Solution Fluency
The 6Ds—Define, Discover, Dream, Design, Deliver, Debrief
Real- World Skills
As a teacher in the computer lab. I am primarily focused on teaching children how to use the computers, internet how to do research projects and use new technology tools. I am also working with classroom teachers to create STEAM projects that match the curriculum standards. I am teaching children how to do basic computer programming with Hour of Code and Tynker. I am also introducing students to Tinkercad. Tinkercad is a simple, online 3D design and 3D printing tool. I am also have them learn how to type, use the internet to complete a research project and many other things.
"I Can's" vs Essential Questions
I really haven’t done a lot with having students design and ask essential questions. We have been really pushed to have “I can” statements posted in our classrooms that connect to what we are teaching. I can turn these “I Can” statements into essential questions with my students.
Define
What is the problem? Identify where we are so we can figure out where we need to go.
Discover
How did this problem occur? What background information do we have that can give the problem its context, and identifying what you need to know and what you need to be able to do to solve the problem.
Dream
How could this problem could be solved? This is where we use the knowledge we have gathered to visualize a creative and appropriate solution.
Design
Design a process of how we are going to solve the problem, working backwards. Making sure you include realistic, measurable steps.
Deliver
Produce or publish present the information. This is where you implement the design to complete the solution to the problem in two separate steps: Produce (actually creating the solution in its working format), and Publish (applying the product in an effort to solve the problem).
Debrief
Take time and really go back and look at what you did, how you could make things better. Students need this step to really take a look at the learning journey and take ownership in their own learning.
Debriefing
I think the debrief is one of the most important. After everything is done and over it is a time to review and analyze the product and process, an identify areas for potential improvement. Students are not often given the chance to evaluate a learning journey, and this is and integral part of guiding them towards taking responsibility for their own learning. I also think that for me the Debrief is one of the hardest things for me to implement. I do exit slips for major assignments but I only see students once a week for 45 mins. I see students roughly 10 times in a trimester and really struggle to fit everything in I need to cover. I really wish I had more times for students to talk about what they did, what they learned, what things went well, how they could improve.
So why use Solution Fluency and Essential Questions?
Essential questions provide the teacher with a thoughtful approach to the content being taught. They help teachers get in his or her mind the usefulness, the relevance, and the greater benefit for the content being taught. The teacher plans using essential questions as a GUIDE to construct a hierarchy of knowledge. Not everything in a course, a unit, or a textbook is of equal weight. Some things are more important than others. (You can’t teach everything! Covering material does not equal LEARNING material! They help answer students’ questions such as, “Why do we have to learn this?” They are thought-provoking to students and can be used to stimulate discussion, debate, dissent, and research. (They go beyond the knowledge level of learning. In fact, essential questions hover around the upper three levels or so of Bloom’s Taxonomy.) All learning ultimately begins and ends with a question! They encourage engaged learners
References
Crockett, L., Jukes, I., & Churches, A. (2011). Literacy is not enough: 21st-century fluencies for the digital age. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin.
- Chapter 4, “Solution Fluency” (pp. 23–32)
Authentic Education. (2013). Video: Jay and others explain essential questions [Video file]. Retrieved from http://essentialquestions.org/video_9.lasso