Doug Lemov's field notes

Reflections on teaching, literacy, coaching, and practice.

06.09.17 For Coaches: Notes on ‘Means of Participation’

      A topic I’ve been thinking about as I’ve watched coaches over the past couple of months is something I call ‘means of participation.’ It’s relevant during questioning. I’ve written about if for classroom teachers here.  But it’s relevant for coaches too- questioning is important in building decision-making and reinforcing knowledge through recall practice…


03.23.17 Common Opportunities to Build Rigor: Means of Participation

Great teachers are always seeking to make their classrooms as rigorous as possible. Over the next three days, I’ll be sharing  thoughts about three ‘common opportunities’ –things I see in place when I observe great classrooms that can often make a big difference—quickly—in good ones. Common Opportunity #1: Improve the rigor of your classrooms by defining…


01.04.17 Engaged Cerebral Classroom Culture: Aidan Thomas’ Master Class on Wait Time

The TLAC team and I had a blast at our weekly video meeting this morning.  The highlight was a series of Wait Time examples from Aidan Thomas’ math class at Uncommon’s Leadership Prep Bed Stuy in Brooklyn.  From one lesson of Aidan’s, Joaquin Hernandez presented us with seven examples of Wait Time (there were more left…


12.10.15 Wait Time Insights from our Workshop Participants

We’re up in Albany this morning studying Engaging Academics with folks from around the country. Our first topic is Wait Time and as with any workshop we’ve learned a ton from our participants. Here are some of their observations: Naomi Ali of Syracuse City School District noted, in observing in one video students slowly and thoughtfully…