Reflections for next year's fully self-directed class

After finishing out the school year with my pilot of a self-directed classroom, I'm so excited about it that I'm going to do my class this way entirely next year!

That's not to say I don't have lots of kinks to work out.

Yet, I am so encouraged by what I've seen--no significant differences in how well students are understanding the physics content, but LOTS of amazing progress towards self-regulation and metacognition--that I feel like going all in starting in September, when I can more pointedly and effectively teach the learning strategies needed to be successful in a self-directed environment, could be transformative for my students.

I have begun planning out my main goals to do this by quarter, including which scaffolds I will need to provide. My overarching goal for the year is lofty:

SWBAT chart their own learning journey, accurately assess their mastery, and design and conduct their own authentic demonstrations of what they know and can do.

Can you envision it?! Students designing their own assessments? Figuring out how to figure things out? #TheDream.

That said, here are my biggest structural "kinks" to think through between now and then.

• How to ensure I'm still providing a variety of useful hands-on activities and practice students can do independently, besides just labs. Are there ways to incorporate some of my previous class activity structures, like the scavenger-hunt-style practice problem setup I typically use, in a self-directed class?

• How to ensure I'm still building community and encouraging collaboration. Some ideas for that include doing a "regroup" session each Friday using class discussion and/or review games to touch base as a class (lots of students have also told me they would appreciate something like this). I am thinking for maybe the first 20-30 min of class, not the whole period. What I definitely want to avoid is this becoming a weekly lecture/reteaching session. I'm investigating different structures to push beyond that, such as this awesome peer-discussion protocol from Cult of Pedagogy.

• How to best setup the room to support a class where all students are not doing the same thing. I have toyed with the four zones I originally set up (independent practice, collaborative practice, investigations, and assessments) but mostly it has ended up with students sitting in the same space every day, making only minor adjustments when needed for labs or assessments. The added challenge is being in two classrooms that I share in total with three other teachers. Still looking for ideas here!

• How to "bake-in" my teaching of metacognitive skills and also help students to recognize their own growth in these skills. I am considering some kind of template for them to self-monitor, but I wonder if there is also a place for me to provide evidence of their growth in certain areas as feedback, with or without celebration?

I am incredibly grateful for suggestions or resources! I know I have my work cut out for me. However, I just cannot get over how cool it is when students say things to me about how they think what we are doing in physics class is going to serve them well when they have to study on their own in college, or when they ask me about some interesting phenomenon that wasn't in the original "curriculum," or when I look up and every kid is engrossed in reading, thinking, doing.