Presentation Day

Today all my excited 7th graders will be presenting the results of their inquiry studies. I am quite thrilled at how engaged they all are. They created the questions about reading. They researched online or by doing surveys and interviews. Today they share what they have learned, so much fun! It feels so good to be heading for school confident that students are prepared and feeling pleased to share what they have discovered. My biggest problem is how to get the 8th graders in Read180 as willing to jump into learning. I UNDERSTAND why they feel defeated and that there is no point in effort. I do. If you haven’t been able to read the work in your classes for years, you don’t expect success. But without the buy-in to giving your best, they are creating a self-fulfilling prophecy. With no effort they will not make growth. This will back-up their feeling that they are going to fail so why try. Equally bad – The 7th grade students in Read180 believe they can do well, but the 8th graders attitudes can convince them other wise. This is the tough stuff, for sure!