Resource Category: Teacher

Tucker: More teachers are like, oh, yes, I’ve heard of flipped classroom. And I’ve actually moved away from flipped classroom as a label to flipped learning kind of where just with the flipped classroom, there was this idea that we’re going to send video instruction home with kids. That will be what they do for homework, so they can control the time, the place, and the pace of their learning.

And then, like you said, when they come to class, we can do that really rich work of digging in and applying and practicing and extending on what was learned in the video, but within the context of the classroom, where teachers are there to support students who have your subject area expert in the room.

You also have this beautiful community of peers, with whom students can lean on and ask questions and problem solve and troubleshoot and there’s a lot of beauty in that model.

But more and more as I play around with video, you know, when I was teaching and now in my work as a coach, video is an incredible vehicle to just create more time and space where we as teachers can really tuck in next to kids and be that facilitator coach. So instead of always thinking of it as the classroom and we’re sending video content home with students. Really, how do we lean on video, even in the context of the physical classroom, once we’re on a hybrid schedule or once we’re lucky enough to be back in schools with kids to free ourselves from that pressure to be at the front of the room, whether that’s orchestrating a lesson, providing instruction, giving directions. Teachers, there’s so much time spent in that “expert at the front of the room” role that I’d love to see spent in direct work with groups or individual students. And so I think video can really free teachers in a way that’s exciting, regardless of whether they’re working online with kids, on a hybrid schedule, or in this concurrent classroom situation.

Tucker: When I think about a lot of the work that I’m doing with teachers right now., yes, it’s digging into models and strategies, but we’re also having to address mindset and where teachers place value on, in terms of their work and the role they inhabit. So what I see teachers doing is placing a lot of value on their role as expert, you know, subject area expert. And of course, we have a degree of subject area expertise that’s really important, but I’m never going to know and hold more information in my brain than Google. So if all my value as an educator is tied up in my expertise, then technology and these different models are a little frightening. And what I would love to see teachers do, is start to really value the human interaction, that human side of teaching, that coaching, facilitating and I think video can play a really strategic role in allowing us to spend more time in that other role.

Armelino:  I think what’s interesting is, that’s always been the key, that was a key before we use technology. I think having people understand is, as Catlin was sharing – that we have to be intentional about that in this new environment and recognizing – it’s not just about delivering instruction. It’s actually being able to interact with kids, allowing kids to be able to interact with each other, and trying to figure out how to use the tool as a specific strategy around doing that and being intentional around it. I think that’s where folks are struggling is still recognizing that I think there’s this, there’s this, I don’t know, it’s that, that, it’s good as the enemy of great, as folks are just they figured out how to do this. So now that we’ve done this right doing then others. We’ve got technology in the hands of kids right we’re using the camera. We’re doing zoom. I figured out how to do this, get everybody to login  then I’m doing all those other pieces and say, okay, now it’s good at teaching. Let’s get it. What we know really works. Kids and actually thinking of this as a new tool and new strategy to enhance things which I really appreciate it. You were trying to get out there is trying to have people think of this from an asset based approach. Not a deficit approach.

Tucker: Like the theory is great, but I want the hands on strategies. I want the resources like I want something I can use right now and I very much take that mentality into the training that I do with teachers and so what I realized is and I’m, I, you know, I’m kind of still fleshing out how to do this best with teachers because the mindset piece can be tough for them. I mean, but I think it’s almost like we have to approach it from mindset, skill set, tool set,  right the mindset doesn’t change,  I can’t do much work with the other pieces. And so I think one of the ways I’ve tried to approach it is, and I did this when we were, one of the things I did for you, is really let’s have a conversation about a theoretical framework that grounds online and blended learning. Let’s talk about teacher roles in this space and where you are currently investing your time and energy and it’s not the best place for you and your students to be putting that time and energy and how do we make adjustments and think about, you know, valuing things like, I see again, and 

This is part of teachers feeling like their value is wrapped up in being an expert. It’s like so much more time is spent in an instructor role and you can tell kids everything you want to tell them, but where they need you is when the rubber meets the road and they’re trying to apply or implement. They need coaching, they need feedback and so really thinking about, like, I’ll tell teachers, I think, giving feedback is as if not more important than the instruction itself. Without the feedback and the guidance kids aren’t going to be successful. So it’s all of these little shifts, you have to have to conversations about grading, and in this moment, which is really sticky also, but just getting them kind of questioning “Why am I doing what I’m doing?” and “Is it serving me and is it serving my students in this moment?”

