Let them do it!

You just have to step back and get out of the way sometimes. It seems that students who are driven to learn will do all of the work if their teachers just get out of the way! I simply had to show my AP class a phenomenon today and told them to explore it and they went of to figure things out. All I did was to come around and ask a few questions about why they were doing things and what they were finding. They were still worried about being wrong when I was asking them questions but much less so when I simply told them to explore. Some of the students wanted to know what they were supposed to be measuring so I simply returned the ball to their court by asking what they could measure.

The most important part of the lab was the discussion afterwards. This is where I slipped a bit. I questioned them and had them talking to me and answering my questions. I have since thought "What about I ask what questions they have about the experiment? Then they can group a few groups together and discuss what they found with each other and ask each other questions. Maybe put a few questions on the board and have them discuss them." I should do this before taking down the lab equipment so that they can see and demonstrate what they were questioning. Then come back together as a class to pull it all together.

I am seriously thinking of running my next new topic in this manner. It seems that they are then allowed to fail and question themselves but with the support needed to bring everything together. They want to learn, I just have to learn to get out of their way.

Edit: I just spoke with a colleague and he started his class getting out of the way. So far, in fact, he left the classroom while I stay to observer the girls in action. It was a genetics class so I could not possibly interfere or answer any questions and the students took over and started asking each other questions and hashing out any misunderstanding from the webcast the previous evening. When they ran out of questions to ask each other, he came back in to make any adjustments and things started going back to teacher led discussion. Still a lot of discussion but more focused on the expert in the room. Perhaps the nature of Genetics?