Examples of Student Voice

Last week I was in a virtual PD session with educators from around the world and in one of the breakout rooms the conversation turned to student voice. Many of the educators were sharing some of the issues and challenges their school was experiencing shifting the educational paradigm to one in which adults see and value the power, purpose and place of student voice within a school context. Listening to where they were in their journey, had me reflect where we are in our journey. And I was really proud to think of all the amazing ways student voice is honored, respected, encouraged and invited at the school I currently work at.

I thought perhaps sharing some of our examples could help schools early on in their journey get some inspiration. And, perhaps other schools farther along in their journey could provide us some feedback to help us continue to grow and improve.

So here it is… some examples of where I can notice and name student voice having space and playing a role within and beyond the classroom.

INPUT INTO PLANNING

These past few years we have been on journey to find ways to invite learners in as co-designers and co-planners of the learning.

Teachers have made the curriculum transparent to students and invited their thoughts, opinions and preferences about which outcomes to explore in upcoming units.

Teachers have invited learners in on identifying Learner Profile Attributes and ATL skills within Units of Inquiry.

Teachers have invited learners in on selecting key concepts and planning lines of inqiury

Teachers have invited learners in on coming up with the central idea.

Teachers have invited learners in on finding resources for the unit and planning next steps.

Teachers have invited learners in on deciding how, when and where to share their learning and ‘take it public’.

Teachers have invited learners into the planning of Exhibition; including the pre-planning as well as the planning of the gala event

INPUT INTO ASSESSMENT

This co-designing and co-planning has also included an intentional focus on how to invite and involve learners into documenting, monitoring, measuring and reporting on their learning in order to build their assessment-capability.

Teachers have partnered with learners to co-construct rubrics and other assessment tools.

Teachers have partnered with learners to monitor their progress throughout a unit.

Teachers have partnered with learners to have input into measuring learning upon completion of a unit.

Teachers have partnered with learners to report on their learning.

REFLECTIONS

Co-designing and co-planning units also means that learners are invited in on the final reflections about the units.

Teachers have noticed opportunities for reflections about initiatives or innovations, such as P.I.E.

FEEDBACK

Another important way we strive to respect and support student voice is by always looking ways for to collect and act upon their feedback.

As a school we have collected learners’ experiences, perspectives and suggestions on school wide-innovations like P.I.E.

This has included gathering data from learners…

Analyzing the data in macro and micro senses…

Sharing the findings with the community…

Currently, this also includes holding focus groups for learners who would like to sit down and talk about our PIE initiative. (Which has been AMAZING… blog post on this coming soon!)

Sample soundbite from the Grade 3 focus group:

This focus on feedback also extends to our school PYP Exhibition experience, where our Grade 5 teams collects data each week to understand how learners are feeling and what they need. This data allows the team to responsively plan next steps based on the data they collect.

EXPRESSION

Another important layer of creating space for student voice is to intentionally find avenues for student expression.

We are using RULER tools to help us make space for students to express their feelings.

Opportunities within and beyond the classroom for students to express themselves via the arts.

And opportunities for students to express themselves via play.

STUDENT LEADERSHIP

Another way student voice has a place at our school is with our Primary Student leadership team. Each year representatives from each grade are elected by their peers, and these representatives form what we call our “Learner Voice Board”.

The Learner Voice Boards gets together each week to deal with student concerns that have been brought to them from their peers.

They also collaborate with other groups, such as the PTA (Parent Teacher Association) and the Secondary School Student Leaders to co-plan and organize school events.

They are also given space to update the community on what they are working on. A great example of this is when our school director invited them to speak at the parent association meeting.

The Learner Voice Board will also play a big role in getting student feedback, and participating in decisions about next year planning; including the schedule, break times and structures, logistics of eating and planning, and refinement of PIE structures.

We are also very proud that our Learner Voice Board has been able to inspire and support other schools and students wanting to create more opportunities for student voice at their school.

INVITATIONS AND OPPORTUNITIES

These habits and practices of seeing and treating children as partners in decision making and problem solving extend beyond certain grade-levels and the Primary division, and are seeped into the culture of our school. Which means that opportunities are created and communicated to learners about how they can get involved in things that the adults are currently tackling.

A great example of this is the Sustainability Committee at our school, which has reached out for student representation to participate in the committee. And has invited them into the current problem them are tackling of setting up a school-wide recycling program.

Another example would be inviting learners to solve problems as they arise. One example of that is getting learners to help us solve the logistical puzzle of sharing play spaces this year.

STUDENT-INITIATED ACTION

One of the amazing bi-products of being at a school that intentionally tries to cultivate and grow students’ voices, is that we start to see more and more student-initiated action because learners come to understand that their voice, their ideas and their perspectives matter and have a place at school.

An example of this is six Grade 3 students coming to me to request a meeting to go through their business proposal for cactus-related products and their needs for space and supervision to have their business meetings, product production and storage.

Another example would be when a group of Grade 2 learners approached our school principal to sit down and talk about what could be done at school to support those impacted by the war in Europe.

Another example would be the group of learners who initiated and pitches a grade wide book club.

I am proud to be a PYP Coordinator who works at a school where student voice is respected and supported. Like all PYP schools, we are on a journey and we know we still of lots of room to grow and improve in this area. However, I also feel we have lots to celebrate and share in this area!

How do you invite and involve student voice into planning, decision-making and problem solving at your school?

What feedback do you have for us about how we are trying to invite and involve student voice at our school?

The Story of our New PYP Planner

It’s the start of a new academic year, and we are ready to pilot a new, home-grown PYP Transdisciplinary Unit Planner. I tweeted about it, and a few people were curious to see the full planner and also hear more about the process we went through.

So here it is!

