The Schoenblog

It’s been a while. In fact, this is the longest I’ve gone without publishing a blog post in about two and a half years. In the past few weeks, life got busier and I needed to press pause. Every week, my regularly scheduled blog alarm would buzz, but I couldn’t find the time to put my ideas down on paper--that’s something I want to work on in the school year ahead.

Right now, my time has been dedicated to a new challenge at a new job. I’ve also been hard at work on a revamped blog with a new title and more focused content. Then there’s the countless hours of doctoral work this summer and my almost ready draft of chapter two of my dissertation.

All of that is great; I’m working hard, and I’m happy. As my professional worlds continue to grow and evolve, I needed to press pause to regroup, reclaim some balance, and make sure to enjoy my life in and out of schools. All educators know that we need to give so much to our students and schools to do our jobs well; sometimes we need a refresher so we’re not running on empty.

And now, with the relative comforts of a teacher’s summer over, I’m eager for my new challenges as a leader, leader, and writer.

This will likely be the last post for the next few weeks as I continue to make serving my new school my focus and learn to better balance these complex worlds. But look forward to a brand new blog coming soon--September 30 is my personal deadline. I’m looking forward to a new site, improved look, and more focused content (read more about it below!). I hope you will join me on the journey.

From Teacher to Leader

Assistant Principal Schoenbart. I like the sound of that. I couldn’t be more excited to have joined the Darien Public Schools as one of the Assistant Principals at Darien High School.

I loved my time as a classroom teacher and a coach--and already miss my Ossining colleagues and students--but it was time for a change and the next challenge. In my years in the classroom, I experienced tremendous growth as a teacher, thinker, leader, and person, and I couldn’t be more proud of that time. And I'm even more proud of the work with students and colleagues that I know will continue.

And now, I’m ready for the future. In just over a week in my new position, I’ve jumped right in the deep end, every day learning and taking on new challenges. I will be responsible for a third of the students as “their AP,” supervise teachers, and help manage the building needs. I’m also thrilled to have a large role in technology and innovation as we roll out the start of a 1:1 iPad program.

Wherever this year and new role takes me, Assistant Principal Schoenbart is ready to lead, learn, and serve.

Looking forward to a great year ahead at Darien! Excited to lead, learn, and serve.https://t.co/727aHiGt1h pic.twitter.com/o4bOFdQc1c

— Adam Schoenbart (@MrSchoenbart) August 17, 2017

From SchoenBlog to #SchoenTell

The title for this blog came from an obvious play on my name, but in creating it, I ignored the obvious choice: #SchoenTell. My students created the #SchoenTell hashtag for our English classes, and for two years I used it throughout my work with students. I liked the separation--that hashtag belonged to the work in my classroom.

But now, with a change in my role, comes a change in purpose. I’ve been working hard on an upgrade to this blog, including a new site on a self-hosted WordPress, a more responsive layout, and updated content, when the realization hit me. Why not bring the #SchoenTell title with me?

My work will always involve students, but I like the idea of retiring #SchoenTell from the classroom and bringing it more prominently into my professional world. It’s just too good not to. I also love the history of it: search it and you find the evolution of my growth as an educator, too.

In the upcoming revamp, The SchoenBlog will become #SchoenTell. The web address will stay the same (in fact, both aschoenbart.com and adamschoenbart.com will take you here). The content might not focus on my own teaching as much, but will still be all about the worlds of technology, education, and leadership.

Coming Soon: Doctor Schoenbart?

Besides the job hunt, I focused a lot of time on my doctoral work this summer, reading thousands of pages of research and dissertations, refocusing my questions and investigation, and writing quite a bit. In the end, I worked out a revised prospectus, a start of chapter one, and an almost readable draft of chapter two.

I had hoped to submit a literature draft by now, but it’s just not there. What I have happily accomplished is that I’ve refined my thinking, selected a concrete and interesting topic, and reframed my entire proposal. I’ve also taken some hundreds of pages of notes from thousands of pages of reading and synthesized them into an almost written thirty-something page literature review. Coming soon.

My work is focused on the changing role of the school principal as a technology leader. Specifically, I’m investigating the relationship between principal self-efficacy and technology leadership. Do principals who are technology leaders have a stronger belief in their ability to perform their job of principals better? How do principals perceive their roles as technology leaders? Do school leaders need to be technology leaders in today's schools?

It’s shocking how little actual research exists about technology leadership; everyone just agrees that we need more of it. I also love the connection between technology leadership, leadership, and self-perceptions. How do we perceive the impact of technology leadership? Also, what does technology leadership even mean? You might be surprised at how many are unsure, and how many more are measuring it through outdated measurements of the dial-up age.

We can do better, and I plan to continue to research, read, and write, both here and in my doctoral work.

Exit Slip

While I write for many reasons, I always come back to reflection. I write to think, reflect, and to grow. Sharing my successes, challenges, and questions with an authentic audience helps me to evolve as an educator and reflective practitioner, and it also keeps me honest. I’m writing this for me, but also for you.

Learn with me. Ask questions. Pose problems. And every once in awhile, ask how the new job is going. Or even better, ask to see my chapter two draft.

Thank you for reading, and I’ll see you on #SchoenTell in the next few weeks.

Share your new start for this school year. How did you grow or change this summer? What are you excited about in the year ahead? Please share your thoughts in the comments or on Twitter @MrSchoenbart.

