Do you know what your students really think about your class?

The end of the year is here.  Some of us are trying to wrap up projects.  Some of us are counting down the day.  Some of us are starting to think about what we plan on changing for next year.  While some of us are making plans for summer.  But, how many of us are asking our students how we should improve our teaching or classroom environment?  Who can offer us a better insight than our students as to ways we can improve our teaching?  They are with us every day, are the target of our lessons, know which approaches work, while which approaches don't work, know if we challenged them, respected them, and can tell us whether or not we were successful with reaching and educating them during the course of the school year.  I challenge every teacher out there to create their own student survey, administer it to their students, and most importantly, use it to improve the way that you instruct your students the following year.

Here's a copy of the student survey that my students will be completing this week as we finish up our school year.  (For whatever reason, the numbers did not copy over correctly):

End of Year Student Survey

1.  Miss Baker makes me feel like she cares about me.
1. I strongly agree
2. I agree
3. Neutral
4. I disagree
5. I strongly disagree

1. Miss Baker tries to understand how students feel about things.
1. I strongly agree
2. I agree
3. Neutral
4. I disagree
5. I strongly disagree

1. Our class stays busy and doesn’t waste time.  (see follow up in short answer section)
1. I strongly agree
2. I agree
3. Neutral
4. I disagree
5. I strongly disagree

1. Miss Baker explains difficult things clearly.
1. I strongly agree
2. I agree
3. Neutral
4. I disagree
5. I strongly disagree

1. Miss Baker doesn’t let people give up when the work gets hard.
1. I strongly agree
2. I agree
3. Neutral
4. I disagree
5. I strongly disagree

1. In this class, we learn a lot almost every day.
1. I strongly agree
2. I agree
3. Neutral
4. I disagree
5. I strongly disagree

1. In this class, we learn to correct our mistakes.
1. I strongly agree
2. I agree
3. Neutral
4. I disagree
5. I strongly disagree

1. I feel that Miss Baker challenges me as a student.
1. I strongly agree
2. I agree
3. Neutral
4. I disagree
5. I strongly disagree

1. This class does not keep my attention.  I get bored.
1. I strongly agree
2. I agree
3. Neutral
4. I disagree
5. I strongly disagree

1. Miss Baker makes learning interesting and enjoyable.
1. I strongly agree
2. I agree
3. Neutral
4. I disagree
5. I strongly disagree

1. Miss Baker respects my ideas and suggestions.
1. I strongly agree
2. I agree
3. Neutral
4. I disagree
5. I strongly disagree

1. Miss Baker checks to make sure we understand what is being taught.
1. I strongly agree
2. I agree
3. Neutral
4. I disagree
5. I strongly disagree

1. The comments I get back on my work in this class help me understand how to improve.
1. I strongly agree
2. I agree
3. Neutral
4. I disagree
5. I strongly disagree

**Please be specific as possible and provide details when answering these questions.**

1. If you feel that time was wasted during class, where do you feel it was wasted and how do you think that can be improved?

1. Which project did you enjoy the most?  What made it enjoyable?

1. What would you have liked to have done more of this year?

1. How have you grown this year?  (What do you feel like was a new skill that you learned or improved upon?)

1. What things did you not like while in Miss Baker’s class?

1. What should Miss Baker change in how she teaches?

1. What should Miss Baker never teach again?

1. What should Miss Baker spend more time on?

1. What is the one thing you are always going to remember from Miss Baker’s class?

1. What rule or routine did you not like for most of the year?

1. What are two specific things that Miss Baker needs to change?

1. What else do you want to tell me?  (anything at all)

Out with the Old...

It's time for them to go.  Our old, outdated standards that focus on topics that hold no interest or relevance for our students.  I spent the weekend creating pacing for our new Social Studies standards and found myself asking "Why?"  Why do we continue to focus our standards on events that happened hundreds of years ago?  Why do we continue to focus our standards on topics that hold no benefit for our students as they progress through life?

Case in point, one of our standards addresses cultural diversity.  Now, I am not trying to say that cultural diversity is outdated and needs to go.  My problem is with the way in which our new standards limits our students in how they can learn about cultural diversity.  The new standards focuses on the study of American Indians.  Yes, the Indians were very cultural diverse when you look at the traditions that were valued by the numerous tribes that existed.  However, how is the study of American Indians going to benefit our students in the culturally diverse world that we live in today?  I'm not trying to minimize the overall effect of the Indian culture, but why not allow our students focus on and study the various cultures that surround them today?  In today's society, we can connect with just about anyone in the world with a simple click of a button through video conferencing programs such as Skype.  If I chose to, I could connect my classroom with students from England, Australia, Japan, Finland, India, Taiwan, Germany, Mexico, France just to name a few.  So, why not focus on the diversity of cultures today?  That way our students are learning information that is relevant to them so that if they do connect with someone from a different country they don't offend them out of their ignorance for that culture.  Why are we forcing them to focus on ancient cultures of groups that are no longer in existence, such as the Incas and Mayans, which are another cultural focus for this standard.  When will my students ever be able to put to use cultural knowledge of these societies that are no longer in existence?  It's time to update our focus to the cultures of today in order to provide our students with some relevance and authentic learning that could benefit them at some point within their life.  Maybe, if our students were allowed to learn about the various different cultures that surround them today, they might develop an appreciation for them and won't be so quick to judge or discriminate against those who are different.

