Camp Week Chronicles: Working in Centers / Student Lead Learning

Yesterday was a pain lot of fun. Thankfully Yet, today we are back to the original plan of working in stations. I have several stations set-up around the room: History, English/Language Arts, Art, Math, and Science.

I am thrilled that I am actually able to work with my students (pictured to the left.) These are the students who were not able to go to camp this week for one reason or another. A couple had parents that believed it was not safe (which I fully agree with) and others who just thought that there was no academic credibility to the program and didn't want their children to be away from them for five days. I actually had a parent say that there was no reason for a child to be away from their family for a week unless there was real academic credence to the work. (Of course this was all said in Arabic because he is not fluent in English yet.

I find it funny that the students didn't argue or moan about what was being asked of them. They liked that they were able to pick what to work on and to what degree they wanted to put effort in. Most are done with at least one or two of the tasks. They just dove in and are really enjoying themselves. 

My ones who need enrichment are able to push further than the others. The ones that need help aren't fighting a whole class for my attention. They're all busy and learning!

The idea behind student lead learning is that students are able to guide themselves. When a child reaches middle school they are bucking the system just to make decisions on their own. They want to grow-up faster. (Poor naive things.) This lends itself well to that want to make decisions. I am noticing that my students who struggle try the easy stuff first and then work towards the harder stuff. My students who are ahead start with the harder stuff and finish with the easier stuff. One even said, "I'm getting my work out of the way so I can have fun later while they're still trying to figure it out."

They need to have the ability to make decisions. While the activities are structured to what they need to be doing, they are still working hard and able to get my attention quickly for help. I am better able to differentiate (or teach at different academic and learning levels.)

Since there is no school for students tomorrow, Thursday we're going to take a few minutes to talk about hyperbole and some grammar. They have a hands-on project to do for both. I'm excited to see where this takes them and I am trying to see how I can incorporate these stations in my classroom full-time starting next week.