Revision! How can we make it more effective?

At this time, every year one of the main questions that teachers begin asking is “how am I going to make my revision this year have a greater impact on how students perform in exams?”  This of course leads into the second question, “how can I make students see the importance of revision?” This is a question that has plagued me for years and I feel that I’m no closer to having an answer than I was 10 years ago!  I have however, made a few observations into some of the reasons behind this mind set:

• Students are afraid of failing, which would only be made worse if they had put in the revision beforehand.    So, there will always be some students that will have decided that if they do little or no revision then don’t perform, they can blame it on a lack of revision rather than admitting that they simply didn’t understand the content.
• In some cases, students will have had unconditional offers to get onto courses and don’t need any results.  When this is the case, students often have no motivation do any revision as what they will be moving onto doesn’t require any particular grades.
• At this time of year, students will be bombarded with revision from all angles.  Inevitably, there will always be some students that buckle under this increased pressure. 
• There can be an entire host of other external problems that help prevent students revising.  One particular favourite that comes to bite me every year is that the fair comes to town in or around the exam period every year.  When faced with this I can’t think on many 16 year olds that would choose to stay in and revise instead of going to the fair with their friends.

The question therefore is, how can I make the most of the revision period before the start of the exams.  Unfortunately, the answer I have come to is that there is no one correct answer, different strategies will work with different students.  There are however, a few tried and tested methods that seem to work with students every year.  I don’t claim that all of these ideas are my own, but I’ve tried to outline some of them below:

Before students begin their own revision get them to carry out a subject knowledge audit.  This is a way of identifying the areas of the syllabus that students are most comfortable with. The information elicited can be used to inform what they need to revise first, and those areas that they don’t need to spend as much time on.  This can be a powerful tool as experience has taught me that 9 times out of 10 students would rather focus on areas that they are already confident with as this is an easier option.

Once students have pin pointed the areas that they need to focus on they need to think about how they are going to do this.  One effective method of doing this is by chucking.  Chunking is an excellent way to make large quantities of information more manageable.  All students need to do to carry this out is to put together similar topics into small groups that they can work through & revise in short sections. 

Concept mapping:  A concept map requires students getting everything they now about a concept down on a sheet of A3.  Students then need to think about a particular question (preferably long answer) and numbering the information in the order that they would need to put it in an exam question.  After students have completed this they can either use their concept map to answer questions, or more effectively, allow students to use their concept map to put together a short presentation that they can use to explain a concept to another student.

Flashcards are proven to improve your long-term memory using the theory of spaced repetition. This practice involves learning a topic and re-visiting it at set intervals to test themselves.  There are a few different ways that students can use flash cards both inside and outside of lessons. 

• Students can provide flashcards with short pieces of information on them that they can quickly run through when they’re out and about.
• Students can write an exam question on one side of the card then the answer on the other.  They can then use them to test themselves.
• Students can work together and split up the work load.  One of them can take half the topics they need to revise and vice versa.  Students can then use them to either question each other on the content or teach each other the content.

Past papers are a vital way that students need to use when revising as an ability to pick out what an exam question is asking is a skill that they need to develop.  There are a variety of different ways that they can be used.

• The most simplistic way that past papers can be used by students is by downloading them from the exam board, working through them, then using a mark scheme to see how they have done and where they need to improve.  Alternatively, students can work I pairs or in groups, answering questions then peer assessing each other’s work.
• You can use past paper questions as part of a circus activity.  Stick the question to a large sheet of paper on one side and the answer to the question on the reverse.  Ask students to start answering one question then after a certain amount of time get them to move onto the next question & continue answering it.  After students have moved round 3 or 4 times get the final student to mark the answer using the mark scheme and feedback on how well the question has been answered.
• Students can be given an exam question an asked to produce a mark scheme for it.  Once they have done that they can let another student answer the question that they can then mark using their own mark scheme.
• You can ask students to break the exam questions up into smaller sections.  Once they have done this they can then explain to other students how to answer each specific section.

Students teaching each other: Micro teaching involves students teaching each other ideas & content during a lesson.  There is lots of evidence that shows that students make the greatest amount of progress when they have to explain ideas & concepts to each other. Below I have outlined how to carry out a micro teaching activity with students and have tried to detail some of the possible preparation that needs to be in place to ensure that this activity has a meaningful impact on student progress.

The first stage in any micro teaching activity is to enable students to gather the information for themselves.  If students have to find things out for themselves they will make more progress than if they are just spoon fed it.  This can be done in many different ways.

• Flipped learning:  Before the lesson you can let students know what they will be teaching and then set appropriate videos for them to watch. Students can then use this to make notes on the content they need in preparation for the next lesson.
• Directed reading:  Students can be given the content they will be producing a micro teaching presentation or short lesson on.  This method works most effectively when students have to pick out key information from the text and then have it taken away before they start interacting with other groups.
• Use exam questions:  During revision, different groups of students can be given different exam questions that they need to explain to other students how to answer.
• Information hunt:  Before beginning the micro teaching activity, put key information around the room that students will need to use.  Give students some time in small groups to go around and gather the information they need to carry out the micro teaching activity.

Once students have collected the information they need, they need to put together a short lesson or presentation on a particular concept.  This can take the form of a traditional short presentation or a short lesson where students have prepared some simple resources to help them teach.  Once your students are ready set them up work around rows of tables as shown in the pictures below

After students have worked around all the other groups you can carry out more traditional AFL to assess how much progress students have made. 

Another method that I think is becoming ever more useful is the use of youtube by students when revising.  As with most revision pedagogies there are any number of ways to use it, which realistically deserves more than a short section in a single blog.  The way that I’ve used it this year is to enable students to fill in gaps that they have previously identified by watching one of a range of videos on it on youtube.

Revision games are another really good way to help keep students engaged during lessons.  There are a number of different games you can use but most of them start with students going over content and then within the game answering questions on that content.  Here are a few ideas of games I have used:

Blockbusters

Anyone who grew up i the 80s will know what Blockbusters is.  Do not assume that your students will as I found out with my Y13 class who had no idea what it was.  Watching classic Blockbusters for 10 mins during the lesson was time well spent I feel.  The way that this game works is to get students to read some content, then produce a Blockbusters board with questions on based on what they have read.  Students then using counters, need to answer questions and either work horizontally, or vertically across the board.

Snakes & Ladders

How many ways are there to play snakes and ladders?  Surprisingly, a lot more than I ever thought possible.  The basic premise to using snakes and ladders is to set up a board with questions on based on what students have read.  I'd advise briefly running through the rules with them first as many of them will have very different ideas of how to play.

Get through the maze game

This game came out of the fact that I really like the film Labyrinth from the 80s.  After students have read a piece of key information they need to roll a dice to see how many spaces they can move.  If they come to a question square they need to answer the corresponding question before they can move on.  As with all mazes the aim is to get to the finish first

Battle Ships

Growing up one of my favourite games to play on a rainy Saturday afternoon was Battle Ships.  Students need to pick 5 positions to place their ships, they then need to take it in turns to pick grid references to try and find each other's ships.  The twist is that each square has a corresponding question that students need to answer based on some key text printed on the board somewhere.

Dice questions

There are a wide and varied range of different dice games you can use in lessons.  Basically most of them centre around students reading some key information, then picking questions to answer from a list either by rolling one or two dice.

Question Grids

The general idea behind this type of game is to give students a 3 by 3 or 6 by 6 grid with questions on based on something students have previously read. Students then simply need to roll a dice twice to pick a question to answer. After students have been playing this for a bit, you can pick on students at random to answer the questions so you can ensure that they have been getting the correct answers.

Game Boards

This is an idea that once you get it set up, can be used in a range of different lessons.  When putting a board together you need to include a range of different squares to help keep students engaged.  Some of the squares that I include are primarily question squares, miss a go squares, move back or forward squares ect.  Once you have set up a template you can tailor your board to the lesson you are teaching.

Key word game

I like many of my colleges did use to think of literacy was just the domain of English teachers.  However, I have come to the realisation that we all need to try and play our part.  After looking at where students lose marks in exams is by not using key words, or using them incorrectly.  So one of the more recent things I'm trying to give a go is to primarily ensure that the key words for the lesson are embedded in my lesson outcomes, then building up a starter game around those key words.

Come up with your own question game

The last idea that I'm going to discuss are games where students come up with their own questions based on the key information they have read.  This sort of game works in a similar way as many other others I have outlined, with the exception that instead of giving students questions to answer they need to think them up themselves.  I've found that this works particularly well with higher ability students, however, lower ability ones have found it more difficult and need more guidance.

One method that I’ve never been 100% about using as it can lead some students into doing less revision is to produce revision notes for students to use.  The big advantage of this is that it helps ensure that students have all of the important content they need at hand.  There are many ways that they can use them, the method I’ve used a lot this year is to start the lesson with students highlighting key points then building the rest of the lesson around the information they have worked through.

The last area that I’ve tried to look at this year is playing the long game.  At the start of each term I’ve given my students a list of short revision activities to work through each day.  I’ve then put up on displays, and have sent out instructions via a number of different ways more detailed instructions what they students need to do for each task.  I’m hoping that little and often will have made a significant difference this year.

I hope that these ideas are different for many others out there and they have provided some inspiration for things you can do within your own lessons.  If you want anything in this blog clarifying please don’t hesitate to get in touch.

You can follow me on twitter @teacherchalky1 or on Facebook @teachlikeahero. 

Thanks for reading

D Chalk

How to use Class Dojo in some innovative ways!

