Time for Reflection: A Gift to Ourselves

Leaving the classroom, the coach and I walked side by side.  She had just finished teaching a lesson with young writers about growing stories.  "I wish we had time to talk," she lamented.  Unfortunately, she needed to be in another classroom and I needed to be in a meeting.  I paused taking in what she had said.  As teachers, we hurry about our day-to-day work without the time to step back to reflect.  It was at this moment I realized that our conversations with colleagues around the work we do are a gift we rarely seem to find time for in our daily busyness.

The Need for Reflection
The need for reflection struck me again the other day as I was waiting on a friend for lunch.  The restaurant was quiet, and for the first time in days, I felt like I had a few minutes of unscheduled time.  I paused and just started thinking about the week.  It wasn't long until I found myself taking a few notes, reflecting on a few interactions across the week, and planning a few next steps.  Honestly, I was amazed at what had been accomplished in less than ten minutes as my friend entered the restaurant and joined me.

It seems in our world, especially in our teaching worlds, it's hard to find time to pause and reflect.  As teachers, our lists remain long so we move from one task to another.  As teachers, it can be a challenge to pause when we are busy working alongside young students with little break in our day.  I'm going to be so bold as to say I think we even feel guilty when we take the time to pause and reflect.  We are always on a path of doing.

That day at the restaurant I don't think I would have paused had I not been given a few unexpected minutes.  We talk all the time about reflection; we understand its power, yet we rarely carve time to pause.

Collaborative Conversations 
As I work alongside instructional coaches and teachers, I'm continually struck by the power of pausing to reflect.  Often in our side-by-side work with colleagues, we do the work inside the classroom; because of time constraints, we settle for moments of demonstration teaching, observation, or quick touches of learning, but it is the deep dive into focused conversation that helps us to grow in our practice.  It is the small reflective conversations before and after our time together we struggle to make the time to have, yet it is these very conversations that lift our work.

While I am trying to be more disciplined about taking the time for personal reflection, it is when I am reflecting with a colleague that I learn the most.  It is in these conversations where new thinking pushes against what I understand.  It is in these conversations that my words are sent back to me in a way that brings fresh understanding.  It is in these conversations I find new perspectives.  It is in these conversations that I find strength for next steps.

As I sit beside coaches and teachers, I've come to realize that the short pre and post conversations we often skip, are truly a gift.  As I observe collaborative conversations I'm always struck by what both people take away after a few minutes in reflective conversation.   Our work is too complex to do it alone.

Whether it is sitting quietly for ten minutes or finding a colleague to bounce around a few ideas, I'm trying to find ten minutes each day for a bit of reflection.  Instead of thinking about it as a something I have to do, I know it is a gift I give to myself.

A Bit More About Reflection

Watch It:  

• Quit Wearing Busy Like a Badge by John Spencer

Read It:  

• The Missing Key to Productivity is Reflection by Jocelyn K. Glei
• White Space:  Why It Matters in Our Life by Brian Gardner

Live It:  

• Take time to reflect (find the white space in your day to think, time to journal, talk with a friend)
• Grab your favorite notebook (or app)
• Apps for written reflection:  Google, Google Keep, Evernote (organize notebooks, tag, type, audio, insert images, and you can write --- but that feature is still very limited), Noteshelf App (set up notebooks with paper-like turns, write, type, insert images), Notability (for fans of handwriting.)  
• Daily Habits  (set reminders for your reflection time...)

Maybe It's Not About Doing MORE

Recently our team sat looking at the information we had collected about our readers.  We had our most recent benchmark assessment information and anecdotal notes from our classrooms.  As we reflected on student progress, we didn't feel we were seeing the shifts we hoped to see.  It wasn't long until our conversation spun to ways we could do more.  

In the last month I have sat in meetings with other grade levels, other schools, our literacy team, and our response to intervention team.  In each of these instances the conversation seems to quickly spiral into ways we could do more.  Even looking at the assessment information and notes I've obtained from the students I support in reading intervention, I find myself looking for ways to do more.  

The truth is, however, we're already doing more.  Educators have many students that have particular individual and small group plans.  There are plans for intervention that are progress monitored.  There are additional support staff that support some learners and programs purchased with the intention to support and remediate.  We pull learning apart from its larger concepts to its minute skills, drilling into what we think might be needed for these students.

Let's pause, for just a minute...

Let's breathe...

Let's leave the rushed frenzy of our data driven world...

Let's put standardized hurdles aside...

Let's not do more...

As I look at the information I have on my readers and consider the rushed pace of our learning, I realize I can't do more.  They can't do more.  I'm asking the wrong questions and seeking the wrong plans.  What I need to be thinking about is, what can I do better?  What are the essential instructional practices that will support my learners?  What really works?  How do I improve my language so that what I am doing has more power, but leaves them with more time to practice these very strategies? 

