Henry David Thoreau
This quote really made me stop and think the first time I read it. Wow! It sort of felt like a slap in the face the more I pondered it. I began to reflect on my teaching style and the way I had been taught. Oh, my...I had some serious revisions I needed to do. Maybe it is just me, but have any of you sat down and really reflected what you have students do on any given day? Is it truly meaningful work? Work that helps your students grow? Work that allows your students to take ownership of their learning? When I reflected honestly, I discovered a majority of my work was busy work for the students which in turn came back to me as busy work 20-fold! (Ouch!-Yep, definitely a slap in my face!)
So now that I discovered I had revisions needed in my style of instruction. How was I going to make it-err...them- all work. When I say work I mean meaningful work that will help each child grow and develop at their rate and speed and also take some ownership of their learning.
I believe that the Daily Five core foundations truly helped me develop into the kind of teacher I really wanted to be! I slowly forced myself out of my comfort zone and into the D5 zone by doing the following:
- Trusting Students
- Providing Choice
- Nurturing Community
- Creating a Sense of Urgency
- Building Stamina
- Staying out of students' way once routines are established
Oh my gosh when I got back this year I started up my "centers" again. I was trying to make them bigger and better by doing all of this research and finding new ideas...however it ended up making WAY more work for me and just simply busy work for the students. I had them turning something in for every one of their 4 stations. So that was 4 sheets of paper for each of my 18 students. Oh my gosh that just overwhelmed me. I knew I needed a time like centers to reach my students but it was hard to give up the control and have it be student lead. I was taught with a teacher up in the front of a room teaching while we sat in our desks. The Daily 5 has really pushed me out of that comfort zone and I love it. I still catch myself some days focusing on what the students are doing and if they are off task, but then I try and stop myself before I say anything. I think that is my biggest struggle of simply giving up that "power" and giving it to the students which they are fully capable of. If we keep the bar up high they will reach it. We just need to remember that as teachers to set that bar high and they will achieve AWESOME things!!
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