Laura: What if I told you the most important thing a teacher does all day isn't the grand, inspiring lecture, but the 12 seconds it takes to pass out a worksheet? Sophia: That sounds completely absurd. Twelve seconds? Come on. You’re telling me that’s more important than explaining Shakespeare or the Pythagorean theorem? I’m not buying it. Laura: It sounds absurd, but it might just be the key to unlocking student potential. And it’s one of the core ideas in a book that has become both a bible and a lightning rod in the world of education: Teach Like a Champion by Doug Lemov. Sophia: Ah, I’ve definitely heard of this one. It’s everywhere. It’s one of those books that teachers either swear by or… well, swear at. What’s the story behind it? Was Lemov some kind of education guru in an ivory tower? Laura: That’s the fascinating part—quite the opposite. He wasn't a theorist. He was a teacher and school leader in some of America's most challenging urban schools. He got frustrated with inconsistent results, so he started bringing a video camera into the classrooms of teachers who were getting extraordinary results against all odds. He filmed thousands of hours of footage, not to theorize, but to decode what they were actually doing. Sophia: So he was like a sports analyst, but for teaching? Breaking down the game tape to find the repeatable plays? Laura: Exactly. He wasn't interested in vague advice like "be inspiring." He wanted the specific, concrete, sometimes-mundane techniques that made up the craft of great teaching. And that's what the book is: a playbook of those techniques.

Laura: And this playbook starts with a concept we hear all the time: "Have high expectations." But Lemov argues we've misunderstood what that really means. It’s not a feeling. It’s an action. Sophia: Okay, I’m with you. It’s easy to say, "I believe in my students!" But what does that actually look like at 9:15 on a Tuesday morning when a kid is staring out the window? Laura: Well, that brings us to the first, and maybe most famous, technique: "No Opt Out." Lemov tells a story about a fifth-grade classroom. The teacher is reviewing multiplication facts and asks a student, let's call him Charlie, "What's 3 times 8?" Sophia: And Charlie says… Laura: Charlie mutters, "I dunno," and looks away. The classic opt-out. Now, the typical teacher might say, "Okay, anyone else?" and move on, letting Charlie off the hook. Sophia: Right, to avoid embarrassing him or wasting time. Laura: But this champion teacher does something different. She turns to another student, Devon, and asks, "Devon, what's 3 times 8?" Devon says, "24." Then, the teacher turns right back to the original student. "Now you tell me, Charlie. What's 3 times 8?" Sophia: Oh, wow. So he has to answer. He can't escape. Laura: He has to answer. The sequence starts with a student unable to answer, but it ends with that same student giving the right answer. The underlying message is powerful: "I believe you can do this, and I will not move on without you. Your participation is not optional in this classroom." Sophia: I can see the power in that. But it also feels a little… intense. What if the student genuinely doesn't know the answer and is just frozen with anxiety? Isn't that putting them on the spot? Laura: That's the crucial distinction. Lemov shows it's not about public shaming. There’s another story about a student, James, who’s struggling to identify the subject of a sentence. He’s trying, but he’s lost. The teacher doesn't just demand the answer. He asks the class for a cue. "What am I asking for when I ask for the subject?" Another student says, "Who or what the sentence is about." Then the teacher goes back to James with that new tool. "Okay, James. Who or what is the sentence about?" And with that little bit of scaffolding, James gets it right. Sophia: Ah, I see. So it’s not about pressure, it's about persistence. You provide the support needed, but you still hold the student accountable for completing the thought. Laura: Precisely. And this ties into another technique called "Right Is Right." This one is so subtle, but so important. Lemov gives this example from a high school English class reading Romeo and Juliet. The teacher asks, "How do the Capulets and Montagues get along?" A student, Kiley, answers, "They don't like each other." Sophia: Which is… technically true. Not the whole story, but not wrong. Laura: Exactly. And the teacher responds, "Right! They don't like each other, and in fact, they've been feuding for generations, a conflict so deep it tears the city apart." The teacher just "rounded up" the answer. He took a partially correct response and added the intellectual heft himself. Sophia: I feel like I've seen that a million times. It seems helpful, like the teacher is elaborating. What’s the problem? Laura: The problem is that the teacher just did the cognitive work that the student should have done. He sent the message that "pretty good" is good enough. A "Right Is Right" teacher would have said, "You're right, they don't like each other. Can you tell me more? How deep does this conflict go?" They hold out for the 100% correct, precise, academic answer. They defend the standard of correctness. Sophia: It’s like learning a recipe. "A pinch of salt" is a partially correct answer, but a great chef would ask, "How much is a pinch? A quarter teaspoon? A half? Be precise." You’re saying that level of precision is what prepares students for college and the real world. Laura: That's the whole idea. It's not about being picky; it's about building a culture where intellectual rigor is the norm, not the exception. It’s communicated in these tiny, everyday interactions.

