Making Thinking Visible SLC Meeting 1: Thinking Routines - Introducing and Exploring Ideas

1. Making Thinking Visible SLC Meeting 1: Thinking Routines - Introducing and Exploring Ideas

2. Learning Intention • To develop a detailed and critical knowledge of the role of thinking routines and their use in the classroom to promote thinking dispositions and deeper understanding Actions to support/demonstrate professional learning • Plan, try out and evaluate a range of thinking routines in the class • Engage in professional dialogue with peers, supporting changes in practice

3. Set Up Activity: Think Puzzle Explore • What do you think you already know about thinking routines? • What questions or puzzles do you have about thinking routines? • What might you hope to gain from exploring thinking routines with your learners? Share your thinking with others in the group.

4. Making Thinking Visible SLC Members Attend every SLC Meeting Engage fully in professional discussions during SLC Meetings Commit to and implement new ideas into classroom practice throughout the Programme Share progress and changes to practice since the previous SLC Meeting Professional Learning Log Pages 5 and 6

5. Making Thinking Visible CORE GOAL To develop learners’ thinking dispositions and intellectual character while deepening subject matter understanding CORE BELIEF Dispositions are promoted by developing a culture of thinking over time CORE QUESTION How do we influence and shape classroom culture to make thinking a more central aspect of classroom life? CORE PRACTICE Thinking routines and documentation

6. A Thinking Classroom “...the importance of the quality and nature of the learning experience in developing attributes and capabilities and in achieving active engagement, motivation and depth of learning.” Curriculum for Excellence: Experiences and Outcomes, Page 4

7. A Thinking Classroom “There are lots of strategies around. The aim of these strategies is to enable pupils to be problem solvers and decision makers. Perkins would argue that these, and many other, strategies should be made available to the pupils so that they have a repertoire at their fingertips and can use them when they encounter difficulties in their learning.” B Boyd: The Learning Classroom, Page 66

8. Making Thinking Visible and Deep Learning Deepening learning through: • Creating rich opportunities for thinking • Effective questioning • Listening and responding with respect and interest • Documenting learning in a way which interprets and deepens the learners’ understanding and helps the teacher to understand and plan how to extend learning

9. Thinking Routines can be seen as... Choose the right tool for the job Key steps build on and extend the thinking from the previous step Routines become part of the fabric and culture of the classroom • Tools which promote thinking and develop thinking dispositions • Structures which scaffold and extend thinking and support thinking discussions • Patterns of behaviour for promoting a culture of thinking In this context, the inference that routines may be mundane, ritualistic or merely habitual patterns of behaviour does not apply.

10. Thinking Routines Categories Introducing and Exploring Ideas Tend to be used early in a unit of study Synthesising and Organising Ideas Tend to come in the middle of a unit of study Digging Deeper into Ideas Tend to have a culminating/summative function When teachers become familiar with using the routines they develop flexibility in how and when they use different routines.

11. Meeting Focus Thinking Routines Introducing and Exploring Ideas Developing Thinking Dispositions – habits of mind which motivate, provoke and create an inclination towards thinking

12. CfE: Examples which Support Introducing and Exploring Ideas SCN 1-02a I can explore examples of food chains and show an appreciation of how animals and plants depend on each other for food SOC 2-03a I can investigate a Scottish historical theme to discover how past events or the actions of individuals or groups have shaped Scottish society Lit 0-01a I enjoy exploring and playing with the patterns and sounds of language and can use what I learn TCH 4-14c I can explore the properties and functionality of materials, tools, software or control technology to establish their suitability for a task at home or in the world of work

13. Thinking Routines Explore thinking routines which introduce and explore ideas. Try one out in class before the next Meeting. Complete the Planning and Reflection – Introducing and Exploring Ideas page in your Professional Learning Log to keep a record of your professional action. Think about: • why you are choosing this particular routine • the learning context and activity • whether it is an individual/group/class activity • which experiences and outcomes from CfE you are addressing and at which level/s.

14. Before SLC Meeting 2 • Try out your selected thinking routine two or three times in different ways, contexts and/or with different learners and record the experiences on the Planning and Reflection – Introducing and Exploring Ideas page in your Professional Learning Log and bring to SLC Meeting 2 • Bring examples from your classroom to the next SLC Meeting • OPTIONAL - Complete your Initial Self Assessment against the GTCS Standard for Career-Long Professional Learning in your Professional Learning Log • Keep your Professional Learning up to date

15. Sharing the Thinking: Connect-Extend-Challenge What connections do you draw between your current practice and the ideas you have learned about today? What new ideas did you get? What was illuminated further/deeper for you? What pushed your thinking a bit more? What challenges or puzzles have been raised? ‘This routine is designed to help students become active processors of information. Therefore, it is well positioned after information-rich sessions as a way of synthesising that information.’ MTV page 133

16. “The importance of curiosity and questioning in propelling learning is easily seen in our experience as learners. We know that when our curiosity is sparked and we have a desire to know and learn something our engagement is heightened.” Making Thinking Visible: Unpacking Thinking, Page 13