Looking at Student Work / Crafting Questions with Multiple Entry Points

Looking at Student Work / Crafting Questions with Multiple Entry Points CFN 204 Meeting February 1, 2014 Presenter: Nate Dechongkit

Agenda • Collaborative Annotations • Looking at Student Work • Crafting Questions with Multiple Entry Points • Looking at Student Work (revisited) • Application to Classroom Practice

Setting the Context - Middle • Read “Earth Water and Sky” • Quickly complete the following graphic organizer with details to show the meteor was powerful:

Setting the Context - Elementary • Read “Greeting the Sun, A Maushop Story” • Quickly complete the following graphic organizer with details to show that Maushop is caring:

Separating the Best from the Rest From the 7th Grade 2013 ELA NYS test: • Which sentence…best shows how powerful the meteorite was? • Suddenly, he heard a sharp, whining sound like the engine of a high-flying jet airplane • Then a ball of fire roared overhead, followed by a searing gust of wind • The shock wave knocked David to the ground, his ears ringing • A second later, he heard an explosive, hissing crash up ahead

Separating the Best from the Rest • From the 4th Grade Released Questions: • Which detail best supports the idea that Maushop cared for the Wampanoag? • “Maushop, the giant, had been sleeping, but the sound of many frightened voices woke him.” • “Maushop stood up from the place where had had been sleeping on the beach, just below the great cliffs at Gay Head” • “Walking very carefully, so that he would not step on anyone in the darkness, Maushop went into the village.” • “’Maushop,’ the people cried. ‘You must help us.’”

Essential and Guiding Questions • How can we help students distinguish high-quality thinking and responses from lower-quality thinking and responses? • What should teachers look for as insight into student thinking? • How can teachers craft questions and activities that will provide insight?

Another Approach • Our goals for students should not simply be distinguishing correct responses from incorrect ones. We should be supporting their ability to distinguish high-quality correct responses from low-quality correct ones.

Annotation Strategies

Collaborative Annotation Protocol • Independent work: Read and annotate • Group Set-up: Each student receives a different colored marker • Round 1: Initial annotation to group text • Round 2: Comments / questions to other group members • Round 3 (and beyond): extended conversation and introduction of new ideas

Shared/Group Annotations Practice • Read the excerpt from “A Long Walk to Water” • Make your thinking visible on a shared copy of the excerpt • Read and respond to others’ annotations

Expanding Student Thinking • Completing the activity does not guarantee improved outcomes • The thinking made visible allows a teacher to assess: • What students understand • What misconceptions exist • What types of thinking students are not engaging in

Types of Annotations/Type of Thinking • Understandings of the author’s ideas and intentions • Main ideas of paragraphs/sections • Summaries/explanations • Arrows that connect related ideas • Reader thoughts, connections, ideas • Connections / Real-world examples • Reader perspectives – agreement, disagreement • Inferences • Questions that indicate confusion • Questions that challenge the author • Evaluations of writing

Turn and Talk • Are students more likely to write one type of annotation? If so, which one? • Understandings of the author’s ideas and intentions • Reader thoughts, connections, ideas • If you chose one or the other, how can we help students balance the types of annotations they create?

Interactive Annotations • Annotate the left and right of a text • Left: What does the text say? • Summaries, explanations • Right: What was I thinking as I read? • Connections • Agreement/disagreement (especially for opinion pieces) • Inferences • Questions • Evaluative statements

Teacher Model • From Pearson Grade 3, Unit 4, Module B, Lesson 3: • Savings accounts are used for setting money aside for later use. Checking accounts, however, are used for spending. They provide an easy way to pay for things without using cash. You cannot get a checking account until you are older, but you should know how they work. I put money into savings accounts I take money out of checking accounts Savings accounts start at zero. Checking accounts should have money. How do you get money into a checking account?

Examining Student Work

Annotation Activity • “A child is born with the potential ability to learn Chinese or Swahili, play a kazoo, climb a tree, make a strudel or a birdhouse, take pleasure in finding the coordinates of a star. Genetic inheritance determines a child’s abilities and weaknesses. But those who raise a child call forth from that matrix the traits and talents they consider important.” - Robert H. Wozniak

Turn and Talk • What is the gist of this statement? • Which sentence(s) is/are central to the gist? Why?

Sample Student Responses What do you notice regarding: The amount of annotation? What students are responding to?

Distinguishing High-Quality from Low-Quality Responses • When looking at student annotations (in which most responses are “correct”), examine not just what they write, but what text they are responding to • Are students responding to critical sections of text?