Experience has taught me that if I put first things first, the rest will fall into place.  So I'm changing my question to "What can I do better?".  As I reflect I am looking for those essential pieces that matter most, and working to do them well.  

End of Year Assessment: A Closer Look

The end of the year is fast approaching.  I always find these last days to be a roller coaster of emotion as we celebrate all that has been accomplished while experiencing those sad moments where we realize this community will never be together again just like this.  All the conversations that have supported us, all the work that has defined us, all the times we've held each other up, are memories we will cherish.  Each year our experiences teach us new ways to learn, to work, and to support one another.

Additionally, the end of the year is busy with closing out rituals.  There is reflecting on the learning from the year as we look at artifacts from September to now and marvel over how we've changed.  We take time to make plans to continue to connect and learn during the summer months.  For teachers, there are end of year inventories, progress reports, and assessments.  Of course, there's the putting away --- all of the putting away.  We work hard to keep our to-dos from taking over and keeping us from getting the most of our last days with our students.

Looking Back - Looking Forward
In the last two weeks, I've been completing end of year literacy assessments in small pockets of time.  It would be easy to race through assessments to get them checked off my list.  The purpose of these assessments is often to measure growth of students across a year.  We look for numbers and letters to place in boxes to show what has been accomplished.  Our team has been talking about the way end of year assessments are more than that for us; we are finding end of year assessments help us to see patterns across our classroom of the learning students have experienced.  Sometimes those patterns are cause for celebration, and sometimes they speak to changes we want to make in the coming year.

While we are spending time reflecting with the students who sit in front of us this year, we are learning about adjustments we can make to improve our instruction next year.  As I complete the assessments for my students I am taking time to notice more than the numbers and letters I am placing in boxes.  I'm asking myself these questions:

Considering Changes

Looking through assessments I am taking the time to notice the areas I feel my students were stronger in as they read, and those I want to think about changing in the coming school year.  My focus remains on what I can learn in moving forward.  

As I look back I find the biggest commonality among students who discontinued was a connection to reading.  Though not measured in assessments in concrete ways, each of these students were students who managed to connect the reading we did together into their personal reading.  These were students I was able to find ways to bridge our conversations about reading beyond the time we spent together.  Each of these readers made some kind of connection whether it was with other readers, with books, with authors or, as was often the case, with a series of books.  These readers connected with reading beyond the required time we met, beyond the time their teachers spent with them, beyond the reading they were asked to do.  These readers began to read because they chose to read.  This will be important to think about over the summer as I look for ways to better build bridges between readers and reading in the coming year.  

As we bring closure to this year of learning, finding time to use what we've learned to look forward into the new year allows us to continue to grow in the work we do for children.  

Happy 3rd Birthday, Dear Blog!

Individually, we are one drop. Together, we are an ocean.  Ryunosuke Satoro

via blueskycollection.com

Seriously, where does the time go?  It's hard to believe it has been three years since I started this blog after encouragement from Mary Lee Hahn and Franki Sibberson of A Year of Reading.  When I first began the blog three years ago, my intent was to reflect on the learning in my classroom.  My hope was that by sharing reflections of our classroom, professional reading, and other learning conversations I'd improve the work I do with students.

However, after three years I've learned something else;  it isn't about the blog at all, but instead about the learning community I've become a part of over the last three years.  Honestly, it isn't writing the posts that helps me to rethink learning, but the reading of posts written by other bloggers.  It isn't the time I put into posts that causes me to pause, but the thoughts of readers who take the time to comment.  It is the conversation that carries across blogs that really pushes my thinking.

It's not just a blog, it's a community.  A couple of days ago I was reminded of this when Tracy at Thinking Stems  wrote a post reflecting on a comment I made on her blog nearly six months ago.  Like Tracy, I often find that the comments made by each of you stay with me for a long time.  Your thoughtful reflections bring me pause and give me energy.  On this, my third blog birthday, I'm reminded of how significant it is to be able to learn with other educators from around the world.  I'm reminded of how much I appreciate all of you who stop by to chat with me.

So, in celebration of 3:

3 Favorite Post from the Past Year

• Do You Reply to Comments
• My Bag Has Been Replaced with an iPad
• Six Ways to Use Evernote to Capture Learning

3 Collaborative Events I Enjoyed

• #cyberPD:  Changing My Frame
• #pb10for10:  3rd Annual Picture Book Event
• Slice of Life Challenge:  The Habit of Writing  (Note:  I participated in this event from my other blog:  Merely Day by Day)

3 Resolutions for the Next Year

• Return to my goal of posting AT LEAST once a week.  (Yes, I've been struggling a bit.)
• Respond to all comments as I appreciate all of you that stop by.  
• Return to reading and commenting on at least 3 other blogs each day.