This week, I asked a friend/ geometry pro/ retired math teacher/ political campaigner, Evie, to consider helping me lesson plan and actually see me teach it out. I'm not sure what prompted me, and I wasn't worried that my classes were falling to pieces. I guess I wanted another perspective and someone to help me stretch.
On a lovely Saturday morning, I went to her house where I set my textbook next to a breakfast spread of Irish soda bread, boiled eggs, brie, blackberries, honey, and coffee. It was as wonderful as it sounds. We started chatting about the law of sines and her eyes lit up as she scanned through her memory of massive archives. We spent talking about how to show a derivation of the law of sines. Evie suggested I show a statement and ask the students if it was true or false. Brilliant. One of the challenging things about showing a proof is getting a gauge of if students are actually following you or not. This was a easy check. We talked about having a problem that could use the law of sines but could also be found without it. I decided to turn it into my class challenge problem. I really gained a lot from her insight, the way she thought about things, and the way she was able to connect ideas. She came to my last period class to observe it all happen in action. I think it's a whole different beast to plan a lesson out and then to watch it unfold in real life. During class, I got hung up on the few students who were behind or kept interrupting me as we went over the derivation. I felt spent by the end of the period. Evie had gone to different groups, giving them hints. It was a nice to have another body in the room, especially one who had helped plan the same lesson. She came up to me at the end of class and simply said, "That was great!" Perspective. I had been stressing about so many little things, and didn't really get a chance to enjoy what was going on that was great. Students brains were fried! I had done my job. They were at max capacity! Some kids came from an exhausting PE class ready to turn off, but they kept pushing on. Some students deeply understood the derivation. Some students had light bulb moments. Not everyone, but hey. I'm not Ash Ketchum here.. A retired teacher saying "This lesson went great" let me take a step back and be thankful. So much work had gone into getting my class to be willing to engage in challenges, work together, turn their brains on. I had forgotten about it all. I realized I have so much to learn from people who've walked the path. What took Evie seconds to think of would have taken me hours. And maybe one day I'll be able to plan great lessons in minutes, but it got me thinking--- I wish teaching was more collaborative. That it included more of the HEART stuff asking questions more like "Are students struggling?", "Are they thinking conceptually?", "Can they make sense of this?" instead of things like "We're covering questions 1-10 on unit 8.2" Even better, if we could watch our lessons as we've created them unfold in real life. That sounds like good PD to me.
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