Wednesday, March 8, 2023

Why It's Not About The Things You Own, But What You Know

Last week I was off the grid.  Traveling home, I had a chance to reflect on why we need to continue to fight for our public schools, and for the teachers, administrators and staff who are vital to the success of our students.  On my trip, I met Raymond.  He was our guide in Roatan, Honduras.  His mother is a 77 year old public school teacher there.  We drove by one of the few public schools, which are free, in Roatan. There are also private schools, which cost $200 a month. Children are only required to attend school through grade 6.  The children were coming out of the school to go home for lunch as we drove by. They do not provide school lunch or transportation to school.  The school was small with a dirt courtyard. Broken desks were piled in a corner of the courtyard.  Public schools in Roatan are not adequately funded.  Raymond took that moment to share what his mother told him when he was a little boy. “You can spend your life putting things in a bucket or spend your life putting things in your brain. People will take things from your bucket, but they can never take things from your brain.”  He went on to share that as a child growing up in Roatan, he never felt like he needed to have many things, because he had a chance to learn skills he could rely on when he grew older.  He went to school and learned to read.  He learned how to swim, because it might help him get a job when he was older. And it did. He has worked as a crew member on a catamaran. He learned how to speak English because it might help him get a job when he got older. And it did. He has been a tour guide. Raymond continues to look for opportunities to learn new things... and help us learn new things. He took great pride in telling us about the history of the island, and the natural resources and neighborhoods we were seeing. He shared stories of the Mayan culture and its influence on Roatan. And he reemphasized why education was important and how important the work of teachers like his mother is to the children of Roatan. And… how important tourism is because we are helping to bring income to the island and provide funding to the schools.   


I loved his mother’s advice to him.  Sometimes we become too focused on the day to day lesson planning, paperwork, and reporting.  We worry about what markers we need, what workbooks to order, how we will get through chapter 10. These are times we are busy filling buckets.  We lose sight of the children who are right in front of us who are looking for opportunities to learn a new skill that will help them solve a problem they see, or open a door to future learning or a future job. How do we keep our focus on helping them fill their brains instead of their buckets? 

  1. Encourage students to become experts - use text sets, and self organized learning (SOLE)  This is also where generative AI can serve as a learning assistant to students.

  2. Provide regular opportunities to engage in integrated science and math tasks that are relevant to the students.  Generative AI can be a teacher planning assistant and suggest tasks that are tied to standards and have relevance to student groups.

  3. Use research based, systematic, explicit instruction in foundational reading.  Generative AI can create decodable texts, and identify essential vocabulary or background knowledge. 

  4. Provide regular access to grade level appropriate informational and literary texts. Generative AI can be a teacher assistant to create book lists, create text dependent questions, and suggest  related materials. 

  5. Provide access to STEAM labs where students can innovate and create, Generative AI can be a critical thinking bot asking open ended questions to help students explore ideas as they work through multiple iterations of solutions.

  6. Establish mentor networks to connect students with other students and with adults who can help them be their best selves.  Generative AI can’t do this…but teachers can! 


Remember, public schools are a pillar of our democracy and our culture in America.  Our public school system is available to every child through the age of 18.  The work we do as educators is essential and our students will be successful because of the work we do! 


Resources To Spark Your Thinking


Upcoming Opportunities:

at
Labels: ,