The Feedback Loop-Fall Lead Teaching Edition

Hi to all,

Now that Fall lead teaching is wrapping up for most of you, it is a good time for me to share some of the trends I observed over the last four weeks. It was obvious that everyone was working hard and learning lots!

Building Up Stamina

From talking with many of you, I know that one key learning was the amount of energy it takes to be an effective teacher day in and day out. Planning lessons, preparing for instruction, assessing student work, entering grades into Gradebook, communicating with families, and the list goes on of all the things a teacher must manage on any given day. The work we are asking you to engage in is intellectually demanding (the work that is critical to student learning and your own) and not necessarily fun or entertaining. Developing this stamina is not only crucial for your current work, but for the work you will do in the future as a teacher in a turnaround school. Most days, your principal, colleagues, students, and families will be asking you to give more. You need to be ready.

Urgency About the Details

One thing you may also have noticed are myriad details that a teacher needs to keep up with on a daily basis. Here is a small list of the many details I saw you juggling over the last several weeks:

• Getting the classroom prepared for the next day’s instruction
• Collecting permission slips and making sure they were submitted to the main office on time
• Entering grades into Gradebook
• Keeping track of student behavior points and hallway transition times
• Organizing student work for differentiation

Were there hiccups along the way? Of course and that is to be expected given that you are a novice and learning how to manage all of these details for the first time. What I hope you saw was that not only do the students and families rely on you to manage all these details efficiently, but so do your mentor and the other teachers on your grade level and cycle teams. Having a sense of urgency about the details is necessary. Please talk with your mentor or me if you need strategies for managing the details-we have many ideas to share!

Positive Framing and Joy Factor

Here is a well-known quote by Dr. Haim Ginott that impacted my thinking as a young teacher:

I have come to a frightening conclusion.

I am the decisive element in the classroom.

It is my personal approach that creates the climate.

It is my daily mood that makes the weather.

As a teacher I possess tremendous power to make a child's life miserable or joyous.

I can be a tool of torture or an instrument of inspiration.

I can humiliate or humor, hurt or heal.

In all situations, it is my response that decides whether a crisis

will be escalated or de-escalated, and a child humanized or de-humanized.

When I was starting out, I did not see the power I had as a teacher. In fact, I often thought the students had all the power and I tended to react to them, rather than be proactive. Positive Framing and J-Factor are very important tools to use to create a positive and proactive classroom climate that is attuned to the needs of students. Check yourself as you are teaching: Are you smiling? Are you teaching with high energy? Are you demonstrating enthusiasm for the content and student participation?

Thank you for reading! Any ideas for topics you would like to see addressed in the Feedback Loop? Please let me know!

Best,

Carrie

TCA Weekly Digest 10/14

Imagine a teacher standing in front a class. Some students may be 100% engaged. Some may be looking out the window and daydreaming. Some may be causing distractions. The teacher is delivering a fabulous lesson filled with the information and skills the students will need to be successful. Which students are learning from the instruction? Now think about your students. If you go through your class list, you will probably be able to classify most of your students into one of those groups. You have the self-motivated students who listen to every word and voluntarily take notes, answer and ask questions, and study. You also have unmotivated students. They choose to come up with their own interesting activities and may even attempt to disrupt the lesson. Because you have strong BMCs, they can’t do that, so they simply disengage. Some of our students have become experts at looking like they are paying attention. They sit still, glance at you once in a while, and think about something completely unrelated to your lesson. Sometimes they will play with a pencil sharpener or do some other action that tells you they are not with you. Often they don’t do anything to attract your attention. They are content to be passive and allow their minds to shift from your lesson to countless other thoughts and distractions. The Domain 2 strategies you are learning this cycle will help you reach those students.

Cold Call
Ask your mentor to keep track of the students you call on when you ask for volunteers. You will probably find that it is a small group of students. Cold Calling, and more importantly establishing the routine of cold calling in your classroom, will lead to greater engagement for all students. Your students should expect to be called on without raising their hands. You know that students expect to be cold called when they stop raising their hands and wait for you. There are many benefits to Cold Calling. It:
• Provides Checks for Understanding for students who don’t volunteer
• Increases the speed of your lesson because you set the pace
• Lets students know that you want to hear from all students
Cold Calling should be predictable, systematic, positive, and scaffolded. It took 14 pages in the Lemov book (pp111-125) to explain all the particulars of effective cold calling. Reread the section and include cold calling in your lesson plans next week. If you don’t use Cold Calling, you won’t have opportunities to use Wait Time or No Opt Out.

