Chapter 1. Teacher Persistence

• Define teacher persistence.
• Explain why teacher persistence is the key disposition of Star Teachers.
• Analyze the ways in which Star Teachers think about their commitment to learners and their efficacy as teachers.
• Explore the classroom environments and problem-solving approaches of Star Teachers.

Interstate New Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium (InTASC) Standards

Standard #2: Learning Differences

The teacher uses understanding of individual differences and diverse cultures and communities to ensure inclusive learning environments that enable each learner to meet high standards.

Standard #4: Content Knowledge

The teacher understands the central concepts, tools of inquiry, and structures of the discipline(s) he or she teaches and creates learning experiences that make the discipline accessible and meaningful for learners to assure mastery of the content.

Standard #5: Application of Content

The teacher understands how to connect concepts and use differing perspectives to engage learners in critical thinking, creativity, and collaborative problem solving related to authentic local and global issues.

Standard #6: Assessment

The teacher understands and uses multiple methods of assessment to engage learners in their own growth, to monitor learner progress, and to guide the teacher's and learner's decision making.

Standard #8: Instructional Strategies

The teacher understands and uses a variety of instructional strategies to encourage learners to develop deep understanding of content areas and their connections, and to build skills to apply knowledge in meaningful ways.

Defining Persistence

What pushes some people to keep trying, to never give up, even when the conditions suggest defeat? Persistence, also known as tenacity or grit, is defined as continuing to strive toward a goal in the face of challenges. It is perseverance with a passion for attaining long-term goals. Persistence is a noncognitive dimension of a person's character, a disposition or a habit of mind operationalized through problem solving.

Though the terms resilience and persistence are often used interchangeably, they in fact have different meanings. As Grotberg explains, resilience is the "human capacity to face, overcome, and even be strengthened by experiences of adversity."¹  Highly resilient individuals are reactive to setbacks in their personal or everyday life, but come out of them as more efficacious people. By contrast, persistence is a proactive personal attribute linked to professional action and goal setting. (We will delve more into teacher resilience in Chapter 6: Surviving in a Bureaucracy.)

We need only look at the inspirational quotes plastered on so many office walls—"Patience, persistence, and perspiration make an unbeatable combination for success" (Napoleon Hill); "Success is the result of perfection, hard work, learning from failure, loyalty, and persistence" (Colin Powell)—to understand how desirable a quality persistence is. Most of us can point to instances in our everyday lives of skilled individuals who seem to have an especially high level of stick-with-it-ness in their chosen field, exercising persistence to achieve goals despite extraordinary odds.

Persistence has long been tied to success in the workplace. Business literature with titles like Executive Toughness and Stick with It highlight persistence as key to professional success. It takes persistence to evolve, acquire competencies, and explore opportunities that develop over time. In comparison with individuals who give up easily when they face hardships, people who persist at any effort further refine their skills and develop expertise.

Kelley, Matthews, and Bartone examined the predictive power of grit and hardiness among a cohort of 1,558 West Point cadets, finding these noncognitive characteristics to be major factors in attrition: the less gritty and hardy the cadets, the likelier they were to drop out. Specifically, the authors found grit to be a differentiating factor between cadets who left West Point early (M = 3.98) and those who persisted through graduation (M = 4.08) (see Figure 1.1). "Conceptually, grit has an obvious link with the demands required for successful performance at West Point," they wrote. "Grit, or ‘firmness of character,’ is synonymous with fortitude or courage and is the essence of what the Academy sustains and builds in its cadets and graduates."²  These findings suggest that cadet officers, who develop as professionals through trial and error, may be readily identified by their grit scores.

Figure 1.1. Grit as a Predictor of Graduation Among West Point Cadets

Teacher Persistence

An online search of the phrase teacher persistence leads to innumerable studies on teacher attrition, teacher retention, and job satisfaction—but few studies on teacher persistence. We define teacher persistence as a disposition manifested in the day-to-day actions of a teacher pursuing an outcome directly related to improving student achievement. This is in line with Haberman's definition of persistence in teaching as the mindset and behavior of a teacher who continues to support learners in a committed way through creative problem solving.³  For Haberman, persistence is at the heart of the seven dispositions of Star Teachers, helping to maintain and actualize the other six

(see Figure 1.2). Persistence determines whether the teacher can sustain fallibility and be vulnerable with students; protect student learning regardless of cost; retain practices that reflect sound theory; preserve a healthy approach to students identified as being at risk; maintain a professional orientation toward student-teacher relationships; and avoid burnout. If learners are to achieve their full potential, teachers must exhibit persistence even in the face of repeated instructional failures, never giving up on their learners.

