High Five
Supporting High Ability Students Through Our Five Goals
Continuing our Journey Through Depth and Complexity
This month we are focusing on the thinking prompt of Multiple Perspectives. Multiple Perspectives is how the same event can be seen from different angles. It is influenced by time, place, and culture. In our individualistic society, it helps students to see that others may perceive things in a different way and that is okay. It helps to broaden their mental and emotional horizon and helps to deter narcissistic thinking. This is what we begin to work on with our children when they are little. How do you think your friend feels when you take their toy? This is a prompt that teachers are really good at and it is more of a literal prompt that can be used all of the time.
Our goal for this newsletter is to learn how the thinking prompts can support student thinking and problem solving and for you to feel confident enough to try a question in your lesson.
Screening Update
NWEA-2nd and 5th Grade
Over Fall Break, the list of students who need further information to help make an identification decision was sent to your building administrators. This list was derived from the CogAT scores. The CogAT is an ability measure that tells us how students learn. Any student who scored an 80-95th percentile on one of the CogAT batteries is in this group. The next step of the screening is to give this smaller group of students an achievement test called the NWEA. The testing window is open 10/30-11/10/23. This test measures what the student has learned. Students take a standardized, adaptive test in Reading, Language Arts, and Math.
HA Office Hours
Do you have questions about a particular student, resources for differentiation, or the identification process? I will hold office hours on the last Monday of each month. I will be available on a Google Meet. Pop on at any time during the hour to ask any questions that you may have. I can also answer general testing questions as well! The October office hour will be on 10/30/23 from 4-5 p.m.
To join the video meeting, click this link: https://meet.google.com/msi-sghh-qof
Otherwise, to join by phone, dial +1 515-518-1055 and enter this PIN: 523 685 448#
To view more phone numbers, click this link: https://tel.meet/msi-sghh-qof?hs=5
Multiple Perspectives
Who benefits the most from multiple perspectives?
This thinking prompt asks students to think about how another person or thing would think about a topic. This is the type of thinking that is lacking in our modern world, and it is one that teachers innately ask students to do on a daily basis. There is one tweak that can be made to take this prompt from so-so to amazing! A way to do this thinking prompt justice is to look at a topic through the perspective of an inanimate object. Describe the total solar eclipse from the perspective of the sun or the moon. Have students look at math problems through the viewpoints of the numbers, variables, the operators, etc. Multiple perspectives can be used in every subject area to quickly increase the rigor and complexity of what we are asking kids to THINK about.
Multiple perspectives in ELA
Analyze two conflicts in the story from the perspectives of ____ and _____.
If we read the story from a different point of view, how might our perspective of that character change?
Write two cinquain poems about the water cycle, one from the 🕶️ perspective of a water droplet and one from the perspective of groundwater.
Prepositions ARE multiple perspectives! Learn the prepositions by creating something from that viewpoint.
Multiple perspectives in Math
How does the right angle feel about the hypotenuse?
Which strategy was easier to solving the problem?
How does your strategy of rounding to the nearest 10 and then doing the math in your head compare to the strategy of creating a drawing to figure out the problem?
Multiple perspectives in Social Studies
In social studies, multiple perspectives broadens emotional horizons and rejects narcissism. It is the backbone of a civil society.
How might a new, young voter feel differently about college tuition loan forgiveness? How might the bank feel about tuition loan forgiveness? How might a Gen X person who just made their final payment after working two jobs feel about loan forgiveness? How can all of these perspectives weigh on a lawmaker or leader and whose perspective should they take into consideration the most?
If King George would have responded to the Declaration of Independence, what perspectives would have been used to rebuttal the claims against him?
Multiple perspectives in SEL
Multiple perspectives affects the interpretation of events and people's reactions. In younger years, teachers innately ask students to think about others when they are teaching kids to share. However as we get older, do we spend as much time asking our kids to think about the perspectives of others?
Other questions to ask about perspectives to climb the ladder of Blooms:
Which perspective is more important in this situation?
Which perspective is most like your own?
Create a new perspective for you to consider that you haven't thought of before.
Multiple Perspectives Teaching Strategy:
When teaching multiple perspectives, the Six Thinking Hats are a must!
Start with this resource and do some more quick searching. They are quick to implement and will ramp up your students thinking very quickly!
Give each student a hat and ask them to only respond with that type of thinking. Alternatively, brainstorm as a class under the same hat and switch hats together. What could we change about our world if we spent more time "thinking in a different color" rather than always asking our kids to debate? How could the six thinking hats and moving through blooms thinking through the lens of perspectives help meet standards, improve their thinking, and more?
Connection to Indicators on the Instructional Domain:
Thinking: analyze problems from multiple perspectives and viewpoints
Questioning: varied and high quality with question types including application/analysis, creation/evaluation
Activities and Materials: student-centered, evoke student curiosity and suspense
Problem-solving: abstraction, drawing conclusions
Here is more on Multiple Perspectives from High Ability expert, Ian Byrd: