A Case of the Blahs (And Teaching Anyway)

By nature, I'm a pretty upbeat person. I can usually look on the bright-side, find something lovely to celebrate, and bring some joy to pretty much any situation. Positivity is one of my superpowers!

But today, I have a case of the blahs. Nothing is terrible, but I'm just feeling that sense of tired irritability where small things bug me, and nip at me, and consume more of my cognitive space than I might like to admit.

Image by Krithika Parthasarathay via Pixabay

I headed into class at noon today, and in those last couple of minutes just before we began, I decided to change up my lesson plan for today. The future teachers I serve are amazing people, and I'm so grateful for the opportunities I have on a daily basis to help them see the varied aspects of the work we do as educators. And today? Today that meant a little meta-lesson about the emotional labor that is assumed for teachers.

I started by just naming it: "I'm feeling uncharacteristically blah today, folks." A few seemed surprised, but most kind of nodded--I mean, I am a pretty bouncy presence most of the time, and I just wasn't at the beginning of class today. And I explained how this is part of the work we do as teachers: we often have to check our own feelings, suck it up, and just teach anyway. This probably wasn't earth-shattering news to anyone in the room, but I thought it could be illuminating for them to notice this, and see if they could tell a difference in the way class unfolded. In another course, I have a lesson I teach about the difference between "acting like a teacher" and "being a teacher." Today's class meeting was an example in practice of "acting like a teacher."

So, after this odd preamble, I headed into the lesson as planed. We spent some time in discussion about a chapter I asked them to read in preparation, and they had lots of thoughtful reflections and deliberate questions, as they normally do. Then a very brief lecture from me, followed by a series of activities and demonstrations. They participated well, interacted well, shared their thinking well.

And you know what? By the end of class, I realized I wasn't "acting like a teacher" anymore. Somehow, starting off with that "acting" morphed back into my more normal embodiment of my own teaching practice. And honestly, the playfulness of the activities I had planned to do with the students--and seeing their joy in discovery--has buoyed my spirits in a way I wasn't expecting.

Somewhere in one of his writings, master educator Parker J. Palmer says something along the lines of, "Technique is what you use until the teacher shows up." Maybe this is the lesson for me that I needed to be reminded of and practice today. And my hope is that, for the future teachers I serve, I got to model some sense of this today.

Learning Targets

 I've been thinking a lot about learning targets lately. In the two methods courses I'm teaching right now (Science Methods for Elementary and Middle School, and Methods of Teaching STEM K-12) we are getting started with developing unit plans, and we're thinking about goals and objectives. And a recent episode of the podcast my buddy Matt and I started was all about learning targets too. (You can listen to the episode here, if you're interested: Hallway Conversations with Matt and Dave: Goals)

The main idea I'm hoping to convey to my students about learning targets is just how valuable they are for keeping both the teacher and the students on track for what we're working towards. Imagine yourself as an archer--having a clear target makes taking aim so much more obvious. A clear target helps you measure (assess) learning: did students hit the bullseye? And, I would suggest, a clear target even helps you focus your teaching on ensuring students will be able to hit that target.

Image by mickrh via Pixabay

Is it possible to over-emphasize learning targets? Probably...like almost anything else in the world of Education today. But I have found targets so helpful in my own teaching practice, perhaps because I'm likely to go off the rails and get distracted pretty easily.

So what is a learning target? Here's my current thinking...

Learning targets are often framed as "I can..." statements, but the old school format for writing objectives that I learned in my own undergraduate teacher preparation works just as well: "Students will be able to..." Thinking this through, I think that "Students will be able to..." (SWBAT) is more framed for the teacher, while "I can..." is more framed for the student. 

And then, the key is following up this introduction with a solid action-oriented verb: what will students be able to do? Describe? Analyze? Illustrate? Explain? List? Develop? Construct? Argue? Contrast? Hypothesize? Write? Model? Debate? There are so many possibilities, but I like the idea of connecting them to different levels of thinking, such as what is described in Bloom's Taxonomy. Aiming for at least some learning targets that get at higher-order thinking skills seems like a really wise strategy to me. (If all we're asking students to do is remember and regurgitate information...that feels like a "thin" education to me!)

When I was talking this through with my students in STEM methods this week, we were debating the pros and cons of writing learning targets for students vs. framing them for teachers. One of my students expressed some concern about "I can..." statements, even as a university student: it puts a lot of pressure on the students to really be able to do these things! Another student responded with a wondering: why not use both SWBAT and I can? Here was his reasoning: even if you are sharing learning targets with students at the beginning of a unit or lesson, using "students will be able to..." as the frame puts this in a future-tense: "Maybe you can't do this now...but you will be able to do this later on." And then, using "I can" as a frame at the end of the unit or lesson gives students an opportunity to self-assess: "Can I now do this, after I've had the opportunity to learn it? Or do I need more practice?"

I LOVE this approach, honestly. And this makes me feel grateful for the opportunity to keep learning, right along with my students.

Are you using learning targets? How do you feel about them? Do you find them valuable for guiding your students learning, or for your own teaching?

Happy PodDay!

My buddy and co-conspirator, Matt, texted me first thing this morning: "Happy PodDay, brother!"

Today is the day...after weeks of dreaming, scheming, recording, and a whole lot of laughing have come together into this thing: we are launching our podcast today.

"Hallway Conversations with Matt and Dave" is what we decided to call it. The whole thing grew out of the way our relationship came together: we often wound up having conversations in the hallway outside of our offices. Matt is my newest colleague in our Education department, but we've known each other--or maybe known of each other?--for years. We have many mutual friends in education, so I felt like I knew Matt even before he moved to town. But it's been so, so good to get to know him in a more personal and personable way.

And after so many hallway conversations...one time one of us said, "We should really record these and turn them into a podcast."

And so we did.

Our basic plan is that each episode will be a 20-minute unscripted conversation around a theme. (20 minutes because teachers' time is precious, and we certainly don't want them to feel like they are wasting it with us!) While we have agreed on some topics ahead of time, each conversation will be driven by a question related to the theme of the episode that one of us will bring without telling the other ahead of time, and then we will think on our feet as we try to come to an answer to that question--just like we do in our "real" hallway conversations.

It's a little terrifying to step up to the microphone and record an episode this way, but it's also been a lot of fun, and some really good professional development for both of us, I think.

And, honestly, it's a little terrifying, launching this out into the world.

Will anyone listen? Will anyone care?

Early on in the recording process we joked that if the only people who listen are our wives (you know, to keep an eye on us...) we will be fine with that. The real intent for us was to further develop our own reflective practices, and build up our friendship at the same time.

But now, now that we're launching it out into the open...I'd be lying if I said that I don't care if people listen. I hope that people listen, and that the things we are talking about in our "hallway conversations" will spark some more hallway conversations among the Christian educators who might listen in, that they might start having these same kinds of professional discussions with thoughtful colleagues in their own school hallways.

Anyway, if you're up for giving us a listen, you can find our podcast on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, and Spotify. Just search for "hallway conversations with Matt and Dave" and you'll find us. Or, you can access the show via the web right here: http://hallwayconvos.podbean.com/ We would love for you to listen in, and to share your thoughts in response.

(So...if I'm not writing as often here on the blog...it's probably because we're recording and editing some new episodes. That was definitely the case in January!)

Happy PodDay!