Figure 1.2. Haberman's 7 Dispositions of Star Teachers

Persistence and Teacher Quality

According to the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA),⁴  all children in the United States are to be taught in the core academic subjects by "effective" teachers. Among many others, Wheatley suggests that persistence is crucial to teacher effectiveness because it "may promote high expectations for students, development of teaching skills, teachers' reflectiveness, responsiveness to diversity, teaching efficacy, effective responses to setbacks, and successful use of reformed teaching methods."⁵ 

Substituting grit for persistence, Robertson-Kraft and Duckworth⁶  analyzed two longitudinal studies of nearly 500 novice teachers assigned to elementary, middle, and high schools in low-income districts, measuring factors such as grit, leadership, academic credentials, and teacher performance. Their findings show that novices who demonstrated sustained passion and perseverance in activities prior to becoming teachers were more likely to stay in the profession and prove effective during their first year on the job. The authors defined effective teachers as those who make, on average, "a year's worth of progress according to published norms" and less effective teachers as those for whom "student progress falls short of the target."⁷  In their study, the mean grade-point average (GPA) of students with effective teachers (3.59) was nearly identical to that of students with less effective teachers (3.60). Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) scores were also close to equivalent, with an average of 1332.78 for students of effective teachers compared to 1327.65 for those with less effective teachers. Similar variables such as "interview ratings of leadership potential and demographics failed to predict retention or effectiveness."⁸ 

The effective teachers in this study were most readily identified by their grit ratings rather than by the GPA or SAT scores of students. Effective middle school teachers (i.e., those most likely to stay in their jobs) possessed a significantly higher mean grit rating (3.98) than their less effective counterparts (2.79). As Figure 1.3 shows, differences between effective and less effective teachers are more evident when noncognitive characteristics are evaluated.

Figure 1.3. Grit and GPA as Predictors of Teacher Effectiveness

In another study, Duckworth, Quinn, and Seligman⁹  asked 390 novice teachers in low-income districts to complete questionnaires assessing their grit, optimism, and satisfaction with life prior to the first day of school. All three of these characteristics individually predicted some measure of teacher effectiveness for student academic gains over the school year. Further, when the three characteristics were measured collectively, only the combination of grit and life satisfaction was determined to be highly predictive of teacher effectiveness. For this reason, Haberman¹⁰  advises administrators to examine observable and measurable personality factors like persistence among teacher candidates—before they are hired as teachers.

The Mindset of Persistent Star Teachers

We can best understand Star Teachers by appreciating how they (1) perceive the nature of the learner and (2) comprehend their personal sense of efficacy. Haberman notes that Star Teachers express deep and abiding beliefs about the potential of diverse learners, the nature of the teaching role, and the reasons they and their students are in school. They are relentless in their efforts to ensure that every learner, regardless of ability, gender, ethnicity, or social class, experiences success. Star Teachers exhibit determination in seeking instructional methods to support all learners as well as optimism that the methods will succeed.

Star Teachers take their roles as educators seriously. They have an uncommon belief about the abilities of their learners, for whom they hold high expectations, and feel a deep responsibility for helping learners to do their best. Haberman states that this mindset is "a clear reflection of what they believe the daily work of the teacher should be."¹¹  Star Teachers who exhibit persistence doggedly communicate through their actions that students are

• Central to their work as educators.
• Growing both cognitively and affectively and may require individualized attention.
• Not allowed to fail—no excuses.
• Preparing for lifelong learning.
• Held to very high standards.

Tomlinson offers additional insight into the convictions of persistent teachers:

The persistent teacher also models the steady but relentless quest for excellence. The persistent teacher generously acknowledges the distance a student has come academically, but also makes clear the distance each student has yet to go. That teacher helps students realize that the quest for quality never ends. If the quest ends, quality ends with it—and so does the growth of the individual…. The persistent teacher not only points out that learning has no finish line for students but lives according to that principle as well. That teacher fights "success ego," never succumbing to the sense that she is "good enough" to be exempt from the need to change. "We're all on a journey," the persistent teacher believes, "none of us is ever through striving."¹² 

Persistent teachers convey these messages daily to students because they feel responsible for creating an engaging learning environment and helping their students to develop mastery over content. Their mindset prevents them from being overwhelmed by challenges or buckling under setbacks. Persistent teachers' "students first" philosophy is mirrored in their classrooms, which typically enjoy a strong spirit of community, positive teacher-student relationships built on trust, and ample student affirmation. Learners in such classrooms feel supported and often think of their teachers as among the few adults in their lives with their own best interests at heart.

Teacher Efficacy

The concept of self-efficacy was originally developed by Albert Bandura and has been defined as the personal belief that one is capable of performing in an appropriate and effective manner to attain certain goals. As such, self-efficacy is a system that controls most personal activity, including suitable use of professional knowledge and skills.¹³  Teacher efficacy is a similar idea with significant implications for learner achievement. It is a teacher's judgment of his or her capability to promote student engagement and learning even among challenging or unmotivated students. As Tschannen-Moran and Woolfolk Hoy note,

Efficacy affects the effort [teachers] invest in teaching, the goals they set, and their level of aspiration. Teachers with a strong sense of efficacy tend to exhibit greater levels of planning and organization. They also are more open to new ideas and are more willing to experiment with new methods to better meet the needs of their students. … Efficacy beliefs influence teachers' persistence when things do not go smoothly and their resilience in the face of setbacks. Greater efficacy enables teachers to be less critical of students when they make errors and to work longer with a student.¹⁴ 

In a large-scale analysis of 43 studies representing 9,216 teachers, Klassen and colleagues¹⁵  explored the connections among teachers'senses of competence, personality, and effectiveness. Their findings revealed a significant positive relationship between a teacher's sense of competence (i.e., self-efficacy) and effectiveness in the classroom. In another study, Jerald¹⁶  noted persistence among the characteristics of teachers with a stronger sense of efficacy. Teachers who have high expectations for learners and who try a new approach when an old one is not working are more likely to have students who learn. Further, Guo and colleagues studied the impact of teacher efficacy, educational level, and teaching experience on the reading outcomes of 1,043 5th grade students.¹⁷  The researchers concluded that teacher efficacy is not positively related to years of experience but that "teacher efficacy was a significant and positive predictor of fifth grade literacy outcomes."¹⁸ 

Teachers who set ambitious goals and have a high sense of efficacy are more likely to persist in helping learners to achieve desired outcomes. These teachers model persistence not only in their interactions with students, but also in their own professional development. Research confirms that persistent teachers are curious learners who take professional learning into their own hands.

