Editor’s
Notes
(3) Kay Buckner-Seal
POOGI
“A life spent making mistakes is not only
more honorable,
but more useful than a life spent doing
nothing.”
—George Bernard Shaw
Oh,
yes! …considering the number of mistakes I seem to make, I guess I can
interpret this to mean that my life is becoming increasingly useful! But, why, I wonder, do I always have to make
them in public?
In
“From the Teacher’s Lounge to the Classroom”, TACTics, July 27, 2001, I
made some errors in describing Rami’s process.
From Rami:
Dear Cheryl,
I've just finished reading the Tactics. Thank you for the excerpt of my presentation that you wrote. The example you shared is excellent and
demonstrates beautifully the procedure.
BUT THERE IS A PROBLEM!
The first two stages of the process that you've described are not the
ones I presented at the conference!
The process you described:
1. Select a text for your students to read that includes a
problem.
2. Verbalize
the action or decision that must be done to solve the problem. Start building a cloud with the
conflict. Remember in TOC there is no
problem if there is no conflict.
The appropriate process:
1. Examine any kind of text or subject matter that you are about
to teach.
2. Find a meaningful action or decision that is described in this
text.
3. Write the execution of this action/decision as one of the wants
in the cloud (D).
4. Write the opposite of the action/decision as the other want
in the cloud (D').
As you can see, there is a huge difference in the initial stages:
• I don't ask the teacher to look for a text that describes a
problem. Asking it will narrow down
greatly the texts that could be taught using this process.
• I ask for any text, knowing that almost all of the texts/subject
matters that we are teaching involve a meaningful action or decision that there
is a consideration not to take it.
• I ask to find any meaningful action/decision that is described
in the text. It doesn't have to be a
solution to any problem!
The rest of the process is like you have described.
Thank
you, Rami, for catching my mistake so quickly and making the necessary
corrections. Following is the revised
step-by-step procedure. If anyone has
any questions regarding this process, please do not hesitate to send them to TACTics
and we will invite Rami to respond to them.
Mea
Culpa,
Cheryl
Do you find that planning a really good lesson for your students takes a lot of time? So much time, in fact, that you don’t seem to be able to plan as many effective lessons as you would like? What if there was a way to plan a lesson that included the strategies that have proven to have a profound effect on student learning and it only took the time it takes to cruise from the teacher’s lounge to the classroom? Rami shared such a procedure that can be used at any grade level, for teaching in most of the content areas except the sciences.
1.
Examine any
kind of text or subject matter that you are about to teach.
2.
Identify a
meaningful action or decision that is described in this text.
3.
Write
the execution of this action/decision as one of the “wants” in the cloud (D).
4.
Write
the opposite of the action/decision as the other ‘Want’ in the cloud (D').
5.
Identify
the NEEDS that will satisfy each side of the conflict. In other words, what are the needs to take
the action, and what are the needs not to take the action.
6.
Verbalize the common goal. You
have a meaningful cloud that describes the text! (We shall call it a “text cloud.”)
If you want to demonstrate
to the students how this cloud is relevant to their personal lives:
7.
Examine
each entity of the “text cloud”, and write it in a very general (generic) way
so that every entity will be relevant to the student’s life. Now, you have a
“generic cloud”
8.
Ask the
student to create and share his or her own examples of this cloud.
The
student is moving from very specific to general and then back to a very
relevant specific.
Text Cloud
à
Generic Cloud à
Personal Cloud
Rami
explained how using this procedure would be Teaching (content) as well
as Educating (values). The
student is actively dealing with the text and making it relevant to their own
lives.
An
Example:
1.
Examine
any kind of text or subject matter that you are about to teach.
2.
Find a
meaningful action or decision that is described in this text.
From Frearon’s Economics, 1995: American
companies are asking the government for millions of tax dollars to help with
research and development so that they will be able to compete with Japanese
technology.
3.
Write
the execution of this action/decision as one of the ‘Wants’ in the cloud (D).
(D) The government should support technology research with tax
dollars
4.
Write the opposite of the action/decision as the other ‘Want’ in the
cloud (D').
