Stronger Together by Erin Watts

At Linn-Mar teachers are required to visit a Model Teacher each school year.  The district employs 35 Model Teachers in the Teacher Leadership Program across all grade levels, Pre-K through 12 and all content areas.  Teachers are encouraged to visit classrooms outside of their department and/or grade level and are free to visit as many Model Teachers as they would like.  In case you have been on the fence as to the impact of a model teacher visit, I challenge you to read the rest of this post.  You may be surprised how a visit out of your content, your grade level, or your building might impact your thinking and your teaching.

In February, High School Project Lead the Way (PLTW) teacher Corey Spurling, scheduled a visit to Jade Calcara’s kindergarten classroom who is a Model Teacher in Linn-Mar’s Teacher Leadership Program.  Corey and Jade are acquainted outside of school and had talked about getting their students together at some point but as of yet hadn’t made it happen.  After Corey observed Jade’s STEM lesson with her kindergarteners about balance using scales and candy hearts, the two saw connections in their curriculum and surmised that getting their students together for a joint lesson would prove powerful learning for all.

On March 7, twelve of Corey’s Introduction to Engineering students boarded a bus for Linn Grove elementary.  As 19 excited kindergarteners awaited their arrival, Mrs. Calcara prepped her class letting them know they would have a high school buddy and would be working on building something together.  “I’ve never done this before,” she told her students, “I’m going to be learning just like you are learning.”

The high school students were given the details of the intended project only minutes before they arrived at the elementary school.  With their kindergarten buddies, their task was to design the tallest structure possible to support a marshmallow using a yard each of string, tape and 20 pieces of spaghetti.

In an efficient manner, the older students filed into the room, introduced themselves and called out which kindergarten student(s) they were assigned to work with.  The groups found space in the classroom to work; they had 8 minutes to brainstorm ideas for their structure, making notes and drawings in the older students’ engineering notebooks.

The engineering students could be heard asking the kindergarteners mediative questions such as:

“What do you think?” 

“What are some of your ideas?” 

“What’s another way we could try that?” 

“What shapes should we use to make it strong?”

At the end of the allotted 8 minutes, the building materials were handed out.  The groups would now have 30 minutes to build their structures, with a goal of making them as tall as possible in the given time frame.

Corey has 24 students in this particular section of Introduction to Engineering.  The 12 students who remained at the High School being supervised by Instructional Coach Sheri Crandall, were engaged in this same task of attempting to build the tallest structure possible.  This project has been done many times over in the PLTW world arena with very young children up through professional adult engineers.  According to Corey, nearly always the youngest thinkers are the groups that build the tallest structures.  It was a contest today to see if the findings would be the same at Linn-Mar.

The kindergarteners jumped right to work once the materials were distributed.  Excited exclamations could be heard all over the room:

“I’ve got a good idea!”

“Wait, let’s try this!”

“Maybe we should add….. “

“We need more weight on this side.” 

“It’s OK, let’s fix it.”

“I don’t know, let’s try it out.”

Although there are times when some students in Jade’s class find it difficult to focus their attention on the lesson at hand, today, all students were highly engaged in their thinking and learning.

As the 30 minutes came to a close, Corey moved to each group, measured their structures and recorded the final height in the engineering students’ notebooks.  The High School students signed their notes certifying that the work was the intellectual property of their group and the kindergarteners added their signatures as witnesses.

When asked how it went with her group, one kindergartener responded, “We used all our ideas together to make it stronger.”

45 minutes had passed and it was time for the engineering students to return to the High School.  After their departure, Jade led her class in a reflection of the project.  They proclaimed that it was, “Awesome!  Fun!  Cool!”  Her also students told how it was frustrating when their structure would break but that they kept trying until it stood tall.  Jade paraphrased her class saying this was an example of flexible thinking and that had they been rigid in their thinking they may have given up and not been as successful. Growth Mindset was evident based on the kindergartners vocabulary and discussion.

Upon returning to their classroom, the engineering students learned that the kindergarten class did indeed build the taller structure with a height of 33 inches compared to 25 inches from the group that remained at the High School!  Plans are in the works for the other half of Corey’s class to visit Linn Grove with a different project in the coming month. 

The impact of this lesson was increased by the collaboration of the teachers and the students.  Imagine what your students could accomplish with another Linn-Mar classroom.

Make Adult Learning Awesome

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Growing up I heard several people say, “Working with people is so hard!”  Being a teacher I used to wonder what they meant.  Working with students can be challenging, but I wouldn’t call it hard.  Working with students was fun, invigorating, and rewarding.  How could working with adults be that different? 

I found my answer first hand after leaving the classroom four years ago to work in my school’s teacher leadership program.  Since then I have been working primarily in adult to adult learning situations providing training, professional development, and 1:1 coaching.  There are difficult moments and my thinking has been challenged, but my learning has been prodigious.  

I wouldn’t call it hard, I would call it character building. The strategies I had in my tool box were for working with students.  It is not the same.  My toolbox needed to be updated and adjusted.  My tool box now includes a wide array of adult learning tools, activators, discussion/dialogue strategies, and opportunities for teachers and other adult learners to have voice and choice in the learning process. Working with adults can be just as exciting and rewarding as working with children, but the process it takes to get there is different, and requires high trust, communication, and great patience.

My greatest “a-ha” working with adult learners has been that they need a clear cut answer or Why they are doing what they are doing.  Once the explanation has been provided with facts, reason, and data adults tend to embrace change better.  They need to see that their learning is relevant and connected to their day-to-day practice.  I needed to be aware of the different learning styles adults hold, and I have to be extremely flexible in my professional development planning. No one wants learning to be boring.  It is possible to breathe life into adult learning.

