picture of hand taking notes on a piece of paper
Critical Thinking, Depth and Complexity, K-12

+1 Routine for Retrieval Practice

Are you ready to try something that requires ZERO preparation in your classroom, something that scientific studies have shown will help your students to retain information? It’s called, “Retrieval Practice,” and you can read a fascinating article about it on Cult of Pedagogy, or listen to the podcast also linked on that page. Dr. Pooja Agarwal explains how retrieval practice works and its benefits. You can also go to Dr. Agarwal’s website for more resources here.

Here’s the thing: you’re probably already doing retrieval practice in your classroom. Quizzes, flashcards, study guides, etc… are all ways we ask students to remember something they learned. One problem is that we are usually using these as assessments (retrieval practice should never be graded, but feedback is good) instead of learning strategies. Another issue is that we are often “feeding” students the information instead of asking them to produce it. Also, we don’t do enough of it in spaced out intervals to help solidify the learning.

Here is the key reason effective retrieval practice works, according to the Retrieval Practice Guide which you can download from Dr. Agarwal’s site: “Struggling to learn – through the act of ‘practicing’ what you know and recalling information – is much more effective than re-reading, taking notes, or listening to lectures. Slower, effortful retrieval leads to long-term learning. In contrast, fast, easy strategies only lead to short-term learning.”

So, today I wanted to share one Visible Thinking Routine that will help you to do retrieval practice. It’s called the +1 Routine, and appears in The Power of Making Thinking Visible, by Ron Ritchhart and Mark Church.

Next time you are showing a video, giving a presentation, or just delivering a lesson, refrain from asking the students to take notes during that time. Instead, ask your students to do the following steps afterward. All they need is a blank piece of paper (or notebook page) and a writing utensil. Have them write their name at the top.

This routine has several benefits. First, students are encouraged to be present during the video, lesson, etc… instead of trying to multi-task by listening and writing at the same time. Second, this is a “slower” and “more effortful” way to recall information, so it has a better chance of ending up in their long-term memory. Third, they are collaborating, so they can take advantage of the “hive mind.” And finally, this is an opportunity to clear up misconceptions.

You can use this as an exit ticket (no grade, though) after the lesson, but it’s also important to space it out, repeating the exercise a few times over the next month or so leading to a summative assessment.

I recently tried this routine at a teacher workshop, and several teachers said they plan to use it with their own students. (By the way, sketch notes are encouraged, which really appeals to some of the creative students.) We giggled (in a nice, supportive way — let’s just say that I introduced the SDG’s, not STD’s) at some of the misconceptions, and it was such a great way, that took 15 minutes max, to close out the session.

For more on Visible Thinking Routines, I highly encourage you to purchase The Power of Making Thinking Visible, visit the Toolbox from Harvard’s Project Zero, and/or visit my Wakelet Collection of other blog posts and free templates.

Critical Thinking, Depth and Complexity, K-12, Student Products

Hexagonal Reflection

This week, I am revisiting some of my tried and true favorite end-of-the-school-year activities. For today, I want to refer you to my post on hexagonal reflection. This was one of those ideas that could have completely flopped, but was way more successful than I anticipated. The students (2nd graders!) were so incredibly thoughtful in their responses that I regretted not having done this with every class since the beginning of my career. For one of my more recent posts about hexagonal thinking, which may be helpful if you are still doing online teaching, check out, “Using Hexagonal Thinking Virtually.” I know this is deep, and the end of the year is generally fun and games, but if you want to help your students connect the dots of everything they have learned this past year and really seal in new knowledge and insights, please give this a try!

2nd grade student writing to explain hexagonal connections

Critical Thinking, Depth and Complexity, K-12, Philosophy

Ethics in Bricks

So my daughter taught me that I was behind the times in using the 😂 whenever I found something hilarious. She probably will wish she did not inform me of this because I now want to use her suggested replacement on a regular basis. As someone who suffers from depression I am constantly seeking out things that will make me laugh. My latest obsession is the Ethics in Bricks Twitter feed (@EthicsInBricks, also on Instagram), and its pinned thread, #ArtInBricks has me 💀 (I probably didn’t use that right, but it doesn’t matter because my daughter doesn’t read this blog anyway.)