Teachers with a low sense of efficacy make comments like "When you have students from that part of town, there is nothing you can do as a teacher to help improve their scores on the state exam. What does the district expect from us when the parents are missing in action?" Such teachers are complacent, believing there is nothing they can do to change academic outcomes for learners. They don't feel they have the wherewithal to develop strategies to support learners on their own; their teaching toolbox is empty. When faced with student setbacks, teachers with low efficacy do not exert any additional effort or develop the skills needed to support learners.

By contrast, teachers with a high sense of efficacy do not make excuses for student failure and place the prospect for improved student achievement squarely on their own shoulders: "It will require more effort and coaching, but if I try really hard I can find a way to support the students who are struggling." These optimistic and persistent teachers do not believe inadequate efforts to support learners are necessarily permanent. As Carol Dweck reminds us, it is a teacher's sense of efficacy, not his or her teaching skills, that best predicts whether he or she will become a gritty teacher during tough times who sticks with established learning goals.¹⁹  Persistent teachers will go to the ends of the Earth to make learning happen for all learners; their motto could be "What do I do next?"

Robert Klassen and colleagues explored the connection among teachers'sense of competence, personality, and effectiveness in a large-scale analysis of 43 studies representing 9,216 teachers.²⁰  The results of their comprehensive evaluation revealed a significant positive relationship between a teacher's sense of competence, or self-efficacy, and effectiveness in the classroom. In a report for the Center for Comprehensive School Reform and Improvement, Craig Jerald²¹  noted several behaviors common to teachers with a stronger sense of efficacy, including persistence: teachers who have high expectations for learners and who try another approach when the one they're using is not working are more likely to have students who learn.

In a 2012 study, Guo and colleagues reported that teacher efficacy had a greater influence on the reading outcomes of 5th grade students than teacher experience or teacher education.²²  The study examined teachers' classroom practices to understand whether student outcomes were directly or indirectly associated with teacher characteristics. The investigators found that teachers with a higher sense of self-efficacy provided more support for student learning and created a more positive classroom environment. They noted that their study "establishes that teacher self-efficacy predicts teachers' practices, which in turn predict student literacy outcome over and above the influence of teachers' experience and teachers' education, when controlling for students' previous literacy skills and their social and economic status."²³  The results indicate clearly that teacher efficacy is predicated as much on teacher characteristics and behaviors as on their qualifications.

Star Teachers understand that a small amount of student underachievement may seem insignificant, but over time, curricular content not met in one subject or grade has a cumulative negative effect on individual learners. A Tennessee study titled Cumulative and Residual Effects of Teachers on Future Academic Achievement found that teachers have an aggregate effect on student achievement.²⁴  After three years of ineffective teachers, students scored less than half as well as their peers who had benefited from more effective teachers. When pre-Star Teachers boast a 70 percent pass rate for learners, the persistent teacher wonders, "What happened to the other 30 percent?" Stars are never content when students do not grasp the content. "What do I do next?" is not a passive quip, but the foundation for a professional and personal model of instructional inquiry. Therefore, Star Teachers who are persistent will try another teaching strategy when one strategy is not working.

The Behaviors of Star Teachers Who Are Persistent

Star Teachers who are persistent make extraordinary instructional efforts; they are doers and find creative strategies for acting on their beliefs about supporting student learning. Star Teachers think deeply about the instructional experiences in their classroom and use innovative techniques to bring their ideas to life. The behavior of persistent teachers is best manifested in the ways in which they make the classroom an interesting place to learn and seek to resolve instructional setbacks to find "what works" for their learners.

Persistent Teachers Create Stimulating Classroom Environments

Star Teachers view the classroom as a student-centered environment that inspires creativity, and they work as purposely at maintaining an inviting atmosphere for learning as they do at designing curriculum or implementing instruction.²⁵  The classroom of a Star Teacher is a wonderland most learners long to visit, with murals and learning centers setting the stage for joyful learning. Steven Wolk captures the convictions of persistent teachers about stimulating spaces when he notes that "the hearts and minds of children and young adults are wide open to the wonders of learning and the fascinating complexities of life"²⁶  and that "as educators, we have the responsibility to educate and inspire the whole child—mind, heart, and soul."²⁷ 

The classroom of a Star Teacher is designed to embrace the following fundamentals:

Climate: It is ideal to provide an atmosphere for learners with images and sounds that invite creative thinking, such as by placing inspirational quotes around the room or sharing music that excites, winds down, or transitions learners from one activity to the next. A teacher providing a warm welcome to each student sets a positive vibe for the day. It is important to greet learners at the door using their names and with a smile. We all have seen the viral video in which the young male teacher greeted each student with a personalized hand-shake. A simple gesture like this one sends a message that each learner is a valued member of the classroom and lets them know you "see" them and cannot wait to learn with them.

