MGI 2017 Reflection Day 4

Day Four at the Institute

To quote the good ol' Grateful Dead, "Once in a while you get shown the light, in the strangest of places if you look at it right!"  After the Team Meeting I found myself feeling like I had learned from talking and sharing with my partner.  I realize I am quick to take on something, only to find myself at some point later falling short of my vision that I started with.  Out of fear?  Lack of commitment? Because I took on something else interesting?  I stop before taking the new task to a higher level. How does that relate to this project this year?  Last year I fell short of being able to present my project in January.  Sure there were lots of factors...but how can I do things differently this year?  With the project and with my personal life?  No answers at this point.  Is that realization enough as a starting point?

Another "getting shown the light" time happened soon after that "a ha" this morning.  I started talking with a teacher who works in the same SU.  We spent a good deal of time processing the year and talking about what went down in our respective schools, celebrations and challenges.  Eventually the conversation turned to our project ideas, and when I mentioned mindfulness she lit up!  She said she has been intentionally doing that for several years in her classroom.  I began asking lots of questions and summarize here:

- Yoga For Classrooms  - This card deck has a large number and variety of mindfulness meets yoga activities.  She swears by it!

- How does she build this intentional practice in?  Morning Meeting.  After recess.  I see it happening after our snack and movement break.

- Sounds like we had a similar year with the dispositions of our students.  What to do with the disengaged?  They can desk rest or do another quiet mindful task

- Mindfulness in her classroom can be doodling, drawing, writing.  That was refreshing and helps me understand the importance I realized yesterday that I need to let the students design this curriculum with me!

- Are other students distracting you?  Ignore them and remind the others that is why we are practicing this!  To be able to focus amidst the distractions!

- Books for resources! - Taming Your Dragons and other anxiety and stress reduction books for children

1:15 Workshop

I decided I needed some hands on time in the Maker Space so I went to Lucie's workshop.  I had to take my foot out of my mouth first after yesterday when I shared out that I hated Maker Space stuff. That was surely me showing off my discomfort with the idea of working with such tools.  It also was evidence of my fear in that I have no idea how to incorporate something like this into my classroom.  Luckily at my school we have a whole room with a teacher dedicated to this kind of enrichment.  But I realize after this session that Maker Materials, like technology or science, needs to be integrated and not a stand alone event.  Well, this is not in the near future for me perhaps, but I see the need to meet the variety of learners in my classroom.  Students with a variety of interests and means of expression of their knowledge should have this access.  Students come from a diversity of backgrounds and learn in countless ways, so giving them access to makes sense, it's now a question of where to start.  Lucie advocated strongly for having the "Makey Makey" kits if you had to start someplace!

Afternoon Work Session

I found yet another sweet nook to work in.  It was quiet for most of the time...I feel I made good progress on my Research Plan.  I decided to leave the reading and rationale part for now and really hash out a calendar of implementation.  I feel very different from previous years in that I feel I have so many ideas of lessons and tools to implement for this plan.  I didn't want to put all of it in September for fear of overload.  I made a conscious decision to use some newer resources and instruction earlier, and then include the resources that I have used in the past later in the semester.  I decided to do that because if I force myself to do the instruction that is new to me first, I feel that I will be more accountable to my plan.
  Take a look at the Research Plan

MGI 2017 Day 3

Starting to feel the pressure a bit of getting some serious reading done.  Looking forward to more student consults as yesterday really gave me some ideas about implementation of mindfulness in the classroom.  Here we go...

Morning Work Session

   I'm glad to have bookmarked articles from a module that I wanted to read.  I feel that they supported my thinking about why I wanted to go in this direction with my research.  It feels more comfortable to have dabbled in this previous years, and encouraging to think that I am going to be more intentional about it this Fall.  I have written several paragraphs of the rationale and need to move into the Mindfulness module soon...student conferring is first.

