How did you learn to read and write? Can you tell a story about your literacy? This is a question I ask my students at the start of each year. Every year, I am struck by the diversity of student responses, as well as the varying levels of enthusiasm for both skills. My own memories…
Tag: learning
Professional Development
Most of the teachers I met in Chicago were frustrated with a great deal of the professional development provided to them by the district and in their schools. I suspect this sentiment is shared in a lot of settings and probably outside of teaching as well with required professional learning, or human resources modules for…
The Learning of School Year 20/21
At the start of school year 20/21, I told that it would be unlike any in history, and suggested they consider writing a journal of their experiences. Coming off of the COVID-altered 19/20 school year, I had low expectations for remote learning, but the year went better than expected. Although I’m not sure how many…
Scaffolding for Student Success
Teachers talk a lot about scaffolding for student success, but teachers understand scaffolding in different ways. In my view, good scaffolds allow students to access material, ideas, and skills they might not otherwise have the skills or knowledge to access. However, scaffolds can also be an unnecessary crutch that over-structure and overdetermine students’ thinking. Over…
Asking For Help
An interesting trend I am noticing in my students’ final reflections on the year, is that some are mentioning they didn’t ask for help as much as they should have, and they are recommending that future students ask for help when they need it. This is despite my constant refrains that, “the only dumb question…
Student Motivation
This pandemic year has, broadly speaking, had a pretty significant impact on student motivation to learn, and particularly to complete assignments. When I check in with students, I often hear, “I’m just not motivated right now, Mr. Rolnick.” While finding the motivation to complete schoolwork has always been a challenge for some of my students,…
Reflection and Learning
How do we know what we know and what we don’t know? Can we put our knowledge in context? Can we connect it to other things we know? Can we express how our knowledge influences or alters our worldview? How do our views and ideas change and develop? How do we determine when our ideas…
Student Views on Grades and Grading
Anyone who has spent time in the classroom has probably given a lot of thought to what a grade represents and anguished over the grading process. Yesterday I wrote about failing in the remote learning context, and briefly discussed grades and grading as part of that. Today I figured I’d go a little deeper into…
Research in Remote
As student enthusiasm began to wane for full-class lessons towards the end of the academic year, I pivoted in all my classes to end-of-year research projects in the remote context. Although independent (or small group) research and analysis isn’t always the best way to keep students engaged remotely, it presents opportunities for students to follow…
Writing for 10 days
One idea I’ve been working around as I complete 10 days of writing 700+ words a day of [roughly edited but intended to be legible] ideas is that writing isn’t actually that hard, but generating novel, interesting or worthwhile ideas is a big part of the challenge. Journaling for myself is focused more on debriefing…