Pivoting from Summer to Fall

See the author's half-erased name? That's intentional—I'm demonstrating the erasable sign I made for posting the book I'm reading!

 

It’s that transition time of year again for teachers and students: the bittersweet letting go of all the blessings of summer vacation to embrace the blessings of a new school term. I welcome students back into my class in 4 days, so this post is my personal exercise in that pivot.

Just a few of the summer blessings I enjoyed:

• Long walks along the sea wall with an old friend sharing family news, good books, and goals for the next year. We’ve gone to church together, had each other’s kids over for sleepovers, and taught each other’s kids. That kind of old friend.
• Sitting in the cabin with my husband listening to the roar of the waves and the shrill of cicadas.
• Books, books, and more books—both fiction and nonfiction, recreational and professional—and time to read them.

Some of the fall blessings I’m pivoting toward in expectation: 

Students: God’s image bearers, packed with gifts and potential. They will come with their own interests and strengths, needs and goals, which may or may not have much to do with my class. My challenge is to meet them where they are and help them understand their own potential and see how language is a gift for unlocking the world, encountering the ideas and experiences of others, and collaborating with neighbors to make a difference.

Language: I get to help those students discover all the coolness of language. In the Bible, God spoke the world into being (Genesis 1), and then the Word became flesh and lived among us (John 1). Language crackles with power. Even our human language can communicate beauty, explore ideas, create connection, encourage, promote justice; or it can hurt, discourage, divide, disempower, dissemble, dominate. As image bearers of God, people are language wielders—I want my students to understand this power, develop it, and use it for good. 

Reading: We will encounter the lives and minds of writers throughout time in independent reading and shared reading. In fiction, we will vicariously experience lives that are like and unlike ours. That will help us to consider who we want to be and to really “see” our neighbors who we are to love. In nonfiction, we will extend our understanding of the history, culture, and influences surrounding the fiction and informing our responses.

Speaking and listening: We will discuss what we read, pushing each other’s thinking as we share questions, connections, and evaluations. We will listen with curiosity, to understand our classmates. We will build on their comments with courage and civility. We are smarter together than separately, and we will collaborate to uncover all the intelligence we can. 

Writing: When we have an important idea, one we want to explore and share, writing will become a tool for clarifying our own thinking and for choosing just the support, the organization, the word, the sentence, that will most effectively express our thought so someone else will understand it. As we share our writing with each other, we will help each other refine our writing for real audiences, communicating with purpose, to make a difference in our community.

Pivot complete. 

Somewhere on social media this week I saw a poster that said, “Your one and only job on the first day of school is to make sure kids go home looking forward to the second day.” I think I’m ready to give it a shot.

How about you? How do you pivot from the blessings of summer to the blessings of fall?

Why Learn?

Here's where I've been doing most of my reading and learning this summer. Leaving today.

What age do you think older people most often pinpoint as the happiest time of their lives? Adolescence, when they were at the peak of their physical prowess? Marriage? Kids? Career peak? Grandkids? Retirement? Nope: 82. For most of us, according to Daniel Levitin in Aging Successfully: A Neuroscientist Explores the Power and Potential of Our Lives, the best is yet to come (loc 417). I picked up the book because I had a question as I watched the generation above me growing older and realized my turn will come: "How can I steward the years God gives me?" I learned a lot of interesting things that can make a difference in my life, and I'm looking forward to 82!

I've been reading a lot this summer, getting answers to a variety of questions, so I can make a difference in my own life and in my classroom. Questions like…

• How can I increase my awareness of how God meets me in the present moment? (The Mindful Christian: Cultivating a Life of Intentionality, Openness, and Faith)
• How can I effectively teach bilingual and multilingual learners? (Bilingual and Multilingual Learners from the Inside Out)
• How can I teach students to read nonfiction critically and with curiosity? (Reading Nonfiction: Notice and Note Stances, Signposts, and Strategies)
• How can I use book clubs in the classroom? (Talking Texts)
• How can I promote justice and equality? (How to Fight Racism: Courageous Christianity and the Journey Toward Racial Justice)
• How can a Christian school meet “the challenges of the day while working toward God’s shalom in a broken but redeemed world.” (Teaching to Justice, Citizenship, and Civic Virtue: The Character of a High School Through the Eyes of Faith, loc 41)
• What motivates students to learn? (Difference Making at the Heart of Learning: Students, Schools, and Communities Alive with Possibility, by Tom Vander Ark & Emily Liebtag)

As I read that last book this week, 2 things happened:

• I was refreshed by remembering the “why” of learning—In the last year of teaching new classes I’ve become so focused on the what and how that the why momentarily slid out of focus. Humans were meant for community and for contribution. When learning has the goal of contributing to community, making a difference, it is hugely motivating.
• I suddenly realized that is exactly what I’ve been doing all summer in my learning: Responding to needs I see in myself and in my community by learning things so that I can use them to make a difference. To live differently, teach differently, impact students differently.

