Rozlyn Linder—Chart Sense

[00:01] Justin Baeder:

Welcome to Principal Center Radio, bringing you the best in professional practice.

[00:06] Announcer:

Here's your host, director of the Principal Center and champion of high-performance instructional leadership, Justin Baeder. Welcome, everyone, to Principal Center Radio.

[00:15] Rozlyn Linder:

I'm your host, Justin Baeder, and my guest today is Dr. Rosalind Linder. Dr. Linder is a literacy consultant and author and a staff developer who works with schools to help them develop comprehensive literacy plans and And she's an expert on charts. You know the charts that we're talking about. If you've ever been in an elementary classroom, the charts that you see on the walls that help students in their learning.

[00:39]

And we're going to talk about precisely how those charts work today and what we can do as school leaders to help them work better for teachers and students.

[00:49] Announcer:

And now, our feature presentation.

[00:51] Rozlyn Linder:

Well, Roz, welcome to Principal Center Radio.

[00:53] Rozlyn Linder:

Thank you. I'm so excited to talk with you.

[00:55] Rozlyn Linder:

So tell us about charts. I mean, we're all familiar with the basic idea of charts that we, you know, as educators create these charts that can go up on the walls and help students in some ways. But take us in depth to the theory of action behind charts. How do they work? How are they developed? What purposes do they serve for students?

[01:15] Rozlyn Linder:

Great, great question. I want to kind of back up a little bit because I want to say that when I began teaching, I was totally against charts. I thought they were just fluffy and cute and decorative. And it really took a while for me to start reading and learning a lot about charts. how visual representations really stick with learners, whether it's in a classroom or just out in the real world. And what changed my mind was really working in a high poverty urban elementary school with students who were struggling.

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And I was noticing that whenever I could give them something, whether it was like a way to put something into an image for themselves or a way to help them remember a formula, those things seem to be sticky, like they really stuck with them. And so little by little, I started creating charts to help them just retain information initially. And those charts, that information, I never had to reteach it. And so over the years, I started realizing, why am I not relying on visual aids more? Why am I not using charts to help make that learning visible? And what I started doing is realizing that it's not really just the chart that matters.

[02:27]

It really is the instruction. And I found that the more explicit your instruction is, the more likely that a chart paired with it would help students retain the information. And what those charts do for elementary kids, I realize they also do that for older students. So I've taught in every grade level and I kept that kind of learning with me. And when I went to eighth grade, we used them. When I went to high school, we used them.

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And people kind of looked at me like I was a nut, you know, making charts with 15 year olds. But that type of visual really helped them. retain information, lean on strategies, kind of decipher what to do when they got to tough spots in their reading or their writing. So since then, I've just been kind of the chart lady and kind of work to really spread that information and just get teachers to say, hey, let me try this out. If it doesn't work, let me just try it for a couple of weeks. And usually if I get a few teachers to do that, they start to see the same thing I saw when I was a skeptic and they start using them more readily in their classrooms as well.

[03:28] Rozlyn Linder:

Well, let's talk about that development process, because my background, I did my student teaching in high school, my classroom teaching at the middle school level, and then became an elementary principal. And the idea of writing something with a marker using my hand that would be permanently attached to the wall, or at least long term, kind of terrified me as someone with just terrible handwriting, really good with PowerPoint, terrible with markers. What's the rationale for doing it in that way? If we could all get on the internet and buy the perfect chart...

[03:58]

Why do we do it this way?

[04:00] Rozlyn Linder:

Great question, because I did go out and buy cool charts. And I would notice if you put a chart from a store on the wall or a PowerPoint that you made ahead of time and anything that you posted in the room like that, if it fell down or came loose, the kids would just kind of look at it. But when we made this thing together, if that fell down, those kids were like, oh, my gosh, our chart, we got to get it back up. And what that represents is that they had this shared sense of creation. Like this was something that belonged to all of us. This wasn't something that my teacher brought in and kind of presented to me as this is law.

[04:35]

This is how you do this. And I'm going to stick it on the wall for you. It was something where basically what I do when I go through the process, I come to my students and I say, you know, guys, this is what we're learning today. This is what we're trying to figure out. This is what we want to get really good at. Here are some ideas that I have.

[04:52]

And I use that chart and start making things so that my kids feel like we're making this together. Now, quiet is kept as the teacher, the instructor. I've already gone through ahead of time. I jotted out a little sketch. I figured out what key information needs to be there. There's a lot more pre-planning.

