cluster four

Case Studies

Early Childhood: “Air”

Elementary School: “Reading About Pirates” Middle School: “King Washington”

High School: “I Don’t Understand”

Module 12: Metacognition

Outline and Learning Goals 214 What Is Metacognition and Why Is It

Important? 215 Special Cases of Metacognition 216 Factors Affecting the Development and

Use of Metacognition 218 Applications: Learning Strategies 219 Summary 226 Key Concepts 227 Case Studies: Reflect and Evaluate 227

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C L U S T E R

EARLY CHILDHOOD MIDDLE SCHOOL HIGH SCHOOL ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

cognitive processes

Module 13: Transfer of Skills and Knowledge Outline and Learning Goals 229 What Is Transfer and Why Is It

Important? 230 Do We Readily Transfer What

We Learn? 231 Teaching Principles That Facilitate

Transfer 235 Summary 240 Key Concepts 240 Case Studies: Reflect and Evaluate 240

Module 14: Critical Thinking and Problem Solving Outline and Learning Goals 242 Thinking Skills and Dispositions 243 Critical Thinking 244 Problem Solving 248 Summary 254 Key Concepts 254 Case Studies: Reflect and Evaluate 255

4

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206

Prepare:

As you read the case, make notes:

1. WHO are the primary participants in the case? Describe them.

2. WHAT is taking place?

3. WHERE is the case taking place? Is the environment a factor?
4. WHEN is the case taking place? Is the timing a factor?

Barb Carson, a veteran elementary school teacher of 15 years, is in her sixth year of teaching full-day kindergarten at Roosevelt Elementary. She loves working with the kindergarteners and was surprised to see how much this age group could achieve when given the right amount of support and encouragement.

This morning the children are seated on the floor around Barb’s rocking chair, listening attentively as she reads a story about the wind from an oversize book with colorful pictures. She begins by showing the children the cover of the book and asking them what they think the story is about. She enthusiastically discusses their suggestions and then ends the suspense by turning to the first page and beginning the story. As she nears the end of the story, she asks Dominique to summarize what has happened in the book. Then Barb spreads out a set of simple sentence cards on the floor, each with a picture depicting a main event from the story. She tells the students that they are going to play a game

in which they mix up the story and try to put it back in order. She calls on Jose to pick the card that describes the first event in the story. Jose struggles to figure out the words on each card, and Barb reminds him that he can also use the pictures as a clue. Jose successfully picks the first card, and Barb then invites Maria to find the next event in the story. One by one, Barb calls on students to help put the story back in order, reminding the whole group that they need to watch carefully and help if someone has trouble figuring out what comes next.

When the class has finished this activity, Barb sends the students back to their seats, clustered around four tables. During the story session, a parent volunteer had placed materials for an experiment on a large table at the front of the classroom and put a prediction sheet at each child’s seat.

“We just read a story about the wind,” Barb says. “What is the wind made out of?” “Air!” several children shout at once.

“Okay,” Barb replies. “We are going to do an experiment to see what happens with air, some water, a cork, and a plastic cup.”

The children squirm with delight. They know these classroom experiments are usually fun.

“Let’s put on our scientist hats today,” says Barb as she walks over to the front table, drops a cork in a clear bowl of water, and holds up a plastic cup. “See if we can figure out what will happen to this cork if we trap it under this plastic cup while it is still in the water. Take a minute and draw a picture on your prediction sheet to show me what you think will happen to the cork.” Barb walks around the room, looking on as the children draw pictures on their sheets. When it seems that most children have finished, she calls on Tony.

“Tony, tell us about your prediction,” she says.

Tony holds up his drawing and explains, “I drew the cork way down near the bottom of the bowl, under the plastic cup.”

“Did anybody else draw the cork down on the bottom of the bowl?” Several children raise their hands. “Does anyone have a different prediction about what will happen to the cork?”

Shelby raises her hand.

“Yes, Shelby. Tell us about your prediction.”

1

Air

Early Childhood

2

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“I drew the cork floating near the top, right under the cup.” Several other students nod that they made the same prediction.

“How do we find out what will really happen to the cork?”

“We test it!” reply several students.

“Yes, we test our predictions. Scientists, look up here and pay close attention.” Barb places the cup over the cork, and it sinks down closer to the bottom of the bowl.

“What happened?” she asks.

“The cork got pushed way down,” Tony replies.

“Why do you think that happened, Maria?” asks Barb.