Tucker: So I was very torn about blogging about the concurrent classroom because I did not, I did not want, I’m very clear if you read my blogs, I don’t think it,  you know it’s not grounded and research is not grounded in best practice to me it feels like a solution that is convenient for staffing and scheduling purposes. And so I wasn’t sure I wanted to blog about it because I didn’t want my blogs to be seen as this endorsement, that this is a great way to handle this situation, I would much rather have teachers totally dedicated to online learning. And then those who are just in the classroom with kids because that juggle is just incredibly challenging, and I don’t think it’s what’s best for kids and I don’t think it’s what’s best for teachers. Now that being said, An increasing number of teachers I support are being placed in that situation. They have no control over it.

So then I want to be as useful as I can in thinking through, “How do we approach this moment and make learning as rewarding and teaching as rewarding as possible?” and I think for anybody who’s trying to juggle kids in the classroom and kids online simultaneously using traditional whole group instructional strategies are going to be very frustrated and very disillusioned very quickly. You’re just going to lose kids, those kids online already don’t feel like they’re equal members of the class, just by function that they’re not in that physical room.

So because my expertise is in blended learning models I was initially like okay, that’s what I would lean on if I was a teacher at this moment. I wouldn’t be trying to keep everybody’s attention on me on a single task at one moment. I’d be thinking about leveraging these models so that students had more control over the pace at which they’re moving through and that I had the opportunity to work with smaller groups of students. So the flip flop approach which you mentioned earlier. Is really just a very simple to station rotation. And the goal was just to have the teacher be able to focus on one group of students, the in class students, the online students, at a single time because what I kept hearing from teachers is it’s chaos. I am so overwhelmed. I feel like I can’t give anybody my complete attention. I’m like, monitoring the screen while trying to address kids in class. And so there is just this inherent inequality of teacher attention in a concurrent classroom and that’s no fault of the teachers. You have kiddos in the room who can yell out or raise our hands or what they’re going to command more of your attention and time. And so for me, the flip flop and always start with those kiddos online and begin every class with , hey, I’m training my kids when they come through the physical door or when they come into the zoom room, they have a welcome task and that welcome task gives me as the teacher, a chance to welcome those online students right because I physically like wait to the kids coming through my door but as they sit down to start that welcome task, I’m on zoom, hey, how are you doing I’m checking in. I’m taking attendance. I’m doing the administrative tasks that take time at the beginning of a period and then I do my teacher lead station with the kiddos on zoom and then release them. Ideally, I know that not all teachers get to do that because there’s requirements about time spent in that synchronous mode. But at the very least release them into breakout rooms or release them on their own, so they can do self paced work and then I shift my attention to these kids here. 

Tucker: One of the other pieces that I found particularly useful to address that inequality of teacher attention is regardless of the learning landscape the child is in, everybody uses the same vehicle to communicate questions or ask for help. So whether that is a Remind App or, you know, having a virtual queue with Classroom Q or messaging in a learning management system that way both sets of students have equal access to our attention as the teacher. So lots of challenges with that that approach for sure.

Armelino: I think that last piece. I haven’t heard that that last piece around everybody using a similar tool to communicate. Right is key, because I think folks are thinking when the kids back at school we put the technology aside and now we teach face to face and we use technology when we’re at home. You know, you bring your tool, bring your resource to class. This is a tool that we need you to always have, all your tools available.