Organization: Learners should be able to easily move around the various parts of the classroom. Teachers should think through sight lines for items of interest, and traffic flow around the room. The reading nook and class library, the literacy center, the computer area, small- and large-group areas, and so on should be thoughtfully planned out. It is critical to avoid visual clutter and to provide blank or visually quiet spaces that give the eye a place to rest. Supplies, tools, furniture, and books should be stored, not left in full display.

Community: Because Star Teachers believe that learning is highly social, they employ tables to make collaborative learning easy. Students should be able to quickly work with a small group simply by turning their seats. The "simple act of positioning desks can promote positive interpersonal interactions."²⁸  Learners should feel like they are co-owners of the classroom.

Environmental Conditions: Star Teachers pay attention to air quality and lighting, fully aware that environmental conditions can affect student behaviors and academic performance.²⁹  Studies have shown that when temperatures are too low or high, the brain will send endless messages to do something about it. Because of the endless intrusions, it then becomes difficult for learners to focus on learning as the body seeks to find a balance in temperature. For example, a 2018 study on grade 9 students demonstrated a direct relationship of classroom temperature to aptitude and attention span of the learners. In regulated temperatures, students performed well. But when the classroom temperature was too hot or too cold, the students'scores were negatively impacted.³⁰  Since many classroom teachers do not have the ability to control the temperature in their classrooms, it is important to consider how extreme or uncomfortable temperatures affect students' ability to learn, as well as the teacher's ability to teach.³¹ 

Volume Control: Noise levels can affect learning by prompting students' bodies to release extra cortisol, which weakens the brain's capacity to store short-term memories. Comprehension can be jeopardized, too: The café effect is a phenomenon in which the noise of a swirling, bustling classroom compromises the learner's ability to clearly understand speech, especially among elementary-age students.³²  Star Teachers seek to mitigate acoustical problems and increase student focus by installing low-cost sound-absorbing materials like insulation panels in their classrooms.

Seating Arrangement: Does your classroom seating arrangement mirror the rigid columns and rows of the 19th century, or is it flexible and designed to encourage student creativity and engagement? Star Teachers reject the implied hierarchy of traditional seating arrangements that place the teacher at the front of the class, embracing instead formats that flatten the authoritarian order. Their seating arrangements send the message that everyone has a voice and that learning is communal.

Bulletin Boards as Teaching Tools: The classroom walls and bulletin boards of Star Teachers are important learning real estate waiting to be filled with content-related posters, banners, learning centers, and vocabulary word walls. Bulletin boards are opportunities to reinforce concepts, skills, rules, and routines; present exemplary work; and showcase students' photos and awards. The classroom bulletin boards of many pre-Star Teachers often have interesting and eye-catching material that offer little connection to course content or state-mandated teaching standards. By contrast, Star Teachers think of bulletin boards as teaching tools—another chance to visually communicate standards-based content. The best of these bulletin boards also introduce concepts, provide a place for daily review, and offer information about seasonal topics or events that extend lessons in novel and interesting ways.³³  Many Star Teachers will create a concept map on a bulletin board in front of students while introducing a new idea, then invite students to expand the concept map as a way of flexing their critical thinking. The concept map thus becomes a measure of students' comprehension (with the teacher correcting any misconceptions or punctuation errors).

Patricia Marshall offers sound advice: "Whether the students in a class are from the same background or represent a diverse array of racial/ethnic groups, bulletin board displays should include positive and realistic images of individuals from various backgrounds."³⁴  Marshall adds that bulletin boards can boost students'self-image, advance cross-cultural competence and respect, enhance critical and analytical thinking skills, encourage appreciation for different worldviews, and promote diverse orientations to learning.

Persistent Teachers Are Problem Solvers

Student underachievement does not sit well with the persistent teacher, who recognizes that student failure may be a symptom of poor instruction. Star Teachers continually look for ways to find what works and refuse to condemn a student's inability to grasp a concept. When their students are not reaching their benchmarks, persistent teachers don't assume that they cannot learn, but rather that their instructional method is ineffective, and they seek another way to hold the learners' attention. Persistent teachers locate resources to meet individual students' instructional goals by exploiting the latest technology and visiting local libraries, or in some cases establishing connections with social and health services. These educators continually ask themselves, "What do I do next to help students learn?"

To make sure that students meet their learning goals, Star Teachers must become problem solvers willing to deeply examine the complexities of learning. Problem solving is the process of finding solutions to challenging or complex issues. It is also the mechanism by which persistence becomes operationalized—Star Teachers are not just thinkers, but doers. Persistence refers to Star Teachers' tireless and creative pursuit to find instructional solutions to learning problems, whether for the whole class or for a single learner. These highly successful teachers never give up on students and always seek answers when challenges hinder academic progress.

Persistent Teachers Adopt Strategies to Surmount Instructional Setbacks

Instructional setbacks occur when student mastery of course content is hindered or delayed. Every educator will face instructional setbacks in his or her professional career, and persistent teachers assemble a repertoire of strategies to surmount them. Here are some common examples:

• Flipped classrooms, which offer learning experiences like lectures and discussions outside the classroom and devote class time to exploring what is learned.
• Project-based learning, a highly experiential strategy whereby students initiate projects that are connected to course content.
• Learning communities where students collaborate in small groups to meet shared academic goals.
• Simulated learning and games that engage and motivate players through direct experiences exploring phenomena, testing hypotheses, and constructing objects.³⁵ 
• Field trips and guest speakers, including virtual field trips and online visits with experts or special guests.

