Preparing K-12 Students to be Postsecondary Ready

Back in 2014, I wrote a blog titled "College and Career Readiness: Less Political Rhetoric, More Practical Strategies" that discussed what exactly does it mean to be college and career ready and how there should be less politicizing and more focus on how we can truly prepare our students for the demands and responsibilities they will encounter in their personal and professional lives after high school.

Two years later, I'm pleased to see that the political rhetoric has died down.  However, two years later, there is still a lack of clarity and understanding as to what exactly does it mean to be college and career ready and how we can prepare our students at the K-12 level.

As I explained in my blog two years ago - and as I discuss in my presentations and seminars - college and career readiness is actually only half of what our students need to be prepared for according to Conley (2010), who identifies the qualities of postsecondary readiness as the following:

• Work Ready: Meets the basic expectations for workplace behavior and demeanor.

• Job Ready: Possess specific knowledge, skills, and behaviors necessary to begin an entry-level position.

• Career Ready: Possesses key content knowledge and key learning skills and techniques sufficient to begin studies in a career pathway.

• College Ready: Prepared in the four keys to college and career readiness necessary to succeed in entry‐level general education courses.

In essence, postsecondary readiness is similar to the Response to Intervention (RtI) in that it focuses on both the academic and behavioral aspects of education.   In the graphic I provided, the academic component is on the left side of the circle while the behavioral is on the right.  Each is split evenly into quarters to suggest that all components are important for a student to learn and develop in order to succeed in life professionally and personally.

However, what does postsecondary readiness mean from a K-12 perspective, and how can we effectively prepare students as young as kindergarten to be postsecondary ready?

I designed the following graphic for K-12 schools to understand what we need to address in order to prepare our students to be postsecondary ready.  This redesign is based upon the research I have conducted on Conley's work, the general definitions of what college and career readiness means (and they are very general), and also my own observations and experiences in my personal and professional life as well as those of my friends, colleagues, or people who have endured great success or setbacks

When we prepare students to be college ready, we are teaching them disciplinary literacy - the ability to demonstrate and communicate knowledge and thinking in an academic discipline accurately, acceptably, appropriately, and authentically.  To prepare students to be college ready, we educators need to teach our students how to read and research to build background knowledge, examine and explain how and why concepts and procedures can be used, and investigate and inquire to extend learning.  These are the key academic skills students will need to develop and demonstrate in order to succeed in their postsecondary academic and vocational endeavors.  We can prepare our students to be college ready by continuously challenging them to demonstrate and communicate - or show and tell -  how and why can the knowledge be used to attain and explain answers, conclusions, decisions, outcomes, results, and solutions.  For example, instead of simply solving math problems, we should be challenging them to explain how and why they can use the math they are learning to defend or refute their solutions, developing and demonstrating deeper conceptual and procedural knowledge.

When we are preparing them to be job ready, we are guiding them to develop and demonstrate basic comprehension and communication skills.  Today's high school, college, or even graduate student must possess the foundational or rudimentary literacy and numeracy skills to perform and complete the tasks they would be assigned in an entry level position.  In essence, they must be able read, write, and do math competently to do their job.  The depth and extent of their literacy and numeracy knowledge and skills as well as how effectively and efficiently they can do their jobs will determine their prosperity and success within a particular company or their chosen field.  However, to get to those next steps, entry-level employees must demonstrate the ability to read critically, write clearly, and do math correctly.  To teach this, we need to foster and promote literacy across the curriculum.  Teaching and learning reading and writing should not be regulated to the English language arts block or classroom.  All teachers are reading and writing teachers, and all students should be expected to demonstrate and discuss what they learning through reading and writing.  All teachers are also teaching mathematics in that we teach students how to make sense of problems and persevere in solving them, reason abstractly and quantitatively, construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others appropriately, use appropriate tools strategically, attend to precision, and look for and make use of structure.  These are not only the standards for mathematical practice.  They are the essential life skills students will need in order to succeed in their post-K-12 academic and vocational endeavors. 

When we are preparing students to be work ready, we are helping them develop independence and self-direction.    This is the behavioral component of postsecondary readiness.  Today's graduate and employee must be responsible, reliable, resourceful, and respectful.  They need to fulfill their job duties and responsibilities.  They need to be counted on and gain their supervisor or organization's confidence that the job, project, or task assigned to them will be completed as expected (if not beyond or before).  They need to be able to seek out the information they need - either from credible sources or from within themselves.  Most importantly, they must show courtesy and consideration to their supervisor, their colleagues, and even their community or customers even if they do not agree or "like" them.    Of all the components of postsecondary readiness, this may be the most difficult and tricky for schools and educators to address.  Our local education agencies, our schools, and our classrooms do not mirror postsecondary academic and vocational environments or organizations.  The consequences for not being responsible, reliable, resourceful, nor respectful are not as impactful or even damaging as if they displayed these behaviors in college or the workforce.  Students will not be expelled or kicked out of school for poor grades like they would in college.  We also cannot "fire" our students for behaving improperly or inappropriately.  However, we can prepare our students to be work ready by fostering a learning environment that teaches students how to develop a solid work ethic and also work productively and politely with others - even if the student doesn't like the person.  Consequences should be real and impactful but not based on punishment and reward.  We should also try to make the classroom as similar as possible to a postsecondary academic or vocational environment.   Talk to college professors or supervisors in the workforce.  Ask them what are the behaviors they expect from their students and employees, and seek their recommendations as to how these expectations can be addressed and instilled in your classroom.