TCA Weekly Digest 10/7/2011

As we begin cycle 2, I want to thank everyone for their dedication. The resident pull-out meeting provided an opportunity to share successes, voice concerns, and begin taking the next steps to becoming champion teachers. Your teaching time is expanding and I observed many complete lessons this week.

Do Now
Great job using Do Nows! As we know, the Do Now gets students focused and working immediately. It is important to use Do Nows consistently to establish that routine for your students. I saw many effective Do Nows this week. Jaime used technology and began his vocabulary lessons by projecting a Do Now on the board. Lauren’s students created 5-sided polygons at the beginning of their geometry lesson. What a way to hook students into the lesson! Remember the criteria for an effective, focused, efficient Do Now.

• Students can complete it without teacher direction
• Can be completed in 3-5 minutes
• Pencil to paper to increase rigor and accountability
• Can serve as a preview or a review

I Do
A well planned I do is a critical part of a successful lesson. You need to think deeply about what information the students need from you in order to successfully meet your objective. It includes modeling, explaining, defining, and most importantly, anticipating. Begin to think about where confusion might occur and plan for it. Provide the information in multiple formats. Valerie used a transparency of a data sheet as she told her fourth grade students how to record their crayfish observations. Latasha used the Elmo to model counting coins in 3rd grade. Both are great examples letting students see and hear your I Do. An anchor chart is also a powerful visual that you should use during the I do. A good anchor chart can be posted and used throughout the unit, or possibly the school year.

We Do
The We Do is the guided practice. This is when you are checking for understanding and immediately correcting misconceptions. It is important to check in with all students. Circulating the room and cold calling are strategies that increase student engagement and give you data about your students thinking during the We Do. At this point, the students begin to do more of the work, and you provide assistance as needed. Suzanne and Courtney called students to the front of the room to solve math problems on the Elmo and the whiteboard. Asking students to “be the teacher” pushes their independence and they love to do it.

You Do
We need to give students “at bats” so they can practice skills and gain mastery. When planning your We Do, keep in mind that repetition matters and by the end, students should be able to solve the problem correctly on their own. Also keep in mind that although we need to provide repetition, we also need to keep it interesting. Capricia accomplished that by creating a very engaging game her 5th graders played to practice using there/their/they’re correctly. Yadira ‘s students made a model to gain a deeper understanding of how arm muscles move. Cynthia’s students flexed their inquiry skills as they investigated what yeast cells need to live. Each of Ron’s 4th graders used a small box of raisins to make estimates, collect, and organize data. Let your creativity shine as you plan the You dos. If you did a thorough I do and We do, the students will be ready.

Exit Ticket
At the end of the lesson, you should ask yourself if the students go it. Did they learn your objective? The exit ticket will give you that answer. Exit tickets should be 1-3 minutes, focus a key part of your objective, and can be used as the next Do Now if students need review.

Trends of the Week @ NTA

Hi to all,

It is hard to believe we are already at the end of Cycle 2! Here are some trends and some of my other thoughts about the week:

Giving Directions to Students

With your use of BMC and What to Do, most of you know how to give clear, verbal directions to students. Although narration gives us additional opportunities to reiterate our directions, many of our students need to see the directions as well. For academic tasks please make sure you are also giving students directions visually. Whether these are on a chart paper, the white board, the ipad, overhead transparency, etc. this will support those students who need to refer to the directions after they have heard them. You also can quickly point to the written directions for a student who needs a reminder as to what to do.

Time Management

This week, I received an email from a resident from last year’s class. He shared with me how challenging it is to manage his time efficiently given the amount of meetings he needs to attend. Within a two-week period he identified 15 meetings he went to. As your teaching load increases, your workload will increase, and your time will become even more precious. Here are some time management tips that have helped me:

• · Schedule everything! I use my Google calendar and also use the Tasks option. This even applies to the weekends.

• · Pick days to come early and stay late. Keeping balance in your life is the way to avoid burning out and feeling overwhelmed. Instead of arriving each day at 7:00 am, choose certain days that you will. Instead of staying each day until 6:00, choose the days you will stay until 6:00. Thursdays were always my late days. I did all my planning for the next week on Thursdays and made all my copies and prepped my materials on Fridays. That left my weekends for assessing student work and other professional work (National Boards, doctoral coursework, etc.).

• · Buddy up! This was not something I have really needed, but I know many people are motivated by meeting a friend at a coffee shop and working together.

• · Take advantage of when NTA is open on Saturdays. It is a quiet place to work and you will have needed materials nearby.