For many years, I have had trainee teachers to look after and every now and again I find that I must ask myself “why do you put yourself through all this extra work every year?”  Luckily last year my trainee rose to the challenge and reminded me exactly why by introducing me to the online Classdojo application!  ClassDojo is a behaviour management tool for the classroom. Each student has a profile – complete with their own avatar – to which teachers can assign positive and negative points throughout the lesson.  This in itself, is a really powerful tool which can be used to re-enforce expectations, however, as a KS4 specialist I’ve tried using it in a few more innovative ways to help engage students especially when it comes to revision.

At the start of Year 11 I set up a dojo with all my students on especially for revision sessions they attend.  At the end of every week you can let students know how many sessions they have attended and you can then make comparisons between attendance and the progress they are making.  You can then use this to help encourage other students to start turning up.  If I were to take this to the next level I’d like to try and use this to engage with parents and let them know what sessions their offspring are attending as this function is available.

Within my day to day revision lessons, I have given students a point for every question that they answer correctly.  This doesn’t sound very exciting or innovative until you start to take into consideration how Year 11 students can become disengaged as they are having revision rammed down their throats in every lesson.  I found that within a few lessons those students who I have to really push to answer anything started to want to answer questions.  On a completely personal not I have to admit that I’m quite sarcastic and have developed a unique understanding with my students who now get freaked out if I’m overly nice to them.  So, I went in and edited some of the responses that come up on the screen to reflect my own personality which has gone down really well.

The last more unusual use I want to talk about is using Classdojo when carrying out class quizzes.  Traditionally I’ve only used dojos with individual students but there’s nothing to say that you can’t set up a dojo with group names that students have picked themselves.  In one lesson, I sat student in groups along table in groups of 4 and on half the screen had a web page open with their group names on and the score they’ve achieved, and on the other half I had a screen showing the students using a camera.  I then ran the lesson like an episode of University Challenge by giving each group a buzzer then giving points out when students got questions correct. 

I hope that these ideas are different for many others out there and they have provided some inspiration for how you use Class Dojo for other things not just behaviour management.

You can follow me on twitter @teacherchalky1 or on Facebook @teachlikeahero. 

Thanks for reading

D Chalk

Why don't High Ability Students Make Progress & What Can You Do About It?

Anyone who has been teaching a long time will tell you that the main thing that used to matter was that every student gets at least a grade C in your subject.  The main reason behind this was for years the progress measures was only interested in students getting five Cs or above, and then more recently getting five Cs or above including Maths & English.  Whilst in real terms out in the real world anything below a C is often seen as a failure so getting a C was important, did these two factors really encourage us to push the higher end as much as we could?  I think, myself included, that our answer would have to be no! 

So, in more recent years, the progress measures have now been changed to actually look at student progress rather than just that final grade.  I’m sure that they’ll be those who’d lynch me for suggesting this, but I honestly think that in terms of pushing students to make the greatest amount of progress they can, measuring an end grade against a start point has been a good thing.  The biggest issue that this has caused however, is that it’s a lot more difficult for a higher ability student to physically make as much progress in terms of levels achieved.  This is one of the main factors behind the much greater focus on higher ability students as well as those students on the C-D boarder line.

Higher ability students are defined as a student who performs at, or shows the potential for performing at, an outstanding level of accomplishment in at least one domain, Maths, English or the Sciences, when compared to other students of the same age, experience, or environment and is characterized by exceptional gifts, talents, motivations or interests.  High ability students need to have educational experiences which help them meet their full potential.  So what does this actually mean?  I think it actually means that a student who is better equipped to make outstanding progress than others.  Basically it boils down to a few simple facts:

1. The student has a high reading age so is able to access high level content
2. Has an ability to understand mathematical problems
3. Is self-motivated so has pushed themselves during Primary school

The problem facing us now is, how can we ensure these students who enter secondary school with a high level of achievement maintain that level throughout, and achieve the high-level exam results which they should be capable of.  I quiet often find myself thinking about this question and maybe the start point should be to try and come up with some of the potential reasons that these high ability students aren’t making the progress they are capable of.

The annual dip in progress at the start of Year 7.  When students are in Year 6 they are a big fish in a small pond, so it may come as a culture shock when they start secondary school that they are now the youngest students.  Just to compound problems, the data that comes up from Primary school is often not with the secondary school for one reason or another at the start of the year.  This can lead to HA students not being put in the correct set which may cause them to become disheartened and damage their positive view of schools.  The last major problem is the way that teachers may view Year 7 students.  This issue arises when teachers (myself included) almost that we need to slowly ease all students in, giving them work which might not be as challenging as it could be. 

Differentiation within the top set where you find most HA students.  In most other classes, you will consider differentiation, possibly in how can I push the top end but more often what you can do to support the bottom end.  When it comes to a top set this doesn’t seem to happen as much.  What we need to be thinking about in terms of differentiation is, what we can put in place to really stretch the top end. 

