How many times does this convo take place in one day?
Bubba: “So what are we doing today?” Teacher: “Look at the board. Your objective is posted there, just like it is every day.” Bubba: Looks at board. Sighs. Trudges to his assigned seat, flops into his chair, and puts head down on his desk. Teacher: Looks at Bubba. Sighs. Wanders back into hallway to continue welcoming students to a wonderful day of learning. Throw in an eye roll or two, and there you have it. In Part Two of the PD with John Antonetti saga, let’s discuss how Mr. Antonetti challenges the conventional wisdom about posting daily objectives, and dig into the relevance of objectives. Objectives seem like such a small thing, but they should be a BIG thing. WHAT IF…instead of students seeing the objective posted right when they walk in the classroom (for those that actually LOOK at it), we WAITED to post the objective until we gave them an opportunity to try to MAKE SENSE (here comes that phrase again) out of a sample of what they’ll be learning that day? Here is an example: Give groups of students a normal deck of cards. Instruct students to place 17 cards in some kind of order so that the teacher will, without any shadow of a doubt, be able to tell the class what the 18th card should be. Once the groups order their cards and the teacher correctly guesses the 18th card, only then is the objective mentioned: “By the way class, we are going to explore and analyze patterns today!” The kids are already engaged, and everyone moves forward. I will be the first to admit…I have a problem with this! I’ve trained my brain to get that objective on the board first thing in the morning, no matter what. If the building is on fire…WAIT – I have to post my objective first! If a meeting is called…WAIT – not ‘til I post that objective! But, I am beginning to see the value in holding off. Should we do this every day? I don’t know. Time will tell. Changing up what we’ve always done, when it goes against our conventional way of thinking, creates unrest. It’s the common feeling when teaching an old dog new tricks. Time and time again, there are always students who enter shutdown mode before class even begins, just like Bubba did, all because the objective sounded too hard, or too boring. Antonetti suggests our focus must shift from asking ourselves, “Have we clearly communicated the objective to our learners?” to “Can our learners articulate the objective for today?” In order for this to be accomplished, the learners must PERSONALIZE the objective (Antonetti & Garver, 17,000 Classroom Visits Can’t Be Wrong, 2015). When students are able to PERSONALIZE an objective, they can go on to VERBALIZE it clearly. Articulating what you are learning is different than articulating what you are doing. Many students can tell you what they’re doing…many cannot tell you what they are learning. If the objective is just written on a whiteboard, that’s not an effective practice. If a student can explain the objective – where they are going and why they are learning it – only then will improvement take place. Can we work to help students personalize WHAT they’ll be learning, WHY it’s important, and HOW they will get there? Sure! Will we? Well… Here are some important nuggets to consider, courtesy of Antonetti, when working to make personalization of the objective happen. If your students are reading a story, can they make a personal connection to one of the characters? Does a character remind them of someone they know in real life? Can they tie that relationship to the objective to help personalize it? What about when studying a foreign language? Can you help students see any similarities between that language and the English language? Can the foreign language help students learn about the construction of the English language? For the math classroom, can we help students to see that there is a mathematical way of thinking within most disciplines, and that so many careers require people to be fluent in thinking mathematically, scientifically, socially? And if we spend time building relationships and trust with our kids, and talk about the relevance to a topic when it’s applicable (i.e., appropriate), will they will be more likely to continue to walk along with us if we are honest and tell them when something isn’t especially applicable, but they need to know it anyway as a skill-builder? I’d venture to say not everyone will continue to walk alongside us, but a lot of them will. I believe the objective is one of the most important keys to producing a successful batch of learners who MAKE SENSE out of what they’re doing. I also believe it’s one of the things we (I) don’t put nearly enough deliberate thought into; fleshing out the WHAT, the WHY, and the HOW. In closing, as panic starts to set in as we all realize it’s past the middle of July, and there is SO MUCH TO DO before the masses walk into our buildings in August, and we just sit for a second in bewilderment, asking where June went…I hope you will join me in trying to find ways to help kids articulate and personalize the things we have for them to learn this year. We can only bite off so much. If we try to start too many new initiatives at the same time, we aren’t going to do any of them well. My two initiatives are helping students MAKE SENSE, and creating an innovative learning space just for them (I’ll explain all about that journey VERY soon…maybe after my stomach stops doing flip-flops!). And those activities I’ve been talking about from Antonetti? Those are coming next…stay tuned. He’s got some good stuff out there. Yours Truly, The Bubba-Melissa Sue Hybrid
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