Inservice15Making Lessons Meaningful

PURPOSEWe all hear it over and over . . . if lessons are meaningful to students, they willwant to participate and will be more likely to connect with the material or skills.This improves their chances of learning and succeeding. There’s no controversyin education regarding the importance of teaching in a way that facilitatesa connection between the subject matter and the life experiences of students.We all know that this is important. We all know that it works. So why aren’t weall doing it?

Remember that many teachers teach the way they were taught. That can begood or bad, depending on how they were taught. But many, many teacherscontinue to teach in ways that are not effective in today’s world. For some, it’s allthey know. Others are aware that there’s a more effective way, yet it’s difficult forthem to leave their comfort zones. Today you’ll be helping all your teachers take

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some new risks, rethink what meaningful learning entails, and make their lessonseven better than they currently are.

INSERVICEBegin by leading a brief discussion based on the following questions and ideas:

� Is it important that the lessons you teach hold meaning for your students?

� Are you interested in learning about things that hold no meaning for you? Forinstance, if you are a first-year teacher and you learn that there is a meetingafter school today regarding teachers’ retirement, will you be motivated toattend? No? But what if the speaker at the meeting is excellent? Still notinterested? Technically, this could affect you thirty years down the road. Butisn’t it true that you can’t even concern yourself with things a year ahead rightnow? Chances are good that you won’t be attending this meeting.

� Would you agree that any one of us is more likely to pay attention and giveour best efforts to a task that holds personal meaning or value?

� What are some approaches you take in your own teaching to ensure thatlearning is meaningful to your students? (Let them share a few ideas.)

Next, have your teachers decide which of these lessons or activities wouldlikely hold more meaning for their students:

1. An activity that asks students to underline the nouns in given sentencesorAn activity that asks students to attempt to speak without using any nouns

2. A lesson in which the teacher has students study the definitions of Newton’slaws of motionorA lesson in which the teacher and students study and discuss how the laws ofmotion apply to football or to playing video games

3. Listening to a lecture about a historical figure, taking notes, and then beingtested on facts about that personor

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Conducting research to compare the historical figure to themselves, pre-dicting how that person would act if he lived in our world today or deter-mining how that figure actually did impact life as students know it today

4. An activity in which students study probability by rolling a given set of diceorAn activity in which students use probability (as it relates to meteorology)to determine which month or week would be best to have an outdoor classparty

Now have teachers share four or five meaningful learning activities they arecurrently incorporating in their lessons.

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

Thank them for sharing. Be sure to express enthusiasm for their creative ideas.By doing this, you are validating those who are willing to contribute and sharetheir ideas, and you are helping make less effective teachers aware that what theyare doing might not be effective.

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70 The Ten-Minute Inservice

IMPLEMENTATIONPair teachers of like subject areas and give them the following assignment:

Discuss, with your partner, ideas for five new ways of taking lessons that youalready teach and making them more meaningful to the lives of your students.When you have come up with five, add them to the master document that will beposted online. Be sure to post your ideas by [date].

Note: If you don’t want to post the document online, then simply tell theteachers where the master copy will be located so that they can add their ideas bythe deadline.

If you think their bags of tricks are getting bulky, we can hardly wait for you toconduct Inservice 16, “Fifty Ways to Make Learning Fun.”

Notes

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