Skip to main content

Home/ Middle School Matters/ Group items tagged instruction

Rss Feed Group items tagged

Troy Patterson

Updating Data-Driven Instruction and the Practice of Teaching | Larry Cuban on School R... - 0 views

  • I am talking about data-driven instruction–a way of making teaching less subjective, more objective, less experience-based, more scientific.
  • Data-driven instruction, advocates say, is scientific and consistent with how successful businesses have used data for decades to increase their productivity.
  • Of course, teachers had always assessed learning informally before state- and district-designed tests. Teachers accumulated information (oops! data) from pop quizzes, class discussions, observing students in pairs and small groups, and individual conferences.
  • ...10 more annotations...
  • Based on these data, teachers revised lessons. Teachers leaned heavily on their experience with students and the incremental learning they had accumulated from teaching 180 days, year after year.
  • Teachers’ informal assessments of students gathered information directly and  would lead to altered lessons.
  • In the 1990s and, especially after No Child Left Behind became law in 2002, the electronic gathering of data, disaggregating information by groups and individuals, and then applying lessons learned from analysis of tests and classroom practices became a top priority.
  • Now, principals and teachers are awash in data.
  • How do teachers use the massive data available to them on student performance?
  • studied four elementary school grade-level teams in how they used data to improve lessons. She found that supportive principals and superintendents and habits of collaboration increased use of data to alter lessons in two of the cases but not in the other two.
  • Julie Marsh and her colleagues found 15 where teachers used annual tests, for example, in basic ways to target weaknesses in professional development or to schedule double periods of language arts for English language learners.
  • These researchers admitted, however, that they could not connect student achievement to the 36 instances of basic to complex data-driven decisions  in these two districts.
  • Of these studies, the expert panel found 64 that used experimental or quasi-experimental designs and only six–yes, six–met the Institute of Education Sciences standard for making causal claims about data-driven decisions improving student achievement. When reviewing these six studies, however, the panel found “low evidence” (rather than “moderate” or “strong” evidence) to support data-driven instruction. In short, the assumption that data-driven instructional decisions improve student test scores is, well, still an assumption not a fact.
  • Numbers may be facts. Numbers may be objective. Numbers may smell scientific. But we give meaning to these numbers. Data-driven instruction may be a worthwhile reform but as an evidence-based educational practice linked to student achievement, rhetoric notwithstanding, it is not there yet.
Ron King

Modeling Instruction in Physics - 0 views

shared by Ron King on 07 Apr 13 - Cached
  •  
    This channel showcases teachers using Modeling Instruction (and other reformed physics teaching methods) in their classrooms. Instead of relying on lectures and textbooks, Modeling Instruction emphasizes active student construction of conceptual and mathematical models in an interactive learning community. Students are engaged with simple scenarios to learn to model the physical world.
Troy Patterson

Differentiation Doesn't Work - Education Week - 0 views

  • Let's review the educational cure-alls of past decades: back to basics, the open classroom, whole language, constructivism, and E.D. Hirsch's excruciatingly detailed accounts of what every 1st or 3rd grader should know, to name a few.
  • Starting with the gifted-education community in the late 1960s, differentiation didn't get its mojo going until regular educators jumped onto the bandwagon in the 1980s.
  • Differentiation is a failure, a farce, and the ultimate educational joke played on countless educators and students.
  • ...16 more annotations...
  • In theory, differentiation sounds great, as it takes several important factors of student learning into account: • It seeks to determine what students already know and what they still need to learn. • It allows students to demonstrate what they know through multiple methods. • It encourages students and teachers to add depth and complexity to the learning/teaching process.
  • Although fine in theory, differentiation in practice is harder to implement in a heterogeneous classroom than it is to juggle with one arm tied behind your back.
  • 'We couldn't answer the question ... because no one was actually differentiating,'
  • "In every case, differentiated instruction seemed to complicate teachers' work, requiring them to procure and assemble multiple sets of materials, … and it dumbed down instruction."
  • It seems that, when it comes to differentiation, teachers are either not doing it at all, or beating themselves up for not doing it as well as they're supposed to be doing it. Either way, the verdict is clear: Differentiation is a promise unfulfilled, a boondoggle of massive proportions.
  • The biggest reason differentiation doesn't work, and never will, is the way students are deployed in most of our nation's classrooms.
  • It seems to me that the only educators who assert that differentiation is doable are those who have never tried to implement it themselves: university professors, curriculum coordinators, and school principals.
  • Differentiation is a cheap way out for school districts to pay lip service to those who demand that each child be educated to his or her fullest potential.
  • Do we expect an oncologist to be able to treat glaucoma?
  • Do we expect a criminal prosecutor to be able to decipher patent law?
  • Do we expect a concert pianist to be able to play the clarinet equally well?
  • No, no, no.
  • However, when the education of our nation's young people is at stake, we toss together into one classroom every possible learning strength and disability and expect a single teacher to be able to work academic miracles with every kid … as long as said teacher is willing to differentiate, of course.
  • A second reason that differentiation has been a failure is that we're not exactly sure what it is we are differentiating: Is it the curriculum or the instructional methods used to deliver it? Or both?
  • The terms "differentiated instruction" and "differentiated curriculum" are used interchangeably, yet they are not synonyms.
  • Differentiation might have a chance to work if we are willing, as a nation, to return to the days when students of similar abilities were placed in classes with other students whose learning needs paralleled their own. Until that time, differentiation will continue to be what it has become: a losing proposition for both students and teachers, and yet one more panacea that did not pan out.
Troy Patterson

