Sir Ken Robinson, Bring on the Learning Revolution!

Hello, followers (probably just my mom)! I'm not continuing the book study in this post. I will get to that later this week. Today, I am posting a reflection I wrote for a GATE class I am taking through UC Riverside Extension. It is in response to this excellent TED talk by Sir Ken Robinson, one of the most popular TED talks ever. A very inspirational talk. So, watch the video, read my response, and let me know what you think!

Sir Ken Robinson, “Bring on the Learning Revolution!” Response

            Though I cannot initiate a revolution from within my classroom walls, well, maybe I can. Every day, as I greet each student with a smile, a handshake, and a “good morning,” I remind my students and myself that today is a new and special day. I look into those children’s eyes, and I see eyes that hold dreams, eyes that are waiting, eyes that are trusting. Those children trust me to protect them, to nourish their minds, to excite their spirits, and to take care with their dreams.

As I listened to the close of Sir Ken Robinson’s inspirational and touching TED talk, I found myself immediately rewinding to listen to his last three lines again. And, then I rewound and listened again. And again. “…every day, everywhere, our children spread their dreams beneath our feet. And we should tread softly.”

I immediately thought of my own toddler at home and her daily quests to explore. She is fascinated by a bag of rice. She marvels at the squishy feel of a mandarin orange. She scrutinizes the ridges on a bottle cap. She analyzes my every motion and mimics without delay. She has no fear. She trusts me with her dreams.     

One day, my little girl will take those dreams and walk into a classroom, greet her teacher, and trust her teacher to protect and nourish those dreams. So, I thought about my students and their dreams, about how I can protect or trample their dreams, and how every day counts. Revolution starts with an individual, with a person’s soul expanding outward into the world. It is true that our industrial model of education can tend to alienate a person from their true selves, their true talents. I would like to say that I foresee in the near future a world, or at least an America, in which we can customize each person’s education. However, in all honesty, I can’t see that. I do, in fact, see many obstacles to this ideal- poverty, literacy, buy-in, to name a few. Though many believe home schooling, flipped classrooms, or MOOCs (massive open online courses) to be the answer, I’m not sure I see any solution other than, for now, an individual passion.

My individual passion is teaching gifted and talented students. My students have such amazing potential, and so many passions. So, what I take from this video for my own classroom is this: I need to do some work. I need to do the work of really getting to know my students. What excites them? What are they passionate about? What are their dreams? And then, I need to find ways (within the very rigid structure of all of the exterior pressures I face as a public school teacher) to allow those students’ passions and dreams to, at the very least, stay alive. And, if those dreams stay alive, I need to help my students pursue the skills necessary to go about living out those dreams and passions. It can be as simple as recommending a book for a student to read that may further his knowledge. Or it may be presenting a student with an independent study opportunity. It could also mean seeking out another teacher or person whose expertise may be better able to support that student’s needs. What I’m getting at is that I have power to do something to nurture my students’ dreams.

So, why can’t the revolution start with me? What if I reflect (as I am doing now), realize my own (very powerful) power, and change (even if just a little bit)? That smile, that hand shake, and that “good morning” will remind me that today is a new and special day, because today, after all, is the day that I will nourish dreams.

Book Study: Pathways to the Common Core

Today I will be starting my book study on Pathways to the Common Core by Calkins, Ehrenworth, and Lehman. Here is the link to the book on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Pathways-Common-Core-Accelerating-Achievement/dp/0325043558/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1378525857&sr=1-1&keywords=pathways+to+the+common+core.

I have just finished reading the book which took me about two weeks. I could have finished more quickly, but I wanted to take my time on each chapter to reflect. Honestly, it is a little overwhelming, too, because as I read, I was constantly thinking about my own school and how much work will truly be in store for us if we are to fully commit to the changes required in order to build Common Core fluent students. So, before I get into the specifics of each chapter and their major points, I want to dedicate this post to my overall reflections and personal points of interests- the things that I feel were most important for my situation as a teacher in the San Bernardino City Unified School District and as a GATE teacher, which is really a unique situation in and of itself. However, I hope my opinions can reach others still.

We GATE teachers are often referring the "Big Idea." For me, I walked away from the book feeling these were some of the Big Ideas:

1) Students will need 90 or more instructional minutes per day reading at their level with a focus on moving children up levels of text complexity. Not answering questions, not discussing, but just plain reading. The questions, discussions, collaborations, and creations are not to be forgotten though. In fact, they are quite vital, but teachers need to be careful to not think that students spending 90 minutes reading a text and answering text-dependent questions actually accounts for 90 minutes of READING time. You need to subtract the time they spent answering questions.

2) Students will need 60 minutes of instructional time in a writing workshop. Not answering questions, not necessarily daily writing prompts, but structured writing workshop time where teachers can help students develop their writing skills. So, if a daily writing prompt is in place, it better be structured, meaning teachers are teaching and facilitating a purpose and focus for that particular daily writing.

3) The narrative writing Common Core standards are far more complex and difficult than the '97 standards, but we need to prioritize argument and informational writing, while building on our skills of teaching narrative writing that many of us may already feel strong at. This is where my personal situation diverged a bit. Being in a district that uses Step Up to Writing, I personally feel as though I am stronger at teaching informative or explanatory writing already and will need to prioritize the narrative aspect because of how much more complex and difficult it is from the '97 standards.

4) Higher-order comprehension instruction is a biggie. This is where I felt a little like I may be on track already as, teaching a GATE class, I am used to using the Prompts of Depth and Complexity (Kaplan) throughout my daily instruction, as well as structures for helping students to think more critically and creatively (e.g, SCAMPER). Webb's Depth of Knowledge seems to be trending over Bloom's as well.

5) We need to increase cross-curricular, analytical nonfiction reading. Another idea that I know most teachers in our district, GATE or not, have bought into and committed to already! 

6) Teacher-created, informative, instructive, easy-to-deliver, performance, low-stakes (not the high-stakes, multiple choice, pass or die kind of) assessments will be crucial to gauge student progress and teacher success.

So, those are the big ideas I came away with. In my next post, I will dive into the reading standards and flesh out my Big Idea #1- All About Reading!