Stimulating reads - Do keep an eye on Blog on the week

In fact, I couldn't choose only one blog this week. Do have a look at the thought-provoking posts mentioned here (tab at the top of the page):
Blog of the week

Perhaps starting with this little gem would be a lovely way to tackle the final half term:
Motivation and Emotion


Please let me know if you would like to write a piece on this blog, either drawn from your enquiry work or from your work in the classroom / your personal reading.

Progress Update. One group's question: How can we change the perception of computer science and IT to encourage more girls to choose this subject for further study?

How can we change the perception of computer science and IT to encourage more girls to choose this subject for further study?

 We felt this was a very current and topical question as out of a number of students taking GCSE computing, we only have a minority of girls.

We narrowed down our research by selecting girls with high and average CAT scores and questioning them regarding their interest in computer science.

We planned a questionnaire to assess their current thinking and experiences. Next we discussed teacher observations and students’ outputs.

Through our investigation into papers written on this topic and our contact with CAS – Computing at School we made contact with Dr Pau who has been working on girls' views and attitudes to computing.

In light of this and the ways in which attitudes could change, we held an intervention which gave the girls exposure to different forms of technology (i.e. Lego Mindstorm). As well as this, Dr Pau agreed to visit our school and the girls.

The girls responded positively to this and we felt that this style of learning would be a benefit to the girls moving forward.

We have had several conversations with the girls regarding attitudes to computing and engineering, generally boy-heavy areas of study, and overwhelmingly views are changing as our intake for next year’s GCSE shows.

Following this the girls were invited to a  free event, planned for International Women's Day at the University of Southampton. It took place on the 7th March from 10am – 4pm, and was a  day of interactive events for female students. The event included sessions that gave: 

•    A chance to explore Lego Mindstorms

•    A glimpse into Nanotechnology

•    An activity based on Optoelectronics with light waves. 

Three key professors introduced the event: Professor Dame Wendy Hall (Dean of Faculty), Professor Neil White (Head of ECS) and Professor Michael Butler (Head of Athena Swan in ECS). 

We could now have a deal for some Lego Mindstorms for the school, future inspirational speakers and workshops for the girls through robogals.org

(Written by Sangita)

Progress Update: Some colleagues share some of their ideas so far

Some colleagues have kindly agreed to share some of their work. Read here about Independent Learning and Memory Retrieval

1. One group's line of enquiry is to find ways of ensuring that students can work more independently (of the teacher) and to evaluate any impact on their learning.

Here is what Reshma, Jade and Bhavna tried.

Aim – make students more independent through a variety of ways:

·         Year 8 – prepared starters on anything to do with number (evidence - student feedback)

·         Year 12 economics – students planned and prepared presentations once they had been given a brief outline of the topic. (evidence – student work, and observation notes)

·         Year 11 – prepared starters. Now have moved on preparing and presenting entire lessons including resourcing for revision purposes (evidence – student work)

·         Year 8 – ask students to read ahead and go through examples, which they can then present in the following lesson as part of the introduction to a topic.

·         Investigational activities to promote independent thinking through questioning (evidence – student work)

·         Modelling by students

·         Student topic leaders / “student experts”

It will be interesting to find out more soon…

Interesting Reading:
What is independent learning and what are the benefits for students? from CUREE

Here is the link:
http://www.curee.co.uk/files/publication/%5Bsite-timestamp%5D/Whatisindependentlearningandwhatarethebenefits.pdf


2. Meanwhile, Hina has been experimenting with ways in which her students can retrieve and retain knowledge for longer.

Here are a few notes from Hina:

CPD: Strengthening Knowledge (Memory) Retrieval and Retention. Experiments with 'Cheat sheets'

I have started to use a strategy called 'Collective Memory' and another where students create ‘cheat sheets’. I focused on years 9 and 10.  Here I will write about 'cheat sheets'.
To experiment with the use of cheat sheets, I asked year 9 and 10 students to prepare a topic cheat sheet (A4 size, single-sided) on Statistics ahead of a test.  The following week, I arranged a test for the students for which they were allowed to use a cheat sheet.

First 20 minutes students were asked to write in their test without their cheat sheet; for rest of the time I allowed them to use the cheat sheet and complete the test. At the end of the lesson, I asked students to provide their views on the use of their cheat sheets.

Here are some of the responses students have provided:

“I think it’s a good idea and they help made me think and remember. It’s good to condense information. I can see how it has really helped me.”

“The support has helped me.”

“I think the cheat sheet was helpful, but if I had added more things that were my weaknesses, it would have helped me more."

“Yes, it has helped, due to me making so many minor mistakes and has cost me many marks.”

From these responses, we can notice that cheat sheets are helping the students to consolidate their knowledge before the test and the simple act of memory retrieval strengthens their learning long term. Having access to the cheat sheets makes the students aware of the gaps in their learning and immediately help them correct these gaps. It also allows the teacher to see where the gaps are and plan subsequent work accordingly.

Students can use them for revision as all key points are written by them in their own style. What they also learnt was that they had omitted to include key information and some wanted to redraft their sheet. Some also realised that what they thought they knew (and therefore did not include on the sheet) was actually far from secure.

From the comments above, I can infer that students are not used to producing cheat sheets to help them remember key points on their topic/s. They need more training on creating and using cheat sheets.

We know that "Whatever students think about is what they will remember… memory is the residue of thought."(Daniel Willingham) and we should therefore encourage them to manipulate / summarise / condense / rephrase their topic content themselves.

Following this experiment and its response, I am planning to train year 9 and10 students to prepare cheat sheets for revision so they can get more benefit from them. I am also planning to test the use of cheat sheets with year 7.

Of course, we cannot allow students to use their sheets in all their tests but the experiment was interesting and I am looking at ways of developing this line of enquiry.

Interesting reading:

This blog by Maths teacher Kris Boulton: ...to the real
Why is it that students always seem to understand but then never remember?
Then this series of posts: Does memorisation get in the way of learning (parts 1- 4)
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4

This article by Daniel Willingham: What will improve a student's memory?
(link to the pdf)

Progress Update. Contribution from the PE department

How effective is diagnostic marking between students and teachers and does it have an impact on their learning or attainment?

Here are some of the slides tracing Hayley's and Jen's enquiry so far.

  

Initial Enquiry Questions (some have already been reviewed and redrafted)

Enquiry Questions, Clusters and Mentors

And this was the initial presentation in the hall (with thanks to David Weston from the Teacher Development Trust for some of the slides):

21 october Presentation from hgaldinoshea