Ready...?

Am I ready? You bet! Another new school year & new school classes. I was prepared and confident. I'd been in well before we were due back & had all my unit plans completed & was ready for that first lesson with each new class. However, there are always some things for which you can never be prepared.

I walked into my new year 8 class, excited to meet them, willing to get started & looking forward to seeing what I could do with a unit plan that I had spent considerable time reflecting on and ‘pimping’ over the holidays. But…… the first lesson wasn't great. In fact it was quite uncomfortable. It was almost like all 18 kids were new to the school and each other. I walked out of that lesson and couldn't stop thinking about the strange atmosphere. The next lesson I went in confident I could improve the dynamics and get on with the year. But it was similar to the previous lesson. No one was talking, despite opportunities to share and collaborate. No one was even mixing socially. This was the quietest class I had ever been in. What was going on? 

It got to a point where I asked the kids to pack up. We sat in a large circle ‘counselling style’ and I had to ask, “What's going on?” Again, no one spoke? After some serious cajoling and asking them to help me out, I finally got some answers. They were scared of being judged! Worried about getting the answers wrong. Concerned that if they shared an idea, thought or answer that someone might laugh. They were worried that if they were the person to answer the Q's, they'd be considered the goodie, goodie! I could not have foreseen this and certainly wasn’t prepared for it.

We spent the rest of the lesson breaking this down. We talked about the issues they raised. I was able to relate a lot of this to the Design Thinking process we use for solving problems within Design Technology. The fact that there often isn’t a right or a wrong. The fact that no idea is a bad idea. The fact that people like Albert Einstein, Thomas Eddison and Steve Jobs probably had their ideas laughed at, at some stage. It wasn’t much, but Finally …we had some discussion in the room!

I knew that next lesson I had to build on last lesson so we could have a learning space that everybody felt comfortable in …including me! Through a little Teacher persuasion I was able to get the kids to agree that we needed to set some rules to address these issues. But, I needed them to collaborate and all agree on them. Progress wasn’t fast. In fact it took the whole lesson but I was determined not to force this. It had to come from them. All of them! Eventually this is what they came up with.

1.      We should respect everyone’s ideas (Listen to them. Never laugh at them)

2.      We should all have to contribute equally (if everyone has a go we are all equal)

3.      We should work together (to be more comfortable and share the load)

4.      We need to understand that everyone is different and has different ideas (never laugh at them)

We were getting somewhere. I posed the questions “What if someone breaks these rules?” Did they need to be ‘Hard and fast’ Rules? Did they need to be ‘Rules?’ The discussion hovered around naming them something else. Standards? Guidelines? Things we respect? …ValuesJ They all agreed on ‘Values’ and we spent the rest of the lesson (collaboratively) writing these as values. This is what they became:

Year 8 Design Technology Values

1.      We value others’ Ideas

2.      We value others’ Contributions

3.      We value Teamwork

4.      We value Feedback

5.      We value Creativity

By the end of this lesson I had mixed feelings. I won’t lie and tell you the kids had turned a complete 180 degrees, but I do believe we had made progress. Each kid had contributed. Each kid had agreed that these would be our class values and I may have even sensed that this class was now ready to get started.

Personally, I was a little disappointed that I had spent three lessons to get to this point. I had a clear idea in my mind, where I wanted to be by now, but I was still at the starting line. It was only through discussion with a colleague that I realised I had in fact made significant gains. I had managed to start a Teacher/Student/class relationship that I could build on. I had set them a challenge that they had solved. I had started to teach Design Thinking without even realising. They had collaborated, shared, given feedback, ideated, developed and refined ideas. All key dispositions that we use and refer to in teaching Design Thinking. I also had a base from which I can launch the rest of my time with Year 8’s.

Was I ready for the new year? In hindsight no. However, as Teachers we have to be flexible and accept change every day in every lesson. It’s what we do. We also have to learn from every day and every lesson. Will I be ready next time? Who knows? But I’m confident I won’t underestimate this kind of situation next time.