Rethinking Pre Assessment

I'm still thinking this one through, but I am starting to think I've been doing pre-assessment all wrong.  Let's take math as an example.  Typically, I've found something out of an old testament, oops, I mean, an old text book, that covers the basic skills that I plan to teach.  I take a few questions from each skill set I intend to cover and clumsily cut and paste them (literally!) onto another piece of paper and pop it into the printer.  Out come identical ugly preassessment "tests"that students either ace or have no idea what they are doing on or simply don't take seriously because they are so unprofessionally presented that they can't bother taking the time to do it, especially since they know it has no bearing on their grades.

I'm pretty much marked as a failure from moment one, right?  I mean, I shouldn't even have text books in my class to refer to if I were a "real" inquiry teacher, right?  I would conjure everything out of my pretty little head...

Fortunately, I have seen a little bit of the light lately.  If I am (mostly) teaching in a constructivist manner, surely my pre-assessments can be tasks that allow students to use their thinking skills to construct some meaning of their own.  I want to see where they are at in terms of their thinking more than I want to see how much they remember from last year.

While math is indeed a spiralling curriculum, we sometimes forget how often concepts need to be revisited.  But not just concepts: thinking skills.  How do you assess how students think?

Well, I am about to do a stand alone unit on data handling.  Good fun, right?   It's a natural for inquiry because students will be able to create their own charts and graphs and thingamabobs.  They'll be able to survey whomever they want about whatever they want.

So here's what I am going to try: I'll let you know how it goes.  Without any talks of tallying or cumulative frequency or bar graphs or pie charts, I am going to have them each think of something they want to find out about their peers.  Then I'm going to let them figure out a way to ask them and record their answers.  Finally, they'll have to find some way to share their findings with the rest of us.

While they go through the process and observe and then listen to what other students have done, not only will I be getting some valuable information about what they do and do not know, I figure they'll be figuring out a whole lot on their own and through their peers.  Pre-assessment and inquiry learning come together in the perfect marriage!

Learn as you go...

Pondering Inquiry From the Bed

Believe it or not, I have been lying in bed on a Sunday morning reading academic literature on inquiry. What's the matter with me?  At best, I could be reading the New York Times and doing the Sunday crossword, cross-referencing and finding the joy of wordsmithing with some jazz completing the idyllic picture.  A cup of finely brewed coffee would, of course, accompany this montage.

But, alas, guilt has set in along with a lingering sense of "I'm not good enough," that has driven me to set a resolution that I will spend at least five minutes a day immersing myself in material that will enable me to cogitate on and activate best practices in my classroom.  Granted, it's hard to get started when I know I have the latest David Sedaris queued up on my Kindle, but once I crack open a book, that five minutes often leads into, "I'm just going to finish the chapter," or "Who knew?  I think I'll read a bit more."  (This is a game I play with myself in all aspects of life that I go kicking and screaming into: "Just five minutes, Leah.  That's all you need to do.")

Yes, folks, I've been inquiring about inquiry of my own volition (and guilt), so I am practicing inquiry at its best: not because I am being forced to, but because I want to - I really do, even if it's not my very first choice on a Sunday morning!

I've been reading Kathy with a K Short, and resonating with her thoughts on how inquiry needs to be a stance, not just a teaching method that is "used" in the classroom.  Inquiry in the classroom, in its ideal sense, should look like inquiry anywhere else: people would become interested in something or another, dig a bit deeper so the small wonderings become bigger questions that titillate and confuse us just a bit more, and then we would be led to pose a problem.  One of the main tenets of inquiry, as defined by KS, is that people, by virtue of their interest, become not just problem solvers, but problem posers.

Becoming a problem poser takes time, background, engagements with experiences, literature, and people to fill in some gaps that we don't know about.  You can't pose a problem if you don't know one exists; you also can't pose a decent problem if you don't have sufficient understanding of a topic.  As teachers, we love to pose the problems for the students because then we can get our Units of Inquiry completed in the allotted period of time, we can create neat and tidy rubrics with specific requirements, and we can tick the boxes on our curricular expectations.

Inquiry is messy, though.  It should be.  It should be confusing and exhilarating, and lead to more questions, not just answers.  Inquiry is never completed, hence the "life-long learners" adage of IB and any other progressive form of education.

Inquiry at its best: Emily decides she wants to build an
airplane after studying structures at school.

Reading about this makes me less confused about "how to do it" but more confused about how to "shut it down" when it is time to start a whole new focus/unit of inquiry.  In the words of immortal Oprah: here's what I know for sure: I never want to "shut down" student inquiry when it is time to move on to some new big picture ideas.  It's my job to help students continue to make connections to what they have learned, thought-through, and acted on.  It is also my job to have them experience as many big picture ideas and conceptual understandings as possible during their time in school so they leave bursting with ideas about how they're going to change the world and what their interests and passions are.  I also hope to give my students experiences and opportunities to allow for a well-rounded look at what it means to be human in its deepest sense, so they can make it a way of life, both in and out of the classroom.