In order to develop teams, build consensus, and grow the relationships in our program we focused on activators at the beginning of each training or meeting.  It took time to move from “me-ness” to “we-ness”.  We intentionally plan how each meeting will begin and end.  We want our teachers and adult learners to walk out of each training feeling awesome about their learning experience.  Here is a list of our teacher leaders' favorite adult learning strategies.

• 3-2-1
• Most Important Point
• Mix-Freeze-Pair
• First Turn, Last Turn
• Paired Verbal Fluency
• Line-Ups
• Jigsaw
• Finger Minutes
• Stir the Classroom

Other resources to put in your toolbox:

http://www.miravia.com/what/

https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/

https://www.teachingchannel.org/

http://sarahbrownwessling.com/ask-sarah/

http://alisasimeral.com/

http://www.ascd.org/Publications/Books/Overview/Creating-a-Culture-of-Reflective-Practice.aspx

Photo by sydney Rae on Unsplash

Reflection with Purpose

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Reflection is a topic that we discuss almost weekly as coaches.  For four years we have pushed the envelope to build capacity in our program and within our schools.  Some days our cups are full, reflection is plentiful, and are hearts happy.  Other days, we are exhausted, the cups are bone dry, and we face a multitude of obstacles as we try and build reflection within our school walls, and halls.  Now in year four, we know that there is always work to be done and we must continue to move into the Action and Refinement Stages of Reflection to have the greatest impact in our schools.

Weekly, our coaches gather to grow as coaches.  They dedicate two hours every Tuesday to focus on being better coaches and improve their craft.  This week we were inspired by the recent #LMPLC17 experience.  In pursuit of continue growth we started this week’s training by considering our WHY?  Why do we coach?  Why did we initially want to be coaches?  And if we know our WHY, how can we use that to give our WHAT greater impact with the teachers we work with.  The WHAT is our daily grind… so WHY are we doing those things?  Are they the RIGHT things?  DO they match our WHY?

All of these questions were a nice segue to our book study:  Creating a Community of Reflective Practice by Pete Hall and Alisa Simeral.  Using Graffiti Boards, coaches used illustrations, text, notes, ideas, anything that stuck out for them in the book.  In groups they discussed their key concepts and ideas and then created illustrations to share out with our whole group. 

Linn-Mar Teacher Leaders create Graffiti Boards to share out text to self connections from the text: 
Creating a Community of Reflective Practice by Hall/Simeral

It's no surprise what our reflections revealed.  Teaching is tough work.  It is important work, but still tough.  There are no rain check days.  The “A game” is a must and the “X factor is real.”  Teachers face overwhelming time constraints, mandates, expectations, laws, rules, criteria, etc.  Yet, they hold the power to make an amazing difference in their student’s educational experience, just by believing that their students can learn.(See Hattie’s work on Collective Teacher Efficacy 1.57 effect size)  Great teachers know they do have the power to create the best learning conditions for students, and they work tirelessly to accomplish it.  Great teachers know that reflection must be intentional,  planning must be deliberate, and that they don't have to do it alone, anymore.

Now more than ever, we need coaches and teachers collaborating.  We need coaches asking mediative questions that help our teachers specify their thinking and reflect on the specific teaching actions that produce the best results.  Thinking about thinking is no easy task, but in a community of reflective practice, you have a village supporting you and thinking with you.  Teaching IS a team sport.  If you are new to the trenches, or buried up to your neck with experience, fear not.  There is no time like the present to become part of a reflective community of practice.

How are you Coaching?

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This week our coaches explored the question: What drives you as a Coach?  What do you believe is your role as coaches?  What affects a teacher-coach relationship the most?  Trust? Credibility? Acceptance?

Using the article, “Are you Coaching HEAVY or LIGHT?” by Joellen Killion, our coaches had the opportunity to take a stand for what they believe their roles truly are.  After reading and discussing the article, some of us had our beliefs challenged.  What resulted was a thoughtful discussion around our identity as a coach. 

Photo by Debra Barry

Using the dots strategy, coaches took turns commenting on the article and their beliefs on heavy or light coaching.  Each coach was given a handful of dots and as they speak they put a dot on an index card.  The coach then needs to listen to other responses and cannot speak again until others have put a dot on the card.  This strategy allows each person a voice and helps all participants focus on listening set-asides.  Instead of formulating your next response, you are focusing on the speaker and what he or she is connecting with in this article.

 Sometimes what we think we value, and believe is true to the core, and other times the swords we pick to fall on are the wrong swords.  I’ve often felt this way as a parent.  Does my child need to eat all the food on his plate, or is it a victory, if I get him to try one bite of everything.  I think it depends on the child, the parent, and your values, beliefs, and the situation.  Coaching is the same.  How we coach is tied to who we are and what we believe.  Sometimes those beliefs can interfere with what we hope to accomplish. As a parent I have learned to pick my battles, and swords carefully.  In coaching, I’m working on it.  

Photo by Jeremy Thomas on Unsplash

We have to master the art of coaching and find the delicate balance of coaching heavy, versus coaching light.  By utilizing our cognitive coaching skills and asking deep, mediative questions, teachers will reflect on their current teaching practice and explore new learning.  A coaches’ primary responsibility is student learning.  How they impact that learning is through coaching and adult learning.  The challenge is to not lose sight of the students in this equation. 

"Coaching heavy holds all adults responsible for student success and engages them as members of collaborative learning teams to learn, plan, reflect, analyze, and revise their daily teaching practices based on student learning results."

                                                                                 ~Joellen Killion