More Front Loading Thoughts

Last week I had the opportunity to offer a very brief optional PD session on EL basics for my peers. I was so thankful to have 9 educators from my school volunteer their time to attend. It speaks to the dedication of the staff at my school that so many teachers were willing to invest their time...none of them needed the credit hours.

I did a modified section of the EL Open Institute where I gave them the opportunity to be second language learners by doing a brief model lesson in German. I try to cram in as many methods of making the content comprehensible as I can, and one strategy that I share is that if possible, it helps to preview the topic in the native language. Normally I give a brief one sentence explanation in English, but this time I was mentally distracted (and a little worn out from teaching all day) and I gave more like a 3-5 sentence explanation that included the language pattern we would be learning.

The result: the lesson fell flat. I was wondering why the engagement didn't seem to be as high as it normally is, but then one of my peers told me, "You front loaded it, so I just hunted and pecked for the right answer."

AAAAAAAAACK!

This is the exact opposite of what I am trying to do. Rather than promoting productive struggle, I spoon fed the answers ahead of time and wondered why they kept yawning.

My point is this: front loading is a lot more tricky than it seems. I crossed over the fine line of offering scaffolding and instead became a crutch, and rather than identifying the pattern themselves and applying it on their own, the exercise I gave became a search for the "right answer."

Have any of you had a teaching experience where your students all got the "right answer," but you ended the lesson pretty confident they had no clue how to find that answer on their own in different contexts?

Folks

Today has been a bit rough. The least favorite part of my job is the rampant standardized assessment. I see my students work so hard and get beat down continually. It's frustrating.

So I'm thinking back to a particularly good moment from last week.

The word "folks" came up in the book we were reading, and my 6th graders were unfamiliar with it. I took some time to explain the word, citing synonyms such as family, relatives, next-of-kin, and added that your folks are the people you would call if you got in trouble. I asked my students to think of an example of the "folks" in their lives.

And one said, "You're my folks."

That, my friends, is why I teach. They are my folks, too. And unfortunately, that kind of thing is difficult to measure on a standardized test.