|
Mary
Pat O’Connell, Principal at Highlands School, 2320 Newport Street Mary
Pat O’Connell is principal at an elementary school in the K-8 San
Mateo School District, a district that is in its second year of implementation
of lesson study with 60 participating teachers K-8. She shared
some of the nuts and bolts of how we are making this practice work for
us, what we are finding is the result of this practice, and what we
have learned thus far about supporting teachers who are doing lesson
study. Makoto Yoshida, along with several other Japanese educators,
worked with teachers in San Mateo last August at a lesson study
summer institute, “ helping us to improve our efforts.” On the week of April 15-19, 2002, we will showcase
some of what we are doing, and Makoto Yoshida will speak at our conference.
The San Mateo teachers have also collaborating with Catherine Lewis
and her colleague, Rebecca Perry at Mills College since fall of 2000.
They are providing the expertise and resources to document the efforts
of San Mateo teachers to implement lesson study. Mary
Pat O’Connell recommended that teachers thinking about trying Lesson
Study should “Just Do IT!” She
observed that there are many reasons for deciding cannot do it, but
by just jumping in and trying it, San Mateo teachers discovered that
there are many benefits despite the problems. She said that one of the
beginning points for San Mateo teachers was a path wise analysis of
the student’s educational experience in the San Mateo K-8 district.
The teachers began by working in path groups----groups that shared
a set of students K-8. They also focused on a Mission Statement, what
are we trying to do with this set of students. The first year (2000-2001)
started with 26 math teachers in 7 groups from 8 schools (Noyce funding).
The teachers were paid $500 for attending a Summer Institute for 20
hours (July 30-August 10, 2001) with Catherine Lewis and 5 Japanese
teachers. The first focus was Demonstration Lessons from the Japanese
teachers who modeled the Lesson Study process. One of the interesting questions at the beginning
of the project was whether or not teachers would agree to be observed.
This turned out not to be a major problem. One solution was to
make certain that in each group there was a teacher-leader or curriculum
coordinator who had agreed to be observed. In
2001-2002, the second year of the project, the project grew to 60 teachers
at 9 sites, adding 30 language arts teachers. The Language Arts group in San Mateo may be
the only Northern California group that has undertaken Lesson Study. 85% of the teachers at Mary Pat O’Connell’s
school are participating. Celeste
Campbell highlighted these points from Mary Pat O’Connell’s presentation: · Importance to teachers of structured time to reflect together · Importance of examining curriculum content in relation to what has come before and what will come later · Value of protocol to focus debriefing discussion · Impact of “knowledgeable other” in deepening discussion and learning · Importance of accommodating various comfort levels of teachers
·
Delay decision about who will teach lesson until lesson design is complete At the April 18 session at Mary Pat O’Connell’s school, two very important points were made by the teachers who participated in the four day Lesson Study process. First, the teacher emphasized importance the three-column format in which one column was the teacher’s question or assignment and another column was the anticipated response of five selected students. This discussion of anticipated responses opened the Lesson up, making visible the thinking of the students and giving teachers an opportunity to share their insights into that thinking. Second, the Japanese teacher who taught the Lesson stressed the importance of the student logs at the end of the Lesson. At the end the students are asked to explain the work of the day and what they learned, what they did not learn well enough.
|
