Article: Kids Speak Out on Student Engagement

Check out the blog post from Edutopia!

Finally Blogging about my Student Voice Surveys!

AP Chemistry--I asked them to type an anonymous reflection on the learning that takes place, my teaching style, and the classroom environment.  Only 11 of 17 students did the assignment.  Of that I would say 8 were positive and 3 were somewhat negative.

One theme among ALL the students who answered was that when I give notes I am hard to follow .  So I am trying to be a more organized note-giver. 

One student described the classroom environment in this way:  "Her classroom is comfortable and most of the time, clean, until her students start or are in the middle of a lab.  That alone helps students feel more at home." 

Many students felt as though the classroom environment was a selling point for taking AP Chem:

"The environment is very comfortable... everyone acts as adults and are very willing to learn.  Becaue of the way we act, Mrs. Schneider treats us as adults and there is an equal respect throughout the class.  Your opinion matters to your classmates and your teacher."

Another theme is that when I do not practice a problem before putting it on the board and drag them through working it out, they often feel worn out and lost. I agree with them to a point and see this as one area in which I would like to grow--being more prepared for the tough material.

I notice a difference in the way some of us approached our student voice surveys:  some of us asked FOR student voice ABOUT student voice; others of us just asked FOR student voice.  Just an observation!

Student Voice in Action by Christina Gouzd and Mary Anne Mullenax

During our world religions PBL, students were asked to address the essential questions:

• Why do religious conflicts exist?



• Are they avoidable?



• What is my role?

Unlike previous projects, students were very self-directed in choosing their teams as well as what type of project they would complete to answer the questions. During our debriefing session which centered around nine open-ended questions, students shared experiences outside of the classroom in tackling these challenges. Reactions ranged from needing more time to complete the project to being pleased with the option to choose their own groups. As usual, our students provided great insight into their views on what aspects of the project worked well and what aspects could be improved.

The students in the video clip are responding to the question: "What role did you take while working on this project?" Their responses led to a discussion about the reactions of others they interacted with during their projects. Many students interacted with adults outside of school by discussing aspects of religion with them.

As typically happens, our eyes were opened by their responses. We were especially surprised by one comment from a young lady in our first session. She felt that while we treat them as "adults" in our classroom, some adults still see them as kids and are hesitant to discuss mature topics with them.

Because we have given students voice throughout the year, many have come to expect that others want to hear their perspectives and want to be active in the learning process.

The Mylan Collaboration Room

Students using the Mylan Collaboration Room for group projects:

Wow! I think we're trying to address all of these!

Here is a link to the following post from The Innovative Educator.

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 23, 2011

Is Your School Preparing Learners for Success? 5 Questions to Consider

Guest post by Shane Krukowski

“The future is something which everyone reaches at the rate of sixty minutes an hour, whatever he does, whoever he is.”

~C. S. Lewis

Redesigning education involves much more than providing content online, prescribing canned interventions and adding interactive whiteboards to every room. It means choosing the abilities that transcend today’s paradigms, so that we authentically prepare students for the emerging challenges and opportunities ahead. It also means valuing assessment that gives us MORE THAN high scores, but low ability.  If you look at  just about any school’s website, brochure or annual report you’ll see many references to similar goals. However upon closer investigation we often find this is not reality.

How do you know if your school is preparing students for their future or their teacher’s past?  Here are some questions to think about when considering if learners are effectively being prepared for their world.

1. How is your schedule effectively meeting the needs of your learners?

As Tom Vander Ark articulates in his book “Getting Smart: How Digital Learning is Changing the World, “Master schedules will give way to interesting blends of customized learning experiences and projects that encourage integration and application. Just-in-time learning will become more common, slowly replacing the current model of just-in-case learning.” 

2. How do you prioritize pedagogy over ‘curriculum’?

What are you doing to create rich learning experiences and cut through superficial busywork that makes adults feel productive, but does little to reinforce/expand a student’s skills, interest and knowledge. If a school responds with the standard brochure talk of ‘high expectations’, ‘common core’ and or ‘interactive whiteboards in every room,’ follow with the question “how?” 

3. How do you build relationships with learners? 

How are positive relationships with teachers, mentors, coaches and family being fostered and supported? 

4. How are you educating parents to the importance and relevance of personalized assessment? 

Look up a stock on Google Finance and see how many qualitative and quantitative measures you have at your finger tips.  Why is it for human capital we don’t have the same appreciation for multiple metrics?  

5. How are you motivating students to keep learning?

In his book Outliers, Malcom Gladwell recommends we maximize the number of innovators we cultivate and foster which requires looking at human motivation in new ways and recognizing the importance of imagination and creativity. How is your school fostering empowering students to own the learning?

Too often schools attempt to polish the edges of their model in attempt to live up to this bigger vision. They hand select individual pieces of effective practice and then when it fails or doesn’t scale, they wonder why. These are schools that do things like proclaim, ‘we do competency-based evaluation’, but use course-based transcripts with GPAs--and they don’t realize the inconsistency. To effectively scale authentic, personalized learning and assessment, educators need to embrace new practices, utilize different tools, and ask important questions such as these. 

Empowering Our Students

As Amy, Joetta and I were discussing student voice during a grant meeting this evening, I kept thinking about all the ways Kristin and I are empowering our students in our classes. I just had to share this story with everyone because I think it is so extremely powerful.

Today, I had a young lady approach me with a concern about one of her group members. She explained to me that her male peer had done something that was inappropriate and she and her group members wanted to fire him from the group because he had not been taking his work seriously. So, instead of approaching him upon hearing this information, I talked it over with Kristin and we decided that we should try the mediation approach because we both agree that it would be more powerful coming from his group members than a teacher telling him that his actions were not appropriate and....we were right.

I had Mr. Shaffer, our assistant principal, sit in on the mediation session so that the group knew that it was a serious matter. I gave everyone a chance to speak and express how they were feeling about the situation. I was so impressed at how they conducted themselves. The student that had caused the issue was very accepting of the process and did not become angry that his group members had brought the problem up. Instead, he owned up to this mistakes and realized that what he did, did not make his group happy and that he would make sure he stayed on task from here on out.

To see freshmen students conduct themselves in a way that they could problem-solve and discuss an issue within their group was certainly eye opening. It didn't turn into an argument. It wasn't a blame game. It was a genuine conversation from several peers to another, letting him know that they wanted him to work with the group and not distract the group from their work, otherwise, they were going to fire him.

I feel that if I or Kristin had approached this student on our own without the other group members, it wouldn't have had the same effect. This empowered the students to have a say in how their peer "got in trouble" so to speak. They were able to have an honest, open conversation with a great end result. I may be assuming when I say this; however, I believe that students respond better to their peers (when executed in the right way) than to teachers, even parents maybe.

I'll have to keep you updated on the student's behavior for the rest of the PBL, but if I had to guess I'm sure he'll be working diligently from here on out.