Student Conferring

Kind of a different session... I think I went in looking for some specific answers from the students and I didn't get it.  I am thinking that was information enough in the end!  I was hoping to hear what those students had been taught about mindfulness and what tools they had to use when the need arose.  One student talked about guided sessions, while the others didn't have much to add.  That leads me to think that perhaps they hadn't been taught.  More justification for my plan...?

I found it interesting that the students did have something to add about what they wanted.  Breathing times, music being played by the teacher, listening to music of their own choice, a break table with relaxing options.

Short Conversation with Pete

We planned time for a quick chat.  Hadn't shared my plan with him yet.  I shared the evolution of my plan from mindfulness and resiliency towards my current plan of intentional mindfulness.  I have been thinking of doing lots of direct instruction of techniques hoping that it would help them create a menu of options for use as needed.  He came at me with the idea of starting the "unit" by asking the students to generate questions that would ultimately lead THEM to designing their own set of tools.  I made this visual:

Lunch

No, this is not about the food.  The usual "Where do I sit" feeling hits right after I filled my plate.  I headed to a familiar face from the Team and got to meet another person.  That seems to be the theme here and what keeps me coming back.  The unexpected conversations you have that help add clarity.  This time it was not just for me, but for helping others find clarity.  We got on the mindfulness theme and I shared my idea, and it was so interesting to hear what the others had to say.  I am thinking of mindfulness for my age group as a way to bring the energy down.  That is still engagement, right?  One of the other people was taking the stance that mindfulness was to CREATE energy.  To help students look deeper at themselves.  In the end...that's kind of the same thing?

1:15 Workshop - Using Digital Media with Pete

mediatools.vt.weebly.com

Path of creation - give many roles
What are you trying to say...
Storyboard...
Media...
Music...
Creation...
Edit...

I tend to gravitate towards video workshops.  I have done a bit in my classes.  I have done more using digital tools for students to create screencast videos that explain learning.  How will I include video making next year?  Can I branch away from familiar tools and go towards full video?  Could they be creating video about their mindfulness tools and practice?

Project Status

I'm feeling in a good place about my project.  I have a concise question to research and I'm believing that there is a concrete space for it next year in my curriculum.  My teammates are on board, and we have made time in our day for this explicit instruction.  I have been wading through the brain research readings, adding them to my rationale.  I need to get moving towards the mindfulness work, using both the module and the presentation that was shared with me today (Thanks Life).  Here's a link to the project plan

Take a look if you wish...

Readings Links and Ideas

Self-awareness plays a critical role in improved learning because it helps students become more efficient at focusing on what they still need to learn. The ability to think about one's thinking increases with age. Research shows that most growth of metacognitive ability happens between ages 12 and 15(PDF, 199KB). When teachers cultivate students' abilities to reflect on, monitor, and evaluate their learning strategies, young people become more self-reliant, flexible, and productive. Students improve their capacity to weigh choices and evaluate options, particularly when answers are not obvious. When students have difficulty understanding, they rely on reflective strategies to recognize their difficulties and attempt to rectify them. Improving metacognitive strategies related to students' schoolwork also provides young people with tools to reflect and grow in their emotional and social lives.

7 Strategies That Improve Metacognition

1. Teach students how their brains are wired for growth.

The beliefs that students adopt about learning and their own brains will affect their performance. Research shows that when students develop a growth mindset vs. a fixed mindset, they are more likely to engage in reflective thinking about how they learn and grow. Teaching kids about the science of metacognition can be an empowering tool, helping students to understand how they can literally grow their own brains.

2. Give students practice recognizing what they don't understand.

The act of being confused and identifying one's lack of understanding is an important part of developing self-awareness. Take time at the end of a challenging class to ask, "What was most confusing about the material we explored today?" This not only jumpstarts metacognitive processing, but also creates a classroom culture that acknowledges confusion as an integral part of learning.

