Designing More Engaging Lessons

Yesterday, I discussed the importance of making lessons engaging and relevant to our students.  I talked about the different levels of engagement that Schlechty identified in Working on the Work and how you can tell what at which level each of your students is engaged.  Today, I'd like to dig deeper into Schlechty's book and discuss the 10 qualities teachers need to keep in mind when designing lessons so as to create work that is meaningful, relevant, and engaging to students.

Love this!  Doesn't this just hit the nail on the head?  Cartoon courtesy of jeffersonchae.wordpress.com.

The first design focus Schlechty discusses is Content and Substance.  We know that our students need to be challenged and that we need to raise the level of questions we are asking and, therefore, the answers we are getting, so as to prepare our students for the future.  In order to elevate the thinking of our students, we must design lessons with the end in mind. If we want our students to think critically, our lessons have to be designed in such a way that analyzing, synthesizing, and evaluating information is built in to the lesson.  Through the use of rich text, project-based assignments, cross-curricular lessons, and materials that build upon our student's background knowledge and increase their levels of understanding, we can design lessons full of substance that cover the curriculum in a way that does more than allow us to check something off of our list, rather we will be able to see a true understanding of the concepts in the products our students create.
These types of lessons often take more planning on the front-end but less work from the teacher on the back-end.  More student involvement equals less work for you!
Product Focus takes the first design quality a step further and emphasizes that students are almost always more engaged when they are working on a project.  If students are given the opportunity to research an idea that is interesting to them and then use that information to create a product of their choosing, they are far more likely to be authentically engaged through-out the process.
Our students should never have to guess why they are learning about a particular topic and they should especially never have to guess what they are learning about!  In the past, I have walked into classrooms and been very unsure what the objective of the lesson was. When I have asked students what they are learning and why they are learning it, they are often unclear.  Let's not keep it a secret from our students, rather, let's make sure we have an Organization of Knowledge that is apparent to our students and to anyone who walks into the classroom.  This would also include tying ideas together across subject areas every time it is appropriate to do so.
Using rubrics, checklists and models can help develop Clear and Compelling Product Standards. It is even more powerful when students are allowed to help create these rubrics and checklists.  Students need to be aware of what the end result is supposed to look like and they will do even more work if they are challenged to go above and beyond.
Our classrooms must be environments where students feel both physically and emotionally safe.  They have to know that others are not going to make fun of them when they fail.  If we can create this type of an environment, our students will be assured that they have Protection from Adverse Consequences for Initial Failures.  They must also feel that it is alright in your eyes if they take a risk and they are not successful.  The use of sarcasm or teasing can often make students feel that it's not okay to try and fail and this prevents them from taking risks.  We can help build an environment of safety by using a Social Contract, which students must sign stating how they will treat others--with kindness, respect, dignity, and fairness.  Likewise, we can encourage students to use kind words and be helpful to each other.  This will allow students to feel more comfortable with their risk taking both socially and academically.
Affiliation is another way of looking at cooperative grouping or projects where students depend on others to complete the assignment.  Much the way that students become loyal to a sports team, they can create a bond with each other that encourages engagement.  Project based learning is an amazingly powerful tool that teaches the types of skills students will need in the workforce--the ability to work together, to communicate effectively, to delegate, and to synthesize various information from multiple sources.  Giving groups a team name and allowing them to socialize and focus on getting to know each other better is a great way to encourage affiliation.
Another way to encourage students to do their best and become authentically engaged is through Affirmation.  This includes praise from the teacher, other students, and other adults like various staff members, parents, visitors, etc. If students know their work is to be displayed or viewed by multiple people, they are more likely to put in extra effort.  Portfolio based projects are an example Schlechty gives that provide opportunities to design lessons highlighting affirmation.
We all know that students love to have the opportunity to choose, so the next design quality, Choice, is no surprise. Likewise, it is not difficult to work some sort of a choice into most lesson plans. Whether you are letting students choose something complicated like a topic for a project or an end product, or something simple like which chair they would like to sit in to complete an assignment, choice is an important way to create an environment where students are happy and engaged.
Students also love Novelty and Variety. There are hundreds of apps and computer programs that we can use in our classroom for legitimate teaching purposes that provide novelty and variety for our students. Try to work as many different technological programs into your lesson plans as you can.  But that's not the only form of variety we can employee.  Costumes, props, artifacts, samples, videos, songs, all of these things go a long way in building higher levels of engagement in our students.
The final design quality is also one of the most important. It's Authenticity and it's vital not only to encouraging engagement but to ensuring students understand the relevance of what they are learning. If we do not allow students to create products that are meaningful and relevant to them, we will not be able to teach them at the level they need in order to be successful.  Whenever possible, place an authentically engaging activity in your lesson plans in place of a menial task like a common worksheet.  In fact, replace all menial tasks with authentically designed activities and you will see that the level of authentically engaged students in your class will also increase. It just makes sense that authentically designed lessons will breed authentically engaged students.
I challenge you to use at least three of these qualities in your lesson plans the next time you sit down to plan. When you are planning with your teams, pull this list out.  Talk to them about ways you can all incorporate some of these qualities into your lesson plans.  If you hear someone suggest a worksheet, be ready with a more authentic lesson or activity instead.  Let us know how this affects the level of engagement in your classroom and the student learning outcomes.  We would love to hear success stories of how you've taken a not-so-engaging lesson and turned it into something amazing.

Toontastic Project

I am embarking on a new project with a group of second graders.  These are students I pull for RTI purposes and they are super excited to have the opportunity to work on a project that involves reading, research, and culminates with a Toontastics cartoon where they can tell everyone what they learned.
We read a guided reading book from Reading A-Z about living in a big city.  We live in a fairly rural part of Texas, though most of my students have been to Dallas because it's about an hour away.  We had a great discussion about what it would be like to live in a big city, how it would be different than what we are used to, what they would like and wouldn't like, etc. Then, we talked about what cities the students had visited, what they did while they were there, and if they ever wanted to go back.  We also talked about cities they had heard of but hadn't visited.
Next, each student chose a city that they would like to know more about.  We talked about what kinds of things they would need to know before they visited the city. For example, they were very interested in knowing where McDonald's was located.  I broadened that question by asking about restaurants in general--what types of foods do people like to eat there? Is there a famous restaurant?  We talked about landmarks and tourist attractions. We also talked about population and density.  One of the major concerns the students had with living in or visiting a big city was how crowded it was so they thought they needed to have an idea of how many people they might be bumping in to.
After we worked together to make a list of potential facts we needed to gather, I typed it up and distributed it to the students.  They used these questions as a guide as they began to do their research.  These students meet for 30 minutes twice a week and we have now been working on this project for about three weeks.  (We are doing some other things, too, like working on sight words and reading skills.)  They are just about done with the research phase.  They are working on gathering their information and determining which important questions still need to be answered.

The Toontastic Monkey!  Picture courtesy of Launchpadtoys.com 

Our next step will be writing a short script that tells about their city.  When that is completed, they will each be making a slide to go in a video which we will create using the app "Toontastic."  If you've never used this app before, check it out. There's a free version, which is very good by itself, and then a paid version.  There are several scenes to choose from and we've already talked about appropriate/inappropriate.  For example, you wouldn't have your character talking about a big city while standing in a cemetery or Frankenstein's laboratory. Once I have approved their scripts, each student will have the opportunity to set up their scene and record their message.  They will also get to add music.  When the entire project is completed, we can uploaded it to Toontastic's website, Launchpadtoys.com so that their teachers, classmates, and parents will be able to watch it.  It's a lot of fun but more importantly it's given them the opportunity to work on some important areas.  In order to put this together we've had to read, write, research, condense, summarize, work together, create a scene, animate characters, select appropriate music, and essentially perform a role.  While the topics of cities in and of itself may not seem that important, it's the act of completing a project and using all of these important skills that has made this beneficial to the students.  We've continued to incorporate reading, word work, and sight word work into our time because that is also important and critical to the success of these children but we are also working on our skills while we create something meaningful that will be long lasting for these students and those who have the opportunity to watch it. 

Questions Every Reading Teacher Needs to Answer Part 3

Originally, I asked the questions I am using in this series of posts in part of a guided reading training I have been presenting (with modifications!) for about 8 years. However, I've decided to modify this question  a little bit.  Rather than asking the original, fairly specific question of, "How are you checking for comprehension after a guided reading lesson," let's just ask the more general, "How will you know how well your students are comprehending?"  This can be applied to any lesson, any subject, any grade-level.  If our students are not comprehending what we are teaching, then we aren't teaching--we're just talking.
(For those of you not familiar with Texas State Mandated testing,  2011-12 was the first year that the STAAR test was introduced to replace the previous state mandated test, TAKS.)Before STAAR came along to make all of our lives brighter, I often heard teachers talking about why the TAKS test was too difficult and that the level of questioning was beyond many of our average students' capabilities. With STAAR, the comprehension level went up even further and we began to realize it wasn't enough to just ask questions at a more difficult level--we had to make our classrooms more like learning labs where students were constantly having to problem solve, analyze, take things apart and put them back together--in every subject. If we are not creating an environment where students are constantly introduced to these types of challenges, not only are we limiting their preparation for the state mandated testing, we're not fully preparing them for the working environment they are going to have to function in as adults.

What are your students getting out of your lessons?

The obvious answer to my question is on assessments. If students are comprehending what you are teaching, they should do well on pencil-paper exams.  However, that is still not necessarily a good indicator as to the level of understanding they have. If you are giving assessments written before STAAR, those written at a lower-level as far as Bloom's Taxonomy is concerned, or possibly something that comes from a curriculum or textbook that is not aligned with the state student expectations or exam, you could well be asking assessment questions that are much easier than the standard set by the STAAR test.  While they may be demonstrating a level of understanding, it might be far below the level they are going to need to be at in order to do well on the state assessment.  Therefore, we cannot use a students' performance on assessments as the sole indicator of how well he or she comprehends the materials we are covering.  We also must take into consideration that some students just don't perform well on written assessments.  There can be a variety of reasons for this but ultimately we need to understand that extremely intelligent children often show up as average or below average in testing situations because of test anxiety, dyslexia, ADD, ADHD, autism, and many other factors we should consider.
Therefore, we must collect other forms of data in order to truly determine the level of understanding our students have of the materials we have covered.  The best way to do this, in my opinion, is to create a project that allows the students to work at the highest levels of Bloom's and then we can use the product they create to determine whether or not the student is able to comprehend at those high-levels.  We need to include components of collaboration, creativity, problem-solving, research, and analysis in those projects.  We also need to allow for student choice, particularly when it comes to choosing methods of research, assignments of particular portions of the workload, products, and sometimes even the topic.  There are a lot of topics that often relate to the same unit or lesson we are teaching so if you can find a way to let students choose a component that they are particularly interested in, why not? In my experience, they always perform better when they are engaged with a project they have had some choice in designing. This also allows you insight into their comprehension levels because the greater their understanding, the more likely they are to design a complex, well-thought out project.
We can learn a lot about the level of understanding our students have by listening to the conversations they have with other students. Ask them to explain a concept to a neighbor.  Better yet, ask then to teach a lesson about one of the topics you are discussing to the class.  You'll find out very quickly how deeply they understand the materials.  The student presenting will also retain the information at a deeper level for a longer period of time.  This is all part of project based-learning and it is definitely coming our way so we need to start preparing for it, whether we like it or not.  We say that, in teaching, every thing is cyclical. I think project based learning is going to become a part of our school culture--like lunch and recess more so than some of the flash-in-the-pan buzz words we've been known to use and then discard.  The reason for this is, project based learning works!  Our students get a lot out of it. It's easier on teachers and it more closely replicates an actual work environment than the typical classroom.  Oh, and also, it's a lot of fun!
When it comes to reaching those upper levels of Bloom's, the level that the students' answer at is going to depend on the level of questioning the teacher is using.  If we ask lower-level questions, we'll get lower-level answers.  Examine the types of questions you are asking.  How many of them fall at the knowledge or remembering level?  How many of them climb up to application or analysis?  You may be surprised.  The best way to ensure you are hitting those higher levels is by planning to do so.  Write those types of questions when you write your lesson plan and then keep them with you when you're teaching so that you make sure to ask them.  If you have access to an instructional specialist or coach, ask him or her to come into your classroom during a lesson and keep track of the levels of your questions. This is a great way to get feedback from a non-threatening  professional who will be there to guide you through the steps of improving your questions, if necessary, and there will be no judgement on his or her part either, assuming the specialist or coach is a pro.  Take advantage of the resources you have and invite these people into your classroom to help with specific areas where you feel you can improve.  They want to help and there's nothing wrong with anyone asking for help in improving areas where we feel we are struggling.

