CHAPTER 4

:

ELICIT

ING E

VIDENCE O

F

LEARNERS’ A

CHIEVEMENT

EM

I LY

SP

I RA

& M

I CH

EL L E

RE

NN

FINDING OUT WHAT STUDENTS KNOW

• Once you establish clear learning targets, you need to determine where students are in their learning.

• Teachers carefully plan instructional activities, but rarely plan in detail how they are going to find out where the students are in their learning.

• Teachers need to make sure the questions you ask, allow you to determine if the students’ learning is on track.

• Sample question p.71

WHERE DO STUDENTS’ IDEAS COME FROM?• Overgeneralization is a fundamental feature of human

thinking. • Ex. “I spended all my money.”

• Children are active in the construction of their own knowledge. They “make sense” of the things that go on around them, including what we teach, and sometimes the sense they make is not what we intended. • Ex. A child might associate “bear” with all stuffed animals.

• *It is essential to explore students’ thinking before assuming that students have understood something.

WHEN TO MOVE ON?

• Whether to go over something one more time or to move on is a professional decision that the teacher must make.

• The teacher must take a number of factors into account:• Is the concept a prerequisite for other skills?• Can the student continue to make progress without mastering this

skill?• Consider high stakes testing

*In your classroom, how do you determine when to move on?

PRACTICAL TECHNIQUES

• Teacher-led classroom discussions is one of the most universal instructional practices.

• American teachers talk less than teachers in other countries with higher levels of student achievement.

• *How much students learn depends more on the quality than the quantity of the talk.

• In a study (p.79) of elementary school classrooms, one thousand teacher questions were analyzed. It was found that 57% of teacher questions were managerial. “Who is finished?” “Do you have your books?”

• Wiliam suggests there are only two good reasons to ask questions:• 1. To cause thinking and to provide information to the teacher

about what to do next• 2. To collect information to inform teaching

Reflect on the questions you ask in your classroom. What types of questions do you ask? How much time do you spend asking managerial questions?

PRACTICAL TECHNIQUES

Student Engagement

Wait Time

Alternatives to

Questions

Evaluative and

interpretive

Listening

Question Shells

Hot-Seat Questioni

ng

All-Student

Response Systems

STUDENT ENGAGEMENT

• Matthew effect (Matt. 25:29) “For to all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but for those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away.”

• This effect happens in classrooms everyday – some students are so eager to answer questions and others try to fly below the radar.

• When teachers allow students to choose whether to participate or not – raising hands, etc. – they are actually making the achievement gap worse.

• In order to avoid this use a “no hands up” policy, or a randomization device .

• Teachers must create an environment where classroom participation is NOT optional.

WAIT TIME

• The amount of time a teacher allows a student to respond before evaluating the response is important.

• The amount of time between the student’s answer and the teacher’s evaluation is just as, if not, more important.

How long do you wait for students to respond?How much time do you spend evaluating student answers?

ALTERNATIVES TO QUESTIONS

• Asking questions may not be the best way to generate good classroom discussions.

• Rather, teachers can make statements and have students agree or disagree.

• The quality of a discussion is enhanced further when students are given the opportunity to discuss their responses in pairs or small groups before responding. (Think-Pair-Share)

EVALUATIVE AND INTERPRETIVE LISTENING• In response to why other coaches were not as successful as

he was, John Wooden stated, “They don’t listen. Listening is the best way to learn. You have to listen to those who you are supervising.”

• Teachers must learn how to listen to students’ responses.

• Most focus on whether a student response is correct, rather than the level of understanding.

• Teachers who listen evaluatively learn only whether their students know what they want them to know.

• These teachers simply respond by teaching the material again.

Evaluative

• Teachers who listen interpretively gain information about how to teach something better from what students say.

• More interested in what/how students think rather than the “right” answer.

Interpretive

What kind of listener are you?

QUESTION SHELLS

• General structures that can help frame questions in ways that are more likely to reveal students’ thinking.

• Ex: “Why is __________________ an example of ____________________?”

• Ex: “Why is a bird not an insect?”

• More thoughtful and reasoned responses are likely to be generated by asking questions in this way.