3. Provide opportunities to reflect on coursework.

Higher-order thinking skills are fostered as students learn to recognize their own cognitive growth. Questions that help this process might include:

• Before this course, I thought earthquakes were caused by _______. Now I understand them to be the result of _______.
• How has my thinking about greenhouse gases changed since taking this course?

4. Have students keep learning journals.

One way to help students monitor their own thinking is through the use of personal learning journals. Assign weekly questions that help students reflect on how rather than what they learned. Questions might include:

• What was easiest for me to learn this week? Why?
• What was most challenging for me to learn? Why?
• What study strategies worked well as I prepared for my exam?
• What strategies for exam preparation didn't work well? What will I do differently next time?
• What study habits worked best for me? How?
• What study habit will I try or improve upon next week?

Encourage creative expression through whatever journal formats work best for learners, including mind maps, blogs, wikis, diaries, lists, e-tools, etc.

Reflection Link to article

• comment on why specific samples were selected or
• comment on what they liked and did not like in the samples or
• comment on or identify the processes involved in developing specific products or performances or
• describe and point to examples of how specific skills or knowledge improved (or did not) or
• identify strengths and weaknesses in samples of work or
• set goals for themselves corresponding to the strengths and weaknesses or
• identify strategies for reaching those goals or
• assess their past and current self-efficacy for a task or skill or
• complete a checklist or survey about their work or
• some combination of the aboveReflection sheets

Probably the most common portfolio reflection task is the completion of a sheet to be attached to the sample (or samples) of work which the reflection is addressing. The possibilities for reflection questions or prompts are endless, but some examples I have seen include

Selection questions/prompts

• Why did you select this piece?
• Why should this sample be included in your portfolio?
• How does this sample meet the criteria for selection for your portfolio?
• I chose this piece because ....

Growth questions/prompts

• What are the strengths of this work? Weaknesses?
• What would you work on more if you had additional time?
• How has your ______ (e.g., writing) changed since last year?
• What do you know about ______ (e.g., the scientific method) that you did not know at the beginning of the year (or semester, etc.)?
• Looking at (or thinking about) an earlier piece of similar work, how does this new piece of work compare? How is it better or worse? Where can you see progress or improvement?
• How did you get "stuck" working on this task? How did you get "unstuck"?
• One skill I could not perform very well but now I can is ....
• From reviewing this piece I learned ....

Goal-setting questions/prompts

• What is one thing you can improve upon in this piece?
• What is a realistic goal for the end of the quarter (semester, year)?
• What is one way you will try to improve your ____ (e.g., writing)?
• One thing I still need to work on is ....
• I will work toward my goal by ....

Evaluation questions/prompts

• If you were a teacher and grading your work, what grade would you give it and why?
• Using the appropriate rubric, give yourself a score and justify it with specific traits from the rubric.
• What do you like or not like about this piece of work?
• I like this piece of work because ....

Effort questions/prompts

• How much time did you spend on this product/performance?
• The work would have been better if I had spent more time on ....
• I am pleased that I put significant effort into ....

Overall portfolio questions/prompts

• What would you like your _____ (e.g., parents) to know about or see in your portfolio?
• What does the portfolio as a whole reveal about you as a learner (writer, thinker, etc.)?
• A feature of this portfolio I particularly like is ....
• In this portfolio I see evidence of ....

As mentioned above, students (or others) can respond to such questions or prompts when a piece of work is completed, while a work is in progress or at periodic intervals after the work has been collected. Furthermore, these questions or prompts can be answered by the student, the teacher, parents, peers or anyone else in any combination that best serves the purposes of the portfolio.

Other reflection methods

In addition to reflection sheets, teachers have devised a myriad of means of inducing reflection from students and others about the collection of work included in the portfolio. For example, those engaging in reflection can

• write a letter to a specific audience about the story the portfolio communicates
• write a "biography" of a piece of work tracing its development and the learning that resulted
• write periodic journal entries about the progress of the portfolio
• compose an imaginary new "chapter" that picks up where the story of the portfolio leaves off