Maria pauses to think for a few seconds and then replies, “Well, the cup was pushing down and that pushed the water down more.”

“It was the air,” interjects Jose. “There was air in the cup and the air pushed the water down more.” Barb continues to ask questions to clarify what the students are thinking and to help them make connections between the experiment and things they learned earlier in the week about properties of air. When she feels that they all have a clear understanding of the outcome of the experiment, she has the students record the result by drawing a picture in the “Now I Know” column on their prediction sheet.

After lunch, Barb challenges the children to create kites that will fly really high during “Kinder garten Kite Day,” a special event later in the week when parents and siblings are invited to fly kites with the students in the field behind the school. “How can you make your kite aerodynamic?” Barb asks. Kiontee smiles because he remembers that aerodynamic is Barb’s “million-dollar word of the week.” She likes to use accurate terms when possible during her lessons and has found that the students feel very important when she sprinkles a few challenging words into her lessons for them to remember. For the next few minutes the children brainstorm ideas about how to design kites that will really catch the wind. After they have come up with a long list of possibilities, Barb teaches them how to evaluate critically the set of ideas and narrow down their choices. As the children settle down to work on their own designs, they seem to lose all track of time, becoming completely absorbed in their plans for making the greatest kite ever.

3 1. What kinds of learning behaviors and attitudes does Barb model for her students?

2. How would you describe the level of challenge that Barb includes in her curriculum? Does the level of challenge fit with your image of a kindergarten classroom?

3. How do you think Barb’s students would describe their experiences in her classroom?

EARLY CHILDHOOD MIDDLE SCHOOL HIGH SCHOOL

ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

Assess

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Prepare:

As you read the case, make notes:

1. WHO are the primary participants in the case? Describe them.

2. WHAT is taking place?

3. WHERE is the case taking place? Is the environment a factor?
4. WHEN is the case taking place? Is the timing a factor?

AI an McPherson is a second-grade teacher at an elementary school that has entered into a PDS (Professional Development School) partnership with a local university. The PDS Alliance provides collaborative research, training, and professional development opportunities for public school teachers, university faculty, and teacher education students, with the ultimate goal of improving public school education for all children. Recently, Ian participated in a focus group exploring evidence-based practice in teaching. As a follow-up activity, teachers were encouraged to keep a journal of classroom activities and then go back and assess areas they wanted to improve through the use of evidence-based practices. Here is an excerpt from Ian’s journal: Yesterday I began the morning reading session by assigning my students three short story booklets to read followed by questions to complete. I instructed the students to color the

Reading About Pirates

Elementary School

pictures in the stories when they were finished so they would be able to remain busy.

Once the students understood what they were supposed to be doing and began working industriously, I called my first reading group back to our designated reading table. As the students collected themselves at the reading table, I made certain that everyone else was working constructively at their desks, and then I took my seat at the reading table as well. As I began my reading lesson with the group of students at the table, I was interrupted by Kiana, who said she was tired and couldn’t work. I had seen this behavior before.

Kiana’s reading skills were on par with her classmates, but she often lacked the motivation to stay on task at her desk

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BC

during our morning reading group rotations. After making sure she wasn’t ill, I told her to continue working and that we’d all take a break together in a little while to have morning snack. I tried to sound caring but firm, and Kiana returned to her seat to begin work on her storybooks.

As I continued my session with the reading group, I involved each of the students in the group by asking direct questions, giving students turns to read short passages out loud, and making sure everyone understood what we were reading. As we worked with our reading selection about pirates and buried treasure, we analyzed it to look for vowel-pairs that we had talked about in class last week. At the end of the reading group lesson, I reviewed basic skills in using a dictionary. We discussed alphabetical order and letter position, and we practiced strategies like looking at the bolded word at the top of the page to quickly orient yourself to where you are in the dictionary. I then had students complete a worksheet in which they searched for certain words and wrote down the dictionary page number where each word could be found. One of the students commented that finding the words was kind of like a treasure hunt—and indeed it was. The word list included words like gold, silver, jewel, chest, and map. This activity enabled the students to move from talking and working in a group to working alone. This prepared the students to work on their own again when they returned to their seats after the reading group was concluded.

As I neared the end of our reading group session, I was disappointed to see that several of the students who were supposed to be doing independent seat work were off task. They weren’t being noisy or disruptive, but it was clear that they were not doing their work either. Kiana was doodling, Randy was slouched in his seat ready to take a nap, and Kelsey was fidgeting with the key chain collection attached to her bookbag.

