Submitted by Sandy Ferguson
Feb. 2, 2010
EDN 515 – Curriculum for Leaders
Dr. Marty Kozloff
Teacher Effect Research
Process:
1. Identify an expert
teacher
2. Compare
instructional
procedures to
novice teacher
3. What worked with
expert teacher?
Downfall of Teacher Effects Research
1. Only identifies general
procedures
2. Useful only if broken
down into steps
3. Doesn’t apply to all
learning
Cognitive Strategy Research
Process:
1. Study and identify
strategies experts use to
solve problems/answer
questions – then teach
these strategies
2. Invention of concrete
prompts (guides,
heuristics)
3. Help students develop a
strategy
Teaching Cognitive Strategies
Cognitive
Strategies
Concrete
Prompts
Scaffolding
Modeling
Guides
Checklists
Stem
Questions
Cue Cards
Thinking
Aloud
Coaching
Instructional Procedures Using
Cognitive Strategies
• Model using strategy
• Think aloud (If…then…)
• Start with simplified material
• Complete part of task for student
• Present material in small steps
• Anticipate student errors & difficult areas
• Suggest Fix-up strategies
• Increase student’s responsibility
Summarization of Results of Cognitive
Studies in Reading
• Cognitive Strategies taught in Reading
–
–
–
•
Summarization only (23 studies)
Question-generation only (17 studies)
Two or more strategies taught (16 studies)
Results examined on multiple choice tests
(standardized), short answer and summarization tests
(experimenter-developed comprehension tests)
• Overall Results: Standardized tests: 50th percentile
→80th percentile
Comprehension tests: 50th percentile → 63rd percentile
[Median Effect Size = average student in 50thpercentile
in experimental group would have scored 80th
percentile in control group]
Basal Readers & Cognitive Strategy
• Over the last 15 years
more cognitive
strategies used in basal
readers
• Examined 3 basal
readers
– Open Court
– Houghton-Mifflin
– MacMillan/McGraw Hill
Changes Observed in Basal Readers
• Open Court – modified to emphasize
strategies in actual reading…
– “sum up to check understanding as you read”
– “ask questions to check your understanding as you
read”
– “determine what is unclear”
– Sheets provided with prompts for “ask yourself”
questions for setting goals, responding to text,
checking understanding, clarification of important
words and passages, and prompts applied to story
Changes Observed in Basal Readers
• Houghton-Mifflin
– Word webs for vocabulary
– Concept charts for expository materials
– Instructional support section – provision for
teacher modeling, thinking aloud by teacher,
checking for understanding, and independent
practices
– After cognitive strategies taught, applied to next
story
Changes Observed in Basal Readers
• MacMillan/McGraw Hill
– Comprehension monitoring (fix-up) strategies
(asking questions and rereading, applying concept
of story elements to a narrative)
– Consistently focused on applying strategies to
basal stories
Future Instructional Research
• More study of strategies experts use
• Identifying concrete prompts that should be
used
• Most important scaffolds and instructional
procedures to use for teaching cognitive
strategies
• How do strategies achieve their effects?
Criticisms of Cognitive Strategy
Research
Discovery Learning
• Emphasizes learning by
discovery and deemphasizes instruction in
cognitive strategies –
“strategies better caught
than taught”
• Recycled 1918, 1950’s,
1970’s
• Rosenshines’s response –
“Show me the data!”