The 16 Week Challenge - Week 16

 

Week 16: Dec. 9 - Practice Co-Constructing Anchor Charts

The challenge is to put into practice what you learned last week by planning to co-construct anchor charts in upcoming lessons. (And feel free to revisit last week's post if you need a refresh on how to do that.)

What does this look like?

1. Find a lesson in which you'd like to practice it. Do this by finding a lesson in which you should co-construct an anchor chart. Internalize the lesson, finding its purpose, heart, and student work, and think about how co-constructing the anchor chart is aligned with that purpose. 
2. See how students will be using the anchor chart over time. Take a peek at a few upcoming lessons. Where do you see the anchor chart come back up? Should students be using it as a resource in some way? Will they be adding to it? Will it be a resource that's available on an assessment?
3. Plan to press for exemplar responses. Look at the teacher exemplar to see the kinds of ideas students should be contributing to it. What do you think students will say? If they don't give you a response that's close to an exemplar, what would you do to press for that level of thinking? (Cold call? Turn and talk, while you hunt and gather? Think-pair-share while you hunt and gather? Write on Post-Its and you show call a strong response?) Remember, the thinking doesn't have to be exactly, word-for-word, what's in the exemplar, but it should be very closely aligned and as complex.
4. Teach the anchor chart part of the lesson analog. This means co-create the anchor chart as designed in the lesson, on paper, without using your slides. You are holding the pen, they are doing the talking, and you are writing what they say, pressing for stronger thinking without rounding up only when needed. (And don't forget those total participation techniques!)
5. Reflect. Look at what students created, and compare it to the exemplar. How close was this? How was this different from pre-creating anchor charts? Did students do the majority of the work?

Completed that? 

Well. 

You just completed Week 16 - the very last week - of the 16 Week Teaching Challenge. Wow! Whether you completed every week or just a few, you have done the work of putting the 8 high-leverage techniques of EL into practice in your classroom, and that is a really, really big deal. 

If you're working for that small prize, you can log your success here. If you'd like to go back and try the techniques of other weeks, you're welcome to do that, too. Just make sure all of your work is logged by Monday, Dec. 16, and that prize will be on its way to you in time for Christmas.

Here's to simply teaching well,