Think for a moment about what experience or influence has helped you grow the most as a teacher or administrator. Was it something that you did completely by yourself, or did it involve deeper connections with mentors and colleagues? Did it take place at your school over a long period of time? If so, keep reading. Lesson study may be for you.
Lesson study is a new term for the old truism that two minds are better than one. It challenges the status quo of teachers and their classrooms as islands--relatively unaware of events on other islands--with students floating in between.
In the lesson study model of professional development, teachers connect with one another, with administrators and specialists, and even with other schools. All participants focus their energy on student learning in the classroom, and together they develop, implement, and refine the lesson being studied.
While its practice in the United States is limited, lesson study has a long and well-documented history in Japan, where it is the most common form of teacher professional development.
Ironically, lesson study emerged in Japan as a grassroots movement of educators trying to replace lecturing with the Western philosophy of "child-centered teaching" and the problem-solving approach.
Derived from the Japanese term "jugyokenkyu," the term "lesson study" was coined by Makoto Yoshida, president of Global Education Resources, who generously collaborated on this issue of RBS Currents (particularly on the lesson observation and debriefing guidelines within). It can also be translated in reverse as "research lesson," which indicates the level of scrutiny applied to individual lessons. Far from shortsighted, the intended impact of lesson study is school-wide, and it requires persistence and patience to reap its full benefits.
"The main contribution that the Japanese form of lesson study offers that is not already in the United States is school-wide professional development that is implemented in a systematic way," says Patsy Wang-Iverson, senior associate of RBS. She stresses that lesson study does not require additional funding to be implemented, but it should not be attempted frivolously or without a supportive network of administrators and content experts.
Yoshida cautions that lesson study is not one lesson, as is commonly misunderstood, but the study of an entire curriculum unit, and how through the unit teachers can foster better student understanding.
The "performance piece" aspect of lesson study is the teaching of a lesson with students that is observed by other teachers. Surrounding this lesson is an intensive, collaborative effort by the study group to extract the best ideas in planning, reviewing, and revising the lesson. The entire process moves toward a broad goal or vision of education developed by the school or study group to enhance their students' lives.
Lesson study emerged in Japan as a grassroots movement to replace lecturing with the Western philosophy of child-centered teaching.Before any lessons are planned, the school staff carefully analyzes its student population in order to select an appropriate, over-arching goal, such as facilitating students' independent thinking. Writing teams collaborate to use this goal in designing and mapping out one original lesson. As that lesson is taught, the non-teaching members and other observers participate as researchers, recording student reactions in order to document student thinking. This live observation sets the stage for an insightful critique session, which takes place the same day. With their findings, the team begins the cycle again, either by refining that lesson or by selecting a new topic to develop for the next lesson. A typical team might team develop two lessons over the course of a school year.
Only two lessons? The real "lesson" of lesson study is not product, but process. It compels teachers to examine their own practice in depth, connects them with their students and their professional community, and inspires them to teach better every day.
In Japan, lesson study groups exist for all content areas. In the United States, lesson study has focused on mathematics and science, because interest in it was stimulated by data from the Third International Mathematics and Science Study. The TIMSS videotapes of Japanese mathematics classrooms were of particular inspiration to New Jersey's Paterson School 2, which has been a pioneer of lesson study in the U.S. for the last three years.
Teachers in Japan frequently observe lessons in other content areas, according to Wang-Iverson, because they use the process to better understand their students. "When you are able to observe your own students being taught by someone else," says Wang-Iverson, "you get a more concrete view of their learning and thinking."
If teachers improve their content knowledge and practice through lesson study, then it follows that their students will have greater opportunities to increase their understanding and improve their performance. For teachers, lesson study provides a dynamic means of sharing new content and teaching approaches. Perhaps just as important, it honors the central role of teachers.
Another indirect benefit of lesson study may be the "professionalization" of teaching. When teachers take time to study teaching, then students, parents, and the education community at large will take them more seriously.
If you are still wondering what lesson study is, think of it as a bridge. Built by schools, it provides an infrastructure for teachers to share and discover best practices in a deliberate and thoughtful manner. Some of those ideas may even come from the "island" right next door to yours.
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