Some “Re-Store”ation Will Do You Good
by Sarah Logan, SPS Professional Learning Specialist

  If you’ve ever driven down South Scenic Avenue, you may have noticed a large blue warehouse near the Horton Smith golf course and wondered what exactly is that place? The answer is that it’s a Habitat for Humanity Re-Store, a nonprofit home improvement store and donation center. Proceeds from their sale of donated items are invested in supporting the organization’s mission of building homes and improving lives.

  So now you’re probably wondering what this has to do with you. As educators, we share a common goal with this organization. We too are interested in building community and improving lives. Though the specific work they do is different from ours, we benefit from reflecting on connections that can be made.

1. Restock, re-shelve, and replace your inventory.

  From time to time it’s important to take stock of the resources you have on hand. This may include both physical aspects of your classroom, such as pencils and textbooks, as well as non-physical ones such as instructional strategies or person-centered relationships.
  How does what you have support you in building community and improving the lives of learners in your classroom? Identify what you need to keep, what you may need to eliminate, and what you may need to obtain in order to fulfill this mission.

2. Encourage innovation.

  Many of the items purchased at Habitat’s Re-Store are not actually used for their original purposes. A doorknob might become part of an art décor project, or a set of kitchen cabinets may be transformed into a window seat storage area. A creative mind sees what is and wonders what it may become.
  What might that look like in your role? Perhaps you can readily identify how you could repurpose resources you have on hand. Solicit input from members of your classroom community to envision creative possibilities that will be meaningful.

3. Remember your influence.

  The Habitat Re-Store is non-profit. All proceeds from their sales are invested back into the organization’s ultimate goal of helping people gain access to affordable housing. A sale is not just a sale. It’s helping someone get one step closer to realizing a dream.
  How does that resonate with you as you consider what happens in your classroom on a daily basis? Recognize that there is a much bigger picture than what is readily seen. You’re not just building community and improving lives in this moment. You’re impacting many moments in a lifetime.

On Purpose
by Alicia Moore, SPS Professional Learning Specialist

I know why you come to work every day. To reach kids. To see that spark of understanding after days of explanation, modeling, and review. To insure that the kids of Springfield have the mental tools to construct happy and useful lives for themselves. To know that there are people out there who picked up some morsel of wisdom in your very own classroom, and that they’re using that wisdom to make our society a little better.

Day after day, year after year, teachers tough out the not-so-glamorous aspects of the job because we have a purpose. Our purpose is to help young people discover their own. It’s a long journey for most students, and seeing it happen is a little like watching an acorn turn into an oak. Educational consultant Tony Wagner (2012) believes that children progress through three stages in this journey. They begin by exploring the world through play, then discover something that ignites a deeper passion, and finally gain the experience and knowledge to turn that passion into purpose. He also notes that almost every young innovator he has studied arrived at their purpose with the help of a mentor.

Teachers, it turns out, are naturally well-suited to serve in this mentor role, and not just because of the hours we log with kids each day. Our real advantage is the nature of the goals we tend to set for ourselves. Daniel Pink, author of the bestselling book Drive (2009), names purpose as one of three forces that motivate modern people. He describes one study that surveyed new college graduates about their life goals. The students’ aspirations were divided into two groups: those focused on helping others or improving the world were labeled “purpose goals,” and those concerned with status or money were labeled “profit goals.” Follow-up interviews with the graduates revealed an interesting contrast. The participants who felt they were attaining purpose goals were happier and less anxious than they had been as college students. However, those who felt they were attaining their profit goals were no happier—in fact, they showed higher levels of anxiety and depression than they had in college. As Pink puts it, “…satisfaction depends not merely on having goals, but on having the right goals” (p. 142).

So congratulations!  You chose a career that is very focused in the purpose department!  I wish you well in your role as a mentor to your students. In the playful moments and passionate discussions, you have an opportunity to steer them toward a deeper purpose in life. Enjoy the knowledge that you are creating meaning not only for yourself, but for all of your students as well.

