Monitoring “In the Along”

In Speech to the Young: Speech to the Progress-Toward, Gwendolyn Brooks urges us to “Live in the along.” Her words offer a powerful metaphor for teaching and learning.

Educators cannot focus only on the beginning of instruction and the final product. A learner should not encounter a concept, move through an entire task, and reach the end before the teacher or parent determines whether understanding occurred. At that point, the adult may recognize that the learner struggled but may have to guess where the breakdown happened.

Aggressive monitoring places the educator in the along of learning.

The model and exemplar establish the expected thinking. The standards-based success criteria define what effective application should include. Thinking questions guide the learner through the process. Anticipated misconceptions help the educator recognize likely errors when they appear. Monitoring then allows the educator to observe developing understanding, identify the precise point of difficulty, and respond while feedback can still influence the outcome.

This does not mean hovering over the learner or interrupting every mistake. It means establishing purposeful pathways and checkpoints throughout the learning process. At each checkpoint, the educator gathers evidence and decides whether to affirm, prompt, guide, reteach, re-model, or release the learner to continue independently.

The final answer tells us what the learner produced. Monitoring in the along helps us understand how the learner arrived there—and what support was needed along the way.