In this episode of The ML Chat Podcast Tim Blackburn joins us to complete our four-part series on the formative assessment process. In this episode, Tim recaps the importance of clear intended learning, eliciting evidence, and interpreting evidence as he builds to a discussion to the fourth and final part of the formative assessment process: acting on evidence.
Automated Transcript
Justin Hewitt: Hey everybody, this is Justin. We are welcoming back our good friend Tim Blackburn, who is the Title Three administrator for Tigard Tualatin School district, just outside of Portland, Oregon. And we have been having quite the conversation. This is a lot of fun. I welcome back.
Tim Blackburn: Oh, thanks Justin.
And I’m just happy to be here.
Justin Hewitt: Hey, we’re, we’re thrilled to have you. And this is, this is gonna be a lot of fun. I, it’s, , it’s been quite the conversation that we’ve been talking about, clear intended learning, and then eliciting evidence and, you know, working through interpreting and analyzing evidence.
Why, do you mind giving us just maybe a quick summary of what we’ve talked about on the, on our previous, , conversations, and then maybe give us a quick highlight
Tim Blackburn: of what we’re getting into today. Sure. Yeah, absolutely. So happy to do that. So, you know, in our, in our prior chats, you know, we, we talked about a.
What is a, a four part [00:01:00] formative assessment process. You’ll also see it in the literature, , referred to as formative assessment practice. But really, you know what it is, it’s a, it’s a pedagogy. It’s a, it’s a set of, you know, considerations that teachers can use to inform their. And so it starts with knowing where you’re going, having a clear sense of, of direction, and we call it clear intended learning.
And the important part about that in terms of serving multilingual students is not just having a a sense of direction backwards design. What you want students to know in terms of the content, it’s also putting a language lens on that content and really defining the language development opportunities.
You know, within that, within that learning. You know, thinking about the academic vocabulary demands, thinking about the forms and the functions of [00:02:00] language that students will need to connect their ideas and express their understanding of the content. So this formative assessment process. Starts from having a clear sense of direction.
Justin Hewitt: Do you mind? And then from there, yeah. Is that what Addie’s talking about when he is talking about .
Tim Blackburn: Clarity of learning. Yeah. It’s, it’s not just, and what Hattie’s talking about is, is not limited to a teacher’s, you know, sense of, you know, where things are headed, but it’s also in the ways in which a teacher communicates that direction and helps teach and helps students.
And this is sort of the metacognitive side of it is helps students evaluat. You know, informatively, where they are in, in terms of those, those target skills, you know, so you’re absolutely right Justin, that. it, it is very , very much, , you know, based on you know, teachers certainly like [00:03:00] kind of plotting the, the map, right?
You know, like where, where things are headed, but also making sure that we shine a light on the specific skills and the language associated with what we want our students to know and do. ,
Justin Hewitt: and I guess if we want to build assessment capable learners, having Yeah. Having that clarity, having that, you know, clear intended learning becomes that much more important.
Right?
Tim Blackburn: Oh, absolutely. You know, they say that, you know, formative assessment is assessment for learning. Mm-hmm. . And so that’s why it’s so crucial to have you know, clearly defined outcome. . And so as a teacher, and this is the second part of the formative assessment process, it’s referred to as eliciting evidence and it, it was understanding language at Stanford that kind of, you know, packaged this formative assessment, you know, process.
And you know, what I [00:04:00] learned from my colleagues at an understanding language is that. In order for me to have a clear sense of what my students know and can do, I, I have to have language output. That’s like the, the key theme related to eliciting evidence. It’s that it’s the, the, the teachers, you know, opportunity to design these, you know, invitations for students to show what they know one can do and to really like, build, and what I Alki would say is that students can like apprentice.
in these, in the, in the target language, in the target concepts and the target skills in low stakes and supported ways. And so if I have, you know, evidence of that growth, evidence of, of learning, you know, for what I, what I hear from my students and their, through their conversations and what I see in, in their writing and, you know, I just love the, the metaphor that Ida Waki uses.