 

Pink, Daniel H. (2009). Drive. New York, NY: Riverhead Books.

Wagner, Tony. (2012). Creating innovators. New York, NY: Scribner.

Maintaining Balance
by Martha Doennig, SPS Professional Learning Specialist

It seems that a well-managed classroom is like a well-oiled machine; it runs itself.  All components are in perfect balance until factors beyond our control interrupt the hum and progress slows, or worst, comes to a screeching halt.   The question I would like you to consider is the following:   When thinking about managing your classroom, over what factors might you have the most control?

Research points to many contributing factors that create a well-managed classroom.   These factors align to the five components of effective classroom management that are embedded in the Department of Professional Learning’s Classroom Management Module.   As you consider the following components, think about the balance within your own classroom.

Relationships: From Visible Learning for Teachers, Hattie states that the essence of a positive relationship includes the following: the student sees the warmth, feels the encouragement, understands the teacher’s high expectations, and knows that the teacher understands him or her.   How might you know positive relationships exist in your classroom?

Mental Set: From the work of Robert Marzano in Classroom Management that Works, withitness and emotional objectivity are defined within a teacher’s mental set.   Withitness can be demonstrated by being aware of what is going on in the classroom at all times, continuously scanning the classroom, intervening promptly and accurately to reinforce behavior, and mentally reviewing situations and taking proactive steps to prevent reoccurrence.   Emotional objectivity refers to the ability to maintain emotions and avoid extremes when dealing with particular students or challenging behaviors. When you consider your own withitness and emotional objectivity, what might it look and sound like? 

Classroom Environment: Fred Jones, in Tools for Teaching, discusses how classroom environment relates to the inviting feel of the classroom.   All classrooms are different, but room configuration for instruction and transitions, proximity, use of visual instructional guides and anchor chart are all contributing factors to inviting classrooms.   What are your hunches about how students feel about your classroom environment?

Rules, Procedures, and Routines: In The First Days of School by Harry Wong, rules procedures, and routines are emphasized.   Students have a need to know the rules and expectations of behavior and routines.   Just as different environments have rules, procedures, and routines, so do classrooms.   To honor students, rules, procedures, and routines should be revisited often and practiced when necessary regardless of the age of the students or the time of year.  How might you know that the rules, routines, and procedures of your classroom are supporting student needs?

Effective Learning Strategies: There is research to support a spectrum of instructional strategies that have impact on student learning.   We know from Hattie’s work in Visible Learning for Teachers that providing students with a clear learning goal and success criteria allow learning to be intentional and focused.   In addition, providing students with meaningful feedback, opportunities to process and be engaged, and efficient use of learning time also support positive learning opportunities.  When you think about positive learning experiences that you have experienced, what were some things you needed for it to be successful?

Now that you have reviewed the five components of Classroom Management, I encourage you to take a look at the Instructional Configuration that Springfield Public School uses for Classroom Management.   This can be used to determine your current level in each area.  Feel free to use the following questions to decide what steps you might want to take to maintain healthy management in your classroom upon the arrival of factors beyond your control.

Where do you see yourself currently?

When thinking about the balance of your classroom management, at what level of competence would you like to be?

Why might that be important to you?

What might it look/sound like when you reach that level?

What is the most powerful step you might take?

Costa, A.L., & Garmston, R.J. (2002).  Cognitive coaching: A foundation for renaissance schools. (2nd ed.). Norwood, MA: Christopher-Gordon Publishers.

Hattie, John. (2012).Visible learning for teachers: Maximizing impact on learning.   New York: Routledge.

Jones, Fred. (2000). Tools for teaching.  Santa Cruz: Fredric H. Jones & Associates.

Marzano, Robert  J. (2003). Classroom management that works: Research based strategies for every teacher.  Alexandria, VA: ASCD.

Wong, Harry K. (1998). The first days of school. Mountain View, CA: Harry K. Wong Publications. 

