The Gradeless Classroom: A Mentor Classroom Approach
My 2017 New Year's resolution was to learn a new skill. I take pride in calling myself a life-long learner, but it occurred to me that most of the ways I was still learning were based in reading, writing, and teaching: three things that come very easily and naturally to me, partly through aptitude, but mainly due to many years of practice. It took me a while to decide what I would do, but in February I settled on taking art classes. My son was already taking at our local arts center so it wouldn't be a major disruption in our schedule, and I love art even though I wouldn't call myself an artist. So on the first Tuesday of February 2017, I sat down in the classroom with my brand-new sketchbook and pencils, and set myself up to learn how to do something new.
I expected to learn a lot about technique and skill, but I was unprepared for how much I would learn about teaching from watching my art teacher, Miss Martha, in action. From day one, I began to realize how magical the workshop classroom could be, and how seamlessly the approach she was taking in teaching us art could be integrated into a successful language arts classroom. My classroom has changed in response to the learning I am doing outside of class. This is key in successful PD: your classroom changes in response to your learning.
What It Looks Like
There are 7 of us in class right now, but over the year the number has fluctuated up to 10 and down to 5. On any given day, we are all working in different mediums at different levels of advancement. Last Tuesday, our projects included pencil sketches, watercolor, inks, comics, and portraiture. 4 of us are under the age of 20, the rest of us are adults.
As students enter the classroom, materials come out and everyone gets started. Martha greets us all as we come in, but there are no instructions given; we know we come in and get to work. Usually everyone is at a different stage in the creative process, so there aren't really any "full class lessons." Full class addresses only happen when there are announcements to be made, or if there is an issue she is seeing in everyone's work simultaneously. She also occasionally calls the attention of the class to exemplary work, or asks them to give feedback on a struggle-level piece. Also drawn to our attention are opportunities to put our work into the community: local art shows and competitions.
As the class progresses, Martha is never still. She travels around the room, stopping and conferring with each artist. The teaching happens within these conferences, always couched in the language of the piece we are currently working on. Methods of shading, blending of colors, the difference between using the point of the pencil and the side to produce effects, how to create light by using negative space, how to ink a pencil drawing... this is a small portion of the list of things I've learned without ever having listened to an art lecture. Sometimes, when an artist is in the "zone," the conference may only be 30 seconds long. Some pieces require multiple conferences in the same period. When one of us gets "stuck" in a drawing, we are encouraged to talk to the other learners around us for help. If we can't find an idea, we are sent to the Internet (hello Pinterest!) or to the multitude of art books shelved around the classroom.
Our drawings are seldom original; most of them are patterned on or inspired by the work of other artists. Kwame Alexander has said of the writing process, "Immature writers imitate; mature writers steal." I would argue that we see the same thing in the art classroom. In my own work, I have become increasingly willing to strike out on my own from the original. The more confidence I gain in my own creative process, the more I allow other artists to inspire me instead of constraining myself to make a perfect copy of their work.
And here's the most important part: at no point is my piece "graded," not even when it's done. If my drawing is flawed, we have a conference and talk about how to fix it. If I'm not happy with how it's turning out, I am free to ask for help (from the teacher or my classmates) and experiment with making it better until I am satisfied. If a piece is not working, there's no judgment in throwing it out and starting something new, or putting one piece aside for a while and coming back to it later. I know that it's done when she tells me where I should put my signature, and I know that all of the messy drafting, erasures, and slip-ups don't matter a bit to how my piece turns out in the end.
Ten Applications in My Gradeless Classroom:
1. It's unreasonable to expect everyone to be in the same place, at the same time, working on the same thing. Sadly, I can't do anything about the fact that the school system itself is set up this way, but I can make sure that this is not the expectation in my classroom. If I am truly meeting students where they are, their individual progress must depend on them, not my calendar.
2. All students don't work in the same medium. I have an affinity for pencil sketches. I love to work with very minute, detailed work. This is not for everyone, and that is okay. I like to experiment with other types of drawings, but this is where I come back to, and I get to make that choice for myself. We must make student choice and preference a defining feature in our classrooms. Different genres, different modes of communication, different ways of proving mastery...these should all be welcome in the gradeless classroom. Student voices should drive the work.