No, this is not academic literature: it's simply cogitation from a teacher lying in bed who is now ready to have a go at the crossword puzzle and indulge in another cup of coffee.

Making Thinking Visible While Measuring Angles

Warning: Unless you are familiar with both "Making Thinking Visible" and an inquiry-based teaching approach, you may not find this particular blog useful.  If you are, please read, comment and add your suggestions!  I don't profess to be an expert by any measure or degree.  (I'm making a funny...)

I will soon be starting an inquiry into angles in mathematics, which fits well with How the World Works and our primary six/grade five study of structures.

After taking the "Making Thinking Visible" online course offered through Harvard as a staff last year (google it to find all the thinking routines/take the course to dramatically improve your teaching and your CV!), it has become clear to us all how well the thinking routines fit in with our inquiry model in a PYP school.  Last year, I used them extensively within my transdisciplinary themes, but this year I'm getting more comfortable using them in stand-alone mathematics planners.

The conceptual understanding I want students to arrive at is: Angles can be measured and constructed for a variety of purposes.

In order to do this, students are going to start by doing a THINK/PUZZLE/EXPLORE routine.  This can be used as a mini assessment.

Students will make obviously connections that go beyond geometry.  Angles are a very important concept in geometry though they are not often thought about in our daily lives. However, angles impact our lives in more ways than we think. Students will begin to understand that we all use angles without even realizing.

We will do a THINK/PAIR/SHARE with the following questions:

1.              How do people in various professions use angles to complete their work?

2.              How do all people use angles in their everyday lives?

3.       How do you use angles?

After time spent walking around the school in pairs and identifying angles, then coming together to list them, students will get an “Angle Facts Worksheet” in which they will have to draw the examples they found. 

Students will also undertake a “building a house” activity that promotes understanding of angles; students will do the CREATIVE HUNT thinking routine with the word TRIANGLE, identifying its parts and purposes (How does it work?); the main purpose (What is it for?); and the audience (Who is it for?).  Students will make a ‘target diagram to explore this idea.

After ample inquiry time, students will watch two khanacademy.org videos on identifying and measuring angles.  After they complete their viewing, they will do the CONNECT/EXTEND/CHALLENGE routine.

Students will then engage in some Mathletics exploration and problem solving to do with angles and finally do a HEADLINE routine to summarize their overall understanding of the importance of angles.  This will serve as a good summative overview.

 Reflections on planning a mini-inquiry using the thinking routines:

By using the “backwards by design” planning model in addition to incorporating the visible thinking routines in my mini-inquiry into angles, I feel really empowered about how I can teach students to think and explore through mathematics without using direct instruction at the outset.  Though it wasn’t my intention, I find it interesting that I used three UNDERSTANDING ROUTINES (Connect/Extend/Challenge, Think/Pair/Share, and Headlines) while planning an inquiry into angles.  It makes sense in that this is a rather straightforward concept, but can be taught/learned with a depth that I haven’t explored before as a learner or as a facilitator.

The fact that I plan to use a CREATIVITY ROUTINE (Creative Hunt) will also be an interesting trial: I'm hoping it will allow us to see that you can go beyond basic facts in geometry and see things from different angles.  (Pardon the pun!)  I like the idea of extending student thinking beyond the factual and exploring the creativity and play behind things, even when dealing with empirical, proven information.

I'm so thankful that I am learning how to be playful in mathematics, and teaching my students to be the same.  The best part?  They're learning more deeply through their exploration and play, and they're having fun.  You can't argue with that combination, can you?

Some Great Inquiry Resources

School has started and my professional reading has been kick-started after a summer of beach reads and fluffy magazines.  (Okay, I always read fluffy magazines!)

These are some of the books that I've been delving into lately or have been referring back to.  Good chance they are in your school's professional library.  Have you looked through it lately?  If they're not there, they are worth making your own personal investment in!

About Teaching Mathematics: A K-8 Resource by Marilyn Burns.  This is a comprehensive text that helps teachers teach math in a way that builds understanding and skills, with a focus on inquiry-based, often open-ended problem solving.  

Classsroom Connections: Strategies for Integrated Learning by Kath Murdoch.  In her own words, "The best topics are built around big ideas that engage students in learning about significant, robust and transferable ideas."  This books is chock-full of strategies to help your students do exactly that!  It's one of my all-time favorites...

Understanding by Design  by Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe  This is a resource to help YOU help kids dig deeper into their projects through thoughtful planning. It's indispensable if you're committed to an inquiry-based learning environment! 

How to Differentiate Instruction in Mixed-Ability Classrooms by Carol Ann Tomlinson.  Differentiation isn't only a buzz-word, it's a must-do.  This is a no-nonsense guide on how to really think, plan and actualize differentiation across the curriculum in your classroom.

Engaging Readers and Writers with Inquiry by Jeffrey D. Wilhelm.  This was recommended to me by a teaching colleague, though I haven't read it yet.  I'm excited to get to it!  It seems like it will fit right into "Making Thinking Visible" routines we already use at our school, and, of course, our PYP curriculum.

My kids giving an example of why
inquiry and critical thinking are
so important!

