Engagement
It has been a hell of a year, but slowly I almost feel like I am back to being a useful human again. The mind wanders a lot when injured flitting across books, surfing the web, diving into Netflix series and even painting. Apart from the act of healing what was I truly engaged in? When I imagine engagement this is what springs to my mind.
Having a goal that is almost overwhelmingly absorbing. Yet we engage in so many different ways. Often we see these differing levels of engagement in the classroom as well as social life. Lessoncraft has been something I have been musing over for some time. I remember a few years ago at a staff function somewhere else getting a wee bit bored of the chat (as the company was nowhere near as engaging as the present company I have) and started to talk about what our best lesson was for that year. I wonder can you remember your first truly amazing lesson? ![]()
I remember some of the shockers both recent and in the past but what about the ones that just made you bubble inside? I cast my mind back to my S5/S6 (12/13) class of 2006 - a lesson on Stewardship. It started as a heartfelt rant (semi-planned) and flowed through to some student discussion, then writing and finally ended up with a destination using the book “365 days to change the world”.
The destination was a call to arms for the youth. If you agree with what you have written if you are passionate about this on Saturday I am spending the day cleaning a beach, join me or do the same which beach would you adopt. In more recent time, engagement has changed. The world has moved on and it seems to spin a little faster. I found a great tool to plan learning journeys on and can share it here.
If you listened to the 10 mins of that then I may have engaged you also. The lesson itself that day wasn’t amazing but I went into class buzzing with excitement about trying a new approach to the learning. It fell flat when the tech let me down. Luckily I was savvy enough to fix it myself as I had been too engaged in plan A to actually have a plan B. The 1 to 1 computer environment led to me being able to engage in meaningful conversation about what we were doing students fears and hopes for their futures. I used the steps in the journey as learning sparks for the students to think on and share with me. ![]()
In Mathematical Mindsets, by the wonderful Jo Boaler (I think PLT has my copy), she talks about low floor and high ceiling activities. The idea of engaging activities that students can all enter into and engage with but are able to challenge. Simple clicking and sorting activities with some room for deeper thought. Ideally it would have rolled into some extended writing or another suitable task.
My lesson outlined above wasn’t flawless but it was enough for me to proudly tell Steph that night after she asked me:
“How was work?” “Great! I have changed the world.” “How?” She asked. “I don’t know, I just think I might have.” ~Duncan Trickey
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June 2019
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