Set big goals
Know exactly what success looks like
Set big goals
Students make dramatic academic progress when, from the very beginning, teachers develop a clear, ambitious vision of success. Highly effective teachers know exactly where they want their students to be by the end of the year and realize that a bold (and some might say crazy) vision of student success can actually drive student achievement.
Powerful, big goals that are measurable, ambitious, and meaningful (B-1) are developed by considering four questions:
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Develop a desire for academic success
Invest students & their families
Many highly successful teachers (and experts) boil the idea of student investment down to two factors: the students belief that they are able to achieve at high levels alongside their desire to do so. Or, stated more simply:
Student investment= "I can" x "I want"
For any endeavor, consciously or not, students are asking themselves "Can I do this?" and "Do I want to do this?". Your responsibility is to be sure that every student answers yes to both questions. Here are three key elements of doing so:
Create a welcoming
environment
Create a safe, welcoming environment (I-5) that fosters self-worth, compassion, shared responsibility and academic achievement.
Create a culture
of achievement
Offer relevant, appropriately challenging academic content
Maximize the impact of all these strategies by informing, involving and investing students’ families and other influencers (I-6)
How to get from there to here
Plan purposefully
Before taking any action, strong leaders ‐ be they in a board room, an operating room, or a classroom ‐ define the ultimate result they want, make clear how they will know they have succeeded and only then choose and design strategies to that end.
Think of purposeful planning ‐ for any type of plan, large or small ‐ as comprised of these three sequential principles:
Vision
First, develop a clear vision of success from which you can "plan backwards"
Develop a clear vision by setting big goals (B-1)
Assessment
Now ask yourself, "How will I know that my students have reached that vision"?
Plan
With the vision and assessment in place, you are now ready to design your plan.
How to differentiate your plans (P-4) to fit your students
Follo
Every action matters - the large and the small
Execute effectively
Effective execution happens in the details of our everyday work. It means we follow through on our actions, big and small, so that we are not just doing what we intend to do but are actually having the effect we intend to have. For strong teachers, effective execution means ensuring that everything we do contributes to the goal of student learning.
We see three general characteristics exhibited by strong teachers as they implement plans:
Do well what must
be done
Teachers must develop knowledge and skills that enable them to be effective executors: communication skills. management skills, pedagogical content knowledge, understanding of the community's cultural norms, etc.
Insist on seeing reality
Do students get it?
Are they engaged?
Are they meeting behavioral expectations?
Adjust course as
circumstances change
What adjustments, if any, do
you need to make to ensure that students achieve your vision of success?
you need to make to ensure that students achieve your vision of success?
These strategies manifest in six teacher actions that make up effective execution:
w this process for all types of plans, including:
- Long-term plans and unit plans (P-2)
- Lesson plans (P-3)
- Behavior management plans (rules and consequences) (P-5)
- Efficiency plans (procedures and routines) (P-6)
