Article #6

Article #6

“The Highly Engaged Classroom”

By Marzano and Pickering

According to Marzano and Pickering (2011), authors of The Highly Engaged Classroom, student “engagement is a central aspect of effective teaching. If students are not engaged, there is little, if any, chance that they will learn what is being addressed in class” (pg. 1).  Therefore, Marano and Pickering highlight the importance of student engagement.

The text is composed of six chapters dealing with strategies to engage students of all learning types. The first chapter entitled research and theory looks at four topics that constitute their model of student attention and engagement (pg. 3). The four topic presented are student emotions “how do I feel?”, student interest “am I interested?”, perceived importance “is this important?” and perceptions of efficacy “can I do this?” (pg. 15). Chapter one then provides a model of engagement and attention, and then discusses transforming research and theory within the classroom (pg. 20). The end of each and every chapter in the text has a section allowing teachers and students to analyze their strengths and weaknesses (pg. 20).

Chapter two focuses solely on the student’s emotion and looks at “how do I feel?” (pg. 21). According to Marzano and Pickering, three factors effect students feelings at school which include the student’s energy levels, the attitude of the instructor, and the student’s view of recognition by teachers and peers (pg. 21).This chapter talks about implementing effective pacing methods, integrating physical activity and illustrating intensity and enthusiasm (pg. 30). The chapter discusses the importance of using humor, constructing up-beat student and teacher and peer relationships. The chapter ends by suggesting exercises teachers can use in their classrooms to meet each students emotional needs (pg. 53).

The third chapter entitled “am I interested?” looks at student interests. Marzano and Pickering explain that “students will attend to activities in the classroom if they are interested” (pg. 57). In order to get students interested in what they are learning, chapter three suggests teachers should employ games and trivial competition such as hosting vocabulary or review games like Jeopardy. In addition, teachers can get students interested by starting friendly debates or presenting unusual information by using outside resources such as PBS and Edutopia for ideas. Marzano and Pickering also propose using questioning to increase response rates by calling on students randomly or through a response chain (pg. 65).

Chapter four asks the question “is this important?” based on students perceived importance. Marzano and Pickering warn that “if students do not perceive classroom tasks as important, engagement will be muted or nonexistent” (pg. 87). This chapter provides ways to connect to students. For instance, chapter four suggests that teachers should connect to students’ lives by implementing comparison tasks or analogical reasoning tasks (pg. 90). In addition, Marzano and Pickering propose that teachers link to the students’ life’s ambitions by promoting personal projects to engage students (pg. 92). Chapter four also recommends teachers work towards encouraging application of knowledge by developing cognitively challenging tasks presenting real-life content (pg. 105).

The fifth chapter is entitled “can I do this?” This chapter focuses on self-efficacy, which is a student’s confidence in their capability to succeed in a particular situation or achieve a certain task. Marzano and Pickering believe self- efficacy may be the most significant element affecting student engagement (pg. 117). Chapter five also discusses ways for teachers to track and study student development by providing ideas to follow academic achievement over a specific amount of time (pg. 119). Next, Marzano and Pickering talk about ways for teachers to use effective verbal feedback and specify what type of feedback to avoid and what type of feedback to employ (pg. 124). This chapter also discusses the examples of self-efficacy through the use of stories, quotations (pg. 127). The chapter concludes by explaining ways to teach self-efficacy by having students recognize their personal theories (pg. 137).

Chapter six discusses “planning for high engagement?” Marzano and Pickering explain that high student engagement does not occur instantly; instead, teachers need think about engagement techniques to employ before each unit of teaching (pg. 147). The sixth chapter discusses daily strategies which include effective pacing, implementing effective feedback and constructing school relationships (pg. 148). The chapter also discusses opportunistic strategies such as implementing physical activity, using games and friendly competition, using humor, presenting unusual information, connecting to student’s lives and teaching self-efficacy (pg. 151). Chapter six ends by highlighting extended strategies and presents a summary (pg. 155).

The book concludes with an epilogue that includes an appendix that consists of answers to teaching exercises throughout the text (pg. 159). In addition, the appendix includes an explanation of what is an effect size regarding meta-analysis and research (pg. 183). Moreover, the appendix includes sample of unusual information teachers of a variety of subjects such as math and social studies should be aware of regarding student engagement (pg. 187). The appendix ends with a section on planning questions to help teachers monitor their daily and opportunistic strategies (pg. 202). The appendix also contains many charts and assessments for teachers to implement to monitor student engagement (pg. 205). 

Reflection

I found this text to be very beneficial for helping teachers understand techniques to better help students succeed. I really like how the chapters of the book are based on the first four topics presented in the beginning of the text. The four topics which are based on student emotions, student interests, student perceived importance and students perceptions of efficacy help the teacher understand and realize each student is different and each student has diverse needs. Therefore, I feel as though and the methods presented in Marzano’s and Pickering’s text make differentiation in the classroom more realistic. Although some of the strategies can be complex, Marzano and Pickering do a great job at providing many real life classroom examples, classroom exercises and charts to explain the techniques in great detail. I plan to use this text to help me formulate my questions for my research study on differentiation in the classroom. I also felt like the summary section near the end of every chapter was very beneficial in helping the reader make complete sense of the readings. The analyzing your strengths and weaknesses at the end of each chapter was also helpful because by using a self-assessment scale, it allows the reader which is the teacher to rate their teaching strategies from a 0 (not using), 1 (beginning), 2 (developing), 3 (applying), 4 (innovating) (pg. 110).

Reference

Marzano, R. & Pickering, D. (2011). The Highly Engaged Classroom. Bloomington, IN:

Marzano Research Laboratory.

Article #5

Article # 5

 "Examining Differentiated Instruction: Teachers Respond"

By Brenda Logan

According to Logan (2011), author of Examining Differentiated Instruction: Teachers Respond, "today's classrooms are more diverse than ever" (pg. 1). Logan introduces her paper by explaining that 21^st century classrooms are “defined by diversity” and states that “by 2035, students of color will be a majority in schools with increasing populations of children of immigrant and migrant families” (pg. 2).

After introducing her study, in order to find ways to differentiate for these diverse students, Logan starts talking about the review of literature she has conducted. The first literature Logan reviews surrounds the major principles of differentiation (pg. 2). Logan refers to many articles and principles dealing with differentiation including work from Tomlinson (1999). Logan explains that according to Tomlinson “teachers ought to focus on the essentials in learning, ought to attend to student differences, should collaborate with students on learning and should not separate assessment from instruction” (pg. 2).

Once Logan discusses the major principles, the second literature Logan reviews looks at the essential components of differentiation (pg. 2). Logan again refers to Tomlinson who classified three components of differentiation which include content, process, and products (pg. 3). Logan then refers to Langa & Yost (2007) authors of Curriculum Mapping for Differentiated Instruction, who suggests three different components of differentiation which are students readiness level, students interest level and students learning profile and then suggests ways to modify content, process and content (pg. 3).

The third literature Logan reviews deals with suggestions for implementing differentiated instruction. Logan refers to many authors and articles surrounding differentiation and suggests easy ways to differentiation. One suggestion Logan makes based on the literature reviews is for teachers to collect profiles of every students such as “learning preferences, family structure, hobbies, interests, and assessment scores” (pg. 4). In addition, Logan suggests that teachers need to take the time to reflect, evaluate and analyze differentiation. Finally, Logan says that in order to make differentiation manageable, teachers need to “build upon personal strengths and talents” (pg. 4).

The fourth literature Logan reviews considers the myths, clichés, and barriers within differentiated instruction. One cliché from the literature review was that “differentiation is just another phase and the pendulum will swing the other way soon because the emphasis on testing will not last forever” (pg. 4). One barrier is that teachers do not have the time to differentiate and that teachers do not have access to the professional development resources or administrative backing necessary for differentiation (pg. 5). One myth was that “the differentiated classroom has to do with dividing the class groups into bluebirds and redbirds (pg. 5).

