This week, please read pages 34-37. Please reflect on your current instructional practices and share :
How do you help your students acquire surface knowledge?
How do you assist in their consolidation of surface knowledge?
What type of barriers are there for promoting students to deep learning?
What high-effect-size strategies do you use to REALize promotion?
What high-effect-size strategies can you use to revise instruction for student promotion?
Interestingly, I acquire surface knowledge differently than I assist students…guess I’m an old-school learner! I typically use mnemonics, highlighting, and note-taking followed up with outlining. For my students, I typically use integrating prior knowledge with visuals and discussion. Whenever appropriate, I use vocabulary instruction. For consolidating, I promote help-seeking and provide strategy instruction.
ReplyDeleteI find that help-seeking is one of the largest barriers for students. Students often feel uncomfortable asking questions and/or don’t know what questions to ask. Getting them beyond the “I don’t understand” generalization is a CRITICAL critical-thinking skill for moving forward! :)
As I am shifting my instruction for EIP students, I feel I will need to use more rehearsal and memorization (particularly in math) and spaced versus mass practice strategies, IN ADDITION to the aforementioned strategies I already use.
Surface learning is a time when students initially are exposed to concepts, skills, and strategies. Surface learning is critical because it provides a foundation on which to build as students are asked to think more deeply. Since I have transitioned from elementary to middle school, I found it interesting that the middle schoolers need foundational practice as well. Some of the strategies that I use to acquire surface knowledge are scaffolding, graphic organizers, KWL's, summarizing, highlighting terms/voc., and rereading (just to name a few). I assist in their consolidation of surface knowledge by moving students beyond rote memorization and guiding them to apply strategies like summarizing, self-testing, rehearsal, and feedback to reinforce basic knowledge.
ReplyDeletePromoting students to deep learning is often hindered by internal and external obstacles. These barriers relate to students' personal motivation and emotions, and to the educational environment itself. Often students may find the content as uninteresting or irrelevant to their lives. Many students often lack the prior knowledge/background knowledge to make a connection with existing content to expand their knowledge base.
Based on Hattie's research on instructional strategies, high-effect-size strategies have a significant positive impact on student learning. Some that I use in the classroom to revise instruction for student promotion are: classroom discussions (p = 0.82), I want to try reciprocal teaching (p=0.74) and the jigsaw method (p=1.20).
Surface learning is necessary in order to move into deep learning. The tricky part is to not stay too long in surface learning yet not moving to quickly into deep learning. Some of the surface learning strategies I use frequently include rereading, making annotations (highlighting, underlining, commenting), and summarizing. These are the beginning steps in reading comprehension to get students to think about a text. Often I see that as being the biggest hinderance to a student's reading comprehension growth - they aren't thinking about what they read. Using these surface learning strategies can help them to think about that text. Once they are thinking, then we can move into thinking more deeply.
ReplyDeleteJust today as we were segmenting a text, rereading, summarizing, etc., a student made a connection in reading "The Secret Garden" that Mary (orphan) loved the secret garden once she found it because it resembled herself, all alone with no one to take care of it. That is some deep learning!! I'm not sure I ever made that connection!
I help my students acquire surface knowledge by integrating prior knowledge, using mnemonics and visuals, vocabulary instruction, and direct instruction. I assist in their consolidation of surface knowledge by using rehearsal and memorization, spaced practice, and encouraging them to ask for help instead of just staying confused and not working. Having students understand that it is okay to ask for help and that being confused is a part of learning is often a barrier as students are very hesitant to ask because they don’t want to seem like they are not intelligent or not a good student. Moving forward, I will continue with the strategies I have been using, while also encouraging students to seek help when needed, while also giving students more opportunities to summarize what they have been learning.
ReplyDeleteWhile I was reading through this weeks pages I started to question and think about my students and what they need from me throughout the day. As a collab teacher, I feel as if I spend a majority of my time trying to build background knowledge or increase their foundation of surface knowledge. I often focus on chunking the assignments given in class and modeling how to complete the assignments. This means that I am constantly rephrasing directions, highlighting key vocabulary or taking notes or even giving examples of how it relates to what they already know.
ReplyDeleteDuring skills class in the afternoon we use a portion of this time to go back through and practice with key concepts being taught throughout the week. During this time it is more of a guided practice time to gain students confident and move them towards being able to use these skills independently. We often use reviews or quick checks to practice math skills or summarize and collaborate on ELA assignments. We often do quick checks or discussions throughout the week in skills to make sure that the students are doing more than just copying down notes. I think that is one of the barriers for my students that they often will take the notes to get them down but they are not really wanting to learn what is being taught.
Repetition is one barrier for promoting students to deep learning as my classes meet only twice per week. Being able to practice and rehearse the musical vocabulary in context with musical examples is essential to the consolidation phase of surface learning, so the limited time does create a barrier.
ReplyDeleteMnemonics (ES=0.65) is one way that I help my students to acquire surface knowledge. I also integrate prior knowledge (ES=0.96) intentionally, as often as I can when introduces new concepts.
I would like to incorporate more interleaved practices (ES=0.46) into my structured lessons. I think this would be a good strategy to try with our limited instruction time. I will need to plan for it specifically!
Most of the surface knowledge in my classroom comes from direct instruction (.56 effect size) and notes (.33 effect size). I do break down morphology (.62 effect size), use real world (sometimes silly) examples, and use rehearsal/memorization games (.71 effect size). I do try and take time to teach more summarizing strategies (,62 effect size) and strategy instruction (.60 effect size) where I try and help them connect the dots (reach conclusions) on their own. Some of the barriers are inadequate implementation due to educator understanding or class time allocated. I began using questioning, vocabulary seeking, and IVF summarizing strategies in 7th grade this week, followed by HOW to summarize reading passages as notes. The modeling and explanation took 2 class periods and honestly could have lasted longer. However, the strategies my class worked on today will need to be reversed frequently for students to translate the skills to other curricula. Another barrier is students not understanding how the work can and will help them deepen their understanding. If the student has no "buy-in" they will struggle to complete work much less understand it. I try to explain the whys behind assignments and ask for student input as to where this might be beneficial and how the information can be used.
ReplyDeleteThings I want to improve is adding more summarizing strategies and re-reading into note taking to make acquiring knowledge more effective. I also want to try the practice testing (.49 effect size) mentioned, especially with tested subjects, as this will also work hand in hand with the test taking strategies (.24 effect size). I also believe there is a more effective way to rehearse information, mainly by lessening the cognitive load by making the memory games shorter- around 7-14 items max.
I also believe surface learning is important and the value according to Hattie proves this to be true. I do see higher effects sizes in deep learning but especially with the younger students surface teaching and learning is necessary prior to diving deeper. I use graphic organizers, mnemonic devices, rereading, and chunking parts of the text to stop and check comprehension. To consolidate learning, we stop throughout our reading multiple times to answers the who, what, where, when questions. I also model what I am thinking out loud as I teaching. I will tell my students "I am thinking that...". The younger students do well with modeling. Also to consolidate learning, I have the students retell what they just learned in their own words or teach a concept to the class to demonstrate understanding.
ReplyDeleteThe biggest barrier I see in teaching deeper learning is time. I feel like not only do I not have enough time each day but also for each unit or topic. Keeping in line with the pacing guide is frustrating especially if I know my students need more time to master a topic or unit of teaching. Finding the best balance of teaching for my students and teaching to the pacing guide is a challenge.
The Hattie effect sizes that I strive to implement more are help seeking (.73) and practice testing (.49). I model all the time about how to ask for assistance and that is ok to ask for help however, sometimes the students do not even realize that they should ask for assistance. They believe they are doing fine or understand the information. So if I can utilize practice assessments, maybe this will demonstrate where the students need support or more practice. The practice tests can hopely trigger the awareness that they do need help. This will be my goal!
I see surface learning as the first and most important step. My students need facts, vocabulary, and processes before they can move on. To build that base, I use direct instruction, worked examples, and plenty of practice and review activities. Once students have the basics, I help them consolidate by having them summarize steps in their own words, use practice quizzes, and explain why a process works. These strategies help surface knowledge stick so it’s ready to support deeper learning.
