Alien Pedagogy

I had only four students in my summer school course. I took advantage of this to experiment with seating arrangements. We had the following stations:

Work Station — This was our base. It’s an ironic name since most of our work was done at computers. However, we would generate notes and discussion here. We read here. Students sat here when if I presented information or a demonstration for the first time. Five desks were arranged in a group.

Computer Stations — Conveniently, there are four classroom computers in my room. So “go to your computer” was something I was able to say every day. Students appreciated having this option and it was not abused. One desk per computer.

Quiz Station — This was the station that really showed the power of the different stations. When we moved to this part of the classroom, students shifted into testing gear. Desks were in two rows of two.

Scored Discussion Station — Four desks arranged so that students could sit and talk to each other.

Conference Station — Where students would meet with me in the classroom throughout the course. One desk for me and one for the student.

I’m not sure that I would run all of these stations again, but normally my class holds like six times as many students so I enjoyed partitioning off the room.

We often think that this sort of seating is designed for elementary students, but even adults subconsciously obey the cues of seating arrangements and interior design. In class, I noticed that this helped students to “transition” from one assessment skill or task to another. So instead of me speaking to guide them through the transition, they just walked to a different place and sat down in a different mindset.

I spent two weeks teaching summer school this month. It was fun, though not what I expected.

• I expected that students would be resentful of spending time at school in July. Actually, all of my students seemed happy to spend more time with their peers.
• I expected to see students to have little enthusiasm for English. Actually, the students did enjoy the story. In fact, what they really lacked in the course was sufficient attention from the teacher.
  
• I expected students to get really bored of spending seven hours / day with me. Actually, they stayed focused and invested in the winter course all the way to the end of the course.
• I expected that I would have to work hard to motivate the class. Actually, each lesson consisted of an demonstration followed by a practice and task. The students couldn’t wait to work.

In the end, summer school was a really great experience for me and for the class. We established a productive learning environment that was fun, safe, and focused. I hope that it will stay with them as they move on to the next grade this fall.

Dr. Kim’s session “Facilitating Self-Reflection, Development, and Growth of Teachers Who Educate Abroad” was intended to be therapeautic. I didn’t read the summary, so I was surprised to find myself in a room full of teachers looking for release — I was the youngest person there by at least ten years.

We started by discussing what we thought we did well as teachers, which I found difficult to do without feeling pretentious. I went for energetic, which I think is honest. I could also have went for humorous.

After this, the session moved on to sharing things that caused teachers stress.

Here’s a summary of things that causes teachers stress:

• “My administrators don’t listen to me” was said by more than one teacher. In fact, a lot of hostility and frustration about admin was vented during this session. I can’t imagine a more thankless job than being a principal, but sometimes they don’t seem to listen so well. Interestingly, Dr. Kim was quick to point out that teachers often fail to listen to students.
• “All I do is work” was said by many teachers, which is true for me as well. I work so much that the main goal I’ve failed to achieve this year is seeing Hong Kong. At one point, a neighbor started “when I go home, the first thing I do is–” and I interrupted “check my work email!” So that was a great moment for me. I was surprised to find so many teachers talking about how they’d neglected to form long-term relationships or had chosen not to start families. Is this what I’ll become?
• Then the teachers with families spoke up, wondering why they aren’t given more time to work with their families — or skip a meeting. I heard at least one single teacher grumble at this.
• No teacher blamed students for causing stress.

In review:

• Dr. Kim was friendly and professional. And funny! She has a lot of personal anecdotes that are engaging and hilarious. I would definitely have stayed longer to hear more stories from her.
• At least half of the teachers in the room came in late, but Dr. Kim patiently invited newcomers to join a group each time they entered late. I’m not sure whether anyone else caught it, but she trained us to invite new comers to sit down — pretty sly, Dr. Kim.
• Dr. Kim had four slides during her presentation, each of them a symbolic image that could be interpreted in a variety of ways. She used this to generate responses to her questions, which I enjoyed.

Ultimately, the experience wasn’t what I expected, but it was cathartic. It was the last presentation that I went to, but I was glad that I went to see her present rather than going snorkeling with my friends.

William and Ochan Powell’s presentation wasn’t the first time that I’ve studied differentiation, validity, understanding by design, or assessment for learning. Nevertheless, their delivery was by far the best I’ve encountered.

Order of Events:

The Powells began with paired discussion about assumptions we make about teaching, which was effective because few concepts are as poorly understood as differentiation. Moreover, many teachers seem even afraid to discuss it (other teachers are eager to brag about it, which actually isn’t productive in these sessions), so the one:one approach was effective (and in line with think, pair, share).

We made a list of assumptions with brief bursts of discussion. We concluded that there’s a difference of purpose between assessment and grades (Assessment is required for learning. Grading is not necessary for learning).

That grading is so often given priority over assessment / feedback indicates a significant problem in our educational system, it reveals that all stakeholders too often focus on rating rather than learning.

From here, they went on to give six recommendations via power point. You can download their recommendations here.

In Review:

• What stands out about this style of presenting is its non-confrontational approach. All too often, presentations begin by outlining what should NOT be done. The audience is invited to engage in two minutes hate. No one felt threatened during the Powell presentation and everyone left with an inspired determination to integrate their “recommendations” (rather than orders, which I thought was a very clever use of word choice).
• That the Powells have delivered this presentation more than once was apparent. However, rather than being impatient or tired, they consistently came across as professionals. I loved the way they looked after each other when teacher comments became a little stressed.
• Their advocacy of “professional judgment” was something I haven’t considered.
• The idea of reporting on “effort, timely completion of work, class participation, attendance, attitude, homework, behavior” without having these things affect the student’s grade was excellent. I also liked how they suggested that these things are more important for succeeding in life than grades but that they still had no business being on an academic rubric (they could be an a study skills rubric that would be listed on a report card without affecting student GPA).

Again, I have studied these concepts before but it’s very useful for all of us to re-attend sessions on these concepts. This style of teaching represents a sea change in our reporting systems and even purpose. It’s very easy to veer away from teaching that is in line with differentiation, validity, understanding by design, or assessment for learning.

I left feeling a sense of pedagogical oneness — a Jedi-like focus.

While reading The Odyssey, our focus has been developing the ability to analyze cultural norms revealed by text. Today students demonstrated this style of analysis through speeches and/ or reflective writing.

We began with a focused group discussion on whether it’s ever OK to give up, re-read the section that we’d study intensively and then groups began to identify key words and concepts required to analyze “The Lotus Eaters.” We listed the best concepts (more than once including drugs, responsibility, escape, obedience, home) on the board and from there went on to do RAFT writing (which I use based on recommendation from Jim Lerch, though Dr. Rojas also mentioned it at the EARCOS conference).

• Role – Odysseus
• Audience – His men who are high on the Lotus
• Format – Persuasive speech
• Topic – Why they should return to the boat

The students wrote. They were required to use at least five of six key concepts written on the board. They then read aloud. From there, they wrote the values The Odyssey attempts to convey.

Reflection:

• Student questions on theme were insightful.
• Student questions on grammar revealed more desire to take risks than usual – they manipulated tense and even used prefixes.
• Voice happened.
• “How do you think Odysseus would feel when he sees his men lazing about?” led to stronger readings.
• The values and evidence discussed in the final activity demonstrated a strong understanding of the text.

On the whole, it was quite an enjoyable lesson for students. It was also effective.