3. Use full class lessons sparingly. I find that because full-class announcements are infrequent in my art classes, I pay closer attention when they do happen. I know that if it is being brought up to everyone instead of a small group or to individuals, it is something that is important. Full class lessons should be focused on positive growth-- opportunities to learn something new, praise exemplary work, or offer options for publication-- but conversations about corrections are better held face-to-face and one-on-one.
4. Routines matter. I don't have to rely on the teacher to get me started because I always have something in process. The learning never ceases. I know that when I reach a stopping point on one piece, I move on to another one. The responsibility for deciding what I will work toward and how I will access the "curriculum" is mostly left up to me, the learner. In our classrooms, we must have established routines that keep the students in our classes moving constantly forward. There should never be an "I'm done--what do I do now?" question.
5. Let's play "Where's the Teacher"? Getting rid of my teacher desk was one of the best decisions I've made. Not the easiest, but the best. Since I don't have a "home base" anymore, I am much more likely to spend any "downtime" sitting by students wherever I can find a spot. This makes me much more accessible for questions, on-the-spot conferences, even just getting to know them a little better. It also cuts down on off-task behavior since they never know where I might pop up! Martha never sits down during our classes, unless it is to sit down next to a student and offer help. It is my goal to do the same thing in my classroom this year.
6. Respect the zone. As teachers, it's in our nature to want to check in with our students. We spend all year teaching them to be independent learners, but it can be frustrating when they don't seem to need us anymore. I've noticed that on days that I am in the zone and working without frustration, Martha usually lets me be. If she checks in with me at all, it's a very short interruption. We have to learn to see the signs when students are in the flow, respect their zone, and leave them alone.
7. We don't have to "fix" every problem. If I am having trouble with something in art class, the teacher is only one of many possible solutions. I am trained to look to my classmates, the Internet, books, and my own eye as resources for fixing problems too. It didn't happen by accident, but by (again) establishing expected procedures. One of the most important lessons I've learned in art is to trust my own eye. Sometimes all I need is to get up, move, and look at my work from a different perspective to see where the problem is. We have to establish the freedom for students to do this in our classes as well.
8. Look to masters to get started. In any subject area there are mentors. These are the experts, the craftsmen, the masters who have gone before us and show us how to be successful. If I want to know how to draw a portrait, I need to study a lot of portraits. When I decided I wanted to eventually draw a pencil sketch from a photograph of my grandfather and me holding hands, I knew I first needed to learn to draw hands, so I started seeking out and trying to emulate sketches of hands. (I consequently decided that drawing humans is not for me.) Our students need to be surrounded by mentors in our classrooms, not just the teacher, but books that are available for our content areas, online resources, even connections through social media to those who are already successful in the field.
9. The process is important. We dwell in an outcomes-based world. In many classrooms, the product is everything, the process is only important in that it leads to the product. High stakes assessments, exams, progress reports lined with dozens of assignments marked with a grade...all of these are elements that remove the focus from our students learning how to do something. I worked on my first piece for a month. I thought I would be drawing one piece every week, because that's what my son does. It turns out he is much faster and less methodical than I am. At no point during that month did I feel that my learning was any less valuable than his, just because it was taking me a longer time to get done. I was still learning.
10. Grades. Don't. Matter. Nobody in my class has ever received an "A" for achieving a great piece. Many of us have won awards in the community. We have all heard praise from Martha, from our classmates, from other visitors that stop by and check out our work. But nobody is giving us a rubric. Nobody is failing because they are taking a long time. Learning is happening, and it is happening with great joy and pleasure in the creative process. I firmly believe that the joy stems from the fact that there are no stakes attached to this learning. I realize that we are all choosing to be in the art class, that no one is forcing us to be there, but even in a public school classroom, where students are compelled by law to attend, there can be joy. There can be fun, and pleasure, and joy in learning, if we look to the models set forward for us by mentor classrooms.
I'd challenge you to find your own mentor classroom. Get outside your comfort zone and learn something new. Find the time to get into another teacher's space and see what you can learn from watching. After all, these ten truths are applicable in just about every field. Who will your mentor be?
This is the 5th post in my "Gradeless Classroom" series. If you are interested in reading more, all posts are tagged with "The Gradeless Classroom." I'd love to connect with you! Follow me on Twitter (@Mrs_J_of_EAMS) or Facebook (Cristi Lackey Julsrud). Thanks for reading!