Instructional coaches are excellent resources so don't be afraid to use them!

It can be exhausting standing up in front of a room of students all day long, discussing all of the material, saying all of the thins you are supposed to say, and knowing they aren't understanding a thing you are telling them.  This is where the art of teaching must come in to play and replace the misconception that covering a topic by talking about it necessarily results in students learning it.  Again, talking isn't teaching.  Teaching occurs when information is transferred from one person to another.  If they don't get it, then you didn't truly teach it to them.  Sometimes we have to teach the same topic in several different ways in order to teach it to everyone, and that's okay.  The more our students are engaged, the more they have the opportunity to discuss, collaborate, and dig into the subject themselves, the better their learning will be and the higher their levels of comprehension.  And when we create this type of learning environment, there's no question that the vast majority of our students will naturally do well on the state assessments because they are constantly being challenged at this higher level and it's nothing new to them.
What other ideas do you have for challenging your students to reach new intellectual heights?

Half-Flip? Un-Flip? Pre-Flip? Lot's of Options for Flipping Your Classroom

At TCEA13 there have been a ton of sessions discussing the Flipped classroom.  Generally speaking, "flipping" refers to assigning the major portion of the new assignment as homework in the form of a video or other on-line front-loaded work the student does outside of classroom and then using the time a teacher would normally be introducing the new concept for students to collaborate or for the teacher to clarify misconceptions, work with students who are struggling, or guide students through a more elaborate project.  However, through our discussions this week, the CISD staff has actually come up with some pretty interesting variations on flipping that may be more appropriate for teachers new to the concept, lower grade-levels, or classrooms without as much technology as we would like.
Our first idea was discussed in an early blog post.  It involves flipping a lesson for a smaller amount of students, our gifted and talented (GT) class of first and second graders.  If you have not read that post, please feel free to read it here.  This is a great way to allow our advanced students ample time to work on a project in a collaborative environment with little to no direct teach from an instructor during class time.
A second idea involves grouping students into Skill Builders and allowing the top three echelons of these students to work on a Project Based Learning lesson while the others are in remediation sessions.  We are discussing doing this with our first grade students.  Essentially, any student in first grade would be able to work on this PBL lesson with the consent of his or her teacher.  We have a schedule that lends itself very nicely to this sort of grouping because we have a 45 minute period built in 4 times a week for tutoring--isn't that amazing?  Simply put, one or two first grade teachers and myself (the Reading Specialist) and possibly the computer or library teacher would direct these students in a PBL or Inquiry Circle Project during that 45 minute block,.  The rest of the students would be grouped by skill gap and pulled by the rest of the first grade team or they would stay in rotation--PE, music, etc.  This would allow extra time for these students to collaborate and complete their end products.  How would this be fllipping?  I'm glad you asked!  We would front-load the information the students would need to know to research their topics and complete their projects either through videos they would need to watch at home or during their regular reading/social studies/science lesson time in class.  Many of these students finish their assignments quickly and they would have plenty of time to work on this while they are at school.
Yet another sort-of-flipping idea involves creating a lesson for students to watch at home or for students without the technology to watch during the beginning of the class period.  If our students have already watched the lesson, they can immediately begin working on the assignment while those who need to gather together to watch the lesson in one grade-level teacher's classroom.  This would also foster a learning environment of collaboration among the grade-level students.  It would no longer be necessary to look at students as belonging to a specific teacher per se, as we take the premise of "we own all students" one step further.
These are just a few of the great ideas we have had while collaborating at TCEA. Isn't it amazing how some great presentations and time to discuss can get brilliant minds creating?  We are thinking well beyond the walls of our classrooms, looking at the needs of all students, and creating an environment more suitable for the 21st Century Learner!

