Brainstorming about Next Year

Whenever I hit March, I begin to think about next year. I think there are a few reasons for this. One of them is the weather warms up my students get a little restless; I begin to have more discipline problems, which results in students not doing as well in class and I look for ways to improve them. So this year I have held firm to classroom rules and will not give in to students pushing boundaries in the Spring.

Another, and more important reason why the Spring evokes thoughts of change, is I have been able to see an analyze what a semester in my current model is like, and I want to change a few things. This blog post is for me more than anyone else. I just wanted to get out some of my thoughts about next year.

Definite Changes for Next Year
Assess Less, Learn More. I want to do away with quizzes. Currently we have two quizzes and a test each chapter. I am again embarrassed to say that we spend the same amount of time assessing as we do teaching. I want to do away with quizzes so I spend five or six days teaching and one day assessing.

This would also allow me more time to analyze the test for gaps in understanding and make plans on how to address those misunderstandings in the future (not when I hand back the test. Very few students are motivated to learn a concept that they missed on the test when I hand it back, so I need to come back to it later.)

Deeper than the Textbook. I would like to move past the textbook at some questions that push for deeper understanding. I don't know it will look more like the explore, flip, apply model, or contextualized problems, or integrated pure mathematics questions like Japanese teachers use.

Stricter Homework Policy. I will probably be flipped next year, like this year. I think I was too lenient on what happens if students don't come to class without having watched the video. So I will probably make it a policy that you can't get full credit if it isn't done by the next day.

Require More from the Summary. I have my students write a summary of the video when they are done. I want to do more with this. Maybe I will have them write it at the end of class, after they have had time to apply the ideas.

Possible Changes for Next Year
Throwing away the calendar. This year I have handed out a calendar on the first day of each quarter explaining exactly what will be done on each day of that quarter and we stick to that calendar. I don't know if I will do that next year. I want to be able to adjust to individual needs and spend an extra day on a topic if necessary.

Genius Hour. This year I have freed up about 11 academic days for a Genius Hour project at the end of the year. I have no idea how that is going to turn out. Maybe it will be the most amazing thing I have ever done and I will keep it, but I am almost planning on it failing and so I probably won't do it next year. This is a horrible way to go into something new, it is just that I usually fail the first time I do something. The question is will I come out of it determined to do it differently next year or determined to never do that again. We'll see.