The Backstory

Last year our faculty spent a lot of time doing individual reflections driven by the new IB Standards and Practices. We then took all the individual reflections and mapped it out to try and identify collective areas of growth. One of our biggest areas where teachers self-identified that they were “developing” or “approaching” was using a planner based on the PYP planning process in all subject areas. So we saw this is an opportunity…

The Process

Our first step was to pull together a “task force”. Myself and the principal I work with strongly believe in teacher voice and shared decision making. This was a little tricky last year – as we were smack-dab in the middle of a global pandemic – but we still wanted to at least put it out there for those teachers who were interested and felt they could donate some time towards this project.

So in February of last school year, we advertised the “task forces” in our Morning Message.

We were lucky to have some people step forward; we were small, but mighty!

From there got together initially and got on the same page. We laid out our purpose and the process we would follow.

First, we clarified that the PYP Enhancements require that we follow the PYP planning process, but don’t require that we use a specific planner.

We were clear about our mission.

And we laid out our predicted timeline for the work and the related steps.

Week 1

We started by ensuring we had a shared understanding of both the IB Standard & Practice driving our work, as well as the PYP Planning Process that came from the PYP Enhancements.

Week 2&3

Next we started to explore different options. Everything from what we had been previously using or had used in the past at our school, the PYP Sample Planner, and some that other PYP educators around the world had share. We started out with and individual analysis of each and then synthesized our pros and cons.

Week 4

Finally it was time to work towards a decision. So we individually reviewed the collective pros and cons from previous weeks for each planner we analyzed and each put forth some recommendations.

Then it was time for me to take those recommendations and build a mock-up. Which I did…

Next it was time to take it back to the task force to “tune” it. I used an adapted version of the SRI Tuning Protocol to facilitate that process with them.

Then I went back and made the changes that came from the warm and cool feedback.

I am very fortunate to have two colleagues, one who has a magical eye for aesthetics and the other who is ninja-level when it comes to Google Slide design work and they took my basic – and let’s be honest ugly planner – and turned it into a work of art!

That brings us to where we are today. We have “finished” the unit planner and are ready to try it out! My original plan was to slowly roll it in to the collaborative work I do with each team, but I with work so many amazing risk-takers, a few teams are piloting it right out of the gate of the new school year!

The “Final” Product

Here is it, accompanied by a few words about how we plan to use it!

The planner is broken up into 7 sections:

• prologue
• initial reflections and pre-planning
• single-subject integration
• ongoing reflection, design and implementation
• final reflections
• “other slides” (as needed by the team)
• appendices

Section 1: Prologue

The title side allows teams to document: the Transdiscplinary Theme, the timeline and the collaborative team contributing to this specific Unit of Inquiry. It also has linked tabs at the top to allow for shortcuts to the different sections of the planner. You also may notice a teeny, tiny little PYP document along the right side. Throughout the planner we have embedded qucklinks to certain sections of the PYP documents that pertain to that specific element or guidance for that part of the process. In this instance, it takes team to the guidance about the different approaches to unit timelines in the PYP Enhancements.

Next there is a slide that reinforces the approach to planning at our school. All planning is driven the by PYP planning process and we do that by delicately balancing 4 things: thinking of our learners, acknowledging what is going on in the world at the time, keeping our finger on the pulse of past learning and consulting our learning outcomes.

When teachers are “considering past learning” they are taken to another risk we are launching this year called Learner-Centered POIs.

This allows them to see their learners’ POI across the years they have been at the school. It has a screen shot of each year’s POI for that cohort as well as a summary of articulation points, such as the TD theme, key concepts, Learner Profile Attributes, Related Concepts and ATL skills to date. This allows them to always keep vertical articulation in mind, but in a living, breathing, emergent and responsive way.

Section 2: Initial Reflections and Pre-Planning

Initial Reflections and Pre-Planning is broken into 3 steps. The first one is focused on the 4 balancing factors I mentioned above that inform our planning. This culminates in a decision about the TD theme as well as the descriptor that will be the primary focus within that theme. Again you will notice in the top-right corner, a shortcut to sections in Teaching and Learning that support this process.

One of the things from the IB sample planner that the whole task force loved, were the guiding prompts. However, they felt embedding the guiding prompts into the planner itself can make it too long and often feel daunting. So we decided to embed guiding prompts as pop-outs when and where needed.

Step 2 of this sections is focused on getting the learners involved in the co-construction of the units and also the finalization of what we have come to call the “big bones” of the unit.

Again there are some guiding prompts for this step that are hyperlinked.

Step 3 of this section is beginning to think about approaches to teaching and assessment.

You may notice this section has many hyper links throughout that support teachers to reference other helpful documents for this stage of the thinking, such as a guide for inviting students into the planning.

Section 3: Single-Subject Integration

Single-subject integration at any PYP school can be tricky. When multiple teachers from different disciplines are all working from the same planner, those planners can get massive and can become less workable. It also means that single-subject teachers may have up to 7 different planners on the go at one time! So we decided to try something out. We have the specialist subject planning linked, but in a different set of Google Slides. We also were inspired by Andy Vasily’s approach to different levels of integration, so we included a section where that can be very clear.

The links then go to that subjects’ planner where they can see any glance to what level they are integrated at the different grade levels and also space for planning that acknowledge’s their discipline specific needs. (This is also a new planner that was the product of a task force… but more about that later!)

Section 4: Ongoing Design and Implementation

One of the things we love about the PYP Enhancements is the big push to move away from planning a whole unit before you launch, and move towards more responsive and adaptive planning. This fits perfectly with our schools’ PLC and RTI processes. For every week that the unit lasts, teams can reflect on and document what the learners’ have revealed and how best they can respond.

Again, there are some additional guiding prompts for teams who need or want further guidance.

Section 5: Final Reflections

Finally, there is space to house the reflections that arise upon the completion of the unit with space not only for the teachers, but also for the learners to think about how the unit went.

