Teaching Our Boys "How to Think"

The following article by Alexis Aoyama, Saint David's Assistant Headmaster and Head of Upper School, appears in the latest issue of Saint David's Magazine:

At Saint David’s, we strive to educate boys to be scholarly and creative. As defined in the Headmaster’s opening letter, “scholarly connotes a boy of great knowledge and learning, an erudite, educated, lettered, literate, well-read boy.”(1) Through diligent study, reading a variety of genres, evaluation of primary sources from a range of perspectives, and close observation, boys develop their knowledge base and begin to make sense of the world around them. We also aspire for our students to be creative – boys who are “innovative, inventive, and original (as opposed to imitative).”(1) To nurture and develop the creative mind, we provide boys opportunities to apply what they have learned to novel situations, to think outside of the box, and to build and create. 

When designing curriculum at Saint David’s, we attend to both the scholarly and creative by immersing students in learning experiences that are designed to deepen their understanding and cultivate their thinking skills. Boys’ minds are not empty vessels we need to fill with knowledge or blank slates we need to fill with words — boys are at the center of their education, building, developing, and demonstrating their knowledge, skills, and understanding. Our job as educators is not to teach our students what to think; it is to teach them how to think. Teaching boys how to think lies at the nexus of the scholarly and creative.

This past summer, 24 of our Lower and Upper School teachers participated in a professional development seminar led by a learning consultant from Harvard and co-author of Making Thinking Visible, Mark Church, whom we have worked with for many years. Teachers learned about the elements of the Teaching for Understanding framework and corresponding thinking routines, and Mr. Church designed a series of exercises that inspired teachers to critically evaluate and strategically enhance their teaching based on the kinds of curricula, teaching, and assessment that support students’ understanding and the development of the scholarly and creative mind. Throughout the summer, curriculum teams received ongoing support and feedback from faculty coaches as well as Mr. Church as they reversioned a unit of study.

To springboard their thinking, each team participated in a week-long workshop in June where they considered what understanding looks like from a performance perspective. Students who deeply understand the subject matter are able to use what they know in a new context to solve a problem or answer a question that they have not seen before. They can explain, find evidence and examples, generalize, apply, make analogies, and represent a topic in a new way. In essence, they are able to use their scholarly knowledge creatively.

With a clearer vision of what understanding looks and sounds like, teachers were asked to consider what kinds of situations nurture understanding. Mr. Church used an extended metaphor of two contrasting environments — boats at dock and boats at sea — to illustrate the types of learning experiences we need to design to promote understanding. When working on boats at dock, there is lots of activity, there are not many variables, and there is little decision making or problem solving. When sailing boats at sea, there is lots of activity, there are lots of variables, there is lots of problem-identifying, lots of decision making and problem solving, and there is no recipe for “getting there.” Classrooms can look a lot like busy docks — students completing worksheets, identifying the elements of art, labeling parts of a cell. That’s not bad, unless students rarely get a chance to sail.(2)

When lessons involve “boats at sea,” students are asked to analyze a work of art or closely observe a 3D model of a cell to infer how its structure supports its function. To set up learning experiences that get students sailing, we use the Teaching for Understanding framework combined with thinking routines. Teaching for Understanding was developed by Harvard’s Project Zero; it is a model we use school-wide to conceptualize and design units of study. 

The framework puts understanding up-front, placing an emphasis on selecting generative topics that have depth, significance, connections, and perspectives. Guided by overarching throughlines, teachers and students pursue a few understanding goals they want to explore deeply as they dig into the topic. Sometimes these goals are worded as statements “students will understand” and often they are worded as questions that are shared with students. 

Examples of the understanding goals for the newly reversioned Eighth Grade art history unit “Elements of Art in the Early to High Renaissance” include: How can careful examination of the artwork’s details lead to a fuller understanding of its many layers of complexity? How do the works of art from the Renaissance reveal artistic innovation and historical change? In Eighth Grade science, as part of a newly reversioned unit on cellular biology, boys are asked to consider: How is a cell its own living system? (How is it part of a whole?) How does structure support or determine function in cells and organelles?

Performances of understanding are closely connected to the understanding goals. They make students’ thinking and learning visible, and they allow students to demonstrate their understanding in different ways. For instance, for the cellular biology unit, when boys are asked to explain or infer relationships between structure and function in cells and cell organelles by closely observing drawings and 3D models of their structure, teachers look for evidence in student work that demonstrates boys understand the direct relationship between the structure and the way it functions and that it is the form and function of every part of a living thing that allows it to survive. 

This introductory performance allows students to begin to grapple with the unit’s understanding goals. Subsequent performances of understanding are designed to deepen students’ understanding. “There is a continual process in place where teachers develop a clear sense of what students are understanding and what they need to push further on or lead into next.”(3) The assessment is ongoing and iterative, and gives shape to development of understanding.

Thinking routines involve the use of effective questioning, listening, documentation, and facilitative structures. These routines, designed by researchers at Harvard’s Project Zero, scaffold and support one’s thinking. Each routine is connected to one of the following ways we demonstrate understanding: making connections, wondering, uncovering complexity, capturing the heart and forming conclusions, building explanations, describing what’s there, considering different viewpoints, and reasoning with evidence. Thinking routines help deepen boys’ scholarly understanding and promote creativity as boys push their thinking to the next level.

Ms. Catherine Milligan and Mr. Drew Burton incorporated “The Story Routine: Main, Side, Hidden”(4) in their lesson about Duccio, Giotto, and Cimabue’s Maestàs. As boys closely observe these three works of art, they are asked to consider the main features, the side elements, and the hidden meanings of each work. 

The dialogue that ensues as students share their thinking promotes deeper understanding of the works as well as the unit-long understanding goal: How can careful examination of the artwork’s details lead to a fuller understanding of its many layers of complexity? By carefully examining an artwork’s details, boys can begin to appreciate it not only as a visual expression of an idea or emotion but also as a multi-faceted reflection of its culture or civilization. The scholarly discipline of looking closely, paired with a thinking routine, deepens boys’ understanding of the works and nurtures their creative minds by affording them the opportunity to share their original observations. 

In Eighth Grade science, as a culminating performance of understanding, boys partake in a “Leaderless Discussion,”(4) a thinking routine that allows students to own and drive the direction of a conversation and important topics and concepts. In preparation, boys read a series of scientific articles, prepare their points, and organize evidence. 

Teachers listen for students’ capacity to articulate perspectives and common ground with others around how technological and scientific advances in cellular biology have affected the way humankind views ourselves and the world, and their capacity to defend their point of view by citing evidence from shared texts. This routine increases student engagement in discussion and brings their thinking to the forefront. The boys develop their creative minds as they articulate their perspectives and make new connections.

Designing units based on the Teaching for Understanding framework while incorporating thinking routines, allows us to simultaneously attend to the scholarly and creative. Developing units and lessons in this manner requires time and opportunities for collaboration. Our summer grant program is essential for providing teachers with the resources they need to pursue initiatives aimed at improving the educational program, while simultaneously aiding in the professional development of the faculty. As a result of this programming, we can ensure boys have ample opportunities to “sail at sea.”

Citations
1. Headmaster’s Opening Letter, September 7, 2021
2. Mark Church’s slides, “Teaching for Understanding: Summer Grant Workshop Days.” June, 2021 
3. Mark Church’s slides, “Teaching for Understanding: Summer Grant Workshop Days.” June 15, 2020
4. The Power of Making Thinking Visible by Mark Church and Ron Ritchhart (2020)