Abolish the status-quo

In these times we hear talk directed at many aspects of our modern society to abolish the status-quo. Perhaps this is a good time to have the same discussion in regard to education, chiefly reducing teacher workload.

The answer is simply obvious and based on reality.

“Remember, the full-time classroom teacher, day-in, day-out, teaches 90 percent of a 25 to 30-hour timetabled week.

This leaves a mere 10 percent of time allocated to complete two remaining, yet fundamental, aspects of the role: marking and planning. This places an incredible burden on that 10 percent – and leaves all other tasks to be completed in our own time.

To reduce workload, we need to consider reducing the teaching load to one-third. That way, we could teach for 33 percent of the time and divide the remaining 66 percent between planning and marking.

Photo by Green Chameleon on Unsplash

Imagine that! Directed time for planning lessons, marking books, and reflecting on teaching and learning during the school day. ” – Ross McGill

Why is it always assumed that we will just keep taking it on? Yes, we love teaching and we feel it is an art, science, and a calling. But we also feel taken advantage of when initiative after initiative is added to our workload.

Let’s start over. Let’s look at a school calendar year, month, week, and day and ask ourselves some hard questions. What can we reasonably expect a child to obtain proficiency in? Look at all these standards, is this a reasonable model for learning, or a lesson sure to fail or sheer lunacy? Are there any models existing on our planet we could emulate in this regard?

The time has come and perhaps it is well past time for a new, Modest Proposal, though not quite in the spirit of Jonathan Swift. A modest proposal based on reality, that genuinely looks after the well-being of those that are charged with the education of our dearest resource. We can no longer afford to dance around and ignore this issue. It is the proverbial elephant in the room.

If not now, then when?

Feedback

1. 1. Comment Bank – Use the comment bank in Classroom’s grading tool to make commenting on student work and providing feedback more efficient. Frequently used comments can be saved for future use.
2. Emphasize Words in Comments – Use shortcuts to emphasize words when inserting comments. To bold a word, put an asterisk before and after the word (*bold*). To italicize a word, put an underscore before and after the word (_italics_). To strikethrough, a word put a hyphen before and after the word (-strikethrough-). These shortcuts can be used in any Google tool that allows the user to insert comments.
3. See the Process – Students don’t have to submit their assignments for you to see their work. When you chose “make a copy for each student” for assignments, each student’s work can be seen in the grading tool, even if it’s not submitted. Teachers can make comments and suggestions along the way.
4. Feedback Before Student Submits – Provide feedback to students while their assignment is still a work in progress instead of waiting until submission. This will help the student better understand assignment expectations.
5. Suggestion Mode – Use suggestion mode in Google Docs to make edits become suggestions in a comment.
6. Feedback on Presentations and/or Presenters – Keep students engaged during presentations by having them utilize a Google Doc or Form to provide feedback on the presentation.
7. Tag Collaborators in Comments – Tag specific collaborators in comments by using the @. Once the @ is keyed in, a list of collaborators pops up to choose who you want to tag. More than one collaborator can be tagged in a comment.
8. Individualized Communication – Classroom can be used to communicate with individuals through email, private comments, and comments on assignments.
9. Ways to Provide Feedback – Provide feedback to students through the grading tool, comment bank, or private comments.
10. Delete Comments – Teachers can delete inappropriate comments.
11. Peer Feedback – Allow students to critique and provide feedback on one another’s assignments.
12. Mute Commenting – Teachers can mute student comments entirely if needed. Comments can be controlled through the settings menu or through the short answer question dialogue box.

Adapted from Matthew Lynch

This blog post contains links to outside sources. It is always good practice to make a copy for yourself that you can revise.

Innovative & Interactive Response to Text

I’m sure that like me you might get frustrated by some of the obvious drawbacks PDF’s have. And, so many of our docs these days are in PDF format.

So, you may find this to be a relief.

“It’s so important in this digital age when so many students consume text online that they learn how to transfer their pen and paper annotation strategies to the online space. Kami is another fantastic tool for supporting active reading online.”

This is a quote from a fellow educator, Catlin Tucker. It was excerpted from this blog entry ==> Make PDFs Interactive with Kami

I started to have my learners engage with a PDF text and then suddenly in the back of my mind I remembered Catlin’s post from last spring.

Here is a recent example from my class illustrating our use of this tool. In order to protect my learner’s identity, the comments he posted have been redacted, only his highlights have been shared.

Setting Sail

Assignment Directions and Rubric

Read and Annotate

Learning Goal: Stop, think and react using a variety of strategies to understand

In response to: “Fighting the battle of copy/paste cheating”

http://ditchthattextbook.com/2018/04/04/fighting-the-battle-of-copy-paste-cheating/

I don’t like the conclusion you reached because I know in my gut that it be true. However, I find it is also a time problem. I have 4 hours each week to plan, provide feedback, communicate, and create for Reading, Writing, Math, Science, Social Studies, Listening, Speaking, Vocabulary Work, Grammar, Mechanics, Technology, and Art Standards. Planning includes analyzing myriad assessments, personalizing, providing remediation, planning for whole class, small group, partner and individual instruction. Communication involves all stakeholders; students, parents, and fellow staff. It also includes writing progress reports and report cards. Creation includes designing units, lessons, and assessments since we often either do not have a guaranteed, viable curriculum or what we have has to be modified. Now throw in a recess incident, a discipline problem, a depressed student, an IEP, etc. and some of that 4 hours is gone. In my desire to be succinct I may have left out a few other requirements.

Obviously, the great load of teaching is played out behind the scenes while the bulk of our time is on the carpet in front of our learners. Hence, many use “activities”, TPT, Pinterest, etc.

And I love teaching. Yet, we find we are constantly striving for a sustainable practice. Sustainable for ourselves, our families, our students, our colleagues, our schools and our communities, all of whom we serve.

Solutions?