Cognition, Thinking & Understanding

Kids Are the Experts! Making Learning Visible in Boston Public Schools

During the 2011-12 school year, 30 Boston Public School early childhood teachers and eight Head Start teachers took a course called Making Learning Visible: Kids are the Experts! The teachers explored how to help children recognize and communicate to others their areas of expertise through words, images, and demonstrations. This short film follows the process of making how-to books and other products in two classrooms at the Gardner Pilot Academy.

Learning that Matters: An Expanding Universe

What's worth teaching is perhaps the most central question of education. Choices about what's worth teaching made by educators, school boards, and governments fill up the schooldays of students. However, many educational leaders today feel that this fundamental question does not get enough attention. Too much effort goes toward doing the same job better and not enough toward rethinking what the job is. In this spirit, educational leaders in many independent schools and some public schools have introduced new themes, such as 21st century skills, digital technologies, interdisciplinary learning, world citizenship, global perspectives and global problems. While mastery of reading and mathematics remains a tremendously important agenda, the universe of what's deemed worth teaching by one or another advocate is expanding dramatically.

This white paper offers a broad but brief overview of trends in that expanding universe.

Documentation: Transforming our Perspectives

This 16-minute film by Melissa Rivard and Stephanie Cox Suarez for the Documentation Studio at Wheelock College features conversations with leaders from Reggio about the practice of documentation and its role in teaching and learning.

Causal Patterns in Ecosystems: Lessons to Infuse into Ecosystems Units...

Causal Patterns in Ecosystems is a curriculum module for use by teachers who want their students to develop deep understanding of ecosystems concepts. Research shows that students who are taught about the nature of the causal patterns while learning science achieve deeper understanding than students who learn the science concepts only. Each section addresses one of a set of six broad and persistent misunderstandings about ecosystems that most students hold, stemming from their reasoning about the nature of causality. The module introduces RECAST (REveal CAusal STructure) activities, games, and simulations that are designed to reveal the underlying causal structure of concepts and to help students restructure their understandings. Each section contains one main activity, a set of additional reinforcement activities, and supporting materials for teaching them. Background information helps teachers recognize the misunderstanding and how it typically shows up in students reasoning about ecosystems. Understanding goals for the subject matter and the causal patterns are listed. The curriculum incorporates best practices in science education, such as inquiry-based learning and modeling. The module is aimed at upper elementary but can be modified for use with other ages. The module can be infused into broader units on ecosystems. It was developed as part of a research project called the Understandings of Consequence Project, which is supported by the National Science Foundation. 2011

10 Ideas to Start Building a Culture of Thinking at Your School

10 detailed activities designed to promote Cultures of Thinking, where a group’s collective as well as individual thinking is valued, visible, and actively promoted.