Week 5 Post #2- True Confessions

Week 5 Post #2

True Confessions of a Teacher- Dr. Mazur Video

 

I love how Dr. Mazur started this video talking about confessing.  He went on to confess all of the mistakes he made early on in teaching.  He also talked about how he ignored some of the signs that it wasn’t working and followed the “how it had always been done” model.  I think this is the greatest benefit elementary school teachers get from summer vacation.  It gives that time to step back and say, “What worked and what needs to be changed?”  I find being reflective in the middle of things very difficult.  Vacations give me that time to rethink things.

He also brought up one of my favorite topics, data.  We have been an RTI school for several years.  We have been working on what data to collect, how often to collect it, and how to use it.  He quoted the former president of the Carnegie Foundation as saying, “The plural of anecdotes is not data.”  

 It made me think back to our Child Study meetings a few years ago when we had a few scores to bring to the meeting but it was mostly anecdotes.  Now we come to the meetings with dates, scores, interventions tried, and results.  Anecdotes still come into play but in a much smaller way.

I can’t imagine trying to make a class of 200 more interactive, but Dr. Mazur tackled this issue with questioning and peer interaction.  Explaining something to someone helps you cement your own understanding.  It also shows you really understand the material.  That is why we have open response questions on the NECAP that ask students to explain their thinking.  These are also the questions students find the most difficult.  They cannot simply recite information, they must know it on a deeper level. 

A few years ago I started using the Jigsaw method for some lessons.  Students are broken into groups.  Each person in the group becomes an “expert” on part of the material.  Students from the various groups work together on common material to learn the subject and then go back to their original group to teach the material to the rest of the group.  It forces the students to be actively engaged in the learning.  It does require more planning, more class time, and more varied materials than the standard lecture type lessons, but it is worth it.

Confessions are good.  It means you have thought about something and admitted there is a problem.  Once you have confessed it you feel more obligated to do something to change it.  A supportive PLC is the perfect place to this.  You can get the support and the accountability needed to make some changes.  I just don’t want my confessions posted to You Tube.