Saturday, October 20, 2012

Classroom Instruction that Works


            In 2001, a book called, “Classroom Instruction that Works” by Robert Marzano, Debra Pickering, and Jane Pollock was published.  In 2012, a second edition of the book written by Ceri B. Dean, Elizabeth Ross Hubbell, Howard Pitler, and BJ Stone was published.  The second edition builds upon the work done in the fist book.  It incorporates findings from a study that clarifies the concepts related to each of the nine categories identified in the first edition and it uses an analysis of the literature published since the first edition to provide an updated estimate of each strategy’s effect on student achievement (Classroom Instruction that Works 2nd edition p. xiii).  The nine categories include:
·      Setting Objectives and Providing Feedback
·      Reinforcing Effort and Providing Recognition
·      Cooperative Learning
·      Cues, Questions, and Advance Organizers
·      Nonlinguistic Representations
·      Summarizing and Note Taking
·      Assigning Homework and Providing Practice
·      Identifying Similarities and Differences
·      Generating and Testing Hypothesis
The book is organized into three parts; in which each of the nine categories are divided into chapters with a final chapter devoted to Instructional Planning Using the Nine Categories.  Each chapter provides descriptions, examples, and strategies to help teachers use these practices in their own classrooms.
            In the chapter devoted to setting objectives and providing feedback it explains that the two concepts work hand in hand.  “Teachers need to identify success criteria for learning objectives so students know when they have achieved those objectives.  Similarly, feedback should be provided for tasks that are related to the learning objectives; this way students understand the purpose of the work they are asked to do, build a coherent understanding of a content domain, and develop high levels of skill in a specific domain (p. 3).”  The four recommendations given for setting objectives in the classroom are: 1.) Set learning objectives that are specific but not restrictive, 2.)  Communicate the learning objectives to students and parents, 3.)  Connect the learning objectives to previous and future learning 4.) Engage students in personal learning objectives. They also have four recommendations regarding feedback.  They are:  1.)  Provide feedback that addresses what is correct and elaborates on what students need to do next, 2.) Provide feedback appropriately in time to meet the students’ needs 3.) Provide feedback that is criterion referenced 4.) Engage students in the feedback process.   Throughout the chapter they give sample situations in which these processes are used and also examples of appropriate learning objectives and feedback. 
            Reinforcing Effort and Providing Recognition explains the importance of giving students recognition for their accomplishments and showing them the relationship between effort and achievement.  The three recommendations made for reinforcing effort are: 1.)  Teach students about the relationship between effort and achievement.  2.) Provide students with explicit guidance about exactly what it means to expend effort.  3.) Ask students to keep track of their effort and achievement.  With regards to the third recommendation, a sample of an effort rubric for test preparation is provided to show students the correlation between their effort and performance on tests.  There are also three recommendations that are made for providing recognition.  They are:  1) Promote a mastery-goal orientation.  2.) Provide praise that is specific and aligned with expected performance and behaviors.  3.) Use concrete symbols of recognition.  It also goes on to explain that too much praise could be negative, so it should be used intentionally, yet sparingly. 
            Cooperative Learning is another area of focus in the book.  According to Drs. David Johnson and Roger Johnson (1999) there are five elements to define cooperative learning:  positive interdependence, face-to-face promotive interaction, individual and group accountability, interpersonal and small-group skills and group processing (p.35-36).  They believe that the most essential are positive interdependence and individual accountability.  The three recommendations for using cooperative learning include:  1.) Include elements of both positive interdependence and individual accountability.  2.) Keep group sizes small.  3.) Use cooperative learning consistently and systematically.  They believe that to be effective cooperative learning should be used once a week and they caution not to over use it. 
            Cues, Questions, and Advanced Organizers is an important section in the fact that it shows teachers the specific ways to ask questions to ensure student learning.   Research has shown that 80 percent of teacher interactions with students involve cueing and questioning (p.50).  This section offers suggestions of some specific practices to make the most effective use of cues, questions, and advance organizers.  The suggestions include 1.) Focus on what is important, 2.) Use explicit clues, 3.) Ask inferential questions, 4.) Ask analytic questions.  With regards to advanced organizers, they suggest: 1.) Use expository advance organizers, 2.) Use narrative advanced organizers, 3.) Use skimming as an advance organizer, 4.) Use graphic advance organizers.  Some examples of the advance organizers are demonstrations, video clips, drawings, graphics, and skimming.  
            Nonlinguistic representations try to encourage students to create, store, and manipulate information either mentally of with concrete tools or displays (p. 64). Examples include:  creating graphic organizers, making physical models/manipulatives, generating mental pictures, creating pictures, illusions, or pictographs, and engaging in kinesthetic activity.  It is explained that the elaboration of knowledge gained by using nonlinguistic representations help students understand knowledge at a deeper level.
            The strategies of summarizing and note taking facilitate learning by providing opportunities for students to capture, organize, and reflect on important facts, concepts, ideas, and processes (p. 78).   Students’ comprehension can be increased through summarizing because they need to sort, select, and combine information.  Similarly, when note taking students must identify important information.  Some suggestions for summarizing include: 1.)  Teach students the rule-based summarizing strategy, 2.) Use summary frames, 3.) Engage students in reciprocal teaching.  The suggestions given for note taking are: 1.) Give students teacher-prepared notes, 2.)   Teach students a variety of note-taking formats, and 3.) Provide opportunities for students to revise their notes and use them for review. 
            Assigning homework and providing practice is an important category because assigning homework and proving practice allows students to learn or review content and skills on their own.  There are mixed results on the research in how effective homework is.  As a result, teachers should carefully design the assignments with the following things in mind 1.) Develop and communicate a district or school homework policy, 2.)  Design homework assignments that support academic learning and communicate their purpose, 3.) Provide feedback on assigned homework.  When providing practice, teachers should: 1.)  Clearly identify and communicate the purpose of practice activities, 2.)  Design practice sessions that are short, focused and distributed over time, 3.) Provide feedback on practice sessions. 
            Another area of focus is identifying similarities and differences, which is important because it helps us make senses of the world.  Identifying similarities and differences is the process of comparing information, sorting concepts into categories, and making connections to existing knowledge.  The recommendations made for helping students to identify similarities and differences are to: 1.) Teach students a variety of ways to identify similarities and differences 2.)  Guide students as they engage in the process of identifying similarities and differences, 3.)  Provide supporting cues to help students identify similarities and differences.  Examples include Venn diagrams, comparison matrixes, and creating metaphors. 
            The final area covered in the book is generating and testing hypotheses.  This includes the mental processes involved in asking questions and seeking answers.  It does not only take place in a science classroom.  It is a part of other content areas, however it may be referred to as other names such as predicting, inferring, deducing, or theorizing (p. 135).  In order to engage students in this process in all content areas the following recommendations are made: 1.) Engage students in a variety of structured tasks for generating and testing hypotheses, 2.) Ask students to explain their hypothesis and their conclusions.  These are important so that students can apply the information that they learn, not just recall facts. 
            Overall, “Classroom Instruction that Works” provides great tips and ideas for teachers to implement their research based strategies.  Each topic is broken down into its own chapter and provides not only tips and examples, but also explains why these are “best practices” according to the research.  My school has implemented the McRel Powerwalk through and has purchased copies of this book for all teachers and they are proving PLC’s in order to help teachers implement these strategies.

           

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