• “Is magnetism a metal?” vs. “Why is magnetism a metal?”

HOT-SEAT QUESTIONING

• Hot-seat questioning is another technique for deepening classroom discussion.

• In hot seat questioning, the teacher asks a student a question and then a series of follow-up questions to probe the student’s ideas in depth. Other students pay close attention because they could be called on at any time.

ALL-STUDENT RESPONSE SYSTEMS

• An All-Student Response System is simple- the teacher asks a question in such a way that allows him to get a response from every student in real time.

• Examples:• Some teachers use class polls.• “thinking thumbs”• “fist to five”• Make sure that the questions being asked are cognitive – thinking rather than

feeling.• Works best with questions for which a single response is required.

ALL-STUDENT RESPONSE SYSTEMS

• ABCD Cards• For questions in which there is more than one correct answer.

• This allows teachers to incorporate items that supports differentiation with questions that all students should be able to answer as well as responses that challenges high-achieving students.

• Can also be used when there are no right answers but different points of view.

• Can also be used to bridge two lessons.

Disadvantage:ABCD cards generally

require teachers to have planned questions

leading to few spontaneous discussion

opportunities,

ALL-STUDENT RESPONSE SYSTEMS

• Mini Whiteboards• Modern version of writing slated used in 19th century classroom. • Allows teachers to quickly frame a question and get an answer from

the whole class.

Tip:Can use page

protectors. This low-cost alternative

allows teachers to different preprinted

images lesson specific.

ALL-STUDENT RESPONSE SYSTEMS

• Exit Passes• Work best when there is a natural break in the instruction; the

teacher then has time to read through the students’ responses and decide what to do next.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS AND DIAGNOSTIC QUESTIONS • Discussion questions are good when the teacher needs to hear the

reasons for the choices.

• Diagnostic questions are based in a fundamental rule of thought – it is better to assume that students do not know something when they do rather than to assume they know something when they don’t.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS AND DIAGNOSTIC QUESTIONS Would this be a good discussion question or diagnostic

question?

Look at the following sequence:

3,7,11,15,19,…..

Which is the best rule to describe the sequence?

A. n + 4

B. 3+ n

C. 4n - 1

D. 4n + 3

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS AND DIAGNOSTIC QUESTIONS

Because there can be more than one possible answer and the teacher needs to hear reasons for their choice, this is a good discussion question and not a good diagnostic question.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS AND DIAGNOSTIC QUESTIONS Would this be a good discussion question or diagnostic question?

Why are historians concerned with bias when analyzing sources?

A. People can never be trusted to tell the truth.

B. People deliberately leave out important details.

C. People are only able to provide meaningful information if they experience an event firsthand.

D. People interpret the same event in different ways, according to their experience.

E. People are unaware of the motivations for their actions.

F. People get confused about sequences of events.

This a multiple-choice question generated by

using the most incorrect

responses from an exit pass.

WOULD THIS BE A GOOD DISCUSSION QUESTION OR DIAGNOSTIC QUESTION?

Discussion is not necessary because the teacher can judge whether the students have understood the main point and therefore this is a more diagnostic question.

• Students who chose D is probably ready to move on.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS AND DIAGNOSTIC QUESTIONS Diagnostic Questions:

Find out what students already

know about a topic before

beginning the instruction,

Range-finding

Hinge

A point at which the teacher checks for

understanding in the middle of the lesson. The direction of the

lesson hinges on students level of understanding.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS AND DIAGNOSTIC QUESTIONS

Hinge point questions:• Should take no longer than 2 minutes for all students to respond.• Must be possible for the teacher to view and interpret the

responses from the class in 30 seconds. • Any longer could be a risk of students getting off task. • Multiple-choice questions are good hinge-point questions.

• Unfortunately, there is not enough time to treat each student individually in the classroom in a typical classroom; however, with careful planning, teachers can make the classroom and more engaging place for students and allowing for effective instructional adjustments when needed.

Once the teacher knows where learners are in their learning, she is in a position to provide feedback to the learners about what to do next.

(p.105)

Final Thought