Why Are We Still Posting Learning Targets?
When I started teaching in 2010, posting learning targets was all-the-rage. Because I was a brand new teacher, and probably because I’ve always been a people-pleaser, I did what I was told—and then some.
I posted every learning target for each lesson I’d teach in my fourth-grade classroom. Next to the day’s learning targets was an oversized and laminated target I’d made out of construction paper, reminiscent of a dartboard. I even purchased a bow and arrow with a suction cup at the end of it. When we finished a lesson, individual students were invited to aim the bow-and-arrow towards the target and make their best attempt at hitting the target.
It was gimmicky, sure, and as you might anticipate, it didn’t last very long. It was time-consuming, it lost its luster, and most importantly, it wasn’t actually contributing to student learning.
Almost 15 years later, teachers are still being asked to post learning targets on the board, clarifying them at the start of each lesson. Many teacher express their opposition to it, some sharing that they “don’t believe in learning targets,” with others complaining that it’s just a “compliance tool.” Some teachers even proclaim that posting learning targets operates in opposition to constructivist teaching: if we wanted students to construct knowledge on their own, they’ll argue, then providing them the learning target ahead of time takes this opportunity away from them.
Grains of truth exist inside each of these counterarguments to posting learning targets, except for maybe that first one. In my opinion, these responses to posting learning targets are indicative of two things: (1) school leaders may be emphasizing the posting of the learning target for compliance purposes, instead of encouraging the integration of learning targets into a lesson for clarity and sustainability; and (2) teachers do not understand, both pragmatically and scientifically, the ways in which learning targets can support student understanding, personalized learning, and sustainability in schools.
The question still stands, but perhaps it’s an incomplete question: Why are we still posting learning targets if we are not going to support teachers in actually using them to their benefit?
Student Understanding
Because many teachers are posting learning targets simply for the sake of compliance, these targets ultimately don’t serve a purpose in building understanding. What’s more, some teachers are posting broad learning goals, as opposed to bite-sized learning objectives on which students can reflect at the end of a lesson.
For instance, something like, “Students will write an informational piece, incorporating their research on frogs” is markedly different from “Students will combine drafts of informational paragraphs into a final draft of an informational piece.” The former indicates a description of a performance task, whereas the latter focuses on a step of the writing process and articulates more specifically the type of skill we want students to be able to do.
By writing learning targets with greater accuracy and clarity, we notice the verb itself. Write is a generic verb and can be demonstrated in different ways. Combine, while still subjective, provides more insight into the task at-hand: the lesson is less so about drafting or writing, and more about synthesizing their previous work into one cohesive piece. One might even consider just calling it what it is, and instead writing the learning target as follows: Students will synthesize drafts of informational paragraphs into a final draft of an informational piece.
The clarity around the learning target itself not only helps teachers focus on the task at-hand; it also establishes boundaries for students. In writing, in particular, it’s rather easy to begin critiquing grammar, spelling, or punctuation, but when the learning target is focused on synthesizing drafts into one cohesive piece, teachers and students can hold off on fixing grammar, spelling, or punctuation until a day when the learning target is focused on an editing.
Personalized Learning
It may not seem like it at first, but posting a learning target actually supports personalized learning. When teachers push back and argue that learning targets operate in opposition to personalized learning, it provides me insight into their misconceptions about personalized learning. Teachers either: (1) have an incorrect definition of personalization, conflating individualized learning with personalized learning; or (2) are hyper-focused on an element of personalized learning, unaware that personalization is an expansive and nuanced term. There are many ways to personalize learning sustainably and in partnership with kids—and it doesn’t require giving each of them their own learning target.
If personalized learning and individualized learning were supposed to be synonymous, we wouldn’t have two different words for them. In actuality, sustainable personalized learning is enacted within universally designed learning environments where students can make productive choices; it is not necessarily enacted through individualized curricula or web-based, adaptive technologies that individualize content dissemination through videos and multiple-choice questions.
The question still stands, though: how can learning be personalized if every child has the same learning target? Carol Ann Tomlinson, author of So Each May Soar, would remind us that differentiated instruction can be enacted in different ways: through the content, process, product, and learning environment. Therefore, if all students have the same learning target, learning can still be personalized through each of these avenues.
While students may have the same informational writing learning target, they might choose to write about different informational topics. When teaching elementary school, my learning targets would generally be focused on transferable writing skills, such as “I can identify a text structure for my informational piece that matches my topic.” While this learning target is universal, students were able to apply various text structures to their topics. This shifted the cognitive load onto them, building agency and independence, meanwhile allowing them to write about a topic that interested them.
In the math classroom, a teacher might want all students to grapple with the relationship between area and perimeter, knowing that students’ processes will differ: some will need to use square tiles to calculate; others will draw models and use various counting and skip counting patterns to calculate the number of squares within a rectilinear figure; some will be ready to apply the standard algorithms for calculating area and perimeter, perhaps even seeing patterns between different sized areas and their perimeters.
In the reading classroom, some learners might demonstrate their understanding of the central theme of a text in different ways. Teachers can offer students various ways to display this theme. Some students may identify a symbol or image to represent the central theme, backing up their choice with a brief paragraph. Others might demonstrate their understanding through a literary essay that incorporates textual evidence. Some might even write an alternative ending to the story, showing how the central theme can change along with the events of a story. While each of these incorporate different mediums and are indicative of varied levels of understanding, they still all provide teachers evidence towards the same learning target, albeit in a manner that provides students choices within boundaries.
Sustainable Teaching
Sustainable teaching is good for kids and good for teachers. This is critical to understand and reiterate. Sustainability is supposed to help teachers work smarter, making their lives easier—and without sacrificing quality instruction. Posting and articulating learning targets meet both of these criteria, and therefore should be done in their classrooms to promote #SustainableTeaching.
While these benefits to sustainability are implied within student understanding and personalized learning, it is worth reiterating that in order to make teaching sustainable, we must shift towards learner empowerment, minimalism in our planning and preparation, and flexibility in our instruction. These are three of the six mindset shifts present in Make Teaching Sustainable: Six Shifts Teachers Want and Students Need.
Student voice and choice lies at the heart of learner empowerment. That said, voice, choice, and empowerment need not entail decision-making without boundaries. While learning targets establish boundaries around what students are learning, the targets themselves do not necessarily define the content, process, or product of learning, as we unpacked in each example related to personalized learning. The boundaries a learning target provides create sustainability and clarity, meanwhile granting students a healthy and developmentally appropriate amount of agency and autonomy in how they approach the learning target, similar to how students can grapple with the relationship between area and perimeter using various tools. These tools promote access for all types of learners—from concrete, to representational, to abstract—and the student’s ability to choose allows for sustainable personalization through their agency.
Moving Beyond Compliance
Sadly, in some classrooms, teachers are still posting learning targets for the sake of compliance. It makes sense, then, why some teachers express resentment or discontent when administrators come into their classrooms and ding them for not posting a learning target.
If you’re an administrator and you see teachers are no longer posting learning targets, this is providing you valuable formative data for professional learning: What do we, as school leaders, need to change about professional learning to help teachers understand the value of learning targets? How might posting learning targets make teachers’ lives a bit easier and their jobs more sustainable?
Asking these questions, instead of grounding our efforts in compliance or control, will make it more likely that learning targets become a critical part of an instructional framework that is inherently sustainable. It will be mutually beneficial for everyone involved: teachers will establish boundaries that minimize complexity; administrators and coaches will have a better understanding of what students are learning when they visit classrooms; and most importantly, learners will have the clarity they need to make productive choices in the classroom, becoming partners in making learning all the more personal by building their agency.