Now I’m wondering how 4th-8th grade readers, writers, and English language learners can use what they learn to make a difference in their communities—class, school, family, neighborhood, and beyond. This requires knowledge and skills—in the context of finding a problem and applying the knowledge and skills to creating a solution. The authors build a convincing case for giving learning a larger purpose, and they include a helpful compilation of 25 important issues in the world today to help teachers and students begin to think about what problems they want to be part of solving as we love our neighbors and steward the earth we have been given for a time. (See below for quotes and for the “Earth Owner’s Manual”)

Here are a few of the quotes (highlights are my own):

“We make the case for making a difference and living in a way that is not just in service of self but that puts the well-being and vitality of others and our communities at the heart of learning and life. We present an Earth Owners Manual, or the 25 most important issues of our time. We believe these issues ought to be the frame for learning in schools—driving students’ lifelong quest to find purpose and contribute through meaningful projects and work.” (loc 547)

“The idea is new to modern public education, but it has been central to all of the great faith traditions and foundational to civilizations that flourish.” (loc 848)

“For example, Father of the Protestant Reformation, Martin Luther, viewed vocation as the locus of the Christian life. He said the purpose of every vocation is to love and serve your neighbors. God does not need your good works, Luther said, but your neighbor does (Veith, 2016).” (loc 874)

“Education for the innovation economy is not just about knowledge and skill, argues Miller; it’s about mindset—collaborative, interdisciplinary, ethical, empathetic, entrepreneurial, and global. Developing these mindsets means an education that asks a new set of questions: 

• Identity: who do you believe you are? 
• Agency: what are you confident you can actually do? 
• Purpose: how will your life make a positive difference?” (loc 1734)

“Almost every significant contribution requires a team. That is increasingly true whether you’re a doctor, entrepreneur, first responder, or educator. Every profession has moved beyond the individual craftsman to delivery in teams—and teams are often diverse in discipline, location, race, and levels of experience. Collaboration is the result of the intentional design of culture and structure; it’s a set of agreements about tools and protocols; and it’s the cultivation of individual mindsets and skill sets (Vander Ark & Liebtag, 2018).” (loc 1750)

And for the "Earth Owner's Manual" compiled by the authors from a variety of sources, see below (loc 1372).

The 25 Most Important Issues in the World 
Adopted in 2015 by world leaders, the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals provide a road map to a better future: 

• No poverty: End poverty in all its forms everywhere. 
• Zero hunger: End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture. 
• Good health and well-being: Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages. 
• Quality education: Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all. 
• Gender equality: Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls. 
• Clean water and sanitation: Ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all. 
• Affordable and clean energy: Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable, and modern energy for all. 
• Decent work and economic growth: Promote sustained, inclusive, and sustainable economic growth; full and productive employment; and decent work for all. 
• Industry, innovation, and infrastructure: Build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization, and foster innovation. 
• Reduced inequalities: Reduce inequality within and among countries. 
• Sustainable cities and communities: Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient, and sustainable. 
• Responsible consumption and production: Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns. 
• Climate action: Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts. 
• Life below water: Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas, and marine resources for sustainable development. 
• Life on land: Protect, restore, and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, and halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss. 
• Peace, justice, and strong institutions: Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all, and build effective, accountable, and inclusive institutions at all levels. 
• Partnerships for the goals: Strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the global partnership for sustainable development (The Global Goals, n.d.). 

The National Academy for Engineering with support from other leading think tanks adds a few emerging challenges and opportunities (National Academy of Engineering, n.d.) 

• Understand the brain: Predict how interactions between the physical and social environment enable behavior. Inform AI and advances in health care, manufacturing, and communication. 
• Cyber security: Prevent intentional or unintentional attacks on public systems and uses of AI systems that do harm or pose an existential risk (Future of Humanity Institute, n.d.). 
• Prevent nuclear terror: A global war could kill a large percentage of the human population, and the resulting nuclear winter could be even deadlier than the war itself (Future of Life Institute, n.d.b) 
• Biotechnology for good: Reduce risk from especially dangerous pathogens and curb negative effects of cloning, gene splicing, and a host of other genetics-related advancements (Future of Humanity Institute, n.d.; Future of Life Institute, n.d.a). 
• Engineer the tools of scientific discovery: Acquire new knowledge about the physical and biological worlds; expand access to data science and impact partnerships. 

The last three are widely supported but differently phrased contribution opportunities: 

• Powerful expressions: Extending the quality of and access to human expression and visual and performing arts. 
• Getting along: Values serve as a pillar of a healthy society (Global Shapers Community, n.d.). They are complemented by empathy, perspective, and self-regulation (Knowledge Works, 2017). They empower difference making in a diverse society (Asia Society, n.d.). 
• Extraplanetary Life: Exploration of space and the potential for life on other planets. Jeff Bezos said, “We humans have to go to space if we are going to continue to have a thriving civilization.” And, “Eventually it will be much cheaper and simpler to make really complicated things, like microprocessors and everything, in space” (Clifford, 2019). 