Robert J. Marzano, Debra J. Pickering, and Tammy Heflebower propose initiating friendly controversy, presenting unusual information, and questioning to increase responses and student interest.³⁶  Haberman suggests "project method, peer tutoring, independent study, inquiry training, demonstrations, creative activities, and scientific experimentation"³⁷  to make classrooms more engaging for learners.

Problem-solving teachers are constantly refining a vast range of strategies that will reach every type of learner they encounter, employing a nimble pedagogical style to find what works for learners in ways that are equitable and meet their students where they are in that moment.

Differentiated Instruction

Because persistent teachers do not believe the myth that students are all the same due to their chronological age, many of them employ differentiated instruction (see Figure 1.4) to tailor their teaching to the specific talents and learning styles of individual students. Though a great deal of effort is necessary for a differentiated approach to work, the return—comprehension and mastery of a lesson's content by every student in the class—is worth it.

Figure 1.4. Differentiation of Instruction

An extensive inventory of differentiated teaching strategies exists, appealing to a wide array of learners. As Parsons, Dodman, and Burrowbridge note, effective teachers carefully revise their instruction to meet the diversity of needs for their students.³⁸  Teaching more challenging content to more diverse learners requires K–12 teachers to deeply understand the effects of context and learner variability on teaching and learning.

Differentiated instruction is a set of unique instructional choices that bring learning to life for all students who are working at, below, or above grade level by providing them with multiple paths for accessing new information. Differentiation also allows learners to process and express ideas in ways that makes sense for their individual needs. As Haberman notes, "This form of teaching requires a high level of teacher with-it-ness, i.e. the teacher's ability to sense what is going on everywhere in the classroom, with all of the children, at all times."³⁹  Practices such as meaningful or respectful tasks, flexible grouping, and ongoing assessments help to guide the process.

Persistent teachers engaged in differentiated instruction consider it to be a mindful and explicit exercise during which they continually ask themselves the following questions:

• How are my efforts advancing or hindering student learning?
• What did I learn about my students' individual learning styles that can help me refine my lessons now and in the future?
• How can I vary my teaching strategies to meet the needs of individual learners?
• What can I do next?

Star Teachers believe that it is their obligation to seek multiple ways to engage all their students in learning. To them, "using only direct instruction would be like having a tool belt with only a hammer in it."⁴⁰  This type of heterogeneous teaching can be carried out by adapting content (materials), changing the process (manner or approach), altering the products or outcome of instruction, or modifying the learning environment.

Differentiating Content: Adapting Lessons for Levels of Understanding

A well-designed lesson is composed of learning objectives that should be explicitly conveyed to learners. Simply saying the objectives aloud or writing them on your board will not guarantee learning. How often do teachers hear the question "Do we need to know this for the test?" Students with diverse learning styles and talents need to have learning experiences that both meet them where they are and engender higher forms of thinking by way of creating, investigating, and analyzing. Instructional instruments for accessing depth of comprehension such as Bloom's taxonomy can help teachers create learning objectives and experiences that promote elevated modes of thinking over rote memorization.

Adapting content objectives to suit diverse learning needs is one proven differentiation strategy. Tiered performance levels allow learners to link learning to specific indicators or behaviors. Figure 1.5 shows an 8th grade earth science objective taken from the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) Standards that is tiered in such a way. Adapted content objectives should be made visible for learners so they can be empowered to improve their own learning.

Figure 1.5. Example of Differentiating Content by Performance Levels

Star Teachers take great pains to explain these ladders of comprehension to students. "Too often, students want to know how many points they need to get the next letter grade," notes Stephens. "These clearly defined levels of understanding shift the focus from point chasing to knowledge seeking. Without gaining understanding, student learning plateaus or plummets."⁴¹ 

Differentiating Process: Adapting Independent Practice for Levels of Understanding

After students' individual levels of proficiency have been ascertained, it is appropriate to identify opportunities for them to demonstrate various levels of comprehension and help them to grow in proficiency. Here are some resources Star Teachers put in place that allow students to choose the learning strategies that suit them best:

Learning Centers: Learning centers are areas of the classroom that are designed for students to interact with instructional materials in an exciting way, individually or alongside peers, as they practice meeting the learning objectives presented in the classroom. Centers are designed for students to deepen their comprehension of content, hone related skills, or develop positive attitudes. They are useful when introducing course material but especially helpful when learners need additional practice with course concepts. Imagine a literacy learning center in a 4th grade class that offers several opportunities for students to practice the concept of idioms and features several activities for each level of performance. Jack, who is struggling academically, may begin his practice at the developing stage and progress to higher levels, while Kerra, a precocious learner who has already achieved some success at the advanced stage, is working toward mastery.

