A Teacher's Role in SOLE
In my experience, a teacher’s biggest concern about SOLE is that they don’t understand their part of it. And it’s true: SOLEs are very student-driven, and teachers often take a step back. Several times when teachers watched me facilitate a SOLE in my own classroom, they asked: “But...what do you do?” In my classroom, where the expectations for SOLE were laid out and students were very used to the process, there were long stretches of time where I was walking around and appeared to do nothing. This is intentional! In reality, I was taking a step back--monitoring, but letting students succeed without me. However, there’s a huge difference between “taking a step back” and “leaving the school and driving home.” A SOLE can’t function without a teacher-- the teacher might just be in a little different role than normal. Students are still students and need guidance. That begins with your big question. Your big question can be generated by students, but obviously, they are vetted by teacher