Another case in point, exploration.  Our new standard focuses on the European Exploration that occurred some 500 years ago.  In order for my students to understand the importance of exploration, they are to study what men did 5 centuries ago, and this is supposed to inspire my students to do what?  Very few, if any of my students, are excited to learn about these topics.  But, what if?  What if instead of European Exploration, the standard focused on Space Exploration?  Instead of making events that happened 500 years ago the primary focus for this standard, why not focus on the type of exploration that is relevant for today?  Yes, European Explorers should be a minor focus within exploration, so students can learn about what they accomplished through exploration and the mistakes that they made.  However, just imagine all of the critical thinking and problem solving skills you could pull in while focusing in on space exploration.  Students could also focus on the types of advancements that we would have to make in order for space exploration to become a reality for humans, the possible benefits of discovering new minerals on different planets, asteroids, or meteors, the circumstances that we would have to overcome in order to have a human travel to, land on, and then return from a different planet, asteroid, or meteor.  What kind of creativity or innovation could the study of space exploration lead to within our students?  What new technological advancements could they discover as they learn about the various obstacles that we currently face when it comes to space exploration?  I'm guessing it would be much more beneficial than the creativity or innovation that is inspired within them when they're busy focusing on the events of the European Explorers that happened 500 years ago.

When are we finally going to realize that it's time to update our standards and the topics that they focus on so that they carry some relevance and authentic learning for our students?  We need to re-evaluate the manner in which we expect our students to learn about these standards.  We need to make our studies current and relevant to the society that our students currently live in, not the one that we've been focusing on for the past 150 years.  The world has drastically changed and it's time for our education system to do the same.

Please note, I'm not saying this is the only thing we need to address in order to fix our education system.  This is just one of many different aspects or approaches that we need to update in order to re-engage our students within the learning process.

What 5th Grade Students Say about Technology

In my mind, one of the strongest voices out there when it comes to transforming our educational system is that of our students.  I often get requests to write articles about the changes I have made within my classroom as I have moved to incorporate a student-centered environment that allows my students to advance at their own pace while incorporating as much choice as I can into what my students are doing while still covering all of our required standards.  Anymore, when met with these requests, I state that I would rather have them talk to my students and get their opinions on the matter in lieu of hearing just another teacher talking about 'what great things they think they are doing'.  If we truly want to effectively transform learning for our students, then, it's only through including our students in the conversation that we can effectively and relevantly transform learning in a manner that will once again engage and excite the students we teach.

from:  The Fremont News Messenger 3/22/13

The article is now a 'paid archive' within our local newspaper, so this is the best way I could think to link to it since I'm pretty much a novice to Blogger.

One Great Big Experiment

 Eyes glazed over, distant far away expressions, thoughts focused on anything and everything except what we were discussing.  This is what I was greeted with day after day after day when I would stand in front of my students 'teaching' them about various science and social studies topics.  We would read together from textbooks or worksheets and then complete worksheets to practice what we learned.  My students were bored, and I was bored.  There had to be a better way to do this.  Somehow I had to find a way to engage my students in order to make learning fun again.

This was two years ago.  Right about the time I started my Masters classes for Integrating Technology within the Classroom.  I had no idea where my Masters was going to lead me, but it had to be to something that was more meaningful and engaging then me standing in front of my students lecturing day after day while they just sit there 'learning' the information that I was dictating to them.  I wanted to do more.  I wanted to place the responsibility of learning into the hands of my students, but the dilemma that I faced was whether or not I could trust my students.  Trust.  The one concept that any adult struggles with when it comes to kids.  How could I trust my students to take control and be responsible for their own learning when I barely trusted them to do anything on their own without strict guidance from me?

While I knew that things were not going well within my class when it came to my students learning and engagement, I wasn't quite ready to make any drastic changes since I was still wrestling with the issue of trust until one of my students came up to me at the end of one of our classes.  At the time, we were studying space, usually one of our more engaging topics, so I actually thought we had a pretty good class until the student said, "I like learning about space, but I already know all of this that we covered today."  I was devastated.  While I thought we had just had a productive class, I had just realized that it was nothing more than a waste of time for this student.

That moment was when I finally realized that it was time for me to try something drastically different in order to ensure that my students were truly 'learning' and not just spending their time listening to me talk.  That was the moment when I realized that it was time for me to learn to trust my students and do whatever I could to make their time with me as meaningful as I could in regards to their learning.  That was the moment when I decided that it was time for me to take risks with the methods and approaches to instruction that were being utilized within my classroom.

That moment happened a little over a year ago and was when I decided that it was time to implement what can be described as a student-centered learning environment.  While not perfect, our current classroom environment is much improved over the teacher-centered environment that it once was.  Currently, I am trying to find the balance of having my students learn our required standards while feeling like they have some sort of control over their learning.  This past year has feels like it has been one great big experiment as I try to relinquish control to my students, yet still ensure that they are learning the standards that will be covered on our state mandated tests.  An experiment that I feel has been a success due to the comments and feelings of my students when they describe what they think about how we have changed our classroom learning environment.

Fifth-graders talk about technology in classroom