By Noreia Benhalima
I was fortunate to recently attend a CPD on GRIT (Growth Resilience Independent tasks). In this CPD it was highlighted that studies have shown when the power of the students’ brain is correctly challenged, it can grow and enable them to learn and become smarter. This will also help develop independence and resilience, two important transferable skills that are useful in everyday life. It will also help prepare students for exam situations where they need to work independently in a time-bound environment.
Independent learning encourages and enables students to become self-directed, take responsibility for their own learning, and have more autonomy and control over their own learning.
“Too often, we teach students what to think but not how to think.”
- OECD Insights (2014)
Furthermore, research highlights that metacognition leads to independent learning and is key to experiencing success, which is a great motivator in any learner. This shows that metacognition and students' independent learning are clearly interlinked. Therefore I would recommend reading Sophie Nash’s blog post about “Teaching Study Skills and Encouraging Self-Regulated Learning” as a starting point.
To create a more independent environment in the classroom, the teaching and learning strategies need to be adjusted and embedded in the lesson from an early stage. This made me reflect on my own practice and think about how I am embedding tasks/ activities to promote independent learning in my classroom.
How am I promoting independent tasks in my lessons?
Within the language classroom, it is important to engage students in their learning and motivate them during lessons. This made me embed some independent activities into my planning to give my students the opportunity to engage in their learning and enable them to be active rather than passive learners.
- Back-to-back dictation: This activity is completed in pairs. Each pair is provided with differentiated texts/ sentences to dictate to each other. Students sit back-to-back to complete this task. Students take it in turns to dictate a text/sentence to each other. Then they peer assess their dictated text/sentence.
- Running dictation: This activity is very popular in the MFL department. Recently I have been adapting this activity to make it more accessible to different students/levels. This is a low-preparation and very accessible activity that can be planned for KS3-KS5 and can promote independent learning as well as competition.
The following is an example of a year 7 (French) activity. The class is divided into pairs (preferably differentiated pairs). Lists of different vocabulary are stuck on the walls around the room and a worksheet is provided for each pair to fill in. Students are to sort out the vocabulary into different categories (school subjects, school uniform, school facilities and adjectives). One student, at a time takes turns to run to the list, memorise chunks of vocabulary and dictate it to their sitting partner, who writes them down in the correct category. After the assigned time ends, the answer is displayed on the board and the pairs are asked to swap their work for peer-assessment. The quickest pair to write down the vocabulary, exactly as the one on the board, wins!
- Le sondage “Poll”: This activity promotes independent speaking. Students complete it individually by interacting with their peers. Students are provided with worksheets where they freely move around the room and ask their classmates questions in the target language then they fill in the grid. In this activity, students collect information about their classmates' interests.
- Sentence builders: I was inspired by the concept of sentence builders and how to embed them in lessons by Dr Gianfronco Conti. Sentence builders, especially in languages, are very important. These can help students in building their confidence in speaking and writing independently. I remember during online teaching and learning, I used a platform called Flipitty to promote speaking skills online.
- Roll the dice (lancez les dés): This fun activity promotes independent learning. In this task students are provided with an answer sheet. This activity allows students to improve their skills in translating differentiated sentences whilst also promoting social interaction and collaboration work. The class is divided into groups of four. One student takes the role of referee/leader who should make sure the group stays on task, the rest will compete with each other. In turn, they roll the dice, the number it lands on is the line that they need to translate. They choose sentences that are in different levels: introduction (1 point), development (2 points), depth (3 points). Finally, the referee checks the players’ translation if it is correct and rewards them with points according to the level they have chosen.
- Writing task: This is a very important task that requires scaffolding and techniques embedded in lessons. When I create presentation slides to complete this task, I tend to help students to be independent by ensuring that I include the information/scaffolding that they will need to successfully complete it. Scaffolding might include sentence starters, sentence builders, a model answer and a checklist of the success criteria.
Some strategies for helping students to be independent learners
To start with, the strategies that I am going to mention don't have to be taught in special sessions or lessons; based on evidence they should be embedded/ integrated in each subject-specific from an early stage.
- Routines, routines, routines...Creating routines that students become familiar with help them learn to work independently. These routines should be repeated all the time until students gain confidence.
- Clear structure and instructions: It is crucial to provide clear structures and instructions at the beginning of each task that students can follow. In my lessons, during independent tasks, I usually have a slide with clear steps and instructions/ rules that students can refer back to at any time.
- Modelling the process/ Guided practice: It is vital to model the process of how to approach a task. This will involve the teacher live-modelling the steps of the task/ activity at hand. I sometimes ask confident students to model the activities and explain them in their own words as I noticed that students like to learn from each other.
- Independent practice: This is the main task where students are asked to complete the activity. These activities/ tasks should be accessible to all students and students should be equipped with different tools/ scaffolding to tackle the said task. The independent tasks can be completed individually, paired, or in groups.
- Checklists: Checklists are important tools to promote independence as they provide learners with the means to self-reflect/ self-assess and judge what they have done and what they should be achieving.
- Structured reflection/ feedback: During these activities, teachers circulate the classroom and gather information on students' performance and progress. Teachers can also use this time to help students who need extra support. After the independent activity, teachers also dedicate enough time to give feedback, highlighting misconceptions and celebrating successes/ good practices. It is important for teachers to allow students to self-reflect on their learning.
- How are we building students' resilience in our classroom? And how can we measure this resilience?
- What are the challenges that can arise when embedding independent learning activities in the lessons?
- Are we providing enough time for our students to reflect/ respond to the teachers' feedback?
Noreia, this is great - thanks so much for sharing! The ability to learn independently is at the heart of an IB education and of "student-centred learning". It also reduces the physical demands of teaching on the teachers: Instead of *performing* hour-long one-act plays, they instead direct the action as well! Thank you for sharing practical examples of how to promote independent learning! Paul
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