Teach Like a Champion by Doug Lemov - Chapter Two

Chapter Two: Planning that Ensures Academic Achievement

Great lessons don’t just happen. They must be planned well in advance. Chapter two provides techniques that will ensure good planning before a teacher walks into the classroom to teach the lesson.
Notes:

6. Begin With the End in Mind – Not what will my students do today but what will my students understand today (Pg 57)
• Progressing from unit planning to lesson planning
• Using a well-framed objective to define the goal of each lesson
• Determining how you’ll assess your effectiveness in reaching your goal.
• Deciding on your activity
• I’ve rewritten my essential learnings in plain English and will always start with them at the beginning of my lesson planning.

7. 4MS – 4 Criteria for Effective Objectives (Pg 61)
• Manageable (objective met in a single lesson)
• Measureable – Write your objective so you can measure it at the end of class. (Exit ticket, outcome sentence)
• Made First – Write your objective to guide your activity. Begin with the end in mind.
• Most Important – Focus on what’s most important on the path to college.
• I have never thought of writing an objective to be met in a single lesson as I’ve always associated objectives with unit planning but of course this makes complete sense. It’s not that I didn’t have outcomes for daily lessons, just never thought of them as objectives.

8. Post It – Post your objective so everyone can identify your purpose for teaching (use Plain English.) (Pg 63)
• The 4MS resonates with me. I always post the day’s for all to see but fail to mention the objective. From now on this will be the first item written.

9. Shortest Path – Activities should always be the most direct route to the goal (mastery of the objective) (Pg 64)
• I’m having a hard time accepting this one 100% of the time. Sometimes most direct may not be most authentic, then what?


10. Double Plan – Always plan for both teacher and student for each phase of the lesson. (Pg 65)
• T-Charts work well for this

• I’ve always used a t-chart type idea for planning my lessons only they look more like outlines instead. Teacher phase at the top, students below. This makes sense to me. I want to know and want to communicate, in advance, what my students will be doing when I am teaching. That way, they know what I expect of them.

11. Draw the Map – Always select the appropriate classroom layout for all lessons. (Pg 67)
Ask yourself
• When should students interact?
• How should students interact?
• Which kinds of interactions support the objective?
• How does the seating layout support the above?
• Doug Lemov prefers students in pairs, in row fashion, and I couldn’t agree more. I like the proximity this arrangement provides to each student. I don’t quite agree that the primary focus is the teacher/board especially in a student-centered classroom.

Teach Like a Champion Reflections

Summer reading for a teacher is always interesting.  Assigned summer reading, well another story completely.  That's why I was pleasantly surprised when I opened my copy of Teach Like a Champion by Doug Lemov.   His premise is that great teaching is an art and just like great artists there are great teachers.  Behind every artist there is an artisan.  The book, Teach Like a Champion, provides teachers with 49 tried and true techniques that are used consistently in Teach for America schools across the nation.  These tools aim to equip the classroom teachers so they too, can become great teachers.  Notes for chapter one follow.

Chapter 1 – High Academic Expectations           

High expectations are the most reliable driver of high student achievement, even in students who do not have a history of successful achievement. This chapter looks at five techniques that raise expectations and differentiate great classrooms from the merely good ones.

1.     No Opt Out – sequence that ends with a student answering a question as often as possible (Pg 34)

·      Cues vs. hints – cue guides a student into discovery, hint suggests student is incapable on own

·      The place where answer can be found – teacher asks where in book answer can be found

·      The step in the process that’s required – teacher asks this of class or student so student in question can be guided

·      Another name for the term that is the problem – if student hears another word for the term, he/she may arrive at the answer.

·      This is an old Denny McLaughlin trick I’ve been using for years but never to the extent I read here.  I like, and will work at incorporating, the ideas that extend further than just asking another student for the answer and then returning back to the original student.  The goal is to provide students as many opportunities for success in the classroom as possible.

2.     Right is Right – Set and defend a high standard of correctness in your classroom (Pg 37)

·      Hold out for all the way – do not accept partial answers

·      Students should answer the question, not a question they want to answer

·      Accept only the right answer at the right time.  Nothing more.

