June 7, 2025 • 21 mins
Has something in this episode resonated with you? Get in touch!
Ready to transform the headache of report writing? Join me, Jocelyn, on the Structured Literacy Podcast, where we unpack the art of aligning curriculum with classroom planning. This episode offers practical tips to grade with ease. We'll reveal how a well-organized classroom and targeted 'I can' statements not only empower your students but also pave the way for straightforward assessments. Say goodbye to the common pitfalls that bog down report writing—like insufficient evidence or a lack of differentiation in student work—and embrace strategies that celebrate every student's unique path to success.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Jocelyn (00:00):
Hello and welcome to this episode of the Structured
Literacy Podcast.
I'm Jocelyn and I'd like tosend some virtual hugs to all
Australian teachers who areapproaching reporting time.
We know that we're busy allyear, but reporting is a unique
time in the calendar.
I recall, year after year, thestack of student work, topped
with on-balance judgment sheets,in a neat line across my lounge
(00:21):
room floor.
I crossed every I and dottedevery T to make sure that my
judgments about studentachievement were correct.
As I did this, carefullyconsidering the achievement
standards of all curriculumareas, I found that some
subjects were easy to grade butothers more difficult, and there
were reasons for that.
In today's episode, I'm goingto unpack some of the reasons
(00:42):
that reporting can be tricky andwhat you can do in your
planning to drastically reducedifficulty in grading.
It might seem strange to betalking about planning as you
approach reporting, but actuallythat's the perfect time to
bring it to your attention,because it's in considering why
grading is hard that we see thegaps in our planning.
You may not be ready to usethis episode right now, so I
(01:06):
suggest that you set a reminderin your phone for about the time
that you're about to startplanning for the next term to
come back and revisit thisepisode.
Use the steps I'm describingand your reporting next time
will be so much easier.
Let's get stuck in At its mostbasic.
The number one way to ensure astress-free report writing
(01:28):
experience is to teachrigorously to your
jurisdiction's curriculumguidelines.
That's it Done.
Glad I could help and go makeyourself a cup of tea and enjoy
your day after listening to theshortest podcast episode in
history.
Just kidding, of course it'snot that simple.
How many times have you satdown to write the semester's
reports, scanned the achievementstandard and thought, oh golly,
(01:48):
gosh, or some such statement,perhaps involving many swear
words, I just don't know what towrite.
If this is you, don't despair.
There are simple steps that youcan take to make it all easier.
In my experience, common causesof report writing stress include
number one not actuallyteaching what the curriculum
(02:09):
requires.
This might include planningonly from content descriptors of
the Australian curriculum oryour state's curriculum and not
giving due consideration to theachievement standard that will
be used to grade.
I've seen this happen manytimes.
This might also include justlooking at the overall broad
content and going off on ayellow brick road of instruction
(02:30):
that leads you to the wingedmonkey's lair instead of the
Emerald City.
Missing the mark on thecurriculum can come about
because you're using units orresources that people claim are
aligned but are only looselyconnected to the achievement
standards.
It can also happen because wehave a vision in our head of
what a topic looks like and theknowledge and skills it includes
(02:51):
that doesn't actually matchwhat the curriculum's asking for
.
Reason number two for reportingstress can come from not
planning instruction andassessment adequately, so that
while you might have done a uniton growing plants, you didn't
think through the assessmenttask well enough to adequately
capture student knowledge andskill.
This leads to not havingsuitable evidence against which
(03:14):
to grade.
Number three is that everystudent has identical work and
you have no way to differentiatebetween them or make
personalized comments if youneed to.
I've been here so many timesand I know it's disheartening.
Usually this has happenedbecause I hadn't adequately
broken skills and knowledge downenough into their smaller parts
(03:35):
, taught them properly andconsolidated them well enough
for students to workindependently.
This led to scaffolds having tobe so tight and strong that it
was almost like I was walkingthe students through step by
step with no independent thoughton their part, it was then
impossible for them to branchout enough to show what they
(03:55):
knew.
Now, when I'm saying thesethings, please know that I'm not
criticizing teachers.
A huge part of the structuresthat are set up for us lead us
in, unfortunately, not the mosttargeted direction.
So the curriculum is written tobe skills-based.
There's very little there aboutthe knowledge that students
have to acquire, and so we do alot of doing in our instruction,
(04:19):
but we don't necessarily focusa lot on what students know.
