Tips for hands-on, minds-on learning experiences

Think about things that you remember best from when you were growing up. What made those experiences stay with you for all these years so that they continue to make up your schema about what learning looks like? Chances are, those things you still remember engaged you or challenged you much more than worksheets or lectures. We call that level of engagement hands-on, minds-on.

Planning and implementing hands-on, minds-on learning experiences is different from opening a teacher's manual and writing down the page numbers. It takes a deep understanding of both the standards and your students. Creativity needs structure - and hands-on, minds-on learning experiences need structure in order to have a sense of freedom. Giving the freedom for your students to explore, create, question, and fail can be scary and it requires a classroom community that values risk-taking and a growth mindset.

Are you thinking about incorporating more hands-on, minds-on learning experiences in your classroom? Here are some tips to help you get started:

1. Plan tasks with multiple entry points. Having multiple ways to solve a problem or having tasks that build on solving problems allows students to see connections in what they are learning and explore possibilities rather than just solve for right answers. 
2. Assign roles. Giving students roles helps them to engage and provides structures for the problem solving.
3. Start with the end in mind. Know what skills students will need in order to solve the problem in order to build those skills into the instruction and practice that you provide. 
4. Teach kids how to fail. Teaching kids to have a growth mindset helps them understand that problem solving isn't just about finding the right answers - it's about learning and growing. 
5. Use the real world. Multi-digit addition and subtraction is far more interesting to students when they have a real world problem to solve. Below, students are determining what they would eat if they had 800 calories and had to have a healthy diet. Multiple solutions, real world problem, and excitement about math!
   

Summer Learning Matters

I have been away from my blog for a couple of months - my oldest son just graduated from high school a few weeks ago and my parents celebrated their 50th anniversary, so I have been fully engaged in just getting through my regular commitments! I woke up this morning to thunder, lightning, and pouring rain, so it is time to get back in to my blogging routine!

This week, we started summer school. What do you think of when you hear the phrase "summer school?"

Well, urban dictionary defines summer school as "school that takes place in the summer - also known as hell." That is definitely not what we want kids or parents to think of when they are thinking about opportunities for learning! The research supports the need for engaging and authentic learning experiences, particularly for urban students, during the summer months to prevent summer slide.

Our vision for summer school was to make it fun for students and teachers - to completely undo that perception that summer school an awful, worksheet driven place where students and teachers are miserable. So, welcome to Summer Academy 2.0.

We envisioned a summer learning experience where students would be "hands-on, minds-on" and teachers would have the freedom to plan thematic instruction with the freedom to practice strategies and use materials that they wanted to use in order to build their own professional toolbox. We envisioned a summer learning experience that was more like the summer camp experiences that cost hundreds of dollars to send your children to - only we would do it at our school!

We have 10 themes and each theme carries throughout the day through ELA, Math, Writing, and Enrichment. In the "Down on the Farm" theme, students are reading decodable texts about farm animals, making omelettes in math using farm fresh eggs, and raising chicks.

One of our themes is called "Around the World" and students have passports that they stamp when they have mastered learning about a continent or a culture. Yesterday during math, the children had counted the number of states in the 50 states and they were discovering how many sets of 10 math cubes was equivalent to the number of states.

 In the "I, Robot" theme, students are learning to be engineers and began coding this week using Oz-bots.

Our "CSI: Classroom Science Investigators" theme is focusing on chemistry and chemical reactions. Students made pinch pots this week which they will be firing in a raku firing with a local artist.

Planning and implementing thematic, project-based learning takes time and a relentless commitment on the part of teachers. Seeing our students engaged, happy, and enthusiastic about their learning is worth it!