This leads into the fourth component of postsecondary readiness - career ready.  We can help students become career ready by having them develop deeper understanding and awareness of 21st Century Skills.  The term 21st Century skills has unfortunately become a catchphrase like college ready and career ready.  It sounds great and spectacular as a campaign promise or a mission statement.  However, it lacks true, substantial definition of what exactly that means.  Also, like college and career readiness, it is also misinterpreted and misleading.  Many people believe the 21st century skills are defined and dictated by digital media and informational literacy and people's ability to use technology.  However, digital literacy is only one small fraction of what encompasses the 21st Century skills our students must develop.

The Partnership for 21st Century Learning - or P21 Council - has identified what are these 21st Century skills and themes our students should be examining and exploring along with learning the concepts and procedures correlated to the core subject areas.  We should teach them how and why the academic concepts and content they are learning are relevant and beneficial.  We should encourage them to investigate and inquire how these academic concepts and procedures can be used not only within a specific subject area but also across the curriculum and beyond the classroom.  We should also guide them to recognize and realize what is their place and responsibility in the community locally, nationally, and globally and how they could use both their innate skills and talents as well as their education to contribute to the world.  By having students address these themes and develop these skills, we will be teaching them not only how to be positive and productive members of society but also develop the critical and creative thinking skills that will help them establish, succeed, and thrive in a career in whatever field they choose - or even develop a career path of their own.

When we are preparing our students for life after their K-12 education, we should not only be focused on guiding them to become college and career ready.  College and career ready sounds great as a slogan.  The true goal is for our students to become postsecondary ready - to develop the knowledge, skills, and disposition they need to succeed and survive academically, professionally, socially, and personally.  When developing the learning environments of our classroom and planning educational experiences, consider how these four components of postsecondary readiness can be incorporated to truly prepare our students for the demands and responsibilities they will encounter in the real world.

Erik M. Francis, M.Ed., M.S., is the lead professional education specialist and owner of Maverik Education LLC, providing professional development and consultation on teaching and learning for cognitive rigor. His book Now THAT'S a Good Question! How to Promote Cognitive Rigor Through Classroom Questioning will be published by ASCD in July 2016.  For more information, please visit www.maverikeducation.com.

Now THAT'S a Good Question! How to Promote Cognitive Rigor Through Class...

In this book from ASCD, Erik M. Francis explores how one of the most fundamental instructional strategies—questioning—can provide the proper scaffolding to deepen student thinking, understanding, and application of knowledge.

The Return of Synthesis: Connecting Critical and Creative Thinking

When Lorin Anderson and David Krathwohl (2001) revised the cognitive categories of Bloom's Revised Taxonomy, we might have gained a simpler way to teach, but our students lost an essential skill to learn.

Anderson and Krathwohl completely revamped this instructional framework we educators we have traditionally used to establish our learning goals and outcomes.  The key shifts in their revised taxonomy were the following:

• The Cognitive Domain was split into two dimensions - the Knowledge Dimension and the Cognitive Process Dimension.
• Knowledge was replaced with the cognitive actions of .  The subcategories of Knowledge from the original taxonomy were combined into four categories within the Knowledge Domain: factual, conceptual, procedural, and metacognitive.  In 2014, Walkup and Jones expanded this domain by adding three more levels - relevant, deep, and communicative - as part of their definition of the concept of cognitive rigor.
• The names of the categories of the Cognitive Process Domain from conceptual nouns to cognitive verbs.   Comprehension became Understanding.  Synthesis was renamed Creating. In addition, creating became the highest level in the classification system, switching places with evaluating. The revised version is now remembering, understanding, applying, analyzing, evaluating, and creating in that order.  Anderson and Krathwohl also shifted the order of the categories, moving evaluate down a level and making create the pinnacle of the taxonomy.

 The revised version of Bloom's Taxonomy is truly a much more effective and user-friendly model.  It is more directive and explicit.  It also is much more applicable in developing  benchmark standards that clearly state what the student will be able to do by the end of a particular grade level. It also is beneficial in setting performance objectives for what the student will do as part of a learning experience.  It also can be used in setting encouraging and personal learning targets that state what I can and what we will do by the end of a unit or lesson.

However, the drawback of the revision is that it removed a key cognitive category that is essential for our students to demonstrate and communicate as part of their learning.

Synthesis was the cognitive category in the original taxonomy that addressed how students can put new information together to produce an original work - a plan, a product, or a project.  It was also the category which we educators addressed and referred when we wanted our students to demonstrate their ability to create.  When we tasked our students to build, create, design, develop, draw, plan, produce, or write something, we would state how The learner will demonstrate synthesis of whatever concept or procedure they were learning and complete the objective by stating what exactly they would do.

However, synthesizing is actually more synonymous to understanding and applying than creating.   Synthesis involves combining ideas and allowing an evolving understanding of text (Fries-Gaither, 2010).  Students are challenged to put pieces together and seeing them in a new way . Essentially, synthesizing is understanding and applying at a higher level.   Synthesizing involves both critical and creative thinking.  It involves students in processing what they have learned to form a new idea, perspective, or opinion or to generate insight (Bumgarner, 2016).   However, what distinguishes synthesizing from analyzing and evaluating is that the knowledge and thinking they demonstrate and communicate is more metacognitive and personal.  These are the conclusions, decisions, opinions, perspectives, and thoughts they have developed and drawn based upon the information they have learned.  They use the factual, conceptual, and procedural knowledge they have acquired and gathered as examples and evidence to strengthen and support their thinking.