You can't be skilled withoutknowledge, so if we haven't
spent enough time buildingknowledge, the kids aren't going
to get to be skilled.
They're also not going to beable to explain the why and the
how of what you're trying toteach them.
Whether this be in English,science, hass or health, it's
(04:39):
the same story.
The fourth reason that reportingmay be difficult is because you
didn't allow enough time tocomplete assessment and have
been frantically trying to pushthrough with the students in
time to meet deadlines.
Rushed lessons where we'veglossed over details and script
on supports leads to substandardwork from students and
difficulty in being able tograde A.
(05:01):
Fifth common difficulty is thatyou taught using an integrated
approach, where you tried toteach more than one subject area
at a time and found that youdidn't actually cover the
subject material in enough depthto really say that students
knew what they needed to.
Integrated approaches oftenlead to shallow coverage of
(05:23):
knowledge and skills because youjust can't go deep in the time
allocated, making it challengingfor students to develop the
understanding and skills thatthey need to.
If this is something you'd liketo explore a little more, have
a listen to season two, episodesix of the podcast, how to
create an integrated literacyblock, and while this episode
(05:43):
does focus on literacy, thereare learnings for the whole
curriculum in that particularepisode.
The sixth reason is you areaware of the rubric associated
with the content area and knewthat some students were capable
of B's and A's but didn't planopportunities for them to
demonstrate their knowledge andskill at that level.
(06:03):
In order to award a B, studentsneed to have demonstrated
knowledge and skills to a deeplevel, with added details
independently.
To award an A, the followingneeds to apply the student
consistently displays accuracyand precision in performing the
skills at a very high level,including large amounts of
(06:26):
detail and explanation.
The student can apply thisindependently to new situations
and contexts.
If we don't give students theopportunity to actually do these
things, how can we award theman A?
The A doesn't go to the mostadvanced student in the class.
Having that approach leads togreat variability across the
(06:46):
school and between schools.
Finally, reporting can betricky because you did a unit
with your class, but when youask them to explain or describe
something, they looked at youblankly and could not actually
describe what, why or how thingshappened.
To be frank, you just didn'tbuild deep knowledge, check for
understanding, adjustinstruction to meet their needs
(07:08):
and then provide the opportunityfor them to show you what they
could do.
If we want grading to be easier,we have to teach in a way that
leads to strong learning, andthat means building knowledge,
helping children apply it inhands-on activities and
situations and then having thembuild a deep enough
understanding that they canexplain it.
(07:29):
Just doing a science experimentis not enough.
It's all very well to talkabout where wheels have fallen
off, and over the years mywheels have well and truly
fallen off, but I have learnedhow to put them back on again.
I want to share some of theideas with you that have really
helped me improve my teachingand therefore reporting, and to
(07:50):
that end, I'd like to outlinesome basic principles of
backward design that I've foundto be particularly useful in
creating rigorous teaching foreffective learning across the
curriculum.
Now, I get that this topic iscompletely unsexy and might
leave you reaching for the skipbutton on this episode, but
please stick with me.
Backward planning or backwarddesign does not have to mean dry
(08:14):
, boring units of work thatleave children rolling their
eyes or sleeping on their desks.
If that's what's happening,something's wrong.
It means being extremely clearabout what you're teaching and
what you're not, and how eachand every lesson and experience
links to the learning intentionsyou've identified.
Step number one in this processis to know your students.
(08:34):
All teaching is about them.
How do they best learn?
What's their level of literacy?
What kind of learning worksbest for them?
And please do not misunderstandme, I am not talking about
learning styles and Bloom'sgardeners' matrices.
What I'm talking about is howmuch complexity can your
students cope with at once?
How fast can instructionproceed?
(08:56):
What is their previous learningthat they're bringing to your
new unit?
You are best placed to knowthat.
The other thing is what levelof language, both oral and
written, do they currently haveavailable to them, and how are
you going to help them build it?
Do your students have theprerequisite skills and
knowledge to even engage withthe learning you're planning?
(09:17):
Do they have a learningdifficulty, such as dyslexia?
Do they have ADHD or come froma background of trauma which
means that they're going torequire an even more structured,
predictable classroomenvironment just to engage?
Are you planning for the needsof all students or just the easy
to reach middle?
Or, even worse, are youpitching learning at the
(09:37):
aspirational level and leavingeveryone else behind?
Step two start with the end inmind.
What does your jurisdiction'scurriculum require children to
be able to know and do?
Are you familiar enough withthe curriculum and know what's
expected of students indifferent grades?
