Every since I was a small child, I have been obsessed with hearts and rainbows.  Blame it on the time of my childhood, between the glorious 70s and 80s, or the increase of rainbows in the world through Rainbow Brite, My Little Pony, and the Care Bears. 

This sense of being happy has stayed with me throughout my life.  I'm not happy all the time, but most of it.  I try to look beyond what is right in front of me and see the bigger picture or the lesson to be learned. 

We all face dark clouds.  Find your rainbow that can shine a light on your gloomy day.  Big hugs!

  
I'm super excited about this upcoming workshop with Misty Paterson.  I've had the pleasure to participate in an edu retreat with Misty and it's unlike any other training.  She is personal and conceptual at the same time.  Just what we need to revitalize the learning within our classroom.  

If you are in the Atlanta region or can make it, be sure to register!  Here is the link. 

As I was getting up this morning, I ran across this interesting article on the effectiveness of Social Emotional Learning (SEL).  I have mixed reviews on how I perceive the findings of a longitudinal study.  

One one side, I agree that SEL as a stand alone curriculum is not effective.  I've seen many traffic sign charts fail, because the teacher made a one-size-fits-all approach to self-monitoring behavior.  When we teach SEL as a curriculum, it sets up a false reality that only during "this" time do you focus on being empathetic, mindful, and caring.  We don't embody those characteristics while learning math, reading, and science.  This seems like quite a disconnect for me as a PYP teacher. 

On the other side, I do believe that we need to have a means for learners to express themselves on a regular basis through reflection.  How do we do this?  We leverage the language of the learner profile. 

Recently, a workshop participant made the connection that the learner profile attributes are actually skills learners need to develop in order to operate within the world.  This got me thinking deeper about their role.  

I concur that the learner profile are skills and dispositions that help young people to articulate how they are acting, thinking, and feeling.  It's about learning the correct definitions, instead of downloading the latest poster set from Teachers pay Teachers.  We've all done it, including me. 

How well do you know the language of the learner profile attributes?  Are you teaching them according to the definition outlined by the IB? 

For SEL in the PYP, we use the language of the learner profile attributes and the approaches to learning (ATL).  In partnership, they create dispositions of authentic thinkers, communicators, and so much more. 

What part of the learner profile attribute will you zoom into in your next unit of inquiry? 

I have made so many mistakes in my life.  Ones that make me cringe and others I'm grateful that social media did not exist to capture it.  We all make mistakes, so we have to stop beating ourselves up when they happen.  

Our youth is meant to be a time of exploration and risk-taking.  It's a time to figure ourselves out and hopefully know where we want to go next.  We will mess up.  In those moments, let us remember to forgive ourselves and remember that we are simply human. 

Hello friends, it’s been a long time.  I’m glad to be back to record the last three episodes of our series on a PYP classroom success criteria.  It has been quite some time since I’ve recorded an episode, which reflects the imbalance in my schedule.  Sorry for being so absent, but many wonderful things are coming, which makes me excited!

​This past week, I was fortunate to attend the IB global conference in Dublin, Ireland.  There were so many examples of education for an inclusive future, which was the theme of the conference.  When you step back to think about inclusivity, what does it mean to you? 

​As part of the global conference, I led a leadership session that explored what it means to create inclusive professional development.  Over the past two years, I’ve met with over a thousand educators in public/state, private, and international schools through IB workshops and my work as an independent consultant.  A common message from these interactions is that many teachers feel disconnected from the top-down professional development and decisions made by governing bodies that directly impact their teaching and the learning of their students.  

I took a risk to meet with school leaders, middle leaders, and teachers to openly discuss the need for inclusive professional development.  I won’t lie, but I was quite nervous and full of imposter syndrome. We explored the need for more democratic schools where everyone in the school has some say in how it is operated.  We particularly focused on discussing uncomfortable issues within our schools that are slowing down our progression and made proactive steps to unpack their causes and an action plan. 

Just about now, you are asking yourself, “How is this connected to differentiation?” If teachers have little decision-making opportunities in their school community, then it’s highly likely that the same experience will transfer to their classroom.  Learners will have less chance to make decisions in their learning due to external mandates, thus there will be very little authentic differentiation.  

Donna Mathew, a fellow PYP educator and Sketchnote Queen asked, “To what extent can we differentiate an inquiry classroom?  What are the different ways of doing it?”  I would like to focus on answering these questions for this session. 

​Let’s do this!

Let’s take a moment to define what differentiation looks and feels like in our practice.  

