Mr. Rennie's Class

  Well I came to a couple understanding this past week, First, the learning logs have been meeting all my expectations. Student's reflections have provided closure at the end of lessons, a meaningful bridge to start lessons and connect to previous lessons, a chance to hold learning and ideas over time and of course the metacognitive act of really thinking and processing ideas about content and self. This week I realized what a powerful device they are to foster formative and self assessment. I'm able to see who grasped a concept on paper or hear their words of understanding or confusion during their debrief with partners. It is a great saver of time to just cruise through the class, keeping my ears open and listening for the general tone of either "we've got this" or "Uhhhhh, what?"This had been a real help to my in the moment practice of when to stop, regroup and reteach the whole group or just certain small groups in the room.

  A very powerful event that showed a real community maintenance role for logs took place as well. A student in our class was upset over the treatment they received outside. They were sworn at, called names and excluded from a playground activity. The child was discovered crying alone behind the school. Instead of a meeting, or lecture we got out our logs and responded to the prompt, "Tell all about a time when you were treated badly and left out. How did you feel?"The responses were universally fluent. Some students wrote and wrote. After ten minutes the students shared with a partner. We then wrote all the emotion words from the logs on the board. It showed how common the experience was, how everyone had been there. Only then did we talk about what had happened to our classmate. Some kids were mover to tears. I heard a few others say things like "that sucks", "that's awful" or "I feel terrible". It was a very meaningful way to get to the heart of the matter and have a real, honest discussion about it that they could all connect to. Overll the integration of the logs into our routines has been awesome.