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Lesson Study in Bellevue Schools
by Ann Oxrieder
A group of middle school math teachers -- Liz, Judy, Steve and Barb -- knows that the kids in their lower-level classes struggle to understand the concepts of slope and y-intercept, even after they're presented in the textbook and they have drawn the graphs to illustrate the point.
What do these teachers do to help their students overcome their dislike of graphing and grasp the content of the lesson? They start by defining exactly what they want their students to learn and how teachers will know that they have learned it. Not easy questions to answer when teachers first begin the work of Lesson Study, a term invented by the Japanese to describe the work done by teams of educators to refine their national curriculum, and a professional development model now being used in the Bellevue School District.
Nearly 200 grade-level or content-area teams in Bellevue have chosen a lesson they want to improve, which they identified by examining student work or by knowing where their students have failed in the past, and these teams are meeting regularly to plan lessons they hope will be more effective.
Teachers will testify that the toughest part of Lesson Study is defining the lesson objective, which is a narrative description that states the concept being taught, the knowledge, skills or concepts the learner will demonstrate and an explanation of how students will demonstrate learning. For our middle school math teachers, this means moving away from typical objectives such as, "Students will learn to identify the slope and y-intercept in a linear equation," to more specific ones," Students will learn that the concepts of slope and y-intercept are recognizable and distinguishable components of any linear equation. More specifically, students will identify that if a constant term is added to a linear equation, that constant indicates the beginning value of that equation when the independent variable is set equal to zero." The objective goes on to describe the content of the lesson, and what students will be able to state and demonstrate at the end of the lesson.
Lesson Study teams may muck around awhile before they actually chose a lesson to focus on and while they're trying to write a clear objective. Once they have settled on an objective, an assessment, and activities, they test out the lesson. Under ideal circumstances, for example, when one member of the Lesson Study team has a planning period during the time another is trying out the new lesson, one teacher can observe another delivering the new lesson. The team regroups after that and talks about what worked and what didn't. Eventually they have a new lesson they're ready to share with colleagues. With an okay from the appropriate subject-area specialist, the lesson is posted on the web for others to use and to share their feedback after their own trials. Thus, the new lessons will support the district's curriculum.
Lessons that are approved for the district website are called Blue Ribbon Lessons and they earn a $1,000 bonus for the team that created them.
Lesson Study takes place on Wednesday afternoons, though, like all significant work to improve teaching, spills over into other days, evening and weekends. Starting in September 2000, the district began releasing students early on Wednesdays, which gives teachers a two-hour chunk of time to do this, each and every week, along with other staff development activities. Also, teachers who work with colleagues on Wednesdays receive supplemental pay.
Each school has Lesson Study leaders -- two per elementary and five per secondary -- who meet regularly to bolster their own skills and provide support to teachers in their buildings. All are learning about Lesson Study by trying it themselves. "It's not easy," says Liz, who is also a Lesson Study Leader. "Teachers are working in collaboration with others for the first time, colleagues with whom they've never worked before. And we have multiple demands on the Wednesday afternoon time slot."
The slope-intercept lesson is over. Liz and Judy have taught it to three groups of students while Barb and Steve observed. They're all pleased with the results. More students seem to have understood the concept this year than in the past, though the teachers will have to study the assessments before they know for certain. This first stab at Lesson Study is almost complete and these teachers say it wasn't just the kids who learned something new. Judy says, "We focused on a specific piece, but to get to that place we had to give a thoughtful and analytical look at the entire unit. I taught a lot of things very differently every step along the way." Liz echoed her comments. "I've done a complete 180 about how I feel about Lesson Study. I was sort of distressed about all this planning for one day and one lesson. Yet, as a result, I taught the whole unit better." Steve summed the experience up this way, "It's made us pay attention to everything, because you have to see all the pieces come into focus and it makes teaching this lesson very rich."
Ann Oxrieder is the Director of Communication, Assessment, Special Projects for Bellevue School District. She has been an administrator in Bellevue for 16 years. She, like all of Bellevue's central office staff, is a member of a school's lesson study team, in this case a group of middle school math teachers, and is documenting the group's work, with the help of the district's videographer.
Lesson Study Contacts: Ann Oxrieder, anno@bsd405.com; Assistant Superintendent Jan Zuber, zuberj@bsd405.com or Curriculum Director Kathee Terry, terryk@bsd405.com
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