Learning from Experience — Resources for Learning in

Teachers’ Talk about Teaching

Judith Warren Little

University of California, Berkeley

Leiden November 2007

Workplace Settings Professional Development

How can talk rooted in classroom experience generate teacher learning and improvements in teaching?

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WHICH TALK?

Pedagogical Reasoning

Problem

of

Practice

Yes

Yes

No

No

1

3

2

4

Pedagogical Reasoning

Problem

of

Practice

Yes

Yes

No

No

1

3

2

4

Examples from Two Groups

Mathematics English Language

“Normalizing” Moves

PROBLEM OF PRACTICE

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I’ve got this problem…

Don’t worry, it’s normal…

So what I had

on the agenda…

Conversation in the Language Group

Lora: What am I doing wrong? Mine are just all like …

Patrick: Oh, really?Lora: Yeah, they can stop reading.Margaret: I think it just depends on the

class. I tried it last year and it didn’t work as well as it’s going this year.

Patrick: It’s a classroom culture thing.

You could try…

I’ve got this problem…

Don’t worry, it’s normal…

So what I had

on the agenda…

Conversation in the Language Group

Leigh: The reason that I brought up that I’m having trouble coming up with a memory… [is] if I’m having trouble … one of my 35 kids might also have trouble and I don’t yet know what I would say to that kid. ……And yeah, I really could come up with a half dozen reading experiences but in that first second, I had a blank. And if you’re 14 and you have a blank, it’s hard to get beyond that and so I’m not quite sure what I would do to help that student.

Karen: What I am planning on doing to get around that is….

I’ve got this problem…

Don’t worry, it’s normal…

Can you tell us

more?

“ I started the geoboards today and it- it felt like mayhem? Like, it felt like no one kind of understood. I just had a vision of what it – I thought it should look like and it didn’t look anything like that.”

Alice’s Mayhem

Alice supplies more detail

I was trying to keep students together in their groups, but they, they weren’t staying together. And then… What was happening? So then I wanted to communicate [the mathematical idea] but if I do it in front of class, no one’s paying attention but if I go around to groups, I felt like I wasn’t communicating it to all the students.

And re-states her problem

It’s just that I have a vision of what group work should look like, and it’s not looking anything like that.

‘Normalizing’ —endemic problems of teaching

Guillermo: That would be my fourth block [class].

[laughter]Female: And mine!Jill: But a reality, right?Guillermo: Yeah.Jill: Reality check, is that we all know what it

can look like, we all know what we’re striving for. But my God -- we’re just like this all the time. After 10 years, after 2 years, after 5 years, every day is like that because we don’t know what’s walking into our classroom. On a daily basis.

Howard: I’ll tell you Alice, I mean I’ve been here a long time. This was the first time I ever used geoboards with an Algebra One class because I was so afraid of how easily they would just go off and play. And the only reason that I attempted it this time was this was our time to do it.

PROBLEM OF PRACTICE

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A generative question

Guillermo: Alice, can you identify the source of the squirreliness? Like <<unclear>> that they, they wanted to wanted to play with the geoboards but didn’t have time to do it?

‘Alice speculates, specifies…and revises her view of the problem: students may not understand the concept of area

Alice: Maybe it was a sense of ––they don’t really have a concept of area at all. …. No, it was like they were just counting the squares the whole time. I kept saying, “Okay, well is there a rectangle there?” and it was like –– that was going beyond for them. Um. So maybe it’s just that the concepts are challenging for them.

‘Alice speculates about an alternative explanation: she got angry and lost control

Yeah. I guess there was that sense that by the end? I was like–– it was like the first time that I just felt angry with them - because it felt so –– like I wasn’t in control? that I started to get angry. And part of that is my control issues. And so, I didn’t even know ––by the end I was like, “I want you guys to stay after.” And I didn’t know if I felt good about having them stay after or if that was a good way to handle it, but I just wanted them to know I mean business and we needed to get work done and –– you know? (2 second pause) So.