Learning Menus: A list of learning options offers students various selections for learning through purposeful practice. Also known as choice boards, learning menus present students with several options for producing a final product. Each selection should be rigorous and take approximately the same amount of time to complete. Some teachers literally present the options in the form of restaurant menus (i.e., students must select one "entrée" and two "side-dish" experiences, with an option to complete the enriching "dessert").⁴² 

Anchor Activities: These are exercises that are accessible to learners once they have completed all their classwork. Teachers can offer goal-aligned anchor activities at selected learning centers in the classroom. To encourage deliberation and introspection, Star Teachers require students to articulate their choice of activities.⁴³  Some teachers curate digital files with hyperlinks for students to practice navigating the internet, and several sophisticated platforms use adaptive analytics to meet individual students'specific academic needs. For example, a teacher creates pre-tests that determine students' background knowledge. As the student engages the online assessments, this adaptive analytic scaffolds the content to become more rigorous and relevant in order to meet the specific needs of the student. These innovative technology solutions "allow learning to be personalized to students' interests, abilities, and preferences in order to provide assistance when needed, and present instruction that is understandable, engaging, and situated in the context of what is important to learners."⁴⁴ 

Differentiating Products: Adapting Formative and Summative Assessments

Student appraisals can also be tiered for levels of understanding. Formative assessments are low-stakes ways to measure performance and provide feedback while students are engaged in learning and should build from basic to advanced levels of understanding to guide instruction and practice. These types of assessments can be either formal (quizzes) or informal (discussion groups, exit slips, thumbs up or down) and allow teachers to assess where students are in the learning process and make attendant instructional choices.

Summative assessments are used to evaluate student learning, skill acquisition, and academic achievement at the conclusion of a specific instructional period (e.g., a project, unit, course, semester, program, or school year). These types of assessments should embrace all levels of understanding to present a clear picture of student performance. Figure 1.6 shows examples of product choices for learners that teachers can include in a learning center, learning menu, or anchor activity.

Figure 1.6. Examples of Product Choices

Source: Adapted with permission from the IRIS Center (2010). All rights reserved. Retrieved from https://iris.peabody.vanderbilt.edu/module/di/cresource/q2/p07/di_07_link_menus/#content

Star Teachers build creative rubrics that can be adapted to effectively and efficiently assess student learning regardless of the final product. It is the responsibility of Star Teachers to continually search for "what works" by tailoring learning experiences to students' needs.

Data-Driven Instruction

Data from classroom and state-level assessments reveal students' proficiency levels, showing who is on target and who may need extra support. While Star Teachers appreciate these methods for taking the academic temperature of students, they also are not overly obsessed by them. What they are is data literate, able to read, comprehend, and interpret data to support instruction.⁴⁵  Star Teachers approach student data strategically, using the information to better understand student learning, find solutions to problems, and reflect on teaching practices. In Why Teachers Must Become Data Experts, Jennifer Morrison explains that effective teachers undergo three attitude shifts that help them to appreciate data. They

1. Realize that data include more than end-of-year standardized test scores.
2. View data collection as a way to investigate the many questions about students, teaching practices, and learning that arise for any committed teacher.
3. Talk with one another about what data reveal and how to build on those revelations.⁴⁶ 

Data-literate teachers also engage in data scooping (see Figure 1.7) by reviewing accessible student data to learn more about individual or classwide academic performance. There are four basic steps to the practice of data scooping:

1. Data collection from the most relevant sources (e.g., state records, report cards, formative and summative assessments, conversations with learners). Teachers may also engage in kidwatching (i.e., simply observing and recording children's development over time).⁴⁷ 
2. Data organization, which ensures that the collected student data are properly arranged in each learner's individualized portfolio.
3. Data analysis and interpretation to better understand and diagnose individual learners' roadblocks to learning. (Adding reflection logs to every student's portfolio is one helpful way to track instructional strategies used.)
4. Data application, or using student data to plan curriculum and instruction tailored to the individual strengths and needs of their learners.

Figure 1.7. Four Steps of Data Scooping

If a learner habitually scores below basic and exhibits other signs of struggling, the Star Teacher will seek opportunities to work one-on-one with him or her, provide peer support, or offer new product choices based on the student's learning style. If students new to the district score lower on a school benchmark than their peers, the Star Teacher will examine assessment data to better understand and address learning gaps. Put simply, Star Teachers exploit student data to understand what works, what does not work, and what instructional approaches may need modifying to support learners' academic achievement.

Teachers must be adaptive to the changing needs of diverse classrooms. As Figure 1.8 shows, today's students are no longer primarily white, middle class, monolingual, or Christian. With every decade the U.S. student body becomes more diverse; by 2025, nearly 6 in 10 students will be nonwhite. Effective teachers must implement strategies that appeal to increasingly heterogeneous classrooms filled with students who learn at faster or slower rates than their peers, speak English as a second language, have unique physical or learning needs, and live in poverty or violent neighborhoods. The tendency for students in some of these groups and others to score lower on tests than their peers is known as the achievement gap. Other factors known to affect the achievement gap include students' race or ethnicity, parents' education level, access to high-quality preschool instruction, school funding, peer influences, teachers expectations, and curricular and instructional quality.⁴⁸  Star Teachers do not shy away from multicultural education or see it as an obstacle to overcome but rather embrace diversity as an opportunity to find new ways for students to learn.

Figure 1.8. Projected Student Diversity in K–12 U.S. Classrooms in 2025

Summary

Persistence is manifested in the day-to-day actions of Star Teachers eager to improve student learning who are constantly searching for "what works." These teachers make the classroom an interesting place to learn for students and embrace creative problem solving. Resolute in their quest for student success, they are willing to try different strategies to solve classroom setbacks, implement differentiated instruction, and engage in data scooping to better understand and address their students' academic needs.