What We (Teachers) Can Learn from Jay-Z

One of my favorite education bloggers, Jose Vilson, has a must-read piece at Education Week-Teacher. In a well-written and thought-provoking piece, he discusses what teachers, at all stages of their career, can learn from the career of Jay-Z. Here is a quick excerpt:

All teachers make mistakes. At the end of the day, we have regrets. We didn't listen to a student when we should have. We didn't take advantage of a professional development opportunity. We could have better planned a lesson. None of these mistakes will break us—unless we fail to learn from them and they become patterns in our careers.

His words remind me that mistakes and missteps are part of our work. It is what we learn from these mistakes and what we do with this learning that will either strengthen our practice or cause us to burnout.

Please read more at: http://www.edweek.org/tm/articles/2011/09/27/tln_vilson.html?tkn=ZVPFGUVICPlLwYOIpDvdDdd9zvNflIj5svTb&cmp=ENL-TU-NEWS1

**Full disclosure: I am a co-author of the book Teaching 2030 that Jose references at the end.

Enjoy Fall Intercession! I’m looking forward to seeing everyone well-rested and ready to go on 10/17!

Best,

Carrie

Trends of the Week @ NTA

Hi NTA Mentors and Residents,

Well, our 7^th week is coming to a close. Raise your hand if you are looking forward to Fall Intercession? Yes, my hand is up! The break will surely leave us feeling rejuvenated and ready to have a strong Fall with our students.

Since I have been “on fire” about supporting all of you this week with hallway transitions, I will start with that:

Hallway Transitions

Yes, there have been some challenges and successes this week. Successes include:

• Using ipad2’s to communicate the goal time to students (Ms. Lyons has a cool app for this)
• Increased used of nonverbal cues to communicate with students
• More consistent use of timers to collect data on students meeting (or not) their goal time

Residents, here some coaching points to consider as you address your individual challenges with leading hallway transitions:

• · Address students calmly and firmly when you need to redirect. Remember if you are getting frustrated, take a breath, and calmly and firmly restate expectations (being mindful of economy of language) and give individual consequences if needed. One suggestion is to carry a class roster with you to note if individual students receive a consequence.
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• · Make sure students know the goal time and let them know if they made it or not when the transition is done. If they are meeting the goal time, challenge them to decrease the time by a minute. Kids love a challenge!

• · Consider tying meeting the goal time to a classroom level incentive. Students may need more immediate gratification with the incentive if they are far from meeting the goal time/expectations.

• · Praise with thumbs up, whispers, smiles, or some other way but work to maintain a quiet/silent hallway

Be a student of the Signature Strategies

In my efforts to be a more effective coach, I frequently reread “Teach Like a Champion” and look at the accompanying video clips. Very often I find myself noticing something new or thinking about a strategy in a new way. This week, Dr. Gardiner shared an email response she sent to a resident who was thinking has some questions about the strategies. With Dr. Gardiner’s permission, here is a bit of what she wrote:

Historically (and contemporarily), children of color & children living in poverty achieve less, are suspended & disciplined more, and referred to special education in disproportionate amounts. So, typically, or at least too often, teachers take a deficit approach to children of color & children living in poverty. To me, the Sig Strats say, “hey, these are social, academic, behavioral skills (and teacher behaviors) that if explicated to children, can help them achieve. So, teach them, don’t blame them for not knowing what will help them be successful in the dominant culture.” So, teach the rules (for success in school and beyond) & also empower students so they can enter a system and change the system. Also, the Sig Strats are just a few tools in a much larger contextual practice with an end goal of increasing students' life opportunities.

So, for the “eyes on me” or “the book” or the “overhead”, to me that’s about focusing attention for learning, but it can slip into a means to control. When I ask for eyes on me, it’s about readiness to learn—and I only ask for it when it really matters b/c it doesn’t always.

So, to me the intent is not to "control" students, but teach them how to be successful learners—there are lots of ways to do that. Sig Strats offer some options. Framing means that I believe in you & your potential and I'm going to help you (sometimes force you—tough love) maximize your potential. And, I think the ultimate goal for children is to be lifelong, empowered learners who use knowledge for their own & the collective good.

I share this with you because I think it is helpful to be reminded of the “why” behind the use of the strategies. It is not about controlling students, although it is crucial to maintain a classroom that is safe, calm, and orderly. It is really about maximizing instructional time and the opportunities for students to learn.

On to week 8!!!

Best,

Carrie

NTA Trends of the Week (Week of 9/12/11)

Hi to all,

Well, the 6th week of school is under out belts. All of our 2nd-8th grade students have completed their MAP Tests in Reading and Math, and we will finish with science next week. Residents, you should know this data about your students. For those of you who teach math or writing only, make sure you know their MAP scores from reading. We expect all teachers to be reading teachers so that data is crucial to your planning.