Where are you right now? Whether it’s #ISTE17, #ModelSchools, hard at work in an office, or sitting on your couch enjoying summer, how, when, and where you learn has changed. I’m become more and more fascinated at how your location has less power on your learning.

Once again, I’m #NotatISTE. Once again, sitting home, with major FOMO (fear of missing out), watching the learning, connecting, and fun pass me by. Full disclosure: I’ve never been to #ISTE. I’ve been fortunate to learn and present at so many conferences in my region, but rarely branched out beyond that. It’s something I’m eager to change, but until then, I’m stuck following along on Twitter.

And what I’m seeing makes me excited not just for teachers, but for students. Maybe I’m blinded by the hype--I don’t even know if my ideas about these conferences are accurate--but there looks to be a positivity and excitement that’s powerful. What if our schools were as exciting as #ISTE? What if our students learned in schools like I do even when #notatISTE?



From the other side of the country, as I watch #ISTE’s Ignites on Periscope, read announcements on Twitter, and see pictures of poster sessions, friends, and events all across social media, here is what I see:

• A world where educators are excited about learning together.
• A conference where the learning is passion-based and fun. Participants have to think critically and make good choices about what to learn, when, and with whom.
• A place for learning presenters can choose how to show what they know through keynotes, ignites, presentations, conversations, poster sessions, and more.
• A week where connecting with other learners is half the fun, filled with #CoffeeEDUs and meetup events, connecting like-minded educators.
• And most importantly, everyone is sharing it all.

I’m not even following any #ISTE-related hashtags. I’m just opening up Facebook, Twitter, or education news, and it’s there. The education community is documenting every step of the learning, connecting, and fun. And it’s shared for everyone, so that anyone, anywhere can follow along, too.

For me, this means that I can learn asynchronously and grow. I can reply to Tweets and comment on posts so that I can connect with the real-time learners, too. I can read press releases, sure, but more importantly, I can talk with the people that are there--both face-to-face friends and members of a growing PLN.

Whether what I see about #ISTE is right or wrong almost doesn’t matter, especially from a far. What matters most is the take away from these ideas: we can learn anywhere and anyhow--and so can our students. While I sit at home on my couch, I realize that my fear of missing out has likely skyrocketed with the growth of social media. But I also realize that maybe I’m not missing out after all. The personal connections and face-to-face learning can’t be replaced--and for that, I’m jealous for sure, but what about the learning?

I can’t help but wonder if conferences like #ISTE and the conference-culture of education aren’t just about the adult learners, but are more telling towards the future of our students and schools. For all of our talk about 21st Century Learning, maybe these events are already showing us the way? And they should be. Maybe we’re a lot closer to that world that we think.

What are your takeaways from #ISTE and education conference culture? How can it teach us about our students, schools, and learning? And does social media help or hurt our FOMO and learning? Please share your thoughts in the comments or on Twitter @MrSchoenbart.

This year, my English 10 students and I took a new approach to #GeniusHour. We focused our student through the lens of the English classroom with #GenreGenius, a deep dive into literary study. Students chose genres to investigate, learned about tropes and origins, read a lot, and did something. Learn more about our work at geniushour.aschoenbart.com or past #Schoenblog posts here.

I love that we’ve focused the open exploration and passion-based learning of #GeniusHour through our class content; it’s made our study more unique to English and a little more special. Since students are already investigating their own interests by conducting formal research in our school’s Capstone program, it was a welcome shift. We can apply the same skills and fundamental philosophy of learning in a new way.

Still, there’s a lot I missed about our traditional #GeniusHour. Mistakes were made.

Let me be clear: these are mistakes in instructional design, the kind that we all probably make when trying something new for the first time. My complaints aren’t with my wonderful students, but with myself. They come from the privilege of 20/20 hindsight. Now that we’re at the end of the project, it’s easy to look back and reflect.

My students read a lot. They read things they might never have outside of our class. They enjoyed it--I think--and they did great things with their learning. I don’t regret any of that. But here are four important aspects of #GeniusHour where I made mistakes or where I felt like we missed out on opportunities. These are things I want to do better to help my students continue to do better, too.

Maggie created a live map of mythological stories around the world for #GeniusHour w the Ford Elements System of Fantasy #OssiningPride pic.twitter.com/UJ7GXAnMv6

— Adam Schoenbart (@MrSchoenbart) May 22, 2017

1. Action Research

In #GeniusHour, my students learned to conduct their own action research as a part of their work. Almost every student did so successfully with interesting surveys, interviews, and artifact studies. I even wrote about the value of teaching students to conduct action research in Teaching Students to Conduct Action Research. But I didn’t focus on it in #GenreGenius because it didn’t feel as authentic to literary analysis and genre study.

But in retrospect, I was wrong. One student chose to survey classmates about how science fiction impacted the way they think about the world, and it was an awesome compliment to her own reading and analysis. I didn’t know much I missed this component of #GeniusHour projects past until I saw it again this year.

2. Literary Criticism

With high school sophomores, I wanted my students to have complete control over their reading and story consumption. As long as they found a range of long, short, media, and informational texts, the choice was up to them. I didn’t focus on the quality of the texts as much as maybe I should have. We didn’t use research databases specifically because it was a skill they had already mastered. Instead, I focused on passion and freedom.