And of course… some guiding prompts!

Section 6: Team Needs

One of the things that came strongly from the teacher voices in the task force was the benefit of having a place to add and embed other things beyond the systemitized part of the planner. This supports teams to have “everything in one place” and allows them to make it work for them.

Step 7: Appendices

The last few slides are some supplementary tools our teachers use such as conceptual rubric templates and provocation design templates so they are there and easy to find when they need them.

Next Steps

As I mentioned above, now that we have it built this year is all about piloting it. Those teams that are ready and willing have already jumped in. Those teams who aren’t ready quite yet, can begin to explore and experiment with it with my support when the time is right. Ideally by the end of the year all teams will have had some solid experience with it, to then be able to provide some feedback about how we can further refine and improve it for next year!

We also followed a similar process for our single-subject planner, stand-alone math and stand-alone literacy planner too!

I know many school around the world have gone through similar processes and designed their own unit planners. We would love to see and hear all about your process and planner, so please leave a comment so we can continue to learn and grow together as a global community.

Reimaging “mentoring” in PYP Exhibition

This year as we gear up for PYPx 2021, we have been dedicating a lot of time to reimagining the role of “mentors”. We have been thinking about “mentor” as a noun – traditionally a person statically assigned to an individual or group for the entire Exhibition process. And we have been thinking of “mentoring” as a verb – connecting with that just-right person, at that just-right time to help with that just-right thing!

We are not alone in these conversations, many PYP practitioners and schools around the world have also been reimagining what support looks like for learners throughout exhibition. Some posts that provoked our thinking on the matter include:

• Authentic Collaboration in PYPx
• Redefining Collaboration in the PYP Exhibition
• Breaking the mould of PYPx
• We are the champions
• Personalized Units of Inquiry

We got to a stage in our planning where we decided this was going to be the year we said goodbye to a static, pre-assigned mentors and instead, be risk-takers, to figure out how we can embrace a more organic, responsive, personalized approach to “mentoring” learners through their Exhibition journey. We felt that the shift from “forced help” to “found help” was a more life-worthy learning experience and that learning how to “gather” support, intentionally and purposefully, as opposed to being simple “given” support would help them grow the most.

So, we decided to build a PYP Exhibition Human Library… and because of the unique context of not knowing whether we will be on campus or learning from home – or a mixture of both – we decided to set it up as a digital database. We also decided to open it up not only to faculty and staff at our school, but also parents and older students. Anyone who might have something to offer to the learners along the way.

First we collected the data: We used a simple Google Form, which allowed us to…

collect information about who they are in the community

… languages and areas of expertise

…specific Approaches to Learning Skills they would feel comfortable helping the Grade 5 learners with

… any of the PYP-ish stuff that supports the Exhibition journey

… and details about the extent to which they are able to support and how best for learners to contact them.

Next we collated the data: We decided to use Google Slides to harness the capability of internal links to allow for smooth and independent self-navigation for the learners.

The first slide acts as a table of contents to allow learners to self-identify in what area they require support

From there they are taken to a sub menu, that either breaks down the skills…

or the languages…

Or the specific topics…

Any of those sections then lead to a list of people to help and contact details for arranging the desired support.

Now that the library is built we are at the stage of thinking through the systems and processes to support the use of this tool:

• ensuring balance of who learners contact
• coaching learners to look for a mentor when they struggling, facing a challenging, or wanting some feedback
• contact expectations (CCing their homeroom teachers on email communication)
• zoom protocols (ie going through the homeroom teacher’s account) to ensure child safeguarding

Once these things are fine tuned, we will be ready to put this Human Library in the hands of the learners in hopes that they are able to use it to find the right people, at the right time, to help in just the right way!

Wish us luck! We will report back about how it goes!

Agency in the Time of CoVid – Part 2

Before this school year started, I shared my thinking about what agency in the time of CoVid might look like.

Now that we are 5 weeks into the school year – thanks to the very special group of educators I get to spend my days with – I am able to share some examples of what we think agency in the time of CoVid has looked like.

… at least at our school anyway!

• We’ve had a whole school Unit of Inquiry where learners have had time, space and support to get to know their learning environments (physical and virtual), their learning communities and to get to know themselves as learners.

• We’ve had teachers and TAs spend weeks inquiring into their learners to begin to get to know them as human beings

• and bit by bit put together the complex puzzle of each individual child by purposefully collecting evidence, analyzing and responding to it

• We’ve launched “Flex Fridays” where learners plan their own day

• We’ve had teachers and TAs invest time in coaching learners about how to plan their own day

• We’ve had teachers and TAs invest time in helping learners understand learning, so they can plan their own personal inquires to pursue

• We’ve had teachers and TAs offer choice-based workshops

• We’ve had teachers and TAs support learners to run their own workshops for their peers

• We’ve had teachers and TAs create time and space for learners to share their talents – within their grade-leves

• and across the whole Primary School

• We’ve had teachers and TAs encourage their learners to choose to share and celebrate learning they are proud of with the whole community at our Learning Showcases

• We’ve had teachers ask for feedback from their learners about what is working and what isn’t and work with them to improve things

• We’ve had teachers invite and involve their learners in deciding and planning of their second Unit of Inquiry

• We’ve had teachers and TAs listen to, honor and quickly respond to the voices of the learners in their pleas for more time for social connections – in the forms of playdates, picnics, hang outs, dress-up days and birthday parties

• We’ve had teachers and TAs plan responsively based on the needs and interests of their learners – from day to day, week to week, and unit to unit

• We’ve had teachers continue to advocate for play and think about ways to support planning for play at home

• We’ve had teachers continue to bring Studio habits of mind and TAB to life

• We’ve had elections for a Learner Voice Board, so learners can represent their peers in the decisions being made in the Primary School

And did I mention… all of this happened 100% virtually.