That’s [00:05:00] instructive here. When. , she calls it, you know, invitations that students have the, the space to interact, you know, in a, you know, in a constructive way. And again, if we’re really clear on what we want our students to know and do, then I’m, I’m listening for evidence through those conversations. I am, I’m looking specifically at, at student writing as evidence of that learning.
And so, Once I’ve designed those, you know, interactions on the day-to-day is how do I interpret what I, what I hear, and what I see in their writing. And that’s the third part. of the formative assessment process. It’s having, you know, tools to not only like an analyze and interpret student growth, but to also en, you know, en invite students to do the [00:06:00] same.
Right. Again, you know, going back to the importance of having clearly, clearly communicated and clearly defined. Learning outcomes and, and so it’s those tools that, that we, we spoke about last time in particular, that can be so instructive for not only for for teachers to communicate growth, but for students to understand their own growth in, in the target set of skills.
Justin Hewitt: It’s such a powerful process, and it makes me think a little bit, I, I have conversations with, you know, with educators all across the country, and we talk about the, you know, them informatively, assessing, speaking, for example. Mm-hmm. . And oftentimes they’re kind of, you know, they’re, they ask, you know, you know, they pair students together and ask them to talk, and then they’re walking around the room and they’re trying to listen.
And I’m just thinking, golly, that would, , I guess kind of hard to you. Interpret and analyze the evidence based on students talking in a [00:07:00] group. By you walking by, and hopefully you heard enough and you were able to gather it, capture it, you know, that that seems like, , there’s probably some best practices to, , capturing that evidence, capturing those speaking artifacts, if you will, writing, you know, whatever it might be as a part of that formative practice so you can interpret and.
Tim Blackburn: Oh, sure. I mean, absolutely. You know. , I think of like there’s so many different ways in which I’ve, you know, I’ve seen, you know, teachers, you know, creatively not just like create the space for students to interact in a meaningful way, but to then like, like, like you said kind of attend to. What students are saying and, and kind of monitor it.
And that’s really like the power of, of group work, to be honest. Like, of having like meaningful student collaborations because it’s, it’s not just like the. You know, the, the conversation in [00:08:00] the, in the, in the small groups that is, you know, illustrative of student learning, but then how that’s actually recorded, you know, in, in, in student work.
You know, I, I like to think about like collaborative dialogues, , or collaborative posters. You know, think about, you know, illustrations and, you know, illustrations of learning, the artifacts of learning. And even additionally, there’s also those really neat tools out there. You know, like Seesaw is a, a really great example of, of, of a ways in, in which I’ve seen, you know, teachers make, you know, like pains to , , to create the space for students to, to talk in a meaningful way.
And then, Record that information too. And another way that I’ve, , actually, I saw, , a beautiful lesson last school year. Every single student in the classroom talked in some sort of authentic and meaningful way. And it was a, just a brilliant Socratic seminar [00:09:00] in an eighth grade English language arts class.
and it was not performative. It wasn’t perfunctory. I, what I tell you is that the teacher. Poured so much into creating like an authentic debate that students were in a, in a very well-informed way. , you know, unpacking in this case it was, it was bullying, you know, the issue of bullying in, in, in their, their school.
So it had kind of an sel sort of component, a social emotional learning component. It was just language rich. And to see the students having this dialogue in an informed way, actually like listening to one another with purpose and responding with data, it was so cool. So cool. But I think it serves as sort of a, a helpful example of how a teacher would not only create.
the space to interact, but also then to kind of like formative form, you know, informatively assess the, the, the use of the [00:10:00] target language, the target skills, and the concepts. Yeah. I love
Justin Hewitt: that idea of inviting them, right? Mm-hmm. , you know, and giving them a chance to apprentice. That’s really cool. Yeah. Okay, so, so we’ve walked through this process and now it’s time to talk about how to act on that evidence, on those artifacts That’s right.
Together, right? Mm-hmm. . Mm-hmm. . You know, I’ve heard that a manila folder is where data goes to die,
Well, I like, like, , like it’s kind of a dramatic metaphor. Tell me, tell me, you know, I mean that, I know that’s a saying that you’ve used. Tell me a little bit about that. Unpack that for me.