But I think I missed an opportunity to teach my students to become critics. I wish we had taken the time to read some genre criticism so that students could develop an informed stance on the genre. They all leaned about genre history, influences, tropes, and seminal works, but I wish there was a more argumentative and critical lens to it all.

3. Synthesis

The need for more synthesis is a longstanding area for improvement in #GeniusHour for my work. I explored it most recently in 5 Ways I Want to Improve #GeniusHour. Last year, some of my students’ projects felt too disjointed and lacked a synthesis of ideas and research. This year, though, the research was more foundational. It was the reading that inspired the creation, for the most part. To that end, most projects didn’t have actual citations because they helped develop thinking, not provide quotes or ideas.

Students made those references in synthesis blog posts, exploring the genre’s impact by discussing all of the works they read or watched. I wish we did more here, too, and really dove into synthesis writing. It was a great opportunity to further develop an important skill by bringing together all of the reading and sources to create new meaning. We do this with the NYS Regents argument essay and other work throughout the year, and it was an obvious missed point here.

4. Authentic Audiences

Despite last year’s successes with Twitter, I didn’t pursue it as much with my students this year. My freshmen needed more scaffolding and my sophomores seemed disinterested; I don’t like these excuses but they led to a more passive push of social media in my classroom this year. That’s a topic that definitely deserves another blog post.

Still, we commented on each other’s blogs and shared them with the world. I Tweeted students work and we we got some comments and feedback. But without making authentic audiences and social media an important part of our learning throughout the year, the audience for blogging and projects didn’t have the same payoff. My students’ work was great, overall, but many had trouble making the authentic audience connection. I miss the way that social media helped my students grow and connect last year, and regret not revisiting it more this year.

Failing Forward

I framed this articles as mistakes, but really they are learning opportunities. I chose not to address these four ideas as much this year because my students were getting those skills in other ways. In fact, I’m working with a team to implement many of these skills in the school’s Capstone program to great success. So maybe my mistakes or missed opportunities are really my own nostalgia. Maybe I’m just missing these elements from my classroom--it’s bittersweet when I don’t need to teach a skill because my students are coming in with stronger skills and knowledge every year.

And those are all good things. Things that I’m proud of. While I’m reflective and a little critical, I can’t help but look at the outcomes of #GenreGenius and see passion, engagement, and innovation. My students have studied a dozen different genres and produced videos, plays, satires, interactive maps, and so much more.

And those are just the things I’ll be sharing in coming weeks. We will explore some of the #GenreGenius projects, student reflections, and goals for next year. Stay tuned.

How has the end of the year helped you reflect? What missed opportunities can you learn from for next time? Please share your thoughts in the comments or on Twitter @MrSchoenbart.

Failure is a natural part of the learning process. We don’t always know the answers and have to struggle productively through failure to achieve real learning and growth. But our schools aren’t made for failure. How do we balance the world of grading and standards with a culture of risk taking, innovation, and intellectual failure? As a teacher, it’s a challenge to deal with any failure, and even more so to determine the reasons behind it. Failure as the first attempt in learning is a great thing, but how can we be sure about the difference between that failure and failure from effort, care, or completion. And how should we respond differently? Or should we?

These are some of the questions and issues I’ve grappled over the past few years as my policies and philosophy on student failure and revision has evolved. In short, I’ve tried to emphasize the learning process over the product by focusing on peer and self editing, reflection, and growth. Students can revise any and all work, earn the highest grade possible, and demonstrate their best learning--but only after coming to extra help.

Overall, this policy has led to more and more students coming to extra help and showing real growth in what they know and what they can do. But if a student doesn’t turn in work, doesn’t come to extra help, or doesn’t meet the basic requirements, they do not earn credit. Overall, I like this policy and have found it effective. Students are doing more, have more ownership over their learning, and are more accountable, too. But what happens to those students who don’t turn in, show their learning, or have that growth?

#LHRICTLI Responds to Failure

Last week, I had the pleasure of attending my local technology conference, LHRIC’s Tech Expo. The event featured around thirty presentations from local educators sharing their best practices and challenges. The keynotes for they day were Kevin Brookhouser and James Sanders, and I was so excited to learn from them. Throughout their keynotes and the day’s sessions the topic of failure came up again and again. I’ll share some keynote highlights through participants’ Tweets below.

The life of a project - you may hate the result, but failure to deliver is not an option #LHRICTLI @LHRICit pic.twitter.com/kMpC9Mbt1w

— Teacher Center (@hrtcsm) April 7, 2017

Kevin spoke about failure in #20time projects, discussing our need to create and iterate. Failure is a natural part of the learning process. James spoke about his own failures in the classroom, all of which he learned and grew from. Without embracing failure, #BreakoutEDU would not exist.

These conversations led me back to my questions above: how can we embrace failure in our classrooms? And not just in the big philosophical idea, but in our day-to-day practice as classroom teachers?

Great stuff at #lhrictli today. #breakoutedu #20time @brookhouser @jamestsanders pic.twitter.com/z9oVtDsZZe

— Marko Markolovic (@MarkoMarkolovic) April 7, 2017

Failure is an Option

“Failure is an option. Failure to turn in is not.” Kevin Brookhouser shared this idea in his keynote, which was complemented by James Sander sharing, “Done is better than perfect.”