Sophia: Okay, so these are all about the micro-interactions, the language of the classroom. But what about the bigger picture? You started this whole conversation with a hook about passing out papers. How does that fit in? Laura: This is the second pillar of Lemov's philosophy, and it's where things get really interesting, and for some, controversial. It's the idea that mundane routines are actually high-leverage opportunities to build culture and reclaim massive amounts of learning time. Sophia: You’re going to have to sell me on this. Passing out papers sounds like the definition of boring. Laura: Lemov tells the story of Doug McCurry, the founder of a network of high-performing charter schools. On the first day of school, McCurry spends time teaching his students how to pass out papers. There's a system: pass across the rows, start on his command, only the passer moves. Then, he gets out a stopwatch. Sophia: A stopwatch? For passing out papers? Okay, now this is starting to sound a bit… much. Laura: I know, right? But he turns it into a game. He times them and says, "That was 19 seconds. Pretty good, but I bet you can do it in 15." The kids get into it, they're focused, they're a team. And they get their time down to about 12 seconds. A typical class might take a minute, or two, or five, with all the chaos and distraction. Sophia: Okay, so they save a minute. Big deal. Laura: But do the math. Let's say you pass things out ten times a day. That's ten minutes saved. Over a 180-day school year, that's 1,800 minutes. That is 30 hours of instructional time. That’s almost a full week of school, reclaimed from the void, just by perfecting one "boring" routine. Sophia: Wow. When you put it like that… that’s a staggering amount of time. That’s an entire unit on a novel or a whole new concept in math. Laura: Exactly. And it's not just about time. It's about culture. When every procedure, from entering the room to transitioning between activities, is crisp, orderly, and purposeful, it sends a constant message: "This is a place for learning. Every second matters. We are focused." Sophia: This is where the book gets its reputation for being controversial, isn't it? I've read reviews from educators who find this approach overly rigid, even mechanistic. They argue it creates a "compliance culture" and turns students into robots who are good at following directions but not at thinking for themselves. Laura: That is the central critique, and it's a valid one to raise. Lemov's response would be to introduce a technique called "100 Percent." The idea is that when a teacher gives a direction, the expectation is that 100 percent of students follow it. Not 95 percent, not 99 percent. One hundred. Sophia: That sounds impossible. And again, a little authoritarian. Laura: It sounds that way, but think about the alternative. Lemov tells a story of a third-grade teacher who raises her hand, the signal for silence. Twenty-five out of thirty kids comply. The room is mostly quiet. What does she do? If she starts talking, she has just taught the other five students that their compliance is optional. She has undermined her own authority. Sophia: And that small moment of non-compliance can grow. Laura: It metastasizes. So the "100 Percent" teacher waits. She might say, calmly, "I'm waiting for two more people." She uses the least invasive means possible, but she waits for 100 percent. The argument is that this isn't about creating robots; it's about creating a calm, safe, and predictable environment where learning can happen without constant disruption. It protects every student's right to learn. When the rules are clear and consistently enforced, students can relax and focus on the actual work, not on testing boundaries. Sophia: So the structure is in service of freedom. Freedom from distraction, freedom from chaos. Laura: That's the argument. The structure isn't the point; the learning is. The routines are just the architecture that makes the learning possible.

Sophia: It’s fascinating. When you lay it all out, the whole philosophy seems to be that excellence isn't an accident. It's not some magical quality a teacher either has or doesn't. It's built. It's engineered from hundreds of tiny, intentional, and practiced habits. It's less about grand inspiration and more about... a kind of beautiful, invisible architecture. Laura: That's a perfect way to put it. And it connects directly to the powerful metaphor Lemov uses to open the entire book. He talks about visiting the Picasso Museum in Barcelona and seeing the artist's childhood sketchbooks. He expected to see wild, abstract genius. Instead, he saw page after page of technically perfect, classical drawings of hands, faces, and objects. Sophia: The fundamentals. Laura: The absolute mastery of the fundamentals. And Lemov's realization was profound: "Behind every artist is an artisan." Before Picasso could shatter the rules of form, he had to master them with obsessive diligence. These 49 techniques—the "No Opt Out," the "Right is Right," the stopwatch for passing papers—they aren't the end goal of teaching. They are the foundational craft. They are the scales, the sketches, the relentless practice that allows for the art to happen. Sophia: Wow. That reframes the whole thing. The "robotic" routines aren't the art; they're what clears the space for the art to emerge. Laura: Exactly. They create the conditions for those magical moments of insight and discovery to happen for every single student in the room, not just a lucky few. Sophia: It makes you wonder, in our own lives and our own work, what are the "mundane" routines we overlook? What are the tiny, fundamental skills that could actually unlock huge gains if we just… practiced them with that same level of intention? Laura: That's a great question for our listeners. What's a "paper passing routine" in your own work or life? A small, repeatable action that could have an outsized impact if you mastered it. Let us know. We'd love to hear your thoughts. Laura: This is Aibrary, signing off.