Lesson Study Conference 2002

Papers and Presentations: Learning from Experience

Lesson Study at Paterson Public School No. 2:
A Teacher-Facilitator's Perspective

Bill Jackson

Paterson Public School No. 2 was the first school in the United States to pioneer lesson study. In this paper, mathematics facilitator Bill Jackson offers a practical guide on how lesson study is implemented at School 2. Beginning with the volunteer group of teachers who first read about lesson study, the paper goes on to discuss how School 2 partnered with other organizations, established a research theme and lesson study goal, scheduled teacher release time, revisited lesson planning methods, instituted formal reflection and reporting, held lesson study open houses, and encountered successes and challenges.

Paterson Public School No. 2 is one of the oldest continually existing public schools in the United States. It is part of the third-largest school system in New Jersey and serves over 700 mostly low-income minority students in grades pre-K through eight. How did this urban public school come to embrace lesson study? In 1997, in response to concerns over poor science and mathematics achievement, principal Lynn Liptak organized a voluntary group of 16 teachers to study the data from the Third International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) and other research.

Through studying the TIMSS data, we noted that Japan was one of the countries with high student achievement in mathematics and science. What could we learn from this? We learned that lesson study was a professional development method in Japan, but what did that mean? How could we do what the Japanese were doing here in the United States?

We decided we needed to reach out to research organizations that had been studying TIMSS and Japanese lesson study. Patsy Wang-Iverson, Senior Scientist at Research for Better Schools, sparked our interest in lesson study when she gave the group an article and a videotape by Catherine Lewis, Senior Research Scientist in the Mills College Department of Education. The materials showed how lesson study helps Japanese teachers develop engaging and effective science lessons. In 1999, Lynn Liptak contacted Clea Fernandez and Makoto Yoshida of the Lesson Study Research Group (LSRG) at Teachers College, Columbia University, who presented an overview on lesson study. LSRG then facilitated a collaboration with the Greenwich Japanese School, an elementary and middle school for Japanese children in Connecticut. The partnerships of all these groups helped to launch the lesson study process at School 2.

Establishing a Research Theme and Lesson Study Goal

Prior to engaging in lesson study, School 2 teachers chose a lesson study goal. The lesson study goal is the central theme around which lessons are developed. The current lesson study goal was developed by first looking at the whole-school research theme of “creating a community of responsible learners.” School 2 teachers began to think about the kind of students they had and the kind of students they wanted to develop. They decided that in order to create a community of responsible learners, teachers must think about ways to help organize student thinking, keep a record to which students can refer during and across lessons, and then share that thinking with their classmates. This led teachers to think about ways to organize the blackboard; create worksheets and use notebooks to guide and record student thinking; and encourage students to present, discuss, and debate their solutions. The lesson study goal that they selected is “to encourage, record, and share student thinking.”

Scheduling

Although lesson study initially began with a voluntary group, now nearly all classroom teachers are involved. Groups of teachers meet according to grade level clusters in weekly 80-minute meetings to conduct lesson study (see table below).

40 min. periods	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday
Period 1		7th/8th Grade
Period 2		7th/8th Grade
Period 3
Period 4
Period 5
Period 6			Promotion Committee	5th/6th Grade	5th/6th Grade
Period 7
Period 8				3rd/4th Grade	1st/2nd grade
Period 9				3rd/4th Grade	1st/2nd grade

While teachers are in these meetings, their students travel to non-classroom subjects such as gym, art, and music. There is also a lesson study promotion committee that meets about once a month to facilitate the process, plan events such as lesson study open houses, and discuss other related issues. In addition to conducting lesson study within the school, a voluntary group of teachers travels after school about once a month to the Greenwich Japanese School to conduct lesson study with Japanese teachers. This collaboration has resulted in lesson study open houses at both schools for the past two years.

With one meeting a week, a lesson study cycle takes about nine weeks and generally follows this schedule:

Planning the unit and choosing a research lesson (2 meetings)
Discussing and planning the research lesson (2 meetings)
Teaching and discussing the research lesson* (1 meeting)
Revising the research lesson (1 meeting)
Re-teaching and discussing the revised research lesson (1 meeting)
Reflecting on the experience and writing a report (2 meetings)

*Teaching occurs during the regular mathematics teaching time. The discussion, or debriefing session, is held during the lesson study meeting.

Each grade level cluster conducts one to two lesson study cycles per year. During a lesson study cycle, each cluster divides into two subgroups to develop one research lesson for each grade level. The yearly lesson study calendar is shown below:

Content and Planning

Lesson study is more than simply planning a lesson. The Japanese teachers constantly emphasize the importance of thinking about and planning the whole unit prior to planning the research lesson. After a unit is selected, teachers carefully examine the textbook to see how the topic is presented throughout the unit, how it is developed in previous grades, and how it is built upon in later grades. Then, the number of lessons in the unit is decided upon and each lesson is planned briefly. Afterwards, teachers talk about the key lessons in the unit and important concepts that may present difficulty to the students. One lesson is then chosen for the research lesson and the rest of the time is devoted to developing this lesson. Since teachers wish to spend most of the meeting time discussing ideas about the lesson, many times the actual writing of the lesson plan and creation of materials take place outside of the regular meeting time.

