Empowering students to own their learning

John Spencer's and A.J Juliani's book, "Empower. What happens when students own their learning" has come at the right time for me. 

With Chapter headings like;

• Our job as teachers, parents and leaders is not to prepare kids for 'something;' our job is to help kids prepare themselves for 'anything'. 
• Assessment should be fun. No, really, we're serious.
• The system should fit the student instead of the student fitting the system.

it's easy to get a sense of the key messages within the book. Couple those key messages with some funky, non-traditional layout and this book lives up to it's title. 

The book itself empowers the reader.

A key message for teachers considering how to Empower their learners starts with asking:

What decisions am I making that students could make for themselves?

It's  a shift from a compliance mindset to a self-directed mindset.

So, how to get active learning? It doesn't happen by accident. It isn't about guiding from the side, it's guiding on the ride. Spencer and Juliani quote guides like Gandalf, Yoda and Ms Frizzle as examples of guides on the ride.
Remembering that when a student doesn't know what to do in Maths we show them, when they don't know what to do in writing, we show them, then the same needs to apply when a student doesn't know how to self-start or self-manage - we need to show them. We teach them along the way, when they signal they need help. (This might not come from the student actually asking for help)

We're sometimes fearful to "release" ourselves enough from what we think we need to do as teachers and that students who have choice in their learning can end up doing nothing meaningful, and I've seen this happen. (Think of the student who looks very busy on their device but achieves nothing).
A recent post called, "Swim a bit Deeper" offers some great ideas about how we can ensure students are involved in worthwhile self-directed projects of work.

So, where to from here for me? I'm thinking ahead to our next step in Inquiry learning at Winchester School and how we might move from Inquiry time to Inquiring classrooms. What will be involved in making this transition?

• Teachers will need to have a similar mindset to mine.
• Get copies of the Empower book for others to read
• A 6 year journey at our school might need to have stages: Ignite, Launch, Explore.
• Map what needs to happen at each stage to develop students who truly can own their learning
• Work with staff to develop "smorgasbords" for independent learning activities
• Model this approach through the professional learning programme for teachers
• How might I give choice and ownership to teachers of their professional learning?

It's a bit of a scramble of ideas, but from this will come clarity as I think through my reaction to the "Empower" book.

This self-starter is under way.

(Read the book and you'll get it)

Could we be missing Something?

We're talking about effective practice and how to best meet the needs of our learners. We're looking at how to develop self regulated learners in single cell classes. Evidence available from australia.teachingandlearningtoolkit.net.au/toolkit shows that meta-cognition and self regulation along with feedback as having high impact on learning and achievement.
So we're wondering how to best create the conditions that promotes these outcomes. We're currently pursuing creating self-guided programmes in single cell classes. We are working on having greater learner voice and choice, through having must do and can do activities within various aspects of our programmes. Learners will be involved in the development of some of the learning activities.
Having just come back from a trip to Christchurch that focussed on collaborative teaching approaches, I'm now wondering about the "power of more than one".
We were reviewing our moderation practices today and then I gave a quick report from my trip and the link was made between the two - with more than one teacher about, moderating would be enabled on a more frequent basis, there would be ongoing moderation as learners are discussed between teachers.
I am learning more and more about personalising  learning and collaborative teaching. I am learning about more advantages for both teachers and learners in taking a collaborative approach in an "innovative learning environment". Such ideas as a learner not connecting with one teacher might be avoided in a space that has more than one teacher, learners might gain different perspectives on the curriculum. Teachers worry about not knowing their learners so well. I know this is a real concern in many schools and one parents might have too - who is actually looking out for my child?
We don't feel we know enough yet about this to implement it successfully and there is a high level of angst in my community about taking this approach. So currently we're  looking at how we can ensure our learners are offered all they can be in a single cell setting.
If there's  one thing I hear over and over again, get the pedagogy right, then go from there. We have work to do to ensure that our classes are running how we want, that we all share some understandings of what we are wanting to achieve and how to go about achieving that.
Perhaps some teachers will select to work in a collaboration in the near future. In the meantime, we need to get our pedagogy right about enabling learners to be self guiding and self regulating.

Self guided learning and another reason why...