Once you know what's expected,you can develop both I can and I
(09:58):
know statements related to thatcurriculum.
These statements will form thebasis of the success criteria
you will share with yourstudents.
You will also use these towrite report comments.
So here's the link between theplanning and the reporting.
When developing the statements,you can then refer to a rubric
(10:19):
you will use to grade, and thisis where you begin to develop an
understanding of precisely whatyour students will need to be
able to do at which level.
So, for example, the achievementstandard of the Australian
curriculum year three sciencearea states they classify solids
and liquids based on observableproperties and describe how to
(10:44):
cause a change of state.
So they can describe not justidentify, but describe in their
own words how to turn a solidfrom a liquid and a liquid to a
solid.
And the content descriptor saysinvestigate the observable
properties of solids and liquidsand how adding or removing heat
energy leads to a change ofstate.
(11:04):
Here's where we get in trouble,because it says investigate.
Okay, well, we can investigate,but how do we know they've
actually learned anything?
You can do the best experimentin the universe, but how do you
know what they know as a resultof doing that?
So we go back to theachievement standard with the
verbs that are used.
(11:25):
The first one is classify, thesecond one is describe.
So our I know statements mightbe.
I know that molecules in a solidstate are packed tightly
together.
I know that molecules in aliquid state move around each
other.
I know that solids have a fixedshape.
I know that solids cannot becompressed or squashed.
I know that liquids have afixed volume but not a fixed
(11:48):
shape.
I know that liquids take theshape of, but not a fixed shape.
I know that liquids take theshape of their containers.
I can statements might be.
I can describe the propertiesof solids and liquids.
I can use this knowledge tosort substances.
I can describe how solids andliquids change when they are
heated and cooled.
So there's more I know thanthere is I can, because you
(12:09):
can't be skilled withoutknowledge, and this forms part
of your review.
In whatever subject area you'reteaching, the knowledge must be
retrieved repetitively, but notrepetitively so that people cry
, but just more than once untilstudents have it, because they
can't describe anything to youif they don't have the knowledge
(12:30):
.
Once you have your I can and Iknow statements worked out, work
through the rubric and decidehow you will determine to what
degree students have learnedwhat they need to, because the
difference here indifferentiating in the
particular unit that I'm talkingabout, is not that some
children will learn all the Iknow and the I can's.
It's the level of supportrequired for them to do so and
(12:59):
the degree of complexityinvolved in them demonstrating
what they know.
Remember, you'll be assessingevery one of these, so be
realistic about what you canreasonably teach well in the
time you have.
It's better to teach less andgo deeper than it is to teach it
all so you can tick the boxes.
But then three weeks later youask the students a question and
they have no idea what you'retalking about.
Do less and do it better.
(13:20):
Go an inch wide and a mile deep, not an inch deep and a mile
wide.
The associated report commentfor a B grade here might be
something like.
This semester in science,student A used specific
vocabulary to describe whathappens to the molecules in
solids and liquids when they'reheated and cooled.
The detailed explanations intheir presentation to the class
(13:42):
showed a well-developedunderstanding of the topic.
Now I've included apresentation here, but you don't
have to.
There's lots of ways forstudents to demonstrate what
they know, but we can see herethat this links to our I can and
our I know statements directly.
There's a direct link betweenthe comment in the report and
what we set out for students tolearn in the first place.
(14:04):
Step three is to plan yourassessment.
It might seem odd to beplanning assessments before your
teaching sequence, but by doingit nice and early you can
critically evaluate what it'sgoing to take for your students
to achieve success and a reallygreat task for you as teachers
to do is to pretend to be thestudent and complete the
(14:24):
assessment task.
If all goes well, you'll nowhave an exemplar.
You'll have a worked example toshow what needs to happen.
But one of the things we oftenfind is that the ideas sound
reasonable in our head.
Then we sit down to actuallycomplete the task and realise
precisely how difficult it is.
That helps us pare back ourexpectations to something that's
(14:46):
reasonable and manageable forcognitive load and also really
highlights what we're going tohave to focus in on to help our
kids In making decisions aboutassessment.
Ensure that you leave yourselfand your students enough time
for them to learn, review andpractice before asking them to
demonstrate the knowledge orskill on their own.
Spending one lesson on aconcept and then asking students
(15:08):
to independently complete atask in that same lesson leaves
a lot of students behind.
It also doesn't adequatelyassess student knowledge.
