Guided Practice

Most effective time for small groups that are formed based on instructional needs -- this is where students who do not have the necessary background knowledge are provided time to do so while understanding how that knowledge will help lead them to the mastery of the learning target. This is why it is so critical to clearly define how a student can demonstrate mastery.
Time for concept mapping, small group discussion with the teacher and/or peers, posing an open ended question with time to find evidence to support an answer and receive feedback with a purpose.
Time for "catch and release" -- reflecting on the target -- students should be able to describe how the learning is empowering them to master the target.

Things to think about:
- All students time to “dig into” their learning based on expectations set through the mini lesson.
- Ensure the activity or activities you provide are designed to help students develop the knowledge and skills being asked to master in the target/standard.
- Provide an opportunity for purposeful reading, writing and discussion to occur which reflects skills needed in the real world.
  - Have students close read, annotate, and answer text dependent questions to gain the background knowledge they need to develop critical thinking skills through the following:
    - Using text based evidence to defend, argue, support a claim, make a prediction or solve a problem. As students engage in one of those tasks, you can communicate to students they will be using one or more of the following strategies:
      - inferencing, analysis, comparison (similarities and differences), classification and evaluation - these will be determined by what the standard calls for.
- Ask yourself, “from a holistic view of the lesson, are there opportunities for students to engage in critical thinking, creativity, collaboration or communication?”
- Know how you will assess/monitor progress of the learning throughout the work time. Think of how you will provide timely and effective feedback to allow students to reach mastery of the target. (Feedback has a .70 effect size).

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