Yes!  You read that correctly.  It’s okay to “lose your control,” provided it’s with student-driven instruction.  In that case, it’s a good thing.  As teachers, we often measure the success of our instruction by how much time we spend on presenting material to our students.  We may think that the more we show and tell, the better teacher we are, and the better our students will learn.  Sure, there are certainly times for lectures, front-loading material, modeling a computational method, and even note-taking for our upper grade students.  In general, facilitating student-driven instruction in your lessons is the way to get students invested in their learning.  The first thing you need to do is “lose control” and give students more voice and choice.  Allow them to persevere with problem solving by trying different approaches and being okay with not getting it correct on the first attempt.  Also, providing opportunities to practice and apply new learning in different ways will make learning more meaningful, enjoyable, and lasting.

Student-driven does not mean starting from scratch

If you are accustomed to delivering lessons that follow the “I Do, We Do, You Do” structure, try challenging yourself to switch it up a bit.  You can try “You Do, We Do, I Do” or “We Do, I Do, You Do.”  It all depends on the subject, content, goals, objectives, and your students’ needs.  The challenge is to adopt a new mindset, break some old molds, and experiment. “Wait! You mean I have to create all new lessons?” you may be asking.  Absolutely not!  Teachers don’t have time for that!  Just the thought of recreating a lesson you already spent hours researching and designing will surely drive you insane.  That is not going to happen because you have a friend in Lumio.  Lumio used to go by the name SMART Learning Suite Online.  Lumio may have changed its name but luckily for us, it’s still an excellent resource for transforming your pre-created lessons into active, collaborative, student-driven learning experiences.  If you haven’t used Lumio in a while, or it’s new to you, take a peek at our Introduction to Lumio course for a brush up on the basics.

How to make the shift to student-driven instruction with Lumio

1. Choose a lesson you already created either in SMART Notebook, PowerPoint, Google Slides, or even a PDF
2. sign in to suite.smarttech.com
3. Click on the green “Add Activities” button > choose “import resources”
4. Click on either “Local Storage” or “Google Drive” and import your lesson to Lumio
5. Turn any page in your lesson into a digital interactive handout or collaborative workspace activity by clicking on the wand in the upper-right corner.
6. Choose to create and insert pre-made templates into your lesson such as Shout-It-Outs, Response 2 assessments, and many game-based activities.
7. Select from ready-made resources to add to your lesson, such as activating prior knowledge, questioning & reflecting, manipulatives, and graphic organizers.

Now, go ahead and “lose control” with Lumio and get your students interacting and collaborating more.  Make a Monster Quiz, slip in a word search, a diagram to label, a collaborative concept web, or turn a PDF into an interactive handout.  While they are working through a lesson in student-paced mode, pull a group or two to address individual learning goals.  

Student-directed learning is a win-win.  You’re not really losing control.  You are encouraging autonomy, agency, and critical thinking while utilizing your teaching time more effectively.  You and your students are going to love Lumio.  Check out the companion course for more tips on making your instruction student-led.   Have fun and send us a message at OTIS@teq.com and let us know how it went when YOU lost control.  

For more tips, tricks, and tools for teaching in and out of the classroom, check out more articles on the Teq Talk blog.

We also offer virtual professional development, training, and remote learning support for educators with OTIS for educators. Explore the technology, tools, and strategies that can spark student success — no matter where teaching or learning are happening.