21 minute read
A Learner-Centered Classroom Culture
cannot grant agency to students. So, how do educators create the conditions to make student agency a reality in schools? While it may be simpler to separate information into litanies of discrete facts and place them into silos for safe storage, teachers need to connect information across disciplines to build knowledge and engage the whole learner. Jones and Kahn (2017) continued their argument for the structure of learning:
Decades of research in human development, cognitive and behavioral neuroscience, and educational practice and policy, as well as other fields, have illuminated that major domains of human development— social, emotional, cognitive, linguistic, academic—are deeply intertwined in the brain and in behavior . All are central to learning . (p . 4)
Educators cannot teach content separate from the act of processing the information to build understanding. Students cannot learn social-emotional skills detached from thinking. Students need to actively think with others and pay attention to how they feel and how their actions make others feel. This reflection needs to take place while they are engaged in a problem with desirable difficulty. Distinct courses or separate curricula for each topic or skill students should know simply pile more on top of what teachers already have difficulties covering in the time available.
Learning is a process that, if practiced, will get stronger. The learner can practice effectively by critically analyzing actions he or she has chosen, which prompts reflection (Ericsson & Pool, 2016). This analysis allows the learner to build better and stronger learning processes to then use them to better predict future outcomes. Reflecting on decisions and how those decisions helped learners reach their goals is a crucial component to what educators do too. Reflection and hindsight give outcomes context.
If practice—the process of learning—is what enhances the mind, how do educators balance that with the need to eventually arrive at the right answer? That is the crucial question behind all educational endeavors. If teachers only test students for the correct answers at the end of the learning process, the students do not receive feedback on the process they used to reach right answers, and they do not adjust their thinking as a result of feedback on incorrect responses. This dichotomous, right-or-wrong assessment removes opportunities to build stronger and more accurate conceptual understanding. As a beginning teacher, I would return unit tests and mark learners’ incorrect responses. I would then move on to new learning. If the information was needed in future study, I was surprised when students still did not know it. I wrongly assumed students would go back and see why the answer they put was wrong, even though I certainly did not take this step as a student. However, when I started requiring the students to review their incorrect answers, explain why they were wrong, and examine what the correct answers were, more of them had the knowledge needed in subsequent units. Providing midcourse opportunities for students to reflect and use feedback to adjust their actions improves their mental models and schemas (the patterns of thought or behavior that organize information), thereby enhancing their ability to think.
Roger Schank (2011), a longtime professor turned college redesign advocate, argued that schools need to focus on cognitive abilities and not scholarly subjects. Certainly, the ability to solve complex problems is better preparation for life and work than a memorized list of facts. Learners need practice diagnosing problems and applying knowledge gained through research, discussion, and experimentation to generate possible solutions. Schank posited that departments of motor vehicles are better at teaching than schools because they use a test of applied knowledge. Having future drivers learn by actually doing the act of driving opens the door for learners to reflect on what they did, how well they did, and also why they did it. Those reflective questions will be the cornerstones of a school centered on developing cognitive abilities. Schank (2011) went on to say:
When we look at people who are knowledgeable and confuse that with people who can think well, we totally miss the point about education . Education ought not be focused on imparting facts any more than athletic training ought to be focused on weightlifting . You learn to hit a ball by hitting one, and you learn to think clearly by thinking . (p . 81)
We need to provide our learners with opportunities to practice thinking. With awareness of their past successes, the learners’ perceived ability to handle future challenges—their sense of agency—will increase.
TEACHER PERSPECTIVE
What I liked best was the sense of community the students showed and the sense of empowerment they experienced . I did not become super focused on their academic performance; if it was low, I did not freak out . In the past, I could see they were struggling with mathematics . I would bang my head against the wall and wonder, Why aren’t they getting it? But then, as I shifted my focus on what was important— their sense of agency—I knew that if they were academically low scoring, but were engaged in how to learn and knew how to teach themselves, they were going to be OK as adults . That was a good touchstone to keep returning to, to help me remember why I was putting in the work was to develop the whole person . I knew they were working hard and it might take them longer but they would get it . We are trying to create people who can function in the modern economy that will require them to work with other people, know how to learn, and learn on their own . If they can do those things, they will be successful . —Mr. Wironen, middle school mathematics and science July 11, 2020
What Is the Framework for Building Agency?
