Jose -

Thanks for the back to back posts. Both got me thinking. I am going to respond to at least one. Maybe two. We’ll see.

About being wrong.

At the early childhood level it is actually considered a capital offense to tell a young child they are wrong. I am kidding but, not really. Telling a little kid they are wrong is just well…wrong.You tell them, “Good try.” or “I see where you tried to do this…” or at the very harshest, “I think you can do better.”

What should still be up for discussion, and in some circles isn’t, is telling a child “No.” Telling a child no, in some of the best most creative preschools in the world is the same thing as saying “You’re wrong.” It is saying, your way of being in the world is wrong. You must fit in this box. Usually, in more traditional settings, that box is a very simple but strong one that the teacher carries around  with them called, the “What I can deal with today” box.

Personally, I have one of those boxes except I have tried to broaden and expand my  “No” box, especially since I went back to teaching. I have tried to turn my “No” box into a “No, but….” box. :)

When I was teaching three years ago I was extremely effective and I had a very sturdy “no” box modeled after the “No” box I knew my kids would get put in when they went to Kindergarten.

No, hitting.

No, screaming.

No, distracting other kids.

Etc. etc. When a child did these things they got the “No. You can’t ….” Carrying around that box may have been one of reasons I got tired and went into middle management.

Now I avoid power games at all costs. I only offer options. “No you can’t hit but, you can say…..” or “No you can’t throw the truck but you can, roll it really fast.” Don’t get me wrong. I still believe children need to hear no. I believe they crave it because they want to know that they can’t just do anything they want. If they could, anything could be done to them.

When I entered the classroom this year I decided I was going to learn a new form of martial arts. I call it psychological jiujitsu.  The most effective move is when I use love to re-channel anger. For example, a child grabs a book out of another child’s hand. I give the child who lost the book a big hug. Hold them. Ask them what happened. By the time I get to this point the other child has usually noticed there is a whole lot of attention being given out and they aren’t getting any. Then when we do a little conflict resolution the book stealer gets just as much care as the other before being scooted back into playing. Can I do it every time? No, but…. When I can it is powerful.

Image: http://www.adventuresindiy.com/http:/www.adventuresindiy.com/home-improv...

Jose-

I have been swamped with my professional development and kicking off a new year but I have to take some time to reflect. Overall, the first two weeks of school went well. Lots of professional development the first week. Lots of home visits and parent contact the second week.

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7 Year-old math Drawing Thanks to @vihart

Jose-

I just had to figure out what Khan Academy is about so I went onto youtube. If the stuff I found is any indication of the quality of Khan Academy videos, I can’t think of a worse way to recycle our same old teacher-served student-swallowed teaching than these videos. I thought I would provide a simple comparison of two videos to explain why we need to create the future of teaching by focusing on student driven learning. But what I found was more than I bargained for.

This is going to be a media-heavy post, so bear with me. First I went online and I found the video below. It appears to be a Khan Academy sponsored video. It seems reasonable enough in terms of content but definitely didn’t hold my attention.

In the process of finding Khan I found Victoria Hart (Twitter: @ViHart). Now this woman is a young “Mathemusician” who has been kinda awesome her whole life. Or, at least since she was nineteen and composed a 7-part musical septet based on the seven books of Harry Potter. She also presented a paper on binary numbers in musical composition and another on Computational Balloon Twisting: The Theory of Balloon Polyhedra in undergraduate school.

Below is a video she created for youtube. Just for fun. I think the comparison of the two videos helped to clarify for me the difference between teaching as explaining math and teaching as inspiring math.

So I said to myself, “Hey check out this awesome artist mathematician I can beat Sal Khan over the head with.” But then I discovered, Sal Khan has hired Vi Hart to make videos for Khan Academy. I was floored, intrigued, confused. Who is Vi Hart? I scavenged her 52 youtube videos for signs of her credibility. Thankfully, I found the video below that Vi created about the idea of selling your message and media.