Armelino: I really appreciate answering that question, especially with the way you prefaced it because I think that’s the struggle is we know it’s not the appropriate way to do it. And it’s a way, and I think all with good intention and often I think administrators are making these decisions around this how we’re going to meet the minutes and policy is creating some of these you know requirements and so they think they’re making it easier for the teacher because now we don’t have to plan an additional lesson. But actually what you’re doing is you’re creating somewhat of a nightmare, because now I have to plan around behaviors and kids who are sitting passively. I’ve had people reach out to me directly, both teachers and even administrators, who are saying this doesn’t make sense to me. This just doesn’t jive with what I know and I’m like, yeah, I can’t find anything that doesn’t jive with what I know about good teaching with and so we appreciate you giving that perspective.

Tucker: Well, and I think they’re like, oh, but it’s the highest flex model adapted for k 12 and I’m like okay, but if you think about the way in which most college courses are run and the teaching the strategies used, it’s a such a different experience that you’re using this high flex approach for at the post secondary level. And so I did some serious digging into the research to try to find, I mean I literally could not find a single reference to this being done in K 12. I found some awesome shout outs in post secondary but it’s just like apples and oranges, you can’t really compare those two and say, oh, well, they’re doing it here, we’ll just do it over here.

Tucker: I wrote a blog about like really thinking intentionally about synchronous versus asynchronous learning kind of activities and how I would love to see that precious synchronous time. And that doesn’t quite frankly – it doesn’t matter to me whether we’re talking about synchronous in a physical classroom or in a Zoom room to really create time and space for the learning activities that benefit from human interaction, social learning. And so, giving kids a chance to bring whatever they have – notes or the beginning of something – to that synchronous time where  the teacher doesn’t have to give the instruction, doesn’t have to go through a model hoping everybody’s paying attention. The kids have had access to that. And quite frankly, if they didn’t watch the video, they can still watch it during this – you know, like play it. And the teacher can get into the weeds supporting that progress and also leverage the community, that collective intelligence of this group, to allow kids to work with and learn from each other.

And I think one of my areas of frustration – I actually just blogged about this – is what I perceive is the under-utilization of shared collaborative virtual spaces online. Like, how are we honoring the fact that, in part, learning has a social dimension and kids are – a lot of them quarantined, socially distant – craving connection. And we’re not necessarily prioritizing that in the synchronous time in the way that I think would help kids take these ideas they engage with asynchronously in a video or whatever and then put them into practice or apply them.

Armelino: And you’re absolutely right, that’s the piece that I think that it goes back to. People are still trying to get comfortable, so there’s this initial okay, I’ve got to do this. So now I’m trying to do it and trying to manage the whole class. And as you said, they’re trying to be experts and so they’re not comfortable sharing the learning, sharing the teaching, knowing how to engage kids, knowing how to be able to put kids into different rooms, how to bring them back. That whole management of that piece and having the comfort level of trying to do it. I think that’s why there are so many that do this whole group. Again, going back to the regular classroom, we see the same thing. Teacher “sage on the stage” kind of thing – having to teach and knowing how to manage cooperative learning and those pieces too.

Tucker: It’s funny, as a coach, I would pre-COVID go into classrooms, like I would have been in individual coaching sessions where we did co-lesson planning together, and then I would get into classrooms and teachers would always lament like “I just don’t have enough time. I just don’t have enough time to get all this stuff done.” And then I’m in the classroom, I’m like, “How long is this first activity going to take?” It’s just ballooning into you know where the teachers kind of doing what they need to do, and kids are kind of just taking their time settling in, and I’m like, we need to maximize this time. And I get it, teachers have so many administrative tasks they have to deal with and checking in, like you said, with kids who have been absent or missing assignments or whatever the issue may be.