This is particularly true forstudents who come to your
classroom with less worldknowledge to draw on.
Knowing your students andunderstanding the expectations
of the assessment tasks you wishthem to complete is crucial
(15:30):
when considering how you'llmaximise their achievement.
Ensure that you plan to haveevidence for all areas of the
rubric under consideration.
Step four plan the sequence oflessons.
So so far we've thought aboutour students, we've thought
about the curriculum and we'vethought about the assessment
task.
Now it's time to plan thesequence of lessons.
(15:51):
Some important points toremember in planning your
lessons are plan units in detailfrom beginning to end.
I guarantee that if you planthe first four lessons and think
I'll get to the rest later, therest will end up in a haphazard
collection of lessons and yourunit will not be nearly as
successful as it could be.
And yes, guilty as charged,your honor, I've been there and
(16:14):
done that.
Make sure that every lessonrelates back to the rubric.
Our days are full and there'sreally no time for waffle.
Share the learning intentionsand success criteria with your
students and refer back to themthroughout the unit, each lesson
showing students where you'vebeen, where they've been
successful and what's comingnext.
(16:35):
This really helps cognitiveload and will help your students
with anxiety immensely.
Use these as the basis forregular review.
Focus on language development Ifyou want students to achieve an
A or a B, they need to be ableto articulate their learning
well.
Provide opportunities todevelop both sentence structures
and vocabulary that you wantstudents to use in their writing
(16:59):
as part of assessment and thisapplies no matter what subject
area you're talking about,whether it's English, science,
hass or health language is key.
Always engage students orallybefore asking them to write.
They get a little run-up andit's really helpful.
Plan for how you will maximiseparticipation of every student.
The we do is not you and twokids who've put their hand up to
(17:23):
answer a question for you.
Go back to the podcast episodeabout getting questions right
from the start.
That will help you here.
If there's a lot of sitting onthe mat and listening or not
listening, as the case may beyou're unlikely to get the
outcomes you're looking for.
How will you check forunderstanding throughout each
lesson and between the lessons?
Keep things simple.
(17:43):
Don't try to design everythingfrom scratch if you don't have
to.
There's nothing wrong withutilising prepared resources for
any area of the curriculum.
Just remember that you do theteaching, not the lesson
provider.
It's important that you makedecisions to meet your students
when they're up to.
It's also important to makesure that whatever you're using
(18:04):
has been planned for you toteach explicitly not with an
inquiry or discovery approachand that it links really tightly
to the curriculum.
Leave time for unexpecteddelays and interruptions I
guarantee they're going tohappen and use an explicit I do,
we do, you do approach in eachlesson and throughout the unit.
Finally, make students activeparticipants in lessons, not
(18:28):
passive receptors.
This does not mean you have toengage in frou-frou, funsy
activities.
You are the teacher and yourjob's to teach.
But they need to be thinkingand doing all through the
lessons, and hands-on work is apart of that.
The final step in the processhere is to review, evaluate and
mark regularly.
Review student work regularlyto evaluate the effectiveness of
(18:51):
your teaching.
Student achievement is feedbackto you about how well your
teaching met their needs.
If your students are not ableto do what you need them to do,
then you need to changesomething about the teaching.
Keeping a formative assessmentchecklist can help you to record
progress throughout the unit,not just at the end.
One of the simplest ways todetermine whether your students
(19:14):
are learning in the way that youplanned is to regularly ask
them to take five minutes towrite down what they've learned
in the unit or the lesson so far.
This is a form of retrieval andserves two purposes it
strengthens student learning andgives you terrific feedback
about your instruction.
A backward design model ofplanning will help you bring
rigor to your teaching and willalso set you and your students
(19:36):
up for success, so that you canreclaim time each semester for
yourself and your family.
Yes, we need to spend more timeplanning for reporting and in
the reporting itself, but indoing that, we're going to make
everything so much easier.
Reporting itself but in doingthat, we're going to make
everything so much easier.
The five steps of backwarddesign don't actually have to be
(19:56):
all that unsexy.
When you know your students, youknow what the curriculum is
asking.
You have a clear vision of theassessment that's going to help
you capture their learning.
You plan lessons to help themget there and then you evaluate
and mark regularly.
With review, the most amazingthings can happen.
This is the approach we take inour tech space units inside the
(20:18):
resource room, but you canapply this model to all of your
planning.