A lack of stretch and challenge within lessons.  One of the main problems that comes up when you speak to HA students is that they don’t feel challenged in lessons.  In part this comes from the fact that often the teacher will feel that they need to impart as much knowledge as possible to HA students, so often fall into the lecturing trap!  This is possibly exactly the opposite to what HA student’s needs as they won’t find sitting & listening for a long period very challenging.

Peer pressure.  I could talk about this one all day however, there is already a wealth of research out there on this point.  For whatever reason, academic success is not something that often students want to exhibit to other students.  This often comes out as answering questions with “I don’t know” rather than stretching themselves.  Eventually this becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy and students convince themselves that they don’t actually know.

Students may develop a lack of desire to learn over time.  Although capable of completing their school work to a high level, they lack the initiative or motivation to succeed.  These are students that can do the work, are highly intelligent, but have decided that there are other things that are more important.  In many cases, they are distracted by out-side factors, emotional issues or a variety of other factors that are out of our control.  I think that out of all the possible reasons, this is the most unfortunate as there is a limited amount you can do. 

These reasons are by no means an exhaustive list but it gives us start point from which to work from.  So, the most important question we need to ask ourselves is “what can we as teachers do to push those HA students to make the expected level of progress when it comes to exam performance?”  I don’t claim to be an expert but here are some of my musings on ways to approach this issue.

The first major thing that we need to think about is what pedagogies can be used to truly stretch and challenge HA students.  I think that the conclusion that most of us have come to is that the main thing that will push these students is to get them to be self-reliant and able to independently teach themselves and others.  There are a variety of methods out there to get students teaching each other ranging from taking a section of the content in a lesson and teaching it to each other I small groups, all the way to mentoring.  Here are a few outlines of some methods I have used:

Micro-teaching:  Students are put in small groups and either given content or asked to research a specific topic.  Once they have done this, get them to put short presentations together that they can use to teach other groups with.  Th really stretch students ask them to think of one question each to ask the presenting group. 

Mentoring:  HA students can be used to mentor other HA students further down the school.  As most student’s will start their GCSEs in year 9 now, this mentoring of the content to younger students can act as excellent revision for HA students.

Putting together revision videos:  This is something of a new phenomenon in education, but as the technology is there it should be used.  Providing that the students aren’t physically filming themselves or others they can use diagrams and talk over them to produce revision videos for each other.

Open ended research tasks:   This one might not be appropriate for every subject, however, in many there should be an element of self-directed learning where they can explore their own interests within a subject.  One example which I’ve tried before is letting my Year 11 students who also take History to look into how the Haber process was exploited to enable Germany to make explosives and why Fritz Haber was convicted of war crimes.

The start point to many lessons centres around discussing concepts with students.  When pupils share their opinion with you, or with a partner during discussion, push them to explain what underpins that opinion. Do not let unsupported assertions escape without asking “Why?”, “What reasons do you have for thinking that?”. You can even train your pupils to start asking these questions of each other.  There are a few ways to help students do this but the easiest way I use is to let students choose who they are going to ask questions to rather than you as the teacher choosing.  This helps enable HA students to take ownership of the lesson so feel like they are in a small way in control of their own learning.

Avoid Worksheets:  One thing that is almost as bad as death by power point is death by worksheet!  For years one of the main approach to differentiating for the top end was to provide more worksheets for if they finish tasks early.  The main problem with this is that if students are finishing tasks a lot earlier than you would expect your pitching your tasks too low!  Nothing will bread resentment in your HA students like giving them more worksheets to do if they finish early as it can make them feel like they’re being punished for doing well.

Meaningful Homework (less is more!) The topic of homework can often be divisive among teachers as most of use can’t come to a consensus on how to set it.  There are several ways to set homework, you may set exam questions or revision tasks.  There has been a lot of talk about flipped learning over the last year, and after giving it a go I’ve found that it can work really well for HA students.  Flipped learning basically is an instructional strategy and a type of blended learning that reverses the traditional learning environment by delivering instructional content, often online, outside of the classroom. It moves activities, including those that may have traditionally been considered homework, into the classroom

Innovation:  Think out of the box!  HA students are extremely able so it’s an ideal opportunity to try all those innovative techniques that you’ve never dared try before.  In terms of lessons for HA students, they’ll really appreciate it and you’ll really enjoy teaching them.

Writing exam answer mark scheme or questions to use:  For those of us who are used to teaching exam groups every year, we all use exam questions especially when it comes to revision.  The question is how can we spice using exam questions up to ensure HA students are really engaging with them?  One method that I have used is to allow students to act as the examiner.  There are a few of ways I’ve found to do this:

1. Give students a variety of model answers and get them to mark them using a mark scheme.  Once they have done this you can question them about why they have given the marks they have.
2. Students can be given an exam question, then asked to construct a mark scheme for it.
3. Students can be showed the answer to a question, then asked to put together a question for that answer.