What ideas have you and your professional learning team come up with recently?  We would love to hear!

Awesome Idea: Flipping a Book Study and PBL

As you know, I am currently at TCEA in Austin and I attended several amazing sessions the last two days where I got a lot of great ideas to use with the students I work with and with classroom teachers at our campus.  I will be sharing a lot of these ideas in the days and weeks to come but my most favorite idea today revolves around the idea that we can flip a book study for our gifted and talented students and also incorporate a project based learning experience! I'm not quite sure where this idea came from, I had it while I was in a session talking about something else, but I absolutely love it, so let's go with it!
I chose our GT kids for this particular project because we are a PK-2nd campus and I don't know that all of our students would be able to easily access the technology I am planning to incorporate or if they would be able to handle some of the higher level content I am hoping to incorporate into the lesson plan. I am working with our GT teacher to solidify our plans but this is the basic premise:
We would select a short novel that is appropriate for our 1st and 2nd grade GT students.  All our lessons would be broken down by chapter or two chapters and we would incorporate the flip by teaching the lesson ahead of time and recording it.  These lessons will most likely be posted on this blog for the students to watch or possibly on edmodo--or both.  The students would need to read the assigned portion of the text, watch the video, and then answer a few higher-level thinking, opened ended response questions. We would also do a lesson about appropriate responses, the kinds of questions to ask yourself while reading, note taking, and questions to ask during conversations with others.  The students would meet to discuss their responses in class and share the notes and questions they jotted down while reading.

BrainPop Jr. exhibit in the Exhibition Hall at TCEA

Bats in our belfry! Can you see the little black speck ?  We had an unregistered guest at TCEA today!   

 They would also be working on an Inquiry Circle Project as evidence of their learning. If you are not familiar with ICP's, I highly recommend you read Comprehension and Collaboration by Stephanie Harvey and Harvey Daniels.  It's basically an idea that stems from PBL (project based learning)  but the most important difference is that the project doesn't have to be directly related to the text--it just has to circle back to it.  For example, I read Pictures of Hollis Woods by Patricia Reilly Giff with a group of 5th graders last year. I explained ICP's to them and helped them brainstorm ideas.  One of the students decided he wanted to research Hershey's chocolate.  He created a Glogster all about the history of Hershey's. How is this related to the novel?  Hollis is eating a Hershey bar in a scene from the book. Hence, the circle!
ICP also involve some circling by the teacher.  It's incredibly important for the instructor to circle everything back to the Student Expectations you are trying to address through the text.  You have to be very mindful of where your students are headed with their topics and make sure it always ties back in to a pertinent skill or piece of knowledge students are expected to acquire.  Daniels and Harvey are very good at explaining strategies to ensure this happens in their book, which became a Bible of sorts for me for a couple of years as I learned to utilize ICP's with my higher level thinkers. Since that time, I've also tried it with my struggling students and it can be incredibly powerful for them as well.
For our GT students, I am hoping to give them lots of different options for their final presentations.  I have used Animoto, Xtranormal, Voki, Blabberize, Weebly, Wikispaces, Glogster, and several other sites before with great success. It seems like most of my students want to choose a PowerPoint and I do not think I will let this be an option this time. Prezi, maybe, ppt. no thank you!  One of the best parts of TCEA for me has been learning about a lot more really amazing websites and apps that work a lot like the ones I listed above and I'm hoping to be able to use some of these!  If anyone would like more information about how I've used these presentation tools before, please let me know and I'll be happy to discuss and link up some examples.
I've had three or four "Ah-ha" moments today and I can't wait to try out some of the other amazing ideas we've had during our sessions and from the conversation that's been generated from them.  If you're at TCEA and you've had an amazing moment of inspiration, please share it in the comments!  We'd love to hear it! Even if you aren't here and you've been inspired by something recently that's made you say, "Oh!  Wow, I can do this!" please let us know!
Tomorrow, I'm planning to post about another super idea we got from a presentation at TCEA.  It involves Xtranormal, Rachel's Challenge, and Classroom Management--three of my favorite topics!