Wednesday, my district opened up a personalized professional development system, and I've been working through it. Shockingly, I'm a bit competitive and have been enjoying proving what I know, and digging in to learn what I don't. It made me realize that I haven't been working to help my students learn as well as I could.
I've let myself slide into old habits that haven't been as beneficial to me & my students. I struggled a lot with station rotation last year, and decided to go back to a more traditional format, at least for a bit while I've been learning how to use the curriculum from Illustrative Mathematics. But, I haven't been using best practices. I'm a bit bored and so are the kids. I've got kids who are struggling and kids who are way above grade level, and I'm struggling myself to meet them all where they are while sticking to the pacing.
So, now after working through the Blended Learning Module, I've got a lot of thoughts floating through my head. I still want to stick with Illustrative Mathematics, because it is good stuff that gets my kids thinking, but I want to allow them more time to learn what they need to and prove to me what they already know. I don't want to go full station rotation because I want them to have more control, and limiting them to 20 minutes per section wasn't good for any of us last year. I think I'm going to have the resources out for each week, and let them know the stuff they have to complete for the week. I'm also going to give them the opportunity to opt out of certain activities if they can prove to me they know the material by working on the quizzes in Khan Academy.
I'm still thinking it all through, but I'm excited and extremely grateful for the work my district office put in to this PD resource.
I've let myself slide into old habits that haven't been as beneficial to me & my students. I struggled a lot with station rotation last year, and decided to go back to a more traditional format, at least for a bit while I've been learning how to use the curriculum from Illustrative Mathematics. But, I haven't been using best practices. I'm a bit bored and so are the kids. I've got kids who are struggling and kids who are way above grade level, and I'm struggling myself to meet them all where they are while sticking to the pacing.
So, now after working through the Blended Learning Module, I've got a lot of thoughts floating through my head. I still want to stick with Illustrative Mathematics, because it is good stuff that gets my kids thinking, but I want to allow them more time to learn what they need to and prove to me what they already know. I don't want to go full station rotation because I want them to have more control, and limiting them to 20 minutes per section wasn't good for any of us last year. I think I'm going to have the resources out for each week, and let them know the stuff they have to complete for the week. I'm also going to give them the opportunity to opt out of certain activities if they can prove to me they know the material by working on the quizzes in Khan Academy.
I'm still thinking it all through, but I'm excited and extremely grateful for the work my district office put in to this PD resource.
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