So, in conclusion here are some of my closing thoughts in the subject and what you need to consider before teaching any HA student.  Identifying the student’s next steps and creating cognitive dissonance.  This means being aware of exactly where you need your students to be heading and how you can enable them to get there. Injecting elements of novelty and variety into the learning experience.  This will help students keep that love of learning and so helps enable them to make progress without realising that they are working hard.  Offering opportunities for independence and self-direction.  You need to ensure the tasks you are setting are open ended so provide real opportunities for students to stretch themselves.  Providing opportunities to work with like-minded peers.  This is a bit of a no brainer.  The main thing that’s going to enable HA students to make progress is to enable them to teach themselves and others using group work. 

I hope that these ideas are different for many others out there and they have provided some inspiration for how you can stretch and challenge your HA students.

You can follow me on twitter @teacherchalky1 or on Facebook @teachlikeahero. 

Thanks for reading

D Chalk

What is independent learning & how can I use it in my own teaching?

One of the buzz words of 2016 was independent learning but the question I found myself asking is what is independent learning & how can I use it in my own teaching?  Independent learning is defined as when an individual is able to think, act and pursue their own studies autonomously, without the same levels of support you receive from a teacher at school.  So, what does this actually mean?  When I think about independent learning these are the main things that come to mind.

Independent learning helps stretch higher ability students.  This is because when students are working independently they need to be self-sufficient.  Often the skills they need to develop in order for this to happen go hand in hand with higher order thinking skills.

Independent learning helps students develop a growth mindset.  Dweck defines growth mindset as “In a growth mindset, people believe that their most basic abilities can be developed through dedication and hard work—brains and talent are just the starting point. This view creates a love of learning and a resilience that is essential for great accomplishment”

When planning independent learning tasks, try, and enable students room for manoeuvre so that they can be creative, think out of the box or both.  There are a few ways round this. When setting homework tasks that will .really stretch the independence of students, give them options to choose from.  In lessons think about tasks that are going to challenge your students and cause them to have to access the lesson content in a way that they will have to be able to explain it to another student if they have to.  

If students are working independently then they must be doing something by themselves.  This was the first main misconception on my part as what I’ve come to believe is that what independent learning really is, is any sort of learning where I’m not directly responsible for what students are learning.  This also means that students can still be learning independently when working in groups or pairs.

If students are working independently then they will by divine intervention, make more progress!  The second realisation I’ve had is that even though independent learning promotes higher level thinking, you don’t need to try and crowbar it into every lesson as it’s not always appropriate.  A more important point is that there is no rule that says that even if you have set an independent learning task there’s no reason that you can’t still give your students guidance or a framework to work within.

Independent learning doesn’t just mean homework.  For years, this was a common misconception made by many teachers across the board.  You can plan independent learning tasks into your lessons.  The most important thing to think about when doing this is to start with the independent learning task you want your students to do, then construct your lesson around it as your students will need to be pre-equipped with the tools they need to complete the task effectively.   

Independent learning should help increase student’s confidence and motivation in lessons.  Because student’s are taking responsibility for their own learning they will be able to help direct the direction they take.  If students are helping to choose how they are learning they should become more motivated about their own learning.  If students are engaged within their learning it should make them more confident about explaining what they are learning.

The final realisation I’ve come to believe about independent learning is that it allows students to work at their own pace.  And with that in an ideal world you’ve discovered the holy grail of teaching.  A pedagogy that allows differentiation, the stretches the most able students, that frees up the teacher in the lesson to help support less able students and that allows students to be creative in their own learning.  If only it was that easy.

The question that I heard asked time and again is “how can I effectively use independent learning within my own teaching?”  This is a question that I’ve been wrestling with for a long time, and I think that I can almost see the light at the end of the tunnel.  Below I have tried to outline some of the methods and activities I use to help independent learning both within and outside of my lessons. 

Get students to teach each other using micro-teaching.  Micro teaching involves students teaching each other ideas & content during a lesson.  There is lots of evidence that shows that students make the greatest amount of progress when they have to explain ideas & concepts to each other. Below I have outlined how to carry out a micro teaching activity with students and have tried to detail some of the possible preparation that needs to be in place to ensure that this activity has a meaningful impact on student progress.

The first stage in any micro teaching activity is to enable students to gather the information for themselves.  If students have to find things out for themselves they will make more progress than if they are just spoon fed it.  This can be done in many different ways.