In 5 short weeks, there are so many examples of how learners are being respected as human beings, being included in decisions about their own learning, having their voices heard, learning how to make choices for themselves and experiencing ownership over their learning. And I KNOW I am forgetting many, many other examples.

Our educators are rock-stars.

Absolute rock-stars.

And I am thankful everyday, that I get to be part of a community of PYP educators that doesn’t let anything – not even a global pandemic! – stand in the way of what they believe children deserve. ❤️

Supporting Teacher Agency – Take 1

Last year, when I was new to my school and new to my role, my biggest focus was to ‘seek to understand‘. Now that I have had that first year (and what a year it was!) to learn about the school, experience the context and build relationships, I feel I am ready to move on to a new professional goal – supporting teacher agency.

New-ish goal might be more accurate.

Last time I was out of the classroom I was experimenting with Ed Camps and other models of Personalized Professional Learning and I was having some major shifts in thinking from working with adult learners. But it wasn’t until I found myself called back into the classroom that I began to find my identity as an agency-supportive educator. That’s when I was able to ‘risk and reflect‘ when working with my Grade 4s and then embarking on the collaborative adventure that was Studio 5. That’s also when I began to dabble with Agency PD to support schools around the world with their journey.

But now it’s time to ground that passion and that goal in this context with this staff. And boy, am I lucky with this staff! ❤️

I am a firm believer that the medium is the message. And learning through agency can be just as (if not more!) powerful than learning about agency.  Therefor I believe that putting my eggs in the basket of supporting teacher agency will have the biggest impact on teachers supporting the agency of their child-learners.

So as I work with my principal and the rest of our school’s Academic Leadership Team to get ready for a new (and unprecedented) school year, there have been some specific agency-supportive ‘moves’ I have tried to attempt to begin the year respecting and supporting the agency of the wonderful teachers at my school.

Here’s what I’ve been experimenting with so far:

Town Halls

No doubt this year there is lots of new and lots of unknown. Lots of differences and lots of change. So as my principal and I have been thinking through approaches to this unique year, we have intentionally attempted to make decisions with our staff, instead of for our staff.

We hosted a ‘Town Hall’  and shared our current thinking with our whole Primary staff on things like the structure of the day, scheduling, first UOI of the year, Family-Led conferences and the public planner.

Then we invited them into an adapted, asynchronous Tuning Protocol where they could share their questions and feedback with us.

Then we coded and analyzed ALL that data!

Then we organized the trends in the data to be able to feedback to staff and respond.

I then recorded and shared videos responding to the major questions and feedback and created a pathway for further questions and feedback.

Think Tanks

There are some things we are trying to build and decide as leaders that we have less experience with than teachers. The last few months of the school year, teachers were on the ground with distance learning and therefor the ones with experience and expertise! So we have been trying to capitalize on this, by including their voice and opinions in not just the decisions, but the thinking as well.

One of the ways we have done this is through an asynchronous “think tank”. Where we have used Nearpod to invite teachers to think through some of the nuances of how we are approaching asynchronous learning this year.

We invited PRO and CON analyses…

 

We asked for votes on potential models…

We invited them not only to connect with our thinking, but also to contribute models and designs based on their thinking….

And because our staff are ROCK STARS, we not only got some mock-ups, but they initiated a critical-friends conversation in the comments sections offering feedback on one another’s ideas!

We were then able to export all this data from Nearpod and bring it with us to leadership meetings to ensure that teachers’ voices and ideas were part of the thinking process.

Agency Supportive O-Week

Planning for orientation is a normal part of any leader’s back to school process. This year is unique though. We will have teachers on campus, teacher in the same time zone but unable to be on campus, and some teachers spread around the world in very different time zones! So it challenged us to re-think some of our traditional approaches to planning staff orientation.

Myself and a colleague of mine – who are both passionate about supporting  agency of both child and adult learners – pitched a collection of ideas to our Academic Leadership Team to hopefully inform the course of our orientation week planning.

Hopefully with an orientation week that respects and supports teacher agency, we can not only personalize the professional learning to each unique individual’s needs and interests, but also maximize everyone’s time to ensure that every minute is purposefully… while at the same time modeling some of the philosophies and practices we hope to see teachers use with their learners!

In-House Experts

Leaders know some stuff. Leaders do not know everything. And that’s okay. Now more than ever leaders must look to the teachers who were on the ground during remote emergency learning last spring to harness their experience and expertise as we prepare for another unprecedented year.

Myself and my principal have tried to keep this in mind as much as possible, as we build our orientation week.

We’ve invited teachers to help curate resources that can be used in orientation and through the year.

We’ve invited teachers to lead workshops during orientation in the area of their expertise.

We’ve invited teachers to contribute to criteria on diagnostic tools.

We hope to invite and make space for teachers to share their learning and passions during orientation week.

Space for Voice

We know this is a challenging time for all. Lots of questions, uncertainty, nerves, fears and excitement for starting the year. So we’ve tried to carve our space for teachers’ voice.

One of the ways we are doing that is offering drop-in office hours for them to pop by and have a space for whatever it is they need space for.

Respect for Summer

Did I mention we are all still on summer holiday!? So we’ve been very careful to ensure all of our approaches are invitations, but not expectations. We know for some teachers August is still a protected time for rest and relaxation – great. We also know for other educators, in August a switch gets flicked and there is a burst of energy and interest in thinking about and working on the year ahead – great. And for some educators… it’s somewhere in-between – great.

So as much as possible, we are trying to be mindful of all those different perspectives and create structures that allow individuals to choose how much they participate based on what they feel is best for them at this moment in time.

 

I’m sure there is MUCH more we could be doing, and hopefully we will continue to challenge ourselves and one another on the leadership team to keep finding and making space for inclusive practices that flatten hierarchical structures, harness expertise regardless of position and see the humanness of each individual within an organization.

