Here's a question for you: Why do we limit participation in Varsity Basketball to just high school students? I have seen for myself that there are plenty of 6th and 7th graders that can dribble, shoot, remember plays. Aren't these the skills we are looking for in varsity players? It's a silly question, I know. While they may have the basic skills, they have not yet had time to develop some more nuanced decision making patterns that are necessary in the faster paced arena of the high school game. They may not be big enough to defend themselves against a bigger, faster opponent. And, while they may have basic dribbling and shooting skills, those skills probably are not developed enough to help them navigate the situations they will find themselves in in big league. It's the same with technology. We issue laptops to students in grades 6-12 so they can access learning materials 24/7. We post assignments and videos and provide opportunities for students to work at their own pace. We use collaborative tools to provide feedback to students seamlessly so they don't have to wait until the next class to move forward. What we don't do is think about our students' ability to manage the added burden that technology can sometimes be. We ask them to make decisions about how best to use the machines, how to manage their time, how to avoid distractions and often times how to navigate through an online social environment that can contain some of those bigger and more experienced players. Rarely do we provide a scaffold to help them learn the skills they need to become "varsity" technology users. Instead we look to disciipline students when things go wrong. When students are found chatting, using social media, or playing games, we hand out detentions. We limit access and in some cases take the devices away altogether. Nowhere in this equation do we ask students WHY they are doing these things. I don't know why it continually surprises me to have a blinding flash of the obvious. In a previous article I wrote about ways teachers can support students to use technology more effectively in competency based learning. It included a continuum for teachers to help identify where students are in their progress towards independent and productive technology use. Shortly after I submitted the article, I was asked to speak with two students about their laptop use in class. One was skyping, one was playing games. Both were significantly behind teacher pace. It occurred to me that I could use my classroom continuum to interview each student- and here's where the epiphany occurred. I could also rewrite the continuum so it contained student friendly language. Each of these students could then go through the continuum and rate themselves on each of the sections. What better way to find out what's going on than to actually ask the student?
The continuum has four columns. Three indicate the level of control and who has it. The fourth is designed to be a "fill in" column as you have conversations with students. It's labelled Strategies/Evidence and is meant to be a way to clarify a way forward for students. The Evidence section is included to do a reality check- what evidence can students provide to they are at a student-controlled level for that standard? The strategies category gives us a chance to find out how students might work differently to achieve a better result. When I explain to students how to complete the chart, I am careful to make sure they understand that this is a continuum. It is not a judgement or an assessment that they can fail. It's a tool that helps me (and their teachers) understand where their strengths and weaknesses lie. Our goal is to provide supports so that EVENTUALLY they will be able to check the boxes under the Student Controlled title. The expectation is NOT that they will be there immediately. They get there when they get there. As an aside, this fits in perfectly with our performance based system. We look at students in terms of skills they have and skills they need to perform at the mastery level. Habits of mind are an integral part of this equation and this continuum helps students assess their level of proficiency when it comes to some of those habits. Once a student has finished, it's time for the conversation. Very often they see themselves as being in the Teacher Controlled column for one skill and the Student Controlled column for another. It's important that you are able to tease out the reasons for their choices. Here's how it worked out with one of those two students I worked with. Charlie is a freshman who has completed very little work. Despite the fact that it is now January, he still has standards left unmastered from his 8th grade year in two classes. He has two current classes in which he has completed no work. His test scores indicate that he reads at least two years beyond his grade level and he has scored well in writing as well. His teachers asked me to speak with him because he consistently sits in the back of the class, hood up and headphones in. He does not ask the teacher for help. When I met with Charlie, I explained that this was not a disciplinary meeting. That's important because in the past that has not been the case. When I step into a room the assumption is that someone is going to face the music. I showed him the continuum, made sure he understood how it worked, and left him to fill it out on his own. I do not stand over a student's should during this process- I want them to feel very comfortable. Charlie completed the continuum thoughtfully and our conversation began. I had done my homework by checking his grades online before our meeting. I started by talking about Art and Music- two classes where he has been successful. We talked about what works well for him in those classes. In his case, they are subjects he feels talented in and he is not asked to use his laptop.
From there we moved to his other classes. I asked him to log into his LMS to go over his progress. (This helps me ascertain whether students even use this tool. Often there are login issues that we can solve right there.) Charlie had not logged in yet this year and was genuinely surprised to see how far behind he was in most of this classes. Now the conversation began to deepen. I used the continuum to find out where Charlie had gaps in his skills. As a classroom teacher I had had Charlie as a student and knew that it was difficult for him to get started on assignments. He identified choosing the best tools to meet his learning goals as an area where he needed teacher help. In our conversation it came up that he has a tough time with written directions and works better when he can listen to short verbal instructions. My natural question was to ask him why he didn't ask the teacher for clarification. I did not expect the response I got. Charlie said that for several years he had been bullied for being overweight. While he has slimmed down and the bullying has abated, he does everything in his power to remain invisible in the classroom. The rooms where he has the most trouble asking for help are those with the teacher's desk at the front of the room and the desks in rows. He feels as though walking up in front of his peers is akin to announcing that he is stupid. Important information for his teachers? I think so. Charlie was able to identify several other needs. He had trouble breaking up assignments into "doable" chunks. (Intervention: Goal setting). He can identify where he is stuck on an assignment but needs help getting over the frustration of not being able to figure it out on his own. Right now his only strategy is to pull up his hood and plug in his headphones. Once plugged in his attention shifts to the music and not the task at hand. (Intervention: Notice Charlie's signs and make time to check in with him when they appear. Give preferential seating where he is easily accessible. Find a peer in the class to whom he can turn for help.) Approaching the problem via this route turned my meeting with Charlie into an intervention. I suggested some strategies for getting help, breaking down his assignments, and monitoring his progress via our LMS. Here's what Charlie heard: I'm not stupid. I can move forward. I have options. Will he use them all at once? Probably not. Will he have trouble still? I'll bet he will. It's a tool, not a magic wand. My final step was to scan Charlie's continuum with our notes and suggestions on it. I then sent it to each of his teachers with the hope that they will use the information we collected to better understand him as a learner and help him move forward through his standards. This continuum could be the lynchpin of PLP's (Personal Learning Plans) for students at the beginning of the year. Having students identify where they are and what strategies they think they would find beneficial helps with student buyin for interventions. It allows teachers to look at
what interventions are necessary for each student; you might also find that your classes have "clusters" of need that could be filled with targetted small group instruction. You can bring it out at parent-teacher conferences to aid students in discussing their own learning needs and the supports they need both at school and at home. The learning continuum can be found here. Please feel free to make a copy and edit it to suit the needs of your students and learning community.