As I said at the start of theepisode, this might not be the
time right now for you to thinkabout this too heavily, so set a
reminder in your phone or yourcalendar to come back to this
episode planning to make reportwriting easier, so that you can
(20:39):
use this structure and style ofplanning when you're thinking
about what's coming up for youand your students.
That's all from me for now.
I wish you a world of happyteaching.
Thanks so much, everyone.
See you next time.
Bye.
Hello and welcome to this episode of the Structured
Literacy Podcast.
I'm Jocelyn and I'd like tosend some virtual hugs to all
Australian teachers who areapproaching reporting time.
We know that we're busy allyear, but reporting is a unique
time in the calendar.
I recall, year after year, thestack of student work, topped
with on-balance judgment sheets,in a neat line across my lounge
(00:21):
room floor.
I crossed every I and dottedevery T to make sure that my
judgments about studentachievement were correct.
As I did this, carefullyconsidering the achievement
standards of all curriculumareas, I found that some
subjects were easy to grade butothers more difficult, and there
were reasons for that.
In today's episode, I'm goingto unpack some of the reasons
(00:42):
that reporting can be tricky andwhat you can do in your
planning to drastically reducedifficulty in grading.
It might seem strange to betalking about planning as you
approach reporting, but actuallythat's the perfect time to
bring it to your attention,because it's in considering why
grading is hard that we see thegaps in our planning.
You may not be ready to usethis episode right now, so I
(01:06):
suggest that you set a reminderin your phone for about the time
that you're about to startplanning for the next term to
come back and revisit thisepisode.
Use the steps I'm describingand your reporting next time
will be so much easier.
Let's get stuck in At its mostbasic.
The number one way to ensure astress-free report writing
(01:28):
experience is to teachrigorously to your
jurisdiction's curriculumguidelines.
That's it Done.
Glad I could help and go makeyourself a cup of tea and enjoy
your day after listening to theshortest podcast episode in
history.
Just kidding, of course it'snot that simple.
How many times have you satdown to write the semester's
reports, scanned the achievementstandard and thought, oh golly,
(01:48):
gosh, or some such statement,perhaps involving many swear
words, I just don't know what towrite.
If this is you, don't despair.
There are simple steps that youcan take to make it all easier.
In my experience, common causesof report writing stress include
number one not actuallyteaching what the curriculum
(02:09):
requires.
This might include planningonly from content descriptors of
the Australian curriculum oryour state's curriculum and not
giving due consideration to theachievement standard that will
be used to grade.
I've seen this happen manytimes.
This might also include justlooking at the overall broad
content and going off on ayellow brick road of instruction
(02:30):
that leads you to the wingedmonkey's lair instead of the
Emerald City.
Missing the mark on thecurriculum can come about
because you're using units orresources that people claim are
aligned but are only looselyconnected to the achievement
standards.
It can also happen because wehave a vision in our head of
what a topic looks like and theknowledge and skills it includes
(02:51):
that doesn't actually matchwhat the curriculum's asking for
.
Reason number two for reportingstress can come from not
planning instruction andassessment adequately, so that
while you might have done a uniton growing plants, you didn't
think through the assessmenttask well enough to adequately
capture student knowledge andskill.
This leads to not havingsuitable evidence against which
(03:14):
to grade.
Number three is that everystudent has identical work and
you have no way to differentiatebetween them or make
personalized comments if youneed to.
I've been here so many timesand I know it's disheartening.
Usually this has happenedbecause I hadn't adequately
broken skills and knowledge downenough into their smaller parts
(03:35):
, taught them properly andconsolidated them well enough
for students to workindependently.
This led to scaffolds having tobe so tight and strong that it
was almost like I was walkingthe students through step by
step with no independent thoughton their part, it was then
impossible for them to branchout enough to show what they
(03:55):
knew.
Now, when I'm saying thesethings, please know that I'm not
criticizing teachers.
A huge part of the structuresthat are set up for us lead us
in, unfortunately, not the mosttargeted direction.
So the curriculum is written tobe skills-based.
There's very little there aboutthe knowledge that students
have to acquire, and so we do alot of doing in our instruction,
(04:19):
but we don't necessarily focusa lot on what students know.
You can't be skilled withoutknowledge, so if we haven't
spent enough time buildingknowledge, the kids aren't going
to get to be skilled.
They're also not going to beable to explain the why and the
how of what you're trying toteach them.
Whether this be in English,science, hass or health, it's
(04:39):
the same story.
The fourth reason that reportingmay be difficult is because you
didn't allow enough time tocomplete assessment and have
been frantically trying to pushthrough with the students in
time to meet deadlines.