·      Use technical vocabulary at all times.

·      Need to seriously work on the this technique as I often find myself answering – that’s close.  Close is not good enough.

3.     Stretch It – Sequence of learning does not end with the right answer.  Reward right answers with follow-up questions that extend knowledge and test for reliability.  Good for differentiation. (Pg 42)

·      Ask How or Why

·      Ask for another way to answer

·      Ask for a better word

·      Ask for evidence

·      Ask students to integrate a related skill.

·      Ask students to apply the same skill in a new setting

·      I have to say that time constraints often keep me from stretching it.  I need to remember that learning is a passion and that passion can only grow from constant stretching.

4.     Format Matters – “The Complete sentence is the battering ram that knocks down the door to college.”  It’s not what students say that matters but how they say it. (Pg 47)

·      Identify the error

·      Begin the correction

·      I do use proper format in the classroom and expect my students to do so as well.  I often begin corrections they must complete.  I think this is essential if they are going to communicate in a future setting, as I have no idea what that future setting will be.  I prepare for the most important and formal setting.  Students can always practice informal speech and response on their own.

5.     Without Apology – There is no such thing as boring content.  (pg 51)

Alternatives to Apology

·      This material is great because it’s really challenging.

·      Lots of people don’t understand this until they go to college but you know it now

·      This can help you succeed

·      This gets more and more exciting the better you understand it

·      Excellent example provided by the author at the beginning of the technique.  He enrolls in a poetry class and almost doesn’t take the class because he thinks the content boring.  The teacher never apologizes for teaching Yeats and the author finds himself riveted by class.  I have heard myself apologize for content when teaching certain aspects of Physics or Earth Science, or most recently when reviewing the school’s Acceptable Use Policy.  Will work on this!

Change

Having just read Heading in a New Direction I immediately began to wonder if the only way changes will occur in the field of educational technology is if change is driven from the top as mentioned in the above blog.  I sure hope not.

Who are the drivers of change?  History has a unique answer to this question.  Historical revolutions point at people and society being the instigators of change.  Many a king or ruler have been deposed by the people they govern.  Change came from within, from individuals wanting something better for themselves and their countries.  The same ought to be for educational technology in the classrooms. 

Leaders in educational technology need to bring awareness to teachers regarding what technology can do to increase student learning and interaction in the classroom.  When teachers begin to demand the tools to allow them to become more effective in the classroom, changes can and will occur.

Reflection from the ISTE 2010 Leadership Bootcamp

Being a part of the first ISTE Leadership Bootcamp was exciting.  The opportunity to connect with and listen to so many visionary leaders in technology was exciting and provided the opportunity to expose myself to forward thinking in educational technology.  Attending the Leadership Bootcamp affirmed my beliefs that educational technology must be progressive, question existing school policy, and expose students to the world in which they live at school.

We must begin to prepare our students for success in a knowledge based, technology driven, globally competitive world by providing time, practice and instruction in that world so they can experience that world in a safe, responsible and challenging way.  No longer are schools confined by location or time as the opportunities for informal education increase.  By communicating, collaborating and creating the future with our students we can begin to transform our schools into high performance environments where students are expected to be and are high achievers.  However, in order to provide these experiences and environments to our students we must spend time in them and experience them ourselves.  We must also reevaluate our school policies related to technology so they reflect the attitude of continuous learning.  

Social online networking need not be solely for students.  Lucy Gray discussed the positive opportunities that social networking has for teachers and how the sharing of such resources can strongly enhance an educators professional development.  The development of a personal learning network for educators is a powerful tool and a first step in understanding the worlds our students encounter on a daily basis when they are not in school.  The use of Twitter and other types of social networking connect teachers from all areas of the world and unite them in a common discussion rich in the sharing of resources.  Student book reviews are no longer stagnant when students from other parts of the world comment on posts via blogs or twitter.  Historical character studies become real when students reenact their lives via profile creations on Twitter.  Finding opportunities to bring these tools into the classroom to enhance learning can provide engaging and authentic experiences for our students.  

