Fascinating Questions, Unique Results, Enhancing Dialogue: Learning Styles, the Road to the Revolution, and 7-1 Students

As we close a week of monumental change, equally powerful strides were taken in the realm of our writing assessments. The pullout sessions were extremely compelling. A small group of learners met in the team area, and a discussion about their specific learning style emerged. More interestingly, I conducted each pull out session as a teacher of that learning style. At one moment, I was “The Captain” and at the next moment, “Socrates” ran a forum. While “Charity” led a talk and “Picasso” strove to establish voice and find meaning. Students were able to ask questions, seek clarification, and note subtle differences between learning styles, teaching demeanors, and assignment expectations. To have concluded the week with a rousing scene from the film Pleasantville, and hearing the sounds of dialogue, dissonance, and discourse emerge from the 7.1 Team Area was a moment that represented the idyll to which all teachers aspire.
In a larger scope, I must stress how powerfully compelling this lesson on learning styles has been. I think it has been a gamble that has paid very substantial dividends. I sense that it has reached students who have normally remained forgotten, and allowed more students to have a greater understanding of how they learn and how their minds work. This has been a powerful experiment in what can happen when we, as educators, seek to broaden the paradigm of schoolwork to incorporate the role of metacognition within our teaching. The inversion of a product based setting to one that focuses on process can be quite rewarding. In the final analysis, taking a risk in teaching and learning can prove to be an experience worth repeating as often as possible.
At this point, we are in the process of assembling drafts. I implore all stakeholders to encourage students to submit multiple rough drafts in order to gain a better understanding of how writing can be enhanced. I do hope that students take advantage of the rough draft process in order to help writing skills improve. When we create better writers, we invariably create better thinkers and emerging scholars.
All final drafts are due on November 20. We are heading into the final ten days. In addition to this, students will be given Social Studies and Language Arts Progress Reports this Thursday, 10/13. Signed cover letters will be due back to Mr. Kannan or Ms. Hill by Tuesday, 11/18. As always, if students require personalized meetings to discuss their writings, they are free to seek me out during lunches, advisory times (pending permission), during Core Extension (pending permission), and through notes, email or phone call (pending permission on the last two.)
Happy hunting.
Mr. Kannan