We sometimes double guess ourselves. I'm not sure why. Perhaps we need to ensure we have done our research properly to feel we have an evidenced base to justify our actions. However, something like self-directed or self-guided learning has plenty of research behind it and many schools are heading in the direction of personalising learning. This is more and more common in MLE's and for those of us in single cell schools, it's about MLP. It is possible to transform traditional practice in a single cell class. It's happening already. In lots of places, like our school.
The double guessing comes when we're questioned by parents (or by colleagues) about our approach and when things aren't quite going right, a new approach is quickly identified as being a potential problem.
And what about preparation for high school? How can students having choices and having to manage themselves possibly prepare them for high school? Sound familiar?
My thinking is, school is first and foremost not about preparing learners for a future life. They're living it right now. We should be giving learners what they need for today. It's ridiculous to suggest that everything a learner is doing is preparation for "real life" and that at some stage they'll recall the skills and learning for when it really matters. It matters now! They need to use and apply what they've got now.
I also believe that the skills and experience gained from managing oneself through a self guided approach will actually give a learner the skills they need to be successful at any time. Being able to prioritise tasks, know how much time to give a task and to know one's own strengths are essential. This knowledge and these skills can only be gained through being given opportunities where learners gain experience in applying them. (And when you look at it, these are actually skills that would make a learner successful when they do go to high school.)
There isn't an age when these skills can be acquired, it's no use saying that these are things a learner will be able to do in the senior school. Nonsense! Learners have been making decisions and learning plenty in their first 5 years of life and it should be that this type of learning continues when they first start school - not ignored for 4 or 5 years and then reintroduced sometime later in their schooling.

So, to all those innovators out there, trying new things and wanting to transform their practice - I encourage you to keep going. Kia kaha. The easy thing to do is "pack up" and revert to what has always been done. Is this a lesson we want our learners to learn? I think not.

The Guide vs the Farmer

I read a recent post claiming that "the guide on the side" position currently put forward as good practice needs to be reconsidered as the teacher should be at the centre of things and a new idea was put forward to consider - the teacher as farmer.
I've thought about it. Here's why I think a guide is going to work better than a farmer as an analogy in education.
A farmer controls just about everything that happens on their farm - apart from weather. They buy stock they want, sell stock they don't want, put fences in place to stop stock movement and drench everything. Hmm. I'm not convinced I want to be in their room as a learner. Drench, drench, drench. Weigh, weigh, weigh.
For me, I want a guide. Someone who has expertise and will offer it to me when asked and when they see I might need it.
Here's my analogy. I'm a novice tourist - never been out of NZ. I wish to go somewhere exotic and different to home. My travel guide should inform me of unsafe places that I would want to avoid. They should listen to what I'm telling them and then ask more questions to find out more about a suitable destination. They may make suggestions and offer me brochures. I get to make the final decision though - not them.
A local guide can be handy when in a new and unfamiliar place. This local expert knows people, hidden gems and the language. This local guide may have been suggested by my travel guide. Ideal!
While visiting my destination I might take a guided tour  - headphones on - where I'm able to pause while I ponder, fast forward past the boring part or rewind to hear it again. It suits my pace and my interests.
Now - here's where my guide is useful again. After my travels they find out about my experience  - what worked, what didn't, what I enjoyed etc, so that the next novice tourist is given this information too.
I'm now no longer a novice. I've travelled a bit. I still need a guide, but less so. I've learned from my first experience and want to make some changes- longer here, less time there, learn more local language etc etc/ I need to be guided, but I'm not entirely dependent.
Eventually, I'm able to self-guide my own travels.

I'm excited about the concept of  learners as explorers and teachers as guides.

(I'd be willing to talk to a teacher/farmer who is willing to go free range perhaps)

Will I be able to write something everyday for 28 days?

Students need to learn how to learn. Teachers need to teach students how to learn.

"Students need to learn how to learn. Teachers need to teach students how to learn." 

This was a quote discussed at a recent PLG . I had to agree. But what is it that students need to learn in order to know how to learn? And in some cases, what is it that teachers might need to learn so they know how to teach students how to learn?

One answer to that second question is that a teacher might need to learn how to change their practice, step aside a little and observe rather than lead what is happening. Sometimes it's scary taking a step back and seeing what happens when you're not quite so helpful and not controlling everything that is going on. Sometimes students show you that they clearly have no idea of what to do, what they're really learning or how to progress. Isn't that wonderful? How powerful it is to find out what a student can and can't do without you leading them all the way. You now know more about that learner and gain clarity on their learning.

I wonder if all students already know how to learn? They spent 5 years learning before they came to school, they're obviously capable of learning a number of things. I wonder if sometimes that some students simply feel they have to hand over their learning and simply become passive rather than active learners. It's those students who need to re-learn how to learn and how to be active participants in their learning journey.

Fortunately, most students I encounter are active life long learners. My job is to get out of their way and let them guide their own learning.