I love when creative people represent famous art works with different materials (remember this post?) so the #ArtinBricks photos make me smile – especially The Scream, which will always have a special place in my heart.

Don’t stop with that thread, though. Ethics in Bricks produces amazing content about philosophers using Lego Bricks, which is perfect for the GT classroom. Take a look at their most recent thread to celebrate Kant’s birthday:

I have yet to meet a student who doesn’t like building with Legos, and this is an excellent way to integrate some deep philosophical discussion with making while also dealing with constraints. If I was back in the classroom right now, I think I would use a quote and picture from this account every day to start my class.

My students really enjoyed Socratic Dialogues and having deep discussions about philosophical ideas. For some other doors into philosophy for students, you can also try 8-Bit Philosophy (screen videos first for appropriateness), Philosophy for Children, and this list of articles on Ethics lessons Joelle Trayers does with younger students in her classroom. Donna Lasher also has exceptional suggestions for using philosophy in lessons. You can find a few of my favorite past activities linked in this post I wrote. In addition, we used this book when I was in the K-5 GT classroom that is a wonderful resource.

Image from @EthicsInBricks on Twitter

Depth and Complexity, K-5, Teaching Tools

Step Inside with Monster Box

UPDATE 10/13/2021: You can now see an updated list of all of the Halloween/October resources I’ve collected by visiting this Wakelet!

As I’ve been going through some of my “Halloween-ish” posts from previous years, I’ve recognized some updating that needs to be done. (Hard to believe I’ve been doing this for nine years now, and wow, have things changed!) For example, I used to do “Misunderstood Monsters” with my younger students, and many of the resources I mentioned in that post from 2012 are no longer available. Fortunately, the adorable short video, Monster Box, (also on YouTube) is still free and easy to access. When I pondered the changes I might make in a current lesson using this, my mind immediately went to the Visible Thinking Routines from Project Zero. One routine that I think would be powerful to use with Monster Box would be the “Step Inside” routine. There are three questions students can consider from the perspective of different characters in the video:

What can the person or thing perceive?

What might the person or thing know about or believe?

What might the person or thing care about?

I would have each student choose a character from the video (shopkeeper, young girl, one of the monsters…), and answer those questions with evidence from the story. Another facet that could deepen the discussion would be if the answers to these questions change throughout the story.

You can see some examples of how to use “Step Inside”, and access some templates, from Alice Vigors here.

My previous post included some templates to use if you were discussing Ethics (from Kaplan’s Depth and Complexity), and those are still available. I also went ahead and made this new Google Slides activity for the “Step Inside” Thinking Routine with a template from Slides Carnival that is free to copy and use. There’s even a slide with monster parts, so students can build their own monster!

Of course, you can extend this activity by creating your own monster paper circuits.

For other posts on Visible Thinking Routines, with links to more templates, check out this Peel the Fruit activity for Google Slides.

3-12, Books, Creative Thinking, Critical Thinking, Depth and Complexity, Math

Dear Data

This is another example of one of the great internet wormholes that I fall into when I read Twitter.  I was fascinated by a Tweet from Nick Sousanis (@nsousanis), which led me to an amazing book so I could interpret his Tweet, which led me back to the work of his students and a bazillion ways remote learners around the world could have fun with his assignment or other permutations of it.

Let’s start with the book.  Dear Data began as a pen pal project between two information designers on different continents.  As they explain on their website, “Each week, and for a year, we collected and measured a particular type of data about our lives, used this data to make a drawing on a postcard-sized sheet of paper, and then dropped the postcard in an English ‘postbox’ (Stefanie) or an American ‘mailbox’ (Giorgia)!”

Each postcard consists of their data and the explanation of its depiction.  The women chose all sorts of topics to record, such as a week of laughter or a week of complaints.  Though they would be collecting data for the same topic during that particular week, their pictograms would be dramatically different.

