Checklist and Choice Boards for the Win!

Increase student engagement by providing student choice and voice in the blended learning classroom setting. The Field Guide showcases examples of how to gradually move both the students and the classroom teacher to deploying higher order choice activities.  Below explore how to gradually incorporate creation, collaboration, communication, critical thinking, and connecting activities into the learning studios.

Getting Started With Student Ownership (Choice)

The White Belt Strategies for Student Ownership introduce the teacher and the students to creativity, collaboration, communication, critical thinking, and hands-on connection activities. The white belt strategies are designed to showcase how to work with partners with various learning opportunities. The engaging learning activities are tied to the daily learning objectives and should take about eight to ten minutes to complete.

Increase Ownership with Extended Projects

Moving to a two-day checklist with the students will provide ample time to complete larger projects in the Future Ready studio, which will help promote higher levels of student engagement and ownership.  A multiple-day activity could include time to brainstorm with the partner, time to design the project, and the ability for the students to record a short video or voice recording explaining the project.  Again, the idea of the two-day activity is to increase student ownership within twenty minutes.  We are still training the students during this phase of the deployment process.

Overview Video on Choice Boards and Checklist