Proximity + Feedback=Higher Student Engagement
by Marcia Hansen, SPS Professional Learning Specialist

Tools for Teaching by Fred Jones is a book that provides practical advice and strategies for classroom management.  Jones notes that many classroom management problems are really what we might call “goofing off” or a lack of student engagement.  So what are some ways we might strengthen this component of our management toolbox? 

Jones lists teacher proximity to students as a highly effective classroom management tool to promote student engagement.  Included in the book are several different strategies to promote teacher proximity.   One strategy mentioned which aligns with our Learning Model is that of providing timely, effective feedback to students.

Providing “just in time” feedback to students is extremely effective and is usually done one-on-one with students as they are working.  Unfortunately, this is also a prime time for student misbehavior to occur; because the teacher can spend too much time with one student and loses proximity with others as a result.

“Praise, Prompt and Leave” is a strategy that Fred Jones teaches as a solution to this problem.  Jones explains that teachers seem to have a natural tendency to spend too much time providing too much information or explanation to a student.  He notes that “too much” puts a student into cognitive overload and ends up not being effective as a result.  It also significantly reduces the teacher’s proximity to the rest of the class.  The steps to this strategy are listed below.  Note that we have adapted the name from “Praise, Prompt and Leave” to “Acknowledge, Provide Feedback and Leave” to better reflect what SPS teachers are providing for their students.

ACKNOWLEDGE: The teacher looks at the student’s work and identifies what is correct and begins the conversation there. “I see that your have written a sentence with a subject and a predicate.

PROVIDE FEEDBACK: The teacher then gives the student feedback- “Your next step is to add some details to your sentence.  What details might you provide for your audience?”

LEAVE: The teacher then walks away with the positive presupposition that the student will resume working.  In the example given, the goal is for the student to think about and add details to their writing.

This frees the teacher up to utilize proximity with the rest of the class, as well as the opportunity to provide many more students with “just in time” feedback.  The teacher may return to the original student and provide additional feedback as many times as needed, keeping in mind that one step at a time feedback is most likely to be implemented. The bonus is a better managed classroom with higher student engagement.

Tools for Teaching is available for loan from the Professional Learning Department Library located at the Tefft Learning Center.

The Positive Possibilities of Feedback
by Dr. Brady Quirk, Coordinator, SPS Professional Learning

   As a new year begins, we tend to be focused on the future by making resolutions and concentrating on the possibilities that lie ahead.  The possibilities of taking our students to that next level is no doubt a resolution for many of us, and focusing on feedback can be an integral part of that.  In John Hattie’s Visible Learning meta-analysis, feedback had an effect size of .73, making it one of the most powerful variables available to teachers. What feedback looks like, however, and how it is experienced by the student tends to vary tremendously.
   According to Hattie, when teachers are surveyed about what they consider quality feedback, it revolves around the “ten C’s” of comments, clarification, criticism, confirmation, content development, constructive reflection, correction, cons & pros, commentary, and criterion relative to a standard. When students are interviewed about their perception of teacher feedback, the main theme that consistently emerges is: they want to know how to improve their work so that they can do better next time. Keeping an awareness of what students need in teacher-provided feedback and perhaps more importantly, how it is perceived by the student, is crucial to moving them forward.