Tim Blackburn: Sure. You. , you’ve, you’ve, you’ve done all this hard work in, in your lesson design, right? You were, you were clear with your learning intentions.
You’ve elicited evidence by, you know, like really looking for, you know, language output as illustrations of, of student learning for evidence of the learning you’ve used. You know, rubrics that are fine tuned to, [00:11:00] to, you know, call out those class concepts and the target skills on the target language. So now what are you going to do with that, that information And you know, you’re, you’re right about, you know, that example that you know, that the data can grow stale.
It could be irrelevant. It might not even be like connected. , your target concepts and your target skills, so you know. Not everything has to be, you know, like a, you know, when you close your eyes and picture, you know, student data, it doesn’t have to be all, all spreadsheets and numbers, but rather what evidence do you have of student learning, and then what are you going to, to do tomorrow to support students in building the, their, their confidence and their competence in the target.
you know, for serving multilingual [00:12:00] students. That could be, oh, I, you know, I’m noticing that, you know, this particular student didn’t yet quite have the independence to, you know, to, to show me, you know, to show me evidence of learning on a particular writing task. So maybe I need to, you know, provide a differentiated support in the form of, , of like a word bank or signal words, , you know, to.
To, you know, serve as, you know, sentence stems. That is, we can use that information really as a tool, Justin, for differentiation.
Justin Hewitt: And, and, and it’s interesting, it kind of reminds me a little bit of the, the metaphor I feel like I’ve heard you use recently about, , you know, data being a constellation. You know, for our students and, and really, you know, or, or trying to get a constellation of data points not just the one data point or, you know, the data that’s on a spreadsheet and goes in that manila folder.
And so kind of maybe [00:13:00] talk a little bit about that constellation idea and, and how we can use that data to actually act on it and use it to inform our practice.
Tim Blackburn: Yeah. I. I mean, I think it comes from an uncomfortable truth. , and you know, and certainly in the multilingual, you know, student field is.
Almost by rule, like we’re overly reliant on our summative English language proficiency measures. And so, yeah, you’re right. I, I harp on this quite a bit, because, you know, I, I want to live. . I want to live in a world where, you know, students aren’t judged on their performance on one test, you know, on, on one day.
Mm-hmm. . And and what I mean by that is we can do better and we have to do better. Our students deserve better. Right? Right. And if we know that [00:14:00] it’s bad practice and yet we , we continue to do it. And so , Robert Lin, , Margaret Heritage, , they, they have, you know, written, you know, extensively about this, you know, the, basically it’s the danger of a single story.
And so, you know, the, the constellation of data points, it is not my metaphor. I did not write that to make that abundantly clear. , I believe it, I believe it actually comes from, from Margaret Heritage and, and Robert Link. And if I remember correctly from a really awesome book that they co-wrote with Ida Walkie called English Language Learners and The New Standards it’s a real awesome book from 2015.
But what I took from from that book specifically related to, you know, formative assessment is. On the daily, having conversations with students and really encouraging [00:15:00] their reflect. on their own growth in, in our target concepts, in our, on the skills that we’re developing. And to foster a conversation with my students about, about growth.
And it, it all starts from, you know, reflection, Justin. I mean it’s, you know, creating that space and inviting students to be, you know, like partners in the process. Mm-hmm. and. You know, when I think about my own practice, there were, there were years where I was kind of operating from a paradigm of the grade book as a private closed space , you know, that, that it was mine and I, it, it wasn’t, you know, until really years later that, that I understood the power of inviting students into the convers.[00:16:00]
they understood the, the value of clarity of learning and gosh, like the simple impact of defining and communicating to students where we’re headed and to, you know, to help them feel like partners in, in the process. I mean, the whole point here is that students have agency in their own, in their own learning.
That’s empowering and that’s the really, like the core shift at play here. It’s moving away from an over-reliance on a single data point and rather inviting students into a process that on, in a, almost like on, on the daily and like in a routine way, we’re talking about growth and we’re focusing on, on, on evidence of learning and, and, and our collective roles.