Key Words

Extension Exercises

1. Review this story: It is 6 p.m. on a sweltering Wednesday in Texas, and Lynn is still at school grading her 6th graders'science benchmark exam. She notices that, while many did really well on other parts of the exam, nearly 60 percent of the students did not understand the earth science concepts of rotation and revolution. This is Lynn's fourth year as a teacher, and she thought she had developed a great three-day module to deliver these ideas using strategies like demonstrations, videos, small groups, and direct instruction. What happened? Did Lynn prepare for the inevitable instructional setbacks in her classroom to meet the needs of every learner? Should Lynn keep moving in her lesson? What would you say to advise or coach Lynn?
2. Review your grit score from Star Tracker 1-1 (p. 23). How did you do? In 250–300 words, please explain whether you believe your results to be correct. Do they indicate that you are a persistent teacher? Why or why not? What could you do to develop yourself as a teacher to improve your grit?
3. Sketch the current layout of your classroom space. Next, rethink your classroom design based on the suggestions in this chapter. What classroom design changes can you do that support learning? Create a new classroom design that honors the three fundamentals for the classroom environment.
4. Check out templates for bulletin boards on social media and online sources. What can you do to enhance the visual appeal of the bulletin boards in your classroom? Create a list of six to eight ideas and share with colleagues.
5. Is there an achievement gap issue in your classroom, school, or district among different ethnic groups? Use the four-step data-scooping process to analyze your state's achievement data online and obtain the data specific for your discipline and grade level. Next, create a bar graph of your findings. What teaching strategies do the data suggest that could help you assist learners in your classroom?

Going Further

Web Resources

• "Believing and Achieving," an issue brief posted by the Center for Comprehensive School Reform and Improvement, integrates an overview of research on teacher efficacy with a discussion of educators' responsibility for student learning. www.centerforcsri.org/files/centerissueBriefJan07.pdf.
• "Teacher Efficacy: What Is It and Does It Matter?" is a short research report by the National Association for Elementary School Principals. Author Nancy Poetheroe does a superb job explaining the link between teacher efficacy and student learning. Check it out at www.naesp.org/resources/1/Principal/2008/M-Jp42.pdf.
• The website All Things Assessment provides various ideas, strategies, and resources to improve educators' proficiency in appraising student work, which may lead to gains in student learning. http://allthingsassessment.info/about-the-center/.
• Earn 3.0 professional development hours in differentiated instruction from the Iris Center at Vanderbilt University. This online module contains strategies for organizing the classroom, suggestions for building differentiated tests and assessments, and audio interviews from leaders with firsthand experience with differentiation in the classroom such as Carol Ann Tomlinson, professor of educational leadership at the University of Virginia. https://iris.peabody.vanderbilt.edu/.
• The site www.teach-nology.com offers many teaching resources (articles, rubrics, and worksheets) to support educators who are interested in building classrooms that support students' voices and choices.

Additional Readings

• In 2014, researcher Felicia Dixon and her colleagues examined differentiated instruction, professional development, and teacher efficacy in the following article: Dixon, F. A., Yssel, N., McConnell, J. M., & Hardin, T. (2014). Differentiated instruction, professional development, and teacher efficacy. Journal for the Education of the Gifted, 37(2), 111–127.
• In "Teaching in the Fast Lane: How to Create Active Learning Experiences," Suzy Pepper Rollins tells how to facilitate a highly engaged classroom with ideas to accommodate different levels of learners by using learning centers and group learning "to foster students' critical thinking and confidence" and help them become self-directed learners. See more at www.ascd.org/Publications/Books/Overview/Teaching-in-the-Fast-Lane.aspx.
• This book is based on Martin Haberman's seven dispositions of Star Teachers as outlined in the following article: Haberman, M. (2002). Selecting Star Teachers for children and youth in poverty. Phi Delta Kappan, 76(10), 777–781. Page 779 is extremely enlightening.

Endnotes

¹  Grotberg, E. H. (1997). The international resilience research project. Retrieved from http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED417861.pdf (p. 13)

²  Kelly, D. R., Matthews, M. D., & Bartone, P. T. (2014). Grit and hardiness as predictors of performance among West Point cadets. Military Psychology, 26(4), 327–342.

³  Haberman, M. (2010). Star Teachers: The ideology and best practice of effective teachers of diverse children and youth in poverty. Houston, TX: Haberman Educational Foundation.

⁴  Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) of 2015, Pub. L. No. 114-95 (2015).

⁵  Wheatley, K. (2002). Teacher persistence: A crucial disposition, with implications for teacher education. Essays in Education, 3. Available at www.usca.edu/essays/vol32002/wheatley.pdf

⁶  Robertson-Kraft, C., & Duckworth, A. L. (2014). True grit: Trait-level perseverance and passion for long-term goals predicts effectiveness and retention among novice teachers. Teachers College Record, 116(3), 1–27.

⁷  Robertson-Kraft & Duckworth (2014, p. 16).

⁸  Robertson-Kraft & Duckworth (2014, p. 21).

⁹  Duckworth, A. L., Quinn, P. D., & Seligman, M. E. P. (2009). Positive predictors of teacher effectiveness. Journal of Positive Psychology, 4(6), 540–547.

¹⁰  Haberman (2010).

¹¹  Haberman (2010, p. 139).

¹²  Tomlinson, C. (2003). Deciding to teach them all. Educational Leadership, 61(2), 6–11.