(D’) The government should not support technology research with tax dollars
5.
Identify
Needs.
(B) Be
competitive with Japanese technology
(D) Support
technology research with tax dollars
(C) Have
tax dollars support vital research
(D’) Do
not support technology research with tax dollars
6.
Verbalize the Common Goal.
(A) Best
services to U.S. citizens
7.
Write the cloud in a general way so that every entity will be relevant
to the students’ life.
(A) Everyone
has the best
(B) Keep
up with others (D) Provide support
(C) Get
what I need (D’) Don’t provide support
8.
Ask
students to bring their own examples of this cloud. Example:
(A) Everyone
passes
(B) Friend
gets a good grade (D) I do friends homework
(C) I
spend my time on my homework (D’) Don’t do friends homework
If
I were to use this technique in the classroom I would scaffold instruction by
first providing the students with the cloud that described the conflict, as
well as the generic cloud, and then do a group “relevant” cloud. As the students became proficient with the
tool, I would involve them in generating the concept cloud and the generic
cloud as a large group activity. My
goal would be to move the students toward developing the clouds independently.
What
are some of the implications of using this technique?
·
Students
become interactive with the text. They
create a concrete visual of the problem/conflict.
·
Students
learn to generalize through the generic cloud.
·
Students
learn to develop their specific cloud from the generic cloud. The concept now becomes relevant. The connection from learning to their life
becomes real.
·
No matter
what level the student is learning at s/he will be able to participate.
·
If it is
quick and easy for the teachers to develop then they will use it.
In
Classroom Instruction that Works, Marzano, Pickering and Pollock have
put together a collection of research-based strategies that have positive
effects for increasing student achievement.
These strategies have proven to make a big difference. I’m listing these general strategies so that
you can see for yourself how Rami’s 5-Minute Technique and all of
the other TOC applications actually enhance student learning based on this
current research.
Research-Based Strategies as shared by Marzano, Pickering and Pollock.
·
Identifying
similarities and differences enhances students’ understanding of and ability to
use knowledge.
·
Summarizing
and note taking requires students to distill information into a parsimonious,
synthesized form.
·
Reinforcing
effort and providing recognition based on specific performance goals addresses
students’ attitudes and beliefs.
·
Homework and
practice that provide students with (authentic) opportunities to deepen
understanding and skills relative to content that has been presented to them.
·
Nonlinguistic
representations including graphic organizers, mental pictures and kinesthetic
activity helps to think about and recall information.
·
Cooperative
learning grouping strategies foster interdependence, interaction,
accountability, interpersonal skills, and group processing.
·
Setting
objectives and providing feedback that is corrective and timely by both the
teacher and the student.
·
Generating
and testing hypotheses deductively or inductively.
·
Cues,
questions and advance organizers to activate prior knowledge.
The
TOC Thinking Processes involve each of the above strategies. For example:
- The
concrete format of the tools is actually a graphic organizer.
- Ambitious
targets and intermediate objectives are setting goals.
Can
you find more?
It’s a great time to…
For
many of us it is summer vacation. What
a great time to do some TOC planning.
Take an old lesson and try Rami’s new procedure. Send it in to TACTics. Seeing examples from other educators is
really beneficial and we can put them in our toolbox of instructional
strategies.
(3) Kay Buckner-Seal
Cheryl
and Rami modeled for us an effective way to scrutinize the work of others. Rami read Cheryl’s article. He constructed, “Yes, but there are
errors.” And, in communicating the
errors, he made it “learner friendly.”
Cheryl, in a way, it’s comforting to see that even an expert makes
mistakes at times. And it’s reassuring
to see how you and Rami came together to handle the situation in a way to make
this a learning experience for us all.
Thanks, for the lessons.
Feel
free to share with us. Send your
responses, applications of the thinking processes, lessons, announcements, and
etc. by mail to: Cheryl A. Edwards, 2253 S. Hill Island Rd., Cedarville, Michigan 49719,
USA. Or send hyperlink to: redwards@sault.com, or bucknek@earthlink.net.
To view TACTics in its intended
formatting, visit our website at
www.tocforeducation.com and click on “What’s New.”