I've been gone but hopefully not forgotten.
We have spent the beginning of this school year in a more focused and purposeful way of work. Our school is entrenched in the Florida Continuous Improvement Model and making certain our students' needs are matched with the appropriate Instructional Stratgies. However, as we started the work this year we were sidetracked by something that does not seem very important..student engagement. How many students were really ENGAGED: interested, excited even , in and about the learning process. We visited classrooms, where at the end of our observation time we were racing out from being so unbelievably unengaged as adult learners. What could our students be experiencing. They walk away content with unengaging, ho-hum classes because they are conditioned to believe that's what school is all about. Only imagine-could our high school students experience this daily. Could students really go from class to class and not have SOMETHING happen that had them NOT wanting to learn more instead of bolt out the door at the sound of the bell?
Of course, me being the eternal learning leader that I am, I knew it had to be my fault. I had to reflect. I often document student engagement or lack thereof, but I really had not done a whole lot of "study" around STUDENT ENGAGEMENT...nor had I taken teachers to task who were just plain boring....so the search began. (Coincidentally our DOE team came in and referenced the students as passively engaged...go figure...passively---engaged)...But, I digressed;...each of us, all of the administrators and the academic coaches, began to search for information that would allow us to put into words what student enagement "looked like in practice."
After much search and finding some really great resources, my math coach found a handbook that I will forever use as a part of my professional material. Student Engagement: Creating a Culture by Richard Jones, gave specific practical steps to view engagement at a glance and the much more challenging noticing of "authentic engagement;" questioning students about their interest in the class and instruction. Our teachers are being challenged to have the students rate their classes on the engagement continuum with level 1 being "I was bored to sleep" to 5 being "I did not want to leave."
We can now move to the next steps of looking at strategies that not only increase engagement but have been proven to yield increased performance. Marzano's High Yield Strategies are not the "end all, be all" but they provide some well documented instructional models that teachers can integrate..not just into their class but into their practice.
Simultaneously we analyzing student work and the quality therein. We often say students rise to the level of our expectation, but is our expectation aligned with what will be necesssry for students to have growth on high stakes tests? One of my Assistant Principals noted higher expectations=better outcomes. Focusing on student work can only be a means to that end.
It was not until today that I thought of our work as being Action Research, but it is. The only question that remains is whether this ation will yield the level of impact necessary to have substanial growth for our children. All I can say is "Watch our Smoke."
And just because it makes me feel better...if you have not read Classroom Instruction that Works, by Marzano, and you are trying to get marked growth with your students...read it.
We have spent the beginning of this school year in a more focused and purposeful way of work. Our school is entrenched in the Florida Continuous Improvement Model and making certain our students' needs are matched with the appropriate Instructional Stratgies. However, as we started the work this year we were sidetracked by something that does not seem very important..student engagement. How many students were really ENGAGED: interested, excited even , in and about the learning process. We visited classrooms, where at the end of our observation time we were racing out from being so unbelievably unengaged as adult learners. What could our students be experiencing. They walk away content with unengaging, ho-hum classes because they are conditioned to believe that's what school is all about. Only imagine-could our high school students experience this daily. Could students really go from class to class and not have SOMETHING happen that had them NOT wanting to learn more instead of bolt out the door at the sound of the bell?
Of course, me being the eternal learning leader that I am, I knew it had to be my fault. I had to reflect. I often document student engagement or lack thereof, but I really had not done a whole lot of "study" around STUDENT ENGAGEMENT...nor had I taken teachers to task who were just plain boring....so the search began. (Coincidentally our DOE team came in and referenced the students as passively engaged...go figure...passively---engaged)...But, I digressed;...each of us, all of the administrators and the academic coaches, began to search for information that would allow us to put into words what student enagement "looked like in practice."
After much search and finding some really great resources, my math coach found a handbook that I will forever use as a part of my professional material. Student Engagement: Creating a Culture by Richard Jones, gave specific practical steps to view engagement at a glance and the much more challenging noticing of "authentic engagement;" questioning students about their interest in the class and instruction. Our teachers are being challenged to have the students rate their classes on the engagement continuum with level 1 being "I was bored to sleep" to 5 being "I did not want to leave."
We can now move to the next steps of looking at strategies that not only increase engagement but have been proven to yield increased performance. Marzano's High Yield Strategies are not the "end all, be all" but they provide some well documented instructional models that teachers can integrate..not just into their class but into their practice.
Simultaneously we analyzing student work and the quality therein. We often say students rise to the level of our expectation, but is our expectation aligned with what will be necesssry for students to have growth on high stakes tests? One of my Assistant Principals noted higher expectations=better outcomes. Focusing on student work can only be a means to that end.
It was not until today that I thought of our work as being Action Research, but it is. The only question that remains is whether this ation will yield the level of impact necessary to have substanial growth for our children. All I can say is "Watch our Smoke."
And just because it makes me feel better...if you have not read Classroom Instruction that Works, by Marzano, and you are trying to get marked growth with your students...read it.
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