Belonging Intersections: Thursday

As an instructional coach, I get to see a ton of instructional design decision-making every day! The variety in my context means fresh opportunities every day to see ways for education to create belonging for all learners! The specifics of the consulting and coaching requests are always different, but belonging always seems the answer!

This week: social studies coaching, science coaching, assessment literacy PD, coteaching coaching, and trauma-informed professional development.

One week, day-by-day:

Thursday: Coteaching coaching. I’m viewing video submissions of coteaching teams coplanning instruction. They have been tasked with coplanning small groups WITHOUT changing the seating chart.

The transformations we’ve been working on for several years with these teams is under pressure from the pandemic pedagogy we are encountering — I mean, you preach small groups of belonging, but how do we do small groups in this era of social distancing and contact-tracing?

Similarly though, it is also inviting new opportunities to see the nuances of belonging.

Zoom in the Room

Consider this “Zoom in the Room” experience. Coteachers use exit tickets to identify variety in the learners and enact two Zoom breakouts IN the physical classroom space. (Thus satisfying “no seat changes and limited-to-no movement” district mandates.)

The lesson goes famously according to the teachers. I plant seeds:

“Now that you’ll be hooked on this, the misconception grouping will be seamless!! And technology will minimize students recognizing these deficits in their peers. That said, keep considering also some strengths-based groups to utilize as well: i.e strategy employed, different visualizations of the math, varied relevant connections of the concepts, etc. In essence, continue to seek to know the variety in your learners that may not be “readiness” based. When we return once again (someday) to face-to-face, the grouping reasons become more known to kids (either overtly, or they “get the drift,” or on a subconscious level their brains pick-up on differences), so strengths-based disruptors are great for the habits as well!”

If our grouping strategies can arise beyond “get’s it, doesn’t get it” or “red, yellow, green,” we can elevate our belonging game!

Let’s face it, learners' brains know if they are in the “bluebirds” or “buzzards” groups despite our efforts to not make it known. We do it however by creating static groups, using stagnant data, or not even trying to cover it up (i.e “Mrs. C’s kids will go out with her.”)

Creating belonging groups is about strengths as much as it is about deficits. It is about more than readiness data but instead the neural variety in learners (think Universal Design for Learning). It is about we all have something to stretch to in our current learning. We bring different misconceptions to content and we bring different strategies.

For coteachers, small groups mean more engagement, more student voices (which means more data worth collecting, and easier to collect). Small groups create space for both teachers to feel a sense of belonging.

Familiar with the models of coteaching? Look at researchers’ recommended uses. Notice any connection to small groups?

Belonging doesn’t just happen. Belonging is crafted. Designed. Strategic.

Belonging opportunities are everywhere! It is our job to seek them and design them for instruction!

Check out Friday: Trauma-informed practices