 

How are you respecting and supporting the agency of your teachers?

How are you building and protecting space for teacher’s voice choice and ownership?

How are you modeling with teachers, what you expect in the classroom?

Agency in the time of COVID

I’ve started to receive some messages in my Twitter inbox asking my personal opinions about how us agency-supportive educators can stay true to our beliefs and philosophies this upcoming year despite the unique circumstances and constraints of how we are returning to school. These requests have engendered much deep thought and reflection throughout my summer holiday; despite my best efforts to shut-off and re-charge!

Instead of sharing my thoughts just with them individually via Twitter messages, I decided to share my thinking here, with all of you – in hopes of opening up a larger dialogue as an education community.

DISCLAIMER: I have no magic answers.

All I can do is share my thinking at the moment.

And then I hope you do the same.

So we can all learn and grow together and keep the global momentum for respecting and supporting student agency going, even during these uncertain, challenging (and likely more restrictive) times.

Regardless of health and safety protocols or whether we are face to face or online (or some sort of hybrid combination of both!) here is my perspective on where there might be space and opportunity this year for continuing to nurture learners’ agency:

1. Prioritize their humanness – Now more than ever we must see, understand and respect our learners as human beings.  Definitely, their academic growth and development is still important; but it shouldn’t be the only thing on meeting agendas and day plans. This is a year where have to honor, prioritize and advocate for their physical well being, emotional and mental health, physical needs, and social development. We need to respect that they (like all of us) have gone through change, uncertainty, and potentially loss and trauma. Now more than ever we must see them as whole human beings – not partially complete adults-in-the-making.
2. No secret teacher business – This is year there will likely be many new restrictions, special parameters and constraints in place; rightfully so, for the health and wellbeing of the community. Why not bring learners into the conversation? Make the “why” transparent. Take the time to discuss the reasons, purposes and benefits behind the decisions that have been made in these unique times.
3. Democratic decision making (where possible) – Although this year many additional decisions will be made by leaders, administrators, boards, ministries and governments there will still be many decisions that rest with the teacher. Why not share those decisions with your learners? How best can we use the time we’ve been allocated? How can we still collaborate while needing to be 2 meters apart? What games can we play where we can keep our distance and don’t need equipment? What should the order of our units be? What online tools and resources might help our inquiry? Obviously, the specifics of the questions depends on your age of learners, subject, and unique context – but the idea of inviting and involving learners in the decisions that are still up for grabs can apply to all.
4. Be intentional with making space and time for their voice – Make school (whether face-to-face- or virtual) a time and place where they know they will be heard. Specifically have a plan for their questions, ideas, problems; things they want to talk about out; perspectives and opinions and philosophies they’ve developed these past months; their reality, experiences, hopes and fears. Why not have a dedicated whiteboard somewhere in the physical or virtual classroom for this? Or a specific Padlet? Perhaps a daily Flip Grid? Or an infinite Google Form? Or carve out a designated community meeting time?  Somewhere and somehow intentional;  where their voice is not an add-on or interruption to the learning. Somewhere where their voice is seen and respected as an important part of the learning.
5. Meet ’em where they are… and move ’em along – now more than ever we need to be critical of the “should be” approach to curriculum. Many agency-supportive educators are always critical of trying to standardize learning, achievement and human beings; but the current reality has amplified the tenuous nature of this curriculum model. What learning and progress was able to be made for each learner in the final months of last year’s school year differs learner to learner and has many variables – family situation, access to technology, health, language – just to name a few. Now more than ever we need to take the approach of understanding learners’ current knowledge, understanding and skills and helping them progress and grow from where they actually are. Regardless of if that is where they are “supposed to be” or if they are “ahead” or “behind”.
6. Stay critical about what’s worth learning – the world has changed, but for many of us, our curriculum hasn’t. Many of us are going back to the same documents that contain the same outcomes and standards that were “critical” a year ago. But what’s worth learning now? What has risen in importance? What has declined in importance? What has presented itself, that wasn’t acknowledged before? What was there before, but now seems less relevant and significant? Getting discussions going about what’s worth learning with colleagues, your learners, their parents is also a great step towards exploring different paradigms of curriculum (like co-constructed and emergent approaches).
7. Plan in response to learning – As PYP and inquiry-based educators we should always be planning in response to learning, but now more than ever, this approach makes the most sense. We don’t know where our learners are in their learning journey… Many of us don’t know if or how long we will be face-to-face or on-line… and none of us know what the future holds. So although it can be difficult to let go of those perfectly laid out curriculum maps and long range plans and unit designs… we might find that this year, getting to know our learners and their families first, then involving them in decision-making and planning and always going one step at a time might be a more fruitful approach.
8. Explore the concepts of individual freedom and collective responsibility – Every country around the world is engaged in their own inquiry and exploration of the balance between an individual’s freedom and their responsibility to the collective wellbeing. Why not explore these same concepts within the context of your classroom. Where does individual freedom supersede collective responsibility in your learning community? Where does collective responsibility supersede individual freedom in your learning community? How does the interplay between those two concepts manifest in some of the changes learners are experiencing at school this year? What is their experience with this in their home country? How do they feel about it? What are their opinions? Do they have any suggestions? Agency-supportive educators often naturally find themselves trying to figure out how best to navigate these concepts anyway, but now more than ever the conversation is globally relevant.
9. Use your language as your compass – the words and phrases we use when speaking to and about learners can be a very interesting barometer to reveal where our own and one another’s thoughts and practices are in relation to our learners’ agency. How often are we saying “make them” “force them” “allow them”? What does that reveal about our thinking? Beliefs? Philosophies? Decisions? Constraints? Contexts? When are these words and phrases in relation to the issues above (health and safety; wellbeing of the community etc.) and when are they not? If we are wondering where we’ve held our course and where we might have strayed – the answers will likely be found in our language.
10. When in doubt… ask your learners –  How can we ensure choice this year? How can we ensure voice this year? How can we ensure ownership this year? It is second nature of us as educators to ask these questions of ourselves, of our colleagues, and of our leaders, administrators and coaches… by how often do we ask those same questions directly to our learners. Be transparent about your goal to respect and their support their agency in light of  the additional parameters and restrictions. Ask them how you are doing with this goal. Ask for their ideas, feedback, suggestions when it comes to amplifying their choice, voice and ownership in their learning and their learning community this year.