They learned a lot from this year-long project, which resulted in a book, a postcard kit, and a journal.  As Giorgia and Stefanie explain in this video, “We learned to pay attention, to live in the present much more, to be more aware of our surroundings, and empower behaviors with new lenses.

So, back to Nick Sousanis, who Tweeted that his visual communications students had come up with their own “Dear Data” projects, and gave examples of some of the results in his Tweet.  I asked Nick if I could share these on this blog and he graciously agreed. (You can click on each picture to enlarge.)

I see all kinds of potential for this with students.  For example, one of the Depth and Complexity icons is “Trends,” and it would be interesting to ask students to analyze one of these postcards, and determine what trends they see.  Using, “See, Think, Wonder” would be a great start. In addition, as Nick found with his class, assigning students to develop their own data sets can invite self-reflection and creativity.

During these unique times, when data has become a fixation for much of the world, students can also examine its importance and reliability.  As the women who completed this ambitious project say in their video, “Finally we both realize that data is the beginning of the story, not the end, and should be seen as a starting point for questioning and understanding the world around us instead of seeing it as the definitive answer to all of our questions.”

(For some other fun ideas for looking at data, check out my posts on Slow Reveal Graphs and What’s Going On in This Graph?)

Critical Thinking, Depth and Complexity, Education, K-12, Student Products, Vocabulary

Reflecting with Hexagons

I think that the deepest discussions I ever hear in my classroom happen when we do Hexagonal Thinking.  If you haven’t heard of this strategy, I explain how I use it with my 4th graders in this blog post.  Last year, I did a post on using Hexagonal Thinking to reflect on the school year.  In the past, my 3rd-5th graders have used Hexagonal Thinking.  This year, on a whim, I decided to try it with my 2nd graders.

My 2nd graders have never done an activity like this before.  It was our last day of class together, and I wanted to help them sum up the things they have learned in our Gifted and Talented class this year.  Because they were new to Hexagonal Thinking, I conducted the activity in a slightly different way.

First, I went to this awesome Hexagon Generator, and asked the class to help me brainstorm words that represented things they have learned in GT.  Here is what they came up with:

Photo May 30, 1 35 37 PM

I did this right before their recess time, so I could make some quick copies for everyone while they played.

When we got back to the classroom, I paired up the students and gave them the paper.  Now this is where I really departed from my traditional lesson.  Instead of asking them to cut up the hexagons and place them where they wanted on a new sheet of paper, I asked them to make connections between words that were already sharing sides.  We went over a couple of examples so they could understand that I didn’t want them to say things that used the words in the explanation, (such as creativity goes with problem solving because you need to be creative to problem solve) but to think about the qualities that each word shared.

You know how you sometimes come up with an idea right before class and you start executing the idea and realize about 3/4 of the way through explaining it that it was the dumbest idea ever and now you need to figure out how to get through the next 45-minutes without anyone crying – including you?

That’s how I felt as I started monitoring the partner discussions.  Expecting 2nd graders to “go deep” on the last day of class was not a brilliant decision on my part.  There were comments like, “Well, bridges goes with stability because they need to stay up or they will fall down.”  True, but not what I was going for.

And then something kind of magical happened.  I heard partners saying, “No, no, that’s not what she wants.”  And I started reading some of their notes.  And I realized that these kids can think deeper than I can when given the opportunity.

A few of their comments:

  • Stability and Support – “You have to be strong and stand up for your friends.”
  • Creativity and Perspective – “You have to think the way others think to make them happy.”
  • Perseverance and Adaptations – “They both don’t give up trying to survive.”
  • Perseverance and Adaptations – “Sometimes you need to change to work together.”
  • Ethics and Perspectives – “When you don’t look at different points of view, sometimes you get in a fight.”

You can see the working drafts one pair used below.

The great thing about this activity was hearing the students use the vocabulary, like “ethics” and “perspectives” correctly, and being able to tell from their comments if they really understood these topics.

If you still have some time with your students before closing out the year, I definitely recommend this activity!

Photo May 30, 1 36 41 PM

Photo May 30, 1 36 51 PM