The fifth literature Logan reviews looks at research studies and theories supporting differentiation. During the first part of this section of the literature review, Logan discusses how differentiation instruction was utilized within the classroom with a number of different content areas such as math, reading, science, social studies, along with different grade levels including, elementary, middle, and high school (pg. 5).

After discussing the five areas of literature reviews regarding differentiation, Logan then sums up the research. During this section, Logan states that “little research has been completed on the effectiveness of differentiated instruction” (pg. 7). Logan feels like there is a “need to add to the body of research about the factors that encourage and discourage teachers in attending to student differences” (pg. 7).

Next, Logan discusses the methods section. Logan explains that the purpose of her study is to learn what teachers identify as chief elements of differentiated instruction (pg. 7). In this section, Logan states her two research questions which are “will teachers agree on what is essential to differentiating instruction in the classroom and will teachers agree with the myths surrounding the practice?” (pg. 7).

Then, Logan explains the participants and setting of the study. For this study, Logan surveyed 141 teachers. Of the participants, 38 were male while 103 were female. Participants taught anywhere from 1 year to 35 years. All content areas were included in the study such as math, art, band, Spanish, special education and technology (pg. 8).

After discussing the participants and setting, Logan explains the research instrument. Logan’s study was based on a qualitative survey that was developed using data obtained from the literature reviews. The survey consisted of 16 questions dealing with the essential principles, the essential components, and the myths of differentiated instruction (pg. 8). The survey questions consisted of a Likert-type scale which asked participants to circle whether they strongly agree, agree, disagree, strongly disagree and not sure (pg. 8).

Logan then goes into the analysis and results section. Logan explains the process of going through all of the data obtained from the surveys. Logan then goes through each question asked on the survey and explains what percentage of teachers agreed or disagreed with the questions asked (pg. 9).

Next, Logan presents the discussion portion of the paper. In this section, Logan says studies need to understand why teachers are not agreeing or disagreeing regarding differentiation. Logan also suggests that the problem of differentiation lies with the public school and that public schools need to spend more time training teachers. Logan stresses that "professors must, as much as possible, engage in professional conversations about differentiation by agreeing to serve as mentors to first-year novice teachers and by offering workshops on college campuses and at school sites" (pg. 10).

Logan ends the paper by stating that differentiation helps students reach their summits and potential. Logan feels as though schools have an obligation to modify to the evolving needs and stages of students (pg. 11). Logan believes teachers need to "move away from a pedagogy of scarcity to a pedagogy of plenty" (pg. 11).

Reflection

After reviewing Logan's (2011), article on Examining Differentiated Instruction: Teachers Respond, I had a new outlook on differentiation. Before reading this article, I did not really consider the clichés, myths, and barriers to differentiation. However, after reading her article I began to realize all of the different perspectives teachers have regarding differentiation.

I found Logan's article to be very well organized. For instance, she did a nice job at separating each section of the article using bold headings. I found her review of literature section to be very detailed and insightful.

I think Logan could have highlighted her research questions a little more in the article. Her research questions were not mentioned until the middle of the article in the bottom of the methods section. Although Logan did a nice job discussing her findings, I think Logan could have talked a little more about the strengths and weaknesses of her study along with additional ideas for future research.

I believe Logan's teacher survey regarding teacher's perspective of differentiation was very well planned and easy to understand. When I conduct research, I may use Logan's type of research format by creating a 15 questions survey based on the literature review I have conducted over the semester and using a Likert scale to obtain teachers responses regarding differentiation in the classroom. Logan did a great job at providing detailed information about the data she received from the surveys.

Reference

Logan, B. (2011). Examining Differentiated Instruction: Teachers Respond. Research in Higher

Education Journal (13). Retrieved from http://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ1068803