What Doesn't Work: Literacy Practices We Should Abandon | Edutopia - 0 views

  • 1. "Look Up the List" Vocabulary Instruction
  • 2. Giving Students Prizes for Reading
  • 3. Weekly Spelling Tests
  • ...3 more annotations...
  • 4. Unsupported Independent Reading
  • 5. Taking Away Recess as Punishment
  • 5 Less-Than-Optimal Practices To help us analyze and maximize use of instructional time, here are five common literacy practices in U.S. schools that research suggests are not optimal use of instructional time:
Troy Patterson

The best way to understand math is learning how to fail productively - Quartz - 1 views

  • Students who are presented with unfamiliar concepts, asked to work through them, and then taught the solution significantly outperform those who are taught through formal instruction and problem-solving. The approach is both utterly intuitive—we learn from mistakes—and completely counter-intuitive: letting kids flail around with unfamiliar math concepts seems both inefficient and potentially damaging to their confidence.
  • So far, teachers have mixed reactions. They recognize that the approach is good but they worry about efficiency and standardized tests: will kids fall on high-stakes national and international tests?
  • Kapur uses the research to make his case. Students get more output (deeper learning) for the same input (hours of instruction), which presents another problem: teachers have to get out of the way. “They [teachers] say it’s stressful to teach this way,” he says. “It’s easier to tell them [students] what you know.”
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • In fact, Kapur theorizes in one of his studies that direct instruction might close students’ minds. Once a teacher presents a solution, students may no longer see the possibility of other solutions, or more creative approaches.
Ron King

Examples of Formative Assessment (West Virginia DOE) - 0 views

  •  
    When incorporated into classroom practice, the formative assessment process provides information needed to adjust teaching and learning while they are still happening. The process serves as practice for the student and a check for understanding during the learning process. The formative assessment process guides teachers in making decisions about future instruction. Here are a few examples that may be used in the classroom during the formative assessment process to collect evidence of student learning.
Ron King

Assessment Training Institute - Tools & Resources: Rubric Evaluations - 0 views

  •  
    n Chapter 2 of the book Creating & Recognizing Quality Rubrics, we describe a "rubric for rubrics" designed to assist educators to be thoughtful consumers and developers of rubrics for instructional use in the classroom. The various quality levels described by the Rubric for Rubrics are illustrated with many sample classroom rubrics. All classroom rubrics discussed in the book have been evaluated using the Rubric for Rubrics; these evaluations are included on a CD that accompanies the book.
Ron King

The break-things-into-bits mistake we have been making in education for centuries - hap... - 0 views

  •  
    In the just-released Math Publisher's Criteria document on the Common Core Standards, the authors say this about (bad) curricular decision-making: "'Fragmenting the Standards into individual standards, or individual bits of standards … produces a sum of parts that is decidedly less than the whole' (Appendix from the K-8 Publishers' Criteria). Breaking down standards poses a threat to the focus and coherence of the Standards. It is sometimes helpful or necessary to isolate a part of a compound standard for instruction or assessment, but not always, and not at the expense of the Standards as a whole.
Troy Patterson

Preaching About Teaching - Association for Psychological Science - 0 views

  •  
    "Obstacles to Applying Psychological Science to Classroom Instruction"
Troy Patterson

Once common standards are up and running, they are going to be largely ignored by creat... - 0 views

  •  
    Our schools will get better if we train and support our teachers better, if we are more careful in the way we pick and train their principals and if we provide more time for instruction and encourage a team spirit in every school.
Troy Patterson

Ten ideas for interactive teaching | Curriculum | eSchoolNews.com - 1 views

  •  
    While lecturing tends to be the easiest form of instruction, studies show that students absorb the least amount of information that way. Interactive teaching methods are an effective way to connect with a generation of students used to consistent stimulation-and education professor Kevin Yee has some advice for how teachers can make their lessons more interactive.
Ron King

Slowing Down to Learn: Mindful Pauses That Can Help Student Engagement | MindShift - 0 views

  •  
    Inserting longer pauses throughout classroom instruction time can help students and educators open up to greater possibilities.
Ron King

3 Steps to Implement Data-Driven Instruction (Part 3/3) | Blended Learners - 0 views

  •  
    In parts 1 and 2, we looked how to get started collecting data for DDI and then how to use that data to plan for whole and small group lessons. In this third and final section, we’ll consider…
1 - 20 of 42 Next › Last »
Showing 20 items per page