'Twas the Season

The Holiday Season. The Season of Giving. The Season of Stillness. There are many ways to describe the time from November to February. For high school teachers, this can be a Season of Productive Learning—classroom routines and expectations are firmly established and relationships are built, so now students can truly focus on learning. It’s also Exam Season for many, which brings anxiety about finishing curricula and assigning final grades fairly and equitably. And it is Semester Change Season, meaning new mixes of students and reflections about how to improve teaching and learning in the second half of the year. Plus, teachers need to balance all of these challenges with the extra celebrations and obligations in their personal lives that come with the holidays. As well as avoid Seasonal Depression in these dark months!

All of that to say, while I came up with a pretty solid plan for developing and implementing my work on vertically-aligning Social Studies skills back in October, ‘twas a Season of Delay until our return to school after the New Year.

I put together rough drafts of intra-grade learning progressions for three Social Studies skills back in the Fall—developing historical claims, considering historical causation, and constructing historical arguments based on primary sources. These were pretty rough, but I shared them with the four 9th and 10th grade teachers who agreed to work with me on this project for their review and electronic feedback. (If you recall, these teachers across two high schools who teach Accelerated U.S. History & Geography 9 and AP World History.) Two of the teachers responded with a few comments, and I dropped by a third teacher's room for an impromptu conversation. The bits of feedback they offered gave me some direction, particularly in what AP World History teachers were hoping their incoming students would be able to do next year. I realized, however, that asking for electronic feedback was too light of a touch for these colleagues who are involved in many district initiatives that take precedence over my passion project. I knew that I needed to have face-to-face conversations with each one of them to ask some targeted questions: How were they already teaching these skills, if at all? Did the sequence of building blocks I had reasoned out for each skill make sense, or should the steps be reorganized? Were there any gaps in the building blocks? Based on their observations, what did they think their students could reasonably be expected to do at the end of each semester? What supplementary instructional supports would be helpful to include with the building blocks in the learning progressions?

And yet, 'twas The Season. I needed time to revise my drafts, but my instructional coach duties were ramping up. Co-planning a unit with a teacher to incorporate political cartoon analysis, developing a mini-professional development session for all high school staff, planning and facilitating team meetings to discuss the formative assessment process, and attending courses for my own professional growth were eating away at my time. And I just didn’t feel right adding to my colleagues’ already jam-packed schedules during the holidays by scheduling interviews with them. So I resolved to meet with each teacher individually in the week after we returned to school in January.

I stuck to that plan and the meetings were fruitful! With each teacher, I shared my goal of having complete, workable learning progressions for each skill by the end of first semester (a tall order, considering there was just one week to go…). And I requested that they use the learning progressions in their instruction and assessment over the next few months in ways that they see fit, as well as provide written feedback in the documents about how things go. I also requested to meet with them one-on-one again each month to discuss their thoughts. All four agreed. And one, who happens to be one of my own former students, as well as a fellow SecMAC alumnus, is passionate about implementing this work and enthusiastic about inviting me into her classroom in the coming months to observe and problem-solve together. My hope is that all five of us will be able to meet this Spring to reflect on the benefits and drawbacks of the learning progressions in terms of student growth, make necessary revisions based on their observations and work with students, and discuss how to move forward together in the Fall with a cohesive and logical sequence of building blocks next year.

So it has been a Season of Success. Last night, I met my goal for the end of this semester, and sent off learning progressions for my colleagues to implement starting this week. Each progression includes a series of building blocks for each skill across 9th and 10th grade. The building blocks consist of a targeted skill with a learning target and a 4-point rubric of success criteria in student-friendly language. Wherever possible, I included reference handouts and instructional resources to support implementation.

The one hiccup in my plan is that I’ve decided to drop one of the progressions, at the encouragement of my faculty mentor. When we met recently to discuss my progress, he said, “This is a lot.” And I agreed. 'Tis a Season of Reflection, and I had already been feeling the weight of tackling three skills with four teachers across two different buildings. His spontaneous reaction allowed me to give myself permission to modify my plan. So I’m letting the skill of causal thinking go, for now, and focusing on the two skills dealing with argumentation instead. As my colleagues are also piloting a new curriculum in the upcoming semester, this will also take some of the load off of their shoulders, too.

Even with this more narrow focus, there is a lot to do, but I’m certain it will be rewarding. Here’s to a Season of Hard Work ahead!