I see many students in my room from year to year and day to day. They are all bright in their own way. Some students are gifted with communication and can explain ideas with depth and clarity. Other students are gifted in athletics and are running marathons at the age of ten and competing nationally in soccer matches. Furthermore, other students are the most caring and empathetic humans that I have ever met. They are young but they can connect, lead by example, make friends easily and glide through social situations easily and freely. And some students just view math and numbers differently than others. You can call it giftedness or logic or an obsession with the order of things, but the connections are deep.
Most of my students are excellent at the "I do, we do, you do" model. If I show a student how to approach a problem, they can copy it, solve it accurately and move on. Their work in neat and correct usually and they tend to win competitions in math if they enter them, do well in school, are tutored on the side, and will be super successful in life.
The tricky part is that in SAGE and PEP, we do not teach in this manner in order for students to learn to be true collaborators and problem solvers. What does your student do when they encounter a problem they have not seen before? Do they have the tools to solve it? Does your student ask peers for advice, draw models and pictures to understand it at a deeper level, try new ideas out, build tables, and seek solutions or do they stare at the board and problem and wait until the adult or teacher tells them what to do?
In my role, I am teaching students to be resilient and solve their problems. In life, there is not always a person who knows how to solve the problem and students need to know the process of figuring out solutions for themselves.... both academically and socially. I believe it is imperative for students to learn how to navigate friendship problems, sibling dilemmas, and academic needs independently, for it is in the productive struggle that they learn who they are, learn self confidence and learn to accomplish hard tasks.
I will help guide students in trying different techniques out when they do not know an answer, but I will not solve the problem for them and show them how to do it. Sometimes this guidance looks like a growth mindset video. Other times, it is a suggestion to go and talk to a neighbor. Finally, it might look like a question, "What would a picture of this scenario look like?"
Problems arise as children and we continue to face obstacles throughout our lives. We are constantly finding new problems solving them, creating new problems, solving them, and so forth. The cycle does not end as one solution inevitably causes a new problem. I believe it is our duty as parents and educators to give students and children the tools to solve their own problems in order to produce and raise productive, kind, helpful members of society. I will continue to gently nudge my kiddos towards this outlook, even when it is hard, again and again.
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