Theresa: Mini-Lessons on Mini-Lessons

This year my school has decided to use mini-lessons as a way to increase our student’s comprehension. As a school we have been doing professional readings, watching video clips (both of good mini-lessons and not-so-good mini-lessons), developing and modeling them as well. I really got a feel for all of the components that must be in a mini-lesson: Connection, Teaching Point, Active Engagement, and Link. Because I am on my school’s Instructional Leadership Team, I was one of the first to begin piloting mini-lessons in my classroom. When it came time to actually try out my mini-lesson I was excited. I thought that my students would really enjoy it and I couldn’t wait to hear their discussions during the active engagement component.

I planned and planned and was finally ready for my math mini-lesson. I called my students over to the carpet, and the wonderful smooth transition that I envisioned in my mind was so different from what I was witnessing. I should have known at this point that this wasn’t going to be good, but I kept going.

A couple arguments and five minutes later, my students were all sitting on the carpet. I had most of them paying attention, so I began my lesson. I was showing them a new strategy they could use during a measurement math problem. I felt like they were really getting it, so I put up a new problem and told them to turn and talk to an elbow partner about what the answer would be. Much to my disappointment, I heard two different responses when I was circulating through my students. There was either “The answer is 3” or “I don’t know” (followed by lengthy silence from both elbow partners).

To say I was disappointed would be an understatement. I envisioned my lesson being like those in the video clips we’ve watched. I kept trying to figure out what went wrong; when it hit me: I never taught my students how to be active participants during a mini-lesson. I just expected that they would know what to do!

So I scaled things way back and began to develop mini-lessons on mini-lesson procedures. The first lesson was about where to sit on the carpet. Since my carpet is a map of the United States, I assigned each student a different state to sit on (and a nice connection to social studies as well!). We practiced coming to the carpet and sitting in the right place. We started slow and noisy, but after a while it got quicker and quieter. Next, we practiced what it looks like to show me that you are an active listener. Active listeners sit with their legs crossed, hands folded in their laps, and eyes on me. Once again, we practiced and we practiced until everyone could show me that they were active listeners. That’s where we left off before winter vacation.

Next comes the part that I have been putting off: teaching them how to have discussions. Some of my students love to share their ideas and others struggle to give me a single word. I have done some research and through some borrowing from different sources, I have made an “Accountable Talk” poster. It is a compiled list of sentence starters that my students can refer to when they give their answer and when they respond to their partner’s answer. I know that it is going to take quite a bit of practice, but I know that it will be worth it. I can’t wait for my students to begin using the “Accountable Talk” sentence starters and have great conversations without me having to guide their every response.

Comments

[Theresa]

Just wanted to give a quick update on my mini lesson procedures. My students have really done a great job embracing "accountable talk"! They are constantly referring to the poster when talking with their elbow partners. (They even made me move the poster so they could see it better!) I am really enjoying hearing my students discuss using "I think that..." "I disagree with..." While we still have a lot of practice ahead of us, things are moving the right direction.
-Theresa

[Melinda Fleming]

Thanks for the active listening comments - my kid listens most intensely when he is staring fixedly just to the left of the speaker. It looks like he is zoning out, but as soon as the speaker is finished, he provides a response that demonstrates how well he's been listening. It's almost as if looking at the speaker is too distracting to absorb the message.

I tend to do the same when I'm REALLY trying to hear every word.

[Cheryl Jackson]

Hi, I feel mini lessons can be beneficial to different students but I am wondering how would a general education teacher who is in an Inclusion classroom deal with mini lessons? I like how you stepped back and reevaluated the situation in order to find out what went wrong and what needs to change in order to correct the problem at hand. That shows some good leadership qualities. Do you think mini lessons are good for differentiated instructions?

[Julie Pate]

HI, I can empathize with Elizabeth because I have son who has Asperger's syndrome. He processes things differently and does have a hard time listening and processing that listening like a normal peer would. I also work as a paraprofessional in a MOID self contained class with students in grades 2-5. Everyone processes differently, and we have to take this into account everyday. However, I applaud you on realizing that they needed the mini lessons on the procedure you wanted them to be able to do to be productive students. It does take personal reflection to question if what you are doing is working or not. Good luck on the rest of the procedure training.

[Theresa]

Elizabeth, I just want to reassure you that "active listening" looks different for everyone of my students. I completely understand that not all of my students are going to sit with their hands folded and eyes on the speaker. I have used the term "active listener" enough with my students that now when I say "let's get ready to be active listeners" I can see them get ready to focus (in different ways) on the lesson.
-Theresa

[Elizabeth]

Just a small reminder that not all active listening is achieved with hands folded, legs crossed and eyes on the speaker. "Everyone" showed you that they could follow directions, which really has little to do with the process of actively listening, participating and engaging with the subject matter. I'm not trying to be pedantic, I'm the mom to an amazing almost 11 year old son with Asperger's syndrome, who processes the world very differently and has occasionally been punished for not being able to demonstrate that "active listening" formula when he just has his very own listening formula.