The significant shift here is, you know, [00:17:00] moving away from, you know, reliance on a sole summative measure, right? And inviting students into a process in which their partners in reflecting on, on their growth, right? And, My role as teacher is more of like, say a facilitator, right? Mm-hmm. , you know, like I, they’ve helped chart the course in terms of the target skills and the target concepts, and then, I can also create the space to encourage students to, to reflect in an authentic way their their own progress.
Justin Hewitt: And so it’s interesting. Originally I figured Acton evidence was specifically talking about like the teacher, the educator, but really is, I hear you describe that. It makes me feel like acting on evidence is a, it’s for everybody. It’s, it’s, you know, it’s the student, it’s the teacher. Ideally, [00:18:00] if we’re bringing the family in on the process, it’s the teacher.
It’s the, you know, the e l d or you know, e n l teacher. It’s the classroom teacher. It’s, it’s, it’s getting everybody to work together and act on the evidence that we have.
Tim Blackburn: Right? Yeah. Yeah. And, and very much in like a metacognitive way. . And so what does that look like? And honestly, like the way I do it, I use do a lot of reflective writing.
Justin, you know, I, we anchor every lesson in our target skills for, for that day. We, we review our agenda for how we’re going to get. But by the end of class, I mean, I want my students to have some space to, to summarize their learning for, you know, for their day to, to reflect on their learning for the day and to think about their next steps for unlocking future learning.
What will tomorrow look like? and it’s that [00:19:00] sort of, you know, formative feedback that I get from my students. Like then, you know, just from the, from the teacher part of it, it informs me about the sort of differentiated supports that I need to consider for the, for the following day. You know, it’s, it’s basically, A conversation of, of strengths and then, and then, you know, then looking for the edge of that growth.
And every student in my classroom will have some, you know, will have a, a growth edge. And every one of my students has.
And so what does the evidence tell me? What evidence do I have of, of student learning that informs what you know, , what tomorrow might look like for that particular student?
Justin Hewitt: I love listening to you kind of talk through that, and it, and it makes me think about. How interconnected each of these four pieces really is, right? [00:20:00] Because you know the act, you know, what you’re just describing there as far as the reflective writing and the thinking of what, what did we learn today?
What did we need to learn tomorrow? You know, the students being on the edge of learning, what’s their next, you know, the like, it really comes down to having that clear intended learning objective for each student. Like, what’s next? But also what is down that road? What are they working toward? And, and I and I, and I’m thinking about being a teacher of ha having 30, you know, 30 students in my class that I’m working with, you know, working towards this with or, you know, and I, or I’m a director and I’m trying to help all of my teachers, you know, do this work and, and I feel a little overwhelmed at trying to think of being able to put this in place for every single one of my students.
Tim Blackburn: Yeah. And. I, I totally get that. It’s not a question of 30 separate lessons, right. [00:21:00] And like, and, and 30 separate learning targets. But rather, like, for instance, like one way that I really came to rely on it is in grouping. Like for sure, like, so if I knew that there were certain strengths in my classroom and or like certain students that were struggling with a particular set of concepts or skills that really informed, you know, the ways in which I grouped my students the next, for the next day’s lesson.
So if you think about it in terms of like mixed level grouping versus say for the purpose of developing a specific skill, like yeah, I wanna. I, I wanna bring those students together so that we can highlight that, that, you know, specific area for, for growth. It’s basically a conversation of not yet, like, so where are you not yet proficient.
Let’s pull you together, right? And we’re gonna, we’re going to focus on this discrete skill so [00:22:00] that you can use that skill to unlock future learning. In a really wonderful book called Amplifying the cu. , atoki and George Bunch, they refer to that as quote, generative learning, and that’s really resonated with me, right?
Mm-hmm. is that, you know, over time as our students apprentice and these skills, it unlocks the future learning as students become more independent in, in the, in our target skills. and I find that like really empowering, you know, as a, as a teacher, that it’s about the ways in which I facilitate that space, right?
I don’t have to write 30 different lesson plans, but rather there’s a real beauty and. using group work and, you know, and collaborative tasks to, [00:23:00] for students to actually collectively build those skills. together.
Justin Hewitt: Thank you for, , for that, for kind of, that gives me a lot of hope cuz 30 different lesson plans would be a little much.