The framework for building agency provides educators with a tool to design learning opportunities that intentionally foster agency development. The framework consists of the following five components.
1. A classroom culture designed to encourage agency development 2. An inquiry starter (an introductory activity designed to cause wonder) 3. Well-defined learning targets 4. An application of the knowledge 5. Reflection before, during, and after the learning opportunity
While the framework delineates the five components for building agency, how a teacher deliberately combines and executes these components is determined by the unit’s purpose. The framework provides guidance on how to account for actions that will lessen the teacher’s need to control the pace of instruction during the unit. Using the framework, the teacher contemplates these possible moves prior to beginning the unit. The following sections provide a brief overview of each component. Forthcoming chapters will explore each component in greater detail.
Classroom Culture
The culture of the classroom needs to be one where the teacher is the director and not the compliance officer. To build agency, students need opportunities to practice independence. They need opportunities to figure out what to do next without always having to clarify everything with the teacher.
The classroom culture should also make all students feel they belong. A sense of belonging is key to being in the right mindset to learn. Without the feeling of comfort brought on by being a member of the group, team, or crew, students will worry about their safety and survival and have nothing left to attend to their learning (Rock, 2010). Abraham Maslow (1962) argued in his hierarchy of needs that belonging was foundational to esteem and self-actualization, the products of education and a sense of agency. Students will work to satisfy that need to feel part of the class before looking to work on the next level of the hierarchy, the feeling of accomplishment that learning a concept can cause.
There are processes and strategies teachers can use to establish the classroom routines and rules that will help students develop agency. Creating shared visions and codes of cooperation with students gives students voice and ownership in the culture of the classroom. Having students create standard operating
procedures (SOPs) for common routines like leaving the classroom, turning in work, or attending to lunch count emphasizes independence rather than reliance on the teacher. These activities give the students tools to meet the needs of the group and transfer the responsibility for adhering to them and realizing the outcomes of those decisions.
Inquiry Starter
An inquiry starter is an activity designed to put the mind into a state of curiosity and cause wonder. It should illuminate the gap between what the learners already know and what they now must know to demonstrate they understand a new concept or to revise a previously held understanding in light of new information. For example, when introducing the scientific concept of force, I might ask students, “Which object will fall to the ground faster, a feather or a marble? And is that true in all circumstances?” We might even drop the two objects ourselves to confirm that the marble reaches the ground faster. I would then show them a video of the objects falling inside a vacuum and ask them how it is possible that the objects hit the ground simultaneously.
An inquiry starter might also cause a shift in how a learner executes a skill fluently—for example, showing students a faster process to calculate a number using more advanced mathematical algorithms. Curiosity drives learners to seek resolution. When they want to know something, they are more likely to work until they find the answer.
Well-Defined Learning Targets
The intended outcome of learning must be transparent to the learners. Teachers need to clearly define what they want students to understand or be able to execute without error as a result of each unit and lesson. They should also communicate a clear progression of how to move from not knowing to knowing to demonstrating understanding. The best way teachers can do this is to unpack ambiguous and redundant sets of standards and form a sequence of content for each topic. The individual statements of content are known in this book as learning targets. While there is not a specific set of recommendations for how many learning targets to have in a unit, teachers need to make sure they are not overloading the learning opportunity. Learners should be given enough time to practice, receive feedback on how they can improve their performance, and try again using the suggestions. I have found that two to three learning targets per three-week unit allow for this recursive learning process. Too many more and you simply cannot provide time to practice, receive feedback, practice while implementing suggested improvements, receive more feedback, and so on. The set of learning targets expresses the progression of learning from less complex to more complex. The learning targets of a unit therefore bring clarity to the learners for how to improve.
