Dear Colleagues, As part of my class this semester on School Improvement I have to research and give a mini-course on something, pretty much anything, relating to School Improvement. My current personal learning focus is on how do we teach and empower adults to help children learn with Sugar. I am especially interested in the tension I see between the structured worksheet, lesson plan, standardized test and the free flowing follow your bliss and learn about what you love exploration models of teaching and learning. <ul><li>How do we support teachers who were taught in the worksheet model and have always taught that way to expand their practice to include a constructivist approach?</li><li>How do we support students, especially ones that are currently seen by the system as "low performing" and "not motivated" to go deep and engage at a high level with open ended tasks. Because the culture of fill in the blank worksheet is not just the teachers, the students will also push for concrete tasks with right and wrong answers.</li> <li>How do we support teachers and schools in bringing in open ended and student driven work within their culture of state mandated curriculum and high stakes tests?</li></ul> As some of you might be aware, I'm just a little busy right now, and this is supposed to be a 10 minute mini-class. I need to narrow this way down! Thus, I'm looking for advice on academic work you have read that you think speaks in a very practical way to any piece of this dilemma. Thanks! Caroline P.S. Not interested in just arguments against the status quo, no matter how right they are. My goal is in going into the existing systems in the very near future. Standing on a soap box saying we should get rid of standardized tests isn't going to help me meet my goals. I want practical techniques that we can teach to teachers, day care instructors and parents. -- Caroline Meeks Solution Grove Caroline@SolutionGrove.com 617-500-3488 - Office 505-213-3268 - Fax