I expected to learn a lot about technique and skill, but I was unprepared for how much I would learn about teaching from watching my art teacher, Miss Martha, in action. From day one, I began to realize how magical the workshop classroom could be, and how seamlessly the approach she was taking in teaching us art could be integrated into a successful language arts classroom. My classroom has changed in response to the learning I am doing outside of class. This is key in successful PD: your classroom changes in response to your learning.
What It Looks Like
There are 7 of us in class right now, but over the year the number has fluctuated up to 10 and down to 5. On any given day, we are all working in different mediums at different levels of advancement. Last Tuesday, our projects included pencil sketches, watercolor, inks, comics, and portraiture. 4 of us are under the age of 20, the rest of us are adults.
As students enter the classroom, materials come out and everyone gets started. Martha greets us all as we come in, but there are no instructions given; we know we come in and get to work. Usually everyone is at a different stage in the creative process, so there aren't really any "full class lessons." Full class addresses only happen when there are announcements to be made, or if there is an issue she is seeing in everyone's work simultaneously. She also occasionally calls the attention of the class to exemplary work, or asks them to give feedback on a struggle-level piece. Also drawn to our attention are opportunities to put our work into the community: local art shows and competitions.
As the class progresses, Martha is never still. She travels around the room, stopping and conferring with each artist. The teaching happens within these conferences, always couched in the language of the piece we are currently working on. Methods of shading, blending of colors, the difference between using the point of the pencil and the side to produce effects, how to create light by using negative space, how to ink a pencil drawing... this is a small portion of the list of things I've learned without ever having listened to an art lecture. Sometimes, when an artist is in the "zone," the conference may only be 30 seconds long. Some pieces require multiple conferences in the same period. When one of us gets "stuck" in a drawing, we are encouraged to talk to the other learners around us for help. If we can't find an idea, we are sent to the Internet (hello Pinterest!) or to the multitude of art books shelved around the classroom.
Our drawings are seldom original; most of them are patterned on or inspired by the work of other artists. Kwame Alexander has said of the writing process, "Immature writers imitate; mature writers steal." I would argue that we see the same thing in the art classroom. In my own work, I have become increasingly willing to strike out on my own from the original. The more confidence I gain in my own creative process, the more I allow other artists to inspire me instead of constraining myself to make a perfect copy of their work.
And here's the most important part: at no point is my piece "graded," not even when it's done. If my drawing is flawed, we have a conference and talk about how to fix it. If I'm not happy with how it's turning out, I am free to ask for help (from the teacher or my classmates) and experiment with making it better until I am satisfied. If a piece is not working, there's no judgment in throwing it out and starting something new, or putting one piece aside for a while and coming back to it later. I know that it's done when she tells me where I should put my signature, and I know that all of the messy drafting, erasures, and slip-ups don't matter a bit to how my piece turns out in the end.
Ten Applications in My Gradeless Classroom:
1. It's unreasonable to expect everyone to be in the same place, at the same time, working on the same thing. Sadly, I can't do anything about the fact that the school system itself is set up this way, but I can make sure that this is not the expectation in my classroom. If I am truly meeting students where they are, their individual progress must depend on them, not my calendar.
2. All students don't work in the same medium. I have an affinity for pencil sketches. I love to work with very minute, detailed work. This is not for everyone, and that is okay. I like to experiment with other types of drawings, but this is where I come back to, and I get to make that choice for myself. We must make student choice and preference a defining feature in our classrooms. Different genres, different modes of communication, different ways of proving mastery...these should all be welcome in the gradeless classroom. Student voices should drive the work.
3. Use full class lessons sparingly. I find that because full-class announcements are infrequent in my art classes, I pay closer attention when they do happen. I know that if it is being brought up to everyone instead of a small group or to individuals, it is something that is important. Full class lessons should be focused on positive growth-- opportunities to learn something new, praise exemplary work, or offer options for publication-- but conversations about corrections are better held face-to-face and one-on-one.
4. Routines matter. I don't have to rely on the teacher to get me started because I always have something in process. The learning never ceases. I know that when I reach a stopping point on one piece, I move on to another one. The responsibility for deciding what I will work toward and how I will access the "curriculum" is mostly left up to me, the learner. In our classrooms, we must have established routines that keep the students in our classes moving constantly forward. There should never be an "I'm done--what do I do now?" question.
