Thread by @JulieHStern

I've worked with thousands of teachers in every content area preK-12 on boosting our practice for an ever-changing world.

Here are my top 3 low-lift, high-impact shifts. 🧵

Shift #1: Ask yourself and your students how studying (whatever topic, skill, or concept) gives us insight into who we want to be or how to make the world a better place. Use this question to guide planning and classroom reflection/discussion.

For example:

❌ What were the main causes of World War II?
✅ How does the study of World War II give us insight into preventing another world war?

❌ How do I communicate in another language?
✅ What does communicating in another language teach me about myself?

Shift #2: Ask students to articulate how 2+ organizing concepts interact. This points their attention to the deeper structural patterns of the discipline.

It allows them to construct the big ideas or enduring understandings for themselves.

For example:
✅ How do energy, force, and motion interact?

✅ What is the role of word choice in communicating meaning?

✅ How does place impact value?

Shift #3: Foster a culture of transfer by consistently asking students to look for concepts and their connections in new situations -- in shorter texts, photos, news stories, or thought-provoking videos.

For example: Where do you see force, gravity, angle, precision, risk-taking, creativity, communication, audience, message, purpose, collaboration and more in this video:

Another example: Where do you see identity, power, authority, change, causation, pattern, and more in this video?

When we teach students to recognize the deeper patterns of new situations, we prepare them to use their learning to figure out new problems we've never taught them. And that's exactly what's needed for today's complex world. 🌏 💪 💜 #LTT #learningtransfer

If you like these shifts, please like/retweet the first tweet & check out our unit database with hundreds of examples from teachers all around the world: learningthattransfers.com/digital-storyb…

And maybe consider joining one of our in-depth courses in September: learningthattransfers.thinkific.com/collections?ca…