• Flipped learning:  Before the lesson you can let students know what they will be teaching and then set appropriate videos for them to watch. Students can then use this to make notes on the content they need in preparation for the next lesson.
• Directed reading:  Students can be given the content they will be producing a micro teaching presentation or short lesson on.  This method works most effectively when students have to pick out key information from the text and then have it taken away before they start interacting with other groups.
• Use exam questions:  During revision, different groups of students can be given different exam questions that they need to explain to other students how to answer.
• Information hunt:  Before beginning the micro teaching activity, put key information around the room that students will need to use.  Give students some time in small groups to go around and gather the information they need to carry out the micro teaching activity.
• Once students have collected the information they need, they need to put together a short lesson or presentation on a particular concept.  This can take the form of a traditional short presentation or a short lesson where students have prepared some simple resources to help them teach.  
• Once your students are ready set them up work around rows of tables as shown in the pictures below

After students have worked around all the other groups you can carry out more traditional AFL to assess how much progress students have made. 

Open ended homework tasks:  These do pretty much what it says on the tin, they provide students with an opportunity to expand their own learning outside of the classroom in a direction that interests them.  There are a few ways to approach this form of independent learning:

1. Set students a general inquiry question that they must research then produce some sort of report on.
2. Set homework tasks which allow students multiple routes to get to an outcome.
3. Allow students to collaboratively to produce a video on a certain topic

Modelling activities:  When getting students to build models to explore concepts you still need to start with the content, however, you don’t necessarily need to stand at the front of the class and physically teach it.  The first step in allowing students to construct models is to allow them to collect or put together the information they need to help them build the model themselves.  This can be done in a few ways; you can use flipped learning and set students a series of youtube videos to watch & make notes on to help them, or lay out a range of information and allow students to gather what they need in small groups.  In some cases, you can give students a sheet with the content on and allow them to highlight what they think is relevant. 

Once students have the information they need, don’t assume they will automatically know where to start.  In many lessons where students are given a chance to build models to explore concepts there isn’t just one correct answer, however, there will still be a range of criteria that students need to incorporate into their models.  Before students start building their models don’t forget to give them a rough frame work to help them structure their ideas that they will incorporate.  In some cases, when you are giving students a task to complete where there is lots of scope for interpretation, it is worth showing students examples to help them get going.

Allowing students opportunities to feedback on each other’s work.  Peer marking is often a contentious method. Using it relies on students understanding what the correct answer is and that they will be able to mark answer without being overly harsh or generous.  The other major problem with peer marking is the quality of the feedback that they give each other.  If the feedback they give doesn’t aid progress has it been worth the time it has taken them to give it?  The way that I think effective peer marking should be carried out follows a few key concepts.

Firstly, if I’m getting students to do any peer marking I get them to do it in green pen.  If students do their marking in green it is easy for them to distinguish between their marking and mine.  It also gives an opportunity to easily comment and give feedback on the quality of peer feedback.

When getting students to make each other’s work don’t presume that they will automatically know how to do it.  It’s been my experience that most students have no idea how to mark a piece of work.  The way to get around this is to give students a strict framework to mark to.  If you want students to mark for SPAG, give them the key words that need to be spelt correctly.  If you want students to mark for specific content get them using a mark scheme to allow them to see what the correct answers are.  Using peer marking takes some time to get right as your students will need some training, however, it’s a useful tool to have I your arsenal.

Allow students to set their own tasks:  This one does come with a little health and safety warning, I would only use it with a class that I felt confident with, and which I’d already set a relatively strict framework for students to work within.  The first thing to do is to ensure that you share the lesson outcomes with students so they know what they need to achieve by the end of the lesson.  From there it’s up to them to set their own task to get there.  Put students in small groups or pairs to do this and then ask each group what they have decided to do to make sure that they will achieve what you want.

Group brain storming activities:  This is a short activity that can allow small groups of students to feed off each other’s creativity, therefore helping each other to expand their own learning.  Start with giving your students a topic to work on expanding it with as much as they can think around it.  Then rotate students around each other’s work and get them to expand on what’s already written.  Continue this process until students are back at their original work, then get them to use the information to compete some sort of collaborative task.

Interrogating the text:  Students are given an unfamiliar piece of text.  In pairs or small groups they are asked to:

1. Formulate important questions the text should be able to answer, or they hope the text will answer.
2. Read the text, highlighting key points,
3. Discuss the key points and agree answers to the questions formulated in ‘1’.

This is by no means a complete list of the things you can give a go; however, they are some of the methods I’ve given a go and have worked pretty well.  I hope that these ideas have provided some inspiration for how you can use independent learning within your own lessons.

You can follow me on twitter @teacherchalky1 or on Facebook @teachlikeahero. 

Thanks for reading

D Chalk

What is Differentiation & How Can It Be Used?

Over 11 years ago, I heard the phrase differentiation for the first time.  I found myself asking “what is differentiation?”  I found myself thinking back to when I was at school and realising that at the time everyone more or less got taught the same content in the same way.  Thinking back to then in comparison to how I teach now, you come to realise contrary to what the press would have us believe, things are much better now.    In part that is to do with a greater degree of differentiation within schools and especially within lessons.

