For the past week my grade 7s have been working intensely with the Ladder of Inference. I drew from the lesson I had learned from by grade 6s about how important it is that teachers and students understand each other's ladders.
We also read the short story The White Owl by Hazel Boswell. After reading it to explore the topic of superstitions, students constructed the villagers' and Felix's Ladders of Inference. This was done in groups of 4.
Today I introduced the idea of salience and that what one considers salient is influenced by one's beliefs. I adapted a lesson from Karl Adamczyk and Cheryl Patterson for this. Students read an article from The Los Angeles Times about the shooting of Jordan Davis, a teen, by Michael Dunn. After carefully reading and annotating the text, students were first asked to identify what beliefs each would have held before the confrontation. (Yeah to Jamie, who asked, "Aren't we going up our Ladders when we do this?)
Finally, students built the Ladders for Michael and Jordan.
This was a challenging task for many students in the class, but they worked their way through. As each handed in the assignment, I asked them to reflect on what they had learned from the Ladder. Comments were similar:
1. It's useful.
2. You can use it to understand someone else.
3. People shoot up their ladders all the time.
4. People are mostly at the top of the Ladder.
5. You can use it to remind yourself to back down.
6. I'm on my Ladder a lot.
We also read the short story The White Owl by Hazel Boswell. After reading it to explore the topic of superstitions, students constructed the villagers' and Felix's Ladders of Inference. This was done in groups of 4.
Today I introduced the idea of salience and that what one considers salient is influenced by one's beliefs. I adapted a lesson from Karl Adamczyk and Cheryl Patterson for this. Students read an article from The Los Angeles Times about the shooting of Jordan Davis, a teen, by Michael Dunn. After carefully reading and annotating the text, students were first asked to identify what beliefs each would have held before the confrontation. (Yeah to Jamie, who asked, "Aren't we going up our Ladders when we do this?)
Finally, students built the Ladders for Michael and Jordan.
This was a challenging task for many students in the class, but they worked their way through. As each handed in the assignment, I asked them to reflect on what they had learned from the Ladder. Comments were similar:
1. It's useful.
2. You can use it to understand someone else.
3. People shoot up their ladders all the time.
4. People are mostly at the top of the Ladder.
5. You can use it to remind yourself to back down.
6. I'm on my Ladder a lot.
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