These ideas are so antithetical to our traditional education system; I’ve heard them a million times but still need to write this post to process them. I’m all for embracing failure and helping student improve and grow through the learning that’s “done” but how do we overcome the challenge of failure to turn in? How do we create a culture of learning where students aren’t missing assignments, or where teachers aren’t okay with the idea of failure to turn in? And how do we hold everyone accountable to that new world?

Great #lhrictli takeaways @brookhouser "Failure is an option;failure to deliver is not" & @jamestsanders "Never stop chasing unicorns" pic.twitter.com/iqenfha0v7

— Mounties ESL (@Mounties_ESL) April 8, 2017

Right now, I have 40 Of Mice and Men essays to read and respond to on Google Classroom. I know that there are 2-3 that aren’t ready yet: they don’t follow directions, have major issues with writing, or have some problematic ideas. But they’re done. They’re turned in. A week ago, I might not have responded to these until the students came to extra help. And if they don’t come to extra help, the essay might hang in a grading limbo.

I believe in these ideas but am stuck on how to move forward with them in the schools that exist today. If nothing else, Kevin and James motivated me to rethink that response and to celebrate the work that’s turned in, but is that enough? I’m not looking for perfect--but still struggle with the massive leaps between turned in, done, and successful work.

In the end, though, it’s conversations like these that lead to purposeful growth and evolution in our practices, teaching, and learning. I appreciate these ideas for my students and wonder if in five years, I’ll look back on this as my own failure in learning and growth. Until then, help me to help my students by commenting or responding on Twitter with your ideas on failure.

How should teachers respond to failure? How should we respond differently to failure from failure to turn in? And how can we overcome the failure to turn in so that we can truly embrace meaningful failure? Please share your thoughts in the comments or on Twitter @MrSchoenbart.

Five minutes. Twenty slides. Fifteen seconds. The Ignite format (learn more at http://www.ignitetalks.io) is rigid in its structure but has so much potential in our schools. In your average presentation, the presenter controls the pace, whether it’s students in our classrooms or facilitators for professional learning. But with an Ignite, the pace is predetermined; instead, the presenter focuses on the story.

Deweaponize grading in the classroom @MrSchoenbart #igniteyourteaching @LHRICit @pnwboces pic.twitter.com/vQ2NZlpDjh

— Teacher Center (@hrtcsm) March 16, 2017

I’ve had the privilege of giving two Ignite talks over the past year. Last month, I participated in a series of Ignites at my local PNW BOCES, discussing deweaponizing grades and improving student reflection in our classrooms. Find my talk below, and the slides at the bottom of this post. A few months earlier, I had the pleasure of giving a talk at Google for New Visions Cloud Lab--I wrote all about it in Never Grade Again! My New Visions Ignite Talk.

Schools are complicated systems. With so many moving parts, there’s bound to be some conflict. But hopefully, all of the parts of moving in the same direction. Ideally, all of our inputs are moving efficiently.

When we discuss efficiency, we’re really looking at the ratio of inputs to outputs: is the work paying off? What is the return on investment for the hard work we do in the complicated world of schools?

More and more, I’m finding that my perspective is changing with the many hats I’m wearing: teacher, instructional coach, tech coach, administrative intern, doctoral student, and more. I'm in the classroom every day but can't help but look towards the big picture, too.

Learning is uncomfortable. When you’re the teacher, that’s sometimes too easy to forget. We design lessons that we think are meaningful and engaging, we work hard to reach out students, and we spend so much time planning and thinking about our classrooms and schools. But we also have to realize that in each any every decision we make, we are asking our students to take risks, to explore the unknown, and to be uncomfortable.

We need to get more comfortable with being uncomfortable--all of us: administrators, teachers, and students. The world and education are changing in ways that force us to recognize and embrace the discomfort, too; for example, there’s simply too much knowledge and too much access for anyone to know everything. That’s a realization that’s powerful and necessary--we can’t assume, or pretend, to know it all. Like our students, we have to be vulnerable and accept discomfort.

Image from http://twobookaddicts.blogspot.com

In addition to good lessons we have to build empathy machines, and systems that empower students to take risks and to be okay with failure as a necessary step on the learning journey. We need to work together to help our students, and each other, do more.

These are some of the big ideas that I took away from #EdcampSummitPNJ. I spent the weekend connecting and learning with so many wonderful educators. A lot of the conversations focused on the impact and variety of Edcamps, like for school districts and for students. Many also explored how schools and learning are changing. A common thread throughout was the need for empathy throughout our schools.

And in the best way, I was uncomfortable in my learning, too.

Always great to learn with the #EdJusticeLeague - @MrSchoenbart @AJBianco #edcampsummitpnj #njed#Arrow #Batman #Superman pic.twitter.com/Y7oQ2FMQwe

— Christopher J. Nesi (@mrnesi) March 13, 2017

#EdCamp journey #EdCampSummitPNJ #whyiedcamp #becauseofEdCamp @EdcampUSA @edcampurban @hadleyjf @TheConnectedEdu @wkrakower @MrSchoenbart pic.twitter.com/7eIxKbhY3r

— bibiana prada (@bookgirl614) March 12, 2017

Over the past few months, my paper-limited classroom has been changing. For a while, I resisted the copy machine and only used paper when it was more effective than technology. And that definitely happened sometimes.