¹³  Gavora, P. (2010). Slovak pre-service teacher self-efficacy: Theoretical and research considerations. The New Educational Review, 21(2), 17–30.

¹⁴  Tschannen-Moran, M., & Hoy, A. W. (2001). Teacher efficacy: Capturing an elusive construct. Teaching and Teacher Education, 17(7), 783–805. (pp. 784–785)

¹⁵  Klassen, R. M., Tze, V. M., Betts, S. M., & Gordon, K. A. (2011). Teacher efficacy research 1998–2009: Signs of progress or unfulfilled promise? Educational Psychology Review, 23(1), 21–43.

¹⁶  Jerald, C. D. (2007). Believing and achieving: Issue brief. Center for Comprehensive School Reform and Improvement. Retrieved from https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED495708.pdf

¹⁷  Guo, Y., Connor, C. M., Yang, Y., Roehrig, A. D., & Morrison, F. J. (2012). The effects of teacher qualification, teacher self-efficacy, and classroom practices on fifth graders' literacy outcomes. Elementary School Journal, 113(1), 3–24.

¹⁸  Guo et al. (2012, p. 4).

¹⁹  Dweck, C. (2014). Teachers' mindsets: Every student has something to teach me. Educational Horizons, 93(2) 10–15.

²⁰  Klassen et al. (2011).

²¹  Jerald (2007).

²²  Guo et al. (2012).

²³  Guo et al. (2012, p. 20).

²⁴  Sanders, W. L., & Rivers, J. C. (1996). Cumulative and residual effects of teachers on future student academic achievement. Research Progress Report. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Value-Added Research and Assessment Center.

²⁵  Haberman (2010).

²⁶  Wolk, S. (2009). Joy in schools. In M. Scherer (Ed.), Engaging the whole child: Reflections on best practices in learning, teaching, and leadership (pp. 3–14). Alexandria, VA: ASCD.

²⁷  Wolk (2009, p. 4).

²⁸  Marshall, P. (2002). Cultural diversity in our schools. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth. (p. 260)

²⁹  Dorman, J. P. (2001). Associations between classroom environment and academic efficacy. Learning Environments Research, 4(3), 243–257.

³⁰  Perez, J., Julio Montano, J., & Perez, J. (2018). Healthy schools as a learning tool. Retrieved from https://healthyschools.cefpi.org/temperature.html

³¹  Eo, I. S., & Choi, K. Y. (2014). Study on the effects of learning by changing the color-temperature LED lamp. International Journal of Multimedia and Ubiquitous Engineering, 9(3), 309–316.

³²  Wålinder, R., Gunnarsson, K., Runeson, R., & Smedje, G. (2007). Physiological and psychological stress reactions in relation to classroom noise. Scandinavian Journal of Work and Environmental Health, 33, 260–266.; Whitlock, J., & Dodd, G. (2006). Classroom acoustics—controlling the café effect…is the Lombard Effect the key? In Proceedings of Acoustics 2006: Noise of Progress. Christchurch, New Zealand.

³³  Bafile, C. (2010). From "pretty" to practical: Using bulletin boards to teach. Education World. Retrieved from www.educationworld.com/a_curr/profdev/profdev089.shtml

³⁴  Marshall, P. (2002). Cultural diversity in our schools. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth. (p. 261)

³⁵  Prensky, M., & Prensky, M. (2007). Digital game-based learning (Vol. 1). St. Paul, MN: Paragon.

³⁶  Marzano, R. J., Pickering, D. J., & Heflebower, T. (2011). The highly engaged classroom. Bloomington, IN: Marzano Research Laboratory.

³⁷  Haberman (2010, p. 118).

³⁸  Parsons, S. A., Dodman, S. L., & Burrowbridge, S. C. (2013). Broadening the view of differentiated instruction. Phi Delta Kappan, 95(1), 38–42.

³⁹  Haberman (2010, p. 114).

⁴⁰  Haberman (2010, p. 118).

⁴¹  Stephens, C. (2015). Levels of understanding: Learning that fits all. Retrieved from www.edutopia.org/blog/levels-of-understanding-learning-fits-all-charity-stephens (para 5)

⁴²  IRIS Center. (2010). Learning menus: Examples of product choices. In Differentiated instruction: Maximizing the learning of all students. Retrieved from https://iris.peabody.vanderbilt.edu/module/di/cresource/q2/p07/di_07_link_menus/#content

⁴³  Haberman (2010, p. 114).

⁴⁴  Walkington, C., & Bernacki, M. L. (2014). Motivating students by "personalizing" learning around individual interests: A consideration of theory, design, and implementation issues. In S. A. Karabenick & T. C. Urdan (Eds.), Motivational interventions: Advances in motivation and achievement (pp. 139–176). Bingly, West Yorkshire, England: Emerald Group. (p. 139)

⁴⁵  Stevenson, H. (2017). The "datafication" of teaching: Can teachers speak back to the numbers? Peabody Journal of Education, 92(4), 537–557.

⁴⁶  Morrison, J. (2009). Why teachers must become data experts. Retrieved from www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/dec08/vol66/num04/Why-Teachers-Must-Be-Data-Experts.aspx (para. 4)

⁴⁷  Owocki, G., & Goodman, Y. (2002). Kidwatching: Documenting children's literacy development. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

⁴⁸  Reardon, S. F. (2013). The widening income achievement gap. Educational Leadership 70(8), 10–16.