Crafting Questions with Multiple Entry Points

Sample Task • One of the main characters in the novel is Salva who is a “lost boy.” This is a reference to “Peter Pan,” a story in which boys fell out of their prams when the nurse was not looking and were lost by their nannies in places such as Kensington Gardens. Having gone unclaimed for seven days, they were whisked off to Never Never Land and lived with Peter Pan and never grew up. There are no “lost girls” because as Peter explains, girls are much too clever to fall out of their prams and be lost in this manner. • In light of the explanation above, how appropriate is the label “lost boys” as a way of identifying the boys who suffered in the Sudanese civil war? Write a response to this question in your notebooks and be sure to cite evidence from prior readings about the Sudanese.

Multiple Entry Points • A student could focus on whether the Sudanese children experienced one or more of the following: • Falling out of prams • Being lost/unclaimed • Going to Never Never Land (or another place) • Never growing up – literally and/or figuratively • * Being only male • Which of the above represent a deeper understanding of the text?

Distinguishing High-Quality from Low-Quality Responses • When looking at student annotations (where most responses are “correct”), examine not just what they write, but what text they are responding to • Are students responding to critical sections of text? • Craft questions with a variety of viable answers • Can you (the teacher) identify multiple possible answers? Are some better than others?

Sample Student Work • Examine the three pieces of student work • Based on our conversations, which ones convey a deeper understanding of the text?

Distinguishing High-Quality from Low-Quality Responses • When looking at student annotations (where most responses are “correct”), examine not just what they write, but what text they are responding to • Are students responding to critical sections of text? • Craft questions with a variety of viable answers • Can you (the teacher) identify multiple possible answers? Are some better than others? • Examine student work not from a right/wrong standpoint, but from a deeper understanding/shallow understanding standpoint • Are you following up with students?

Application to Classroom Practice

Prompt Thinking about Quality • Ask students to rank items, then justify: • Which detail best shows that Maushop is caring? Why is that detail stronger than the others? • Which detail best supports the main idea?

Prompt Thinking About Quality • Ask students to rank items, then justify:Which step is the most pivotal? The least?

Ways of Ranking • Least/most, best/worst • On a scale of 1-10 • Assigning values: • 5-cent detail, dollar-detail • Thermometer degrees

Craft Questions with Multiple Viable Answers • Instead of asking students to provide support for a statement or idea, give students a line of text and ask for the statement or idea it supports: • Ex. from “A Man of Persistence” (ReadyGen Sleuth Unit 4): • Analyze this text: “…the ship was securely stuck in the ice and would remain stuck through many long winter months. …Shackleton had his crew stick to their routines and exercise the sled dogs they had brought with them.” What does this text reveal about Shackleton?

Provide Systems for Evaluating Quality • Students can provide abstract characteristics • Science Example: characteristics of a good results section of lab report (graphs, tables, diagrams, quantitative and qualitative) • Example: characteristics of a good summary • Students can read and comprehend summaries • Students need to be able to: • Match characteristics of summaries to a given summary • Recognize when a summary does or does not exhibit a targeted characteristic

Characteristics of Good Summaries of Literature • Good Summaries Should / Should Include: • Good Summaries Should Not / Should Not Include:

Matching Criteria to Text Evidence Criteria for Good Summary Sample Summary Maushop lives near the Wampanoag people. He goes to talk to the Sun on the other side of the world. The Sun calls Maushop his younger brother. Maushop is also friends with the spiders. The spiders weave a net for Maushop to use.

Prompt Thinking about Quality • Instead of asking students to summarize, provide multiple similar summaries and ask students to discuss what makes one a better summary than the other. • Who does the summary focus on? • What details are unnecessary? • What missing details should be included?

Prompt Thinking About Quality • Instead of simply creating a Venn diagram, (where appropriate) ask students to discuss where authors/ideas/items are the most similar and the furthest apart

Practice • Read Botstein’s “Start it Earlier, End it Earlier” and Ripley’s “Real-World Skills in the Classroom” • Complete the attached Venn Diagram (how are they similar and different) • Scaffolds available! • As a group, we will transfer the information to a continuum, distinguishing where they slightly differ from where they greatly differ

Closing • Timecards/timesheets • Feedback/Evaluation Forms • Future Meetings: • Scaffolding (elementary): February 8 • Scaffolding (middle): March 1 • Questions? Comments? Concerns?ndechon@schools.nyc.gov

Looking at Student Work / Crafting Questions with Multiple Entry Points