An Ethic of Excellence-Ron Berger

Several years ago, our school had Ron Berger visit as a guest speaker. He showed us example after example of amazing work. He has a quiet demeanor, but tells stories in a captivating and inspirational way. This year, we were asked to read his book, An Ethic of Excellence.

This was the second time that I read this text, but it was still a powerful read. Parts of it really resonated with me, and made me wonder how I can use his information in our classroom. Philosophically, I agree with him and would love to teach in a setting similar to his school. Our school uses more of a Standards-Based approach, and is trying to incorporate Project-Based learning into our current practice. The difficulty for me, and teachers like me, is determining how we can weave both approaches into our teaching. I do not have a perfect answer to this question, but I am experimenting and working hard to figure it out!

One of the examples that Berger often references, is Austin's butterfly. Click here to link to a video where he shares the critiquing process with a group of students. This picture shows the progression of his work.

The student created a drawing of a butterfly, presented it along with a picture of a butterfly for feedback from his peers several times, and revised his work each time after receiving their feedback. 

I teach Kindergarten, and thought that something like this is manageable, even for my young kiddos. We are reading non-fiction books currently, and our book for this week is Getting Around By Plane. 

Before I showed the students the book, I asked them to draw a picture of a plane. Then, we read the book. It showed the students many kinds of planes, and included important components of planes. When finished, the students listed parts of the plane that they thought should be required on our drawings. We drew a picture together, making sure to include each part from the list. Then, they drew their own planes. When complete, they shared ideas about what they added to their second plane. Some students even asked to draw another plane, and even now, a few days later, they are still drafting planes! An advanced student labeled the parts of his plane, and after he shared, we discussed the benefits of a labelled drawing. 

Here is an example of on of the student's work, before and after:

When I asked if I could use his work, he insisted that I explain that you cannot see his engines because they are under the wings! This is because we had a discussion about how the viewpoint of the camera made it hard to see some of the components in the book. He also pointed out that his landing gear was down because his plane was about to land! I was extremely proud of this student, because he tends to sacrifice quality for speed on much of his work, and he really took his time and added detail to this drawing.

This activity really energized all of us. They have been requesting specific non-fiction books, and we have been searching our class library, my files, and the school library for books on their requested topics. They are accustomed to thinking about our schema, our misconceptions, and our new schema, so they truly embraced this activity. I will be sure to update this post as this develops.