Synthesizing, however, is not the same as creating.  Creating involves designing, developing, or doing something physical that reflects and represents students' skills and talents.  For example, develop and use a model or produce a plan, project, or product.   Students synthesize by processing what they have learned into a personal argument, choice, claim, conclusion, decision, opinion, perspective, or point of view they can defend with credible information.   They create something to that will reflect and represent not only their thinking but also their talent.

Synthesizing is affective as well as cognitive in that involves processing learning to produce opinions, perspectives, or thoughts fueled by evidence, examples, and emotion.  In fact, synthesizing is what engages students in the affective actions of the Affective Domain of Bloom's Revised Taxonomy.   The following graphic shows how synthesizing  guides students through how we internalize what we are learning into personal insight.

• Receiving: Students receive factual, conceptual, and procedural information about who, what, where, when, how, and why.  This occurs as they demonstrate and communicate the ability to and evaluate the ideas, information, texts, techniques, themes, and topics they are reading and reviewing.
• Responding:  Students process the information into personal or self-knowledge when they show and tell how do you transfer and use what they have learned to attain and explain answers, outcomes, results, and solutions.   They also engage in strategic thinking and problem solving by showing and telling how would you and what they have learned  to address and respond to academic and real world circumstances, issues, problems, and situations.
• Valuing: Students use what thay to make and defend decisions using the personal or self-knowledge they have developed.  This is when students engage in argumentative thinking, establishing claims and conclusions about do you think.... or should... and making choices about whether do you agree or disagree...  This is an essential category within the Affective Domain - and with synthesizing - because it engages students to develop and demonstrate disciplinary literacy, the ability to examine, explore, and explain ideas and information in the subject areas.
• Organizing:  Students show and tell how they can use the personal knowledge and thinking they have acquired and developed in different hypothetical scenarios, settings, and situations.  They demonstrate and communicate conditional and contextual thinking by addressing and respond what do you do when.  They also demonstrate and communicate creative thinking by showing and telling what would you do if.  This is also when students begin to develop and demonstrate expert thinking, showing and telling how they would personally use what they have learned in any context.
• Characterizing: This is the highest level of synthesizing, where their knowledge and thinking defines and describes a student's identify as a learner and a scholar.  They take what they have learned and express what do you believe, feel, or think.  They share what is your opinion, perspective, or thoughts.  Most importantly, they take what's academic and even abstract and use it to explain who are you as a learner in a particular subject area.

Since college and career readiness is marked and measured by cognitive rigor and cognitive rigor challenges and engages students to demonstrate higher order thinking and communicate depth of knowledge, perhaps it is a wise decision to bring synthesis back as a separate cognitive category within Bloom's Revised Taxonomy.   It should be positioned between the categories of evaluate and create.  This will be the cognitive category where students will write and present argumentations and express and share their attitudes, beliefs, and feelings about what they are learning.  

Here is a redesign of the Bloom's Questioning Inverted Pyramid I designed that can be used to develop good questions that promote cognitive rigor.  Notice where is placed and what distinguishes its question stems from the ones that challenge and engage students .  This establishes a more definitive connection and progression between critical and creative thinking.

Next year, when you're teaching and learning for cognitive rigor, be sure to include educational experiences that challenge and engage students to synthesize by asking good questions that ask what do you believe, feel, or think; how do you; how can you could, or how would you .  Then ask them what can you design, develop, or do to express that reflects and represents their talent and thinking.

Erik M. Francis, M.Ed., M.S., is the lead professional education specialist and owner of Maverik Education LLC, providing professional development and consultation on teaching and learning for cognitive rigor. His book Now THAT'S a Good Question! How to Promote Cognitive Rigor Through Classroom Questioning is now available from ASCD.

For more information on this topic or how to receive professional development at your site, please visit www.maverikeducation.com.

Active Learning: It's Authentic, Relevant, and Personal All Year Long

It's beginning to look a lot like the end of the school year.  The state assessments have been taken, the final benchmarks are being completed, and almost every classroom has students busily "doing project-based learning" as a reward for all the hard work they have done all year long, ending the year on a fun note.

You might be wondering why I put "doing project-based learning" in quotes.  It's because that's what I'm hearing from both my colleagues who have been directed by their site administrators to "do project-based learning" as their final activity for the end of the school year.  The justification or reason, according to the principal, is "because these kids deserve it after all the work they did to prepare for the state tests and all the benchmarks they took".  In other words, reward them those last 20-30 days for all that teaching and test prep they were presented and provided over the past 150-160.

I even heard from my own daughters that they are "doing project-based learning" in their classroom.  My middle school daughter is "doing project-based learning" in all her classes.  For example, in social studies, she's completing a PowerPoint timeline on significant events and people during the 1920s.   In math, she's using geography to design a city.  My 4th grade daughter just did a PowerPoint project on a tiger.  When I asked them why they are doing these projects, their response was the same: "The teachers said they wanted to end the year with something fun."