Rushed lessons where we'veglossed over details and script
on supports leads to substandardwork from students and
difficulty in being able tograde A.
(05:01):
Fifth common difficulty is thatyou taught using an integrated
approach, where you tried toteach more than one subject area
at a time and found that youdidn't actually cover the
subject material in enough depthto really say that students
knew what they needed to.
Integrated approaches oftenlead to shallow coverage of
(05:23):
knowledge and skills because youjust can't go deep in the time
allocated, making it challengingfor students to develop the
understanding and skills thatthey need to.
If this is something you'd liketo explore a little more, have
a listen to season two, episodesix of the podcast, how to
create an integrated literacyblock, and while this episode
(05:43):
does focus on literacy, thereare learnings for the whole
curriculum in that particularepisode.
The sixth reason is you areaware of the rubric associated
with the content area and knewthat some students were capable
of B's and A's but didn't planopportunities for them to
demonstrate their knowledge andskill at that level.
(06:03):
In order to award a B, studentsneed to have demonstrated
knowledge and skills to a deeplevel, with added details
independently.
To award an A, the followingneeds to apply the student
consistently displays accuracyand precision in performing the
skills at a very high level,including large amounts of
(06:26):
detail and explanation.
The student can apply thisindependently to new situations
and contexts.
If we don't give students theopportunity to actually do these
things, how can we award theman A?
The A doesn't go to the mostadvanced student in the class.
Having that approach leads togreat variability across the
(06:46):
school and between schools.
Finally, reporting can betricky because you did a unit
with your class, but when youask them to explain or describe
something, they looked at youblankly and could not actually
describe what, why or how thingshappened.
To be frank, you just didn'tbuild deep knowledge, check for
understanding, adjustinstruction to meet their needs
(07:08):
and then provide the opportunityfor them to show you what they
could do.
If we want grading to be easier,we have to teach in a way that
leads to strong learning, andthat means building knowledge,
helping children apply it inhands-on activities and
situations and then having thembuild a deep enough
understanding that they canexplain it.
(07:29):
Just doing a science experimentis not enough.
It's all very well to talkabout where wheels have fallen
off, and over the years mywheels have well and truly
fallen off, but I have learnedhow to put them back on again.
I want to share some of theideas with you that have really
helped me improve my teachingand therefore reporting, and to
(07:50):
that end, I'd like to outlinesome basic principles of
backward design that I've foundto be particularly useful in
creating rigorous teaching foreffective learning across the
curriculum.
Now, I get that this topic iscompletely unsexy and might
leave you reaching for the skipbutton on this episode, but
please stick with me.
Backward planning or backwarddesign does not have to mean dry
(08:14):
, boring units of work thatleave children rolling their
eyes or sleeping on their desks.
If that's what's happening,something's wrong.
It means being extremely clearabout what you're teaching and
what you're not, and how eachand every lesson and experience
links to the learning intentionsyou've identified.
Step number one in this processis to know your students.
(08:34):
All teaching is about them.
How do they best learn?
What's their level of literacy?
What kind of learning worksbest for them?
And please do not misunderstandme, I am not talking about
learning styles and Bloom'sgardeners' matrices.
What I'm talking about is howmuch complexity can your
students cope with at once?
How fast can instructionproceed?
(08:56):
What is their previous learningthat they're bringing to your
new unit?
You are best placed to knowthat.
The other thing is what levelof language, both oral and
written, do they currently haveavailable to them, and how are
you going to help them build it?
Do your students have theprerequisite skills and
knowledge to even engage withthe learning you're planning?
(09:17):
Do they have a learningdifficulty, such as dyslexia?
Do they have ADHD or come froma background of trauma which
means that they're going torequire an even more structured,
predictable classroomenvironment just to engage?
Are you planning for the needsof all students or just the easy
to reach middle?
Or, even worse, are youpitching learning at the
(09:37):
aspirational level and leavingeveryone else behind?
Step two start with the end inmind.
What does your jurisdiction'scurriculum require children to
be able to know and do?
Are you familiar enough withthe curriculum and know what's
expected of students indifferent grades?
Once you know what's expected,you can develop both I can and I
(09:58):
know statements related to thatcurriculum.
These statements will form thebasis of the success criteria
you will share with yourstudents.
You will also use these towrite report comments.
So here's the link between theplanning and the reporting.
