More than Just a Scribble in the Margins

 

If you have ever sat with a 5-year old, a box of crayons, and a blank sheet of paper you may understand a small corner of the deep, complex world that young children inhabit. A simple blue squiggle is representative of “that time that grandma and I went swimming and we saw the jellyfish.” While the brown circle is, “how I feel when my sister is away and I don’t have anyone to play with.” Most of the time, these moments are fleeting; snapshots of one moment in a child’s mind. These stories are relational and help us understand the ways that children see their world. As parents, we want to remember and hold onto these sweet moments. As educators, our challenge is to capture these moments and use them as an intentional part of the student’s learning process.

 

 

 

 

We know that learning is representational: words convey concepts, numbers convey quantities, and images convey ideas. For teachers of our youngest students, this understanding is a critical part of knowing where each individual student is in their learning and how to reach them. A perfect example of this comes in the annual Kindergarten study of moon cycles. Each student experiences the same classroom activities, the same stories, and the same outdoor explorations. They make shiny models of the moon’s surface, using similar materials, yet the words they use to describe their models and the process are often radically different. One student may tell you, “This is my moon. There is no gravity on the moon. If I dropped my pencil on the moon, it would slide right off.” Another would personify the satellite, describing its relationship with its environment: “My moon sits high in the sky. She loves to be in the stars, and she watches the earth and other planets float by.” These narratives help us reach each student effectively the next time they are approaching a challenging task.

 

Another form of documentation is photographs of the students themselves at work and play. When teachers invite students to reflect on the pictures later, they can ask any number of questions, including: “What’s happening in this picture?” “What are you doing in this picture?” or for older students, “Do you remember what you were thinking when this picture was taken?” This process is incredibly powerful as it requires that students revisit an earlier experience, building stronger neural connections to that learning. When the students’ words are paired with the image, it also gives the students the chance to see their voice in print. For our youngest students, this helps build the understanding that print has meaning, and that their own words matter. In the kite pictures below, you can see these emerging voices exploring scientific concepts (wind and shadows) and relating key events from their experience.

 

 

 

 

 

As students get older, we can use this same strategy to help them think about their learning and build effective problem-solving strategies. In the sample below, you can see a group of second graders designing a feeding toy for a bobcat at the Trevor Zoo. Being asked to remember and explain their process encourages the students to see themselves as problem-solvers and builds confidence for the next time they encounter a roadblock in their learning. The same strategy can be used to help students understand what study strategies work best for them or how they can improve their time-management skills. Simply asking students to take a few minutes throughout a task to document their thinking in a journal helps them slow down and recognize that they have control over their own learning.

 

 

 

 

As parents, we can extend this concept to the learning our students do at home. Whether we’re exclaiming over a drawing, reviewing a math test that came home from school, or just flipping through pictures on our cell phones, we’re already asking our students to reflect on what they’re doing. Questions like: “Do you remember why you solved the problem that way?” or “Tell me what was happening in this picture?” give students the chance to explore and explain their thoughts. We’ve all had that moment of being surprised at how complex or creative our children’s thoughts are in response to these questions. We can capture these thoughts as captions in the email we’re already sending to grandparents or scribble them in the margins of the math test. Taking the time to record these moments in their own words makes all the difference in helping our students feel understood and being able to take the next step in their growth.

 

by Rebekah Jordan
Head of the Lower School