Welcome to Season 3, episode 3 of Angela Watson's Truth for Teachers.

I'm your host Angela Watson and I'm here to speak life, encouragement, and truth into the minds and hearts of educators and get you

energized for the week ahead. Today I'm going to share some thoughts on how to

support students who don't take ownership of their learning.

Visit truth for teachers.com to get the transcript, links to recommended resources,

and share your thoughts on the show.

So you know the exact problem that I'm talking about this week.

You're patiently showing a student how to solve a problem or figure out a process and

the student responds by saying, can't you just tell me the answer?

Or you're responding to a student's question with questions of your own to try to prompt

him or her to figure out a solution independently and the child

says, can't you just tell me what to do?

When kids are unmotivated like this, the solution seems pretty natural. You give them more ownership, right? In

traditional schools that might be something like a homework menu where students have a choice about what type of assignment to

complete or other small ways in which kids get to make decisions about their learning.

In more progressive schools we're seeing an increased focus on project-based learning. Genius Hour, we're seeing 20% time,

maker spaces, passion projects, all these

approaches are all designed to make learning

more authentic and to empower kids to decide

what they want to learn about,

determine how to learn about it, and choose how they'll

demonstrate their learning.

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