A few of my teacher friends have approached me over the last couple of weeks asking, "What kind of fun project-based learning can I do between now and the last day of school?"  When I ask why do they want to "do project-based learning", they share with me the reward directive, the fun excuse, or even the explanation that, "My kids are just burnt out and done after all the teaching, the testing, and everything else."

Then I'd clarify, "So you want to 'do project-based learning'  just to keep them busy between now and the end of the year?"

Some of my teacher friends will admit without any hesitation that's why they want to "do project-based learning".  They are looking for something that will keep the kids preoccupied between now and the last day of school.  Others will justify their reasoning by saying that the kids deserve to "do project-based learning" after all the arduous work they had to do prepping for the state test.

When they say the kids deserve to "do project-based learning", I tell them I agree.  However, I would then reiterate that they deserve to experience not only project-based learning but also problem-based, inquiry-based, expeditionary, and service learning all year long!

These active learning experiences should not be a reward students receive at the end of the year.  They should be provided throughout the school year either quarterly or even on a unit-by-unit basis.  Every unit or quarter should culminate with an active learning experience such as project-based, inquiry-based, problem-based, expeditionary, or service learning that engages and encourages students to transfer and use what they have learned in different academic and real world contexts.

Unfortunately, the real problem with active learning is how these strategies have been perceived and portrayed - fun,  rewarding, busy.   The more appropriate descriptors for active learning strategies such as project-based learning should be ersonal, and relevant.   That's it's true purpose - to be an authentic experience that reflects and represents how students will personally address and respond to ideas, information, texts and topics that are relevant.  They should challenge and engage students not only know and understand but also develop deeper appreciation and awareness  of the importance, value, and worth of the concepts, content, and procedures they are learning.

They are also described as something that is to be done -- such as we are doing project-based learning or doing problem-based learning.   The activities involved in these practices are not something to be done.  They are meant to be experiences that in which students learn how to transfer and use the knowledge and thinking they have acquired and developed not only accurately but also acceptably, appropriately, and authentically.   For example, students will develop deeper appreciation and awareness of the importance of learning the Pythagorean Theorem if they were presented with a role-playing scenario in which they had to use the theorem to determine where to position the fire truck ladder to save people in a burning building.  They can also develop a deeper appreciation and awareness of an author's craft or the ideas and themes expressed in a text if they were engaged to produce their own original text that emulates the author's style or addresses the central idea or themes addressed in a text.  For example, we can engage students to develop deeper appreciation and awareness of the theme of friendship by having students read Charlotte's Web by E.B. White and also write and produce their own original narrative that addresses and explores the friendship of individuals who are very different from each other.

Most importantly, active learning experiences truly engage and encourage students to remember what they are learning.  Remembering in education is not about recalling the facts, information, methods, and process being taught.  Students remember the experience in which they learned the concepts, content, and procedures.  Think about it.  What classroom experiences do you remember from your own education?  Do you remember the day you did that worksheet that taught you how to compare fractions?  Do you remember that particular spelling test in which you learned how to spell chrysanthemum?  Do you remember that homework assignment with the questions you had to answer at the end of the book?  Or, do you remember that classroom experience in which you truly developed deeper appreciation and awareness of a text or topic because your teacher had you demonstrate and communicate your learning through creative design (project-based learning), research and investigate the subject (inquiry-based learning), use what you have learned to address a problem (problem-based learning) in the world at large (expeditionary learning) or within your community (service learning)?

Active learning, however, can be daunting and overwhelming for both our students and us teachers.   That's why I suggest keep active learning simple initially.  Assign one active learning experience per semester to familiarize yourself and your students with the experience.   You could also follow these steps:

1. Start with inquiry-based learning experiences that prompt students to think deeply and express and share the depth and extent of their knowledge.  Through this experience, students will learn how to address and respond to questions not only accurately but also acceptably, appropriately, and authentically using some form of oral, written, creative, or technical expression.  Use the Cognitive Rigor Questions Framework I feature in my book Now THAT'S a Good Question!  (ASCD, 2016) to help you rephrase the performance objectives of academic standards into good questions that will set the instructional focus and serve as assessments for units and their individual lessons.

2. Provide a project-based learning experience that encourages students to address a driving essential question that asks what can you design / develop / do, how could / would you, or what do you believe / feel / think.  Don't have the students all do the same project.  Provide them the opportunity to choose how they will demonstrate and communicate the depth and extent of their learning.  You can use the Multiple Intelligence Activity Grid I created to engage and encourage students to show and tell the depth and extent of their learning using their innate talents.

3. Present a problem-based learning experience that has students use what they have learned to determine whether a problem can be solved or can it only be addressed, handled, settled, resolved - or even avoided.  Use this Problem-Based Learning Table I developed based on Jonassen's Typology of Problems (2008) to help you present different kinds of problems that resemble the ones students will experience in their professional and personal lives.

4. Expand students' awareness and appreciation of what they are learning by involving them in an expeditionary learning experience that engages them to use the academic concepts and procedures they are learning in a real world setting.  Extend the experience by having students use what they are learning to address and respond to an issue, problem, situation, or topic in their community - globally, nationally, statewide, locally, or even within the school - through a service learning  experience. 