At this point I am not sure who is smarter, Vi Hart for being able to help me understand math better than I ever have before or Sal Khan for hiring her. He can certainly afford so pay her well, so I hope he is. Especially sine his salary seems to be confidential and has not been reported to guidestar since 2011.

Finally, check out the drawing at the top of the page my 7 year old son did after watching Vi Hart’s videos. We have been watching them all back to back now and he is fascinated with the ideas of math more than I ever was. Now that is brilliant.

Jose-

Your thinking along with Ilana Horn’s about Khan Academy and achievement versus learning sparked a thought for me. I have often seen  this this similar mis-assumption about behavior and communication. Often teachers in younger grades are expected to adopt a “behavior plan” from day one. This usually includes a nominal nod to student ownership of the classroom by having students create a list of rules based on their prior experiences with school or home. This one sided conversation between teacher and students is usually strong armed towards what the teacher wants to happen.

Sometimes this plan includes a parent communication piece. A smiley chart, stop light, or stickers are used to let parents know how their children are doing in school. The intention is to create a compliant classroom so that the teacher can teach.

Then the behavior plan is used. It works for a while but then it doesn’t. Often new teachers appear bewildered when they start to lose the shine cast by glowing faces that appeared in September. They can’t understand why the behavior  plan is not working.

The teacher laid out the rules, sent home the sad faces, the teacher hasn’t even smiled since school started. What isn’t working?

I think the answer lies in understanding the relationship between behavior and communication. Just because the teacher has communicated behavior expecations to students or parents it doesn’t mean he/she has communicated the intention behind the expectation. By using a behavior plan this teacher may communicate that behavior is all about compliance. When a new teacher communicates the intention is that the child and parent should feel safe at school and engaged in learning. On the flip side, when a teacher realizes that a student’s behavior is actually a form of communication instead of a form of non-compliance they are able to use “misbehavior” to benefit their students in the long run. They can adjust their practice, build a stronger relationship, or find out why the student is having difficulty engaging with learning. This is why I suggest we are cautious in adopting any plan that doesn’t start and end with the student, whether it is Khan’s formalized plan for teaching math or classroom behavior plans. Without including the communication of students in either process the intention is lost.

image: http://yzukozudil.github.com/good-behavior-chart.html

Image by Peter Skillen

Jose-

I went to Target yesterday and was reminded that a new school year is just around the corner. As I look forward to the coming school year I am thinking about how I will create the classroom my students deserve. I know I want it to be full of choices and opportunities. Most of all I want every child to feel valued. I know one of the most effective ways to do this is through student centered learning. Powerful Learning Practice that takes student interests and builds on them to honor the student’s perspective while they simultaneously acquire central skills and knowledge necessary for a strong foundation. I am faced with the challenge of knowing what I will need to teach, letters, letter sounds, print and word awareness, sentence segmentation, rhyming, adding, subtracting, patterns, collaboration, connection, etc. but not how I will teach it because I don’t know my students yet. I find myself considering modular learning projects, student centered big idea investigations, that might spark interest in students. At my level that includes family, changing seasons, growing, or specific authors like Eric Carle or Lois Ehlert. I think this form of open ended thinking about education could be applied to how folks in positions of accountability enforcement could better understand effective teachers deep desire for autonomy. When I worked as a supervisor it was easy to only focus on the outcomes and to forget the importance of the process. Or, even worse, to assume that a certain process would not lead to the necessary outcomes. This is where scripted curricula become so favored. As Ariel Sacks discussed recently, her innovative, open-ended, and effective teaching methods would not work as a scripted curriculum. It might, however work if adopted as a choice by a teacher. The act of choice is an empowering process that teachers understand through working with students. It is not easily understood when entirely focused on outcomes. As we move forward with the national Common Core curriculum I can only hope that choice is considered as an effective teaching and learning method by administrators. We don’t know how students or teachers will best process these new standards but we do know that we don’t all learn or teach in the same way.

The above image is the sole property of Peter Skillen and Brenda Sherry. Please visit their post here.

Image: http://plpnetwork.com/2012/07/13/pbl-right/