learning strategies

Freeze Frame: Celebrating Understanding

Janell ClelandLeave a comment

Throughout my career, I aggressively tried to move students away from the term “smart” as a way to name their academic identity – to no avail.  It is the term they consistently use to describe themselves, so I decided to approach it from a new angle –  to define “smart” – to make it visible and then name when and where “smart” happened in our classroom.  I wanted to create a classroom that allowed students to publicly experience academic success.

I started by narrowing the focus of what I would define, and I settled on a skill set that I felt would transfer to other classes and beyond the school doors: the ability to participate in a discussion.  We began the process of defining the characteristics of an effective discussion.  We watched discussions online (book clubs and college seminars), and my students visited other classes during our class period to observe discussions. Then we shared observations and looked for patterns across our notes and named what it looks and sounds like to be involved in an effective discussion.  We defined “smart” as it relates to discussion:

  • Listen to each other.
  • Be willing to contribute.
  • Don’t dominate; everyone needs a chance.
  • Support opinions with evidence.
  • Respect what is said even if you disagree with it.
  • Shares opinions, asks questions, makes connections, and analyzes author’s craft
  • Work for dialogue (not talk):
    • Build on others’ comments
    • Work toward discovery of new ideas

We began reading and annotating short stories in preparation for our discussions.  The success of our discussion would be measured by whether we left class with a new understanding of the text.  We referred to this as reaching deep meaning where we stopped discussing the surface of the subject/text (who, what, where, when, and how) and moved to “why” – moving beyond what the author says to what the author means.  The skill set identified above became our process to get to deep meaning. One day during discussion, I realized “it” was happening.  We were having a meaningful, thoughtful dialogue; I was worried they weren’t seeing it so out of nowhere I yelled “freeze frame!”  A strategy was born!  The entire class froze.  I ran to the white board and mapped what I could remember about how the comments built to the point where I had stopped them.  I named exactly what I heard and who said it to make visible how the collaborative building of ideas was leading us to deep meaning.

Naming contradicted advice I was given early in my career where naming a student might make them the object of teacher-pet teasing.  Students’ names were used, their contributions were named and analyzed publicly, and they were all encouraged to replicate the process they had just seen and heard as we continued our discussion.  Creating knowledge became visible, and when it is visible, it can be replicated and controlled.  Making-meaning of difficult text became a celebration!

In Emma’s end-of-the-year portfolio, she reflects on what she remembers as being her most memorable discussion.  Her comments illustrate the visual nature of naming academic thinking:

We knew that we were getting close to dialogue because Mrs. Cleland was webbing on the white board (she tends to start webbing when we get to dialogue; this is a habit that she picked up over the year).  Dialogue happened when we started adding to each other’s ideas and getting closer to the deeper meaning that way. We could see where it happened in the web. It was exciting.

Eventually, the students would call their own freeze frames and name what they saw.  We found that an entire class discussion made it impossible for everyone to experience the process and to meet personal discussion goals, so we moved to an inner/outer circle structure.  I created a discussion observation chart for the outer circle to record their observations through our discussion criteria lens.

When visitors came to our class, students invited them to use the strategy if they needed explanation of what was happening or if they saw a process they wanted to share with the class.  One story I will always remember happened when I told my students that visitors from an area high school were coming to observe our freeze frame technique so they could use it in their classrooms.  One student said “Let’s use a story we have already discussed so we look really smart.” Another replied “Mrs. Cleland, why don’t you give us the hardest story you can find so we can really blow them away.”  I knew their academic identities were moving beyond the fragile stage; they knew the process to put into place to create meaning of difficult text, and they were ready to use that process in a public forum.

Here are two journal entries from that class (Freshman Reading) that illustrate the importance of “naming”  and freeze frame as a strategy to nurture academic identity.

Entry #1:          In our class a moment when I felt smart in class was when we were having a discussion and I said something.  During the freeze frame you told the whole class that it was a really good observation and that we built a dialogue out of what I started.  When that happened I felt better about myself and I felt smart in the way where I was actually getting somewhere in the discussion we were having.

Entry #2:          The first time I really helped the class to enter into the deeper meaning of the text was a day that I remember.  The fact that you pointed it out not only to me but to the whole class made me feel even smarter.  The fact that I can really understand the things we read for a deeper meaning just makes me feel like I am more than just a simple student.  I can get the deeper meaning and really understand it.  Not only do I use this in this class but I use this all the time which makes me feel smart all the time.

Connections to other posts;

This example provided an additional illustration to the difference between reflection and critical reflection from a previous post.  At the conclusion of the discussion, you might ask students the following reflection questions:

  • What role did you play in today’s discussion?  Give a specific example.
  • What is comment/question you had in your head but didn’t get a chance to share?
  • What will you do differently during our next discussion?

These questions will encourage students to revisit the discussion and share their perspective with you.  However, in order to move to critical reflection, students use the “characteristics of an effective discussion” as the lens through which they reflect?

  • Which of the characteristics was your strength today?  Give a specific example.
  • Name someone who clearly demonstrated one of the characteristics in today’s discussion. Specifically, what did he/she do that allowed them to demonstrate this characteristic?
  • Which of the characteristics will you work on in tomorrow’s discussion?  Where could you have demonstrated this characteristic in today’s discussion?

One technique is not better than another.  Giving their perspective through reflection may give the personal insight a teacher needs.   For my students and me, critical reflection let us focus on the behavior rather than the person, and in this setting where I was working to nurture academic identity, that was the best strategy choice for us.