The definition of what differentiation is:  Differentiated instruction is the way in which a teacher anticipates and responds to a variety of students' needs in the classroom. To meet students' needs, teachers differentiate by modifying the content (what is being taught), the process (how it is taught) and the product (how students demonstrate their learning).  What I think this actually means is that you don’t need to treat every student the same.  Because no two students are the same, should we teach any two students in exactly the same way?  After 11 years of teaching the only conclusion that I can make is “NO!”  So, the challenge is “how can we differentiate effectively without having to teach 25 lessons at once.”

Over the last 11 years the face of differentiation has changed drastically.  At one point differentiation consisted of producing a range of individual tasks or activities for each student to work through and then to mark each individuals work using a different set of criteria.  Whilst this seems like the ideal situation, in the world of full time teaching you physically don’t have enough time to do this without killing yourself or building a time machine.  Below I have tried to outline some of my ideas about how I differentiate and a few different approaches I use.

Know your audience:  I know that this can be easier said than done, however, over time this is what everything else I do with differentiation is built on.  On taking over a class it’s important to make sure you know what level your student’s should be working at, and if you get the opportunity, talk to their previous teacher to help you get a feel for them.  There are many important advantages to knowing your audience in term of differentiation:

• You can sit your students in specific groups based on their ability.
• You can direct specific questions to different students based on how much stretch they need to get the most progress out of them.
• If you are working with students that have been put into sets based on their ability range, you can either increase or decrease the difficulty of the content you include.
• It allows you to differentiate by task as you’ll get to know what works for your students.
• Using various Edtech, it allows you to set individualised homework for those students who need that extra bit of challenge to enable them to hit those top grades.

Objectives:  A few years ago, there was a point where every objective needed to follow Blooms, be levelled so that progress could be shown against the objectives and needed to follow the all, most, some model.  Whilst this seems like a good way to construct differentiated objectives, it never quite hit the spot for me.  The issue with focusing too much on blooms was that I focused too much on trying to fit the model rather than on the content of the objective.  The problem with having all my objectives levelled was that students would often only work to their target level instead of trying to push themselves to a higher level.  The biggest issue however, is the all, most, some part of objectives.  The problem was that lots of students did the all part, then didn’t go any further.  So, the question is how to use objectives to enable differentiation within a lesson?  The trick I use is to have reasonably generic objectives based on the content but without telling students differentiate my expectations of student outcomes to tasks based on my objectives in accordance to the level that individuals should be working at.

Differentiation by task:  Would you teach a top set using the same lesson as you would a bottom set?  As much as I’d love the answer to be yes, I think I’d have to say no!  If you work in a school where students have been put into sets based on their ability then you need to consider what extra support you need to put in place to support lower ability students, and how to step up your activities to challenge higher ability students.  Below are some things that you might find helpful to think about when differentiating the tasks within your lesson:

• Not all your students will learn in the same way so you need to plan a range of different tasks that will enable all your students to access the lesson.
• Use open ended tasks.  By using tasks that have more than one solution you can allow lower ability students to access the content whilst at the same time allowing higher ability students to stretch themselves.
• If your using exam questions with students, especially long answer ones, break the question up into smaller pieces with advice on how to answer each piece.  This works well with low ability students.
• Consider the level of questions you are using.  If you use a programme like exampro, the exam questions are levelled 1-3.  If you have a lower ability class you might want to use lower levelled questions, and with a higher-level class vice versa.
• Consider the content you are teaching students.  There is very little point I trying to teach high level concepts to low ability students as they will become disillusioned when they struggle to understand it.  At the other end of the spectrum think carefully about how you can use the content to stretch students.  Do you have to teach them everything or can you challenge them to find things out for themselves?
• The pace of the tasks within your lesson is vitally important.  With some classes, you’ll need to keep the pace fast in order to stretch you students, whilst with other classes you’ll need to take it more steady to enable them to access the content.  With low ability students, don’t be worried about spending longer on tasks even if it runs into the next lesson.
• Think carefully about your Power Point.  Lower ability students will find a slide with lots of writing on difficult to access.  In terms of differentiation, you need to change how you present content dependant on your audience. 
• Each student has a preferred learning style, and successful differentiation includes delivering the material to each style: visual, auditory and kinesthetic and through words. Not all students require the same amount of support from the teacher, and students could choose to work in pairs, small groups or individually. While some students may benefit from one-to-one interaction with a teacher or classroom aide, others may be able to progress by themselves. Teachers can enhance student learning by offering support based on individual needs.

Questioning:  Possibly the easiest way to differentiate is by questioning.  Once you know the level that your students need to be working at you can target them with specific questions.  You can use open questioning to stretch higher ability students, or can use closed questioning to often help convince lower ability students that they are making progress.

I hope that these ideas are different for many others out there and they have provided some inspiration for how you can differentiate within your own lessons.

