GREAT THINKING THURSDAY
For Klein ISD Educators of Gifted Learners
September 6, 2018
HQT: Intentionally Personalized: Explore and Create Personalized Student Learning Plans and Pathways
In her study on the “The Eight Great Gripes ” of gifted students, Judy Galbraith identified boredom with school as gripe number two.
"The stuff we do in school is too easy and it’s boring."
This complaint is completely understandable. How many meetings have you sat through, going over material you had already mastered? Have you ever understood something quickly, but had to trudge through 45 more minutes of examples and explanations?
For our gifted students, their school career is a long stretch of those meetings. Many of them remember the topic you’re teaching from previous years, learned about it outside of school, or simply understood your lesson right away.
WE'VE GOT TO MOVE THEM ON TO SOMETHING ELSE.
- FOCUSED Pick a reasonable sized topic to pre–assess. An entire unit is too large. You won’t find many students who can demonstrate mastery of such a large topic. However, a single day’s lesson is too small and will bury you in paperwork as you try to pre–assess on a daily basis. More examples here.
- QUICK A giant test is intimidating and discourages effort. A quick, focused assessment encourages students to do their best, even if they can’t always pass. More here
- COMPREHENSIVE Think of the errors that separate expert understanding from basic understanding, and test those. Examples here.
- BUILT ON EXISTING MATERIALS Dust off those ancillary materials and mine them for good questions. Don’t reinvent the wheel.
- GUIDING Your pre–assessment should do more than separate the class into two groups: mastery and non–mastery. It should also inform your lessons.Maybe only three students successfully passed the pre-assessment. But did everyone get questions one and two right? This should change the way you teach that material.
SENSITIVE Your gifted kids like to score 100%. Explain why you offer the pre-assessment. A student who achieves 90% shouldn’t be forced to sit through all of your lessons. If a student misses one question, I’d include them on that specific lesson
SAVE THE DATE: GT SUMMIT: SEPT 29 2018
CALLING ALL EDUCATORS AS PRESENTERS!
LIQUID SHARD
Curiosity Guidelines
· Prompt students by simply asking: What do you notice? What do you wonder?
· Preview anything you show to kids.
· Write kids' questions down. Keep them posted.
Model curiosity! You must notice and wonder along with your students.
RIPPED, 3D POP UP CARDS
PSAT-NATIONAL MERIT SCHOLAR-SCHOLARSHIP RECOGNITION OPPORTUNITY!
WOW! THE CAMPS HAVE REACHED CAPACITY!
CALLING 9-12 GR TEACHERS!! You can VOLUNTEER here!