So for me, that “do now” or that welcome task, it’s to make sure we’re not losing precious minutes at the beginning and also we’re kind of squashing some of those management issues that happen at the start a class because they’re wiggly little humans who are excited to see each other. And that’s okay, but let’s train them to kind of quickly transition into a task. And what I want teachers to do is to think about all the ways they could use that that beginning time. So maybe it is some brain-based retrieval kind of activities or maybe it’s start with a feedback form about tell me about this experience, how you enjoyed this lesson, how effective was this video. So using it as an opportunity to collect feedback from students so we’re continually learning and improving on our practice. Let’s engage them in some self assessment activities, let’s pique their interest, drive inquiry. There are so many cool kinds of things we could do to get them settled where it’s not always the same task, which can get kind of old over time for kids. They’re like, “Ugh I gotta sit down and do this grammar review every time at the beginning of class.” There’s lots of ways to leverage it to engage kids in metacognitive skill building and review and practice. And you know, even an online discussion prompt where everybody gets a chance to have their, you know, add their two cents to a conversation.

And then when it comes to the strategies I feel like teachers could use to engage kids, I go through and talk about lots of ways to structure like small group teacher-led experiences in a classroom. But even on a Zoom call, so many teachers, the go-to is like, “I’m going to lead with instruction. I’m going to lead with modeling.” And sometimes that’s all they ever do in those sessions with kids and you know, I just want them to consider what if you use like a “Hook the Group” strategy where instead, you lead with an unfamiliar problem. Maybe it’s a math problem you’ve never gone over or maybe it’s an unfamiliar task you are asking kids to tackle. And you let kids kind of sit in this space of productive struggle where they can chat, they can think creatively, collaborate with their peers. It could be in a breakout room, it could be in the physical classroom, and they just wrestle with it. And as a teacher, you learn so much just by listening and observing those kids at work. What strategies are they using? What questions are they asking? What prior knowledge are they drawing from? Where are the clear gaps that I need to make sure I address? And then once kids have had a chance to kind of struggle together in this productive way and you debrief and you let them kind of share out. What did you do? Why’d you do it? Then they lean into the explanation. They kind of want to hear the instruction because they’ve sat in the space of productive struggle.

I talk about modifying – like if you want to model something, let’s make that really robust and interactive, and you know, do kind of like that “I Do, We Do, Groups Do, You Do,” and create space for that. If you are going to do some direct instruction like remember that working memory in the brain is really small. So chunk your presentation and follow kind of a “Present-Pause-Discuss” strategy. I present for five minutes. I give you some time to catch up on your notes, process what you heard, identify your questions. And let’s have an informal conversation so you make sure anything that’s unclear, I’m able to clarify before we move on. So there’s all of these little approaches. I have one that’s like a “review, bridge, build.” Let’s start by reviewing something we’ve already done. Let’s create a bridge between that and what we’re going to talk about today. And then I have instruction. So just thinking about how do we make this interactive and engaging for learners so they’re not just passively listening to a teacher talk for an extended period of time in class or on a Zoom call because we all know that’s not going to be really exciting for kids.

Tucker: I think the goal is to feel less like we have to manage everything. And it’s scary to let go and trust that kids can do it, but they are so capable. Doesn’t mean they won’t need some, you know, skill building and some redirection at times, but they can do it. And if the tasks are interesting and engaging, some of those management pieces kind of fall away eventually anyway. But that’s another, that’s another conversation.

So one of the things that I focus on a lot in my work with teachers who are planning for online learning because I’ve been a traditional classroom teacher, I taught blended learning courses, and I’ve taught entirely online, and I do know from experience that that physical distance between teacher and student online makes it harder to kind of track where kids are at. It’s harder to have your thumb on, okay, who’s stagnating, who’s making progress, who needs more, who didn’t get this. And so being really intentional about building those mechanisms into our lessons to collect formative assessment data is critical. Otherwise it’s very hard to, at the very least differentiate learning, and at the very best to personalize learning. And so for me, just reminding teachers that you know, that can happen at three different points in a learning cycle. You can assess prior knowledge at the beginning. We know not every kid is starting from the same spot. So are we being intentional about trying to understand where they are starting from, what they already know, or what the misconceptions they’re bringing into a particular learning cycle is? Then obviously, that check for understanding along the way – what are they getting, what are they missing, what have I maybe not been super clear about? Then getting them reflecting on the learning that has happened. Taking a step back to identify what did I learn, how did I learn it, what am I still confused about? You don’t have to do all three in every single lesson but just being aware that we want to be integrating those mechanisms as much as possible, not to shove a bunch of points in a gradebook, which I’m very clear when I talk to teachers, it’s a signal for us. Where are kids at and what do they need? 

