.

We may often remark that he or she is not a good collaborator. Yet when we state that, what do we mean? What does it mean to be an effective collaborator? This is a critical skill in today's world due to our increasing populations, ready information streams, evolving interdependency, and need to collaboratively solve complex problems.

To teach well today means that we will purposefully develop students' ability to effectively collaborate.

As I reviewed the start-of-the-school-year agenda this morning, I began to look at the details of the first weeks of school lessons, the all-important six weeks that Ruth Charney outlines in her book, Teaching Children to Care.

As I looked over the many lessons included in the Learning to Learn curriculum, I was prompted to give greater shape and order to the area of collaborative skill.

In order to do that, I took the attributes outlined in a Forbes article, and created a student survey. Willingham affirms the use of question/answer surveys as one way to strengthen learning in his book, Why Don't Students Like School. I will ask students to take the survey in September, January, and June. I will also use the collaborative attributes list on the survey form as a reference point for our grade-wide biography framework.

As an educator who is moving from the isolation of schools in the past to a learning community that requires regular, thoughtful collaboration, I too will give the survey careful consideration and attention as I hone my own skills and abilities in this area.

In order to promote students' future success, we need to pay attention to the way we foster, teach, and engage students in the study and practice of collaboration. Beginning with a student survey and focused attention to collaborative attributes is one way to begin this effort in your classrooms and school.

As always, please let me know what you would add, revise, or enrich to make this study more meaningful. I look forward to your share.

Link to Survey Activity, Simply click "file" and "make copy" to personalize the document.

Afterward
I was unable to teach this activity as planned. The problem with the "Learning to Learn" curriculum has been the time to teach it all and the students' readiness for so many concepts at once. Instead I find myself chipping away at each attribute and skill with regular focused attention through discussion, video, and activity. As I think to the future, I'm wondering how we can blend these activities into our Open Circle activities for greater learning.

Teach Well: Broaden Your Horizons

Yesterday I had the opportunity to explore the world of music via the Internet. With a couple of free hours I simply explored the work of multiple artists and genre. I collected a few favorites on a YouTube playlist. I thought about the intersection of film and music, the vibrancy of multiple cultures, and the artists themselves.

I also realized how often we get stuck in same patterns and routines which reduce our reach and understanding. In the past, our stretch was limited due to the fact that it took a lot of time or resources to find and buy books related to new ideas, visit another country, or attend a concert. Today it's still expensive to do those things, however, the Internet provides us with an efficient and low cost way to "travel," attend amazing events, and make collections of the work that inspire, entertain, and informs us.

The Internet will never replace the real world experience of attending a conference, visiting another country, or experiencing new skills and knowledge first hand, however the Internet does serve to broaden our horizons, whet our appetites, and help us understand the world around us with greater depth and care.

Therefore, take an hour or so, and go on a virtual adventure using the multiple platforms available. That experience will enrich your world and better prepare you to teach children well.

Monday, July 14, 2014

What is your goal?

Today, home and parenting, I have been thinking a lot--thinking about the past year, the year to come, and summer days. I've been thinking about my age, my failures, and my goals.

What is my purpose? What is my goal? What do I long to achieve?

I've been playing with these notions in writing and action throughout my life. Mostly propelled by needs of all sorts, I've pushed forward to learn, love, nurture, advocate, explore, seek, get along, and understand--always trying to put the puzzle pieces of life into an order that looks good and feels right.

As I ponder broad and deep, I typically come back to the same three goals: to love my family, to teach well, and to live a good life. My goals aren't big and glamorous, but consistent and close at hand instead. Simple goals to write, but not so simple to do well as doing our best by those we love and serve is work that's rich, deep, and often challenging calling forth the best of who we can be.

I choose to write too, to tell my story. Why? I write to forward my vision and lend my witness to life's triumphs, challenges, and typical days too. Life isn't always easy, yet there's great grace to experience in life too. Lending our stories to each other, both good and not so good, helps each of us travel the road with a bit more wisdom, care, and focus. Life isn't quite as challenging if you know someone else has tried that before, encountered a similar obstacle, or forged ahead with a dream like yours.

The best we can do is care for one another with as much compassion, empathy, and understanding as we can muster. That will make a good world, the kind of place we all hope to nurture. Agree?

Developing a Program: Summer Start

Before me stands the task to develop a program.

I'm moving to fifth grade, and while a program exists on paper, the reality is that to teach well, I need to build that program.

I need to synthesize the paper program, available supplies, students' needs and interests, collegial consult, family information, my skills and knowledge, and daily schedule to best meet the standards, program, and expectations that exist.

I could wait until September as some colleagues suggest, but I know that once September comes I'll be in the thick of it responding daily to 20+ learners. With that in mind, there's no doubt that some of the planning has to start now during the summer days when I can afford a lengthy wait to schedule a field trip, search online for the best tools and information, and study new standards and programs.

Thus, the 2014-2015 Charting the Course list.

Taking advantage of rainy days, quiet mornings, and available resources will help me to ready for the eager students who will fill my classroom beginning in September.

There needs to be time to set up the classroom too--to ready the learning environment, but first the program framework needs to be in place.

How do you use the summer days to plan for and develop the teaching/learning program ahead? Also, how do you balance the need for rest and play with the advantage of getting a lot of the leg work done ahead of time?

Taking the time to do some work up front will serve you well, but also making time for vacation is important too. This is part of the balancing act that all educators engage in during the summer and throughout the year as well.

Farm Days Field Study Analyzed

Learning to Learn Start-of-School Program

Last year our grade-level team participated in Farm Days. The experience was successful in many ways including the following:

Hands-on exploration of the local habitat.
Learning with experts.
Interdisciplinary, standards-based study in the field.
Collaboration with local environmental organization.
Beautiful, energized school days on a farm.
Invitation to and participation with a follow-up River Days grant.
Great lead time communication with family members and staff--dates and permission slips were created for early year family response.
Positive, grade-wide post communication about the events with images, video, and newsletter descriptions.
Inclusion of multiple parent volunteers, student teachers, and teaching assistants.

Now that I think ahead to more on-site learning, I'm also cognizant of the following areas that we can plan better in order to grow our field studies with greater effect.

Greater attention to learning-in-the-field behaviors, and practice with those behaviors for shorter periods of time on our school grounds.
Greater attention to brain-based, learning-to-learn mindsets and behaviors.
Less lecture, and more interactive events. This requires substantial lead time learning design.
A day for the teacher team to plan with the staff at the local organization.
Greater allegiance to all pre- and post- activities including related close reading, vocabulary work, journal writing, and reflection.
Greater attention to standards-based, interdisciplinary planning and design--we did a lot, but we could do even more. The goal is to embed the standards seamlessly.
Write grant proposals during the summer to support related materials, training, and consultation.