5. Let's play "Where's the Teacher"? Getting rid of my teacher desk was one of the best decisions I've made. Not the easiest, but the best. Since I don't have a "home base" anymore, I am much more likely to spend any "downtime" sitting by students wherever I can find a spot. This makes me much more accessible for questions, on-the-spot conferences, even just getting to know them a little better. It also cuts down on off-task behavior since they never know where I might pop up! Martha never sits down during our classes, unless it is to sit down next to a student and offer help. It is my goal to do the same thing in my classroom this year.
6. Respect the zone. As teachers, it's in our nature to want to check in with our students. We spend all year teaching them to be independent learners, but it can be frustrating when they don't seem to need us anymore. I've noticed that on days that I am in the zone and working without frustration, Martha usually lets me be. If she checks in with me at all, it's a very short interruption. We have to learn to see the signs when students are in the flow, respect their zone, and leave them alone.
7. We don't have to "fix" every problem. If I am having trouble with something in art class, the teacher is only one of many possible solutions. I am trained to look to my classmates, the Internet, books, and my own eye as resources for fixing problems too. It didn't happen by accident, but by (again) establishing expected procedures. One of the most important lessons I've learned in art is to trust my own eye. Sometimes all I need is to get up, move, and look at my work from a different perspective to see where the problem is. We have to establish the freedom for students to do this in our classes as well.
8. Look to masters to get started. In any subject area there are mentors. These are the experts, the craftsmen, the masters who have gone before us and show us how to be successful. If I want to know how to draw a portrait, I need to study a lot of portraits. When I decided I wanted to eventually draw a pencil sketch from a photograph of my grandfather and me holding hands, I knew I first needed to learn to draw hands, so I started seeking out and trying to emulate sketches of hands. (I consequently decided that drawing humans is not for me.) Our students need to be surrounded by mentors in our classrooms, not just the teacher, but books that are available for our content areas, online resources, even connections through social media to those who are already successful in the field.
 |
| Hand study... It's so hard to draw humans! |
9. The process is important. We dwell in an outcomes-based world. In many classrooms, the product is everything, the process is only important in that it leads to the product. High stakes assessments, exams, progress reports lined with dozens of assignments marked with a grade...all of these are elements that remove the focus from our students learning how to do something. I worked on my first piece for a month. I thought I would be drawing one piece every week, because that's what my son does. It turns out he is much faster and less methodical than I am. At no point during that month did I feel that my learning was any less valuable than his, just because it was taking me a longer time to get done. I was still learning.
 |
| My first drawing |
10. Grades. Don't. Matter. Nobody in my class has ever received an "A" for achieving a great piece. Many of us have won awards in the community. We have all heard praise from Martha, from our classmates, from other visitors that stop by and check out our work. But nobody is giving us a rubric. Nobody is failing because they are taking a long time. Learning is happening, and it is happening with great joy and pleasure in the creative process. I firmly believe that the joy stems from the fact that there are no stakes attached to this learning. I realize that we are all choosing to be in the art class, that no one is forcing us to be there, but even in a public school classroom, where students are compelled by law to attend, there can be joy. There can be fun, and pleasure, and joy in learning, if we look to the models set forward for us by mentor classrooms.
I'd challenge you to find your own mentor classroom. Get outside your comfort zone and learn something new. Find the time to get into another teacher's space and see what you can learn from watching. After all, these ten truths are applicable in just about every field. Who will your mentor be?
This is the 5th post in my "Gradeless Classroom" series. If you are interested in reading more, all posts are tagged with "The Gradeless Classroom." I'd love to connect with you! Follow me on Twitter (@Mrs_J_of_EAMS) or Facebook (Cristi Lackey Julsrud). Thanks for reading!
So much truth here! Thank you.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed your post today. Yours became the inspiration for mine! In case you are curious ... http://mbsteven.edublogs.org/ Thank you!
ReplyDeleteNew this year - we are using a mentor approach in our Career Technical Education program and the students are choosing which standards they will master throughout the year. So far, for students who have only learned in a transitional classroom it's a struggle. They're not used to such flexibility. However, many are enjoying the approach as they feel empowered in their learning.
ReplyDeleteTraditional, not transitional :)
Delete