Then as we think about the station rotation, you know, when we start doing those checks for understanding, we’re going to have kids who are in different places. And so using that data, that information, to inform – “You know what, today I’m going to group kids this way because this group actually needs this, this group would benefit from this, and this group over here needs this.” So in that teacher-led station, we’re being really nimble. And it’s fascinating because over the years, what I’ve heard from teachers who that hasn’t quite clicked for them yet is, “I don’t know why I would do station rotation? I’m saying the same thing three times or four times. Why would I do that?” And I’m like well, if you’re saying the same thing, the same way, three or four times, then that’s not a good use of your time.

But kids are very different. They have different needs and skills and interests and language proficiencies and are we taking that into account when we design this teacher-led station? Even if we’re going to cover the same skills or content with each group, maybe the scaffold supports, the problems, the prompts we’re using are slightly different depending on the kids that we’re working with. And so I think that’s kind of – you almost have to get comfortable with the rotation, make the mistakes that are just typical at the beginning of trying something new. And then start layering on that complexity of like, really being diligent about building in formative assessment mechanisms and differentiating those experiences at the various stations. And start with your teacher-led station, because that’s the one that’s going to be the most natural for you to start to make those kind of adjustments.

Magyar: I kind of wanted to get at this larger issue of  why we might be bringing the younger students back to in-person instruction or on campus in some way. We think a lot of LEAs are going to probably be adopting this approach, where you have either the cohorts of high-need students or kind of the younger students. So can you speak to the rationale behind that, some of the the pros and cons to that, anything that we could do to help LEAs accommodate this, because you’re actually speaking to how young learners can really thrive in the online space. And so I’m just kind of curious your thoughts about the waiver options and bringing these students back. 

Tucker: Well, ironically, I think the most successful young learning I’ve seen happening online, is really prioritizing getting those kiddos off the screen. You know, have them pull together, build community, give an overview for the week. And then you have like, you know, I’ve seen elementary teachers who’ve been successful in this moment – it’s not easy, but they’ve been successful – where they’ll start with one of those quick 20 minutes, almost like replicating circle time on a Zoom call where the goal is like, “Let’s make connections. Let’s have fun. Let’s figure out where we’re going this week.” And then the rest of the week, the teachers are doing a really beautiful job of small group, like pulling kids into small group instruction, spending 15-20 minutes with this group, and moving.

It’s exhausting for the teacher, but then they’ve done a beautiful job of releasing kids to do things, whether it’s printing, or going outside and coloring pictures, or identifying colors and shapes, and all these different things, where they really found a way to allow young learners to engage in that experiential, very tactile learning that is so important for them. And quite frankly, younger learners don’t have the self regulation skills developed yet to be a successful in this asynchronous learning or even synchronous online learning. We have high school kids who are struggling with that and so  I think it’s really appropriate to try to get those kids back into physical spaces in a safe way obviously as soon as possible, because of the smaller attention spans at that age, you know like I said, not having those self regulation skills, and there’s also just like the social component, right. Some of these kids have never been in school or daycare, anything beyond their home environment. And there’s a lot to be said about that social interaction, that social learning that happens when you have to negotiate with other tiny people who want to get in your space and they want your stuff. You know, so those pieces, you can’t replicate that experience online as much as we would love to. As I said, I think what should be happening in the classroom are those pieces that really benefit from social learning and human interaction. And kids that age, they just love their teachers, right, like they have such a connection. And I heard a quote on an NPR story I was listening to where they were talking to a parent and they asked the kid a question. She’s a kindergartener and she’s online. They were like, “Do you have any friends in your class yet?” And she goes, “No, not yet. I haven’t met anybody. Just seeing them on the screen.” I was like, oh my god, I want to cry.