This is what should be occurring in our classroom ALL YEAR LONG - not just as the end.   This is the educational experience our students should be receiving.  This is the learning environment in which your students should be developing and demonstrating not only their knowledge and thinking but also their skills and talent.  Don't reward our students for all their hard work all year by providing them with a fun task that will keep them busy until the last day of school.  Make active learning the engaging educational experience that will not only help our students develop deeper knowledge and thinking but also deeper appreciation and awareness of what they are learning.

Also, watch and witness how deeply your students will learn and how well they will perform on the state standardized assessments and school benchmarks if you provide students with active learning experiences that are authentic, personal, and relevant all year long.

H.O.T. / D.O.K.: Depth of Knowledge or Extent of Learning?

H.O.T. / D.O.K.: Depth of Knowledge or Extent of Learning?: What if depth of knowledge actually has nothing to do with knowledge at all? Just let that simmer for a moment and consider this - or, as...

Depth of Knowledge or Extent of Learning?

What if depth of knowledge actually has nothing to do with knowledge at all?

Just let that simmer for a moment and consider this - or, as Hans and Frans used to say, "Hear me now and listen to me later."

Webb (1997) explains how depth of knowledge "can vary on a number of dimensions, including level of cognitive complexity of information students should be expected to know, how well they should be able to transfer this knowledge to different contexts, how well they should be able to form generalizations, and how much prerequisite knowledge they must have in order to grasp ideas".   Hess (2006) describes the levels within Webb's Depth-of-Knowledge Model - which Webb himself describes as "nominative" rather than as a taxonomy that scaffolds - as "ceilings" that indicate "different ways students interact with content".   

Take a close look at what both Webb and Hess, who are highly regarded as the experts on depth of knowledge, are saying.  Webb talks about students' ability "to transfer the knowledge to different contexts".  Hess elaborates by explaining how the depth of knowledge levels indicate"different ways interact with content" - or rather, different contexts.

So perhaps depth of knowledge is truly not about developing and demonstrating thinking and knowledge - or rather, cognition and content as categorized in the Cognitive Domain of Bloom's Taxonomy that was revised by Lorin Anderson and David Krathwohl (2001). Perhaps depth of knowledge is actually about context - the different scenarios, setting, and situations - or ways - knowledge can be transferred and used. 

Perhaps when developing learning environments and delivering educational experiences that foster and promote depth of knowledge based upon the levels of Webb's Depth-of-Knowledge Model, we should use these criteria to mark and measure how deeply and extensively students will be expected to demonstrate and communicate their learning:

• DOK-1: What is the knowledge? The context at this level of knowledge is topical, focusing on the specific concepts and content being taught and learned in class.    For example, in English language arts, the instructional focus is on the specific text or particular topic being read and reviewed.   Similarly, in history and social studies, the instructional focus is on specific ideas, incidents, and individuals that occurred during a particular period of time.  In math and science, the instructional focus is on concepts, procedures, and terminology.  The objective is for students to read and research to build the background knowledge and foundational understanding.  The goal is for students to process the information they have acquired and developed into the knowledge they will need to draw upon and use to attain and explain answers, conclusions, decisions, outcomes, results, and solutions. 
• D.O.K.-2: How can the knowledge be used?  The context at this level is applicable, involving students in demonstrating and communicating - or showing and telling - how they can use the knowledge they have developed.  For example, in English language arts, the instructional focus is on how authors and texts use the elements of craft, structure, and language to present ideas and information.  In history and social studies, the instructional focus is on how ideas, incidents, and individuals can be categorized, classified, and compared; In math, the instructional focus is on how mathematical concepts and procedures can be used to solve mathematical algorithmic and word problems.  Similarly in science, the instructional focus is on how scientific concepts and procedures can be used to produce a particular outcome or result.  The objective is for students to examine, experiment with, and explain how and why concepts and procedures can be used.  The goal is for students to understand and use these concepts and procedures to answer questions, address problems, accomplish tasks, and analyze texts and topics.
• D.O.K.-3: Why Can the Knowledge Be Used?  The context at this level is  multidimensional, engaging students to think critically and strategically about reasons, relationships, and results and how and why answers and outcomes are accurate, achievable, and attainable.   The context can be reflective, engaging students to think strategically transfer and use what they have learned to attain and explain causes, connections, and consequences.  In these contexts, students are presented the outcome or result of a scenario or situation and asked to transfer and use what they have learned to defend, explain, and justify why it is practical, possible, or even proper.  In English language arts, the instructional focus is on explaining the impact of a text or topic and its intended - or unintended - effect on the reader or audience based upon how its written and presented.  Similarly, in history and social studies, the instructional focus is on explaining the impact and effect of historical ideas, incidents, and individuals.  In math, the instructional focus is on using reasoning and proof to defend, explain, and justify why an answer or solution to a mathematical algorithmic or word problem is correct or incorrect.  In science, the instructional focus is on explaining why can science be used to explain a natural event or phenomena.    DOK-3 contexts can also be hypothetical, asking students transfer and use the knowledge they have acquired and developed consider, imagine, and predict, and validate - or invalidate - what if, what could happen, what would happen, or and how will.  DOK-3 contexts can also argumentative, engaging students to transfer and use the knowledge they have acquired and developed as examples and evidence to strengthen and support their claims and conclusions.  In essence, the objective is for students not to transfer and use the knowledge they have acquired and developed to describe what is the answer or demonstrate how can the answer be attained but decide and defend why is this the answer. 
• D.O.K.-4: What else can be done with the knowledge?  The context at this level is extensive, encouraging students to look beyond the teacher, the text, the topic, and even themselves to explore how else can the knowledge be used and express what can you do with the knowledge.  At this level, students are demonstrating expert thinking and communicating disciplinary literacy - the ability to read, write, and think in the academic disciplines.   These learning experiences take students across the curriculum and beyond the classroom to explore how and why can the deeper and extensive knowledge they have acquired be transferred and used to address and respond to a variety of academic and real world circumstances, issues, problems, and situations.  In English language arts, the instructional focus is on exploring how the central ideas and themes expressed in a particular may be expressed similarly or differently in another text within a the same or different genre or written by the same or different author.  In math, the instructional focus is on exploring how can the mathematical concepts, operations, procedures, and theories can be used to address and solve complex real world problems.  Similarly in science, the instructional focus is on extensively exploring and explaining natural events and phenomena through scientific inquiry and engineering design.  In history and social studies, the instructional focus is on exploring and establishing the lasting and long-term impact and relevancy of historical ideas, incidents, and individuals.   The objective is to make the concepts and content students are learning practical and personal by encouraging them to experiment with and design how else could they transfer and use what they have learned beyond what has been presented to them in class as an assignment or an assessment.  The goal is for students to develop self-knowledge and awareness of why the concepts and content is important and vital - or essential - to learn and how can they personally use what they have learned academically, professionally, and personally.