In addition to academic learning targets, educators should prepare and use learning targets to help students practice the mindsets and skill sets of agency. These topics relate to mindset.
• Growth: A belief that I can accomplish my goal, just not yet • Perseverance: An understanding that effort pays off • Emotional intelligence: An awareness of myself, my feelings, and my social relationships and how to properly manage them • Creativity: An inclination to seek many ways to solve problems • Wonder: A sense of awe
Skill set topics include the following.
• Goal setting: The ability to envision a future version of myself • Reading with understanding: The ability to obtain and analyze information (written, spoken, and quantitative) to make decisions • Effective oral and written communication:
The skill to share information, persuade, or ask for and receive what I need or want through essay and speech • Problem solving: The process of using resources to find ways around obstacles that appear on the pathway to my future self • Collaboration: The ability to work with others to move from my current state to the desired state as represented in the vision of my future self
These topics amount to the mindsets and skill sets of agency. Making these topics explicit through learning targets is key to supporting students’ development of agency.
Application of Knowledge
Thad A. Polk (2018), professor of psychology at the University of Michigan, wrote that learning is the process of acquiring knowledge or changing behavior brought on by experience. To simply test whether students have retained information shared by the teacher does not get at what they have truly learned. Without giving students the opportunity to use knowledge for some purpose, to do something beyond simply recalling it, one cannot say students have learned. Without having students experience trial and error as they attempt to apply knowledge and find a path forward, one cannot say students have learned. Students need to connect separate pieces of information to construct knowledge, and they must further process and use knowledge in a demonstration of understanding.
TEACHER PERSPECTIVE
Once I started using the framework, my students liked coming to school . I had very few students who did not end up engaging in school . Every student was very engaged in education . I woke up in the mornings excited to get to school because I knew the students were excited to come and learn— even the ones who were seriously at risk prior to entering my classroom . Learners who had anxiety issues blossomed when they worked within the framework . Some students would not have made it [to graduation] without this style of learning . I would never teach any other way . It was a tremendous amount of work to coordinate all of the pieces, but worth it when I knew I was helping students think, which would set them up for success . —Ms. Belolan, middle school English language arts and social studies July 15, 2020 Reflection
For learners to grow in their belief that they can overcome obstacles and reach a desired outcome, they must use the power of reflection and plan, monitor, and evaluate the pathway and the decisions to complete tasks. The skill of reflection requires modeling and practice—the teacher must demonstrate this skill and give students chances to try and improve. To assume students know how to reflect means passing up an opportunity for them to grow in a skill necessary for continuous improvement. As discussed previously, people move from not knowing to knowing to being able to demonstrate understanding through deliberate practice. Experts are not simply more talented than other people; they are good at deliberate practice. Deliberately practicing the skill of reflection, as discussed further in chapter 6 (page 99), requires knowing what one wishes to accomplish, choosing an appropriate strategy to get there, and then evaluating how it helped or did not help in achieving the goal.
How Do I Plan Units That Build Agency?
Proper, deliberate planning is required for a unit that motivates learners to attend to a problem and discover a solution. The agency unit planner is a tool designed to guide a teacher through deliberately deciding how to implement the four instructional components of the framework for building agency (inquiry starter, learning targets, application of knowledge, and reflection) so he or she can ensure a well-coordinated learning experience that benefits students’ development of agency. Note that the first component of the framework, classroom culture, is not part of unit planning, as it needs to happen every day in the classroom.
