Responding to diversity by engaging with students voices: a strategy for teacher s development. European Union Comenius Multilateral Project, 2011-2014 Draft case study account, July 2012, IES LAS DEHESILLAS This text has been written by one researcher from the University Autónoma of Madrid who has been involved working with this school. Its content is based on the written and verbal accounts provided by the teachers who have been involved in project activities so far. Indeed, the trio have read it and they have had enough time to remark. Description of the school context: The school Dehesilla is a state school (No fees must be paid by parents) located in the village of Cercedilla, in the northwest of Madrid region. The majority of students are Spanish, but other nationalities (specially, Moroccan, Latin American, and Rumanian) are also represented in the student population. Students from the age of eleven to eighteen are admitted, regardless their social or economic background. The students come from different small villages (in the area) and they get to school by school bus or taken by their parents. This makes it difficult for students to stay for extracurricular activities in the afternoon. Process: The school followed the seven steps of the initial action plan. Below is a brief description of each of the steps: 1
Step 1 Forming a Working Group A working group was formed which comprised of three teachers from different subject areas: Art, Technology and Science. Also, the school counsellor who is the current coordinator of the project has been very active in the working group. All teachers taught Year 8 (1º ESO) (12 13 years old) and they showed especially motivated by the opportunity to observe each other in the classroom. Also they are a little bit exhausted and downhearted for current moments in that education in Spain (cuts, increase time of teaching, etc.) They hadn t enough time to join one hour, so meetings were held in the playground time approximately one a week from January to June. Step 2 Analyzing Diversity After several meetings discussing the implementation of the project in the school and analyzing the school students diversity, teachers thought it was better to focus on one class not the whole school in order to analyze diversity.teachers wanted to carry out the project in a class of Year 1º ESO (12-13 years old) because this group was especially challenging for them and the results of the first evaluation meeting were very disappointing for all the subjects. Teachers thought that maybe this project could help them to improve their academic achievement. Students showed low academic achievement (of the 19 students, 9 have unfinished primary education, it means, they had some subjects retaken, 3 students repeating this year, in fact, only 7 students had passed all the subjects in the first term) and also coexistence between peers was damaged. In order to analyze this classroom s diversity several different sources of information have been used, including the following: Individual interviews with the school counsellor, trio teachers and the group s tutor. Assessment of the documentation relevant to the initial evaluation and the evaluation for the first term. Review of the documentation for each student with regard to their academic expectations at the college and the study time they dedicated to each subject. Sociogram. 2
The accounts found were discussed with the school s work group. Teachers underlined the importance of group diversity, especially from three sources: a- Diversity deriving from previous knowledge from school experience as well as family and other cultural experience. b- Diversity in the level of knowledge acquired at school, especially written and oral competency levels in the Spanish language. c- Diversity in the availability of assistance at home in completing homework tasks. Step 3 Collect the Views of Students The Project was presented to the students by means of a flyer containing general guidance by the deputy head teacher, the school counsellor and the university researcher. Figure 1. Flyer used for the Project presentation. In order to gather students voices several measures were adopted. It is tried to link these activities with the activities planned by the counselling department this academic year. The first activity consisted of an exercise involving unfinished sentences (Appendix 1) for collecting general information about coexistence and learning issues which was useful for design other activities, such as a photo-elicitation 3
activity (Appendix 2). This activity was used in order to facilitate discussions with the student about participation, fair and unfair issues, teaching methods.the photos were selected by the university researcher and they reflected different lessons in several state schools in Spain. Subsequently, two discussion groups (4 students each group) were conducted by the researcher. These students had showed passive attitude or had barely spoken in the previous sessions. In the discussion groups had to answer in written briefly. The researcher read the answers but they did not know who had given the answer. Thus, anonymity was guaranteed for helping them feel more confident. The questions are mainly related to class participation factors. The university research transcribed interviews. Moreover, an information collection sheet on every day activities was completed after each lesson. Students were asked to state how many minutes of class-time were lost, whether there had been any conflict situations or disrespectful behaviour and if so, how these had been resolved and positive aspects to the classrooms. Every day, a student was responsible for filling in the sheet and placing it in the designated letter box in the hall of the school. The total of the students (19) filled in