I was talking with another educator who teaches the same course I am now teaching. He spends the first half of the course in teaching about how to give a speech and then, in the second half of the semester, he has the students do speeches. I have my students give speeches after the third class. I think that I have scaffolded their speeches so that they can be successful in including all of the elements of good speaking. The proof will be tomorrow when they give their first speech.

Do you spend much time in teaching the material and then give the students a little time to practice it or do you present the material quickly and then give the students much time to practice?

This semester I’m trying a new strategy which  is to reduce the pressure to be “perfect” on assignments.  Recently, I told students to do their best at this given stage but that doing the essay was not a life threatening event.  I then added that once they hand the essay in, I’ll give them feedback and then they can make those changes. Furthermore, I told them that what I wanted to see is improvement through the semester so their beginning papers would be baby steps in doing the essay.  I could see many faces changed from pure panic to less stress.  Some students even leaned back instead of being so far forward I thought they were going to fall. My hope is that if  they can feel less stress, they will work more from thinking than from fear.  I’ll let you know if this less stress and more thinking strategy pays off.

Do you build in stress or take out stress in your students’ work?

This semester I have introduced and constantly use DeBono’s thinking hats in my class.  I ask students to put on their black critical analysis hat or to put on their green alternatives hat.  When a student asks a question, I identify which hat the student is using.  Ive found that using the 6 hats (white-data/facts; red- emotion; black- critical/negative; yellow -positive’s; green - alternatives; and blue - overview/process/reflection) creates a structured approach to their thinking about something.  I can say  “We think of other ways of doing this” so use your green hat.  Therefore, there can be no negativity, no emotion, no facts, no positive, only alternative thinking.  Students feel uncomfortable at first in compartmentalizing their thinking but they do become better thinkers.

How do you help your students to think more critically?

This semester I am trying to celebrate student successes more frequently. I let students know when they have successfully demonstrated a task, a goal or even the standard. I emphasize what they are doing well. So far, students have had a very favorable response. Many seemed shocked that I point out some many successes. I am trying to build in them a feeling that they are successful learners. Also, when I do give them formative feedback on a learning gap, I focus on how they can improve. They see that they can transform this into a success based on their past successes.

Do you build on students’ successes or failures?

I was sitting in a boring meeting look at the shirt of the man in front of me. I came to realize that his shirt had a subtle pattern in it. It took me a few minutes to notice it.

I wonder how good we are in our classroom about detecting student learning patterns. Do we grade standards so that we can look at our gradebook/spreadsheet and see how the student is progressing in the standards. Is the student increasing, staying the same, or decreasing in the standard? What about all the students in the class as a whole? Do we see students who need small-group direct instruction and students who need one-on-one assistance before they will be successful? As we have a class discussion, do we carefully note the responses of each student to see which ones add new information, which ones frequently need clarification, etc. As students do activities, do we monitor them so that we can see a pattern in their learning? Does Juan need more structure than the activity provides? Does Connie lack writing skills to be successful in our social studies DBQ?

What patterns do you see in your students? How do you use those patterns to help you better assist them in their standard-based learning?

I watched a young boy ride his bike that had training wheels.  I saw him dip toward one side to be supported by the training wheels.  A few seconds more and he dipped toward the other side, again the training wheels supported him. He was able to move forward, instead of falling, due to the training wheels.

I wonder how much we provide training wheels for our students as they learn our subject area. Do we provide them with support, scaffolding, so that they can only dip so far before the scaffolding supports them? Do we build in success checks frequently so that we can find out their learning gaps and then help them? Or do we let our students fall down?

As I have been rereading various publications on formative assessment, I’ve begun to notice a pattern. Some authors focus more on the teacher and instruction. They write about the teacher reflecting on what happens and about how the teacher should rethink the lesson. Other writers focus on the teachers’ feedback to students in this learning goal. These writers concentrate on the students; they concentrate on how teachers or other students will give the feedback so that students can improve.

Your interpretation of formative assessment will determine your focus in the class. I hope that you will focus on actions that lead directly to student improvement.

I’m teaching a course in critical thinking to college students. I showed them a glass case, asked them to think of five questions to determine what was inside and then to write down the questions. Next, I had them get in groups of 5-6 and read aloud their questions. Then, I asked them to think about the answers of others and their own answers. Finally, I asked them to rewrite their questions based on the questions they had heard. I was amazed at how many students did not change their questions. 20 questions became 100 questions. They handed in their original questions,their reflection and their “revised” questions. I realize that pre-assessment revealed much about their critical thinking and the skills that I have to teach them.

As teachers we can incorporate many critical thinking through reading activities into our classroom. We can have students:

Annotate the text

Explain the context of the reading

Outline or Summarize

Predict

Ask questions about the text

Compare/ contrast to other readings

Connect to other readings or other things containing the ideas found in the text

How do we change our curriculums from memorization of facts to higher level thinking curriculums?

One way is to ask questions that require our students to compare and contrast. How is the American Revolution like the French Revolution? How is it different? How  does the Spanish present tense compare to the Future tense?

Another way is to ask questions that ask our students to explain the consequences of some act.  For example, Science classes can explore the implications of every American home using five compact bulbs on the energy use for the nation.

In a third technique students evaluate a situation.  Which  of these solutions is better and why?  Math students can figure out which of three loans will be a better financial deal and explanation their reasoning.

Students will still know the basic but more important, they will be able to use the basic information in higher level thinking.

How do you  cause you students to engage in higher level thinking?