Category: Growth Mindset

The Moments in Between

1/9/2019

#earlylang colleagues at ACTFL 2019

Attending a conference is a fabulous way to learn and grow, but wading through the number of sessions offered can feel overwhelming. While it is important to get your money’s worth (especially if your district or company is paying), it is also essential to make time to engage with other participants. I’m not talking about a 3 hour lunch or happy hour instead of attending sessions, but rather taking the time to network and interface outside of a planned session.

Do you know the feeling you get after attending a great session? You leave with so many ideas you feel like you might burst with excitement but also that your head is swimming with where to begin. This is an ideal time for a small conversation that can lead to big changes. Often we try to rush off to another session when it might be more valuable to stop and chat with another attendee. You both received the same information through a different set of eyes and perspective; sharing and conversing can give you both a way to see the application in what you learned. Not only did you have a shared experience, but your differing previous experiences allow you to sift through things in distinct ways creating more ideas between the two of you. This is a great opportunity to bounce ideas or share reactions, and to create a connection point for future conversation.

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I "Can Do"

8/17/2017

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Students self-assessment has always been a bit of a struggle for me. Can a 3rd grader really assess his own learning? How can I help my learners understand where they are and where I want them to go?

Enter the ACTFL “Can Do” statements. These are not new, but after many years of working with them, I finally feel that I figured out their true place in my classroom. Over the past few years of writing and re-writing curriculum, we’ve used a wide range of Can Do statements in our documents and with our students. I’ve created bulletin boards, created ranking documents and pretty much anything else you can think of. No matter what form they’ve taken, the self-assessment piece hasn’t worked for me.

This year, my team and I are taking a different approach to the Can Dos and self-assessment. In language learning, it is impossible to acquire something and then never use it again. Language builds on itself; we go deeper into topics and broaden our vocabulary around that topic. We constantly talk about spiraling curriculum and vocabulary, but how does that play out in the Can Do statements.

Enter the travel map.

This goal is to help students visualize a path through our unit. Each can do reflects the vocabulary and functions we expect of our students, and through this path, they better understand that each piece is important in reaching our goal.
As we go, students will be asked to shade each circle. Wait, shade? You read that correctly! Since language learning is not a one and done, we want to help students visualize they are consistently adding layers to their learning. By shading the circle, students demonstrate they are continuing to build their knowledge so that by the end of the unit they’ve had the chance to revise the Can Dos multiple times.

Part of my goal for the year is to help students understand that learning is a process and that it takes a long time to become proficient. I’ve been working on my Spanish since I was in elementary school and every day I learn new words and phrases and I work to refine my language. It is my hope that not only will they begin to understand the process of learning language, but will also be kind to themselves on the days where they struggle and extremely proud of themselves as they see the progress they’ve made.

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Central States Conference 2016 Reflections and takeaways

3/19/2016

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Just a week out from Central States Conference 2016, and I think I'm finally ready to put what I've learned into words. As I reflected on my time at the conference, I realized that aside from the classroom and student focused takeaways, there are some big picture ideas that really stuck with me. My growth and learning came to more than buzzwords and targeted practices, but also in the importance of sharing time with colleagues and learning from those colleagues. We may not all be experts in anything, but we have a passion for language and teaching and we want what is best for our students. The presentations and conversations at Central States made this very clear. So here’s some stuff I picked up:

Everyone is doing their best to make learning better for their students.
No matter where my colleagues are in their career or in the process of writing or rewriting curriculum, we are all working hard to take the baby steps necessary to make huge changes. The way we teach language has changed drastically over the past years and there is a lot to take in and learn. It isn't just about what and how to implement ideas, but an incredible shift in the way we view language teaching. Just accepting this shift is a huge accomplishment. Diving in and making those changes is just a part of the process. Each time we take a small step, we really can't have a big impact on the students learning. Just the small steps can lead us to where we want to go with her teaching to where we want our students to go. It doesn't have to happen overnight and we, As teachers, have to be OK with making one change at a time to reach our bigger goal.