A second invitation…

Guillermo:Were they receptive to that?

Alice replays her exchange with the students…

Alice: Yeah, I mean, they were like (exhales indignantly), “This is

not fair!” Jill: laughsAlice: I’m like ( 2 second pause)Others: (laughing)Alice: I mean like.Guillermo: Perfect.Alice: So they stayed after 2 minutes, you know. And I mean that was. It was fine. Jill: Snorting, like holding back a laugh.Guillermo: Yeah, but they’re like dying for those two minutes, right? Like two minutes=Alice: Yeah I mean, it’s like, “Two minutes? Come on!”Others: (laughing)Alice: So.

More normalizing…the emotional reality of teaching

You really are describing my fourth block. Minus the staying after for 2 minutes. (Alice, others laugh) Because at some point I’m angry enough that I don’t want to SEE them for 2 more minutes! (others laughing).

Generalizing an interpretive principle…

Carrie: When they get upset and they seem to be off task and acting goofy, it usually is motivated by “I’m so confused and the last thing I want to do is admit I’m confused Alice: Mhm.Carrie: so I’m instead I’m going to find a way to distract myself or distract others so that I don’t have to face

the fact thatAlice: Mhm.Carrie: I don’t know how to do something.

Generalizing a teaching response…

Carrie: Um. So I always try to sympathize. I’ll feel myself

being mad, like “You guys aren’t working! What are you doing?” And

then I like try to take a step back and say, “Okay. What are they afraid of? Alice: Mhm.Carrie: “How can I make them feel comfortable with that fear?”Alice: Mhm.Carrie: “What can I say to them or what can I do for them to make them feel (pause) like this is a

safe place.”

Generalizing a stance to teacher learning

in and from practice…

Carrie: And that usually takes me somewhere where ––it never is fully successful—but I see some successes and then that translates into other days that become more successful.

PROBLEM OF PRACTICE

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RevisionsGenerative questions

Generalizations

Specifications

Generative questions

Comparing Group Routines

Routine for: Language GroupMath Group

Sharing lessons Walk-through“Following” &role play

Support re

Difficult classes

Sympathy; out-of-class advice

Observation &Consultation

Coordinating

teaching

Lesson pacing (same lessons on given day)

Discuss student progress & teaching decisions

Working together 1.5 hours/week1.5 hours/week

Professional

Development

IndividualCollective

Comparing Group Resources

Resource Language GroupMath Group

Ideological

Socio-cultural &cognitive

Material

Organizational

Interaction

Broad goal agreement; local disagreements

Sympathy; out-of-class advice

Early stage curriculum development; common tasks but weak link to goals

Autonomy without strategy

Division of labor; weak external ties, individual autonomy

Shared value commitments

Common perspective & language

Rich, coherent curriculum, student work, “lab gear”

Autonomy and strategy

Internal leadership, external ties, collective norms

What are the implications for practice?

• Introduce routines and other resources for focusing on student experience, student thinking, student experience

• Cultivate external ties and collective participation in professional development

• Foster norms and relationships consistent with “safe”public talk about complex problems of teaching and learning

• Create a more generous ratio of in-class to out-of class time

Connecting research and practice

An entire industry in the U.S. has sprung up to promote “teacher community” and specific practices like “lesson study”

Connecting research and practice

The good news: help in connecting research to practice

The bad news: inflated claims about research, and research that is a weak fit with the needs of practice

How might research contribute?

• Deepen and broaden workplace studies to focus onactual practice of teacher-to-teacher interaction — and the formation of teacher community

• Remedy the disciplinary divides — do more to integratethe contributions from psychology and organizational sociology

• Forge ongoing research-practice partnerships (and otherwise figure out more about the research-practice connection!)

Learning from Experience — Resources for Learning in

Teachers’ Talk about Teaching

Judith Warren Little

University of California, Berkeley

Leiden November 2007