Later in the day, Ian looked back over what he had written about the morning work. He saw things that he thought were successful, as well as areas that could be improved. As he reviewed his notes, he identified the reading tasks assigned for independent seat work as an area for improvement. He tried to better define his own expectations about how the reading session should run, and then he began to make a list of the ways he could have been more effective in working with his reading group as well as ways he could have improved the learning experience for the children working independently at their desks. He wasn’t sure he had really hit on a plan that would work any better than what he was already doing, so he stopped in to speak with Linda Ariano, a second-grade teacher in the classroom next door. Ian and Linda brainstormed possibilities together. When he left to head home, Ian felt optimistic about his plans for the next morning. He wouldn’t really be sure he was on the right track until he had an opportunity to test his ideas with the class, but he felt he had two or three options for adjusting the morning routine that were worth a try.

EARLY CHILDHOOD MIDDLE SCHOOL HIGH SCHOOL

ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

Assess

1. In what areas do you think Ian did an effective job with his morning session?

2. What areas would you suggest he try to improve?

3. Ian kept a classroom journal. Do you think keeping a journal about your teaching would be useful? Why or why not?

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210

Prepare:

As you read the case, make notes:

1. WHO are the primary participants in the case? Describe them.

2. WHAT is taking place?

3. WHERE is the case taking place? Is the environment a factor?
4. WHEN is the case taking place? Is the timing a factor?

Tom Radcliffe looked out into the sea of faces in his second-period eighth-grade social studies class. He knew his students were paying attention to his lecture on the Revolutionary War period because of the way he started the class. He began by asking Carrie Johnson, “Who was the first president of the United States?”

“George Washington,” replied Carrie, amazed that he had asked her something so easy yet worried that she wasn’t off the hook yet.

“Why do we care?” asked Tom.

Carrie hesitated and then said, “I don’t know.”

“Clayton, is knowing that George Washington was the first president going to make you rich?” Tom asked.

Clayton, a slightly disheveled student in the third row, sat up. “No, not unless I get to be on Who Wants to Be a Millionaire and that is the final question to win the million,” Clayton responded, to mild laughter from his classmates.

“Not likely,” chimed in Clayton’s friend Brad.

“Is knowing that George Washington was the first president going to make you a better friend, Cathy?” Tom asked a girl in the front row.

“No,” Cathy replied.

“Is knowing that George Washington was the first president going to make you more popular with the ladies?” Tom asked, pointing to Chuck, an outgoing basketball player.

“No, but I don’t think I need any help in that category,” Chuck joked. Cathy rolled her eyes.

“Okay, so why do we care?”

When the class sat there stumped, Tom said, “Knowing that fact all by itself may not really mean very much. But what if you knew the characteristics that made Washington a great man and a great leader? What if you understood how he handled power? How many of you knew that George Washington had the opportunity to be king and turned it down?” A couple of hands went up; most students looked surprised.

“How many of you would have given up a chance to be king?” He had them hooked, and he knew it. The questions Tom asked in order to launch this topic stirred up a little controversy and got everyone interested. He proceeded with his lecture, confident that the students now really wanted to know more about George Washington.

A week later, Tom gave a test on the social studies unit. His students did well on the questions about big ideas related to George Washington, but they missed much more than he had expected when it came to details. The next day he did a “notes check,” asking students to pull out their notebooks and flip to their notes from the previous week. Their notes were very sparse—and in some cases nonexistent.

“Come on, guys. How come no one took good notes?” He heard a variety of responses. “I was too busy listening.”

“I already knew about George Washington so I didn’t think I needed to write anything down.”

“You didn’t tell us what we should be writing down.”

Middle School

King Washington

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B+

EARLY CHILDHOOD MIDDLE SCHOOL HIGH SCHOOL

ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

“I didn’t realize that stuff was going to be on the test.”

Tom paused dramatically and said, “I am getting ready to give you some absolutely free advice that countless hordes of people would spend at least five bucks to hear me share.” The students smiled. He turned and wrote in great big letters on the board, TAKE GOOD NOTES! “The process of taking notes helps most people retain information better—even if they never go back and look at those notes. If they actually do look over the notes the next day, they get another little boost in memory. And if they go back to review those notes again five days later, they get an additional memory boost.”

