Key points
- Tatem et esed quos sit volut eni met que poris maiorrore eosam sinveli asinus ulparunt. Neque cust doloribus ut a quos ipsa dunt et lam quameni mperundae est sincimus.
- Explore the role of video in developing models of practice excellence.
- Identify the limitations of describing specific techniques in a job so complex as teaching.
The participation problem
Participation is essential because learning is hard
Student participation impacts what students learn. It is students (not teachers) who need to wrestle with the content/concepts/skills of the curriculum. It is students (not teachers) who need to routinely verbalise their thinking, explaining what they understand and determining (along the way) what they are yet to master. As much as we’d sometimes like to, teachers cannot learn for students. It is the students who must expend the most effort and energy for learning to stick over time.
Better participation allows for responsive teaching
Participation is inextricably linked to belonging
Participation is also important for student wellbeing; it generates a sense of belonging. It is terribly hard to build a great learning culture when some students have checked out, when they have disconnected from their teachers and peers, when they exist at the fringes of a class they are not a part of, when they feel unseen. Schools that care about student wellbeing should prioritise systems for securing participation from everyone. If we care about student agency and wellbeing, we cannot accept students falling through the cracks.
Participation provides opportunity for rehearsal
Students require rehearsal of thinking to make sense of new content and concepts. If a student is learning to conjugate the verb avoir in the present tense, they are going to need a lot of practice at that! We know that once is not enough for most children we teach. If we can ensure that all students are participating, we are more likely to be giving more students the crucial rehearsal they need for learning to stick over time.
Participation opens the door for more
Students who participate most probably get the most from their teachers. Those who participate more are more likely to receive more feedback (“Good, but you forgot the units there. Go again, with units”). On balance, these students probably get more behaviour-specific praise (“Inconsolable! What a lovely use of our target vocab word”). Every little skerrick of participation opens the door for more – and it is sometimes the students who participate the least who need the most.
Discussion prompts
- What are participation rates like across your school?
- How do you talk about participation? Why is it important to your aims?
- What are the most common reasons students opt-out or get “lost” in the classroom?
- What does it look like when students are slipping through the cracks?
- What are the characteristics of instruction where participation rates are the highest?
- What is it that teachers are doing to secure participation from more students?