When considering what level of Webb's model a learning experience falls - be it for planning or evaluating instruction - use the following questions to guide you:

• Is the expectation for the students to show and tell what is the knowledge that defines the concept or content?  Then the learning experience would be designated as a DOK-1.
• Is the expectation for the students to show and tell how can the knowledge be used to answer a question, address a problem, accomplish a task, or analyze a text or topic?  Then the learning experience would be designated as a DOK-2.
• Is the expectation for the students to show and tell why can the knowledge be used to attain and explain answers, conclusions, decisions, outcomes, results, and solutions?  Then the learning experience would be designated as a DOK-3.
• If the expectation for the students to show and tell what else can be done with the knowledge or how can you use the knowledge in different academic and real world contexts o?  Then the learning experience would be designated as a DOK-4.

Hopefully this clears some confusion about what exactly depth of knowledge.  It's not about the content or the cognition but rather the context in which the knowledge and thinking can be transferred and used - topically, applicably, multidimensionally, or extensively.

Erik M. Francis, M.Ed., M.S., is the lead professional education specialist and owner of Maverik Education LLC, providing professional development and consultation on teaching and learning for cognitive rigor. His book Now THAT'S a Good Question! How to Promote Cognitive Rigor Through Classroom Questioning will be published by ASCD in July 2016.  For more information, please visit www.maverikeducation.com.

What Is Cognitive Rigor?

Rigor has become the educational "buzzword" of the 21st Century.  Cognitive rigor is marked and measured by the depth and extent students are challenged and engaged to demonstrate and communicate their knowledge and thinking.  It also marks and measures the depth and complexity of student learning experiences.  This instructional model developed by  Karin Hess, Dennis Carlock, Ben Jones, and John Walkup (2009)  superimposes two educational frameworks that are commonly used to establish performance objectives and learning targets:​

Bloom's Revised Taxonomy: The revised version by Lorin Anderson and David Krathwohl (2001)  defines the kind of knowledge and type of thinking students are expected to demonstrate in order to answer questions, address problems, accomplish tasks, and analyze texts and topics.  In their revised version, Anderson and Krathwohl distinguishes between knowledge and thinking by splitting the Cognitive Domain of Bloom's Taxonomy into two dimensions that address the following:

• The Knowledge Dimension (Content and Concepts)
• The Cognitive Process Dimension (Cognition)

​Each of these dimensions within the Cognitive Domain ​of the revised taxonomy categorizes "the skills and stuff" students will learn based upon their complexity. 

 The skills are the cognitive actions and processes students are expected to demonstrate and develop.  The stuff is the curriculum and subject matter that is being taught and learned - or what the landmark report A Nation at Risk (1983) describes as "the very stuff of education".  By splitting the Cognitive Domain into two dimensions, Bloom's Revised Taxonomy clearly distinguishes between the subject matter content (knowledge) that is being taught and learned and what students must do (thinking) with what they are learning. 

Webb's Depth-of-Knowledge Model: ​The depth of knowledge levels in the model developed by Norman Webb (1997, 2002) establishes how deeply or extensively students are expected to transfer and use what they are learning.  This model consists of four levels:

• DOK-1: Recall and Reproduction
• DOK-2: Basic Application of Skills and Concepts
• DOK-3: Strategic Thinking
• DOK-4: Extended Thinking​​

​While Bloom's and Webb's both deal with establishing and evaluatIng the depth and complexity of student learning experiences, they differ in regards to their their scope, application, and sequencing. 

