Students Write Higher Level Thinking Questions

I was in a Modern Literature classroom with juniors.  They were organized into heterogeneous groups, and they were holding a discussion on the novel, On the Beach.  The students had submitted questions for the discussion; the teacher listed the questions on a hand out.  After each question was the name of the student who wrote the question.  The student questions went far beyond remembering and understanding.  Students asked their peers to analyze and evaluate.  Some examples:

"The first mention of a dead body comes pretty far into the book.  Why didn’t the author mention dead bodies sooner?" (Nick)

"What is the significance of the garden?" (Sam)

"Discuss Moria’s relationship with Dwight.  Is it based on genuine affection, or is the relationship building just because death is near?" (Sean, Valerie)

I reached several conclusions.  Because the students had written the questions and their names was connected to the question, they took great pride in the process.  Students were totally engaged as they thought their way through the list and often commented to one another that the question was a good one.  Second, higher level questions produce better discussions.  Third, because higher level thinking question are modeled so effectively by our teachers, those same higher level questions are being regularly asked by our students.  It is as if, the level of thinking has been raised school wide.

Celebrating Success

I keep a copy of the first semester D and F chart on the table in my office.  I like to look at it.  In January 2005, 1037 F grades were earned; in January 2010, we are at 663.  In January 2005, 1655 D grades were earned; in January 2010, 1157 Ds were earned.  This improvement in grades is validated by improved performance on state tests, AP exams, and SAT tests.  It is never quite clear just what it is that made the difference.  Was it focusing on higher level thinking skills, or formatively assessing and re-teaching, or making more parent contacts, or helping students to better choose classes, or a change in culture, or heterogeneous grouping or a more rigorous curriculum for all students?  But it is clear who made the difference:  the teachers who somehow find a way to bring more students to mastery of standards and the counselors who support that effort.  There are our students who reaching higher academically, and the parents who support the students and the teachers.   The team is rounded out by the clerical staff, the custodians, and the administration.  This continued improvement is not accidental.  Take a moment and celebrate what our team has achieved: we have supported students to higher levels of achievement.

• Students are spending more time in small groups practicing new skills. Students are supporting each other in learning.
• Teachers are formatively assessing student learning and re-teaching. Teachers have always done this, but in the past two years, I have noted that teachers are doing this more intentionally, and that students are more aware that teachers are checking in with them to determine what they do and do not understand. It seems that in the classes I visit, students are articulating for the teacher what they do not understand far more clearly than in the past. I sense a deeper learning partnership.
• I also note that teachers are asking higher level thinking process earlier in the learning continuum. In most cases, teachers taught the material and then asked students to analyze or evaluate using that material. Now I see teachers more frequently posing critical thinking questions at the beginning and during the learning process. Before beginning the chapter on the French Revolution, students stood in one of four corners that represented their philosophic view of revolution. I see Socratic Questioning in many classes that so effectively blends thinking with learning. The learning process feels more active for the students. It is as if students think their way into learning.

Sequencing

I watch our teachers in all subject areas build-in greater opportunities for student success through sequencing assignments and providing stop points to re-teach.  Students in one classroom first wrote an essay on a work of literature in mixed ability groups.  Then students moved to a second set of mixed ability groups to score the essays using a rubric. Next in their groups students improved the essay they considered the lowest scoring.  What follows is the individual essay on the work of literature on another topic.  The sequence of assignments clarifies the qualities of a strong essay and builds student understanding and skill.  Each step along the way, the teacher determined what needed to be re-taught.  In math, teachers present a variety of methods to solve a problem.  Next students work in groups to determine which method works best with each problem.  Prior to a summative test students work individually to determine which method to use.  Again, the process produces greater student success.  I better appreciate that a key component of the art of teaching is providing multiple opportunities for students to learn through the sequencing of assignments.  Our teachers are master sequencers. 

Move from Remembering to Analysis in One Step

As I visit classrooms, I watch teachers and students move from learning and remembering information to analyzing.  An example of this happened in a foreign language class.  Students were asked to conjugate verbs, trade papers, and correct (a low stakes assessment).  After the papers were returned, students were asked to analyze their errors and write a note to self stating what they understood and what they still needed to learn.  So often promoting higher level thinking is adding that additional step that asks students to evaluate, judge, revise, predict, or differentiate.  Our teachers are becoming masters at this.  We are learning that Bloom's is not a ladder that students must climb rung by rung.  A lesson can productively skip from remembering to evaluating. 

In one classroom students were asked to read literature and then write down the question that the author asks about life, and then give the author's answer.  Students in robotics are determining the best design for a cardboard bridge.  As each bridge is tested, students ask questions of each other.  In an English class, students work in pairs.  Working with the Bloom's list, students pose high level questions to each other.  In watching students work at this, I have come to understand that posing the question demands that students know and understand the material, and then analyze and evaluate the material.  Even though this process of questioning is daunting even for a graduate student, our students pursue this with confidence.  To pose a high level question, I have learned that the students must own the material. 

On Tuesday the Verdugo School to Career Coalition visited four CV classrooms.  In each one thinking combines with doing to produce an end product:

Robotics:  Dr. Greg Neat turns students loose to think and create within a framework that guides the process.  Whether students are attempting to build a cardboard bridge that can bare proportionally the most weight or building a hybrid car, students combine knowledge with thinking to produce an end product.

Graphic Arts:  Mr. Herb Smith has designed this project-based class to teach students computer skills and then enable students to create a unique product.  Students design anything from a shirt to a logo and then produce the product.  Bloom's higher order thinking is alive and well.

Foods:  Under Mrs. Sara Harm's guidance, students produce an end product that all enjoy!  However, that is only a small part of the total picture.  Students learn nutrition, food safety, following directions, and collaborating with a group to produce an end product.  I marvel at the buzz of productive activity in the foods class.

Bio-Tech:  Ms. Orenda Tuason provides a special opportunity to our Science and Medicine Academy Students.  In an after school class, students learn laboratory techniques such as extracting the DNA from a strawberry.  Students working in teams use equipment used commonly in commercial labs.  They acquire skills that enable them to conduct experiments at the college level.

The Visiting Coalition was impressed by these four programs, and all of us have a right to be proud of these career technical programs designed by our teachers.    

How do you build in the desire to learn?

I watch our teachers do this and marvel at the variety of approaches used.  What I am recognizing is that the motivation is tied to higher level thinking.  For example, the French Revolution is difficult for tenth graders to grasp.  The teachers put four attitudes toward revolution on the board ranging from never revolt to revolt when unhappy with a government decision (Bloom: evaluate); she designated a corner of the room to represent each one.  Students were to go to the corner that best represented their thinking.  Once in the corner each group talked about why they held this attitude.  Each corner summarized their stand.  Students were invited to move corners.  Finally, students sat down to write about revolution, but this activity had raised the interest level.  They had a position on revolution.  In a government class, students took what they had learned about writing a bill and in groups were asked to choose a topic and write a bill.  Part of the assignment was to define the opposition and to counter the opposition’s argument (Bloom: analyze, evaluate, create).  Choice resulted in buy-in.  In Algebra I, the teacher was re-teaching:  the topic—word problems.  She proceeded to explain how each problem was a scavenger hunt.  All the information they need to solve the problems is jumbled together.  She provided a variety of charts.  Their task: unscramble the problem and identify the correct chart (Bloom: analyze, evaluate).  In all three classrooms students were engaged and thinking at a very high level.  It is such a joy to visit classrooms at CV.

Our teachers are incorporating higher level thinking, specifically analyzing and evaluating, in many ways in lessons designed to introduce new information.  In a Literacy for Success, the teacher asked students to review the prompt and discover what she had left out of her prompt list.  In Spanish, students were asked to write a sentence using the newly introduced verb tense, and then another student translated that sentence into English and determined if the verb tense was used correctly.  In biology, students were asked to predict what would happen to a population given a variety of factors that they had just learned.  In another Spanish class, students were asked to analyze the work they were doing and determine what level of thinking the work demanded.  In an English class, students were asked to compare and contrast a teacher written essay to essays written by the students.  As I visit classrooms, I see this time and time again.