The power of the baseline

The Power of the Baseline

TL;DR: Establishing a starting point for students' abilities with the curricular competencies (a base line), is the first step to not only assessing what they've learned, but also the first step to growing their skills in your curricular area(s). 

If you are reading this in the hopes of a post regarding the righteous baselines of The Red Hot Chili Peppers, you are going to be disappointing. The title was misleading, I'm sorry. However, if you are tuned in for a post regarding assessment practices with the curricular competencies and some standards based assessment, then boy do I have a treat for you!

Some background information to start. When the new curriculum for BC came out,  I wasn't a big fan. It taught too little, there wasn't enough detail, the content was ambiguous, overall I thought it was  'bleh!'. As I've worked through the new mandate from the ministry of education, I've grown to appreciate it. The following are my reasons for the turn around.

1. Memorization is not Science. While it is true that you need to know things in order to practice science, it is not true that the focus should be memorizing facts. 
2. I have been teaching the scientific method for years, and this curriculum is heavily influenced by it
3. I am a huge nerd and this allows me the freedom to go into the areas both my students and I find interesting. 

The only issue I've had (up until recently) was how to assess the curricular competencies (CC). Neither the district I work for, nor the ministry of education itself, were of any help here. So this is what I've come up with...

Step 1: Baseline assessment (experiment like gyrocopter lab, non-curricular, but opportunity to explore the CC

Step 2-5: Graduated Release of the Inquiry process (focus on how it relates to the CC) 

Step 6: Open inquiry

Steps 1-5 are almost entirely student assessed with teacher support, step 6 is an interview based assessment with the questions supplied in advance of the interview. 

Assessment is done with a single point rubric (what students are working towards) with a growth mindset emphasis, that students are not expected to exceed expectations in all categories (or any really for that matter) but rather are expected to address where they are, and how they can improve. The goal, I tell them, is to fully meet expectations for all of these items by the time you graduate high school. 

The beginning of the year, which previously was reserved for "teaching the scientific method" is now "introducing the CC". Throughout the year, I have students do labs/inquiry projects with decreasing involvement from myself. The first project I guide the CC heavily (direct questions, check lists, etc) but as we progress through the curriculum, I provide fewer and fewer scaffolds, and allow them to be independent with the CC more and more. My hope is that they can reflect on their CC and see how their skills have developed over the course of the year. Below is what it looks like in general for science 10.

Intro lab: Galileo's rolling ball experiments- how does the height of a ramp and slope of a ramp impact the final velocity of a ball. - students self assess on CC

Start the question journal: Students are informed that they will learn a lot of interesting things this year, many of which are half-truths. There will be a lot of room for questions, and those questions are encouraged. They are asked to keep a journal of any questions that come up for them, and time is given at the end of most classes for students to reflect and record these questions. 

First guided lab: Foam insulation and marble roller-coaster. - Students build a roller coaster out of foam insulation, marbles and tape. They first model it using a phet "physics skate park" and I ask them questions directed to address ALL the CC directly (major headings, but not the sub-headings)

Second Guided activity:- Students measuring pH of soil sample. I provide a back story that describes how I have begun the inquiry process, students complete the process, then reflect on any CC that have grown. 

Question journal check in : Class discussion regarding the questions they've developed and how they can be moved to an inquiry question.

Third Guided activity: - Students address the question "If the Canadian space agency wants to colonize a new solar system, what star should they target" - students develop criteria, I give resources for students to develop understanding of star-cycles to help them frame their questions further. Students then present their information as a bidding war to the agency as to why their solar system is the best choice. 

First unguided activity: - Students are asked to investigate the questions they've had throughout the year. This is a formally assessed project, and students will engage in a double blind assessment of the draft product

Fourth guided activity: - Are Mr. Smith's children his own? Students use their understanding of basic Mendelian inheritance to develop and ask questions to explore the problem. *Special focus on ethics in this section*

Final inquiry project: Students are told to "mine" their journals for a question to research. They are expected to go through the CC for guidance on what their research should include. The final assessment will be in the form of an interview, where they look at where they started off in their CC and make claims on their growth, using their learning portfolio (Freshgrade) and their final inquiry project as evidence of that growth. 

All of this is done with the typical classroom activities which will develop their CC as well as their curricular content skills (and core competencies of course), but the steps described above are typical classroom activities that have been adapted for the purposes of illustrating their CC. 

