What’s Your Focused Finish?

Dear colleague,

At the front of my classroom hangs a simple poster with the words “Do Hard Things.” It reminds my students—and me—that growth happens when we embrace challenges with purpose. Doing (the right) work with (belief-fueled) care = the core of the Do Hard Things ethos.

As we enter the final quarter of the school year, I want to pose a question that can help us thread the needle between the Limping and Striving Modes I wrote about last week: What's your Focused Finish?

I'm not talking about an exhaustive list of all you have to do between now and year's end. I'm not inviting you to reinvent your practice during the last quarter. But I am calling you in to be a bit aspirational here as we round the bend.

If you had to pick a single teaching area that, if improved, would have the biggest possible ripple effect for you and your students, both now and in the future, what would you pick? If you and I could hop in a time machine and fast-forward to year's end, and we got to see a version of you that had improved in one key area or accomplished one kind of thing, what would you hope to see?

In my years working with teachers, I've noticed a counterintuitive, dependable trend: those who finish the year with the greatest sense of strength in their soul don't try to reach every possible goal and complete every possible thing at 100%. Rather, they strategically direct their energy.

So, how? It's as simple as two steps:

First, pick a category (e.g., classroom management, student motivation, student writing, student argument). The categories I use are the ones that make sense to me — the six things in These 6 Things, the competency areas discussed in Strategy #2 of The Will to Learn, the Five Key Beliefs and corresponding strategies. Some folks prefer using their evaluation rubrics for categories (my mind is too simple for most evaluation rubrics; when I read them, all I see is an overcomplicated word salad).

Second, pick one to three SMART(ish) goals or experiments related to improving in that category. Some examples from my past years have been:

• Complete one Pop-Up Debate per week between now and year's end, culminating in Pop-Up Toasts on the last day
• Daily provisional writing with my students during the warm-up, keeping track of our word count as we go, aiming to produce at least 100 words per day (I've been doing something like this with my students since the fall — fascinating lessons learned)

Some I'm working on this year:

• Woodenizing the effective use of AI to support (rather than misguidedly replace) the work of learning
• A round of MGC check-ins prior to May that build off a personal reflection writing assignment (“Who You Are, Where You're Going, and What You're Doing to Get There”) I gave my students a few weeks ago

And here's a few examples from our colleague Caleb, who wrote in after my last article:

• Planned, written-out mini-sermons two times per week, helping students connect with why
• Feedback — one assignment per week where I am giving specific, actionable feedback on student writing
• MGCs — end the year with a more regular cadence, focus of checking in with students and tracking my progress

And I could go on and on, but I won't today in favor of brevity. For now, just ask yourself these two questions and let me know your rough-draft answers.

1. If you had to pick one area of your teaching practice to improve between now and year's end, what would you pick?
2. If you had to pursue that improvement via one to three little projects or goals or experiments, what would they be?

Reply to this article and let me know.

Teaching right beside you,

DSJR

P.S. Remember that identifying some Focused Finish work doesn't mean neglecting everything else. We still maintain a sustainable status quo in the other areas of our practice. It simply means being intentional about where you direct your best energy and creative problem-solving.