When developing the statements,you can then refer to a rubric
(10:19):
you will use to grade, and thisis where you begin to develop an
understanding of precisely whatyour students will need to be
able to do at which level.
So, for example, the achievementstandard of the Australian
curriculum year three sciencearea states they classify solids
and liquids based on observableproperties and describe how to
(10:44):
cause a change of state.
So they can describe not justidentify, but describe in their
own words how to turn a solidfrom a liquid and a liquid to a
solid.
And the content descriptor saysinvestigate the observable
properties of solids and liquidsand how adding or removing heat
energy leads to a change ofstate.
(11:04):
Here's where we get in trouble,because it says investigate.
Okay, well, we can investigate,but how do we know they've
actually learned anything?
You can do the best experimentin the universe, but how do you
know what they know as a resultof doing that?
So we go back to theachievement standard with the
verbs that are used.
(11:25):
The first one is classify, thesecond one is describe.
So our I know statements mightbe.
I know that molecules in a solidstate are packed tightly
together.
I know that molecules in aliquid state move around each
other.
I know that solids have a fixedshape.
I know that solids cannot becompressed or squashed.
I know that liquids have afixed volume but not a fixed
(11:48):
shape.
I know that liquids take theshape of, but not a fixed shape.
I know that liquids take theshape of their containers.
I can statements might be.
I can describe the propertiesof solids and liquids.
I can use this knowledge tosort substances.
I can describe how solids andliquids change when they are
heated and cooled.
So there's more I know thanthere is I can, because you
(12:09):
can't be skilled withoutknowledge, and this forms part
of your review.
In whatever subject area you'reteaching, the knowledge must be
retrieved repetitively, but notrepetitively so that people cry
, but just more than once untilstudents have it, because they
can't describe anything to youif they don't have the knowledge
(12:30):
.
Once you have your I can and Iknow statements worked out, work
through the rubric and decidehow you will determine to what
degree students have learnedwhat they need to, because the
difference here indifferentiating in the
particular unit that I'm talkingabout, is not that some
children will learn all the Iknow and the I can's.
It's the level of supportrequired for them to do so and
(12:59):
the degree of complexityinvolved in them demonstrating
what they know.
Remember, you'll be assessingevery one of these, so be
realistic about what you canreasonably teach well in the
time you have.
It's better to teach less andgo deeper than it is to teach it
all so you can tick the boxes.
But then three weeks later youask the students a question and
they have no idea what you'retalking about.
Do less and do it better.
(13:20):
Go an inch wide and a mile deep, not an inch deep and a mile
wide.
The associated report commentfor a B grade here might be
something like.
This semester in science,student A used specific
vocabulary to describe whathappens to the molecules in
solids and liquids when they'reheated and cooled.
The detailed explanations intheir presentation to the class
(13:42):
showed a well-developedunderstanding of the topic.
Now I've included apresentation here, but you don't
have to.
There's lots of ways forstudents to demonstrate what
they know, but we can see herethat this links to our I can and
our I know statements directly.
There's a direct link betweenthe comment in the report and
what we set out for students tolearn in the first place.
(14:04):
Step three is to plan yourassessment.
It might seem odd to beplanning assessments before your
teaching sequence, but by doingit nice and early you can
critically evaluate what it'sgoing to take for your students
to achieve success and a reallygreat task for you as teachers
to do is to pretend to be thestudent and complete the
(14:24):
assessment task.
If all goes well, you'll nowhave an exemplar.
You'll have a worked example toshow what needs to happen.
But one of the things we oftenfind is that the ideas sound
reasonable in our head.
Then we sit down to actuallycomplete the task and realise
precisely how difficult it is.
That helps us pare back ourexpectations to something that's
(14:46):
reasonable and manageable forcognitive load and also really
highlights what we're going tohave to focus in on to help our
kids In making decisions aboutassessment.
Ensure that you leave yourselfand your students enough time
for them to learn, review andpractice before asking them to
demonstrate the knowledge orskill on their own.
Spending one lesson on aconcept and then asking students
(15:08):
to independently complete atask in that same lesson leaves
a lot of students behind.
It also doesn't adequatelyassess student knowledge.
This is particularly true forstudents who come to your
classroom with less worldknowledge to draw on.
Knowing your students andunderstanding the expectations
of the assessment tasks you wishthem to complete is crucial
(15:30):
when considering how you'llmaximise their achievement.
Ensure that you plan to haveevidence for all areas of the
rubric under consideration.
