EL Study Guide

• Do you agree with Wiliam's statement? Why or why not? Do you believe that there are any instances when you should instead focus on an existing work, such as the thesis example Wiliam cites on p. 12?

When schools offer students the opportunity to revise and resubmit their work after receiving feedback from teachers, Wiliam says that students don't learn much from the process. Instead, they "turn in poor-quality work, wait for the teacher to tell them how to improve it, and then just follow the instructions."

• Discuss your school's revise-and-resubmit policy. Do you find that students are overly reliant on teacher feedback? Or is there some merit to this practice?
• On pp. 13–15, study Wiliam's suggestions for providing meaningful feedback. Brainstorm ways that you might incorporate these strategies into practice. Could these approaches replace existing policies about revising and resubmitting work? If so, what outcomes would you expect?

Making Written Comments Count

In "The Two Es," Heidi Kroog, Kristin King Hess, and Maria Araceli Ruiz-Primo write that written feedback on student work should be both effective and efficient.

• In their study, the authors found that only 14 percent of work that teachers graded was designed to make thinking explicit (in other words, assignments that revealed how students arrived at their answers). Share an assignment with your colleagues that may have fallen short of revealing student thinking. Together, rework the assignment so it better meets this objective.
• For written feedback to be effective, the authors say that it should be both descriptive and prescriptive, as opposed to merely evaluative or corrective. Descriptive comments "let students know why something was correct or incorrect;" prescriptive comments "let the student know how to improve." Examine a sample of student work on which you provided written comments. Using the authors' examples on pp. 23–24 as a guide, decide whether the comments are descriptive, prescriptive, or both. If not, reframe your comments in a way that is descriptive and prescriptive. Report back to the group on your observations.
• In an effort to be more efficient with your grading, look at a class set of graded assignments with your group. Keep track of how many repetitive comments you find. What patterns do you notice? If you find repetitive comments, decide whether it would have been more economical for the teacher to meet with a small group of students, work with an individual student, or reteach the lesson to the whole class.

Cris Tovani ("How I Learned to Be Strategic about Writing Comments,") says that when it comes to providing written comments, timing is key. "By spending the majority of my time grading final papers and assessments, I was missing too many chances to help students get better. Where I really needed to give feedback was before final assignments were due." Review Tovani's strategies on pp. 57–59, including her comprehension checks, silent reading think sheets, exit tickets, and response journals. Which of these seem most useful to you? Why? Commit to trying at least one and report back to the group.

Protocols in Action

Tina Blythe and David Allen ("Making Protocols Work,") outline four common challenges that arise when groups of educators use protocols to look at student work. Examine the list and reflect on your experiences. Have you encountered these same problems in PLCs?

• Read the authors' suggestions for addressing these challenges. Which of these strategies might you try?
• As a group, choose one of the protocols detailed in the sidebar—either The Tuning Protocol or The Collaborative Assessment Conference—and use it to examine a piece of student work. Afterward, debrief on the activity. Did the group encounter any of the four challenges? How did you work through them?