On Kidney Tables: Small Changes for Big Effects
Karen Szymusiak
Our staff is opening a new elementary school this fall, and we have been buried beneath the many decisions required to establish a new place for learning. When you start with nothing, it is easy to fall back on the experiences you have had. It's tempting to do things the way we have always done them. But a new school offers us many chances to shed our previous teaching and learning experiences, rethink what we do, and make the most thoughtful decisions for our children. What are the messages our children will come to understand from the decisions we make? How can we keep the perspective of children at the surface as we plan the way we live and learn together in our new school?
When we met for one of our earliest staff meetings last spring, we began talking about the furniture we were purchasing for the school. Some teachers asked about ordering kidney-shaped tables. It seemed like a reasonable request, and we began to consider how many we would need to order.
But small moments in our lives can bring clarity to our thinking if we slow down enough to recognize them. Near the end of the school year, I participated in a parent conference. As we entered the classroom, the parents and I sat on the outside of the kidney table and the teacher sat in the cutout section on the other side of the table. The teacher was delightful and professional. We had a productive conversation about supporting a child who was struggling, but it felt uncomfortable to me. Nothing the teacher did or said made me feel that way. It was the message represented by the position of the teacher at the head of the table. It signified a sense of authority and power that was not conducive to shared problem solving or collaboration. It didn't encourage a conversation among four people who cared deeply about the student's success.
When I drove home from school that evening, I began thinking about the kidney table and imagining what it feels like to sit there as a child. I wondered if children feel less responsible for their own learning as they wait to be directed by the teacher sitting on the other side of the table.
What Kidney Tables Represent
Does the kidney table represent a hierarchy that we don't want to promote in our lovely new school? I hope we treat children as equals in the learning process. The teacher and the child both learn. I hope we portray that we are learners, too - that when we sit at a table with children, we are all teaching and learning. I think that if we talk to children as peer learners, they will respond in positive ways in their own learning.
I really believe that it is not our job to make children feel small and insignificant. Children have wisdom beyond our imaginations, and sometimes they have even more wisdom that the adults in their world. I will never permit a staff member to make a child feel small, embarrassed, or "bossed around." I want to discourage children from making each other feel small. I will not promote the teacher as the all-knowing expert or the person who always gets to make the decisions. There won't be big people and small people at Glacier Ridge Elementary. There will be learners - all of us together on a level field where we can learn from each other every day.
Our school will be a place for the children. The school belongs to every child and not to the adults who work there every day. The school should be a place that promotes collaborative and interactive learning with many thoughtful conversations about learning. Can that happen at a kidney table? We think not, because the design sets the teacher up as the all-knowing authority who is taller, bigger, and smarter than those sitting on the other side.
Can we consider other ways to talk with children? Can we gather at round tables or in a circle of stools or pillows, or gather casually on the rug where the teacher sits at the same level as the children? We want to raise the question and to think about other possibilities. We want our children to have clear messages that they have the power to become learners for a lifetime. We want our school to be a place where learners are equal and the conversations we have move us toward excellence.
We did order round tables to replace the kidney tables in our new school. As we open the school this fall, we are hoping for many thoughtful and collaborative conversations that help us discover who we are as learners. We will look for ways to help children take charge of their learning and become part of a learning community.
©Karen Szymusiak. All rights reserved.
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Jennifer Allen
