Wow! The Twittersphere was on fire on 10/22/2020 when the #G2Great chat discussed Alfie Kohn’s article from the Boston Globe, “Is Learning ‘Lost’ When Kids Are Out of School?” You can check out the article here and the Wakelet for the chat here.
I trust that you will want to check out the article as Alfie Kohn succinctly answers his own question. But that also causes a few more questions for readers which is why the discussion was scheduled with the #G2Great audience. What’s important? What matters?
Here are a few tweets illustrating that point.
Where do we begin? Many government officials and capitalists would have us begin with assessments but if you espouse “student-centered” education then you already know that we must begin at the very beginning. Are there really gaps? How would those be assessed? And how would we really assess learning? And that circles back to student-centered learning. We begin with student assets as identified in the tweets below.
In the Boston Globe article, Alfie Kohn pulls no punches with his beliefs about standardized tests. Do they REALLY measure learning? Well, that then requires us to think about learning. Is learning merely the regurgitation of factoids, examples, and curriculum that could be answered by a Google search? Or is “learning” something else? What do educators believe? How would students respond?
Here are some thoughts on “What is learning?” from the #G2Great community.
So if we are not going to use standardized assessments to measure “Learning”, what can the education community STOP doing now? How can we help “Learning” be the sustained focus and not just the “flavor” for a chat response or a newsletter? How can we make LEARNING the focus of all our future conversations?
In order for instruction to provide opportunities for learning as well as choice, and adding in “student-centered”, what will educators need to be working on expanding? What about: Student agency? Empowerment? Choice?
These four tweets will jump start your thinking about additional actions for your school community.
Is learning lost? There may be some summer slide, but as previously mentioned, students have shared powerful learning from their at-home work that has longer lasting life-time implications for their communities. Where will change come from? What will it look like? It will begin with a belief in the need for change. We can no longer afford to prepare our children for the 20th century. Change has been needed for decades and is evident that we are now in the THIRD decade of the 21st century. The pandemic just made the need for change more visible when schools were shuttered across the U.S. (and Canada) last March.
Where will YOU begin? Who else needs to read and discuss this article with you? When? The time for action is NOW! The students are depending on YOU!
On Thursday, September 24, 2020, #G2Great welcomed authors Doug Fisher and Nancy Frey to chat about their current book (which is one of the titles in this series, Link). The Wakelet from the chat is available for your perusal here.
This review of their book by Jackie Acree Walsh said so much that I actually thought my work was done as far as this blog post.
Echoing through the pages of this timely book is the message: Effective teaching is effective teaching, no matter where it occurs. Teacher voices and classroom examples animate core principles of research-based teaching and learning, enabling the reader to visualize practices in both face-to-face and online learning environments. Multiple self-assessments and templates for reflection support reader interaction with the content. The authors connect Visible Learning and informed teacher decision-making to all facets of effective lesson design and delivery, and address the important issues of equity and inclusiveness; learner self-regulation and driving of their own learning; and use of formative evaluation and feedback to move learning forward. A must-read book! Jackie Acree Walsh, Book Flyer Link (Corwin site)
What a great book that builds on our existing knowledge and pedagogy as well as our values and best intentions! But never let it be said that I didn’t share my own ideas and thinking! Let’s get started with Doug and Nancy’s thoughts about a message from the heart!
What is a message from the heart you would like for every teacher to keep in mind?
Taking care of oneself is essential. Teachers are so giving, sometimes to the point where they sacrifice their own physical and mental well being for the sake of the students and communities they serve. Self-care isn’t selfish. It gives you the emotional muscles needed to serve others effectively.
So what does self-care entail? What do teachers and school staff need to be thinking about? Module 1 in The Distance Learning Playbook addresses this topic. Individual teachers and teams can work through this module to consider actions that will engage and impact students. An excerpt is available from Corwin at (Link) to explore a work / life balance.
One example: If you are considering a “standing desk” to avoid sitting all day every day, think about how you could “try this out” without spending money on a new desk.
HOW? Try a paper box . . . those sturdy boxes that reams of copy paper come in. Do you have one on hand? Or a crate? Set your computer on that box or crate to “raise” the eye level camera for distance learning. Find materials in your home that could be used to raise the work level of your desk in order to create your own DIY standing desk with $0 cost. WIN/WIN!
Do you want to increase the likelihood that you will carry through with actions to increase engagement and impact? Find a commitment partner and agree on what and when you need assistance from your partner in order to be successful.
All of this is possible because Doug and Nancy are quite specific about their success criteria and share those criteria as well as ways to think about rating the criteria and determining the importance of each factor. Link to an example.
What are your BIG takeaways from your book that you hope teachers will embrace in their teaching practices?
The big takeaway is that we realized that as a field we know a lot about teaching and learning, and we didn’t forget it when we needed to engage in distance learning. We hope teachers will regain their confidence as they link what they know to new implementation practices.
