Scaffolding Techniques In My Classroom

I recently introduced a game called “Murder Mystery” in my class during transitions and to get kids out of their seats. The way you play is you have one person secretly chosen as a murderer. Then all students walk around and shake hands, only the murderer, when he or she shakes someone’s hands secretly scratches their palm, which means that they are poisoned and after waiting 5 seconds, they have to stage a dramatic death. To illustrate what I meant, I had another student shake my hand and then after five seconds, I “died.” This gave students a sense of how to play the game and illustrated it.

My CT is great at using modeling to show examples of good student work. In the middle of independent work, she’ll hold up one or more students’ work and either read it or show it if it’s art work to show what makes it great. I think this raises expectations in a way, and also provides one model of how to accomplish a goal. It also gives positive feedback which is nice.

My CT also encourages metacognition by having students grade themselves on various tasks that they’ve completed. She also has them think more generally about how they can improve, and she has them set goals as well. One example of her use of these strategies is after having students run “Literature Circles” at each table group. Literature Circles are a rather challenging form of student led discussions about text. In this case they discuss a novel they are reading. Each student has a different role, and each student at some point leads a discussion on an aspect of the text. This activity required a lot of teamwork, patience and hard work to learn these new roles. After trying these literature circles, Carlee (my CT), had them give themselves a grade, and she had them reflect on what worked and what didn’t work, and asked them what they could do differently next time. She had students share out their ideas so potential problems and solutions surfaced for the whole class to benefit from. I can’t remember the specific remarks that students made, but I was impressed by the honesty and clarity that the students had about themselves and their groups’ work.