(2) News from Singapore, Kathy Suerken
(3) Conference Feedback: Summary of
TOC and Brain-Based Learning,
Larry Till
Editors’
Notes
(4) Kay Buckner-Seal, Cheryl A.
Edwards
(1) The Measure of Success
By Kathy
Suerken
As an
educator, do you ever find yourself caught in the dilemma of whether to teach to
individual academic needs or teach to the academic needs of the majority? This week I shared with a local high school
principal a list of obstacles and intermediate objectives I had written as part
of an Ambitious Target Plan (PrT) on:
Disruptive students cooperate in class.
Although written while still in my middle school classroom, the
principal and I both took note that the first obstacle on the list I
constructed 6 years ago was:
Individualized teaching and discipline strategies for all students require
time and energy beyond that available to a regular classroom teacher.
I then
shared with this principal one of my favorite quotes, “The measure
of success
is not whether you have a tough problem but rather if it is the
same problem
that you had last year.” (John Foster Dulles)
Would you
agree that differentiated instruction is one of the most daunting, frustrating
and enduring undesirable effects for every teacher? Even tracking students doesn’t eliminate the problem. We still have varying levels of skills (even
in TOC classes!) and tracking leads to other problems as well.
In my
mainstream teaching experiences, if I taught to a middle level of skills, the
more advanced students were bored and those with less advanced skills didn’t
understand the lesson. The resulting
boredom from both groups can easily lead to disruptive behavior. Lose/lose for everyone and leading to
problems with parents and administration as well? A holistic problem?
And thereby
hangs this tale! For the last year I
have had the challenging opportunity to try some TOC lessons on an ENTIRE class
of 28 students considered being “at risk of failing.” Some had even been in jail.
And, even though they are “tracked” as a group into one class, their
academic skill levels are all over the place.
Please note that I purposely say skills, not abilities because I
fervently believe that they all have the ability to learn to improve their
skills. Our job is to lead it out of
them, starting with the motivation obstacle/IO.
In addition
to disparate entry-level skills in this class, I had some additional, unusual
obstacles as well. As a volunteer, I
had no authority over the kids. Because
of my intensive travel schedule, there were huge breaks in my one hour visits /
instruction. Sometimes as many as half
of the class would be different. And in
teaching TOC as a “life skill” to this group, I encountered an obstacle that is
not always at the surface level.
Although they had bought into my visits as a way for me to do research
to help others, they had COMPLETELY given up on helping themselves. They said they are the cause of their own
problem because they are just simply “BAD.”
For them, this was a “hopeless obstacle” and therefore an excuse not to
change.
Although the
Ambitious Target tool (my first lesson) went down well, the class was not
especially responsive to learning tools needed to achieve the IOs: to cause the
change in themselves (cloud, nbr). One
injection was to support my lessons with some small group interventions (or one-on-one
TOC counseling sessions) but, given my own time constraints, I couldn’t make
myself so available.
Teaching
through the personal application just wasn’t Socratic enough for this
particular and large class. I revisited
the first prerequisite IO on my 6 year old PrT and decided to try another
action to achieve it. “Would you allow
me to teach a content lesson, I asked their teacher?”
The book she
gave me to “teach” is entitled Pinballs and is about three children who
have been taken from their homes and put into foster care. Although I expected the subject matter
(especially since it was about middle school children) to be highly relevant, I
found that only two students had read the assigned book.
It just
“happened” that before diving into the book I did some riddles as a classroom
activity with them to get their attention and focus. (This is no small feat in this class where about 1/4 of these
students usually have their eyes closed).
Kids love riddles! Additionally,
my riddles were focused on the concept that if you don’t understand what is
meant by a word, you can easily go astray in the solution.
I then asked
one of the students who had read the book to give a one-minute summary of the
book’s plot. And then I jumped in with
one of the specific dilemmas in the book, which I thought would be of high
interest. At this point I deviated from
my usual method of having students write the cloud on their own because I was
afraid that some of their literacy skills were so low that I might lose some of
them (they would get stuck in the writing process and tune out). Too risky!
So contrary to my usual approach, we did the cloud orally which meant a
very astute student answered for all of them.
The dilemma
under discussion involved the situation in which one of the foster children
wanted to run away to be with his Mother who had left the family to join a
commune. The problem as defined by this
student:
A: Be happy.
