Strategy Highlights & Model Lessons
Wagon Wheel Ms. Shambaugh's 6th grade elective students practiced the Wagon Wheel strategy. She used the strategy as a summarizing activity for students to share their comic book drawings.
Strategy:
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Elevator SpeechMr. Penner assigned 6th grade students the task of giving a 45 second elevator speech about a region of the United States. Students completed research and designed a model to represent their region.
This strategy forces students to focus on the key ideas and most important information to share. Writing a 45 second elevator speech requires students to process facts and information into a summary that demonstrates their knowledge of the content. Then, they have to communicate that learning clearly with their audience.
Students were scored on their communication skills, along with their content knowledge, using portions of the communication rubric. |
Student ReflectionMrs. Bukousky used the Communication rubric to encourage students to reflect on their communication skills during a partner lab.
Reflection engages students to think metacognitively about their personal skills. The added expectation to cite examples strengthens student awareness of HOW they demonstrated strength in communication. Exposing students to small portions of the rubric at a time will build a common language across the middle school and begin to build consistent expectations that ultimately become the norm! This is our goal. Students who actively engage in quality discussion with their peers at higher levels. It takes time, practice, exposure and high expectations! |