I try to teach according to my beliefs. One of those beliefs is this:
“The most powerful learning often happens when the teacher sets the conditions and gets out of the way.” I’m not even sure who said this or where I heard it, but it has always guided my teaching and my coaching (I try to let it guide my parenting too, but I sometimes have trouble with the “getting out of the way” part.)
Recently I have been modeling a series of lessons in third grade for two teachers who are new to this grade level. The lessons are meant to provide some early, engaging, and meaningful practice on the kinds of experiences students might face on our upcoming state test. One lesson involved watching a video, identifying character traits, and then sorting and ranking those traits to determine which trait BEST described the character (sounds like a test question, right?). We were working to determine traits for two of the characters in the video.
I had the children work with the traits of one character, determining precise traits, working with partners to sort and rank and then defend their decisions. The students were engaged and thinking hard about the work. The lesson seemed to be going well. It was then that I decided to create some conditions and step aside. We had identified a few traits for the second character in the film. On the chart, students had listed the following: mean, rude, bully, cruel. I challenged them to, if they chose to, for homework, decide which of these traits BEST described the character and write an entry in their notebook explaining why.
As I was introducing the challenge, I saw one student’s hand waving at me.
“What is it, Abby?” I asked.
“I don’t agree with ANY of those words! Can I use different words when I work on this tonight?”
Now that’s the kind of thinking I’m looking for.
I need to keep setting the conditions and getting out of the way.
(p.s. Abby (pseudonym) came to me early the next morning to show me pages of thinking. She had decided the character was competitive and had all sorts of evidence to support it.)
Writing to Learn, Learning to Write 
Yes! It is always wonderful when the students ask if they can move away from the assigned task in some way and create a new way of doing it – put their own personal stamp on it. Thanks for sharing and reminding us that this is more than okay – it shows us real engagement and often outside-the-box thinking. Thanks for sharing.
Woo hoo for stepping out of the way. It’s not my forte, but I need to do it more often with 2 year old grandson.
What an engaging way to work on the state test tasks and so many other standards in third grade. What movie did you show?
The film is actually an ad. It is called The Outsider. We heard about it through our staff developer at TC. It’s a great one!
Oh, yes! I know it. It would be great for us.
Getting out of the way! A great tip!
I love the idea of setting the conditions and getting out of the way, and you illustrate what that means very nicely. It’s got me thinking about whether or not I do this & how I could do it more. Hmm… thanks for the thoughtful post.
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