Summer Reading: Part 3 of ? - The Value of Time - Deep Thinking requires Deep Knowledge - Wait time

Summer Reading: Part 3 of ? - The Value of Time 

TL;DR: Students miss school because the time spent in it, is not accurately valued by students. In their minds, minutes and even hours can be wasted with no adverse consequences. One way to change this mind set is to treat every second in your class like gold. This gives your students more time for learning.  

I remember when a misadventure in elementary school left me with three days at home to think about what I had done. I don't know much about other 11 year olds, but I know I wasn't exactly the "self-reflection" type. I was a ninja turtles type, so that's what I did. I watched TV, I read comics, and I played video games. Oh sure, there was homework assigned as punishment, but that took me 15 min and then I was free to do what I liked. To make matters worse, I completed two weeks worth of work in the three days off. This was likely the most damaging event in all my schooling. Essentially, I was given very clear evidence that my time in class was a waste. This attitude lasted until my first year of university, and very nearly cost me my place there. I can't help but wonder, are any other students getting this same evidence anywhere?

1) What do we want!? Student accountability for their own learning! When do we want it!? When parents stop sabotaging our attempts at instilling it!

So cheeky title aside, the area I teach has a fair number of students whos' families hail from lands far from where they currently call home. Normally this is a fantastic addition to the classroom because it provides me a variety of viewpoints and opinions to draw from. All too frequently however, it presents a significant problem for myself and my students. Visiting the homeland. Any time we have more than a few days off, I lose at least one of my 150 students to visiting a far flung land. Not for days, but for weeks, and occasionally months. On this, I am torn.

On one hand, it is an opportunity of a lifetime. I grew up not knowing my heritage (not that it is all that exotic) so for my students to experience a new culture, and to be able to relate that to where they came from? That is something that I couldn't give them in a lifetime of classes. However, that isn't what I have been tasked with teaching them. I have a detailed set of learning outcomes that I have to assess at the end of the year. If a student misses a month of school, what are the chances that they will achieve all of the learning outcomes demanded by the ministry of education? What am I to do with a student that is gone that long. As previously indicated, I am very much on the fence. Theoretically, students are intended to get a form filled out for any extended absences, I could simply refuse to sign it until a student has shown me they have the minimum skills / knowledge from the unit/s they will be missing. Unfortunately, the vast majority of the time these students don't get the forms signed, and if they actually do bring you the form, it is considered a fait accompli. I don't want to be the road block stopping them from seeing where they came from, but I also don't want to be complicit in them sacrificing their education. I am often confused as to what the parents are thinking when they book these expensive and extended vacations. I have a strong suspicion they don't value my class time. That might be my fault...

2) Time use: Waste Not Want Not

Hands up if you have ever had this experience. You have given the students a task to complete, most of the students remained on topic and are now finished whatever it is you have assigned. There is five minutes left in class, and one student starts the avalanche of "pack up time". With an efficiency typically reserved for military parades, all your students have packed up and are now fully, and completely off task, regardless of the completion level of their respective assignments.  Not a big deal right? 5 minutes? 

5 min / class  X 180 classes per year = 900 min. That is 15 hours of lost time, or in other words, 11 full classes missed. 

I routinely communicate this to my students, but unsurprisingly, I get few results. Here is my theory on why. 

Some students will complete assignments fairly quickly, it is just the nature of the game. Often, I don't have meaningful work ready for those students. By the time I drag out something for them to do, their lack of attention / activity has spread like wildfire and wild horses couldn't drag their attention back to whatever it was I wanted them to do. 

Doug Lemov in his book Teach Like a Champion has a fairly simple solution. Always have deep and meaningful work in your pocket (literally or figuratively) The moment a student completes an assignment, you pull out something new for them to do. Taking it a step further, I would prefer to have an ongoing, weekly assignment, that students would work on in their spare time. There is no waste on transitions, no confusion, and no opportunity for tom foolery. 

This communicates to students that your time, and their time is valuable, and not to be wasted. Sometimes enforcing the "work to the bell or past it" mentality is exhausting, but anything less communicates to students that the time in class in not of value. I suspect this bleeds into their parents' opinions of school and is a contributing factor in why they think they can pull their child out for a month and have no consequence. 

In my next post:
3) Deep thinking requires deep knowledge
4) Wait time, and why do we ask for hands?