This book is titled: The Distance Learning Playbook with a subtitle “Teaching for Engagement and Impact in Any Setting.” That “any setting” means that the basic principles apply across all settings. Yes, distance learning may be one setting but it does not wipe out all other teacher knowledge around pedagogy and curriculum. We don’t reset at zero when the delivery models change; instead, we sort and sift to ensure that we are choosing the BEST strategies and tools for engaging and impacting learning. This information is included in Module 9: “Learning, Distance or Otherwise”.
What motivated you to write this book? What impact did you hope that it would have in the professional world?
Like educators everywhere, we had to rapidly shift to remote learning this spring. But going forward, we knew that we couldn’t remain in a state of crisis teaching. John Hattie’s Visible Learning scholarship has transformed education worldwide. Dozens of educators opened their virtual classrooms to us to create a new visual lexicon for how those evidenced practices are enacted in distance learning. Weaving the two together has transformed the conversation. We hope that it sparks action about how schooling in any setting can be better than ever.
“Action about how schooling in any setting can be better than ever” is the goal. Time, learning opportunities and resources like this text have provided examples of increased learning for students. With a “can do” growth mindset and a toolbelt of best ideas and resources, we can and MUST improve learning. And as a part of self-care and informed, reflective decision-making, our days do not have to be filled with doom and drudgery. We can and MUST build in time for laughter and relationships with our students, parents and communities in order to sustain our lives in these challenging times. Additional ideas on this line can be found in “Module 3: Teacher—Student Relationships From a Distance.”
How are you handling your self-care needs?
What impact are you designing in your lesson planning?
Additional resources: The Distance Learning Playbook – Corwin link Free resources – Corwin link Introduction to Visible Learning – Corwin link 3 part Webinar – Teaching Channel and Distance Learning Playbook registration – link Free Webinar: Going Deeper With Distance Learning, Tuesday Sept 29 @ 12pm PDT/ 3pm EDT – Registration on Corwin site
A pandemic, an economic crisis, and ubiquitous social unrest are begging us all to wake up and take notice of all that is fundamentally wrong within our society and public systems. Teachers, in particular, are at a crossroads to consider what we value most. What practices do we cling to as we face an uncertain start to school? Sometimes a book comes along at exactly the right moment. I think this is one of those times. Sarah Zerwin has written the book, Point-Less: An English Teacher’s Guide to More Meaningful Grading, to help us find a better way forward.
Decreasing the emphasis on numeric grades while creating a classroom culture that embraces risk and celebrates learning is a value that requires action on our part. Any big important work begins with big important questions: Why this book? Why right now? Why is it so important that we move beyond numeric grades alone? How can we begin this shift to a more holistic assessment system in our classrooms? What if we were able to tap into students’ motivation? Just asking these questions makes me feel dizzy with excitement.
Why this book, why now?
A1 I want my students to read and write because both are practice for reading our complex world to be able to write one’s own future within it. I want them to read texts that help them understand who they are, to write to cultivate their own voices. #G2Great
Sarah recalls her initial motivation for writing her book:
I got to the point several years ago where I could finally see clearly how the focus on points and grades in my classroom was getting in the way of my students doing authentic work as readers and writers, and I just couldn’t do it anymore. The book captures a process I landed on after quite a bit of trial and error, and I hope that process helps my readers to think through how they might grade more meaningfully in their classrooms, in ways that work for their particular teaching contexts. I want my students to read and write so they can make sense of our complex world and use their voices to impact it; when they were focused on grades and points, they weren’t doing this important work.
Sarah M. Zerwin
When the Numbers Don’t Add Up…
A3 As #PointLess describes, my students set learning goals, plan out how they’ll get there, monitor their progress, and write the story of their learning journey at semester’s end to figure out what grade to select. #G2Great
Becoming a literate citizen of the world requires more than just a passing grade. A numeric grade is just one part of a bigger picture. Sarah inspires us to consider how we can grow our instructional practice to be more inclusive of our students.
Just because our districts or schools provide us with numbers-based grade books to keep track of our students’ work doesn’t mean that’s how we must get to our students’ final grades. We can design a different path that invites our students to read and write in ways that matter to their lives rather than focusing on collecting points. We can put learning solidly at the center of our classrooms so they orbit around that rather than the points-based exchange that centers the traditional grading system.
Sarah M. Zerwin
Intrinsic Motivation Leads to Realizing Potential!
A4 Reading a book just to have a conversation about it. Writing something not so the teacher will grade it, but so that someone else in class reads it and responds to it. Just responding to student writing rather than having to evaluate it. #G2Great
Believing that students will embrace learning for learning’s sake is easier than you’d think. To make this a reality it requires a little time, a little trust, and lots of relationship building.
Our students want to do work that matters to them. They know exactly how a traditional grading focus gets in the way. Talk to them honestly about this and listen carefully–they’ll tell you what they need. It’s definitely a leap of faith to leave the traditional grading system behind, but once your students trust that you are really, truly stepping out of the grading game, they’ll follow you.
Sarah M. Zerwin
Thank you, for guest hosting #G2Great and for your leadership by writing this insightful and practical book, Sarah. If you believe that your students are more than a number, then here are some links to help you get this work started in your own classrooms:
