thinking about your thinking/different learning styles/ making connections/ graphic organizers

Thinking About Your Thinking/Different Learning Styles/Making Connections/

Graphic Organizers

Wed Oct 16, 2013 Wendy Klassen, Anne MacLean

Faculty of Education, UBCO

GOALS

• Make your students’ thinking visible: primarily for themselves, but also for you

• Encourage students to think more deeply– Past the superficial, passive, filling a vessel notion– Enrich students’ conceptual understanding– Personalize the learning– Make connections– Think critically

Inclusive Practice for a Wide Range of Student Needs

…Why?

Colleen LindsaySchool Psychologist

Student Support ServicesSD 22 Vernon, BC

Why? This Task May Illustrate This Question

• Take out a blank piece of paper.• Draw a picture of a pig.• You will be presented with the

completely nonscientific analysis of your drawing.

Interpretation

• If the pig is drawn:–Toward the top of the paper, you are

positive and optimistic.–Toward the middle of the paper, you

are a realist.–Toward the bottom of the paper, you

are negative and pessimistic.

• If the pig:–Faces left, you believe in tradition.–Faces right, you are innovative and

active.–Faces forward (looking at you), you are

direct and forthright.–Faces the rear, seek counseling

immediately. (That’s a joke.)

• If the pig is drawn with:–Many details, you are analytical.–Few details, you are a risk taker and

sometimes commit before analyzing an entire situation.

–Fewer than four legs showing, you are living in a time of major personal change.

–Four legs showing, you are secure and sometimes stubborn.

–More than four legs showing, seek professional help. (Another joke.)

• The size of the ears indicates how good a listener you are – the bigger the better.

• The length of the tail indicates the quality of you love life. The longer the tail, the more fulfilling your love life.

• Did you even draw a tail?

TYPES OF KNOWLEDGE

Type of knowledge How Assessed? Examples

What our students learn

Content knowledge: ‘What to know”- facts, vocabulary, concepts etc.

Procedural knowledge: ‘How to’ knowledge- skills, strategies, techniques, procedures etc.

Formative or Summative

Work samples or portfolios with feedback /response

Rubrics Quizzes/tests Free writing Performance tasks with

criteria Interview or other personal

communication

How our students learn

Tacit knowledge: ‘Soft skills’ that help students acquire knowledge: for example, how to... take notes, read a textbook, pace yourself in the allotted time organize to begin a task be attentive to details, ask for help

Formative

Observation self-checking strategies To do lists Contracts Templates and graphic

organizers Modelling Feedback

What motivates our students to

learn

Self-knowledge: For example-Learning profile: our preferred modes of engagement when learning such as... Learning style Multiple Intelligences (MI)Affect: students’ attributes that directly affect a students’ motivation to learn and predispose them to behave in academically and socially productive (or unproductive) ways such as... Interests Attitudes/Anxieties Aspirations & Efficacy

Formative

Observation Questionnaires or surveys

(Learning Style, MI, Interest, Attitude)

Free write: journals, metaphors, poetry

Visual representation: drawing, sculpting, model creation

Metacognition:

- awareness and understanding of one's own thought processes- active control over the cognitive processes engaged in learning

Assessment AS Learning

Teachers work with their students to bring them into the assessment

process so that the students learn to understand

how they are learning as opposed to

what they are learning.

Self-Assessment: An on-going process whereby students reflect on their learning

Association for Achievement and Improving for Learning

Students take responsibility for their learning

Association for Achievement and Improving for Learning

Activities such as planning how to approach a given learning task,

monitoring comprehension, and evaluating progress toward the

completion of a task are metacognitive in nature.

Metacognitive strategies include mnemonic devices, problem-solving

routines, self-monitoring skills, and the use of graphic organizers. Graphic organizers are designed to assist

students in representing patterns, interpreting data, and analyzing

information relevant to problem- solving in order to assess their own

learning.

CONNECTIONS

What did you have for dinner last Sunday?Learning is contextual!!

Prior Knowledge Prompt

• Relates new learning to existing knowledge

• Promotes learning by helping students retrieve relevant information and learn with awareness

Mnemonic Devices

• Strategies that students and teachers can create to help student remember content. The verbal information promotes recall of unfamiliar information and content.

• Examples??

Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally

BEDMAS

My Very Educated Mother Just Served Us Nine Pizzas

K-W-L or K-W-H-LK W L

K W H L

Before introduction of a topic, students write down and discuss, what they know (K) (or think they know) and what they wonder about or want (W) to learn about the topic. They may also include how (H) they are going to find the information.

Graphic or Visual Organizershttp://www.enchantedlearning.com/graphicorganizers/

Frayer’s Model

Fishbone

PMI – Plus, Minus, Interesting

Venn Diagram

Flowchart

Graphic or Visual Organizershttp://www.enchantedlearning.com/graphicorganizers/

GOALS REVISITED

• Make your students’ thinking visible: primarily for themselves, but also for you

• Encourage students to think more deeply– Past the superficial, passive, filling a vessel notion– Enrich students’ conceptual understanding– Personalize the learning– Make connections– Think critically