In the TED Talk, "Let's Teach for Mastery, Not Test Scores," Sal Khan (My 2nd favorite behind Yoda) offers an amazing analogy at building a house in reference to mastery. You would not move to the first floor of building a house if the foundation wasn't fully set. You certainly would not move on to the second story if the foundation wasn't set AND the first floor was only 80% finished.
So why do we move students along when they have not fully mastered the material? I see this very often in our math classes. We lecture, give homework, go over homework the next day, lecture some more, more homework and so on for a few weeks until the assessment is given. If a student has earned an 80% they kind of celebrate - hey I got a B. What about that 20% of material they didn't show mastery on? This is going to rear it's head again. Even the 95% test earner still shows that 5% is unlearned. We are creating educational gaps that will bite these students hard, later on in their schooling. We need to be patient and wait out the curricular demands and pacing schedules and help students master the information before introducing something new.
Sal was speaking directly to me, as he normally does, when he mentions students who experienced learning gaps and attributed them to the "I don't have the math gene" and "I can't learn this" as excuses. This WAS me as a student and then as an adult it all changed when I matured and persevered. I loved mastering math and teaching math to students who feel like they just don't get it!
Now I just wish it wasn't a race the to the finish line!
Patience, you must have. - Yoda
Julie - Mastery you say? Yes, when will we be given permission to slow the train down and let everyone master the concept before going on? I hear you loud and clear and agree. I think this class has given me some of the tools I need to help kids to master the content. I'm really excited to try some flipped learning especially in math, so that I have time to help those who really need it and let those who want to be the conductors of the train zoom on. We'll see how it goes. My learning journey continues. I hope Yoda will be there with the force to help me:)
ReplyDeleteJulie,
ReplyDeleteYour comment that even if a student receives a 80%, that means 20% of the material is not mastered is powerful. Connecting this idea to math where we move on to many new skills and applications within a given week, and adding that the unmastered content will inevitably come back around, does cause for pause. I love the ideology of Mastery Learning and I think if grade level teams collaborate to work on a structure or pathway to follow, it could be possible to achieve. Through collaboration, one way teachers could divide the planning toward a mastery pathway is to create flipped lessons to fill in the gaps along the way. May the force be with us all!
Julie,
ReplyDeleteThe video really spoke to me in a similar way. The house building analogy really is perfect for what we are doing in math. There is no doubt that a house would fall down if 80% or less of each component was done correctly and no one would be surprised by that. When a student's math education falls apart after years of non mastery or partial mastery of building standards, everyone is surprised. I see teachers taking good steps to correcting this, but as a district we have a long ways to go.