this task. They were very responsible for doing it. Following, the tutor discussed their accounts with the student and they reached some commitments as a group. The agreements were hanging in the classroom s wall. This activity helped students to reflect personal factors and group factors relevant for improving their attainments. So, they need to take responsibility of their own learning. Finally, information was collected from written essays by students who were asked to give advice to their teachers on certain specific aspects such as classroom layout, homework tasks or evaluation criteria, among others. After analysing all the data collected, a summary was drawn up and distributed to the teachers as a reminder of students opinions regarding how to bring about improvements in the classroom. It is decided to include direct quotations from the students as they felt that these would be more powerful rather than just summarising the themes that emerged. 4
Table 1: Students views about improvements in teaching Discipline Improved understanding /explanation Teachers don t reinforce that we behave properly. Always fixing what misbehave "( student). Sketching of each lesson. ( student). When all messages are written on the board. (student) When I could help to my classmates who don t understand the lesson.( student). The teacher explains giving examples of some of the students in real life (student). When the teacher explains with familiar words. (student) Sometimes teachers are expressed in a way we do not understand " (student). We understand better when the teacher is not angry. (student) That classes not just listen to the teacher. It s difficult to pay sustained attention. ( student). When we do not copy all the time ( student). Assessment Take exams shorter. (student) To evaluate students behavior. (student) Participation Teachers do not ask everyone. ( student) Teachers should be taken out to the blackboard more often. In class there is always a lot of noise in order to participate. I do not participate because I know nothing ( student). I know that if I speak up,my colleagues will laugh at me (student). Steps 4, 5 and 6 - Planning research lesson, -Teaching the Research Lesson Interviewing Students. It is exposed next steps jointly because accounts have more sense: a) Lesson planned bearing in mind the views of students and professional discussions amongst the trio. b) Lesson taught recorded and observers filled in a questionnaire. c) Different academic achievement and cultural background students were interviewed by the university researcher. 5
It was no very easy for teachers to decide on the study lesson topic due to teaching across different subject areas. Finally, it is chosen the earth s structure topic. A distribution of functions, background knowledge and theory-practice was made. The three sessions were recorded on video. The first session was a theory science lesson. Teachers decided to support this theoretical part of the lesson with illustrations (art lesson) in which students had to design an earth structure with different materials in groups of three people, in pairs or on their own. The grouping was elected by students. In technology lesson, the teacher explained briefly the activity and students worked in pairs. The lessons were too different from each other depending on the subjects, the teaching strategies, and the teaching style. Each observer should fill in a questionnaire (appendix III) with 16 different criteria previously designed by the school counsellor and the university researcher. Teachers knew the questionnaire beforehand and they had time to make comments some weeks before recording. In each of the three lessons planned, the teachers and the counsellor filled out a questionnaire. Nine interviews about the lessons content and methodology were conducted with students with different levels of knowledge and participation. In general, students thought lessons helped the motivation and appreciated teachers effort to work together. During the interviewing stage, students, at the science lesson, realised that the topic was interesting because the teacher linked each new knowledge to the previous one, but they thought the teacher s explanation was too long to pay attention. Indeed, teachers also admitted that the explanation was too long for them as well. Meanwhile observers detected high levels of engagement and enjoyment in the computers. Step 7- Identifying implications for practices After concluding each lesson, a meeting was held with teachers (trio) to assess the content and the main achievements and the difficulties encountered. They reflected on some teaching routines which is not very common out of habit and lack of time. 6
In the discussions, teachers identified some successful practices carried out by their colleagues but, at the same time, they recognized that their teaching style was completely different and, so, they wouldn t be able to implement these practices. Regarding to the observation questionnaire, teachers considered it was too long for collecting all the information during one 50 minutes class. Also they considered indicators would be more useful for a theoretical class than a practical one. Therefore, indicators will be reviewed in the next course. In light of the comments made after lessons by students, teachers agree with the students about the following aspects: a) Explanations Teachers and students agreed about explanations, whenever possible are more effective in small groups than a large group. In fact, the students insisted on explanations to great group are long, they are often disconnected. b) At the end of sessions According to students, teachers often end lessons quickly. Students need time to recap the contents and remember the homework tasks to do. Teachers fully agreed with the students in the statement noted. Moreover, it exposed some disagreements between teachers and students indicating thus that teachers don t consider to introduce the suggestions that students have noted previously: a) Materials. Students found very useful that teachers gave them some written schemes and found more crucial to learn by doing activities rather than by listening long explanations. Teachers partially agreed with students but also they felt that despite the way how to work the contents, students didn t study enough to learn and 7
