Blown away by this blog post/attached video this morning as it came across my RSS feed. I have been a subscriber to Joe Bower's blog for over a year now. I place a high value on his posts and his view of pedagogical best practice. I have been implementing many of his (and his subscribers') suggestions/theories/practices into my classroom this year.
What blew me away is the timing. This is the first year we have been tasked with posting our essential questions and daily objectives in front of the class. To me, this request seemed pretty reasonable and logical. You're giving students a some daily exit strategies (wouldn't it be great if our world leaders knew what those were...?) and therefore providing them with a sense of ownership in each day's lesson. However, I also get what Mr. Bower and Mr. Kohn are also saying here. Perhaps, by giving away the ending, you're losing the opportunity for true learning to organically evolve?
My relief (and vindication that I'm justified in being torn) came from Mr. Bower's last line: "At the very least, teachers should be afforded the professional responsibility to decide whether writing the objective on the board is pedagogically appropriate." This showed me that there certainly are two ways to look at this and I'm interested in finding out more.
My next question, of course, comes from the lesson Alfie Kohn describes in the video regarding measuring the ship. Our district has heavily invested itself this year in the GRR (Gradual Release of Responsibility) model. I've been reading the Fisher and Frey book and have found many areas of my teaching that can be improved some of the methods and practices described in this text. How does this boat-measuring exercise fit within the context of GRR? I don't know - I'm going to have to let that marinate for awhile. For now, GRR seems to be a model worthy of continued exploration. It's been showing me some simple tips and tricks to navigate some of the areas of classroom instruction in which I have identified myself as week in the past.
I will continue to promote this blog on Twitter. So far I've had a few dozen reads from many countries around the world. I hope folks will stick around and submit ideas/theories/questions, etc. to build this up into a true workshop community.
There are two debates here. One is whether we should be writing the objectives on the board. This is an important discussion to have, whether you are for it or not.
ReplyDeleteThe second debate here is whether teachers should have the professional responsibility to decide whether placing anything on the board is appropriate. For external sources to impose their ignorance with the force of law on teachers seems to me to be grossly inappropriate and irresponsible.
Thanks for sharing this. It's a discussion that does not happen nearly often enough.
Joe