 

 

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Creating a strategy-based classroom

Janell Cleland2 Comments

Increasingly, educators realize that in a world where content can be revised and updated almost daily, the ability to understand one’s process for creating meaning of content, rather than memorizing that content, is a critical component in becoming a successful learner. One aspect of understanding process includes knowing the strategies you use when you need to create meaning of difficult text – whether it’s a written text, a visual text, a math problem, or a science experiment. Simply put “What works for me when I’m stuck?”

In the 2012 literature review titled “Teaching Adolescents to Become Learners,” The University of Chicago Consortium on Chicago Research dedicates a chapter to exploring the relationship between learning strategies and academic success and suggests that “teaching adolescents to become learners depends in large part on the identification of effective strategies that teachers can share with students to help them achieve their academic goals” (46).

When students have not identified strategies to use when they encounter difficulties while studying/learning, it can lead to poor academic performance which in turn can undermine their belief that they can be successful. The ability to persist – to remain optimistic about learning – can suffer when they find themselves in a cycle of struggle and failure. As they progress through the educational system and as content becomes more difficult, they may unknowingly self-sabotage success rather than risk the pain of continued failure claiming that the work is stupid, that they could do it but they don’t care, or that the teacher is unfair.

Frequently at this point, their only strategies are “trying harder” and “studying longer” – both abstract and ineffective. We need to arm them with a repertoire of learning strategies that can lead to academic success and, ultimately, help them maintain their optimism about future success or, more importantly, allow reluctant learners to re-enter the system with an a renewed belief that school is a place there they belong and where they can experience success.

This posting (and many to follow) will provide practical classroom examples of how to incorporate strategy instruction into the secondary classroom; I will share strategies that I have introduced and that my students have created.

First up…creating meaning of difficult text!

Target: A strategy-driven curriculum allows learners to experiment with the strategies introduced by the teacher; however, the ultimate target is to provide opportunities for each learner to revise the strategy introduced by the teacher, to reject it after a reasonable trial, and over time to own their own personal repertoire of learning strategies.

In my Freshman Reading class the introduction to strategy instruction begins by reading a short story and experimenting with four different strategies during that one story. I frequently use “And Summer Is Gone” by Susie Kretschmer as my intro story since it deals with the struggles of entering high school and having to choose whether to stay loyal to friends who might not be considered “cool” in this new setting.

Strategy #1: Annotations
I start by introducing an annotation system designed to accurately identify the who, what, where, when, and how of the story – what we call surface meaning. I emphasize that if this surface-level knowledge is inaccurate, determining why the author wrote the text or why an historical event impacted future events (the deep meaning) can lead to erroneous connections, assumptions, and interpretations. I insist that they experiment with my system until they can provide evidence that their revisions to this annotation system better supports their creation of meaning.

Surface annotations symbols:
Who = circle
When/where = square or box
Unknown vocabulary = squiggly line
Important what = underline (with a limit of three important “whats” per page)
Assigned focus = * in the margins (i.e. identify where you make personal connections to the text)

Strategy #2: Quote/Response freewrite
Next I ask them to return to their annotations and choose an important quote they underlined or starred (word, phrase, or sentence) and write that quote at the top of a clean journal page. Freewrite for five minutes about that quote asking yourself “what insight does this quote give me as to “why” the author wrote this story?” Time the writing for five minutes – no stopping. I always write with them!  I love this Norman Mailer quote to support the power of non-stop writing:
“Once in a while your hand will write a sentence that seems true and yet you do not know where it came from. It may be one’s nicest reward as a writer.”

It is important to tie their annotating to additional strategies for creating meaning.  Annotations are the foundation for meaning-making.  Too often students see this step as busy work because they don’t understand how to use the annotations in the next step of the meaning-making process (both in writing and during discussion).

Strategy #3: Two Whys (or three or four…)
At the conclusion of the five minute freewrite, we stop and reread our writing and then write the single word “Why?” or a new “Why” question under the last line of writing. Write another five minutes answering the “why” about the previous writing.  This strategy pushes them to explain the content in a deeper way rather than rely on the single sentence answer that frustrates us as teachers.

You can repeat this step for as long as they continue to be engaged in the writing. My personal goal is thirty-minutes of “whys” by the end of the school year. It is so exciting to watch them learn to value the process of writing as discovery, but it takes time to develop.

Why strategy: note that Emma chose to open with a why question and she followed that with two more “whys” during her entry.

Strategy #4: Naming meaning-making and process
Finally, at the bottom of the entry write “New understanding:” Reread the entire entry and name on one idea that emerged during your writing. Choose something that you hadn’t considered while you read the story – something that didn’t come to you until you wrote your journal entry. Also, name the strategy where this idea emerged. Was it during the quote/response freewrite or after you posed a “why”?

As a reminder, the target of strategy-based instruction is to introduce learning strategies, to provide multiple opportunities for experimentation that result in revising, abandoning or owning strategies, and ultimately, for students to create a repertoire that works for them as learners/scholars. With this in mind, it is critical that students/scholars track what worked for them, how they tweaked a strategy, and why they abandoned one. You might create a structure for a strategy log that allows them to document their discoveries. This is especially important for classroom teachers who have caseloads of over 100 students. In essence, this system allows you to differentiate instruction for each student while they document the results for you.

Future posts: More strategies (many more) and for classroom teachers, ideas for how to grade journal entries that value both process and plausible interpretations.