1) Intelligence tests and assessments are often culturally biased and measure acquired knowledge rather than innate ability. They are not always accurate measures of what students can achieve.
2) For learning to occur, students need cognitive skills to understand information as well as the ability to process, store, and access information. Teachers can help build these cognitive strategies through mediation.
3) There are various instructional interventions that can improve student achievement such as using graphic organizers, goal setting, hands-on learning, and having students generate their own questions about texts. Guiding students with high expectations, support, and insistence can also help.
1. Instruction and Improving achievement A Framework for Understanding Poverty:Chapter Eight
2. Intelligence Tests and Assessments Culturally biased content Measure acquired knowledge, not intelligence Not accurate assessments of what a student can achieve
3. Teaching and Learning Learning can not occur if a student does not have the cognitive skills to understand Students need the “software” to process and store information They need the ability to access that stored information.
5. Cognitive Strategies Mediation builds cognitive strategies Stimulus – do not walk in puddle Meaning – your shoes will get wet Strategy - walk around puddle
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7. If students have the strategies for learning: They would: Use planning behaviors Control impulsivity Use evaluative behaviors Explore data systematically Use specific language This would improve discipline, achievement, and their use of the strategies.
8. Student Eye Movement as An Indicator If gaze is looking upward, then the person is accessing information they processed visually If gaze is forward, the person is accessing information processed through hearing If gaze is directed downward, the person is having internal dialogue or emotions A teacher can use this information to draw the student out by asking: “what are you seeing, remember hearing, thinking?”
9. Instructional Interventions Graphic Organizers Tools to help students identify, label, sort information Tree charts Character maps Etc. System for analyzing/sorting text Goal setting and self-talk Associate what student knows with what he is learning
10. Instructional Interventions, cont. Kinesthic learning – hands on Rubrics for student self-critique Language structure and patterns – for instance: Project Read – multi-sensory Students make questions about the text themselves Main points – sorting cues Mental models
