NTPRS 2014

Hello from Lisle, IL!  I know that there is an official blog on the NTPRS conference this year, but I have decided in part to use some of my down time in the evenings trying to synthesize just what it is that just happened.

Overall, I thought that the sessions today were good.  I spent 5 hours in an intermediate workshop.  We started by making a list of things that kill our stories.  Those things that, when they happen in our classroom, make us want to give in to the little voice in your head saying "The textbook is the way... Comprehensible input is too hard, you can't even do it right and your kids aren't learning... Go back to the textbook...''.  Now, I've never taught using a textbook (TPRS since Day 1, baby), but the voice even says that to me! I liked the list, especially since we problem-solved around some of these things. Here it is.

• Kids want to go really far out of bounds because they're having so much fun being ridiculous. (Just say no! Maybe they suggest a bunch of stuff and finally you, the teacher, says 'No! It's obvious! Inset in-bounds statement here.')
• Conversely, some classes you just can't squeeze the damn details from. (Try giving them a choice of two.  Hard to refuse when you already have two options laid out in front of you.)
• Students struggle with the purpose of the class and feel as though they aren't "learning" anything (they have already been sucked into the traditional 'school' mindset, in other words).
• As teachers: setting or believing that we can set goals and targets for a CI-based class - and what would those targets be anyway?
• The quality of our kids' acting. (Threaten to fire them, then sit 'em down, 'cause ain't nobody got time for that.)
• How to grade kids.
• Transitioning from PQA to a story. (Simple.  Just say, "Ahh! Clase, hay un problema!")
• Pulling back from the absurd (so they don't begin to expect it and become immune to it).
• Keeping PQA interesting throughout the year.
• Getting a story to end. (Story Ender Wizard/Fairy ... the teacher just tells them at the end of class so they have some closure)

The presenter was great, very engaging, and the feedback I gave at the end of the session was simply that we were practicing a lot of detail fishing, storytelling/asking, and parallel character-ing in small groups, but there was no time between people practicing to give feedback to the last person! There were some things I definitely wanted teachers to know they should keep doing, and some of them didn't have the basics of circling down but didn't even seem to know that. I think a safe space of "Keep doing..." and "Next time try..." language would really be useful to make the practice as meaningful as possible.  We worked on:

• Fishing for details
• Verifying with Actors
• Parallel Characters
• Create-an-Event

There was a keynote speaker, Diana Noonan, who spoke about building a TPRS district out of Denver Public Schools district.  It was interesting to listen to, but not super relevant to me.

Finally, I went to a session titled "Assessment and the Common Core."  I figure it would talk about effective assessment strategies (using concrete details) for the FL classroom, probably using a lot of reading strategies.  I was wrong.  The session wasn't bad! I will probably create a separate blog post for the new topic I discovered in his session called "Depth of Knowlege" (DOK) indicators.  Basically a way to consider the rigor of what we are teaching and assessing.  

At this point it's time to work on LPs for summer school in 2 short weeks, then read a bit before bed.  Tomorrow's plan includes more workshopping, a session on management, and a trip to an exhibitor's reception.