[05:07]

You know, I've really broken that skill down to the tiniest piece. So I already know what's going to go there. But it's so important for the students to have that conversation and to take ownership and believe this is something we figured out together. Now, when I tell teachers that, they automatically kind of scoff at it and go, wait, that's going to take a lot of time. But if you can spend that time early on, a little extra time in that conversation and come into these general understandings about the different tasks and what's expected, you save a lot of time later because you don't have to go through and reteach that. over and over again which you know in reading and writing we end up doing that a lot you know i taught parts of speech in third grade i taught the same parts of speech in eighth grade and i did it again in high school because if the learning is not something that they're able to internalize and really grab onto you just kind of keep teaching it over and over again and so that whole shared creation means a lot and so what that looks like for writing a lot of times it's me actually writing

[06:09]

And for charts, I tell teachers, whenever you make a chart, you have to do what's called a think aloud. You're not just writing information as you are adding things onto your chart. You are literally talking to yourself, thinking out loud. You're wondering you're trying to let them get a peek into your own. cognition because you want them to take that away it's not so much about it being pretty i have awful awful handwriting some of my charts when i'm done i'm like this is not pretty but those charts are the ones that as long as we made those together the learning counts and i am guilty of taking it later and trying to fix it up because i am not that artist at all but i talk about that in my books and i tell teachers it's not about it being pretty you know you won't see any charts in my books They have, you know, cool butterflies or something on it. It's not about that.

[06:55]

It's about the strategies and that content and it being created together as a group. And so I think when teachers start to see that, maybe their thinking shifts a bit and they get, OK, this isn't just decorative or this isn't just cute or this isn't just something that, you know, we're doing because this is the thing right now. But it's actually something where we together have created something and we've taken ownership over it as a class, as a body of learners.

[07:20] Rozlyn Linder:

I love it because it's so integrated with both the instruction itself and it's an ongoing support for the work that students are doing after maybe that initial lesson is over. And it links up really well with something we talk about at the Principal Center, which is the high performance triangle. And in the content that we teach to help administrators be more productive and get more done as leaders, I say you've got to have three things working together. You've got to have a strategy. So you've got to be doing the right work in the first place. And of course, if it's reading or writing, then you're teaching specific strategies for reading and writing.

[07:56]

If it's about your work as an adult, you have a theory of action about what kind of leadership actions you need to take to make a difference in your school. But strategy, you can go to conferences, you can read books, and you can do strategy all day long and not have it show up in your practice or not have it show up consistently. And I think one of the main reasons that people don't implement strategies is that they don't have the time. They can't pull it off. So the second piece for me is around tools and having tools that can make the work more efficient, that can make it easier so that it actually gets done, you know, so that it actually happens. And then the third piece is habit, you know.

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Are we doing this consistently over time? Is this really a part of our work or was it just something we kind of tried randomly after we heard about it? I think when we have strategy tools and habits working together in concert, that's what enables greatness. That's what creates high performance. And I see that same dynamic playing out with charts where you're sharing the strategy, you're creating the tool that's going to keep students focused on how to use that strategy whenever they need it. And then the habit over time, that to me, the connection I see there is that's why it's on the wall, right?

[09:03] Rozlyn Linder:

I totally love that. I'm going to totally act as though that was intentional. I'm like, yeah, that is definitely happening. I totally, I love that. Because the thing with the chart being up there, once we have gone through all these things, we've made this tool here. One of the things that literally makes me want to just cry when I see kids doing this is when we come in the next day or the next week or whatever we're doing and we're working on that particular task.

[09:26]

When you see that student stop and literally go over to a chart or look up at a chart because they know that this is the thing that's going to help them. And what I find is that even though that tool is there, that visual is there for them to get through that particular task, once they've done that so frequently, they really start to know what to do. And I find when testing comes and you have to clear your walls or cover your walls, I always notice a kid maybe during testing glance up to where a chart used to be. You know, it's kind of like this sense of knowing like, oh, yeah, you know, it's become a habit that they know, hey, you know what, this is a tool that will help me. But the more they use it over and over, they end up not needing that tool because they now internalize that strategy. So really, those three things working together, I mean, that really is a very similar process and concept.

