Learn By Doing

A Lifelong Learner Shares Thoughts About Education

  • This article on the link of your child having a job and being successful in high school and college was covered in a recent Professional Development.  Ostensibly an AVID assignment, it appears to have been chosen to provide a discussion point for a class.

    Young people who have held jobs are better students because they know they can’t do everything at the last minute, all at once or erratically. They whine less, they make fewer excuses and they don’t expect something for nothing — like, for example, an acceptable grade for unacceptable work. They wouldn’t expect to get paid for showing up every day if they didn’t do anything and yet some of their more spoiled counterparts, shockingly enough, actually believe the should get a “pass” in a course simply because they showed up for every class.

    I tried it in a number of my classes and the consensus from students that had jobs matched this one, that they could easily spot those who had a job by their work ethic and attitude in school.

  • This post resonated with me, it was from @TeachThought

    1. You’ve spent as much (or more) time redesigning assessments than you have “re-teaching.”
    2. You’ve cried at least twice.
    3. You know the reading level of every single student, no matter what content area you teach, or how many students you teach.
    4. Students grow more confident as the year goes on, not less.
    5. You realized that your Project-Based Learning unit really should’ve probably been a novel study, and your “poetry unit” really should’ve been a self-directed, Challenge-Based Learning unit, and….well, you get the picture.
    6. You dream in edu-jargon.
    7. You’ve taught before class, during class, after class, during your lunch, during your planning period, in the hallway, before school, after school, via twitter, across email, and through YouTube.
    8. You focused more on learning than teaching.
    9. Your unit and lesson documents have more post-it notes (indicating needs for revision) than original text.
    10. Speaking of post-it notes, they’re making more than 50% of your books unreadable with clutter.
    11. Your instructional coach actually quick-walks the other way when they see you.
    12. You can recall, on demand, more than 75% of your academic standards.
    13. You text with your principal.
    14. You’re out of paper, hard drive space, bandwidth, or email storage by December.
    15. The email address of more than 25 parents “auto-completes” in your email address bar.
    16. You’ve Google’d “instructional strategies” at least 11 times.
    17. Your district technology coordinator is intimidated by you.
    18. You read TeachThought, Edutopia, and Mindshift more than you watch local news, The Bachelor, and Duck Dynasty put together.
    19. You’ve encouraged your spouse, children, or friend to be “data-driven.”
    20. Some students don’t like you.
    21. Your facebook page has more edu-commentary than the YouTube comments section of an Arnie Duncan press conference.
    22. You have more than 3 legal pads full of meeting notes that seemed important at the time.
    23. You’ve spoken to the grandparents of certain students more often than your own siblings.
    24. You’ve “borrowed” someone else’s coffee, tea, or Diet Coke.
    25. You’ve fallen asleep grading or planning.
    26. You’ve wanted to fall asleep teaching.
    27. You’ve noticed a growing suspicion that the “unit” may not be the best way to package curriculum.
    28. Students seem bothered when you’re disappointed in them/their performance.
    29. You literally never stop thinking what you could’ve done better.

  • A recent Professional Development (PD) got me thinking about what kind of questions I might ask to extend students into the world of metacognition, I ran across this article on TeachThought that had a list of questions.  I am going to try some and see how they work for me.

    Reflection & Collaboration

    1. What do you think about what was said?

    2. How would you agree or disagree with this?

    3. Are there any other similar answers you can think of with alternative routes?

    4. Does anyone in this class want to add something to the solution?

    5. How might you convince us that your way is the best way?

    Self-Reflection

    6. How did you determine this to be true?

    7. Why didn’t you consider a different route to the problem?

    8. Why does that answer make sense to you?

    9. (in response to an answer):…what if I said that’s not true?

    10. Is there any way to show exactly what you mean by that?

    Reasoning

    11. Why do you think this works? Does it always? why?

    12. How do you think this is true?

    13. Show how you might prove that?

    14. Why assume this?

    15. How might you argue against this?

    Analysis

    16. How might you show the differences and similarities?

    17. What patterns might lead you to an alternative answer?

    18. How many possibilities can you think of and why?

    19. Predict any number of results?

    Connections

    20. How does this relate daily occurrences?

    21. Which ideas make the most sense and why?

    22. Which problems feel familiar? Why?

    23. How does this relate to current events?

    24. What kinds of examples make this problem workable?

    25. What other problems fit this style or example?

    Science and Social Questions

    39. What’s the purpose for this experiment or argument?

    40. Would you elaborate on the purpose of this?

    41. What issues or problems do you see here?

    42. What evidence or data are given that help make this worthwhile?

    43. What are some of the complexities we should consider?

    44. What concepts help organize this data, these experiences?

    45. How can you justify this information?

    46. How can we verify or test that data?

    47. What details can you add to make this information feel more complete?

    48. Which set of data or information is most relevant or important?

    49. How is all of this consistent or inconsistent?

    50. How am I seeing or viewing this information? Objectively or subjectively? Should I then change my view?

  • I am thinking of using this for a lesson with my classes.