B: Have a better life.
D: Run away to be with
mom.
C: Stay safe.
D’: Don’t run away to be
with mom.
All eyes
were still open but it was when I ask WHY on the connections that I took note
that not only were students engaged (interested, lesson was relevant) but in
addition, they were ALL actively participating in the learning process. Because?
No matter what their entry level of skills (or subject information) they
all had sufficient entry level of opinions and conclusions they were sharing
based on their **.
Why do you
think I found that all of them were able to focus their brainstorming on the
lesson content/objectives? (Which is not always the case) In fact, THE most disruptive student (for
me) in this class popped out with, “Well, it all depends on what you are
assuming!” At that point, I went to the
board and said, “Brilliant conclusion and that is what these reasons are
called: ASSUMPTIONS!”
Likely you
can draw some conclusions of your own to the impact on this student, the other
students, and me! Not to mention the
teacher who was furiously copying the example from the board.
You might
want to compare this specific example to the generic and systematic process to
teach concepts which was created by Danilo Sirias and provided in last week’s
article by Bea Kovacs. Of special
interest to me is the common thread that rests at the bottom of my 6-year old
PrT. The “entry level” IO reads: Socratic questions enabling students to own
solutions, not just problems.
The measure
of our success to me is our TOCFE progress to make more concrete and systematic
the questions within the applications so needed to address holistic obstacles
to the learning process. On a personal
note, I am “simply” overwhelmed by the
privilege of being part of such a phenomenal goal-driven Process of
Ongoing Improvement.
(2) News from Singapore
From Kathy
Suerken
The National
Institute of Education at Nanyang Technological University sponsored a Summer
Institute on Thinking in June, which included a TOC TACT seminar taught by Dr.
Ang Wai Hoong. As a result, we are
happy to welcome an additional 35 Singapore educators to our TACTics
list-serve.
Additionally,
a TOC "TACT" chat room has
also been established in Singapore to encourage local educators to share
experiences.
(3) Conference Feedback: Summary
of TOC and Brain-Based Learning
By Larry Till
Professor
James H. Berry, St. Clair Community College, Michigan, and Larry Till, Joy
Middle School, Detroit, Michigan teamed up to share the research of Rita
Smilkstein, Ph.D., North Seattle Community College at the 5th
International TOCFE Conference. They
discussed how they felt using TOC “helped learners learn through the natural
learning process,” which is based on Dr. Smilkstein’s research. Following is a summary of their presentation
written by Larry Till.
The brain
acquires new concepts/skills for empowerment in seven ways:
1.
Learning is physiological. Learning is the growing of new brain
structures. Teaching makes it possible
for students to grow these structures. If
these structures include the TOC tools, learning seems to go at a faster rate.
2. New
structures grow off the structures that each person already has. The implication for learning is that the
student must make the connection with something they already know. In the case of the TOC Thinking Tool, the
Cloud, that something is the “wants and needs.” In the PrT, the “obstacles” make the connection.
3. New
brain structures grow with practice and grow for what is practiced. In teaching TOC, we must allow time for this
practice. "It is good
enough" is a way of allowing the student to make attempts at practicing
without giving up because it is not perfect.
4. New
brain structures take time to grow.
5. Basic
foundation structures are needed before creative and critical thinking can
happen. The TOC tools seem to be
these basic structures that can support learning.
6. Structures
grow when learners are active. Students
do a task individually, discuss it in small groups and then participate in a
large group activity. If we do this in
teaching TOC our students learn faster and retain more.
7. Emotions
affect the growth and functioning of brain structures. The learning environment must be supportive
and positive. The TOC Thinking tools
seem to aid in keeping an environment that is positive and student centered.
I think that my students tend to learn more effectively when I use
these seven principals with TOC. Some
of the dramatic results we have achieved at Joy, I believe, resulted because we
have used these principals.
(4) Kay Buckner-Seal, Cheryl
A. Edwards
It’s
always wonderful to hear from our colleagues, thanks for sharing. Please feel free to share with us. Send by mail to Cheryl A. Edwards, 2253 S.
Hill Island Rd., Cedarville, MI 49719, USA.
Or, send hyperlink to <redwards@sault.com> or
<bucknek@earthlink.net.
To view TACTics
in its intended formatting and to read previous issues, visit the TOC website
at: www.tocforeducation.com