When it comes to helping students achieve a deeper understand of materials, we know the materials but lack the recipe. Just like a recipe, if one ingredient is omitted or two much of another added, the dish will be off. As teachers we need to use our classroom as the test kitchen to discover the perfect blend of ingredients to help our students.
There are six essential C's for learning to help teachers verify deeper understanding is happening in the classroom through different activities.
CURIOSITY: Students want to learn what they are interested in, good thing is that humans are naturally curious and as teachers we are creative. So, tap into students curiosity to motivate learning
Activities may include: asking questions, having students create goals or the rubric, fun hands on activities.
CONNECTION: Connect new learning to prior knowledge. Help students make the connection between what they learned in the past with what they are currently learning.
Activities may include: pre assessments, daily lessons and homework.
COHERENCE: Sometime students have difficulty recognizing connections, patterns and the larger meaning of what they are learning. As teachers we should be guiding them to find these and sometimes even explicitly spell it out.
Activities may include: cooperative learning, hands on activities, teacher-student interactions.
CONCENTRATION: Give students time to process new information, with teachers, peers and even alone. Students could get frustrated and distracted if we don't give them this time.
Activities may include:daily writing assignments, journal responses, assessments, independent assignments
COACHING: Learning is mostly trial and error, students need opportunities to practice new skills and retrieve information from their memories. However, left on their own students can actually develop incorrect procedures or misconceptions, therefore guidance from teachers is necessary through feedback and "coaching".
Activities may include: homework, exit tickets, rubrics, daily checks.
CONTEXT: If students don't apply their knew knowledge then most likely it will fade from memory. However, research shows that if students have opportunities to repeat procedures, apply new learning to novel situations, or find real-world connections for what they're learning, the new knowledge is more likely to stick.
Activities may include: performance tasks, real world problems/ examples, final projects
An example of these 6 Essential C's in implementation can be found in my DBQ Lesson Plan.
There are six essential C's for learning to help teachers verify deeper understanding is happening in the classroom through different activities.
CURIOSITY: Students want to learn what they are interested in, good thing is that humans are naturally curious and as teachers we are creative. So, tap into students curiosity to motivate learning
Activities may include: asking questions, having students create goals or the rubric, fun hands on activities.
CONNECTION: Connect new learning to prior knowledge. Help students make the connection between what they learned in the past with what they are currently learning.
Activities may include: pre assessments, daily lessons and homework.
COHERENCE: Sometime students have difficulty recognizing connections, patterns and the larger meaning of what they are learning. As teachers we should be guiding them to find these and sometimes even explicitly spell it out.
Activities may include: cooperative learning, hands on activities, teacher-student interactions.
CONCENTRATION: Give students time to process new information, with teachers, peers and even alone. Students could get frustrated and distracted if we don't give them this time.
Activities may include:daily writing assignments, journal responses, assessments, independent assignments
COACHING: Learning is mostly trial and error, students need opportunities to practice new skills and retrieve information from their memories. However, left on their own students can actually develop incorrect procedures or misconceptions, therefore guidance from teachers is necessary through feedback and "coaching".
Activities may include: homework, exit tickets, rubrics, daily checks.
CONTEXT: If students don't apply their knew knowledge then most likely it will fade from memory. However, research shows that if students have opportunities to repeat procedures, apply new learning to novel situations, or find real-world connections for what they're learning, the new knowledge is more likely to stick.
Activities may include: performance tasks, real world problems/ examples, final projects
An example of these 6 Essential C's in implementation can be found in my DBQ Lesson Plan.