Happy reading!  Remember: even five minutes a day of professional reading is going to improve your teaching practice.

A New Understanding of Concepts Courtesy of "Making the PYP Happen"

I'm leading my first PYP workshop in Mumbai in September so I thought this weekend would be a good time to do some rereading of "Making the PYP Happen."  (I hear a lot of the PYP aficionados in India can quote it verbatim, even giving page numbers and paragraphs.)

In my intimidation and, of course, my attempts at preparation, I am rereading this important document with a serious demeanor, green highlighter and post-it notes in hand.  I'm the first to admit that I am more than a bit intimidated that I am being entrusted with imparting IB wisdom or at least facilitating IB discussion amongst colleagues, many of whom will be more experienced and adept than I am at embracing and USING this framework for constructivist learning.

I thought I really knew this document, but there are so many things that are jumping out at me on nearly every page.  The section on concepts has given me my biggest "I really needed to reread and remember that" moments thus far.  I'm certain there will be many more such jolts as I continue my re-education.

According to "Making the PYP Happen," the concepts are key: they "drive the curriculum," but sometimes they have driven me a bit crazy in the sense that I have a hard time explaining them and thus using them as effectively as I might with my students in their inquiries.  They key questions have always challenged me just a bit.  I don't always completely get them.  Do you know what I mean?  (And should a woman who has been practicing PYP for 11 odd years and who is a workshop leader be admitting this on a public blog?  Probably not.  Let's just say I'm a lifetime learner and someone who forgets easily so I have to do a lot of re-learning.)

Anyway, as I studied my PYP bible today, and came to the concepts section of the Essential Elements, I realized I had not looked at it in a long time.  Big aha: for each concept, there is not only a key question, but a definition, a rationale, and examples of related concepts.  Now, I'm not admitting that I didn't know this; I'm just saying I haven't looked at this in a while and suddenly I am feeling much more conceptually confident.

Let me give you an example of what I'm talking about complete with my own thought bubbles, in case you can't rush right over to your own "Making The PYP Happen" and see for yourself.

Concept: Causation

(This is one of the eight concepts that I actually find the most challenging.  I've never been that good with cause and effect.  Maybe that's why I keep making the same mistakes over and over...)

Key Question:  Why is it like it is?

(We all know this question inside out and ask it all the time, right?)

Definition: The understanding that things do not just happen, that there are causal relationships at work, and that actions have consequences.

(Now why couldn't I share that definition (and all the others) with my students?  Of course I could!  (I'm sure many of you have it prominently displayed in your classroom.  I do, but the typeface is so small, I can't even read it. Tomorrow I enlarge.) As soon as I read the definition again today, I had a whole new understanding of this concept and its key question.  It helped me enormously.)

Rationale: This concept was selected because of the importance of prompting students to ask "Why?" and helping them to recognize that actions and events have reasons and consequences.  The analysis of causal relationships is significant within and across all disciplines.

(Thank you, IB!  I had forgotten that you have given us rationales for why PYP is constructed the way it is.  These rationales are embedded throughout the entire document.  It's very reassuring!  I know what I am doing works, but understanding why and how it came about lends a fair bit of credibility to this framework we've all bought into, doesn't it?)

Examples of related concepts: Consequences, sequences, pattern, impact.

(Those sure seem like mighty transdisciplinary concepts too, don't they?  Yahoo!)

Each of the concepts are unpacked in this same manner.  Form, function...you name it.  I'm all ready to dive into a conceptual cocktail of learning with my students this year and to figure it out together.  (Admittedly, cocktail is not the best word to use in conjunction with students and IB, but I liked the alliteration.)

So...even if you're a "seasoned professional" why not do some rereading of your IB documents to refresh and invigorate your practice?  Don't do it all at once: just a few pages a day, maybe five or ten minutes, with or without a cocktail in hand (probably without, especially if you're still at work).

Your students (and admin) will thank you!

Run Around the Field For Five Minutes Routine

I'm in the middle of P6/Grade 5 exhibition with my students.  They are intently focused I would say about 80 percent of the time, but sometimes their eyes roll back in their heads or I actually catch them passed out in front of their computers.

(In another blog I'll write about how important it is during exhibition for teachers and mentors and parents to help in the finding of sites related to their research so students can actually focus in on the research rather than spending the entire six to nine weeks on google fruitlessly culling through millions upon millions of useless sites...)

Meantime, when my students get exhibition fatigue, I give them permission to step out of the room and go for a run.  They just need to look up at me, give me a nod, I give them a nod back, and they know they are allowed to scamper out onto the field for five minutes to clear their heads.  I have some students do it two or three times a day; some students never do it, and most students do it a few times each week.

What I do know is this: each time a student comes back, they're ready to get right back into what they were doing with renewed vim and vigor.  Either that or they've realized they need to be doing something else, and they get going on another aspect of their work.

Giving students permission to take responsibility for not only their own learning, but their own need-to-take-a-break time is important.  My ten and eleven year old students can handle it.  I trust them.  They haven't let me down yet.