Did anyone else notice I used the phrase “now more than ever” in almost every section? That was not intentional! But I think it might be revealing…

Revealing that this year – as we go back to whatever re-opening plan our school or district has in store – not only are agency-supportive practices prefered, but they may actually end up being essential. Essential in order to give our learners the support that they deserve. Essential in order to surf the waves of uncertainty and change. Essential in order to maximize the learning in consideration of each learner’s unique needs, challenges and situations during this global pandemic.

So maybe we won’t be able to have 120 learners freely flowing through an open-concept, student-designed learning studio, mixing with different groups of peers and interacting with different adults… but I believe there is still lots of space – regardless of the constraints and parameters – to see and respect children as human beings, invite and involve them in their learning and the decisions that impact their lives, and make school a place where learning is relevant, significant, challenging and engaging for each learner.

What do YOU think?

What would YOU add to the list?

Where do YOU see space for agency-supportive practices this year?

Pedagogy 101 For PYP Parents

All week long I haven’t been able to stop thinking about a request that one of our parents made during our virtual “Parent Coffee”. Throughout this Distance Learning adventure, our Parent Coffees have provided space for the voices, opinions, perspectives and needs of our Primary School parent community. Each time, I leave with a page full of notes which lead to reflection, action and adjustments. But this time was different. This time my thinking was provoked – in a larger, more substantial way.

She was talking about how, inevitably, parents have taken on a bigger role in their children’s learning, and in most cases are now sharing in some of the roles and responsibilities that normally are fulfilled by teachers in face-to-face school. And as such, requested some help. Help that goes beyond what their children need to focus on and where to find resources and activities. Help more specifically focused on how to support their children in their learning; the pedagogical tips and tricks, us educators have in our back pocket when we are helping learners.

I’m sure parents at any school are likely overwhelmed at the prospect of taking more responsibility supporting their children’s learning. Now factor in what it must feel like to be a parent at a PYP school that is built on inquiry-based, concept-driven, agency supportive approaches to education. Wanting to help their child… but not being sure exactly how to do so.

We have to remember that most parents are not educators. They don’t have multiple degrees in education. They haven’t read endless books and blog posts. They don’t have resumes full of PD workshops. Understandably so, it’s our career – not theirs.

So how can we help? How can we share what we’ve learned through all those degrees, books and blogs, courses and workshops into something manageable and helpful that we can transfer over to them?

Here is my attempt. A pedagogy distilled. Condensed. Simplified.

Dedicated not only the wonderful parents at my school, but to all PYP parents around the world partnering with us during these difficult times to support their children.

1. Take an inquiry stance

Meet a question with a question. Often our first instinct when a child asks us a question is to provide an answer. But this approach can prevent a golden opportunity to have learners not only learn that thing, but also learn something about how to learn. So next time your child asks you a question (“How do you spell ….?” “How do you multiply fractions?” “What are the types of energy?”), no matter what the question is, instead of supplying the answer, try responding like this:

Great question! How could you find that out? What resource could you use to discover that? How could you figure that out?

Be prepared to inquire together. Sometimes, when you meet a question with a question, you get an “I don’t know”. That is an invitation to a great teachable moment! If your child doesn’t know how to find out on their own or what resource to use, you can step in as their partner and respond like this:

No problem! Let’s figure it out together. Maybe we can try this…. Have you ever used this… Let’s see if this resource has the answer….

This way you are still supporting them to figure out what they are trying to figure out, but along the way you’ve also helped develop their skill as an independent learner – so the next time, instead of needing to ask you, they might have some ways to figure it out on their own.

Ask the magic question – “What do you notice?”. No matter what subject, what area of learning, or what age – the secret ingredient to inquiry-based learning is asking learners to think about what they notice. Whether your child is learning their letters and looking at the letter “B”, or building their multiplication fluency by looking at a multiplication table, or developing their scientific knowledge by studying a model of a cell…. that one question works every time, and can always be followed up with “what else do you notice?” to probe for further thinking.

Don’t feel you have to be an expert, just be a learner. It is okay to not know something. In fact that presents an amazing opportunity to model your own approaches to learning. Feel confident to say, “I don’t know” or, “I have no idea”. Just make sure to follow it up with, “But now I want to know, so here is how I am going to find out!” or, “Let’s figure this out together!”

2. Support conceptual understanding

Value process. As often as possible get your child thinking beyond what they did and what they learned, and more about how they learned. Some great questions include:

How did you do that? Why did you do that? What strategy did you use? How did you learn that strategy? What steps did you take?

Harness the power of the key concepts. In the PYP we have 7 Key Concepts, that are secret ingredients to help learners think more deeply and understand… ANYTHING. The beauty of these key concepts, is they work for everything! You can apply these questions to any subject or area of learning. Whether your child is trying to learn about shapes… commas…. a historic figure…. a sports skill… sentence structure…. an art technique…. a water bottle! Anything. Here are the key concept questions you can ask your child at any time about anything they are learning:

What is it like? (Form)

How does it work? (Function)

How is it connected to other things? (Connection)

How does it change? (Change)

Why is it like that? Why is it the way it is? (Causation)

What are the different points of view? (Perspective)

What are our responsibilities? (Responsibility) 

3. Prioritize Reflection

Get them thinking about their thinking. Similar to the Key Concept questions, there are two questions you can ask your child to help them think deeper, about whatever it is they are learning. Again – any subject, any topic. More specifically, they get children thinking about their thinking! Here are two magic questions to support learners deep understanding:

How do you know?