But so then I’m thinking how do you, how do you decide to group your students and mm-hmm. , I feel like a lot of times one of the things that we see is, , in an absence of maybe some, you know, speaking or writing artifacts, some of the mm-hmm. , you know, the evidence that maybe we’re hoping, that we’re gather.
you know, as a part of our eliciting evidence piece in an absence of maybe data on speaking outside of, you know, our high stakes language assessment results, we end up using like our reading data, right? Like, oh, well we have an assessment for reading. And so we use that as like a default. And if we do that instead of using actual speaking data for students, what are some of the challenges that that.
Will [00:24:00] create,
Tim Blackburn: well, I can think of a few. I mean, you know, firstly, it really comes down to like the purpose behind your, your grouping. Right? And so the kind of grouping that I was, you know, describing before was really. , , like a homogeneous grouping, right? You’re, you’re grouping students with a, a like need because you’ve observed, you know, through your formative assessment that students are not yet proficient or they could use some extra support in a differentiated way on, on a discreet skill.
And so, you know, irrespective of. You know, what your iReady data might say, or you know, what sort of, what, what DIBELS tells you. , you’re kind of, you’re, you’re basing that grouping judgment on the student’s needs as evidenced. through, you know, the, the, the day’s lesson. [00:25:00] On the flip side of that, as far as, you know, the value of reading data and speaking data and sort of like a, it’s kind of thinking about the.
, this might be helpful, like the clarity and the depth of Yeah. The, the snapshot, right. . Mm-hmm. . So you think about it as like, in terms of like a, like a, a, a picture, right? Yeah. When you. , to what extent does the data reveal like an actual representation of where students are in their, in their language proficiency or in their, their reading comprehension?
Like those, those data data are instructive. They are helpful. And my argument here is that they’re not the end all be all, is that your classroom observations are also [00:26:00] just as valid, if not more so.
we often really like lean into these quantitative representations of what students know and can do in terms of their, you know, their English literacy. , and I’ve been thinking a lot about like the, the gaps in that. Like, because there are certain assumptions that, that even by just referring to, you know, English, you know, English language, you know, like assessments, that certainly does not reveal to me the, the strengths and the assets that my students bring to to class in terms of their home language literacy or their home language.
RS E . . And that’s really what I meant about like having like a, you know, having data from like valid data. From your observations as, as teacher in these, these target skills are, are going to give you like a, like a, a, a full and rich [00:27:00] picture Yes. Of the student’s assets and Yes. Of the areas in which they are not.
independent or not yet proficient. And so a again, it’s like, it’s not a question of, of or right? Like mm-hmm , these, you know, like qualitative data or quantitative data. It’s rather. A conversation of, and like, how can I compliment these data? You know, the quantitative data with my classroom observations,
Justin Hewitt: which is powerful, like as you say that I’m thinking I love the, and in there qualitative and
Tim Blackburn: quantitative
Justin Hewitt: because a lot of times it seems like we’re we, we default to what we can measure.
- . I had a c e o that I worked with one time that said, if you can’t count it, it doesn’t count . We, I always disagreed with that personally. He would say, yeah, I
Tim Blackburn: would, I dunno about that. , I wouldn’t mind crossing swords with that [00:28:00] because, yeah. Yeah, because it’s , I think it discounts the role, , , the, the role of, , of a teacher.
I mean, to think about the expertise and the, you know, the empathy, , I mean mm-hmm. , we, we, I mean, I think that in a lot of ways that’s, that’s a very disempower. , right? If we’re to solely rely on, on what we can count, right? And so again, it’s, you know, for me, if, if we’re going to have a conversation about student growth, it, it, it, we need to have like a, a fuller picture that that accounts for what students know and can do.
Yes, yes. In English language reading, yes. Great. But mm-hmm. . There’s more, there’s more out there. Right. Especially in considering a student’s home language skills.
Justin Hewitt: And, and so when you’re thinking about acting on evidence, I mean, it’s [00:29:00] really mm-hmm. , it’s not just a one. . It’s not just me, you know, using what I’ve observed, you know, as we elicited evidence and then, you know, kind of interpreting it and analyzing it and trying to figure out what’s next for this student or this group of students and how I want to group my students to talk about it.
