What's GRR?

Yesterday afternoon, I engaged in a Twitter discussion about the Gradual Release of Responsibility. Because of the confines of the medium (maximum of 140 characters in its pure form), we quickly condensed the phrase to GRR. This resulted in the following tweet between John and Frank: 

I am a nosy Tweeter so I butted in and shared this video on GRR by Jeffrey Wilhelm:

My first introduction to this teaching and learning model was at a workshop on content literacy put on by The Learning Network. Margaret Mooney was the keynoter and she described the model using a figure similar to the one shown to the right. I was resistant because the leftmost stages reminded me too much of lecturing - a method I had decided was ineffective when it came to constructing understanding. I was what my wife calls a "constructivist gone wild."


Then I read about GRR in Debbie Miller's book, Reading with Meaning. She writes:

Chances are that if you think back to a time when you learned how to do something new, the gradual release of responsibility model (Pearson and Gallagher 1983) comes into play. Maybe you learned how to snowboard, canoe, play golf, or drive a car. If you watched somebody do it first, practiced under that person's watchful eye, listened to his or her feedback, and then one fine day went off and did it by yourself, adding your own special twist to it in the process, you know what this model is all about. (p. 10)

I was not completely convinced, but I was beginning to see the appeal of this more natural approach to teaching and learning.


Finally, I watched a first-grade teacher use GRR during a series of reading comprehension lessons. She modeled for me how she used formative assessments to evaluate where learners were in the model and how that informed the level of support she needed to offer during instruction. This demonstration helped me to see GRR as a framework that supports teacher decision-making during lessons focusing on processes. It has been an essential framework in my teaching ever since.


A few years ago, one of our teacher assistants suggested that a rubric describing the roles of teachers and learners in this model might help him in identifying where learners were at in their understanding. Working with my colleague John Golden, this pdf draft was developed. You will see that the role of the teacher moves from being a model, to being a mentor, to monitoring the learner.


There are many other resources available on this model. Fisher and Frey discuss it in Better Learning through Structured Teaching. @mrsebiology recently tweeted these resources (a framework and a matrix).


I hope this helps to answer the question, "What's GRR?" If you're interested in learning more, I would suggest: (1) find an expert to watch; (2) collaborate with the expert in your own classroom; and (3) modify it to make it work for you. At least that is how I learned to apply this model.

What support do learners need?

Last week I shared a lesson plan used to introduce the clock model for adding and subtracting fractions to a class of fifth-graders. This post focuses on the follow-up lesson, which concentrated on developing an anchor chart that learners could lean on as they solved progressively more difficult fraction computation problems. In particular, I will discuss how the instruction attempted to offer support so new learning could occur.

Learning is about moving from the known to the new. Therefore, we began by activating our schema regarding how we had used the clock model to add fractions in the previous lesson. Then we considered other fractions that could be represented using time as a context and began building an anchor chart based on our experiences with clocks in and out of the classroom.

An anchor chart supports learning by creating a record that learners can refer to as cognitive demand increases. In Reading with Meaning, Debbie Miller writes, "Anchor charts make our thinking permanent and visible, and so allow us to make connections from one strategy to another, clarify a point, build on earlier learning, and simply remember a specific lesson (p. 57)." This anchor chart offered the fifth-graders support both as a representation for thinking as they computed the fractions and a representation of thinking that they could point to as they communicated their thinking to their peers.

We worked through the number string together, with me starting the computation and learners offering advice as we went along. A number string is a series of progressively more difficult problems that build on the success of prior solutions. Being sure to use "I language," I started each problem by saying, "This reminds me of ..." As we went on, I asked more and more often, "What should I do next?"


From the perspective of the Gradual Release of Responsibility, my approach for this lesson would be considered Shared Practice [WITH]. (In the previous lesson, I had relied on Demonstration [TO] in order to support the introduction of the clock context - something new. Based on learners' efforts in that lesson, I was confident that they were ready for more responsibility.) With Shared Practice, the teacher supports learners by reinforcing how problem solvers get started, but there is still room for exploration and approximation as learners offer their suggestions for what comes next. This came in the form of the fifth-graders telling me what to do to complete the fraction problems. Not all of their suggestions worked, but we thought through them together and used our prior knowledge and anchor chart to get back on track. Any "mistakes" were used as an opportunity to foster a learning community that could support each other through difficult problems.

