Stories of Engagment

EngagementA Passion Story Told in Three Acts

Act 1Theres a Problem?

A few years ago I was feeling pretty distressed; I had just left the classroom and was working at CDE. As part of that job I visited classrooms all across the state and classrooms of all levels. What I saw was depressing. No socratic seminars, no rich projects, no writers workshop. I needed a lift so I called a friend and said take me to a classroom where I can be inspired.3

5

9

Lesli Cochrans class: all students were engaged literally all. Over the years I was fortunate to study her classroom and the classroom of others. I interviewed students, etc. Here are some stories that pop out:Aaron the autistic kidJavier, the kid with the ankle bracelet

10

We can choose to work or not to work, but if we dont work, shell hunt us down.I could not come to her class unprepared. If I did, I felt like I let her down. She believed in my ability to succeed; therefore, I believed in myself.Thank you! I never had a teacher believe in me this much.

What do students want?11

ENGAGEMENT

What is the current situation?3 table stand up (24 people)=elementary disengagement5 table stand up (36 people)= elementary disengagement7 table stand up (60 people) = high school disengagement12

Critical factor in academic success is ENGAGEMENT13

THE GAP BETWEEN LOW AND HIGH PERFORMERS

The problem of inequality is becoming more pronounced and more entrenched decade by decade...a social time bomb.

--Michael Fullan

African American and Latino students on average 1 yr behind white counterparts by 2nd or 3rd grade

15

12th grade: 3 to 4 years behind

African American and Latino students16

Engagement

One of the most robust predictors of student achievement and behavior in school regardless of whether students come from families that are advantaged or disadvantaged. (Klem and Connell, 2004)17

MEET Charlie18

K-3 grade:40% of students read daily 4th grade: 29% read daily

Not only does volume of reading go down, so does achievement in both math and reading.19

I used to be a good reader until around third or fourth grade, then I suddenly got stupider.Smith and Wilhelm, 2002Wilhelm and Smith

Expectancy Value TheoryDo I value climbing this mountain?Do I expect to make it?

21

Yes and yes!

NO, DONT THINK I CAN DO THIS!

They believe that self-efficacy is the trump card.23

Cycle of Failure

24

The Current Reality?

Everyone stand up: Engagement when students start elementary the tables sit down engagement at elementary40% sit down: engagement in middle54% sit down: engagement in high school

25

26

Everyone stand up; the goal of engagement 100% of you engagedDuring elementary, something happens: 24% sit downDuring middle school, it continues: 39% sit downAnd by high school, 56% sit downLook whos left!We cannot abide by this!28

Engaged students in 8th grade = graduate from both HS and MS29

857 Desks

One desk for every student who drops out each hour of the day, according to College Board; Ed Leadership, 2007, 1.2 million annually30

With a partner, ponder the quote.

When lists of standards for school achievement are made, nobody seems concerned that happiness is not on the list. It would be easy to make the case for it, though. Happy children are better learners But the omission points to a much larger problem. Children live at least twelve years of their lives in school, and their experiences influence every aspect of their development and wellbeing the intellectual, the emotional, the psychological, and the social . While we are busy teaching children to read and write, the students are also trying to make sense of being human. Pressures to focus on the basics and academic rigor often distract us, and we forget that healthy development and well-being require children to experience a sense of autonomy, relatedness, and competence.

-Johnston, Peter and Gay Ivy, 2015. Engagement: A Hub of HumanDevelopment. In Glover and Keene, The Teacher You Want to Be.

Act 2Engagement Revealed

And then I met Katie the fake reader37

Dimensions of Engagement

BehaviorDIMENSIONS OF ENGAGEMENT

Step into the mind of your students -- who fits which response?40

Cognitive

Emotion

BehaviorDIMENSIONS OF ENGAGEMENT

What is engagement?

Commitment

Attention

Persistence

Meaning & value

FLOW

Reflect on your engagement

Lets ponder a momentAcademic success

Engagement Dimensions:BehaviorEmotional CognitiveAttention PersistenceCommitment Value/Meaning

How Might a Student Respond to Tasks?

55

ENGAGEMENT

COMPLIANCE

57

Strategic compliance

Get another pic!58

Nothing but As!

