I found the task of giving feedback to be wonderfully thought provoking. During a preliminary meeting held on Thursday afternoon via a phone call, Simone and I agreed to come prepared to Data Meeting 5 with our feedback already composed. A Google Drive Folder was set up for us to share important documents that the other would need to view during the feedback process. It was really interesting for me to delve into a totally new set of Data Meeting assignments for a different partner as I had been fully immersed in all music content information for the last eight weeks. I enjoyed the challenge of looking at Simone's assignments for her High School French classroom. I was able to wrap my head around her instructional tactics and methods pretty seamlessly, and even found myself trying to become one of her "students," reminiscing upon the days of old when I was a Spanish Language student in High School. While I was no means an expert in her content area, I did feel that I was capable of giving productive feedback to Simone that can ultimately lead to overall improvement and growth for her as a practitioner.
I found the task of receiving feedback to be scary at first, as I thought that perhaps I had made a few missteps somewhere in my Action Plan Tracking Sheet. I was presently surprised -- and relieved -- to find that Simone had given my Data Action Plan two thumbs up. It made me feel really good that someone else that wasn't intimately familiar with my work for eight weeks could find value in the hard work that I had done. I found that Simone offered me feedback that I could reflect on and learn from. I was able to talk to her candidly about my classroom, describing the atmosphere, and she was there to give me a fresh set of eyes with which to identify areas of both strength and weakness.
In conclusion, I believe wholeheartedly that flipping the switch and getting people out of their comfort zone -- i.e., totally changing my expectations for Data Meeting 5 -- can be scary but also very empowering. Forward-moving feedback is the way to go. Luckily, both Simone and I came into this experience with a positive mindset, an openness, and an intention to help the other grow. With that as the foundation for the meeting, we did just that.