therefore, teachers perceived that sometimes their efforts for designing materials were useless and many times they saw materials lying on the floor. For some students, the sessions (art workshop and Technology) need clearer guidelines. Students think that if they got a guideline in writing would be easier to get to understand the steps. However, teachers consider that the written materials requested not read, because what they want is that the teacher is resolving doubts individually. "They want me to write on the board because they see it as the TV and when they want to copy is not copy them. I'm not defensive but... the daily practice of this course is that as other" (teacher) "Experience is not good, in the laboratory of the years my experience tell us that is not achieved self-employment" (teacher) b) Evaluation. According to the students, teachers should evaluate to students more often. "We are encouraged that the teacher asked us in class on a daily basis" (student) However, teachers think when asking students about lesson more often, results are similar when they ask lesson more infrequent, equally negative. c) Activities. Students value different levels of knowledge activities when they do. Teachers believe that students prefer to do different activities in groups as they are often easier for them. Teachers were in a dilemma that explicitly or implicitly emerged in many occasions. On one hand, they acknowledged the students efforts to be very positive because they were doing small actions and making efforts, but, on the other hand, teachers considered appropriate just to hold them because they did not consider their levels of knowledge adequate to endorse or promote course. 8
"I was looking some working sheets and I noticed that the current activities for students belong to special education needs students. I've noticed but I've gone down without noticing " (teacher). "We are continuously evaluating many small efforts but they don t know enough to pass. If students take an exam from 2003, it will be impossible for them to pass it. (teacher). Barriers and opportunities: Teachers have recognized the importance of mutual observation and, in particular, the wealth of benefit to be gained from reflecting jointly on teaching methods, but they have not developed teaching materials jointly. The true shift underlying the whole process is the relations and dynamics that have arisen from sharing their teaching experience. From the joint discussion, it is mobilized internal structures encouraging each participant's knowledge changes in both procedural and attitudinal ways. Also, it is interesting how teachers became more aware of their teaching style. The group of students received with great interest the consultation process in which they were given a voice, and have stated that the teachers forming the trio always took an interest in them. However, it is felt that the data were insufficiently contrasted with the students. It should be necessary watching video all together and analyse with students in detail. So, it would be convenient adding one step more in order to contrast information with students. Another issue that emerged is related to teachers who are not sure of being able to identify those teaching factors that better help students to learn more significantly. One sums it very clearly: "Although there are many teachers who do well or you don t know really know stuff if you have done contributes to success" (teacher) Therefore, it is necessary to deepen into this topic and make an attempt to find the relationship between diversity students sources and teaching methods or designed activities. 9
APPENDIX I- UNFINISHED SENTENCES 1. I feel good in class when... 2. I think the lessons are fun class when... 3. I understand the lessons better when... 4. The worst thing about this school is... 5. I would love it left me in this center... 6. The worst in my class is... 7. I feel insecure in class when... 8. I understand better what the teacher says when he / she... 9. I wish my teachers... 10. It is unfair when the teacher / a... APPENDIX II 10
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APPENDIX III OBSERVATION REGISTER CRITERIA 1.It includes any activity or to detect dynamic background and interests and relate them to new activities. 2. The teacher explains clearly the objectives of the lesson 3. Connect the content with the current situation with previous issues, with events experienced or known in everyday life. 4. The information offered to students is well organized. 5. It attempts to present the information visual aids 6. Clear instructions are given. 7. Comprehension checks are made. 8. You remember general rules and procedures (raise your hand, not getting up, etc.). 9. Anticipation of disruptive behavior (X need anything?) 10. Proposed different ways of achieving activity or activities 11. The materials used are attractive to students. 12. Is made positive comments group or individual. 13. Ensures that is clear about homework tasks. 14. Is the written content offered to students fragmented so that it can be understood by students in sequence? 15. Are there activities for reinforcement and expansion in the various subjects taught? 16. Are there opportunities for students to participate? 13