It, it’s really, it’s a lot more, there’s a lot more dimension to it. Than just necessarily how I’m going to respond next in my classroom.
Tim Blackburn: Absolutely. Yeah. And I think sort of
implicit there is that you don’t have to do it alone either, and that, that there’s a real value in. and coming together you know, with colleagues to, to talk and, you know, like share observations, you know, so when you, when you work through these cycles, the formative, you know, assessment cycle process and you’re analyzing, interpreting evidence, think about how powerful that would be.
You know, doing so with [00:30:00] partners, you know, with my teacher peers. . And then, you know, pulling on that is like, how can we develop, you know, like common supports that, that, you know, that might be like shared routines or you know, grouping strategies that emerge as a result of our conversation as a result of our, our collective.
You know, it’s teaching can be like a really isolating thing. And, and, and so again, the formative assessment process can actually assign sort of like a meta language for, for a pedagogy, a responsive pedagogy, and designing culturally and linguistic. Your responsive, you know, , tasks and tools that just create the space for students to show us what they know and can do.
Justin Hewitt: That is so good. And, and so do you have any last thoughts maybe on [00:31:00] this, on this whole process that maybe, you know, kind of wrap this up for us, if you don’t mind and yeah, help us catch the vision of how we get, get moving on this.
Tim Blackburn: Yeah, so there’s a few things that come to mind. I mean, the, the, the process like nc like the process on, you know, all together is, is really designed to be like totally agnostic of, of a particular content area, but it does assume something really important.
Well, a few important things actually, you know, is firstly, There are language development opportunities throughout a student’s school day, and so by starting from clear intended learning, the, the layers there are, are three at least, right? It’s [00:32:00] having a, a clear understanding of the target concepts. Having a focus on, on those bloomy verbs, right?
The, the, the thinking practices and, and really building student independence in higher order thinking practices like evaluating and analyzing and interpreting, synthesizing, summarizing. and finally implicit in, you know, the in analysis for instance is, is a language load. You know, what is the language development opportunity for, you know, analyzing a cause and effect relationship?
Well, the, the formative assessment process kind of. Gives us, you know, a tool for unpacking those demands. And, and, and again, it’s so important that we do that, you know, with our colleagues that we’re, we’re highlighting these, these. [00:33:00] Clear intended learning outcomes together. And, you know, extending that is, you know, with my colleagues is, is thinking about the invitations, thinking about, you know, creating the space for students to, to grow in, in those skills and those target skills over time.
And I just love, love, love. The metaphor of, of invitation, right? You know, and, and apprenticeship and thinking about in kind of a spiraling way. How we can design these invitations for students to grow in these, in these skills over time. And then, you know, from there is equipping students with the skills to monitor their own growth and equipping myself with the tools for analyzing and interpreting student growth in, in those target skills.
And you know, the more I think about this, [00:34:00] the, the. The more I’m convinced that teachers coming together in a, in a professional learning community to, to actually hone in on, on that growth is so important because, , the impact of that is so direct into thinking about the, you know, future supports and actual like, differentiation, you know, differentiated supports for students, you know, tomorrow and the next day.
That is what emerges from those conversations is. it is generative because it’s, you know, designed to equip students with the tools they need to unlock, you know, future learning. .
Justin Hewitt: And I think that’s why we see leadership playing such an important role in student achievement, right? Is because, yeah, our best leaders do such a great job [00:35:00] of getting their teachers, their, you know, their, their, you know, building that teacher, , collective teacher efficacy, that group bonding people together, working together, creating a common language.
You know, putting out that north star of what we’re working towards and getting everyone to row together, and I think that. That’s what is, you know, I’m kind of thinking about as you, as you kind of described that and think about that or, or kind of talk through that, I guess. Is that it? You know, oftentimes that’s, that’s why we see achievement, you know, we know that it’s the importance of the teacher in the classroom or the teacher with the students, but collectively as a group for that school leadership matters.