Over the next few days, Tom made a point of teaching his students different note-taking strategies. He encouraged them to take thorough notes by giving an unannounced “notes quiz” in which the correct answer was something they could easily copy down directly from their class notes—if they had taken the time during his lecture to write down the information. As a culminating activity for the unit on events surrounding the Revolutionary War, Tom presented his students with the following scenario:

You are to be a colonial delegate to the Second Continental Congress in May 1775, just a few weeks after the battles at Lexington and Concord. In preparation for the Congress session, develop a list of talking points to express your opinion about how the colonists should respond in light of recent events, giving particular attention to the Intolerable Acts. On Wednesday we will convene our own Continental Congress, and you will have the opportunity to come together to decide the course of history.

1. What did Tom do well as a teacher in the opening scenario about George Washington?

2. What mistakes did Tom make?

3. What changes did Tom institute after seeing how his students performed on the exam? How might these changes make a difference for his students?

Assess

%

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212

Prepare:

As you read the case, make notes:

1. WHO are the primary participants in the case? Describe them.

2. WHAT is taking place?

3. WHERE is the case taking place? Is the environment a factor?
4. WHEN is the case taking place? Is the timing a factor?

M s. So Yoon Park is a first-year teacher in her second month at Sunnyside High School. She recently completed a lesson with her tenth-grade algebra class that left her feeling very frustrated. That evening, she e-mailed the following message to a mentor teacher to get some advice: Mr. Kim,
Today did NOT go as well as I had hoped. My assignment was to teach the class to change repeating decimals into fractions. I began by instructing the students to open their books to the section and take out some paper for notes. I went through a review of terminating decimals and fractions on the board. The students did not have any questions about the review. I continued with the problems on the board by writing a repeating decimal and asking the class how to change the decimal to a fraction. A few students had some suggestions, but they realized that a correct fraction could not be found with previous methods they had learned in converting fractions and decimals. I taught them a step-by-step process that would change the repeating decimal into a fraction. I had the attention of the class, and I was confident in my abilities.

I went through the example and then asked if there were any questions. The entire class looked at me with confusion. I did not know what was confusing them, so I asked questions about each step in the example. This helped me target the problems, and I changed the approach I used to explain the process. I used different vocabulary, related steps to previous lessons, and asked students more detailed questions for each step. I believe a few students caught on to the idea, but the majority of the class was still saying “I don’t understand.”

I answered individual questions from students raising their hands, and I also had students answer some questions in hopes they had an explanation their peers would understand. As I continued to show examples, many students still did not comprehend the lesson, and I was running out of ideas to help them. I felt like the students were losing all interest in learning the strategy I was trying to teach. I was afraid that their minds were shutting down because they began to show very little skill even in the individual steps which involved previously learned material, such as subtracting equal amounts from each side of an equation. My students were becoming frustrated, and the classroom became unsettled with chatter and distractions. I was frustrated, too, but I tried not to let it show because I did not want to add my own aggravation to the already tense feeling in the room.

I realized that I was failing as a teacher, and I did not know what to do. There were still many questions from the students and I wasn’t sure what to do next. I noticed that the students were more focused on finding shortcuts or quick ways to solve the problem to lessen the amount of work they had to put into the solution. My students had missed out on the strategy being taught because they were so focused on finding a way to skip steps. I had not anticipated that they would dislike putting in the effort to complete the few lines of actual work for each problem.

I did not expect the students to be so confused with new material. New ideas and processes are taught in school all the time, and I really expected that the students could

High School

I Don’t Understand

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EARLY CHILDHOOD MIDDLE SCHOOL HIGH SCHOOL ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

transfer some of what we had done previously to help them approach these math problems. I am sure no other teacher has ever felt so out of control, unprepared, and unorganized as I did while teaching this class. I was not prepared for students to give up, and I was not ready to manage an entire class confused by the lesson topic. I thought I had prepared a successful lesson, but I failed to really teach my students today. You seem to handle your own lessons so well. Do you have any suggestions about what I could have done differently? I need help!

So Yoon

Mr. Kim replied:

So Yoon,

Don’t be so hard on yourself. Based on what you described to me, it sounds like you really made an effort to get through to the class. Although you didn’t think the lesson would be a particularly difficult one, many students shut down their minds when they see something totally new. . . .

Assess

1. So Yoon is worried that her entire lesson was a failure. Is there anything that she did well during the lesson?

2. What should the teacher do when the majority of the class does not understand the material presented in the lesson?

3. Are you surprised that the class was not able to apply previously taught material to the decimal lesson? Why or why not?

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