ReplyDeleteTeaching virtually sometimes dialogue can be limited. Many students are satisfied with “just getting the answer” instead of really explaining their thinking. Pacing can also be a barrier. When we rush, we sometimes just skim the surface of a skill. Feedback and scaffolding are key for me.Giving students in the moment feedback in Google Meet and GoGuardian and scaffolding big problems into smaller steps.
I’d like to add more reciprocal teaching, where students explain to each other. Also, I want to build more real-world transfer opportunities, so students see that surface knowledge is just the starting point for deeper application. Surface learning is not the destination, but it is the foundation. Without it, students can’t reach deep or transfer learning. The key is making sure we don’t spend all of our time at the surface, but we also don’t skip it.
Moving from primary to secondary I have changed how I help my students acquire surface knowledge. In Kindergarten and First grade, I spent a lot of time helping them acquire basic background knowledge. Now that the students are older and have more background knowledge in their schema, I help them integrate the prior knowledge (ES=0.96) and use direct instruction (ES=0.56) as they learn new information. To help my students in the consolidation of surface knowledge, I use rehearsal and memorization (ES= 0.71), strategy integration (ES-0.60) and Spaced Practice (ES=0.59). Some of the barriers I have found are the students’ level of interest in the topic/lesson and trying to keep the students actively participating and engaged. I think I would like to add more reciprocal teaching (ES=0.74) for deep learning to help
ReplyDelete*How do you help your students acquire surface knowledge?
ReplyDeleteI use direct instruction , especially in math, to go through step-by-step processes. The use of mnemonic devices to find quirky or fun ways to remember surface content and I use a lot of examples and, in science, a lot of demonstrations to get them o relate to the learning.
*How do you assist in their consolidation of surface knowledge?
I give check-ups to formatively assess what they know; I will break the lessons down a bit further and we practice little at a time in order to grasp the information needed for deeper learning.
*What type of barriers are there for promoting students to deep learning?
Time pressures in having to follow the pacing guide doesn't give a lot of those students who need more surface level acquisition to happen. Lack of prior knowledge and having to return back to topics/content that they have had prior to now blocks from moving on at a greater pace.
*What high-effect-size strategies do you use to REALize promotion?
Discussion and self-reflection of "how did you get that? Or what did you not understand on this question?"
*What high-effect-size strategies can you use to revise instruction for student promotion?
Use of scaffolding more and guided collaboration with discussions
This week’s reading on surface learning helped me reflect on how I support students in building their basic understanding of content before they move into deeper thinking. As a collab teacher, I work closely with my co-teachers to make sure all students—especially those with IEPs or learning difficulties—get what they need in the early stages of learning. To help students gain surface knowledge, we often use direct instruction. We break tasks into smaller steps, use visuals or anchor charts, and give students graphic organizers to organize new information. I also use guided notes or fill-in-the-blank outlines, which help students focus on key ideas instead of trying to write everything down at once.
ReplyDeleteOnce students have been introduced to new content, I help them practice it in different ways. We use partner activities, exit tickets, and quick checks for understanding. I also make time for review games or short group discussions where students explain what they’ve learned in their own words. Repetition and review really help students with learning challenges hold on to what they’ve learned.
One big challenge we face is time. Sometimes we feel rushed to move on before students are truly ready. Also, some students struggle with reading or attention, so if the material isn’t presented in a way that makes sense to them, they get frustrated and give up before they can really engage with it. It can also be hard for students to connect new learning to what they already know. One strategy that works well is using collaborative learning. I often group students so they can explain ideas to each other, which helps deepen their thinking.To improve, I want to include more opportunities for students to reflect on their learning. I can use sentence starters or learning journals to help them think about what strategies helped them and where they still need help. I also want to use more worked examples and model how to approach complex problems step-by-step, especially in math or writing.
I find that I use direct instruction most often when acquiring surface learning. Each year I try to improve on the explicit info and improve on my ability to use small increments of instruction at a time. I also use integrating prior knowledge in class discussions.
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