Step four plan the sequence oflessons.
So so far we've thought aboutour students, we've thought
about the curriculum and we'vethought about the assessment
task.
Now it's time to plan thesequence of lessons.
(15:51):
Some important points toremember in planning your
lessons are plan units in detailfrom beginning to end.
I guarantee that if you planthe first four lessons and think
I'll get to the rest later, therest will end up in a haphazard
collection of lessons and yourunit will not be nearly as
successful as it could be.
And yes, guilty as charged,your honor, I've been there and
(16:14):
done that.
Make sure that every lessonrelates back to the rubric.
Our days are full and there'sreally no time for waffle.
Share the learning intentionsand success criteria with your
students and refer back to themthroughout the unit, each lesson
showing students where you'vebeen, where they've been
successful and what's comingnext.
(16:35):
This really helps cognitiveload and will help your students
with anxiety immensely.
Use these as the basis forregular review.
Focus on language development Ifyou want students to achieve an
A or a B, they need to be ableto articulate their learning
well.
Provide opportunities todevelop both sentence structures
and vocabulary that you wantstudents to use in their writing
(16:59):
as part of assessment and thisapplies no matter what subject
area you're talking about,whether it's English, science,
hass or health language is key.
Always engage students orallybefore asking them to write.
They get a little run-up andit's really helpful.
Plan for how you will maximiseparticipation of every student.
The we do is not you and twokids who've put their hand up to
(17:23):
answer a question for you.
Go back to the podcast episodeabout getting questions right
from the start.
That will help you here.
If there's a lot of sitting onthe mat and listening or not
listening, as the case may beyou're unlikely to get the
outcomes you're looking for.
How will you check forunderstanding throughout each
lesson and between the lessons?
Keep things simple.
(17:43):
Don't try to design everythingfrom scratch if you don't have
to.
There's nothing wrong withutilising prepared resources for
any area of the curriculum.
Just remember that you do theteaching, not the lesson
provider.
It's important that you makedecisions to meet your students
when they're up to.
It's also important to makesure that whatever you're using
(18:04):
has been planned for you toteach explicitly not with an
inquiry or discovery approachand that it links really tightly
to the curriculum.
Leave time for unexpecteddelays and interruptions I
guarantee they're going tohappen and use an explicit I do,
we do, you do approach in eachlesson and throughout the unit.
Finally, make students activeparticipants in lessons, not
(18:28):
passive receptors.
This does not mean you have toengage in frou-frou, funsy
activities.
You are the teacher and yourjob's to teach.
But they need to be thinkingand doing all through the
lessons, and hands-on work is apart of that.
The final step in the processhere is to review, evaluate and
mark regularly.
Review student work regularlyto evaluate the effectiveness of
(18:51):
your teaching.
Student achievement is feedbackto you about how well your
teaching met their needs.
If your students are not ableto do what you need them to do,
then you need to changesomething about the teaching.
Keeping a formative assessmentchecklist can help you to record
progress throughout the unit,not just at the end.
One of the simplest ways todetermine whether your students
(19:14):
are learning in the way that youplanned is to regularly ask
them to take five minutes towrite down what they've learned
in the unit or the lesson so far.
This is a form of retrieval andserves two purposes it
strengthens student learning andgives you terrific feedback
about your instruction.
A backward design model ofplanning will help you bring
rigor to your teaching and willalso set you and your students
(19:36):
up for success, so that you canreclaim time each semester for
yourself and your family.
Yes, we need to spend more timeplanning for reporting and in
the reporting itself, but indoing that, we're going to make
everything so much easier.
Reporting itself but in doingthat, we're going to make
everything so much easier.
The five steps of backwarddesign don't actually have to be
(19:56):
all that unsexy.
When you know your students, youknow what the curriculum is
asking.
You have a clear vision of theassessment that's going to help
you capture their learning.
You plan lessons to help themget there and then you evaluate
and mark regularly.
With review, the most amazingthings can happen.
This is the approach we take inour tech space units inside the
(20:18):
resource room, but you canapply this model to all of your
planning.
As I said at the start of theepisode, this might not be the
time right now for you to thinkabout this too heavily, so set a
reminder in your phone or yourcalendar to come back to this
episode planning to make reportwriting easier, so that you can
(20:39):
use this structure and style ofplanning when you're thinking
about what's coming up for youand your students.
That's all from me for now.
I wish you a world of happyteaching.
Thanks so much, everyone.
See you next time.
Bye.
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