I’m lucky to work with a close friend in my English 9 classes, and in our collaboration my vision for technology’s use is sometimes challenged--as it should be. I have to justify my instructional choices more often, and really think about how any why we’re using technology, paper, or any other resource. That colleague (Hi, Katie!) pointed out that in our collaboration, I’ve been using a lot more paper and copies in my classroom; we’ve probably made more copies this month than I have in the past year.

And that’s okay. Paper on it’s own isn’t inherently good or bad. It’s just a tool to communicate and demonstrate learning. Paper’s easy, quick, and plentiful, but it’s also an old medium that can’t always solve new problems in the way that technology might be able to.

In the past, and in other classes, all of our class resources are online, some are printed, and students often have the option of taking notes by hand or online. All assignments are submitted electronically on Google Classroom. This year, we are still using the technology all the time, submitting work, collaborating, and creating, but a lot of the more traditional instruction is moving away from the screen and towards paper.

Reflecting on these choices has led me to wonder why paper has been more effective that technology with my freshmen this year, and to reexamine Paper in the Digital Age: Considering the Pros, Problems, and Power of Paper to explore new reasons when and why the pen and paper make all the difference.

3 Reasons I’m Using Paper in My Classroom This Year

1. Technology Distracts My Freshmen!

I like to describe my freshmen as adorable puppies--they are fun, sweet, and loyal. But they also have awful attention spans. They’re distracted by the drop of a pin or a sneeze, let alone a bright screen and the power of the internet. This year, my freshmen are more and more distracted by the power of technology that it often takes away from the learning experience.

2. Technology Takes Too Much Time

We’re a 1:1 Chromebook classroom but not a 1:1 school; this means that our Chromebooks live in a cart and need to be taken in and out each day. With a well organized class, this just takes a few minutes. Every minute away from instruction matters, but the Chromebook movement can be quick. This year, it’s just not. We’re slow. Again, we’re distracted. And time packing up and plugging in Chromebooks is time away from instruction and learning.

3. Paper Demonstrates More Learning

In English 9, the students are learning the foundations of literary analysis and writing. This involves a lot of scaffolding and outlining as we build to more formal and summative writing. My students are fine writers when it comes time to putting their words together, but the brainstorming, outlining, and drafting process is more productive for most of my students on paper. Maybe it’s indicative of the distraction and time, or maybe it’s an actual processing difference with technology; maybe it’s something else entirely. The bottom line is that the process work is better on paper.

Paperless Power

I’ll never stop a student from taking notes or working on process work by hand. But digital tools help us do more than paper ever could. They provide a permanence to our work and lets learning exist everywhere at once through sharing and collaboration. But it’s important to teach students how to demonstrate their learning in new ways and to manage these tools.

Most of my challenges here aren’t really technology issues, they’re management issues. How can I improve classroom management with these students to improve their efficiency and accountability when working online? How can I make more effective use of the powerful tools in my classroom? It’s not about paper or about the technology alone--and never really should be--it’s about the learning and the students.

How do you make the choice between paper and digital in your classroom? When is paper most appropriate? Share your ideas in the comments or on Twitter @MrSchoenbart.

Today, February 1, was the annual Global School Play Day, with over 275,000 students participating around the world. And this year, my 20 tenth grade students were among them. We had a great time playing and talking about the value of play.

Global School Play Day started in 2015 with 65,000 students. The numbers have jumped impressively last year, growing to 177,000 students celebrating play. Their website asks educators to “Light the fire so others will catch the vision of returning the gift of unstructured play,” calling for a day of unstructured play without screens.

The #GSPD2017 website shares these wise words from Plato about the value of play.

Before class, I spread out a series of games around the room: Checkers, Chess, Scrabble, Pictionary, Play Dough, and more. I introduced the students to the concept of #GSPD2017 and let them go. We put our cell phones down, chose games, and played. I also asked students to think about the value of play in schools, especially in high school.

I took some quick pictures and then I put my screens away, too. My cell phone went in my desk, and I played Scrabble with my students. And I did not win.

Had a blast with #GSPD #SchoenTell #OssiningPride pic.twitter.com/ftdEAmfrV4

— Adam Schoenbart (@MrSchoenbart) February 1, 2017

What’s the value of play in high school?

In the last five minutes of class, I passed out note cards and asked students to reflect on the value of play. Here are some of their responses:

• Play allows for more social interactions between classmates. It can help with team work skills.
• Play time is valuable because it shows us how to be creative and to use our brains in a different way.
• Play keeps your life balanced.
• Play gives us a chance to relax and give our brains a break.
• Play is valuable in school because it teaches you to think creatively and in a different. setting than just your classroom. It can let you express yourself and have fun in a healthy, competitive manner.
• Play is valuable because it makes the brain think and provides a sense of innovation and creativity.

For more about play in my classes, check out Everything I Know I Learned from the #MarshmallowChallenge and Ending the School Year with #BreakoutEDU.

I love these responses and reflections on creativity, socialization, and collaboration. I’ve tried to value play a lot this year and have had success with challenges like #BreakoutEDU and the #MarshmallowChallenge, but would love to see play become a more consistent fixture in my class and school--even (and especially) for high schoolers.

What role does play have in your classroom? Why is play valuable for students? Have you participated in #GSPD? Share your thoughts in the comments or on Twitter @MrSchoenbart.