Bloom's defines the skills (cognition) and stuff (content, concepts, and courses of action) students will learn as part of an educational experience.  Webb's designates the scenario, setting, or situation (context) in which students will transfer and use the deeper knowledge and thinking they have acquired and developed.  The "rigor" of a learning experience is marked and measured how deeply students are expected to think about what they are learning and how extensively they are to express and share what they have learned.​

Also, Webb's Depth-of-Knowledge Model is not a taxonomy that scaffolds based on complexity like Bloom's.  Hess (2006) describes the Webb's levels as "ceilings" that designate how deeply or extensively students are expected to transfer and use the knowledge and understanding they have acquired and developed. For example, learning experiences at a DOK-1 level expects students to develop and demonstrate background knowledge or foundational understanding about a specific text or topic.  An educational experience at a DOK-2 level challenges students to examine and explain how academic concepts and skills can be used to answer questions, address problems, accomplish tasks, and analyze specific texts and topics.  An educational experience at a DOK-3 level engages students to think strategically about how and why they can transfer and use what they are learning to attain and explain answers, outcomes, results, and solutions.  A learning experience at a DOK-4 level encourages students to think extensively about what else can be done with the deeper knowledge and understanding they have acquired and developed as well as how can they personally use what they have learned in a variety of academic or real world contexts. 

​Teaching and learning for cognitive rigor expects students to demonstrate and communicate their learning.   The cognitive categories of Bloom's Revised Taxonomy --which Anderson and Krathwohl (2001) renames as verbs -defines and determines what students will do with the concepts and content they are learning.  Webb's Depth-of-Knowledge levels designates how deeply and extensively students will express and share their knowledge and understanding.  The cognitive rigor of a learning experience is marked and measured by how deeply and extensively students are expected to demonstrate and communicate the knowledge and thinking they have acquired and developed.  Cognitive rigor challenges and engages students to express and share their deeper knowledge and thinking both concretely and abstractly through description, discussion, and design. 

​Marzano's (2004; with Simms, 2013) methodology of deepening background academic knowledge through direct vocabulary instruction and language development fosters and promotes communication of depth of knowledge by challenging and engaging students to do the following:

• Describe, explain, and elaborate upon ideas and information with textual evidence and personal examples.​
• ​Rephrase or restate formal definitions and explanations in their own words and in their own unique way.
• Convey deeper knowledge through linguistic (language-based) and nonlinguistic (image-based) representations.
• Express and share depth of knowledge through oral, written, creative, or technical communication.

The communication of knowledge and thinking can be tiered based upon its complexity based upon the criteria set by Beck, McKeown, and Kucan (2002).  

• Tier 1 Communication: Students understand and use concrete and high frequency words, expressing knowledge and ideas using everyday speech, and developing English language acquisition.  
• Tier 2 Communication: Students determine and distinguish words with multiple meanings, develop understanding of general academic words and cognitive action verbs (e.g. analyze, apply, interpret, evaluate), and express knowledge, understanding, and usage of complex language.  
• Tier 3 Communication: Students develop and demonstrate of disciplinary literacy - reading, writing, speaking, listening, and using domain-specific language in the academic disciplines.

Tiering the communication of knowledge by its level of complexity helps students better understand how to consider the task, purpose, and audience when sharing ideas and information.  It also serves as a method to foster and promote English language development, helping students with limited English proficiency to develop and demonstrate deeper knowledge and understanding of how to express themselves in English in different contexts.

​Questioning for cognitive rigor is an instructional method that supports teaching and learning for higher order thinking, depth of knowledge, and language development.  It involves rephrasing academic standards, performance objectives, and learning targets into good questions that prompt and encourage students to think deeply and express and share the depth and extent of their learning.  It also makes learning environments and educational experiences more active and authentic, challenging and engaging students to attain and explain answers, outcomes, results, and solutions using the content, concepts, and procedures they are learning.  It also supports differentiated instruction, encouraging students to show and tell the depth and extent of the self-knowledge and awareness they have acquired and developed in their own unique way.​

The instructional delivery of questioning for cognitive rigor can be scaffolded in the following manner:

• C.R.Q.-1: What are the skills and stuff?  Students show and tell background knowledge and understanding of academic vocabulary and subject-specific details and terminology.
• ​C.R.Q.-2: How can the skills and stuff be used?  Students show and tell how to answer questions, address problems, accomplish tasks, and analyze texts and topics.
• C.R.Q.-3: Why can the skills and stuff be used?  Students show and tell why answers, conclusions, outcomes, results, and solutions are accurate or inaccurate, true or false, or valid or invalid using what they have learned.
• C.R.Q.-4: What else can you do with the skills and stuff?  Students show and tell what they personally can do with the deeper knowledge they have acquired and developed into thinking and talent and how else the skills and stuff can be used in different academic and real world contexts.

Categorizing and scaffolding questioning for cognitive rigor in this manner fosters higher order thinking in that students must actively acquire and gather the information they need to develop and process into the deeper knowledge and understanding they can transfer and use in different academic and real world contexts.  It also addresses each kind of knowledge students must develop and demonstrate as categorized in the Knowledge Dimension of Bloom's Revised Taxonomy.  Questioning for cognitive rigor also extends depth of knowledge by engaging and encouraging students to express and share the knowledge they have acquired and developed authentically through some format or type of oral, written, creative, or technical communication.

 By using good questions instead of performance objectives that direct students simply to do something to prove they are learning, we not only prompt students to think deeply about the texts and topics they are reading and reviewing but also express and share how they can use the concepts and procedures they are learning in detail, in-depth, insightfully, and in their own unique way.  That's what truly marks and measures rigorous learning!

Erik M. Francis, M.Ed., M.S., is the lead professional education specialist and owner of Maverik Education LLC, providing professional development and consultation on teaching and learning for cognitive rigor. His book Now THAT'S a Good Question! How to Promote Cognitive Rigor Through Classroom Questioning will be published by ASCD in July 2016.  For more information, please visitwww.maverikeducation.com.