The agency unit planner helps teachers create coherent, relevant, and comprehensible learning experiences. A coherent learning opportunity is one that proceeds logically and stays focused. A learning experience without a deliberate plan can meander and get off track quickly, emphasizing learning targets unrelated to the unit. It will leave learners with unintended gaps, omissions, and errors in thinking. A poorly planned learning opportunity may also repeat material without extending the thinking to deeper levels, wasting
valuable learning time. To be clear, this is not to say that learning should never stray from the targets explicitly defined as part of the learning opportunity. Other topics arise as student interest, logical connections, or current events dictate. Discovery can happen along the way, and teachers should encourage those connections, but the learning targets that teachers will spend the majority of their time assessing, instructing, and remediating or extending need to be transparent from the beginning (as emphasized by the component of well-defined learning targets; see chapter 4, page 53).
A relevant learning opportunity has a close connection to what the learners find interesting, or to real-world issues, aspirations, or goals. Mark B. Moss (2018), a professor and chairman in the department of anatomy and neurobiology at Boston University, said, “Attention is the gateway to the mind. If you do not have their attention, you do not have their mind.” The easiest way to lose learners’ attention is to begin discussing something that has no relevance or connection to the reality they are currently facing. David A. Sousa (2017), science teacher turned neuroscientist, pointed out a discrepancy in how teachers plan lessons for their learners. He found that teachers can spend up to 95 percent of their planning time ensuring a particular lesson is clear for the students. This leaves only 5 percent of an educator’s planning time to make the lesson relevant to the learners’ lives. Without relevance, a learner will disengage and lose focus. Besides making the learning experience dry and unmotivating, the overemphasis on clarity smooths over the “bumps” in the pathway to understanding. Learners need to have these bumps in their learning to ensure they experience desirable difficulty. Teachers can intentionally leave the bumps in by letting students make decisions and choices on how to answer the driving question or explain the inquiry starter experience. Learning experiences disinfected of all confusion will not allow students to find a path around the bumps but instead will cause them to simply follow the one laid out by the teacher.
A comprehensible learning opportunity is one that the learners are able to understand. Are they able to grasp the information that teachers and other sources input into their minds? According to Robert J. Marzano (2017), the process of chunking content, breaking it down into “small, understandable increments” (p. 56), helps students learn new information. Students can only hold up to seven bits of distinct information in their working memories at one time (Sousa, 2017). If there are too many chunks, or if the chunks are so large as not to be digestible, the learner will become overwhelmed. Proper planning will ensure appropriate chunking to cover the needed foundational knowledge and make the concepts in the unit comprehensible so that students can then apply that knowledge.
All the sections of the agency unit planner align with the four major components—inquiry starter, learning targets, application of knowledge, and reflection. Specifically, the sections of the agency unit planner are as follows.
• Inquiry starter: Plan an activity that triggers wonder and link it to your initial ideas about the culminating project. • Learning targets: Identify the learning targets and essential knowledge that form the foundation of the unit. • Mindsets and skill sets of agency: Select cognitive and metacognitive skills that will be an explicit part of the unit. • Application of knowledge: List foundational knowledge, how students will learn it, how they will provide evidence that they know it, and how to apply it to demonstrate they understand the concept or can execute the skill without error. • Assessment plan: Plan specific assessments for foundational knowledge and the targeted understanding or skill. • Culminating project: Design an authentic assignment that requires students to apply their learning. • Reflection: Prepare for student reflection before, during, and after the learning experience.
The planner also includes a project calendar for drafting a schedule for when you will introduce new foundational knowledge and when you will assess. Note that you will need to adjust to students’ needs throughout the unit. The project calendar is more of a guideline than a script.
As you progress through the chapters, you will discover each section of the agency unit planner in turn. Complete blank and example unit planners appear in the appendix (page 117). Each planner section describes decisions you need to make as you plan the unit. For instance, when choosing learning targets, you also must consider what foundational knowledge learners need so they will be able to adequately apply the knowledge gained in the unit to demonstrate an understanding of the learning targets.
