Look – no hands!
Our region has been working on formative feedback and assessment and looking closely at the work of Dylan Wiliam, in preparation for his visit to us in October. I like Dylan Wiliam’s work as, to me, an awful lot of it just seems to make sense. However, I was intrigued about his claim of the difference we can make to learning by not using the traditional “hands up” approach when asking questions in class. I had never really thought about the smart kids getting smarter as they’re being continually engaged but the less smart kids becoming less engaged and the gap actually widening. I toyed with this a little last year but, sad to say, I forgot about it at the beginning of this year. It probably didn’t help that I am now in the class teaching only two days each week.
On the first day of this term I ran a session for our staff on formative feedback and assessment and showed some of Dylan Wiliam’s video clips. It dawned on me that it was a bit hypocritical to be advocating some fo these techniques if I wasn’t modelling them well myself. Since then I have had a “no hands up” policy in my classroom, after explaining to my students why we needed to give it a try.
I can honestly say that I’ve seen a significant difference in my class. They all know that they are going to be asked a question at least once and that I am happy to wait for an answer. There is no escape! I combined this with consciously increasing my wait time and it has been so gratifying to have some of the more reluctant or less confident students answering more willingly and thinking more carefully about responding, where previously I may have received a distinct “Don’t know”.
Just in the last two days we have had some wonderfully interesting and thought-provoking discussion on Inanimate Alice (including thoughts about loneliness, home-schooling and religious differences and discrimination) and cybersafety. Some of the students have astounded me with their depth of thought.
Have you ever tried this with your students? I’d definitely recommend trying it – you may be very surprised by the results.
cc licensed ( BY NC SA ) flickr photo by mag3737: http://flickr.com/photos/mag3737/2289757349/
This is a great idea and does work wonders for engagement. I found that changing your style in this way sometimes needs some new techniques otherwise I just slipped back into asking the same kids I always did – habit I guess? Some of the strategies I’ve used to use to support questioning are:
- Put a number next to everyone’s name in the role. Then, get the IWB to randomly select a number (or have numbers in a hat) and that person is the one who answers the next question
It’s very interesting! 
- As pupils enter give them raffle style numbered cards. Pupils/teachers/visitors pull the corresponding number from a bag to see who goes next.
- Grey kids – I didn’t really like the idea of this… until I tried it… At one school I worked in they introduced the idea of the ‘ grey kids’ these are the pupils who are neither naughty (and get our attention) or over enthusiastic (and get our attention). They’re the ones who behave well and answer occasional questions but can get missed sometimes. The deputy at the school asked us to identify these children with a colour (he chose grey – that’s the bit I don’t like). He then asked us to keep the plan on our desk whilst we taught to remind us to direct questions/praise etc to these ‘grey children’. If we’re in control of who answers the questions then we can still miss those kids. It works but I rebelled and used a nicer colour than grey!
- Plan your questions as part of your lesson planning. Also sounded mad to me – until I tried it and boy what a difference it made! You can really delve into pupils individual learning pathways with a bit of pre-planning
- Use the IWB to get kids to choose who goes next
Anyone else got any ideas to share?
Hi Selena. I realize I didn’t actually mention the how! S some of the things we do:
- kids’ names on popsticks which I, or another student pick out
- all kids have a roll number and we have number cards in a box, to be picked out at random
- we use a couple of different random generators. Kids really love The Hat which is a free download. Can’t remember the name of thei other interactive one the like but it also speaks the name (often very badly!)
Random name picker http://primaryschoolict.com/random-name-selector/
Hi Pam – great post – and good reminders! Have a look at The Classroom Experiment on youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J25d9aC1GZA part one and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1iD6Zadhg4M part two. My Formative assessment Tfel team presented “the best bits” of this to staff at staff meeting so that everyone wouldn’t have to watch the whole two hours – funny thing was, staff were so enthusiastic in presentation and excited by the research and findings in the experiment that many other staff have asked for the links so they CAN watch whole two hours! Great for PD – gives good insight into how kids feel as well as teachers about no-hands up etc.
Hi Louisa. Yes, I’ve seen those two videos and found them very inspiring. What is your Formative Assessment TfEL team?
Hi Pam,
Thanks for sharing.
I have incorporated another step into the process by expecting everyone to answer the question and respond by recording with whiteboard marker on their personal folder. I can see at a glance who needs help with the concept. One student’s name is still pulled out of a box to share the answer. This is working well with mental maths, writing sentences, etc.
Daniela
Yes, we’ve now got individual whiteboards in class and my co-teacher has just started using them. I think these strategies will prove very powerful for our learners.