MEET JUSTIN: 59

Ritualistic Compliance

NON-COMPLIANCE

Retreat

Return to Charlie and tell the ghost story62

Rebellion

63

The Engaged Classroom

Most students engaged most of the time; sometimes theres compliance and occasionally noncompliance, but not enough to see it as a pattern; idiosyncratic.64

The Well-Managed Classroom

Most common type of classroom; strategic compliance and ritual compliance are dominate modes on response; little or no rebellion; students appear to be engaged but theyre compliant65

The Struggling Classroom

What Schlechty calls the pathological classroom; presence of rebellion; no isolated; many students actively reject doing the assigned work; teachers tend to settle for retreatism or compliance, perhaps even lower their expectations. 66

Lets take a pause and reflect on ourselves. Check out the grid. When you think about yourself or students you know, where do you fit? Does this capture you?67

Act 3Taking Action

But.

Whats gets in our way? What stops engagement?69

Could be PARCC, Smarter Balanced, or state teststends to get in the way of teachers going for engagement75

Arnie Duncan quote76

What if we built a school system designed around wonder?We could begin, for instance, by seeing books themselves as rich provocations, rather than as tasks or assignments to be dispatched and completed, since every good book invites its readers to consider what it might mean. And since a provocation, by its very nature, is intended to spark thinking along with both curiosity and puzzlement, we might also want to reconsider some of the practices we may implement when readingsuch as doing a picture walk, reading a back blurb, or providing a brief summary or background knowledge for the text

1. Design compelling, juicy work

Talk about the importance of designing work that is meant to engage: remember the definition of engagement attention, persistence, commitment, meaning; remember the dimensions of behavior/emotion/heart

READ QUOTE 2 AND 378

If I have to go to school, then just give me busy work. Its easy and I can get a good grade.

Wild animals domesticated: Moral? Immoral? Neither?

Where does your right to develop and express your unique identify end and the rights of others who would object begin?

Leslis class82

83

How does discrimination sneak into a culture, and what does it take to weed it out?

Culminating project: soapbox speech85

[T]he goal of developing in most.

Rather than designing work for students.

In America, we say.

Quotes by Phil Schlechty and Vicki Vinton

schlechty86

Did you know:Honey is the one food that does not spoil. Archaeologists have tasted and deemed edible three-thousand-year-old honey found in the tombs of Egyptian pharaohs.Many species of moths feed on the tears of larger animals.

2. Nurture and maintain a culture of care

What about care for these guys?

MEET CONNOR89

Jeff Wilhelms research on boysboys resist learning from people who do not take an interest in them and who dont show care for them.

91

Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It's not.

At table talk about what you all do to create a caring classroom community. Write one or two ideas on sticky note and add to the poster on CARE.92

3. Ferociously commit to students potential

Zora Ball (7)Youngest person to invent a mobile video game

7-year-old,Zora Ballis the youngest person to create a mobile video game. Ball developed the game using programming language Bootstrap, which is usually taught to students between the ages of 12 and 16, to help them learn concepts of algebra via video game development.94

Alexandra Alex Scott(8)Alexs Lemonade Stand Foundation has raised over $1,000,000

Alexandra "Alex" Scottwas born in Connecticut in 1996, and was diagnosed with neuroblastoma, a type of childhood cancer, shortly before she turned 1. In 2000, just after turning 4 years old, she informed her mother she wanted to start a lemonade stand to raise money for doctors to "help other kids, like they helped me." Her first lemonade stand raised $2,000 and led to the creation of the Alexs Lemonade Stand Foundation. Alex continued her lemonade stands throughout her life, ultimately raising over $1 million toward cancer research. She passed away in August 2004 at the age of 8.Today, Alexs Lemonade Stand sponsors a national fundraising weekend every June calledLemonade Days. Each year, as many as 10,000 volunteers at more than 2,000 Alexs Lemonade Stands around the nation make a difference for children with cancer.95

Zach Bonner (6)Founded Little Red Wagon Foundation

After Hurricane Charley, he started a non-profit organization to help children of poverty, particularly homeless children. Collected 27 truck loads of water in his little red wagon donations. 1st year: walked 250 miles to collect donations. Continues to walk to collect donations. Hosts parties for the homeless and received multiple awards for his efforts. Elton John even donated $25,000 to his cause.

96

How do you see students who challenge you?

97

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLYECIjmnQs

What do they have in common? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLYECIjmnQs