Helping Students "Stick the Landing"

I don't know about you, but when I watch the gymnastics portion of the Olympics, I become an instant expert on the gymnast's technique and precision. One portion I'm exceptionally good at evaluating is the landing. Did she end with a solid dismount? Did he wiggle or wobble while attempting to maintain his balance? Was there (gasp!) a step forward/back/to the side? A gymnast can perform a flawless routine and be knocked out of the running for gold if she doesn't stick the landing.

Why is sticking the landing so important in gymnastics? Despite what you may believe from my couch-scoring of Olympic gymnasts, I'm not a gymnastics judge, but here's what I imagine a judge would say. First and foremost, sticking the landing is safest for the gymnast's body...but I doubt that is the reason it makes or breaks a gold medalist. The real reason, I believe, is two fold. First, it is the very last technique a gymnast can show a judge. It is the final opportunity to make a lasting impression. The middle might have been a little muddled, but if a gymnast can stick the landing, suddenly the muddy middle doesn't seem quite as severe. The gymnast exits the arena feeling more successful, and the judge is left with a more favorable opinion when processing the performance. Second, it is one more opportunity for the gymnast to demonstrate mastery, her control over her body. Gymnastics is precise. There are many ways to demonstrate that precision and control during the routine, but the only way to show it at the close is to stick the landing.

What does this have to do with the classroom if you don't teach PE or coach gymnastics? ASCD published an article this past summer entitled "Stick the Landing" where history teacher Tyler Reese connected sticking the landing to closure. Helping our students experience closure in the classroom is one of the more highly effective strategies we know for helping the brain process and store information. Students need effective closure for similar reasons a gymnast needs to stick the landing.

When a teacher provides a student with time for closure, both the student and the teacher are given an opportunity to stick the landing. In many closure activities, the student is given one more instance where he can demonstrate his knowledge to the teacher. This is turn becomes a moment of formative assessment, which allows the teacher to reevaluate next steps. When students participate in closure that is reflective in nature, they also move towards a deeper understanding of the content as their brains attach connections to the content. In this way, closure is the last chance (at least for the moment) for the teacher to help the current content make a lasting impression in the student's brain.

If you're not sure where to start, Reese provides three of his favorite closure activities: Around the Horn (a variation of closing circles), Negotiations, and Logo Galleria (a variation of a gallery walk). If none of these three strike a spark in you, don't worry; there are many ways to provide effective closure. Some methods take more preparation than others; some are quick in the classroom while others take a chunk of time. The important piece is to remember to do it regularly - and that doesn't mean just at the end of the class period. Closure is beneficial anytime you are concluding one piece and moving on to another.

A few that are often quicker and easier to implement are quick writes/journals (paper/pencil or digital), critical thinking exit ticket questions, and connection-based pair-shares.

Have a closure strategy that you have found to be very successful in assisting students stick the landing? Please share your ideas in the comments!

Impossible to Fail Quizzes?

An impossible to fail quiz? What would be the point in giving that?

Tom Mullaney, author of the Sustainable Teaching website, posted recently about why they just might be worth trying. From his perspective, this "quiz" is not meant to be a summative assessment. I would argue that it is not even a formative assessment since the teacher doesn't gain much feedback regarding student learning through it. The students receive immediate feedback, however. Thus, it is a non-assessing quiz (if that is possible).

So what exactly is it if it is not an assessment? An impossible to fail quiz is a learning tool, it provides students with immediate feedback, and it is in fact quite impossible to fail. It is a digital quiz that customizes the next step based upon correct and incorrect answers. If the student responds correctly, the student moves on to the next question. If the student responds incorrectly, the student is instructed to view a video reviewing that particular concept. Then the student tries the missed question a second time. When the student correctly answers the question, the student then proceeds to the next one. (Try/view an impossible to fail quiz here.)

Clearly, it is not an assessment because every student should (in theory) earn a perfect score by the end of the quiz. The purpose lies not in assessing student knowledge but in giving students an opportunity to test their knowledge and practice as needed. (How in-depth the practice goes depends upon the teacher creating the impossible to fail quiz.) In theory, each student will eventually correctly answer each question because he/she either knew the material or learned the material through the review videos.

Think you might be interested in giving one a go in your room? Mullaney posted a very thorough tutorial on how to create an impossible to fail quiz using Google Forms. If you give the impossible to fail quiz a try, I'd love to hear about your experience!

Goobric Now Offers Voice Comments

It looks like I may have been a little eager to share the Goobric updates! Another update was released this weekend that allows users to leave voice comments on a Google Doc via the Goobric app. Yippee! The 10-minute tutorial (posted just today!) walks users through the Goobric steps for leaving feedback. If you are familiar with Goobric, you can skip to 5:43 to view the steps regarding how to leave voice comments.

Doctopus, Goobric, and Docappender...Oh My!

There has been an upswing in the number of teachers utilizing Google Classroom this semester, and a common concern I've heard is one regarding losing the ability to run various scripts and add-ons with student Google Docs. Thankfully, there are a number of fantastic tools connected to Google Drive that you can still access for assignments created through Google Classroom, specifically Doctopus and Goobric.

Andrew Stillman recently posted on Google+ regarding some improvements to the Doctopus and Goobric partnership and improvements to how they interact with assignments created through Google Classroom, and he should know because he helped designed them. After searching YouTube, I came across the video below regarding how to make use of Doctopus and Goobric through Google Classroom. (Posted just a week ago on January 9, 2015, it is the most up-to-date explanation I could find.) It is about 17 minutes, but it contains great information on how to utilize the two to give students feedback using an online rubric. (Disclaimer: It is more of an explanation and overview than an actual tutorial, but it does cover some of the basics.) If you are crunched for time, the first ~11 minutes covers Doctopus and Goobric. One nice piece about using Goobric is that you can provide your students with digital rubric-based feedback and still easily enter comments on the student's Google Doc as it is all viewed in the same window.

If you do have the time to watch the entire 17 minutes, please do! The last segment is focused on a tool called Docappender. I was unfamiliar with Docappender until viewing this video, and I am intrigued. Docappender gives you the ability to add a student self-assessment piece to the feedback process. And, due to some Googly magic, these three tools combine their powers and record all of the feedback on the student's original document. The student's document ends up with the teacher's rubric-based feedback and comments, and the student's self-assessment added to the end.

If you would like a tutorial on how to do the entire process of using Doctopus and Goobric through the Google Classroom platform, the following video is a great place to start. It is ~7 minutes and walks you through each step. It was posted in early December, 2014, so it is fairly recent.

Whew! Anyone else tired from just thinking about all of those feedback opportunities? If you give these pieces a try, I'd love to hear about your experience. And, if you'd like to look at these pieces together, just send me an email and we'll find a time.

Go forth and give effective feedback!

Using Goobric in Google Classroom

If you have avoided Google Classroom because you didn't want to lose the use of Doctopus and Goobric in your classroom...Or, if you have stopped using Doctopus and Goobric in your classroom because you thought they didn't play well with Google Classroom...Or, if you have no idea what I'm talking about with Doctopus and Goobric...

Fear no more! They can all be friends!

Apparently, even though Doctopus is somewhat woven into the threads of Google Classroom, you can still utilize the full Doctopus script, as well as the digital rubric called Goobric. This tutorial video is about 10-minutes in length, but it will take you through the steps of how to use both tools within Google Classroom.

Giving Feedback with Diigo's Clipboard Add-On

Giving students timely, useful, and clear feedback is a vital piece of the writing process, and of the classroom in general. Unfortunately, there don't seem to be enough hours in the day sometimes. Ok, not sometimes. Ever.

Enter Diigo's Clipboard Add-On for Google Docs. You start by adding on the Add-On. Then, create a document that contains feedback on the general areas where you anticipate to see student's struggling. This feedback could contain a quick explanation of how to fix the issue, a link to an online resource, both pieces, or anything else you desired. After creating your feedback snippets, you add them to the Diigo Clipboard, which appears along the right-hand side of your Google Doc. When you open a student paper, you can view this same clipboard. As you add a comment to the paper, you can copy the pre-generated feedback from the Clipboard (link and all) and paste it into the comment box. The video below is a quick, 2-minute tutorial if you would like to see it in action.

This tool is obviously not the silver bullet for feedback since it is basically a way to give more detailed canned comments. It does, however, allow you to give more feedback in a faster manner, which saves you time for adding those individualized comments for each student.

Bonus: Students do not need to add any apps or add-ons to view your feedback because it is all right there in the normal Google comments box. Yea!

Voice Comments with Kaizena

Kaizena is a Google extension and Google Drive add-on that allows teachers to provide students with more formats of feedback than the traditional Google comment tool. In a nutshell, Kaizena takes the basic Google comment, pairs it with TurnItIn.com's GradeMark tagging feature, and adds in the ability to record a voice comment. Not all of their feedback options seem to be working at the moment, specifically the ability to link a piece of feedback to an online resource. BUT, the feather in their hat - the voice comment feature - appears to be one of their strongest features, and it has worked perfectly for me.

If you are interested in trying it out but would like a little guidance, you may use this Kaizena: Steps for Getting Started instructional/tutorial document I made.

(Feedback Add-On Tip: If you are interested in leaving voice comments, I would highly recommend a program like Kaizena. However, if you are more interested in leaving detailed comments with links to online resources, I would recommend using a program like Diigo Clipboard, which you can read about here.)

Turnitin Webinars

Turnitin is offering a number of webinars this week as they focus on their "Student Success Week." You can find the whole list here, but I've also included the links for a few that may be of higher interest regarding feedback.

(It is unclear if they will archive the webinars for all to access, but the registration pages do say that all registrants will be emailed a link to the recorded webinar. If you are interested in one, you may want to register just to have access to the archive.)

*Thursday, Oct. 9 @ noon: Students Feed Back: Student Perceptions of Instructor Feedback

*Thursday, Oct. 9 @ 3pm: Is the Pen Mightier than the Pixel? Students' Reactions to Handwritten vs Digital Comments

*Friday, Oct. 10 @ 1pm: The Role of Automated Feedback in the Classroom

6+1 Rubric Updated to Address the Common Core

Education Northwest recently revised their 6+1 rubric, the one we commonly use around our district. They have cross-walked it with the Common Core, and released this new version. As a teacher, it breaks down the traits in a way that allows you to give more specific feedback to your students.

What Your 9th Graders Did Last Year

Here is a small sample of some pieces used at the middle school level for reading and writing:

RACE
Most Whittier and some Patrick 8th-grade teachers used the RACE: Restate, Answer, Cite, and Explain strategy with their students last year (2013-2014). This year, most 8th-grade teachers are using it. It is a strategy to help students answer constructed response questions.

Sentence Starters for Response
These two documents, Reading Strategies and Cognitive Reading Strategies, are used by many middle school teachers to help students work through the reading strategies, as well as the idea: What strategic readers are thinking. Both documents also provide example sentence starters for responses.

Model Peer Feedback Through the Butterfly Video

This week, I heard a few teachers talk about using the butterfly feedback video (from our August inservice) with their students as they approached the peer-editing process. The teachers received pretty positive student feedback. Here's the video if you wish to use it in some way as well.