Sometimes all we need is a spark.
As I started the weekend at Central states, I was feeling a little lost as to what I really wanted to get out of the conference. I feel really good about where we are in our curriculum as a district, but it just isn't enough. I really couldn't decide what it was I wanted to focus on. After Amy Lenord's presentation on ditching the vocabulary list, however, I realize that I wasn't looking for a solution, but a spark. Just one idea can have a huge impact in changing the way we think about curriculum and how we teach. Why was I picking vocabulary (seemingly out of thin air) when I could use my authentic resources to dictate? Add this to Laura Terrill's idea of starting with culture and content and the pieces begin to come together. Neither one had the whole answer, but each of pieces begin to fit together to help solve the puzzle of how to push students to higher language proficiency.

Don't forget the conversation
The amount and variation in the sessions offered at Central states was incredible. But sometimes conversation after and between sessions is more valuable than attending twice as many sessions. Not only is it a time to continue the learning from the session, but to brainstorm ideas and connect with other colleagues. The more connections we make, the more potential there is for sharing and collaborating down the road. I am a person that likes to process information with other people; I like to talk it out to help formulate ideas and thoughts. Without these conversations, I’m not sure I would necessarily come to the same ideas or conclusions that I do when sharing and brainstorming with others. Not only do they have different perspectives and come from a wide variety of educational backgrounds and situations, but also they have differing experiences that lead to seeing material in distinctive ways.

Social media isn’t just a distraction
Despite constant commentary about millennials and technology, Twitter played an extremely important role in Central States for me. Not only is it impossible to attend all of the sessions, but it is also impossible to take everything in over the three day conference. The backchannel Twitter conversation provides an archive of thoughts, ideas, conversation and more that occurred during, between, and after sessions. Days, weeks, and months later, I can return to that “archive” under the #CSCTFL16 and review these ideas or moments to spark a new idea. Not only that, it is a great way to process ideas and have conversation even if you aren’t sitting next to the person in that moment. The amount of sessions I was able to “attend” was expanded just by virtue of reading the ideas or thoughts of others. Moreover, everyone hears the information differently, even if they are in the same room. The ability to read another perspective opens my mind to greater possibilities.

Central States this year didn't really feel like a regional conference. It was amazing to hear from some of the top people in the field and to connect with those who are facing the same everyday struggle to make language learning more effective and authentic for our students. Looking forward to next year in Chicago!

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Why Failure IS important

3/7/2016

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No one ever wants to fail. Ever. But the truth is, periodic failure offers much more than perfection. If you are perfect (and who can really say they are?!?!) then there is no room to learn and grow.

As a teacher, I feel like I often spend hours crafting what I hope is the most amazing and exciting lesson or activity. I think I’ve considered all angles, worked through giving the directions, thought about the vocabulary my students need, etc.; I’ve got this lesson in the bag. And then – EPIC FAIL!!

https://chrishildrew.wordpress.com/2014/03/21/becoming-a-growth-mindset-school/

But is it really a failure? Or is it only a failure if you never learn and grow? We ask our students to learn from their mistakes, so shouldn’t we, as teachers, model that behavior for them? Taking a failed lesson and reflecting and working through it to make it better is really no longer a failure. Not only is the lesson better, but also you as a teacher are better. Growth mindset is the current buzzword in education, but it is more than that, it is a choice to look at and reflect on your teaching to make it better for you and for your students.

Reflecting on failure has a benefit for our students as well. Imagine a teacher that never tried new ideas and always played it safe. Not only might the class be a bit boring, but also she sends the message to her students that risk-taking and change are not important. A teacher who looks for new opportunities and ideas, however, demonstrates the importance of taking risks. We constantly encourage our students, especially World Language students, to take risks and put their language use out there. If we don’t model that behavior with our teaching, why should they believe us?

It isn’t, however, just the risk-taking that we model. When an assignment or activity doesn’t work quite right, it is important that we model the reflection process with our students as well. Including them in the reflection not only provides us as teachers with a different perspective, but also teaches students that mistakes are great, but reflecting and improving is even better!

Failure provides that real-life, teachable moment. So grab your epic fails by the horns and reflect and change to make the failure worthwhile.

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The Moments in Between

I "Can Do"

Central States Conference 2016 Reflections and takeaways

Why Failure IS important

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