In order to complete the planner, you cannot merely follow a top-down approach. In other words, completing the planner is not an entirely linear process. As you make a decision in one section, it might affect a decision in another section or cause you to adjust a decision already made. You, the teacher, need to stay flexible as the learning opportunity takes shape. For instance, you might decide on a driving question as an inquiry starter, but then adjust it based on the assessment prompts created for the application of knowledge. Or, while you are identifying the foundational knowledge for a learning target, you might decide a debate is a better demonstration of understanding than an essay. Because you must be deliberate in your consideration of the components when completing the agency unit planner, you will have created an outline for a learning experience that gives learners the chance to make decisions and reflect on those decisions’ outcomes to see whether they effectively moved toward the learning target or if they could have made a better choice.
The agency unit planner emphasizes that teachers need to move away from day-to-day lesson planning and instead plan multiweek units. Doing so will allow teachers flexibility to meet the students where they are each day and adjust as needed to help them grow. Instead of planning that every student will be in the same place on, say, October 14, educators should prepare lessons to support the truth that some students take longer with some material while others need less time with other concepts or skills.
STUDENT PERSPECTIVE
I like having the time to work on questions I am interested in figuring out instead of always having to answer the question the teacher wants . I also like that I get to work with a few friends and move about the classroom when I need to go get something to help us answer questions . I am talking and moving but also not being disruptive because I am doing things that do not break our code of conduct .
I have heard people say that this type of learning is not good for students that struggle with learning or being able to pay attention . I am one of those students, and I am doing so much better in school now . I actually like school now . —Elementary school student May 9, 2016
Conclusion
This chapter provided an overview of how a teacher can structure the classroom and learning opportunities to follow the assigned curriculum while also allowing learners to make decisions, reflect on those decisions’ outcomes, and see the skills they developed as a result. Students need agency to control the lives they choose. Schools can provide the opportunity to practice the mindsets and skill sets of agency. By deliberately planning learning opportunities that involve the components of the framework for building agency (as represented in the agency unit planner), teachers ensure learners go beyond the acquisition of knowledge used to pass tests. Instead, learners will use knowledge to make decisions, solve problems, debate ideas, and practice the skill sets and mindsets of learning and cultivate their agency. In the next few chapters, I will review each component separately, discuss its importance, and present strategies to help teachers implement it effectively. We begin with the learner-centered classroom as it is a constant throughout all units of learning.
MINDSETS SKILL SETS
for learning
A Framework for Building Student Agency
“Bill Zima provides a unifying framework for what student agency is and how to achieve it . . . leveraging his considerable experiences as an educator and coach to bring simplicity to complexity. Mindsets and Skill Sets for Learning is a book that will last the test of time, inspiring educators with clarity and direction as they prepare students for a rewarding future.” —Patrick Hardy
Principal, Proviso East High School, Maywood, Illinois
When educators hear the term student agency, many are left wondering, What does that truly mean, and how do I make it “This book helps us to right happen? In Mindsets and Skill Sets for Learning: A Framework for the balance of instruction in the Building Student Agency, author Bill Zima provides definitive classroom and invites us to look at answers. With a research-backed conception of agency as the the larger purpose of education: foundation, Zima introduces a framework that K–12 teachers the purpose of teaching our students can use to organize their instructional practice to create the how to grapple with questions conditions that give learners control over their thinking. This and how to find joy and affirmation framework allows teachers to shift from simply delivering in the struggle of learning.” content to deliberately planning lessons and opportunities that encourage students to become active participants in —Brenda Whitaker their learning. By reading Mindsets and Skill Sets for Learning, Principal, Edgewood Primary School, educators will support and cultivate students’ ability to build Bloomington, Indiana agency within themselves. Readers will: • Explore the framework for building agency and understand the importance of developing agency in students • Receive detailed explanations of all components of the framework, including end-of-chapter assignments that ask readers to apply their understanding of the components • Utilize an agency unit planner to design learning experiences that develop learner agency • Investigate what agency looks and sounds like in the classroom while utilizing research-based tools and strategies • Gain firsthand perspectives from teachers and students who have transformed learning with the framework for building agency ISBN 978-1-943360-35-2
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