After teaching virtually during the pandemic most teachers thought it couldn’t get any worse than that. Much to the contrary the 2021-22 school year was notably the hardest year I have had to teach, and I’ve heard the same thing from many other teachers. With that year well behind us, the teachers that stuck around for the 2022-23 school year had the new mindset we would be back to normal this school year. I mean last school year we were building the plane while flying it at top speed. We were having to learn how to adjust to full-size classes back together while keeping everyone socially distanced because we were still amidst a pandemic. Classrooms were being shut down every week or so due to exposure to Covid, students had suffered learning loss during virtual learning, and everyone was learning how to be social once again. The 2022-23 school year had to be better than that, right? Now that we are about seven weeks into the school year a lot of teachers are already feeling burnt out. Why, you ask? Because we are still learning how to teach amongst an ever changing playing field. The pandemic and the lockdown that ensued for nearly 2 years created new social norms for children and adults alike, everyone had adapted to spending more time on screens and less time having to sit still and listen. This school year has its own unique challenges that include reduced attention span, the need for new and innovative approaches to learning, and resetting boundaries and social norms within a classroom setting. Teachers and administrators are not shocked that assessment scores and classwork alike are showing that students have fallen behind in all subject areas. The kicker is; teachers can no longer function as a general education teacher within the classroom. You want to know what I mean by that? Teachers now serve as interventionist and have to ensure they incorporate all of the elements of the universal design of learning in every lesson they teach. How can a teacher be in charge of 30 or so learners while functioning like an interventionist? This year is proving to be just as tough as the few previous years. Here are a few tips on incorporating UDL and specialized instruction to meet the needs of the vast array of learning levels within one classroom setting:
The eight minute rule is out the window
Previous research has shown that children had an attention span for 7 to 8 minutes of listening. It is seeming as if this number has been halved. With this being the case teachers are having to facilitate and get their teaching points across in a much shorter frame of time. How is this possible when 7 to 8 minutes seemed short as it was? Well, chunking! We teach the strategy in reading often, but utilizing the chunking strategy as a teaching tool seems like a win-win. The students win because they get to hear the most important element of instruction in a shorter frame of time and get hands on practice more often, and the teacher wins because the students are learning. Chunking instruction into such short bits of time will take front loaded planning. After Giving 4 to 5 minutes of instruction allow the students to do a partner talk or a hands-on activity based on what you just showed them. And then return back to the next chunk of a 4 to 5 minute piece of information. This also allows for a lot more hands-on time which seems to be the favorite style of learning these days.
Hands-on it is
Teachers have been including hands-on activities within their lessons for ages. The chunking strategy listed leads to having more opportunities for students to have a hands-on approach. This could mean manipulatives for everyone versus manipulatives only for those with an IEP or 504. This could also mean reading windows, pointers, highlighters, sticky notes, place value chart, multiplication charts, and the list goes on. Other hands on approaches May include the use of clay or beads, or anything that ties in with the lesson and the skill that was explicitly taught. Have fun with this one! But don’t forget when using hands on tools you do have to spend some time Preplanning and pre-teaching the proper use of those items.
The new wave of technology
It shouldn’t have taken a pandemic for us to venture into the world of virtual teaching and learning. The need for more technology inside of the classroom was a long-standing discussion. Just because we are now back in the classroom doesn’t mean we should leave the technological side of learning behind. This could mean using strategies in your lesson that include recording a response on Flip Grid, conducting a phonics activity or word sort on Google slides, or even listening to a book or watching a video tied in with the lesson topic and typing a written response. I think we all learned including more technology is super helpful. Not only are we gearing up our children for future success by incorporating more technology, but we are also captivating their attention. Let’s face it, learners seem more engaged when it comes to technology than they do listening to us lecture and facilitate.
It takes a lot of front work to colorcode vowel patterns or word family patterns on index cards as well as prepping the connected text with that particular phonics skill. Planning for some students to be able to do a virtual retell of the story while others are filling in a paragraph frame that is color-coded, all while another group of students is independently writing their retell seems insane. That’s like 4 separate teaching session! These are all things we as educators were already doing. However, we may have only been utilizing and employing some strategies for one or two students based on the interventions and skills that work best for them. Now we are finding ourselves scaffolding and creating leveled work for the same lesson for 30+ students (individualizing for everyone). Jack of all trades master of none, I think not!
In summary teachers are now expected to operate as interventionists within their classroom setting. This is a good thing for all of our learners because they will be exposed to multiple modalities and types of learning. They will be able to pick up various strategies throughout one lesson. Their attention will be captivated with shorter spurts of information given. Technology will be utilized more often to enhance the learning experience. But what one has to realize is that a teacher is being asked to follow curriculum with Fidelity, while having no planning time inside of the school hours because that time is absorbed by meetings etc., and newfound behavior problems have to be managed appropriately before learning can even begin. That is why an interventionist is a separate job from a classroom teacher. Whether you are a parent, an educator, an administrator, or just someone interested in the topic that is reading this blog please extend grace to your classroom teacher. It may seem as if all of the items mentioned here should have been taking place already. Much to the contrary, there was always scaffolding and differentiation that took place within a given lesson but the magnitude and specialization that it is now required every single day is a new level of expectations and workload for the general Ed teacher. Teachers I see you working hard strategizing for all of your students in order to meet them where they are and help them learn in the style that suits them best.
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