Pushing All Students Above and Beyond

The Situation As teachers, we assume certain things about our students based on Family educational background Family's financial status Student's past academic performance Student's behavior We use this information to make judgments about student's academic abilities and behavior

The Issue These assumptions and judgments affect how we approach the student. We may plan different, making false assumptions about the student's ability to meet expectations.

Why is this an issue? Our expectations for a student are the highest they will go If we only assume a student can read at grade level, it is more than likely that the student will never read above grade level Regardless of their natural talent or abilities

How to fix this Issue High expectations Scaffolding Enabling strategies Encouraging all students Focus on skills instead on content knowledge

High Expectations Hold all students to a high bar Use the next year's content expectations as a guide Provide all students with opportunities to be exposed to information

Scaffolding Provide students with activities that slowly step them toward the final product. Instead of asking for the final product right away, guide students through a good thinking process Showing students the steps that successful students take will allow them to follow similar processes in the future

Enabling Strategies Like scaffolding, enabling strategies shows students what processes good learners go through. Many struggling students are not aware of what strategies will help them succeed Think-alouds allow the teacher to show what they are thinking during the learning process. Walking through an activity allows students to see this as well.

Encouraging All Students Although preconceived notions may cloud judgment, it is important that teacher continue to encourage all students Each student deserves an encouraging teacher that believes that they can succeed.

Skills instead of Content At the end of the day, we need to foster good citizen skills Although we all love our content, we need to keep what is NECESSARY in mind (enduring skills) We want to produce productive citizens! By helping them build problem solving skills, we give them a leg up for living in a competitive world.