Summary
Small, intentional teaching moves can complement strong lesson design by sparking curiosity, strengthening connections, and keeping students engaged in learning.
Key Takeaways
- Student engagement often depends on how a lesson is delivered, not just what is taught, making small instructional choices an important part of effective teaching.
- Knowing students’ interests and creating moments of curiosity or surprise can make learning feel more relevant and invite greater participation.
- Purposeful lesson design creates space for students to do more of the thinking, talking, and meaning-making while teachers guide the learning.
Each time I walk into a Starbucks with my teenage daughter, I feel uncertain. She orders with confidence complicated concoctions I think I may love. But the way she rattles the order to the barista leaves me in the dust and I just get something basic, feeling pressure to not hold up the line.
Recently, she ordered something that wasn’t just modified but not on the menu at all. She said it came from the “secret menu.” There are the drinks we all see posted, and others only Starbucks enthusiasts know about. It made me think about my role as an instructional coach. Sometimes I coach from the regular menu. Other times, I pull out the small teaching moves that hook students and keep their interest up.
I’ve read lots of books on instructional coaching. I feel confident in my ability to work with teachers to design lesson plans that consider standards alignment, learning targets, engagement, relevance, and rigor. But it’s often the little things, the moves that aren’t spelled out in lesson-plan templates, that students respond to most. This is my secret menu. (Starbucks doesn’t have the only one)! Here’s a sampling.
1. Get personal
I have three children. One (okay, all) dreads math. But when he was in middle school, a teacher changed that by tapping into something my son genuinely cared about. He loves the NBA, namely the Philadelphia 76ers. And one of the 76er’s rising stars, the “one to watch,” began dating a pop culture figure who fans, fair or not, saw as disruptive to professional athletes’ mojo.
To a Sixers fan, this was not welcome news. My son and his math teacher bonded over it and decided to track the player’s stats before and during the relationship. My son was all in. Math became his most anticipated class of the day. The teacher took personalized learning to another level. He knew what my son cared about, how to connect with him, and that turned a kid who dreaded math into one who looked forward to it. Unconventional? Absolutely. Effective? 1000%. As a parent, I’ll take it. Students know when you know them, and the learning goes down a whole lot easier. Like a spoonful of sugar. (Credit to Mary Poppins)!
2. Love your lessons
I love watching HGTV. Seeing talented designers transform spaces is fascinating. I wish I could do what they do but it’s not just the budget holding me back. I don’t see spaces the same way designers do. But I do feel confident designing lessons. It’s a different lens, I suppose. I think about this when I’m visiting schools. Though I keep my face neutral, I’m always a little pained when I hear teachers lament lesson plan writing.
I get it, I really do. Lesson plans are time-consuming and there are so many parameters to consider. But I think of lesson planning as our HGTV moment. This is where we design, tweak, rearrange, and create. We don’t end up with an aesthetically pleasing living room, but we can get an incredible 45-minute block of ELA that is more of an experience than a class period.
Creating is the tippy top of Bloom’s Taxonomy and lesson planning, even with constraints, is where we get to do our best work. This matters mightily. When you’re looking forward to a great lesson—maybe it’s a discussion question you’re excited to hear students debate, a surprising text pairing, or an opener you can’t wait to try—that feeling is contagious. If you love your lesson plans, your students will too.
Sometimes I coach from the regular menu. Other times, I pull out the small teaching moves that hook students and keep their interest up.
3. Do the unexpected
I often work with teachers to establish procedures in the classroom. If done well, the procedures become routines. And routines are gold! Effective classroom management depends on them.
But well-managed doesn’t mean the same routines day in and day out. Imagine coming home from work each day and someone hands you a to-do list the minute you enter. The routine of a “do now” or “bell ringer” can feel like that. Well-managed? Sure. But so predictable.
Teachers who illicit anticipation and surprise are so engaging to see in action. Doing the unexpected is a power move.
Recently, I was reading a book to kindergarteners. Kindergarteners, much like Starbucks, intimidate me. Holding their attention is a feat. The book was about popcorn. It wasn’t really riveting (though I didn’t say that aloud!). I wanted to make it exciting somehow. I took a few pieces of popcorn and shoved them in the spine of the book. I held the book tightly and began reading with the kindergarteners sitting on the carpet in front of me.
After a few pages, I released my grasp and the popcorn fell to the floor. I shot my head towards the ceiling, as if it had fallen from there. This is where kindergarteners are the best, right? They too swung their heads upward and there were gasps and exclamations of delight over the popcorn that appeared out of nowhere. I felt like David Blaine. They were spellbound. That book became legendary in their classroom.
Doing the unexpected is fun. And it works for older students too. Arranging desks differently, changing the lesson sequence, inviting guest speakers, there are so many ways to flip the script for the sake of surprise.
4. Say less; mean more
Teachers, is it our fault we like to talk? It almost seems like a requirement of the job. But it’s often overdone. Big time. This is a frequent coaching point for me. Keeping direct instruction succinct is an art and a worthwhile pursuit that brings out the best in students. Editing our talk often increases theirs and academic discussions are gold. For the sake of modeling, I’ll leave it at that.
5. Tell stories
Storytelling remains one of the most effective student engagement strategies I see in classrooms. I’m not talking about going on a huge tangent and getting off track from the goal of the lesson. Brainstorm stories that are connected to your objective but not in an obvious way. Instead of starting class with the anticipated, “Today we are going to…” instead try, “Last Wednesday, I walked out to my car and…” It’s an immediate change, builds curiosity and, depending on its connection to your content, can spur thinking.
The best stories are often ordinary ones, a conversation, a mistake, a surprising moment, or an experience that eventually connects back to the learning. Telling stories with the first four menu items in mind is a chef’s kiss!
That’s a sampling of the secret menu. It’s in a continual state of change as, like Starbucks, I try to stay current and keep my “customers” engaged. Revising the menu is what keeps me motivated and inspired. I have so many teachers to thank for that. The menu may change, but the goal stays the same: keeping students engaged and excited to learn.
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