Sometimes one question is all it takes.
When
working with teachers who have experience and expertise, a well-designed
question can cause a big shift. Last week, I had a debrief conference with Julie,
a teacher who is strong in so many areas. Julie’s classroom management is consistent, she is teaching for concept development, and discussions engage all
students. As I reflected on the lesson I’d observed, though, I realized there
was something that would have made the lesson even stronger: differentiation.
She was teaching a lesson that connected the idea of timelines with story
sequence, and she’d done an excellent job of helping students make connections
to their personal experience and making cross-disciplinary connections to
number lines in math. She’d used partner talk and whole-class discussion so
that students could build their own understanding. She’d previewed a text with
them, having them highlight difficult vocabulary and providing support. Then
she divided them in groups and sent them off with pictures of events from the
story (a biographical narrative) that they were to sequence on a timeline. So
many things were going well in the lesson, so she was ready to focus on
differentiation, which I view as an advanced teaching practice. I felt that if
I asked just the right question, Julie would recognize for herself the value of
differentiation in this situation and be open to it for future learning
experiences. I knew from past experience that saying, “You should have
differentiated this activity,” would be far less impactful than inviting her to
consider possibilities for herself. She was ready to do that. So I asked, “What
would have happened if you had asked students to create a timeline without
giving them the squares?”
There
was a thought-filled pause. Then Julie said, “Well, some of the students could have handled it.” In her mind, she was
rebutting my suggestion. But I wanted to encourage her to think about what she
had just said, so I responded simply, “Hmmmmmm.”
Another
thought-filled pause, and then I saw that look that we coaches and teachers
love – the light-bulb moment.
“Ahhhhh,”
she said. “I could have given some of
the students just a timeline.”
“Yes,”
I said.
“But
some of them would have needed the squares.”
“Yes,”
I said again.
Julie
looked excited.
“Differentiation,”
I said.
Then
came an avalanche of ideas, as Julie talked about how she knew all about
differentiation but had rarely tried it. She thought about those successes she’d
had in the past and began planning for differentiated instruction in upcoming
lessons.
Sometimes
one question is all it takes.
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*If that sounds like a recommendation-disguised-as-question, I’ll admit that in some circumstances it would have been. But in this situation, I used the question to provoke Julie, not to suggest a single course of action.
This week, you might want to
take a look at:
In
honor of Valentine’s Day: Love stories ignite a romance with reading:
A
formative assessment video – “Show Your Cards”:
Student voices about how the “posse” approach uses positive peer pressure to keep kids in school:
Thoughts about personalizing professional development:
This
article, “Digital Literacy Can’t Wait” talks about ways to build capacity and
enhance Language Arts lessons with technology:
This
short video by writing teacher Kelly Gallagher describes literacy instruction
that he feels is in the best interest of students (don’t be put off that this
video previews his new book – the video is great in and of itself!):
That’s it for this week. Happy
Coaching!
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