 Matthew Stein  4/16/12  Dr. Kajder  IL 2240  Inquiry Based Project Presentation Scaffolding in the Classroom

 Questions to be discussed/addressed:  What are the best ways to scaffold information to students?  How are scaffolds best implemented?  Does/can scaffolding inhibit individuality and/or creativity? Scaffolding in the Classroom

 Scaffolding has been around forever as a something that was done but not something people ever really thought about.  Not until 1976 in study by Wood, Bruner and Ross was scaffolding termed as a "process that enables a child or novice to solve a problem, carry out a task or achieve a goal which would be beyond his unassisted efforts” (90).  This meshes with Vygotsky’s theory of the Zone of Proximal Development or ZPD which states : “every mental function in a child's development first appears in collaboration with an adult”.  In other words, the area between what children can do independently and what they can do with assistance.  Scaffolding looks to take what is outside ZPD and move it inside ZPD through a step by step process to be looked at later. Scaffolding? What is it?

You tube clip ZPD and Scaffolding

1. Begins with teacher monitoring students' learning as they take them step by step through the process 2. Teacher provides assistance on an as-needed basis and as "a temporary supportive structure that teachers create to assist a student or a group of students to accomplish a task that they could not complete alone" (Graves and Graves 44) 3. Once the teacher has confidence that the students have learned a technique well enough, the students take on the task or technique by themselves with little to no support from the teacher. Scaffolding

 Student must be “faced with new challenges” (Bruner et al. 90), in his/her problem solving ventures otherwise it is not really scaffolding.  Helping to recall information already taught/learned does not = scaffolding  Task must be outside of child’s ZPD  Fact-based learning does not = scaffolding Key points of Scaffolding:

 Teachers must get all students on board and actively engaged  This begins day 1 by “Hookin ‘em In” (Edelsky), engaging them and helping them believe in themselves as learners and as people  Imperative that the teacher must both believe and make the students believe that “the students [are] competent, sensible, and well-intentioned” (Edelsky 271) for scaffolding to be effective Before Scaffolding can Work

 Students must “think the task important and worth accomplishing” (Edelsky 272) for them to feel successful and therefore more apt to do another task because earned success is the best kind  Imperative to get students to see opportunities everywhere for learning,  Get students to think and take pleasure in using their intellects (which promotes individual and critical thinking),  Help students learn to get along with and appreciate others, their beliefs and their values to create community of learners Con’t

 Seeing a model or example of how to do something can always help a student who might be struggling to think of how they might want to go about completing something.  Modeling/giving examples can be student work, teacher work, or even just an example using something students are familiar with in the social world  Good for helping students regardless of ability level Good scaffolding techniques:

 Assess by listening to conversations and analysis of texts  Jigsawing activities are some of the best ways for students to scaffold amongst themselves, to teach themselves and become masters of a topic  When students begin scaffold amongst themselves so that they can teach each other how to do a task then you know scaffolding is working and students are learning because of scaffolding techniques How to tell students have learned from scaffolding techniques

 When scaffolding DO NOT give in and help students with the answer  Students MUST believe they can come to an answer themselves  Respond by saying something like “you decide; whatever you want to say; help each other out, or don’t ask me, use your head” (Edelsky 272) Implementing scaffolds

 When a student says they don’t know the answer, the teacher should respond in turn with a simple “No ‘I don’t knows’!” (Edelsky 266).  This response should be a rule in every class, that way the phrase is totally gone from a student’s vocabulary and therefore they will not be allowed get in the habit of even thinking they don’t know.  Even if they truly don’t “know” the answer they can find it out somehow. They can look it up or they can ask one of their peers for help rather than the teacher which is exactly what scaffolding is always trying to eliminate. Con’t

 Question about how students felt about being given models and/or examples in regards to how creative they felt after being given them:  Those interviewed agreed that once an example of something is given, creativity basically flies out the window  “once I am given an example, it’s all I think about. I don’t feel very creative at all once I’m given an example to help “guide” me” (S.C.-interviewee). Responses to Interviews on effectiveness of scaffolding

 Catch 22  New concepts NEED examples and models as beginner steps  May curb creativity and originality.  Unfortunately an impossible dichotomy to circumvent  Want students to know what we want but also wanting them to be individual learners who are both creative and original. This is where the term “minimal guidance” (Edelsky 270) comes into play.  Minimal guidance is just giving students an initial scaffold perhaps a single model just for clarification purposes and then letting them be on there way so as not to hinder creativity and originality. Flip side

 All students and all teachers interviewed N=5 said scaffolding is better than lecture  Participants were split as to whether they would prefer examples or be given total freedom with an assignment  All part. said examples necessary if it’s a new concept though Interview ?’s

 Scaffolding is widely used but not always used properly  If scaffolding process followed properly scaffolding does wonders for classroom management, student engagement, true student learning, overall performance, etc  To a point scaffolding using models/examples CAN inhibit some creativity and originality  BUT is necessary for new concepts and for students who need help beginning /understand a task initially Main points learned from Research/Findings

 Comments/ questions? 

 Thank you for watching!!! 