We have an obligation to our students to introduce them to a 21st Century global world through tools and applications that connect one another.  This idea is often regarded as a fearful one by school districts because it opens the doors of our schools to the outside world.  Often our school policies around the use of technology perpetrate this fear.  Acceptable Use Policies are developed to provide a safety net surrounding this fear.  Perhaps the most forward idea I heard at the Leadership Bootcamp came from Scott McLeod when he proposed doing away with Acceptable Use Policies and, instead, using the school discipline code to deal with problematic issues arising from the use of technology. After all, these types of disturbance are disciplinary in nature and should be treated as such.  He suggested many school districts treated issues arising from the use of technology with a prohibition-type approach instead a Driving Under the Influence (DUI) approach.  The prohibition approach denies the activity.  For example, a ban on social networking by a school.  The DUI approach puts mechanisms in place that deal with the small percentage of the population that have trouble following the law or rule.  Prohibition failed in the 20th century and has no place in 21st Century schools.

Chris Lehman challenged us with a thought - "What if high school were not preparation for real life, what if high school was real life?"  Ideas must live in practice.  We must build systems and structures that reflect this vision if education is to succeed.

ISTE10

ISTE10

Wikispaces as Platforms for Essential Learnings

The curricula at Manitou Springs School District is defined by Essential Learnings. These Essential Learnings (ELs) represent what students are expected to know and be able to do in each curricular area.

Through the review of research on content, instruction, and assessment and the analysis of state and national standards, staff determine core sets of Essential Learnings for each grade level and course.   

Moving these essential learnings off the shelf and into the foreground of lesson planning and assessment development may prove to be the greatest hurdle districts encounter.  There are several companies designed to aid schools in their storage and tracking of ELs and we spent quite a bit of time examing the pros and cons of these organizations.  Additionally, we met with other area districts who use these companies to house their ELs and determined that most were not using the services to their fullest potential for a variety of reasons.  I suspect these reasons related to the large learning curve required to become fluent in the applications.   These companies charged a large amount of money for their products while state funding for public education was decreasing. 

So, we were faced with a decision, spend a large sum of money for a program that housed ELs and wasn't very user friendly or try to find an alternative.  Though any application can be learned, the amount of staff development necessary to bring competency levels to the proficiency status also became a factor in choosing to move to Wikispaces as a platform for our Essential Learnings. 

Wikispaces is fairly easy to learn and navigate.  A Wikispace easily funcitions as a housing unit for information and essential learnings are no exception.   However, it was the additional functionality of Wikispaces that sold us on using Wikispaces as the platform for our Essential Learnings. Through Wikispace training we're finally realizing the potential and value of having EL's easily accessible and searchable.  In addition, the training has exposed teachers to the powerful and collaborative environment of Web 2.0.  Suddenly, we're seeing a surge of interest in using and integrating technology in the classroom.  Little by little, our essential learnings are becoming viable documents used in the classroom on a daily basis thanks to the creation of our Wikispace.

Educational Technology

On March 10, 2010 the Department of Education and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) met to discuss the future of technology in K-12 education in Washington DC. 

The Department of Education presented their National Technology Plan which takes a look at the following areas related to technology: 

• Learning
• Assessment
• Teaching
• Infrastructure
• Productivity

I'd like to take a look at these five areas related to MSSD as I think they serve as an excellent spring board in restructuring Ed. Tech.

I'd also like to offer my assistance with the teaching piece of this focused on how to better integrate technology into the classroom by continuing Tech Tuesdays at MSMS next year during our professional development time.  Over the past two years Tech Tuesdays has fluctuated with attendance but rarely do we get more than five teachers attending these informal meetings to discuss using technology in the classroom. 

Also, the FCC presented the National Broadband Plan which includes three recommendations:

1. Supporting and promoting online learning
2. Unlocking the value of date and improving transparency
3. Modernizing educational broadband infrastructure

I think the district wikispace we are about to embark on will do good job of improving transparency within our district in regards to curriculum and it's relationship to essential learnings.  Stay tuned.