Today, BPS has off for Good Friday. I took the opportunity to go to a yoga class. (I’ve just – just – started. Don’t judge.) I think yoga classes must be the approximate opposite of many public school classes, and certainly of mine most days. As we waited for other students to show up, as we started the class, as we moved through the poses, the teacher kept reminding us that there was “no rush.”
No rush!? Most classes I teach feel if not downright rushed, at least packed full. Will we finish the project in time? Will the students complete the classwork fast enough to have the full discussion? From the moment the bell rings until the end of class I am pushing students to do more. We don’t have time to waste, get to work right away! Finished early? Do this. Now this. You can go to the bathroom, but you’re going to miss out on the example/partner-work time/discussion. Let’s squash this side conversation immediately so we can get back to the math.
In some ways this seems good — we don’t want to waste students’ time. We want to be learning as much as we can. We want extensions for students who finish quickly. We want to expect lots of learning from every student. But in other ways, it feels unnecessary and inhuman. Does anyone benefit from packing every moment full? Do people do better work with time or with pressure? Probably a little of both. But for sure, nothing is actually so urgent about learning math that we should feel stressed, right? It’s not a crisis situation.
So one thing I’m thinking about is what it will look like when we focus less on learning all the topics we “have to learn” and instead focus more on learning, period, whether that be problem-solving, interpersonal, reflective, or social-emotional skills. I am imagining a classroom where not every day has to include a discussion. Where students can come back to the same rich problem several days in a row, deepening their thinking over time, working on the feedback pieces, the group interactions. Where I don’t feel guilty for talking to a student about her new baby sister or his life in Sri Lanka because on some days (many days?) there is no rush.
SL
langer.kogut.math 
I am really looking forward to the days that most of my classes have this feeling. I think if we design our curriculum to do more (things) with less (objectives) that we will be able to not feel super pressured to complete EVERYTHING and we will be able to have moments to get to know our students as people AND learners. We will be able to differentiate more, create more low-threshold, high-ceiling problems, and let students rise to the challenge of being experts.
While it seems crazy far away from where we are now, I often like to look back to our 2009-2010 work and reflect on the differences that we’ve already incorporated. We’ve made progress; we need to make more progress. Oh the tension.
I would just like to say that I love what you guys are doing and the way you are writing about it and I look forward to more, and it will be hard to keep up the pace but I hope you keep up some regularity.
love. love. love. you have said it so perfectly.