From 24 Goals to Save the Planet (T. Vander Ark, 2020)

I'll be coming back to this list a lot this year as I think about how to help students see themselves as difference makers who learn in order to love and serve their neighbors!

Equipping Students to Read Nonfiction

“The major problem with simply telling kids what they need to know is that for the rest of their lives, there will be a great many people happy and eager to do precisely that. There’s no doubt that this would be a faster, more efficient way of getting content to them. But in the long run, although this very direct type of instruction might help raise test scores, it won’t help raise students who are independent thinkers.” (Kylene Beers and Robert E. Probst, Reading Nonfiction: Notice and Note Stances, Signposts, and Strategies, p. 32)

How can we raise students who are independent thinkers? According to Kylene Beers and Robert E. Probst, it is teaching students how to read nonfiction. I loved this book. After 30+ years of teaching English, ranging from 4th through 12th grade and including Advanced Placement (AP), I still relish discovering new tools to give students to engage them with their own learning. Reading Nonfiction: Notice and Note Stances, Signposts, and Strategies is practical, research based, applies across grade levels and subject areas (social studies, science, math), and filled with stories (as well as links to videos) of what students using the ideas actually looks like. It builds on reading strategies and academic conversation. And it is immensely readable. I can’t wait to get back to school and start using what I’ve learned! (And I also really want to read the authors’ previous book about reading fiction, but it will have to wait until next summer.)

To counter students either reading to answer pre-formulated questions by the teacher or the textbook, or simply saying, “I don’t get it,” Beers and Probst offer the following guidance: Approach the text with curiosity (3 questions), look for 5 signposts in the text to give traction on the questions, and use specific activities for building, repairing, or solidifying understanding (your answers to those questions). Here’s what that looks like:   

A curious stance comes to a text asking the following 3 questions:

1. What surprised me? This raises the expectation that readers should find surprising things in a text. The authors say, “Fiction invites us into the writer’s imagined world; nonfiction intrudes into ours and purports to tell us something about it” (39).
2. What did the author think I already knew? This takes the onus of confusion off the reader, puts it on the writer, and yet gives the reader a fix on what exactly the missing piece that is essential for understanding is, and thus empowers the reader to find or figure it out. 
3. What challenged, changed, or confirmed what I already knew? This raises the expectation that nonfiction should impact a reader’s thinking. It is fully respectable to change one’s thinking when one encounters new information, or the information may offer me new ways of explaining what I already understood.

Yet students can’t always identify what exactly it was in the text that surprised, confused, or challenged them. Or they can’t even get traction on answering those questions. The 5 signposts offer students specific spots to look for in the text that can give traction with the questions:

1. Contrasts and Contradictions: These can be within the text or between the text and the reader’s own experience or understanding.
2. Extreme or Absolute Language: This includes words like everyone/always, but also expands to include loaded language, propaganda, and anything that seems to be stated surprisingly strongly.
3. Numbers and Stats: In addition to numbers written both as numerals (2) and in words (two), this includes vaguer amounts like a few, a majority, most.
4. Quoted Words: It helps to identify why the author chose these words from this person.
5. Word Gaps: When students don’t understand words, it may be because they have multiple meaning, are specific to the field, or are given sufficient clues in the context.

Finally, Beers and Probst offer 7 strategies--specific activities for building, fixing, or solidifying understanding (answers to your questions). They can be used before reading to build an anticipatory set, during reading to fix confusion as it occurs, or after reading to reflect on what was learned. All of the strategies send readers back to the text repeatedly, deepening understanding with each reading “draft.”

• Before reading (2): Possible Sentences, KWL 2.0 (“want to know” flows directly out of what you know—what else do you wonder about what you already know? 2 learn columns—one for answers to the L questions, and another for anything else you learned)
• During reading (3): Somebody Wanted But So (structure for summarizing), Syntax Surgery (when looking carefully at pronoun reference, missing words, or other complex syntactical issues can help), Sketch to Stretch (when visualizing has failed).
• After reading (2): Genre Reformulation, Poster.

I’m already planning how I will use these stances, signposts, and strategies with specific pieces of nonfiction I’m using for background information in the novel study in my combined 6th and 7th grade English class in September. And I’d love to do a book discussion of this across grade levels and disciplines—anywhere nonfiction is read. The authors include in the signposts different questions to be asked by elementary, middle, and high school students—and the high school questions are differentiated by discipline, with different questions for history, science, and math. 

For instance, for the nonfiction signpost Numbers and Stats, they take the generalizable lesson “When the author uses specific numbers or provides statistical information, you need to stop and ask yourself…” 

• Elementary students: “What does this make me wonder about?” (For elementary, this question is the same for all the signposts. Brilliant, eh?”
• Middle school students: “Why did the author use these numbers or amounts?”
• High school students:
• History: "How do these numbers help me see patterns occurring across time, regions, and cultures? What do these numbers help me see?” 
• Science: “What purpose do these numbers serve in this context? Do these numbers help prove a point?”
• Math (in a word problem): “What question is the author asking me, and how do those numbers help?” 

Anyone want to read it again with me?