Authentic Teaching & Feedback
How can we move toward more authentic ways of learning, while satisfying the assessment demands of school and workplace?
Like anything else, satisfying the demands of assessment and authenticity in learning is a balance - especially in public school settings. I myself work in a public school environment but have the good fortune to work in a school that focuses on the need for students to explore, experiment, create, play, make mistakes, and engage in rich learning environments. Despite our unique project-based learning approach and the fact that a third of our school year is spent taking students places outside of the school building, our test scores are the second best in our very large district. We are proof that it is possible for these two things to coincide in a learning environment. What makes it possible for us is how we use our roles as teachers. We work hard to foster a learning environment school-wide that empowers students to take action for their learning, to ask hard questions, and we teach them how to effectively seek out answers to their questions. The majority of our facilitation time is spent on coaching students on how to learn as opposed to what to learn. While we are accountable for the state standards, being a public school and all, we infuse the standards into more authentic and hands on experiences that give students the chance to use and hone their skills for learning. Yes, it takes a lot more effort on behalf of us teachers to create these experiences. However, at the same time working in conjunction with all of the subject area teachers, it also alleviates the burden of feeling isolated to teaching only your specific content. By blending content standards, more ground can be covered in less time while simultaneously reinforcing the authenticity of the experiences being designed for our students. It can feel like an impossible effort incorporating these experiences into your own classroom while also feeling accountable for your standards. It can almost feel like double or triple the work load, but through empowering your students and sharing the load by including other content area teachers it is possible to design worthwhile experiences and have students achieve proficiency on assessments.