At the close of this lesson, I offered a final support - time to reflect. Without an opportunity to consolidate their experiences from the lesson, it is very likely that the learning would not last. I asked the fifth-graders to write in their journals a recount of the day using the What, So What, and Now What framework. Their responses would serve as a formative assessment used to inform future lessons. But that is for another post.

Why are frameworks important in education?

Almost two years ago GVSU selected me for the first joint appointment between the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences (CLAS) and the College of Education (COE). As you might imagine, I was anxious about the appointment – anxious in both senses of the word. I was excited to explore everything this new opportunity had to offer, but there was also a lot of anxiety about a change in circumstances. In particular, I was worried about teaching new courses focusing strictly on education instead of math education.

Organizing and Managing Classroom Environments (ED 310) was one of those new courses. My COE colleagues gave me a lot of support, but I remained nervous. At this same time, ArtPrize came to Grand Rapids and a group of artists put a giant peace sign made of rocks in the Grand River just outside the building where I was teaching. I came to see this symbol as a reminder that I had nothing to be nervous about. I had the support and experience necessary to be successful.

Unfortunately, my learners in ED 310 remained stressed out. They were in their first teaching practicum and finding it difficult to organize and manage their classrooms. I explained the need for a firm foundation that I equated with a succinct teaching philosophy. This resulted in a workshop called “The Six-word Teaching Philosophy” based on an NPR story I heard about six-word memoirs.

Like all effective workshop teachers, I began with a model. My Six-word Teaching Philosophy is “Engagement that fosters capacity and agency.” The ED 310 learners found the activity interesting but not necessarily helpful. They needed something more concrete. So I explained how a teaching philosophy represents a framework and used the peace sign in the river as an analogy.

My presentation went something like this:

This fall, GR hosted ArtPrize. Works of art sprung up all over the downtown area and some were invisible unless you looked at them from the right perspective. Such was the case with a peace sign just north of the Fulton Street Bridge. I failed to see it when I was walking on the Blue Bridge, but from the 6^th floor of the Eberhard Center it became visible. This reminds me of the need for perspective when creating our classroom management plans. We design our plans based on a theoretical vision – a framework.

As September turned to October, the river began to rise and I noticed something interesting about the peace sign. While the water around it was turbulent, inside the peace sign was calm. I began thinking about how a well-constructed and enacted management plan based on a firm framework can maintain serenity within a classroom setting.

Later in October, after several consecutive days of rainfall, it appeared that the peace sign was gone. As I walked over the Fulton Street Bridge, however, I noticed it beneath the surface. Again, I see this as a metaphor for teaching. When I am overwhelmed, it may seem that things are not going according to plan. In reality, the problem may not be the plan but the very nature of teaching. Given time the waters of standardized testing, parent-teacher conferences, whatever… will subside and the framework remains.

Sure enough, in November the river began to lower and the peace sign once again became visible. An interesting phenomenon accompanied this change; the peace sign was actually causing turbulence. This reminds me how setting boundaries and expectations can sometime ruffle feathers of pupils, peers, and parents – especially if they are different from what is typical. The trick is to determine what is flack and what are legitimate concerns needing attention.

Here, a learner interrupted my presentation. She saw the last picture differently. “I think of it as creating ripples. Maybe having an impact on learners and colleagues.”

I thought for a moment, smiled, and said, “It’s important to connect frameworks to our own vision in order to make them useful.” I thanked the learner, said I would add her idea to my metaphor and then went on with the presentation. What I said after didn’t matter. The point was made.

I don’t know for sure if the presentation made a difference in their anxiety level. After all, teaching is a stressful career. The learners began to use the metaphor, however, and some included their own version in their final project. What’s important is that they saw the power of frameworks in instructional decision-making. Whether we are talking The Teaching-Learning Cycle, Understanding by Design, Conditions for Learning, or the Gradual Release of Responsibility, we need a framework in order to organize and examine our practice.

One might think that the story ends here. Then you can call this the epilogue. When I returned to the COE in the following Fall, I noticed that the peace sign had taken a beating. I wondered how this fit into my metaphor. I decided that it meant that our teaching experiences (tests, administration, professional development, …) take a toll on a teaching philosophy. And that it may periodically need updating.

Amazingly, within a few days, artists were out putting it back together. This was a reminder that we often need the support of others to keep our practice fresh. I have found that community at GVSU and with my new professional learning network on Twitter.

That is why my Twitter icon is the peace sign in winter. I hope to keep updating it (the icon and my philosophy) as seasons progress. And I hope you find peace in your practice.