Written by Reflection of first F2F:
I had no idea what to expect from this first session! I was full of nerves as I am always uncomfortable in situations where I don’t know many people. Thankfully, my department head is also taking part in Cohort 21, as well as a past colleague – so I had two familiar faces! That being said, everyone was SO friendly, supportive, and encouraging it felt like I was in a room full of friends and colleagues. I am still relatively new to teaching (on year 6 now!) so my teacher network is not very large, so I am thrilled to be on this journey with everyone!
The Power of Three:
Since the beginning of the school year, I have been observing and talking with my students. I wouldn’t say I “interviewed” anyone, but I have had some brief conversations with some students, as well as parents and teachers, about the most valuable things students can learn. From these conversations and observations, I believe the three most urgent needs of my students are:
1) Positive/Growth Mindset
This is something I strive to instill in my students every year, and is a constant battle. Though I usually reach three or four of them, I desperately want to expand that to include all of my students (or let’s be realistic, as many as possible!).
I have had two conversations with parents about this recently that were very refreshing. A lot of the time, when speaking with parents, they are most concerned with their child’s grade. Both conversations came following a math test that went poorly for two boys.
The father of one of the boys was concerned because his son texted him saying things like “I am so stupid”, “Why do I bother trying when I fail anyways?” right after writing the test. When talking with his dad, he was very clear – he did not care what his son’s grade was on any test or in the course, but he didn’t want his son to ever feel this way about himself. How could we help his son to see his potential, even when he struggles? Fast forward to the retest this student wrote after some positive encouragement and extra support – his test mark improved by 30%! Fast forward again to a collaborative learning activity (this boy is usually pretty quiet in these scenarios) where he came up with the method to solve the problem! And fast forward one more time to his latest test – he passed on his first attempt, improving 15% from his unit one test mark! Even better, he is more excited and committed to working through the struggle!
Another student, who also struggled on the first test, is new to our school. When talking to him and his parents, they all were very open to taking more advantage of extra support that offered. When his boy wrote his retest, he had a minimal improvement, but it was enough to earn a pass! When returning it, I was cautious as often students would react with disappointment at this result. I was pleasantly surprised when he was excited to see an improvement! He said to me “That is better than last time! Moving in the right direction!” OH MY GOSH! YES! He valued 
the process, not just the result and that is GOLD. Fast forward to his second test, where he earned a 72% and was ECSTATIC!
I very much want all of my students to experience the joy in the process, rather than disappointment with the results.
2) Resilience and Perseverance
These skills are SO important in every aspect of our lives. Nothing comes easy in life, but I want my students to achieve their goals. That means they CANNOT give up when things get hard or if they fail. Unfortunately they often do. Have you ever heard the saying “mistakes are proof that you are trying”? YES. Mistakes are so valuable to continual growth and improvement. I want my students to learn to view their mistakes and failures as motivation to do better the next time!
I have one student this year in grade 10 math, who I also taught last year. All year she struggled between working hard and giving up. This year we had a conversation right away to set the tone for the year, and she decided to go full force this year. She is attentive during classes and participates, comes in for extra help, sees a tutor, and asks for extra questions. Does she still get overwhelmed and feel like quitting? At least once a week. Does she quit? Not yet! She is much more confident with her abilities and is seeing her hard work pay off!
3) Ability to Collaborate
This is something that I talk about at least once a week with my students. I have incorporated a lot of collaborative learning activities this year since I believe it is important that students learn to work effectively with a variety of people. This is something that happens in life a lot; you might not always like the person, or know them well (or at all), but you may still need to work with them. It is a constant battle I am having with some students. The strong students want to do the work themselves, and the weaker students aren’t confident enough to speak up or ask questions. How can I get through to both groups to work more effectively together?
To Sum Up:
I am looking forward to diving into this process further to help decide on a particular path to take for my Action Plan. As you can tell, I am still a little all over the place!
@sletham I love that you have identified mindset as a particularly urgent area to focus on this year with your students. You are not alone. For the last several years of C21 we have seen this creep up and up in the Actions Plans of the past.
Check these out from some Action Plan inspiration and validation –
https://cohort21.com/action-plans/2018-19-action-plans/
See you Saturday!
@lbettencourt @acampbellrogers @apetrolito @mmoore
Great post, @sletham! I echo @jmedved ‘s comments about looking at last action plans. I’ve only been a part of two cohorts but I remember seeing mindset, and resiliency come up over and over again, from educators across all age groups and disciplines.
You said “I usually reach three or four of them, I desperately want to expand that to include all of my students”, which I think is an amazing goal, but it may be daunting at times. Remember to celebrate the small victories (as you did with the two students you spoke about) while you continue to strive to reach all of your students.
Also, have you thought about sharing your blog with your students, as a way of modelling positive mindset and resiliency for them?
See you Saturday!
Great work here Stephanie,
Connect with @acampbellrogers and @vhcivan who are looking at this or have looked at this in the past. We are all looking at ways to improve the students level of achievement, and it sounds like you are focussing on the long game (mindsets and strategies) and not the short game (grade and marks).
Thanks and see you soon,
Garth.
To hit on the collaboration piece a bit: this year when our first Learning Skills assessments went out to parents, @gvogt had the faculty guide our student mentees through a self-reflection (using a process based largely on a Cohort post @lfarooq shared last year) that eventually required them to write their own progress report comments. Collaboration was a common area of improvement identified by many of our students, and it was interesting to see how their self-awareness, and plans for improving this learning skill, changed once they grasped the concept of focusing on what THEY could control, rather on what their peers were or were not doing. This is certainly not a standalone solution for improving collaboration, but perhaps a point from which students’ internal dialogues can be explored as reframed if necessary. Looking forward to following your process this year, as these are certainly needs I see in many of my students!
Great post, @sletham! It was heartwarming to read about the parent who was more concerned over their child’s metal health than their grades. Thank you for sharing this story. I wish all parents could shift a focus away from grades to the process of learning, how students deal with challenges and overcome those challenges. Another person you might want to connect with is @cmcinnes – and she is in our group as well! She is interested in exploring the process of learning vs. the end product. Make sure you chat on Saturday! Looking forward to seeing you.
Hi Stephanie!
Thanks for this post, several peers pointed out that we are pursing learning in similar areas so it will be good to chat! I’m wrestling with perseverance as an important area of skill development. Something I’m looking into is tying together the idea of ‘failing well’ … articulating for students what that looks like and also managing self-talk. I think together, with ample practice we could approach a mindset shift around perseverance! Look foward to seeing you Sat!