In today’s standards based report card design session, I shared a story from the road. It featured a devoted and tireless leader from another district that I supported in the same capacity a long, long time ago: I was doing a bit of norm-setting and establishing expectations relevant to transparency when it became clear that something was off. I wondered aloud if my friend was having second thoughts. Did he still want to move forward?…
Sharing My Thinking and Learning and Work As promised, I’ll be sharing a few peeks into my work facilitating a standards based grading and reporting initiative in a New York State public school over the next several weeks and months. Each visit will bring me back to this space, where I’ll try to make our process and more importantly, our greatest discoveries and tensions, as transparent as I can. I’m hoping that this will…
When I was a fellow in Communities for Learning, Leading Lasting Change, I learned a great deal about seeking representation. “Who will be most affected by the shift you’re making?” I was asked. “How do you plan to assess their needs and interests and include them in the planning?” These questions came back to me as I began planning to plan a new standards based grading and reporting initiative a few months ago, and they…
Over the last ten years, I’ve facilitated district-wide shifts to standards based grading numerous times. As I prepare to begin again in a new-to-me school district, the memories of those professional experiences aren’t the ones rising to the top of my consciousness, though. I’m thinking about how standards based grading helped me parent better. I actually wrote a tiny bit about that on this blog, way back when. My daughter Nina was in fifth grade. She…
What does revision look like beyond your writing workshop? Have you thought you about this? I don’t think that I ever did when I still had a classroom of my very own, but I’ve been wondering about it often, lately. Who expects writers to revise other than their writing teachers? And what does that experience entail? How do other teachers expect writers to approach revision, and how do their practices influence the way writers treat…
There are many reasons and many ways to make writing in our classrooms and workshops. And there are many things that should give us pause here, too. For instance, if making isn’t elevating the writer in our students or the writing that they produce, I question whether we should be sacrificing writing time to it. But. If you know me well, then you know that I also spend a bit of time questioning what it…
2006. I think this was the first time that I found myself facilitating a curriculum mapping initiative. Even then, it was all about culture ahead of curriculum. I was fortunate to have mentors who helped me seek representation from those who would be most affected by the work, ahead of doing it. They helped me establish better feedback loops. They challenged me to think hard about how I would sustain our learning and our work.…
I’ve spent this entire week traveling all over Alberta, Canada. I’ve worked with primary and intermediate level teachers, and I’ve worked with middle and high school teachers. I’ve worked with English and Science and Social Studies teachers. I’ve worked with French teachers. I’ve worked with Math teachers. And I’ve also worked with ELL teachers. They support the Hutterites who live in their communities. Those children were born and raised in Canada. German is their first…
This photo was taken last fall, as I led a week-long lesson study on argument writing at the middle level. It’s interesting: Many teachers tell me that narrative is difficult to teach, but personally, argument writing has inspired a great deal of my own growth over the last 25 years. Doesn’t that sound sweet and super positive? Yes. Argument writing has been an inspiring teacher. But y’all, you KNOW how that growth happens. It…
“If we want to understand better the complex world of the classroom, and if we want our scholarship to have an impact on the work of teachers, it’s important we find a more central place for story.” Steve Shann I’ve been moved by Steve Shann’s work for quite some time, as an educator, a writer, and a story lover. Steve knows the importance of this form. He understands its ability to change minds and lives. And…