You can follow me on twitter @teacherchalky1 or on Facebook @teachlikeahero. 

Thanks for reading

D Chalk

Top tips for AFL in lessons

When you teach for long enough you’ll see many ideas and acronyms come and go, and for the most part with good reason.  Anyone who had the misfortune of having to experience APP will be relieved that particular concept came, and disappeared just as quickly.   One idea that seems to have stuck however, is the concept of assessment for learning.  Assessment for Learning is the process of seeking and interpreting evidence for use by learners and their teachers to decide where the learners are in their learning, where they need to go and how best to get there.  In short, it is used to assess how much progress your students are making. 

The most traditional form of AFL is marking; this doesn’t give you any real-time evidence for how students are progressing during the lesson.  I’ve found that lesson based AFL is one of the holy grails in teaching as when used effectively can be used to hang your lessons on.  Below I’ve tried to outline some innovative ways of using AFL which you can use within your own practice.

Simple class responses when questioned how much they know

The whole point of AFL is to get an idea about how much students have understood.  There are a few different ways of doing this throughout the lesson that take little or no planning or resources.  Some of the methods I have used are:

• Thumbs up or down:  The way I use this method allows students to angle their thumbs to show where on a scale their understanding is; thumbs up meaning completely understands, thumbs down meaning they understand nothing and anywhere in-between.   
• Coloured cards:  Students can have red & green coloured cards that they can have out to show if they have understood a particular part of the lesson.
• Stand up or sit down:  This method can be used by asking students to stay stood up if they understand what you have been through.  You can then ask the students questions who have stayed stood up. 

Literature Games

One key point in any lesson is how you use literacy within it.   In my opinion nearly every lesson should have some aspect or activity where students must read something to cover an area of content.  As it’s been proven that the more students read the higher their reading age becomes, and the higher their reading age, the better their chances of achieving higher exam results.  The trick is to firstly get students reading without any innate barriers going up, and secondly checking that they have read what they have been given.  This is where AFL comes in. 

There are a few ways that I’ve found work well in regards to assessing how much students have understood from what they have read.  So, the question is “how do I get students to work through a series of questions on what they have just read without realising that they are working through a set of questions?”  The conclusion that I have come to is to place the questions that you want to ask in some sort of game.  Some of the games I use are snakes & ladders, battleships, pacman, various grid games and many more.  Once students have had chance to work though the game and answer all the questions you can carry out a bit of AFL.  The easiest thing to do is direct the questions from the game to specific students and check the answers you get.

Dice games

Every teacher should have a big bag of dice in their class room that can be used for a variety of reasons.  AFL often includes a range of questions based on what students have just covered.  If you simply give students a list of questions to work through their likely to get bored as they probably spend a fair amount of their week just answering questions.  The solution to this problem is to use just six questions that students pick to answer by rolling a dice.  By doing this they don’t naturally equate it with answering questions and you can still assess how much they have understood.

The use of the letters A-D

One of the more baffling things I’ve found with the new structure of A Level papers is that the first few questions are multiple choice.  I have however, discovered that for whatever reason my students find answering this type of question harder that long answer ones.  As of late I have been trying to drop in a couple of these types of question into lessons which act as AFL questions for the content you have just worked through.

Directed questioning

This type of AFL doubles up as a type of easy differentiation you can use within your own practice.  This method relies on knowing your audience and the level that they are working at.  After you have finished working through an activity or in some cases during it, simply ask specific students differentiated questions based on what they are covering.

Peer Marking

Peer marking is often a contentious method. Using it relies on students understanding what the correct answer is and that they will be able to mark answer without being overly harsh or generous.  The other major problem with peer marking is the quality of the feedback that they give each other.  If the feedback they give doesn’t aid progress has it been worth the time it has taken them to give it?  The way that I think effective peer marking should be carried out follows a few key concepts.

Firstly, if I’m getting students to do any peer marking I get them to do it in green pen.  If students do their marking in green it is easy for them to distinguish between their marking and mine.  It also gives an opportunity to easily comment and give feedback on the quality of peer feedback.

When getting students to make each other’s work don’t presume that they will automatically know how to do it.  It’s been my experience that most students have no idea how to mark a piece of work.  The way to get around this is to give students a strict framework to mark to.  If you want students to mark for SPAG, give them the key words that need to be spelt correctly.  If you want students to mark for specific content get them using a mark scheme to allow them to see what the correct answers are.  Using peer marking takes some time to get right as your students will need some training, however, it’s a useful tool to have I your arsenal.

The last main way to carry out AFL in a lesson is to listen out for what students are saying.  By just listening you’ll pick up on how much students have understood.  I hope that this has given you some inspiration about things you use for AFL within your own teaching.

If you have enjoyed reading this, you can find me on Facebook @teachlikeahero and on Twitter at @teacherchalky1

Thanks for reading

David Chalk