Shout Outs

• To Stacy Barrett: Wow! What a smooth, Tight Transition leading your 6th graders from specials to the 4th floor on Thursday morning. Stacy used nonverbals/sign language effectively. The students were so quiet Ms. Jones did not even hear them until they were right behind her. Keep it up!
• To Jasmine Floyd: Another model of Tight Transitions! Your crisp, clear directives and voice of a "no nonsense nurturer" made the transition from the classroom to the cafe on Thursday quick and orderly. Again, keep it up :)
• To Megan Stewart: Having students Cold Call each other during a whole class discussion gave them ownership over the discussion. Nice!

Domain 1/Planning and Preparation

• During the planning process, it is imperative that you write clear lesson objectives that articulate what students should know and be able to do at the end of your instruction. This goes for mini-lessons, differentiated math/reading groups, read alouds, etc. If you are not clear about what students should learn/know/be able to do, you will not communicate it clearly and your students will be unsure of what you are doing with their time.

Domain 2/Classroom Environment

What to Do

As a teacher it is critical that your keep your emotions in check (see Lemov "Emotional Constancy"). When your emotions are not in check you get frustrated and often fall into nagging students. For example, a teacher who does not have their emotions in check and is frustrated may say, "You are in 5th grade and you are lining up like kindergarteners!" This does nothing to get students on the right track. What the students do need is a calm, firm teacher to name the desired behavior by using What to Do. Here are two other examples to illustrate this:

NO: Why are you moving before you've heard directions? YES: Stop. Wait to hear the directions.

NO: Why aren't you lined up yet? YES: Everyone walk to their line and face forward.

Mentors, you can help with this by bringing your residents' attention to their language by scripting, using audio record, or video

capture. Have your residents think about the messages their verbal and nonverbal communication sends. Then, have them

determine more suitable word choice if necessary.

I have a wonderful book titled "The Power of Our Words: Teacher Language that Helps Children Learn" by Paula Denton. It is

all about the teacher's words and tone of voice. Please see me if you want to borrow it. Language (verbal and nonverbal) is one

the most important teaching tools, if not the most. Use it wisely!

Tight Transitions

Part of what made Stacy and Jasmine's hallway transitions so effective was that they hardly spoke to students. You might be thinking, "Wait Kamm, with BMC you taught us to narrate. If I am going to narrate I am going to talk." So, let me unpack a bit more what made their transitions so effective and why they did not need to verbally narrate.

1) They used nonverbal cues/signals to communicate with students. Students knew what these nonverbal cues meant.

2) When they did talk it was to give students a quick, firm, calm directive.

3) There was no overt praise, just a thumbs up or a "Well, done 404. We made our goal time."

Remember we want to contribute to the hallway being a level 0 space. Part of that means we need to be as silent as possible in our communication with students. So, as we move forward into week 7, check to see that you:

• Have a goal time for each transition that has been communicated with students. Create an incentive if needed.
• Use a timer for transitions to collect data towards the goal time. Again, communicate this with students.
• Use your ipod to capture the audio so your mentor can hear your words with students.
• Determine what the nonverbal signals are you will use with students and make sure they know them.

Positive Narration

I am seeing more use of positive narration, but we are not there yet. J-Factor and Positive Framing-read each of these in TLAC and ask yourself these questions: What is my plan for better utilizing Positive Framing? In what ways can I incorporate J-Factor into my instruction and interaction with students? Also, check out the video clip of Ms. Austin form the TLAC DVD. She illustrates this well.

Domain 3/Instruction

Think Time

With giving think time, you want to do some work to make it more likely that everyone in fact is going to be thinking about your question or prompt. So, instead of saying "Can someone raise their hand and tell me what to do next" and give think time, try "Everyone think about what to do next" and give think time. It is a small tweak, but again communicates a firmer expectation that everyone is expected to think.

Domain 4/Professional Responsibilities

True Grit

This week I have been obsessed with the word "grit" thanks in part to this article by Paul Tough in the New York Times (a must read about how the KIPP schools develop grit in their students: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/18/magazine/what-if-the-secret-to-success-is-failure.html?_r=1). So, KIPP has created a report card that assesses students character (you can see it at the article-I'm kind of obsessed with it). One of the traits they assess is grit. Students who demonstrate grit:

• Finish whatever she or he begins
• Try very hard even after experiencing failure
• Work independently with focus

This got me thinking about the importance of teachers having grit, especially those who are effective in high need schools. Grit to me means working though the failures, having a strong sense of urgency about getting it right, and not settling for mediocrity in ourselves or our students. What does having grit mean to you?