Picture the scene: Year 8. Set 3 of 3. Haven't had a content lesson in over two weeks. You crack out the mini whiteboards to see what they can remember, have they got the prereq knowledge for today's lesson. And, to no one's real surprise, they don't. What is a surprise is just how much they've lost.
This was me, on Wednesday, with my year 8s. [who I genuinely love teaching]. There's 11 of them in the class because they are supremely needy, bless them. We were [meant to be] doing the adaptations of small intestine, so naturally, I needed to check if they remembered the factors that affect diffusion, and how said factors affect diffusion.
First question: "Just before half term, we learned about three factors that affect the rate of diffusion. On your MWBs, what are the three factors that affect the rate of diffusion?"
Blank faces. More importantly, blank boards.
Shit.
Okay, scrap that question. Should've anticipated that one.
"On your MWBs, what is diffusion?"
This one gets a quizzical eyebrow or a thoughtful expression from one or two.
"3, 2, 1, show me"
A selection of almost-answers. "The movement of particles". "High to low". "High concentration and low concentration". One student almost gets it with "The movement of an area of high concentration to a low concentration". [As my year 7s would say "NO PARTICLES!🙅"]
I have three choices available to me here. I can:
- Make like The Beautiful South and 🎶carry on regardless🎶;
- Reteach it for understanding; or
- [unpopular opinion] Drill it for pure recall
And my choices depend entirely on the class.
Option 1: Carry on regardless.
Terrible idea, no matter the class. If they can access the lesson without knowing the prereq knowledge, it probably isn't prereq.
Option 2: Reteach it for understanding
For most classes, this is the go-to. You can't move on if they don't have the foundations. You're building on sand and wasting your time. Sure, you might be able to move on a bit, but they won't "get it" properly, and it will take you much longer to get them to understand. If I find my students don't have the prereq knowledge, I'm probably in a position to reteach this stuff right now - I don't need to go into massive amounts of detail, I just need to get them to have enough understanding to build on. It's enough to explain it, do a CFU, then move on. They probably don't need a whole load of independent practice so I don't need loads of questions prepped. For new teachers, I would 100% recommend having a textbook to hand when you teach so you can use their questions rather than having to think up your own on the fly.
Option 3: Drill it for pure recall.
This is for worst-case scenarios. This is for those classes that you've explained it again and again, you've tried different ways of explaining it. You've tried diagrams and manipulatives and you're about ready to try mime just in the hope that it will work. This was actually the second time I'd "taught" adaptations of the small intestine to this class. It was like groundhog day.
I don't know how well-versed you are with how tiered cakes are made, but it's not cake all the way down. They actually look like this:
A light sponge will be unable to support the weight of the upper tiers and their icing, so dowelling is used to provide support. Why am I talking about cakes? Well, sometimes, we have to give our students dowelling. Their prerequisite knowledge is moist and fluffy. It can't support the weighty follow-on knowledge we're about to lay on them. It's there, but it's not strong enough. So we turn to rote learning.
I do not advocate for pure rote learning. I firmly believe students should have at least some understanding of what they are learning, not just have the ability to regurgitate what I've told them. But knowing stuff is better than not knowing stuff (Adam Robbins, 2020-something). With my 8Y3s, I could try yet again to get them to understand the factors that affect diffusion. Or I could give them dowelling. As long as they know the factors that affect diffusion, right now that is enough. If they can tell me that increasing the surface area increases the rate of diffusion, that is enough right now. They can then learn the adaptations of the small intestine. In time, we can revisit the factors that affect diffusion, and reinforce that fluffy prereq knowledge. But at this point, they just need to know it.
With some classes, I would be able to reteach it [yet again] but with this group, they would remember doing it enough to be irritated and tune out thinking "We did this before half term, I know this", so I made a drastic decision. Those delightful year 8s did look/cover/write/check with the factors and how they affect the rate, then they quizzed each other, then we did some MWB work, then we looked at the small intestine. And every one of them could tell me the adaptations and why it has those adaptations.
Dunno if they'll still know it tomorrow, mind...