Good resolutions are like a good lesson plan, or so I claimed earlier this week in Rethinking Resolutions: How Good Teaching Can Improve Your New Year’s Resolution. If you’re in the 8% of Americans that achieved yours, they were likely simple and tangible but challenging, too. They probably required critical awareness and cultivated optimism. Like a good lesson, they can be assessed to show success.

That’s exactly what I will start to do today. My classroom resolutions were published in July in 5 Shifts for My Classroom in 2016. Then, I discussed five anticipated changes for my classroom for the current school year:

1. Rethinking grades
2. Portfolios, publishing, and growth
3. Project-based learning
4. From engagement to empowerment
5. Failing forward

I’ve had a lot of fun with my students this year, along with the successes and challenges that any school year brings. It’s time to look back and forward to see what I planned, how I’m doing, and were I will go for here. With the advice of resolution experts in mind, I’ll explore a few tangible and measurable goals for the remainder of this year along with the steps I plan to take to get there.

With project-based learning on the list, I also need to promote the great Hacking Project Based Learning by Ross Cooper and Erin Murphy. This new release will be my guide to implementing some of these plans to make change in my classroom and for my students.

Resolution Reflections

• By promoting reflection and both peer and self-assessment, I’ve worked hard to devalue grades and emphasize meaningful feedback. This has definitely led to more opportunities for conversation, revision, and growth--but there are still grades attached.
• This year’s students were more resistant to social media and I haven’t emphasized publishing for authentic audiences nearly enough. They’ve done some awesome work that I was sad was only for me. I share plenty of it, but want to shift the culture to where share--and want to share--too.
• PBL hasn’t happened yet. Our projects have been more about my vision than theirs so far. We need to work on this.
• I’ve done fairly well with engagement and empowering student voice, but I think we can do more. I realize now that many of these goals and comments are connected--by working on the goals above, I think I can promote empowerment and ownership of learning.
• The idea of no student failing is a complicated one. So many of my students are working hard, coming to extra help, and revising everything, so they always show growth. Sometimes I still struggle to reach some of them and am especially concerned when there are major issues with attendance or effort. Still, I think this year’s emphasis on building relationships helped here.

For more posts related to these shifts and resolutions, read What I Learned from Students’ Narrative Writing, Using Technology to Enhance Student Voice and Audience, Failing Forward: Students Reflect on Almost Escaping #BreakoutEDU, When Students Self-Assess, or Starting the New School Year by Putting Relationships First.

Reassessing Resolutions

I know my classroom goals and have evaluated some of my success. Now, I need actionable plans to revise and achieve them. Instead of addressing every single past shift individually, I want to focus on three simple concepts:

1. Reflection and feedback over grading
2. Empower students in learning (student centered)
3. Share with the world (and each other)

I now see PBL as a way to achieve these goals rather than an isolated shift. In #HackingPBL, Cooper and Murphy explain that they want to demystify the process while promoting high impact instruction and learning strategies. Those kinds of resources are exactly what I need. Moving forward, I want to include students more in the planning process so that we are creating projects and activities that are not designed for them but by them, embracing their voices, needs, interests, and ideas to meet our class’s standards and goals.

For my tenth graders, I want to use a portfolio system for the second semester. Students will track their growth, reflect on artifacts that demonstrate learning, and then make arguments for their grades. They will have that power but learn to use it wisely, which will involve a commitment to teaching students to provide meaningful feedback--something I know we can (and need to) work on.

Finally, I want to embrace the mini-lesson. I like to think that my students do way more talking than I do, but I’ll reevaluate that to make sure the focus is on them and their learning. Cooper and Murphy discuss mini-lessons, writing, “The concept of bite-sized does not mean you should just practice talking faster. Focus on the vital information students need to know to work more productively on their own . . . The key is giving them information they can use right away” (99). For me, this is a valuable takeaway to always make my own learning, as well as my teaching, actionable and specific.

Sometimes I think I’m my own worst critic. I could list dozens of ways I want to--and sometimes need to--grow and improve. I like the idea of a check-in on these goals and my progress every few months--I’ll let you and this blog help keep me honest.

Earlier this week, I asked you to share your classroom resolutions--please continue to do so. Now I’m also interested in your progress and growth in past resolutions along with your plans to achieve this year’s. Share your thoughts in the comments or on Twitter @MrSchoenbart.

It’s that time of year again. 2016 has come and gone, and I hope you had a wonderful start to the new year. And I hope that all of your dreams, ambitions, and resolutions come true. 45% of Americans usually make new year’s resolutions and another 17% do so infrequently, which makes the odds likely that you have one in mind, too (according to Statistic Brain).

Most commonly, these resolutions focus on self improvement or education, weight, money, or relationships. Yet Just 8% of People Achieve Their New Year's Resolutions. This Forbes article keeps it simple, explaining that the most achieved goals are simple and tangible. USNews also shares five tips to succeeding in resolutions in Why 80 Percent of New Year's Resolutions Fail: Think small, build trust, invent challenges, cultivate optimism, and develop critical awareness.

So what does any of this have to do with education?

The practice of New Year’s Resolutions got me thinking--sure my year starts in January, but it also starts in September. The new school year might as well be the start of my year. In a sense, it also restarts at the end of January after midterms, too. Some teachers even get new students for the new semester and are literally starting from day one.

Let’s go back to the tips from the articles above. In order to have a better chance in succeeding in achieving a resolution--whether it be January 1, September 1, or any random date, you need tangible and achievable objectives, a positive attitude, critical awareness, trust, and challenges. That sounds awfully familiar.