What makes you say that?

Whether they are showing you the solution to a math problem, discussing parts of a book they are reading, summarizing information, sharing their perspective on a world event… these questions have super powers!

4. Support your child’s agency 

Invite and involve their voice. Don’t be afraid the let them express themselves. Give space for them to articulate what they like and don’t like about learning, and why that is. Listen to when they are advocating for what they need as learners. Listen for what they really care about and matters to them and try to understand and find ways to support it.

Respect and support their choices. Be aware of what choices you are making for your child, that they could probably be making themselves. Choices may include when they learn, where they learn, what they learn, and how they learn. Coach them to make informed choices, by making the decision making process explicit (What choice are you making for yourself?), then follow up with a reflection about how effective that choice was and whether it’s a good choice to be made again in the future (How did that choice work out for you? How do you know? What will you choose differently next time?).

Emphasize ownership. Sometimes learning can be something that gets misrepresented as something done to learners, or around learners. This creates a false sense that they are passively drifting through the process, and have no impact on their own learning. We want learners to know it’s their learning, they own it, they impact it. It is something done by them, for them, and we are the supporting actors. Use words and phrases that build that sense of ownership over their learning:

It’s your learning.

You’re in the driver’s seat.

Your learning, your choice. 

5. Be purposeful with feedback. 

Teach to fish, don’t give a fish. As much as possible, when you give feedback to your child, think about how to give advice that will go beyond that one moment. As teachers, we often use phrases like, “teach the writer, not the writing” to help us give tips that will impact that learner in a bigger, more sustainable way. Instead of just telling them how to fix something. Here are some examples of ways you can phrase that type of feedback:

“Readers…. (often go back an re-read what they don’t understand; share their opinion about what they read; break words into small chunks to help them sound it out etc.)

“Writers…. (read their writing outloud to themselves to try and find their mistakes; use capitals to show the reader a new sentence is starting; support their opinions with facts and evidence; add details to make their writing more interesting etc.)

“Mathematicians…. (double check their solutions for accuracy; use objects and drawings to help them solve problems; use short cuts and tricks called “algorithms”; use special words etc.)

This helps phrase feedback in a way that will help them in that moment, but also help them in that area beyond that moment as well. Feedback that not only fixes mistakes but helps them grow and develop as readers, writers, mathematicians, scientists, historians, artists and athletes!

 

As PYP educators, we need to see this as more than a short-term investment. The time and energy we spend supporting parents who are looking for help in this area, will pay long-term dividends when life returns to normal and we have a coalition of parents who not only understand inquiry, concepts and agency – but have experience living it.

What other points of pedagogy could we share with our PYP parents?

How can we help them, help their children?

What tips and advice can we impart unto our parent community as they become pioneers of at-home pedagogy?

Learners or Students?

Lately I’ve been wondering if in our attempt to create life-long learners, we are accidentally creating life-long students.

Does what we do each day at school help learners, learn how to learn?

Or how to be taught?

The unexpected and unfortunate circumstances of Distance Learning has presented an interesting litmus test for answering this question.

How has the experience of distance learning differed for:

Children whose time at school has helped them to know:

• what their own interests, passions, purposes, curiosities and needs are
• how to set their own intentions, criteria for success, goals and finish lines
• how to find, curate and judge resources that are most helpful for them as learners
• when, where and with whom they learn best
• how to make decisions about the best way to capture, document, and collect what they learn along the way
• how, when and from who to ask for feedback, support, help and guidance
• how to self-assess and triangulate perspectives on how they are doing and what their next steps are
• how to take their learning public – the different tools, approaches, and forums for doing so
• how to self-manage: to organize their time, tasks, and materials

Compared to…

Children who show up to school each day and are used to being told:

• what to learn
• why to learn it
• when to learn it
• how to learn it
• where to learn it
• with whom to learn it
• what resources to use
• how to capture and document
• how they are doing and what their next steps are
• when, how, with whom to share it with

Obviously, the goal is not to prepare children for Distance Learning. But Distance Learning gives us a unique snapshot into learning without school, learning beyond school and how learners approach learning when we’re not there with them.

What we do as educators each day can either contribute to an internal or external locus of control for the children we work with. Learning can either be seen as something done by them or something done to them. If children leave their years at school, thinking learning is only the by-product of teaching, then what happens when all of the sudden they no longer have ‘teachers’? Then there’s no more learning? Let’s hope not!

So what can we do, as educators, to be sure we are creating life-long learners?

1. Unpack the difference between learning and school:

 

2. Spend more time, learning about learning:

What does learning look like?

What does learning feel like?

What do you believe about learning?

How is learning unleashed?

Understanding learning

Work or Learning?

An inquiry into learning

 

3. Ask this simple, powerful question of ourselves:

Credit –John Spencer

 

4. . Take small steps sharing, and eventually shifting over, planning for learning

Link to resource

 

5. Elevate the importance and role of ATL skills in everything we do

Credit – Orenjibuta

 

6. Help learners take back ownership over their learning.

Credit – Barbara Bray and Sylvia Duckworth 

7. Be careful not to confuse compliance and engagement.

Credit – Barbara Bray and Sylvia Duckworth 

8. Be careful not to conceptualize “independent learners” as students who follow our directions by themselves without reminders

 

9. Take lessons learned from Distance Learning back with us, to keep pushing the envelop and breaking the mould of what school could be

 

10. Pull wisdom from the famous adage: Give a man a fish and he eats for a day. Teach a man to fish and he eats for a lifetime. 