• Keeping Feedback Future-Focused: While teachers’ input revolving around the ten C’s may seem like it meets this need, the feedback is almost always focused on a past product or piece of data.  Students tend to be future-focused, looking toward the next assignment or task rather than on work already left behind.  This is not to say they don’t want mistakes to be corrected, but rather that the key may be in the delivery of feedback while also looking toward future opportunities for mastery. The positive possibilities of what success may look like on subsequent opportunities will inspire effort more than just a critique of the past assignment, which they have mentally left behind.
• Positive to Negative Ratio: While students want to know where to go next, research shows that teachers tend to achieve this goal through what students perceive as negative feedback. The result is students often ignore the extensive feedback that teachers spend a lot time and effort to provide. Human nature is to lend more weight to negative events (or feedback) than positive events.  In regard to teacher input on student work, Hattie found that students mentally/emotionally equate one negative comment to four or five positive comments.  The suggestion is not to provide a constant stream of unfounded praise, but rather to maintain an awareness of the ratio of positive to negative comments.  Keeping the ratio of positive to negative input as equal as possible and focusing on the student’s next opportunity to perform seems to produce the greatest growth in student work.
• Too Much Praise: Keeping the positive to negative ratio somewhat equal is important, but over-praising can also have a negative effect. While classroom praise has positive interpersonal and classroom management results, there is no research to show that it considerably improves student achievement.  Research on growth mindset has shown that frequently praising students for being intelligent or clever on simple tasks has the side-consequence of causing ability to be perceived by the student as a limited resource.   When more complex tasks are presented, students are more likely to perceive themselves as “not smart enough”.  Keeping feedback tied to the learner objective and not emphasizing natural ability has shown the best results.
• The Video Game Comparison: Feedback attempts to move students from their current level of knowledge/skill to a desired objective.  Oddly enough, video games do a great job at this by clearly showing the player what success will look like. Video games are programmed to monitor player performance and pick up next time where the player left off.  The game then provides a new challenge that is just out of reach of the current state, combined with extensive “feedback” in order to get the player to the next level. What we don’t want is for the classroom to look the video game without the appropriate feedback.  Students must know what success (i.e. the next level ) will look like for them to move forward, so clear goals and success criteria are crucial.

Being mindful of HOW we provide feedback to students is just as important as the feedback itself.  By maintaining a balance between the student work in question with the next opportunity, and by being intentional to balance the positive with the negative, feedback can be framed in such a way that students take it, use it and really show you what they can do.

Hattie, J. (2014). Visible learning and the science of how we learn. New York, NY: Routledge

Recommended Resource for Differentiating Instruction
By Curtis Cunningham, SPS Professional Learning Specialist
 
   If you are looking for a good resource to support your efforts in differentiating instruction we recommend Fair Isn’t Always Equal by Rick Wormeli.  Differentiating instruction can seem like a daunting task, especially when the teacher considers how differentiation will effect grading and assessment.  Wormeli addresses topics such as: incorporating effort, attendance, and behavior into academic grades, grading homework, recording zero for missing assignments, allowing students to redo assignments and assessments.
   Wormeli is a frequent presenter on the topic of assessment and grading.  He also holds the distinction of National Board Certified teacher and he is a columnist for Middle Ground magazine.  His entertaining, yet thought-provoking writing style makes Fair Isn’t Always Equal a must read for any teacher intent on differentiating instruction. 

Teaching with Passion and Purpose
by Alma Pettenger, SPS Professional Learning Specialist

   Teaching provides us with the unique opportunity to inspire, guide, and help students find their purpose.  For me, teaching is more than just a job; it is a privilege which bears much responsibility.  How did you decide to become a teacher? What influences in your life brought you to where you are today?  What keeps you going even after the tough days? As you have this inner dialogue, you might want to think about what purpose means.  By definition, purpose is knowing the reason for which something is done or created or for which something exists.  A teacher who has found true purpose in what he does is a gift to students.
   I recently had an experience that led me to this state of reflection about teaching with passion and purpose. What I thought would be a routine coaching conversation with one of my STEP UP Year Two teachers turned out to be an inspirational and highly motivational experience for me.  As I started to lead this young teacher into a coaching conversation, a conversation in which the goal was to support and stimulate his thinking, the roles became reversed, and I found my thinking being supported and challenged. 
   Austin Kendrick, a PE and Health Teacher at Parkview High School, is a cancer survivor who has truly found his purpose in life.  He believes that his life experiences and some very influential people around him have prepared him for his role as a teacher. 
   I invite you to follow this link to listen to Austin as he shares his story.