What are resolutions if not goals for achievement? And the best way to achieve these goals is with a good lesson plan. Determine the learning outcomes, decide how the learning will be demonstrated, and then plan the best experiences to achieve the goal. Whether it’s a new year’s resolution or a lesson plan, it’s really all just backwards design.

Infographic courtesy of elearninginfographics

For the past two years, my resolutions came at the end of summer, as I planned for the new school year, reflected on my challenges and successes from the previous year, and set goals for myself and for my students. Each year, I share my classroom shifts (5 Shifts for My Classroom in 2016), and like to return to them throughout the year on my blog and in professional practice.

I do so because I find the reflection essential for growth. I write about and share my experiences to connect with an audience, sure, but also to process and improve my own practice. Because I want to be in the 8% to achieve my resolutions, for myself and for my students. Next time, I'll come back with updates on those shifts and the progress of my resolutions, and set some tangible goals. I encourage you to do the same and to share your thoughts and resolutions here in the comments and on Twitter.

Are resolutions important to your teaching? What are some of your goals for the new year? Share your thoughts in the comments or on Twitter @MrSchoenbart.

As the calendar year winds down, I’m again looking back and forward to reflect on the year that’s past and what’s to come. Last year, in Best of 2015: Reflections & Resolutions, I shared professional accomplishments and goals with the hope of using the writing process to solidify my commitment to them. A lot has changed in the past year in my teaching, coaching, and writing, and I’m struck by the growth since last year’s post.

As a full time teacher/coach, I’ve rediscovered fun in my practice and reignited my passion for classroom teaching. I don’t think I’ve ever had as much fun as I’m having with my students this year, and I’m happy with my progress in some of this year’s classroom shifts. As a coach, I’m very excited to continue working with teachers to promote meaningful use of technology in teaching and learning. I’ll continue to document that work in The Coaching Chronicles, where I’ll explore planning for this year’s #EdcampOHS, learning more about math and science, and planning an expansion of Tech Tuesdays--some sort of event to be named.

As a student, I’ve continued my doctoral and administrative work, and am now nearly done with my School Building and District Leader program and halfway through a doctoral program in educational leadership. All of this work continues to push my thinking, skills, and views on teaching and learning. I’m eager to make progress and plan to finish the administrative work this upcoming semester and hope to make more time for doctoral writing.

The writing has grown too, with 84 posts on The Schoenblog and many guest posts on sites like Edutopia. #JokeoftheDay Prepares Students for Learning had been in the works forever and I’m very proud of it. Recently, The Schoenblog was also awarded an Editor’s Choice Content Award from ASCD SmartBrief for the article, The Coaching Chronicles: Breaking Down Walls.

Finally, we are currently hard at work on a rebuild of #TheEduCal, bringing theeducationcalendar.com over to the new Google Sites with an updated campaign to bring professional learning opportunities to all of you. #TheEduCal was named #5 in the top ten s’cool tools of the year from EdSurge this week! Check out their article at Counting Down EdSurge’s Top Ten S’Cool Tools of 2016.

My students are pretty good at answering questions, but they aren’t always great at asking them. Questioning is a hard skill, involving critical thinking, creativity, and inquiry. Simply put, we don’t do enough to teach students how to ask good questions. At least I don’t.

After watching groups of students awkwardly flail in silence in lieu of meaningful Socratic discussion and questioning, I realized this dilemma: how can we expect student to ask high level questions to promote critical thinking and discussion when school prepares them for the opposite? Too often, our system prepares students to answer more than ask and to consume instead of create.

How do I know if my teaching really has an impact on learning?

That’s the question that I grappled with for most of the day on Friday. Do my instructional choices lead to a positive impact on learning? Am I building a culture for meaningful learning--as a teacher, as a coach, and as a part of a school system? What does the research say about high impact teaching? Any why don’t we talk about these questions more often?

On Friday, I attended a conference from my local @PNWBOCES exploring student engagement and the 4 Cs: communication, collaboration, critical thinking, and creativity. Educators from all around the region gathered to learn, share, and connect, and while the sessions were valuable, it was the keynote from Peter DeWitt that really stuck with me.

Peter spoke about high impact, research-based, practical strategies to make positive changes in schools and learning. He discussed the value of climate as the 5th C and a “plate where everything else should rest.” I liked that he provided time for the audience to discuss, reflect, and participate, and loved how seamlessly he integrated research into his ideas. In particular, his discussion of the work of John Hattie in Visible Learning spun through my mind all day.

If research shows certain strategies to have a tangible impact on learning, why isn’t that something that we’re talking more about? Teacher training and professional learning often discusses big ideas, anecdotes, and abstract strategies, but doesn’t always address the practical impact nearly enough. I’d guess that most teachers agree that reciprocal teaching is a good strategy, but for me, learning that it has a .74 effect size makes it all the more important.

Hattie’s work ranks 138 influences on learning by studying their effect size based on a study of 1,200 meta-analyses. Basically, he studies the influences that have represent best practices and lead the highest impact on achievement. The average effect size is 0.40, while 1.0 represents the growth of one year; therefore, an effect larger than 0.40 is above average and above 1.0 is a huge growth in learning. Learn more about Hattie and these influences at VisibleLearning.org.

