November 2-6, 2015---Checking for Understanding

Welcome November!  It's a new month, let's add some fresh vision for where we see Bolton going this quarter.  Let's DREAM even BIGGER this 9 weeks! 

Classified Employee of the Year nominations are open from November 2- December 4, 2015.  This information was e-mailed to add WSFCS employees earlier this week. We will post the flyer in the main office and in the workroom.  Any WSFCS employee may nominate a classified employee for Classified Employee of the Year.  Please consider taking the time to nominate someone you feel would be a great candidate.

2nd quarter is here! As we progress over these 9 weeks our instructional goals need to be intentional and they need to be purposeful.  This week's blog focuses on what it means to Check for Understanding.  The following Learning Showcase is very explicit in what it means and how we can do it with maximum efficiency.  You will also receive the sheet 53 Ways to Check for Understanding.  All 53 will not work for every grade level but stretch yourself and try something new. You will receive the 53 Ways to Check for Understanding handout with this week's lesson plan feedback. 

This Week's Learning Showcase: Checking for Understanding from

http://dataworks-ed.com/the-importance-of-checking-for-understanding/

• Posted on July 14, 2014 
• by Patricia Bogdanovich
• in Research Review

What is Checking for Understanding?

Checking for Understanding (CFU) is the backbone of effective instruction. Checking for Understanding is the teacher continually verifying that students are learning what is being taught while it is being taught. CFU provides the teacher the opportunity to improve learning based on student responses throughout the teaching and learning process. Using CFU in “real-time” allows teachers to make crucial instructional decisions as necessary (like re-teaching) during lesson delivery.

Research behind Checking for Understanding

According to the article Principles of Instruction: Research-Based Strategies that All Teachers Should Know by emeritus professor of education Barak Rosenshine (American Educator, Spring 2012, effective instruction asks questions and checks responses of all students in order to help students practice new information and connect new material to their prior knowledge.

The article suggests that to practice new information, teachers must ask students questions while they are teaching. In a classroom-based experiment, a group of teachers was asked to increase the number of factual questions and process questions during guided practice. The results of this experiment showed that students who had these teachers achieved higher scores than students whose teachers did not ask multiple questions. Also, teachers who asked a large number of questions had higher student participation. Furthermore, teachers were able to assess if the students understood the content, which allowed the teachers to make modifications of the lesson or reteach when necessary.

Rosenshine observed that successful teachers found ways to involve all students in answering questions. Examples include having all students:

• Tell the answer to a neighbor
• Summarize the main idea in one or two sentences, writing the summary on a piece of paper and sharing this with a neighbor
• Writing an answer on a card and then holding it up
• Raising their hands if they agree with the answer that someone else has given

The National Research Council recommends implementing formative (on-going) assessments such as checking for understanding in order to improve instruction.  The National Research Council frames such assessment as the process of teaching scientifically:

Teachers collect information about students’ understanding almost continuously, and make adjustments to their teaching on the basis of their interpretation of that information. They observe critical incidents in the classroom, formulate hypotheses about the causes of those incidents, question students to test their hypotheses, interpret students’ responses, and adjust their teaching plans.

Why is Checking for Understanding so beneficial?

Using research-based strategies, the DataWORKS Explicit Direct Instruction model incorporates Checking for Understanding during a lesson because:

• It allows the teacher to make instructional decisions during the lesson. It informs the teacher when to speed up, slow down, or re-teach. CFU helps pace the lesson.
• When teachers look at independent work, homework, quizzes, or state test results to see if students learned…it’s too late to modify instruction.
• CFU is the back bone of effective instruction and Explicit Direct Instruction… because you measure and monitor student learning in real time.
• CFU guarantees high student success (80-100%)… because you revise teaching in direct response to student learning.
• CFU ensures that your students will not be practicing and reinforcing their mistakes.  Practice makes permanent, not perfect!

Some ways to check for understanding......

November 2nd--Haiku Training #1/ Please bring your laptop, District Teacher of the Year Celebration---Congratulations Mr. Monroe 

November 3rd--5th grade Field Trip to Walkertown High School Production

November 4th- November Staff Meeting @ 7:30 am

November 4th and 5th---3rd grade to Reynolda Gardens for Field Trip/ 2 classes on 11/4 and 2 classes on 11/5

November 6th--Bear Pride Celebration for October at 2:30 PM

November 16-20, 2015---ITBS (only a small group of students -2nd and 5th-will be testing, more details to come when we know who will be testing--this information comes from Central Office)

November 16-20--Book Fair Week

November 17th-Science Night and Book Fair Night

November 23rd--Haiku Training #2