First, we must know our learners:  their unique background, personal experiences, how they feel about various subjects and tasks and how they learn best.  Lynn Erickson and Lois Lanning in their book, Transitioning to Concept-Based Curriculum and Instruction: How to Bring Content and Process Together state, “In order to provide appropriate differentiation, teachers must first know their students well from a variety of perspectives.” What does this mean for our practice?  We take time to first to learn our learners, before shaping their learning.  

Then, we are able to move forward with differentiating the learning.  Let’s take a moment to identify what is our role in the process.  For this, I will defer to the great and powerful Carol Ann Tomlinson.  In her book, The Differentiated Classroom, Tomlinson purports, “During planning, a teacher should generate a specific list of what students should know (facts), understand (concepts and principles), and be able to do (skills) by the time the unit ends…Activities should lead a student to understand or make sense of key concepts and principles by using key skills.”  

As I unpack this quote by Erickson and Lanning, I can’t help to think of the purpose of an authentic and agentic unit of inquiry.  It leads learners to determine their understanding and connections between the various parts of a unit.  Differentiation is HOW learners make those connections through unique processes and products. 

To begin, teachers must think differently about unit planning.  We do this by answering these questions. 

Teacher Questions

• What do I want my learners to understand by the end of the unit of inquiry? 
• What learning engagements, assessments, and skills will be required to reach learner independence?
• What is my role in the process to model and guide the learning? 
• How will I give up my need to control the learning?

These questions are deep and set the stage for more authentic decision-making on part of our learners.  There is direct teaching, modeling, and guiding on the part of the teacher.  The main difference is that learners help to decide what ideas, tools and processes will be used while they are teaching.  It becomes a true partnership. 

At this point, I think we recognize that differentiation is more than creating a choice board or various tasks in small group stations.  They definitely have their place in supporting learners, but differentiation is not a passive act.  It’s allowing learners to make decisions about their learning based on where they are on their learning journey.  

Tomlinson reminds us that “In healthy classrooms, the teacher helps students dream big.  Not all of the dreams will be alike, but each student needs to have big dreams and concrete ways to climb to them. Thus, the teacher teaches up.”  

What does this mean?  We don’t dilute the curriculum to make it more accessible.  It’s quite the opposite.  We give more opportunities for our learners to make choices and mistakes in their learning.  

We can begin this process by co-answering these questions with our learners.  If the unit planning remains a one-sided conversation of the teachers, it’s difficult to truly differentiate learning.  We need the unique perspectives and ideas of our learners, since they know how they learn best. 

Learner Questions:  these are questions teachers use with learners to create engagements

• What do I want to learn in this unit of inquiry?
• What are my strengths and opportunities for development? 
• What processes and products will I use to show my thinking?
• How can we deepen our thinking while learning new ideas? 
• How will I take risks in this unit?  How is it connected to my goal? 
• Where do I see my learning journey in the classroom?
• How will I give and receive feedback and feedforward? 

These questions transition from the teacher driving all of the thinking to the learners making choices based on their curiosities, abilities, and goal development.  Be prepared for different outcomes, because no two children will think the same way. 

Along with these processes, we are providing tools that promote independence and inquiry such as: 
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• Graphic organizers
• Visible thinking routine templates
• Word banks
• Co-created anchor charts
• Variety of learning materials

There is a natural relationship between agency and differentiation.  It’s about relinquishing our control of the planning and teaching process, so learners can make mistakes and discover their unique learner profile.  Are you willing to let go of the control?  

Just like a well-intentioned school leader, are we going to ignore the needs of our learners while moving forward with our initiatives? 

​Imagine my surprise when I ran into this smiling face at FLIBS. The last time we saw each other, it was over Zoom during his IBEN development. The world is truly a small place.

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There is something special at Florida IB Schools conference.  I always find the participants are so open-minded and willing to take risks. 

Since 2018, there is alot more flexibility of how the PYPX is operated.  It can be:

• a unit that last six weeks and follows a theme
• a unit that go throughout the duration of the year and follows a theme
• it can be outside of your programme of inquiry 
• it can be outside of your programme of inquiry and run all year long

I'm sure if you were creative, you could find the right solution for your campus.  In these pictures, these teachers are creating their PYPX calendar for the year ahead.  They are considering what would be meet the needs of their learners.

If you had a choice, how would you run the PYPX calendar? 

Personally, I would take Who We Are or How We Express Ourselves and run them throughout the year.  This would add depth to the units and allow for more in-depth exploration of the other five units.  

To give focus on the year-long unit, I would begin the year with them and unpack  the big ideas.  This will help to set the intention of the year-long exploration.  At the same time, I would embed the skills required outside of normal teaching to be planned into the curriculum.  

​So many options to choose from.