9. HEADS DOWN

AND COLD CALL IN PHASE 5

What

- A method of gauging understanding of the whole class at once
- Plan to ask a short sequence of questions that reveals the extent to which students have mastered the central content of the lesson
- Highlights misconceptions and misunderstanding
- Combine WCR with Cold Calling for the most impact

Why

It’s quick: enough to get a good idea of how your students did on understanding your KO
Designed to yield data: think about asking each question to focus on a specific part of the lesson (not qs to summarize the whole lesson)
Great for informing DO NOWs: if you notice common errors, you can use it to inform the starter task to your next lesson

heads down + cold call = effective checking for understanding

4 easy steps for this method of checking for understanding:

WCR Technique: Heads Down
Get DPR KO up ready and change judgements!
Cold Call using your data
Bounce and Repeat: What did x say?

Here's how you might script it:

3, 2, 1 and Heads Down.
Open your hands if you’re not sure if you can use electrolysis for this aqueous substance…[teacher gauges whole class data]...close your hands…
Open if you think, yes I can use electrolysis...[teacher gauges whole class data]...close your hands
Open if you think, no I can’t use electrolysis...[teacher gauges whole class data]...close your hands…
Heads up and back in SLANT!

Benefits of the heads down technique:

students can’t copy each other
teacher can see v quickly what everyone is thinking in the room
keep a neutral tone as you gather the data so students feel confident to share

What A Good One Looks Like

Georgia Heads down.mp4

WE LOVE HOW GEORGIA...

...models how to do Heads down first to make her expectations clear
...uses this method to ascertain confidence in understanding
...brightens lines between each response with ok...close your hands…
...enforces habits of attention with track the speaker

Keila Heads down.mp4

WE LOVE HOW KEILA...

...uses her DO NOW multiple choice to quickly ascertain understanding using heads down
[0:33] ...instructs the class to resume ‘perfect SLANT’
[0:35]...uses the data from Heads down method to inform her cold calling and extending a student who she knows got the right answer

Key takeaways

Get the wording of your questioning right. Plan ahead.
Make Heads Down method a regular feature in your lesson
Combine WCR with Cold Calling so that your Cold Calling is informed by data

Take the quiz to complete module 6!

KEY READING / listening

Effective Questioning in the Classroom YouTube video by Pritesh Raichura (Heads Down technique from 14:05)

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