05.13.16Sarah Fischler’s Fifth Grade ‘Teaching Assistants’
Sarah Fischler is a science teacher at North Star Academy in Newark. She’s one of our seven TLaC Fellows this year. She recently shared with us a video of a great system she’s implemented: classroom TAs. The system allows her to keep kids productive and give them agency over their work but also to spend her own time in the classroom more efficiently and check for understanding even more efficiently. It’s a bit like a combination of the Front Table and Affirmative Checking.
Here’s a video she made of the system in action:
What’s most impressive and most important about the system is the installation. Hopefully as you watch Sarah’s video you are thinking–“OK, that probably took a ton of work to implement that system. If I tried to just tell my kids they were going to be TAs tomorrow the results would not look like this.” If that’s what you thought you were right. But that’s why the best part of this blog post is what comes next: Sarah shared the details of her implementation- notes on all the things that happened in the weeks leading up to this clip to make it possible.
Here’s what she sent (You’ll definitely want to read the whole thing but please also note there are additional resources at the end):
When rolling out a new system, especially one this intricate, I took it step by step. The first step was ensuring that a strong culture of error foundation thrived in our classroom. From trading/grading partner papers to frequent show calls of student work, I was very intentional about normalizing error. My ultimate goal was to have students see an error and see an opportunity to use it come out with stronger work in the end. That was incredibly important.
Second, I set out to lay a strong foundation of students giving feedback to other students. They did this constantly in writing and re-writing throughout the year, both privately, student-to-student, and publicly during show calls. In student discussion, I was careful to build ‘habits of discussion’ and encourage students to speak directly to their peers and be explicit whether they agreed or disagreed develop a culture of camaraderie and get students comfortable with constructive disagreement. We did these things for weeks and the more we practiced, the stronger their skills became. Students looked forward to lively debate and began to focus on the process of developing a strong an answer instead of just the answer itself.
Once these foundations felt solid, I introduced the idea of “student checkers.” Simplicity was key. I wanted to normalize the idea of students checking one another’s work. At the outset, any students could ask to check – if they thought they the work completed and all correct, they could put up their thumb. I would check it, and if they were accurate, they could check others papers using their own as an exemplar. I did this with do nows, classwork, and small bursts during extended independent practice. I stood in the front to monitor student interactions. If any student-checker was off-task, they were asked to sit, losing dollars on their paychecks (our behavior management system) for the infraction. “Please take -$3 from Janai for being off-task as a student checker. Janai, take a seat. Jordyn, please stand and check column 3.” With the public exchange, it became well-known that any student might be called to relieve an off-task student checker at any moment. This knowledge strengthened my classroom management tremendously as the entire class instantly became understudies for the leading role.
We spent several more weeks building this system and embedding the culture that comes with it. For example, if any student checkers demeaned the work of a peer or disrespected them, the protocol was the same – you were replaced by another checker. My kids were really motivated to become checkers. The speed with which they worked increased – I found that I needed to add more challenge questions at the end! If students were not correct the first time, they learned quickly to go back, fix their own errors, and put their thumb up again. They improved at balancing speed with accuracy, and when I said “go” on a batch of independent practice or a do now, there was the immediate scratching of pencil to paper.
The final step — where the student checkers became teaching assistants (TAs)–was the hardest. I knew I had to be much more systematized in how in implemented it. First I lowered the number of checkers to 4 to make it manageable –I could watch my checkers carefully make sure everything went correctly. Watch TA took a column of students. I previewed this new system for the class. Explaining what to do and carefully modeling correct TA behaviors.
“Scholars track me. Today we are graduating from student checkers to teaching assistants (or TAs), just like they have in college. [Silent excitement ! Back in STAR] Anyone can become a TA for the class, so if you’re not selected today, don’t be discouraged – don’t be… [call and response] discouraged. The first four students whose work is complete and correct will be asked to TA. We’ll use the same procedure we used with checkers, except that you will first come up and get a clipboard, a pen and a TA answer key.” The clipboard had an exemplar on it and a key, a sort of checklist for what to look for on the problem. TAs would put student initials in two different columns: one for correct, another for incorrect.
I explained this piece of the system individually to the TA’s when they were selected each day, since it was new and I was worried it was too much to explain at once to the whole class. I also instituted an accountability system for the TAs right from the outset. “When I call ‘TA Check,’ the TAs should all come back to me so I can check your work.” This helped me keep them accountable while doing other work. And this was important because being able to do other work was a big reason why I build this system. I wanted to have more time to work with my most struggling kids.
So right before a batch of independent practice I would say, “If I call your name, bring your paper and pencil to the front.” At this point, I called for my scholars who had struggled on the last Interim Assessment (or perhaps a quiz/test/exit ticket). Because we have a culture of error, this felt normal to them. I didn’t tell them why they were there – we just worked. I cold-called students to do the heavy lifting through different parts of the question and talk through parts they didn’t understand. They were able to ask each other questions as well. If a student mastered part of the skill, I would have them teach it to the rest of the small group which allowed me to monitor the class or do a loop while the small group completed the skill. It’s important that students find success in different aspects of the skill – they may not be good at everything, but the opportunity to teach a small aspect they’ve mastered is incredibly powerful. The TA system allowed me to make this investment in these kids. I think that’s important. I was always reminded how much work it was to get this system up and running, so the payback in how I used my time had to be really big.
During a TA Check, I scan the data. This doesn’t just hold the TAs accountable. I use the data, identifying struggling students I might have missed to invite up to the front to work with me. Or I might choose to stop work session and address a persistent error most students were making with the whole class. If no such data appeared, the TAs would back to work. At the end of the independent work, I collect all TA papers and student work to ensure accuracy, and to analyze the data a bit deeper.
Some additional resources:
Class Map for TA – 5th Grade Science.
