A Balanced Instructional Diet

Teachers have so many expectations placed in front of them that their vision can become blurred.   Many schools and districts have encouraged the use of technology in classrooms above all other instructional strategies.  One local district went 1:1 in 2012 and mandated the use of IXL and Scootpad as a tool to monitor student and teacher use of technology.

If you've ever witnessed a student working on IXL, it is painful.  Students have to answer multiple questions based around a specific standard.  If the student receives an incorrect answer, their percentage of accuracy is bumped back down.  Many teachers require students to receive a 100% before a standard can be mastered.  I observed my primary aged daughter as she completed an IXL drill and practice session for homework.  This assignment took almost an hour for my child to overcome her tears and achieve a 100% on the assignment.  This session was not unlike the type of tasks that were completed in the classroom.

As an educator, many of us have missed the mark through the way that technology is utilized.  My daughter would have been better off to receive a worksheet with the same drill and practice questions.  If the assignment were on paper, we could have completed it together, discovered where the breakdown was occurring, and corrected these errors before the computer and timer made her feel defeated.  An hour of math work is not developmentally appropriate for a first grade student.  It is also not any more engaging than old school paper and pencil approaches.

The question is where have we missed the instructional mark.  Teachers should have the freedom to use a variety of instructional approaches to increase student engagement and help students struggle toward mastering a standard.  In mathematics, for instance, students should be given manipulatives or even a hundreds chart to help them use a concrete model for solving problems, such as addition and subtraction.  These tweaks would improve number sense, which is the ultimate goal for mathematics instruction in the primary grades.

I look at instructional approaches like that of a balanced diet.  Just as you would not want your students to eat sugary foods all day long, we should not be placing children in front of a computer for long periods of time and calling that instruction.  Classrooms need to have a balanced plate of hands on learning, games, student dialogue with peers, small group instruction lead by a teacher, and authentic uses of technology.

Teachers need to be given autonomy to analyze the needs of the students in their classrooms and determine the instructional approach that would best meet their student's needs.  High quality teachers are skilled practitioners.  Let's give them the space and support that they need to do what is best for students and offer a balanced instructional diet.