Experimentation: with ideas, content, instructional strategies, assessment, curriculum, pacing, the language we use with kids: all facets of teaching and learning. Planning is important, but it’s not until we get into the weeds and actually teach the lesson that we’ll know how that plan will need to be revised, modified, changed as we implement it. 

​​​​

Revision: planning something, trying it out, coming together to evaluate, then planning again to make our practice stronger.

 

​Refinement: master teachers constantly refine their practice. 

​​

​Messy and imperfect: lessons will fail badly, they’ll fail for one kid or a group of kids, they’ll look like they’re failing but come together in the end or they’ll look like they’re going strong and fizzle out before learning happens. All of this happens within the course of a lesson. The goal is simply to be more scientific about the mess so that we learn how to get better and better.

​​

Joyful: when learning is pleasurable and engaging, it fosters deeper understanding and increased motivation.