Once you as a teacher are no longer responsible for delivering content instruction, your students become free to progress through course material as quickly as they like, or as slowly as they need. The Modern Classrooms Project defines self-paced structures as classroom structures that allow students to work through well-planned units of study at their own pace. In such an environment,
Students always have something appropriately challenging to learn, and
Teachers target instruction/intervention towards individual students or groups.
Please note that self-paced learning is absolutely (if, at times, somewhat uncomfortably) compatible with unit and course deadlines. Allowing students the freedom to move at their own paces does not absolve students of the responsibility of staying on top of, and being prepared for, instructional deadlines.
By the end of this module, you will:
Determine the “suggested pacing” of your Modern Classrooms Unit,
Build a progress-tracking system for your classroom, and
Identify the strategies you will use in your classroom for collaboration, differentiation, and motivation.
Start by watching this video, which explains self-paced structures and your goals for this module.
To Start Module 3, check out some best practices/resources that explain both the theory and the practice of self-paced structures in the classroom. Again, we strongly recommend that you use these as resources as you answer the reflection questions and start to design your own self-paced classroom structures.
Self-Paced Learning at reDesignU -- a collection of resources, including models and exemplars, for self-paced learning structures of all types.
Kareem Farah, “How Self-Pacing Improves Students' Academic Achievement and Self-Confidence” -- MCP’s co-founder discusses the impact of Self-Pacing on academic achievement and self-confidence.
Robert Barnett, “Differentiation in the Modern Classroom” -- MCP co-founder Robert Barnett outlines the “Must Do / Should Do / Aspire to Do” strategy for effective differentiation in Modern Classrooms.
The final task of this module is to design a self-paced structure for your own Modern Classroom Unit. This structure should should contain (1) a suggested pacing guide for the Unit, (2) a system by which students can track their own progress through the unit, and (3) strategies for differentiation, motivation, and collaboration. Once you’ve answered this module’s reflection questions, you should present your self-pacing plan in the Unit Planning Template.
Please take a few minutes to reflect on your learning about self-paced structures in the classroom, with the survey below.