Tim Blackburn: It really does. And when I think about My warmest memories and experiences as a teacher, were, were serving on a, on an interdisciplinary team at International Community high school. [00:36:00] And when I think about like the, probably for me, like the most like crucial leadership move, you know, from my, my dear former principal, Barina Kaba.
I said she trusted us, you know, she said, these are your 90 children. and I need you to see them through . She, she totally trusted us to, you know, with, you know, the, the charge of making sure that we’re holding our students to. To a high, you know, grade level standard that, you know, despite their, the fact that they were, you know, recently arrived, you know, newcomer, multilingual children, they were also ninth graders.
Right. . And so we had to, you know, come together to find a way to simultaneously, you know, [00:37:00] Build their, their readiness in terms of, you know, grade level content and grade level skills, and equipping them with the, the language they need for success within each of our disciplines. That wasn’t just a question of what Mr.
Tim did in class, but rather what we were doing collectively, you know, to, you know, as a, as a teacher team. And, you know, as you shared, you know, Justin, like for me, like the, the big leadership moves was the. Who was the trust in, you know, from our, from our school leader to, to do the job?
Justin Hewitt: Is that the same principal that, that, , gave you the bus analogy or metaphor about different, different principal?
Oh, that was a different principal. Okay. Different principal. Yeah, Mr. Boss said that. Yeah, you gotta, you’ve gotta walk us through, you know, tell us that and then we can, we can kind of wrap.
Tim Blackburn: Same, yeah, same sort of thing. I was just referring to, you know, , Richard Boss. , this was back when I was at the Fordham Leadership Academy for Business and Technology, [00:38:00] and what Mr.
Boss said was you know, I want you to imagine that there’s 30 children get on the bus with you at the start of the year. What are you going to do to make sure that those same 30 children are with you at the end of the year? Well, it’s just like a helpful metaphor, you know? It’s like you can’t drive like a maniac, you know, screaming down the highway that bust, you know, bouncing up and down and, and losing children along the way.
And for me it was like a very instructive sort of, sort of visual, like, okay. They’re my responsibility. I accept that, right? I accept that challenge. And I think what I learned though along the way, that it’s not just about me, but rather what my colleagues and I can do together to ensure that those same children arrive safely and better for it
Justin Hewitt: and better for it.
And you know what? We’ve all been [00:39:00] better for, , being able to spend this time with you, Tim, and kind of walking through. , you know, this four step formative process, , formative practice process and model and, , really appreciate you doing that. I I know that, that, , you’re gonna continue to be here on the ML Chat podcast so people can continue to tune in to find you here.
You know, but tell us if our listeners want to go find you, you know, somewhere else online, where can they go to follow you or connect with you, Tim?
Tim Blackburn: Oh, that’s a really good question. I do have a a Twitter handle that I never use. Would that be helpful?
Justin Hewitt: I think it’s helpful. Let’s throw it out there.
And maybe this will be the beginning of a, of a big Twitter following. Let’s go.
Tim Blackburn: Yeah, you can find me at at Blackburn. I love language, so I’ve made my own verb , so I turned my last name into. , so you can reach me at at Blackburn and needed. I’m on LinkedIn as well, , at Tim Blackburn. And then, , of course you can find me in the, in the Tiger Tuan School district.
I’d be happy to, you can reach me [00:40:00] at, , my emails on their website actually for, , ttsdschools.org.
Justin Hewitt: Yep. If people want it, they can go hunt it down and go find Jen connect you that way. . . Well, Tim, what a pleasure this is. This has been, , incredibly valuable for all of us and, and we look forward to figuring out how we can.
How we can, you know, really take this, these learnings of, of clear intended, , learning outcomes, kind of starting with that, and then working through eliciting evidence and interpreting it, analyzing it, and then lastly, acting on it. Not just in the classroom, but you know, as our teacher groups and as you know, as, as, , You know, as a, as a learning group to meet the needs of our students, our multilingual learners.
And anyways, this has been amazing, Tim. Thank you so much for being here.
Tim Blackburn: Thank you, Justin. I really appreciate the opportunity to chat.
Justin Hewitt: All right. We’ll see you soon. Thanks everybody.
Tim Blackburn: All right, later on, Justin. Thanks everyone.
