Students at the Center: Personalized Learning with Habits of Mind

by Bena Kallick, Allison Zmuda

Educators' most important work is to help students develop the intellectual and social strength of character necessary to live well in the world. The way to do this, argue authors Bena Kallick and Allison Zmuda, is to increase the say students have in their own learning and prepare them to navigate complexities they face both inside and beyond school. This means rethinking traditional teacher and student roles and re-examining goal setting, lesson planning, assessment, and feedback practices. It means establishing classrooms that prioritize Based on their exciting work in the field, Kallick and Zmuda map out a transformative model of personalization that puts students at the center and asks them to employ the set of dispositions for engagement and learning known as the Habits of Mind. They share the perspectives of educators engaged in this work; highlight the habits that empower students to pursue aspirations, investigate problems, design solutions, chase curiosities, and create performances; and provide tools and recommendations for adjusting classroom practices to facilitate learning that is self-directed, dynamic, sometimes messy, and always meaningful.

Genres: Education, Professional Development, Teaching, Nonfiction, Grad School

160 pages, Paperback

Published January 30, 2017

Reviews

[Toni Taylor · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a quick & easy read to understand and learn about Personalized Learning. The book addresses how the four attributes of PL (voice, co-creation, social construction, and self-discovery) are the pillars for creating a personalized learning culture in a school and classroom. “As the classroom and school focus on the four attributes…the Habits of Mind become a set of behaviors that students and teachers build on, come to value, … and use…” There are 16 Habits of Mind which are considered “soft skills” or “non-cognitive” skills that students should have to be successful in life. Overall, this is an interesting book that made me reflect on my own pedagogy.

[Ryan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this as part of our school’s initiative. It should be looked at by all educators. Great ideas, I wish they gave more concrete examples on how to implement their hypothesis instead of giving generalizations. For example, giving actual examples of what an art class or math class would look like instead of saying “teachers need to think and plan creatively”. Sorry but most teachers already do this so you need to be more specific. In fact it would have been awesome to get a whole chapter on just specific examples of this. I like the idea of student driven classrooms, but the reality of implementing one isn’t as easy and as straight forward as is posited in the book.

[Katelin · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book was picked for my department's book study. I can't stand it. The real world doesn't work like this and we are doing a disservice to the students by teaching them they can make choices when colleges and jobs do not give you option on how to complete you tasks.

[Tracey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Personalizing Learning is much different than Individualizing and differentiating instruction. Personalizing Learning is placing the student in the driver's seat of his/her education and the teacher is the co-pilot making sure all educational learning standards are met.

How do we do this? At some point, we really have to jump in with both feet and get started!

We need to Empower Students to find their own way by helping them find their voice, work in a co-creation manner with the teacher, guide students to build ideas through relationships to develop social construction and through self-discovering which is helping students understand themselves as learners.

Incorporating the 16 Habits of Mind is essential to Personalizing Learning. They are:
The 16 Habits of Mind identified by Costa and Kallick include:
• Persisting
• Thinking and communicating with clarity and precision
• Managing impulsivity
• Gathering data through all senses
• Listening with understanding and empathy
• Creating, imagining, innovating
• Thinking flexibly
• Responding with wonderment and awe
• Thinking about thinking (metacognition)
• Taking responsible risks
• Striving for accuracy
• Finding humor
• Questioning and posing problems
• Thinking interdependently
• Applying past knowledge to new situations
• Remaining open to continuous learning

Students grow with student-driven practice. This includes:
• Goals
• Inquiry/idea generation
• Task and audience
• Evaluation
• Cumulative demonstration of learning
• Instructional plan
• Feedback

Personalized Learning includes two elements of utmost importance: Goal Setting and Inquiry and idea generation

While there are many sources of educational goals, i.e. standards and objectives, I found the section on SMART Goals most interesting. SMART goals are strategic/specific, measurable, attainable, realistic/relevant, and time-bound. Inquiry/Idea generating focused on asking questions rather than reaching out and providing everything a student needs to accomplish their task.

The rest of the book focused on implementation and what Personalized Learning looks like. I found this to be a very worthwhile read and plan to use the ideas this upcoming school year!

[Billeen Carlson · Rating 5 out of 5]

How to teach the future

This was my first introduction to the 16 Habits of Mind, a codified set of “attitudes & dispositions” found by research to drastically improve learning. This book, for teachers & administrators, translated the Habits of Mind into a whole child, personalized approach emphasizing school & classroom culture.

While my students are not ready to dive into Habits of Mind quite yet (this year we will focus on the fat crayon version; Grit, Gratitude, & Growth Mindset), this book gave me much to think about on the problems associated with implementing Personalized Learning and practical approaches to overcome them for students, teachers, & administrators.

[Tara Schuhmacher · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well looking at my finished copy... now colorfully adorning about 20 sticky notes, I have to say I'm very impressed with how much concrete advice this book offers.

I feel so many books have great ideas, but they leave you lost without knowing how to really begin executing them.

This book gives a lot of tools you can use tomorrow, or in my case, add to my game plan for next year. I still have gaps I hope further research will help me understand, but this was definitely a must read for anyone interested in beginning a personalized learning journey.

[Tammy Westrick · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book frames personalized learning through the habits of mind. I appreciated the focus on "soft skills" or dispositions, as well. I especially appreciated Chapter 7 that addresses creating a culture of personalized learning as well as some tools to help move a school forward including the Shift in Practice Matrix (pg. 84) and the Four Phases of Personalized Learning Implementation (pg. 122)

[Brenda · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm excited to read and share this book. I have been looking for something that stretches my thinking and revitalizes my teaching. I'm am looking forward to the ways this can guide me back to where I was almost a decade ago and then lead me forward toward developing an environment that is more conducive to self-directed, self-reflective metacognitive learning.

[Emily Klusman · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love the ideas this book had to share. It had some great tips but did feel vague and open-ended at times. In other words, it answered questions ans created more questions at the same time. Quick and easy read in terms of professional development!

[Hannah Soriano · Rating 5 out of 5]

Definitely helped me to take a step back and analyze a bigger picture when working with students in the classroom!

[Kim Fontana · Rating 5 out of 5]

Zmuda and Kallick present a perspective on personalized learning that is emancipatory for students and teachers. It has the potential to change lives for both--just what we expect education to do!

[Erin M-M]

This book is wonderful for someone who wants to learn how to implement the Habits of the Mind in and Personalized Learning to their teaching style. I am fairly well versed in HOM and PL, but this book reinforced some notions that I had, correct misconceptions and gave new ideas for the coming school year.

Worth the read!