Within our ability.....#studentengagement16 #edchst #NYEDChat pic.twitter.com/1yvlGXbzTq

— Fred Ende (@FredEnde) December 2, 2016

What Role Should Research Have in Teaching?

Teacher estimates of achievement, collective teacher efficacy, and self-reported grades. These three influences have the highest effect sizes of all, according to Hattie (1.62, 1.57, and 1.33, respectively). I want my student to rise to high expectation. I hope that my teachers feel confident in their abilities and teaching. And I love having students self-assess, report, and reflect. But having a foundation in this research to further develop these ideas provides a whole new language to the conversation.

I don’t believe in silver bullets in education; there’s not one influence or idea that will simply fix our problems and help students achieve, but an understanding of these findings has really inspired me to learn more. It’s probably the end-of-semester doctoral student mode, but I’m fascinated by this type of research and a more thorough understanding of how I really influence student achievement.

Recovered my sketchnotes from this morning's keynote from @PeterMDeWitt #studentengagement16 @Occh2 @LearnerAlmOUFSD @knv80 @psmirra37 pic.twitter.com/RGYCtKHpXv

— Adam Schoenbart (@MrSchoenbart) December 2, 2016

The average teacher makes 1,500 decisions a day. Let’s make sure that they're the best ones. Hattie’s work reminds us that so many influences and strategies have a positive impact, but it’s important that educators are making the best choices to produce the desired results for learning.

As a teacher, I want to keep this in mind and plan to share this research with my students. I want to continue to work on building relationships, promoting student agency, and providing effective feedback for growth. As a coach, I want to use to use it as a springboard for discussion with teachers. I bought Hattie’s books this weekend, Visible Learning and Visible Learning for Teachers, and am eager to dive in for more.

How does research influence your teaching, practice, or work with students? Share in the comments or on Twitter @MrSchoenbart.

In my English classes, I try to stress the importance of creation and creativity in all of our learning. Too much of our work and writing, though, is standards and test-driven, which makes real creative writing difficult. I’ve long grappled on my trouble making creative writing matter in my classes, so I was thrilled to offer students a creative narrative writing project to conclude our study of The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time by Sherman Alexie.

In English 9, we examined Alexie’s coming of age text through the lens of identity and belonging. The protagonist, Junior, struggles to find himself and his community as he is torn between his home on the Indian Reservation and the white school he wants to attend. After a few weeks of close reading, literary analysis, and discussion, we switched gears to narrative writing.

Students were asked to write a multigenre narrative capturing a story of their part-time identities. Junior writes and draws his story in a journal, filled with cartoons and self-deprecating humor. We asked our students to tell their story through words and media--images or video--and to write or film a part-time narrative (here is the assignment if you’re interested).

And the results were so much fun. I learn a lot about my students every time they write, but these narrative pieces helped reaffirm the importance of putting student relationships first and encouraging students to write (and publish) for authentic audiences.

#SchoenTell English 9 Ss created visual representations of Junior's internal conflict in #PartTimeIndian by @Sherman_Alexie pic.twitter.com/sKsa2gfI97

— Adam Schoenbart (@MrSchoenbart) November 3, 2016

Relationships First

This has been a common mantra for me this year (see Starting the New School Year by Putting Relationships First). I’ve made an effort to really focus on building relationships with my students: to teach people, not content; to learn about their interests; to talk to them all every day. But this project is where I learned about the part-time lifeguards, gymnasts, and lacrosse players in my classroom. It reminded me that my students are artists, and dreamers, and siblings, too.

It was so rewarding to ask students to develop their voice and share their passions through the lens of this model text. The project was fun and revealing--I hope my students felt the same.

The Push to Publish

But I was the only one who saw it. And that made me terribly sad.

With my sophomores, I expect all of their work to be shared with public audiences early on in the year. We are constantly collaborating, sharing, and revising. We will soon push that work out on social media and blogs--I want us to share with the world. But with freshman, for better or worse, I took it slower this year. I want to build the basic skills of English and writing before the social media skills (and I now question that choice). So while we collaborate, present, and share, the audience is inherently limited.

Quickly, I thought of the quote below from my friend Ross Cooper in his article, Why Write for Your Teacher When You Can Publish for the World?


Immediately, I knew that I missed an opportunity here. I knew that I had renew my efforts to explore authentic audiences, publishing, and connecting to the world in my classroom. So, now we will.

Student Work

Social media, blogs, and portfolios are all spinning around in my head. I’m working on my plans to share student voices and work with real audiences, and look forward to those opportunities. For now, though, I want to share a few of the samples from this project that inspired this thinking.

Read Pujita’s The Absolutely True Diary Of A Part-Time Dreamer, Zack’s My Life as a Part-Time Cripple, or Nolan’s The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Arsenal Fan. Then, watch Jackie’s Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Artist in the video below.

What are your tips, strategies, or questions about sharing student work with real audiences? What advice do you have about our journey to publish? Share your thoughts in the comments or on Twitter @MrSchoenbart.

Looking back, I think #EdcampNJ 2013 was when I first began to understand the power of passionate, connected educators. It was one of my first edcamps and I remember being overwhelmed by the hundreds of people in the room, the massive session board, and buzz of excitement. It was before I had really begun attending conferences regularly, and I had never presented at an edcamp before. I even remember being inspired to look for more conferences in my area, which led to me finding and eventually co-organizing #edcampMville and co-creating #TheEduCal.