[10:14]

You know, you really are doing those three things through the charts. And I think with one of the downfalls when teachers try to make charts, if they don't have that first part right, if they really haven't taken that strategy and truly broken it down, it ends up being ineffective. One of the things I do when I go out, we talk about... different writing genres and how we can get kids to you know use evidence in their writing or for the younger ones maybe create a narrative or whatever the genre is the students are writing and I'll say well what kind of strategies are you teaching them and I do this a lot with writing because the more I dig and the more I dig We get to the end point that they're really assigning a task, but they're not really giving them strategies.

[10:54]

You know, I'll say, well, how do you teach them to begin a narrative? And we'll just keep digging and digging and digging. And we find that if they don't really do good work at the beginning, they don't really figure out what those kids, that tiny explicit piece, what they really need. All the rest of the steps fall apart. And I think that's where ChartSense comes in. It helps a lot of teachers because they can go directly to that strategy or standard and they can see right there, hey, these are the specific strategies that students need in order to master this particular standard.

[11:26]

So it kind of helps them make sure they're doing the right work, because if not, honestly, it's all wasted, you know, because your strategy wasn't really aligned to the outcome you wanted.

[11:36] Rozlyn Linder:

So how many different formats of charts would you say there are? Because I remember as a teacher learning different mind maps and thinking maps and things like that. What do you consider a good repertoire for teachers to develop? Because I know in your books you have 65 or 70 different charts. Yes. What's what's a good kind of starting repertoire that, you know, perhaps if we were working on a PD plan for the year and we said, you know, we want teachers to be able to kind of flexibly make charts, not just print them off the Internet, but actually make them in the process of teaching their lessons.

[12:10]

What would be a good first goal for building out a repertoire of chart strategies?

[12:15] Rozlyn Linder:

Oh, great. Even at 65, and I will tell teachers, I don't intend for you to make all 65, but I want you to have multiple choices. But they basically fit into two or three categories. We talk about toolbox charts. These are things where these are tools or strategies that you go to when you're stuck. Like, I don't know what to do here.

[12:34]

What am I supposed to do? What can help me fix this? We do a lot of that kind of work with vocabulary. You know, here you are, you've hit a word you don't know. What are you supposed to do? So toolbox things are things that kind of go in and they fix strategies.

[12:47]

So this is kind of a catch-all to help that student that gets to something that stumps them or they're confused. And then we have things that are basic. And I think this one here, teachers get, we have those ritual and routine charts, things that really kind of blur the line between management and how your class runs smoothly. And then we have the strategy charts. Those are things that most of, I'd say 70% of my charts fall into that category. And these are things where I am giving you specific strategies so that you can attack a certain problem.

[13:18]

So let's say, for example, we're talking about writing. You haven't written anything, so you're not stumbling. It's not like reading where you hit a word you don't know, but you are trying to figure out what to do, where to go next. So those type of charts are the ones to me that are the most powerful with literacy, because a lot of times kids will have attacks. They read it. They don't see a problem.

[13:38]

They're great. They need some direction. OK, what do I do now? I just read this. One of the things with close reading, people talk a lot about doing close reading. And I'll say, well, where where's your chart to show them?

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Like, what do I do? I just read this text. So what? But if I can give you a little map, a lot of the thinking maps fall into this category and I can kind of direct you where to go. Those things just kind of provide a roadmap for you. So those to me are the most important.

[14:03]

I think the toolbox ones are really good, especially for teachers who have struggling learners because they're going to need that. What do I do? I'm stuck. But the directional ones, those are the ones where I think most of the thinking needs to go into. Those are the ones that. I talk to teachers about, OK, what are you actually showing them?

[14:19]

How do what are you teaching them? How are you being explicit? Those are those strategy ones. So those to me are the most important, but they are the most challenging for teachers if they really are still sorting out, you know, what does the standard mean? What am I doing here? And so those are challenging rituals, of course, are the easiest because those are most familiar.

[14:38]

But those are the three we look at overall.

[14:40] Rozlyn Linder:

Well, and I love the fact that you mentioned struggling students because I think some of the biggest potential here, you know, this can help everyone, but I think for students who struggle to see the patterns and struggle to find things to kind of connect to and say, okay, this is what we're doing. This is how it's related to previous learning. I mean, I think one of the feelings that is probably common among our students who struggle the most is that they're that what I'm doing now is different and foreign, and I don't have previous experience with it, and it's disconnected. And I think what you're conveying with the charts is a sense of pattern, that yes, maybe we're doing a new topic today, or this is a different lesson than you've ever seen before, but it's not completely from scratch, uh, out of the blue in terms of the, the work that you're being asked to do. And just to give students some anchors, you know, elaborate on this, describe that brainstorm, you know, whatever the, the particular task that we're asking students is that they have some, some kind of learned habits and some, some patterns that they can, uh, can use to gain some traction rather than just kind of staring at the blank page.

[15:46] Rozlyn Linder:

Yes. Yes. And one of the keys to that I talked to teachers about with the charts is much as possible, uh, make them interactive, make them something that kids can actually use. So if you're teaching a particular skill for reading, maybe you're teaching them to make inferences, for example. When I make my chart, I might give you steps that you can follow, but I like to use the sticky notes because I want to use a real text we're working on and kind of walk them through my thinking as we do this as a group. But a lot of times I like to be able to pull those things off and say, you know what, guys, the steps are here.

[16:16]

Go and work through that process right there. and the kids literally i keep those large sticky notes and they'll come through and they'll start going through the steps but not just the steps in terms of oh one two three four but actually doing the steps and putting that work up there so it's visual i've had charts like that that we use that change out probably every other day and that's where i send my kids to a lot of times that are struggling so you know guys i want you to work over here because you're trying to work on this skill we did this together here here's set of post-it notes, here's some markers, you know, go through that process. And for us as adults, it seems like, oh, I would need to do that. But something about them having that model right there in front of them, being able to connect to that group conversation we had, but now being able to take their text or whatever they're working on and actually kind of use that as a model and figure out what to do from that point. It's really powerful for them.

[17:08]

And they have this sense that they've done it. Even though that tool helps them, they figure it out versus me coming over and going, well, how about this? Do you see how this connects? No, go there, look at what we did and make your connections. And it really makes them, I think, have a sense of ownership again. And they feel powerful as though they had a role.

[17:25] Rozlyn Linder:

Absolutely. That sense of empowerment is so critical. Roz, it has been a pleasure to speak with you today on Principal Center Radio. So the books are all titled Chart Sense, right? We've got Chart Sense for 3.8, Informational Text and Literature, Chart Sense for Writing, and then K2 Chart Sense.

[17:41]

Is that right?

[17:41] Rozlyn Linder:

Yes, K2 Chart Sense. Chart Sense is regular reading. It's just called Chart Sense because we didn't anticipate another one. And then the other one is Chart Sense for Writing.

[17:50] Rozlyn Linder:

So if you are an administrator looking for this piece of the puzzle in the coming year for your PD plans for teachers, I would encourage you to check out the Chart Sense books from Dr. Linder. Roz, thanks so much for joining me for Principal Center Radio.

[18:04] Rozlyn Linder:

Thank you. It's been great talking with you.

[18:07] Justin Baeder:

And now, Justin Baeder on high-performance instructional leadership.

[18:11] Rozlyn Linder:

So high-performance instructional leaders, what did you take away from my conversation with Rosalind Linder? One thing that I want you to leave this podcast with is the idea that these things really work. And especially if you come from a secondary background or you're not primarily a literacy teacher, these charts, these charts that teachers make in class and put on the walls can seem a little bit strange. But let me tell you, they work. And I want to share just a brief story that proved to me once and for all that students internalize the strategies that go into these charts. that Dr. Roz talks about in her books.

[18:49]

We had a student, a first grader, or this might have even been when she was a kindergartner, who was in a classroom that was using these charts diligently. The teacher would teach the lessons, make the charts together with her class, post them on the walls, ask students to use them as they were reading and writing. And one day, this student was at home playing, and she asked her mom for some markers and some paper. And her mom didn't think too much about that, but went ahead and gave her what she asked for. And And later in the day, she showed her mom the charts that she had made, and she had reproduced from memory half a dozen of these charts that the class had made and posted on the walls. And of course, they were in first grade handwriting, but the strategies were there.

[19:33]

The kid had internalized these strategies and had remembered them. And as Dr. Roz said, we may have to cover those things up when it's time for standardized testing, but the habits have been formed. Students have gotten into the routine of using those strategies that are going to take them much, much farther than they could go without them. So if this is not a familiar concept to you, I want to encourage you to check out Dr. Roz's books.

[19:56]

They're very practical, and you can find them on Amazon. Just search for Chart Sense and see if this needs to be part of your professional development for the coming year.

[20:07] Announcer:

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