School 2 teachers have learned much about planning from the Greenwich Japanese School teachers. They have adopted the Japanese teachers’ lesson plan format that is different from what is typically used in the U.S.

The lesson plan generally includes the following:

the name, goal, and sequence of the unit
the title and goal of the lesson
the rationale for teaching the lesson and the connection to the lesson study goal
a detailed description of the lesson in column format (see below).

Steps	Student Activities, Teacher’s Questions, and Anticipated Responses	Teacher Support and Things to Remember	Method of Evaluation
Includes the steps of the lesson and the time allotted for each step	Includes activities students will be engaged in, problems posed, questions to provoke student thinking, and anticipated student solutions, methods, and errors	Includes things the teacher needs to keep in mind and remember to do during the lesson	Consists of questions designed to determine the effectiveness of each section of the lesson

This four-column format allows teachers to focus on student thinking, not just on what the teacher needs to do. It also helps teachers to create a coherent flow to the lesson and simultaneously monitor this flow from the perspectives of the student, the teacher, and the observer.

Reflection and Reporting

After the research lesson has been planned, taught, revised, and discussed in a debriefing session, the lesson study cycle is still not over. One of the most important parts of lesson study at School 2 is reflecting on the group’s lesson study activities as they relate to the lesson study goal. Each group creates a lesson study report that usually includes the following information:

the original lesson plan
notes from the debriefing session of the first teaching
the revised lesson plan
how the lesson plan was changed and why
notes from the debriefing session of the revised lesson
what was learned by the teachers (e.g., content, teaching, student thinking)
additional materials (e.g., samples of student work, photos, videotapes).

These lesson study reports are stored in the library for future use by teachers.

Open Houses

Another important feature of lesson study at School 2 is the lesson study open house. During a lesson study open house, teachers from the school are able to observe and discuss several research lessons and many visitors are invited from outside the school. Educators and researchers from all over the country have attended these open houses and well-respected knowledgeable others are invited to provide final comments on each lesson. Sometimes an open house is scheduled in conjunction with a larger conference on lesson study. Open houses often include a large “public lesson” where all participants observe a single lesson held in the gymnasium or library. School 2 teachers conduct lesson study open houses to promote lesson study within the school and to spread lesson study to others outside the school.

Outcomes at School 2: Successes and Challenges

Lesson study has provided the opportunity for teachers to develop a shared vision of teaching. From a survey conducted in the spring of 2002 (Wang-Iverson, 2002), many teachers reported that they now believe that lessons should be student-centered and focus on concepts, not just procedures. Students are encouraged to think, share, and discuss their solutions and errors. Because teachers believe that it is important to keep a record of the lesson for students to refer to, they are beginning to think deeply about how to organize their blackboards and how to use worksheets and notebooks to guide student thinking. School 2 teachers also believe that their own subject matter knowledge is important. They are less reluctant to admit they don’t know something and more willing to ask colleagues for help (Wang-Iverson, 2002). Lesson study also helps teachers to focus on the details of instructional practice. Lesson study allows teachers to think deeply about the questions they will pose, how their students will react, and other important details that transfer into daily instruction.

Because lesson study is scheduled on a weekly basis throughout the year, it also provides a way to continuously improve the teaching and learning of mathematics, allowing School 2 teachers to become life-long learners. The environment created by lesson study reduces teacher isolation and fosters collaboration among professionals. This environment has encouraged and supported School 2 teachers to open up their classrooms and ask each other for help. By providing a means to reflect on curriculum, lesson study motivated School 2 teachers to adopt mathematics textbooks from Singapore because of their focus and coherence. Lesson study has also motivated other professional development activities such as summer courses for teachers on mathematical content knowledge.

Although much progress has been made in conducting lesson study at School 2, there are many areas still in need of improvement. Much attention has been given to developing a single lesson but not enough thought has gone into developing the entire unit. Groups are now concentrating more on whole unit planning and some have even conducted “whole unit lesson study,” where detailed lesson plans are created for every lesson in the unit. Some teachers want to conduct lesson study in subject areas other than mathematics. Lesson study has now been expanded to include science, and next year it will possibly include other subjects. Another area in need of improvement is the lesson study promotion committee. Although this committee has existed for two years, its role remains too limited. There is also a need to improve the quality of the lesson study reports and think about ways to better use them both within and outside of the school.

Through the experience of School 2, we can gain insight into what elements are necessary for lesson study to succeed in the U.S. and what obstacles educators may face. Some of the elements that have helped lesson study to be successful at School 2 include enthusiastic teacher-leaders and committed administrators who carefully schedule time for teachers to meet during the school day. School 2 has also had the help of experienced lesson study practitioners and knowledgeable others who have acted as guides and mentors.

There are also challenges to the success of lesson study. The standardized test-oriented culture now prevalent in the U.S. presents difficulties for a professional development approach that is long-term in nature and promotes slow but steady improvement. The lack of patience for programs that don’t provide a quick fix for complex problems may make it difficult to sustain lesson study not only at School 2 but throughout the U.S.

Four years after its inception, lesson study has become a vital part of School 2 teachers’ professional growth. It has not been easy or painless, but it has been extremely rewarding. It is our hope that others can learn from our experience and that they too will be able to enrich their professional lives through lesson study.