Rigor in STEELS Student Learning

Perquisite: Academic Productive Discourse Session 
 

Rigor for Phenomena-based, 3-Dimensional pedagogy includes teaching and learning strategies, protocols and tenets from Ambitious Science Teaching and Culturally Responsive Pedagogy. 
 

Ambitious Science Teaching (AST)

Pressing for evidence-based explanations 
This final set of four AST practices helps students synthesize ideas at key points during the unit and at the end of the unit to help students construct an evidence-based explanatory model for the phenomenon and, when relevant, work to apply explanations to problem-solving. An important goal of this practice is to connect students’ explanatory models with social, political, cultural, and community-based contexts for the phenomenon. 
This complex set of teaching practices includes:  
1. Engaging students in authentic disciplinary discourse around using evidence to support explanations 
2. Holding students accountable for using multiple sources of information to construct explanatory models (with scaffolding and guidance from the teacher). 
3. Engaging students in reflecting on how their perspectives, ideas, and questions broadened over time 
4. Engage all students in authentic disciplinary discourse around using evidence to support explanations. 
5. Hold students accountable for using multiple sources of information to construct final explanatory models for the anchoring event (this accountability of course must be supported by scaffolding and guidance from you). 
6. Support students in using evidence to support different aspects of their explanatory models. 

We’ll be using enhanced Claim-Evidence-Reasoning (C-E-R) with emphasis on a gapless explanation, “Must Have” 
Explanation Checklist and group feedback regarding C-E-R. 
 

Research-based Principles that should guide all variations of this practice
- Causal explanations in science draw upon multiple forms of evidence and multiple ideas. 
- This coordination requires specialized tools for organizing ideas. 
- Students benefit when the teacher is explicit about what counts as evidence, how it is used to support explanations, and in general what the rules of epistemic talk are in the classroom. 
- Explanations for contextualized events or processes can take many legitimate forms and can be expressed in different ways. This heterogeneity in student expression stimulates comparative reasoning about the understanding of scientific concepts and explanatory coherence. 
- Reproducing canonical explanations can result in fragile and short-lived understandings.

Culturally Responsive Pedagogy 
Applying brain-based learning theory, Building Intellectual Capacity and a Ready for Rigor Framework, Zaretta Hammond has developed teaching and learning strategies, skills and protocols to support the success for all leaners. 
 

Attending to the survival and intellectual levels of the brain is key for students successful learning. 
- Brain stem & cerebellum a.k.a. “lizard brain” 
o    Fight, flight or freeze 
o    Includes trauma-informed education and post-pandemic lingering challenges 
- Limbic Region a.k.a. “emotional brain” 
o    Helps us to learn from experience, manage our emotions and remember 
o    Records memories of experiences and behaviors. both positive and negative past experiences 
o    Avoid threats and pursue rewards 
o    Creates internal schema that acts as our background knowledge 
o    Includes trauma-informed education and post-pandemic lingering challenges 
- Neocortex Region, home to executive function - “command center” of the brain 
o    Oversees our thinking and manages working memory; controls planning, abstract thinking, 
organization, self-regulation and houses creativity 
o    Almost endless capacity to learn and rewire itself 

The challenge is to bypass the first 2 “gatekeepers” to build brain power and intellective capacity (malleable information processing power). 

How do we do this? 
Building an Alliance (between teachers & students) Is the Reason for the Relationship 
- students need both care & push from the teacher(s) – being a “Warm Demander” 
- teachers use the trust developed during the rapport stage as fuel 
- RESULT = students give you permission to push 
Socio-Cognitive Norms for Learners
- Errors are information, NOT confirmation of low intelligence 
- Answers are important, but NOT only the content counts 
o    Pay attention to HOW you are processing the information to arrive at the answers 
- Use non-linguistic representations to think (think with pictures, symbols, etc.) 
Engagement that leads to deeper learning (into the Zone of Proximal Development):
- requires grappling, figuring out 
- is hands-on and/or group-oriented 
- has to stretch the student 
- has to create “gentle disequilibrium” between what the student can do and what they can’t do 
- requires you to create challenge, puzzle, and ambiguity in order for the brain to grow and improve information processing, which equals engagement