Shifting the Struggle by Writing More and Grading Less
The screenshot above is the APS "Shift the Academic Struggle" Continuum . At the Teaching Partner meetings I'm attending regularly now, we talk often about "shifting the academic struggle" to students. These conversations are vitally important because they encourage our group to think with others about how to engage students in heavy thinking work. As teachers are up to their elbows in new curriculum tools and challenged to think about standards prioritization as they use those tools to plan, it is essential that as we move from planning to teaching, we remember that all the intellectual work we did in planning should help us "do less" of the thinking work in the classroom. When I'm invited into classrooms for the purposes of observing, coaching and giving feedback, teachers usually appreciate if I watch with a critical question in mind: "Who is doing the work and who is doing the thinking?" It is such a valuable consideration becaus...