Time: a race against the clock and the calendar?

Teachers in almost every school I've visited and worked at have told me that time is a challenge (specifically a lack of it) so I was keen to dip into Chapter 6 of Finding our way today.  Teachers are often under pressure to "cover" content, collect assessment data, keep with with the school's calendar of events and deadlines, write reports and so on, while at the same time trying to balance this with creating rich and meaningful learning experiences for their students.  It's not surprising that teachers are often feeling overwhelmed!

Fiona and Anne ask us to shift our view of time from "something to control, to something to inhabit with children".  They write that "reframing time is a deliberate choice - an act of professional agency through which teachers (re)claim their integrity".  In some schools the requirements are such that the whole year's curriculum is carved up into weeks, lessons and minutes, each of which has its own specific objectives that must be met and measured.  In these schools, the work of teaching and learning is dictated by external pressures rather than the capacities, interests and inquiries of the children, and deep exploration, curiosity and meaningful reflection can become marginalised.  All too often, time for work, play, eating and resting is something that emphasises efficiency, and when I often go into classrooms where there is a rigid schedule teaching is seen as something that has to be "done" within set times with little room for flexibility for curiosity, inquiry or agency in the learning process.

Aligning time with pedagogical values

Anne and Fiona write that teams that value inquiry and reflection "must intentionally structure time and space to allow children to explore questions without pressure, enabling children's sustained attention, revisiting of ideas, and deepening understandings ... the way a team sees the influence of time shapes everything they do".  Teachers need to slow down to engage more fully with children and their unfolding thoughts and feelings - they need to notice more, listen more deeply and engage more meaningfully. Teachers who feel rushed to get through the expectations of the day may well feel disconnected from the purpose of their work.  

Relationships, connection, meaning-making and community

Time is never neutral - it either constrains or enables the depth and quality of relationships.  Children's relationships with each other need time, and they also need time to return again to questions, thoughts, emotions and understandings.  Fiona and Anne write that if a teacher is constantly preoccupied with what comes next, then they often miss subtle cues that signal a child's readiness to connect and engage, whereas "when time is not urgent educators can dwell more fully in the moment with children, listen deeply to their play, pause for reflection about their thinking, respond to ideas with curiosity, and follow the path of inquiry".  They write about moving away from fixed routines, and focusing more on the rhythms of variation and responsiveness.  Routines can create predictable, yet flexible, patterns which offer structure and security for children, helping them to understand what to expect, and as a scaffold for inquiry, and they can also support inquiry through embedding habits of reflection and communication which build a culture of listening and noticing.  However fragmented schedules with frequent transitions "disrupt the natural rhythms of play and inquiry, limiting opportunities for sustained thinking and problem solving".  They write that "when their days are no longer predetermined by rigid schedules created by teachers and focused on output, attainment, and regurgitation of the "learned curriculum", it becomes easier for children to dig deeply into the ideas and concepts that matter most to them.  

Leadership and time

 Leaders need to take time to examine whether the daily schedules really reflect their values and to engage with their teams to explore whether these daily routines express their values or contradict them, how some habitual practices might be limiting or expanding children's agency and engagement, and also how the use of time might be fostering or hindering relationships with children, families and each other.  Leaders often take decisions about time, which shapes both the daily schedule and also the entire culture, so it is the leader's responsibility to protect time not only for children's inquiry, but also for educators' reflection and collaborative dialogue.  Leaders need to resist over-scheduling and fragmentation, and so open up the possibility for more meaningful relationships between children, between children and adults, and between adults to unfold throughout the day.  When teachers are given time and space to observe, reflect and dialogue they develop a deeper sensitivity to children's thinking and learning and they become more attuned to the unfolding curriculum that emerges through shared inquiry.  It is through removing roadblocks and standing alongside their teams that leaders make visible their deep trust in the capacity of teachers and children to co-construct the curriculum from "the dynamic interplay of children's ideas, theories, and questions, and teachers' thoughtful responses, provocations, and proposals".

Evidencing and documenting learning

This also takes time!  When teachers are given time to reflect and discuss, this shifts the task away from compliance-driven documentation towards a practice grounded in curiosity, interpretation and relational knowledge-building.  I once worked in a school where TAs played a role in documenting various milestones on a daily basis - the pressure was so intense that I heard some of them asking children to "do it again" so that they could video progress towards a particular learning standard to upload into an online platform at the end of each day.  Thankfully we moved away from this, but this does highlight the importance of teachers moving away from documentation as an end point, and helping them to understand it more as a process that drives pedagogy forward.

Image by Roberto Justo Kabana from Pixabay