“Give a child their learning, and they’ll learn for a day.

Teach a child how to learn, and they’ll learn for a lifetime”

.

So whether you are still in Distance Learning, heading back to IRL school, or already back in the normal swing of things, now is a chance for all of us to reflect and take stock of whether our intentions and actions truly create the life-long learners we hope for.

 

How do you ensure you are supporting the growth of life-long learners?

How do you prioritize learning how to learn?

How do you help learners discover who they are as learners and how best they learn?

 

A Chance to Liberate Learning from Schooling

I haven’t blogged all year.

And I’m not quite sure why.

Likely because I was finding my footing at a new school, in a new country, doing a new job. Trying to understand a new organization; what are its values, beliefs, challenges, obstacles, strengths, perspectives, philosophies? While figuring out how my own individual values, beliefs, challenges, obstacles, strengths, perspectives and philosophies fit – or don’t fit – within that organization.

Whatever the reason, my last published post was August 3rd!

Then Distance Learning hit.

And once that whirlwind began (as I am sure all of you have experienced), it was a sprinted marathon. So although I had many thoughts and ideas bouncing around my head, I was too swept up in it all to sit down and write.

Until I was given an assignment from my Director of Learning….

To sit down. For 15 minutes. And write.

So here I am – sitting down. For 15 minutes. And writing.

Our assignment was about pausing to notice and reflect upon success within our Distance Learning experience so far. And there are SO many tangible moments of success that I could point to – the tireless efforts and mind-blowing creativity of the staff; the resilience and commitment of the learners; the seemingly never ending patience, support and empathy from leaders and coaches; structures, systems and approaches that had positive impacts… and the list goes on!

But my mind usually has a way of zooming out, to the intangible and abstract – especially when it comes to school. So instead, I find myself reflecting upon how Distance Learning may unexpectedly be helping an entire generation (of learners, educators and parents) brake some of the shackles and constraints of the traditional paradigm of school that have been hard to shake free from in the past.

I’m not sure about your experience with Distance Learning so far, but for me, the experience seems to have begun to separate and elevate the concept of learning from the current, collective, notion of schooling.

Not by choice or intention. But by having to start over. Having to start from scratch. Having to come up with totally new things. Having to look at old things, in completely new ways. Questioning the purpose, place and impact of things that we may have never needed to question before. Rendering the phrase, “that’s the way we’ve always done things” powerless.

There have always have been small pockets of educators and parents critically examining the current paradigm of education and asking questions like:

What is learning?

How does learning happen?

What is truly worth learning? Who decides?

How do we know learning has happened?

What’s the point of grades?

Do schools create life-long learners or life-long students?

Does everyone have to learn the same things? At the same time? In the same way? At the same pace?

How do we help learners, learn how to learn?

How do we raise the profile of approaches to learning skills and attributes? 

How do we best meet individual and family needs?

But now those conversations seemed to have migrated from small pockets in certain schools and Twitter circles, to general discussion, happening on a much wider scale.

It seems that we have stumbled into a situation that forces us to focus on how to plan for learning and support learners without:

• compliance
• rewards
• punishments
• extrinsic motivation
• timetables
• grades
• seat-time
• standardization

But instead, to focus on how to plan for learning and support learners through:

• curiosity
• relevance
• motivation
• interest
• significance
• personalization
• choice
• ownership
• feedback
• relationships
• family partnership

It seems that for so long the system of school has muddled the concept of learning with self-imposed structures that seemed natural, invisible, ingrained and unchangeable. But now, these awful and unfortunate circumstances have engendered a global, collaborative inquiry into learning. Which has allowed us all to see through those structures and peel back those limitations, to gain a clearer, more accurate picture of LEARNING itself.

Obviously the necessity of distance learning, and the circumstances surrounding it, is something nobody wanted or planned for. And all of us are counting down the days to when life gets back to normal, when people are healthy, happy and safe and we’re back on campus, surrounded by learners, colleagues and families. But while we find ourselves in this unique situation, what lessons might we learn along the way that we can bring back with us?

How might this unwanted disruption to all of our lives, springboard our collective disruption of what school could be?

How do we take what we’ve been wondering and discovering about learning during these extraordinary circumstances, to help us shake-up and re-define what school looks like when we all go back to our ordinary circumstance?

How might this collective experience leave the door open a crack for bold moves and innovations when we return?

Starting the Year with the PYP Enhancements in Mind

Our PYP community is in a unique situation. We welcomed in the PYP Enhancements last school year – but for many of us, it was mid-way through the year. Which means this is the first time lots of us are planning our first weeks with the enhancements in mind.

I’m sure many of these considerations were already present in our previous approaches to back to school planning. But now we have a solid, common, intentional framework from which to plan our first day, our first week, and even the days leading up to the first day.

So as we plan our start to the year we need to be sure to ask ourselves and each other:

Are we thinking about The Learners?

Are we thinking about Learning and Teaching?

Are we thinking about the Learning Community? 

To help us all in this collective goal I’ve shared some ‘start of the year’ blog posts organized around those 3 categories:

The Learner

Relationship Building 

Why We Must Invest in Relationship Building First

An Inquiry Into My Students

Connecting with Students 

Learning and Teaching

Sowing the Seeds for a Great Year – 10 Tips for an Inquiry-Based First Week 

What Does an Inquiry-Based First Week of School Look Like?

What Could an Agency-Supportive First Week of School look like?

Best First Week of School Ever!

Best First Month of School Ever!

My Plan For  a More Fair and Free Place to Learn

Starting the year off slowly

The Learning Community 

Reaching Out to Families

Getting Parents On-board 

How are you ensuring the PYP Enhancements are guiding your back to school planning?

What other resources would you add to this list to help strengthen our focus on The Learner, Learning and Teaching and The Learning Community?