From+the+Ground+Up



From the Ground Up: Building Investment in Every Lesson Name: Date:

__Goals__ 1 .Identify the overall change you’d like to see in your students’ actions as it relates to their daily effort and investment in working towards the big goal. __ 2.Choose at least one investment strategy category and one lesson component-specific strategy you use in your classroom and describe your strategy. __ __ 3.For an upcoming lesson, plan exactly how and when you will introduce and use that strategy in the lesson. List the response that you expect to see from your students. __

__ Agenda: __ __ 1. Examine strategies for increasing engagement and building investment in every lesson __ __ 2. Collaborate on best practices __ __ 3. Integrate effective components into future lessons. __


 * Strategies for Reinforcing Effort in Every Lesson __**

Example: “Yesterday we successfully mastered comparing two fractions. Because you guys have mastered this skill, you are sure to master our objective of ordering three or more fractions today. This is very exciting and leads me to believe that if we work just as hard today as we have been working, we will destroy our fraction unit assessment which will bring us very close to meeting our Big Goal!” Example: If the objective is relating to area, you might have your real life application be determining how big of a carpet you need to buy for your college dorm room. || Example: you might say “I can tell this person put a lot of careful effort into this exit slip because she showed all of her work.” || Example: Students rate themselves using a rubric with a 5-point scale. Each lesson the teacher records the number of points by filling in a thermometer. Students work toward earning enough points to fill the thermometer to a designated point. Example: Consider using special “shout out” or “hot tamale” cards. **What did you learn?** As students exit the classroom, stand by the door and have each student tell you what they learned that day. For more teenagers when parents ask "what did you learn in school today?" they reply "nothing." This activity forces students to tell you what they learned that day and later if their parents ask, they can regurgitate what they already told you.
 * ** General Strategies – Appropriate Throughout a Lesson ** || ** Code Word: ** Use a given word of the day which signals a student to remind the class of the standard that the objective is leading to.
 * Teacher Praise ** : Just as you would provide positive reinforcement for following directions or demonstrating excellent behavior, positively reinforce student efforts in working hard toward the daily/weekly/ big goal.
 * Peer Praise: ** Explicitly instruct students over how to recognize the efforts of one another. Provide a structured time within the lesson, or in between lessons where students can “shout out” their classmates for the effort they’ve exerted.
 * Class Mantra: ** Develop an inspirational message to serve as an ongoing motivator for your class. Use this not only to refocus students in working hard toward the goal, but also as a celebration of students’ efforts.
 * Link Extrinsic Motivators with Intrinsic Motivators: ** If you use points, raffle tickets, or other rewards, make sure to verbally state the connection between the physical reward and the reward of learning itself.
 * Awards:** Periodically print and present certificates/awards for character traits valued in the classroom, from "Academic Achievement" to "Joy in Learning." The more pomp and circumstance, the better. Simple to implement, and the physical artifact is helpful. ||
 * ** Anticipatory Set (Opening) ** || ** Use Feedback from Previous Lesson to Open New Lesson: ** If you have given your students an assessment at the end of the lesson, use their results as a starting point for the next lesson.
 * Celebrate what Students Already Know: ** When introducing a new skill,provide students with an opening problem that relates to the learning objective, but that they are likely to get right based on prior knowledge. Build students’ confidence that they are already on the right track to master new learning and with hard work they will surely master the new skill. ||
 * ** Into to New Material ** || ** Explicitly Connect Skill to Big Goal in Key Points: ** In addition to making sure your INM includes explanation and demonstration of new learning, include a key point which explicitly links the daily objective to the big goal.
 * Real Life Application: ** In addition to posting the objective, teachers can post a specific situation in which the skill can be applied. As kids get more comfortable with this, they can start to add real life applications too.
 * ** Guided Practice ** || ** Model what Exemplary Student Effort Looks Like: ** After you give students an explanation of the guided practice portion of the lesson, ask student volunteers to model what strong performance would look like. Once students have completed the demonstration solicit student feedback on the quality of the demonstration. Provide your own feedback if necessary.
 * Competition: ** If your guided practice includes a collaborative component, tell students you will be looking for the pair/group that is exhibiting the strongest effort. When you announce the winners, make sure to state how much their effort contributes to their ability to reach the goal.
 * Academic Feedback: ** When giving students academic feedback over their performance, include not only feedback that further explains the skill or misunderstandings. Also be sure to include feedback over how the work was approached.
 * Group Reflection: ** Teach students to evaluate their own effort. At the conclusion of the guided practice, quickly solicit student feedback over the performance of the class. Consider attaching an incentive system to this such as a class point system. ||
 * ** Independent Practice ** || ** Prizes or Celebrations: ** As youare circulating tocheck student work, celebrate or reward students that seem to be working especially hard. You could write a message of praise on a sticky note, add to a point system, or distribute raffle tickets. Remind your students that these rewards are for those that are working hard, checking their work, and not giving up when they run into minor frustrations.
 * Model Excellent Student Work: ** If possible, show students a model of what excellent student work on the independent practice portion of the lesson would look like.
 * ** Closing ** || ** Student Testimonials: ** Close the lesson with testimonials about how the day’s lesson leads to success for students in the future or how they are going to use the information in the future. Alternatively, for teachers who don’t feel like their students can come up with something on the spot, ask certain students to write a quick testimonial for homework and then share it as an opener.
 * Summarize Learning: ** Teach students not only to summarize the critical attributes of the skill they are learning, but also how success in this skill will lead to success in future learning or in life.
 * Evaluate Effort as a Class: ** Use a rubric to teach your students to evaluate the performance of the class. After a lesson, facilitate a quick evaluation. Consider attaching the ongoing evaluation to an incentive system.
 * Teacher or Peer Recognition: ** Provide a structure to recognize student performance at the close of the lesson. Teach students to highlight one another for their hard work by pulling out specific examples and connecting student work to what they will be able to accomplish in the future.


 * Stoplight Reflection**: Have students respond to one of 3 sentence starts on a post-it. Green: "Today, I learned..." "Yellow: "Today, I considered (a new idea, a fresh perspective, a novel question)..." Red: "Today, my learning stopped because..." When exiting, students place on the appropriate colored stoplight near the door. More flexible than an exit ticket, it allows students to reflect on their learning, ask questions -- and bring up legitimate concerns. Plus, post-its = instant investment. ||


 * __ REFLECTION TOOL __**

// (How did you want students to respond to the strategy?) // || Student Notes // (What did students actually do when you implemented the strategy?) // || Reflections // (How can you improve the strategy next time?) // ||
 * Strategy || Intended Student Response