Do you know which single practice will result in the most growth in your students?
Do you know which practices will have a bigger impact than where a learner sits on the socio-economic ladder?
I have to admit I didn't really know until I was formally introduced to the work of John Hattie and suddenly all the transformation that Ontario teaches have been required to undergo over the past 10 years made sense. If formative assessment and feedback are done well, they can add two years growth to a students learning. Feedback
I've been thinking about that a great deal this week during my grades 6 and 7 students' presentations. Grade 6 students have been presenting their Canada's Links to the World research and the 7's have been presenting biographies on their parents and grandparents.
Today at the half way point in presentations, I felt that students had seen enough variety to allow a useful discussion about assessment and feedback.
I began with the idea of the learning curve. Some students may be sitting at the beginning of the learning curve having just learned how to make jot notes and write content in their own words on information they wish to include in a presentation rather than relying on cutting and pasting. The ability to do this represents huge growth for them but they are still sitting near the beginning of the learning curve when it comes to the ability to create a knock it out of the ball park presentation. We then talked about mastery which a few students clearly had reached. I pointed out that because these students have mastered engaging an audience during a Prezi or Powerpoint, they need to think about where to go next, that they should choose a different presentation format next to continue developing their skills.
Next I wanted students to think about their content and what how they present it. One topic students were required to research for the unit was famous people from the countries they were researching. A few students created slides like the one I've drawn below. They listed people, some may also have included pictures, and then read the names on the slide to the class. For my example, I deliberately chose names of famous people the students wouldn't know in order to illustrate the problem with this approach. Students saw that merely listing the names wasn't good enough. They still didn't know who these people were or what they had accomplished.
I turned to the Thinking Matrix to look at where this kind of information lies. It sits in "Retell" the lowest skill on the Matrix. The student showed that they could research and "tick it off on the list" but what makes a presentation interesting is explaining why the person was chosen. More information and opinions are needed to keep the audience engaged. I asked students to reflect on their own presentations. Had they done this at any point?
We then went on to discuss some of the presentations that the students felt showed mastery.
After that I asked students who had already presented to stand in a line and for those who hadn't yet presented to stand facing them. These students had 1 minute to give the presenters feedback on their presentations. After one minute, the feedback line shifted one person to the right and again had 1 minute. Students felt this was a good idea but some asked if next time we could do this right on the day of each set of presentations so that they could better remember what they had seen. I will make this adaptation as well as have students who receive feedback write it down. Students were asked to identify strengths and areas for improvement.
Next I gave each student a sticky note and asked them to draw the learning curve and mark an X where they felt their presentations was located. Even those who hadn't yet presented were able to do this. They also had to explain why.
I then conferenced informally with each student, asking for a more detailed explanation of their X. This was my opportunity to help them clarify their thinking as well as get them to use the terminology correctly. I was also able to point out what I had noticed about their presentations and what I had observed a various points in the project.
Students then had to choose a next step.
The whole point of feedback is to shift the responsibility for assessment to the students so that they develop independence and the ability to critique their own work, use and understand the vocabulary of assessment and identify personal goals.
All students but one accurately placed themselves on the learning curve and could identify their own next step. This was with only minimal feedback from me. The one student, however, placed himself at the Mastery level when in fact he is just past the beginning stage. This was a huge red flag and shows that this student needs to develop of much deeper understanding of Success Criteria and how to evaluate his work in relation to that criteria.
Do you know which practices will have a bigger impact than where a learner sits on the socio-economic ladder?
I have to admit I didn't really know until I was formally introduced to the work of John Hattie and suddenly all the transformation that Ontario teaches have been required to undergo over the past 10 years made sense. If formative assessment and feedback are done well, they can add two years growth to a students learning. Feedback
I've been thinking about that a great deal this week during my grades 6 and 7 students' presentations. Grade 6 students have been presenting their Canada's Links to the World research and the 7's have been presenting biographies on their parents and grandparents.
Today at the half way point in presentations, I felt that students had seen enough variety to allow a useful discussion about assessment and feedback.
I began with the idea of the learning curve. Some students may be sitting at the beginning of the learning curve having just learned how to make jot notes and write content in their own words on information they wish to include in a presentation rather than relying on cutting and pasting. The ability to do this represents huge growth for them but they are still sitting near the beginning of the learning curve when it comes to the ability to create a knock it out of the ball park presentation. We then talked about mastery which a few students clearly had reached. I pointed out that because these students have mastered engaging an audience during a Prezi or Powerpoint, they need to think about where to go next, that they should choose a different presentation format next to continue developing their skills.
Next I wanted students to think about their content and what how they present it. One topic students were required to research for the unit was famous people from the countries they were researching. A few students created slides like the one I've drawn below. They listed people, some may also have included pictures, and then read the names on the slide to the class. For my example, I deliberately chose names of famous people the students wouldn't know in order to illustrate the problem with this approach. Students saw that merely listing the names wasn't good enough. They still didn't know who these people were or what they had accomplished.
I turned to the Thinking Matrix to look at where this kind of information lies. It sits in "Retell" the lowest skill on the Matrix. The student showed that they could research and "tick it off on the list" but what makes a presentation interesting is explaining why the person was chosen. More information and opinions are needed to keep the audience engaged. I asked students to reflect on their own presentations. Had they done this at any point?
We then went on to discuss some of the presentations that the students felt showed mastery.
Next I gave each student a sticky note and asked them to draw the learning curve and mark an X where they felt their presentations was located. Even those who hadn't yet presented were able to do this. They also had to explain why.
I then conferenced informally with each student, asking for a more detailed explanation of their X. This was my opportunity to help them clarify their thinking as well as get them to use the terminology correctly. I was also able to point out what I had noticed about their presentations and what I had observed a various points in the project.
Students then had to choose a next step.
The whole point of feedback is to shift the responsibility for assessment to the students so that they develop independence and the ability to critique their own work, use and understand the vocabulary of assessment and identify personal goals.
All students but one accurately placed themselves on the learning curve and could identify their own next step. This was with only minimal feedback from me. The one student, however, placed himself at the Mastery level when in fact he is just past the beginning stage. This was a huge red flag and shows that this student needs to develop of much deeper understanding of Success Criteria and how to evaluate his work in relation to that criteria.
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