Why Asking "What Is the Central Idea or Theme?" Is a Bad Question

What is the worst question we can ask our students but the one we reading and English language arts teachers often use and even rely upon as evidence that we are challenging and engaging our students to think critically and deeply about the texts and topics we are reading and reviewing?

What is the central idea or theme of a story or text?

What's ironic is that this very question is considered to be a good question  -- or even the best -- that we can ask our students to stimulate their deeper thinking and deepen their knowledge, understanding, and awareness about the meaning and message presented in the texts and topics being read and reviewing in class.  When ask students what is the central idea or theme, our intent and purpose is for students to think critically about the meaning or message presented in the text either concretely or abstractly.   We also believe we are challenging students to demonstrate higher order thinking -- specifically, the ability to analyze and evaluate.  

The question what is the central idea or theme should be an open-ended inquiry that should challenge and engage students to think critically and creatively about the meaning and messages presented in texts.  It is an interpretive inquiry that should prompt and encourage students to express and share their own impressions and perceptions of the central idea and theme of a text.  However, students' responses to this question should not be based on emotion or opinion alone.  They should justify their interpretation or perception of the central idea or theme by citing specific evidence from the text or explain the logical inferences made by the author.

Unfortunately, the real problem with asking what is the central idea and theme is it's posed as a closed-ended question that students can only answer correctly or incorrectly.   What's also interesting is how we pose or present the question does not resemble or reflect how the question is asked on formative and summative assessments.  Usually, we want students to provide a short answer or write an essay that describes and explains what is the central idea and theme.  Questions about the central idea or theme of a text or passage generally looks like this:

Consider what students are expected to demonstrate and communicate here.  Its intent and purpose is to assess whether the student understands what is the central idea or theme.   While the question asks students to think deeper, in regards to depth of knowledge, asking what is the central idea or theme could be categorized as a D.O.K-1  because it is asking them to recall and reproduce what the central idea or theme is as accurately and explicitly as it was taught or told to them by the text or the teacher. Also, if you think about it, multiple choice questions such as these provide the students the correct answer.  They just have to read the text and figure out which is the correct answer from the other three distractors.  Questions such as these also give students the impression that there can only be one central idea or theme expressed in a text.

Questions such as these also control or directs their thinking.  It also forces students to accept or agree with what one source states is the theme.  It could also damper or even dissuade students from thinking critically and creatively when they are reading and reviewing text - especially if they can't or don't recognize and agree with what is presented or portrayed to be the central idea or theme.

That's why this is a bad question - or even the worst question we could ask students. 

Literary texts are highly complex and dynamic - especially literary fiction that can address and allude to numerous ideas and themes.  Just look up any text explained by supplemental references such as CliffsNotes, Spark Notes, or Shmoop that are meant to help students understand the complex ideas, motifs, symbols, and themes addressed and expressed in texts.    Literary analysts and critics also have their own unique impressions and interpretations of different texts and the meaning and messages they express.  However, who is to say they are accurate or even right?

So how can we ask good questions -- or at least better ones -- that not only reflect the type of questions about central idea and theme on standardized assessments but also challenge and engage students to demonstrate and communicate the following:

• Determine the central idea or theme of a text.
• Analyze how the central idea or theme of a text develops.
• Summarize how key details and ideas strengthen and support the central idea or theme of a text.

These are the performance objectives that mark and measure cognitive rigor as well as college and career readiness.  However, when we ask , we're only addressing that first performance objective.  Just look when we state these performance objectives as cognitive rigor learning goals that challenge and engage students to show and tell higher order thinking and depth of knowledge:

• Show and tell what is the central idea or theme of a text.
• Show and tell how does the central idea or theme of a text develop.
• Show and tell how do the key  details and ideas strengthen and support the central idea or theme of a text.

Take away and you have these questions:

• What is the central idea or theme of a text?
• How does the central idea or theme of a text develop?
• How do the key details and ideas strengthen and support the central idea or theme of a text?

When asked together, these good questions scaffold the level of thinking and extend the depth of knowledge students should demonstrate and communicate - or show and tell.  That's how we can make what is the central idea or theme of a text a good -- or better -- question.

However, these are overarching essential questions that challenge and engage students to show and tell their conceptual and procedural knowledge of the central idea and theme of texts and how can both be determined.  In English language arts, good questions must focus on the specific text being read and reviewed and the central ideas and themes they express and infer.

So what if instead of asking students what is the central idea or theme we ask students the following good question?

How does the text address the following central idea or themes?

Then, instead of having students identify the central ideas or themes, we list what the themes are and encourage students to think strategically (D.O.K.-3) how the text addresses these ideas and themes by citing specific details or making logical inferences.  Asking questions about central idea and theme would look like these:

• How does Green Eggs and Ham by Dr. Seuss address the following ideas? Change can be scary but good.  Try new things.  Keep an open mind. Don’t judge appearances.  Don't take life too seriously.
• How does Charlotte's Web by E.B. White address the following themes? admiration, friendship, home, perseverance, time, life and death
• How does Charlie and the Chocolate Factory address the following themes?  family, wealth vs. poverty, greed, reward and punishment, appearances, parenting, vice, good things come in small packages, what comes around goes around
• How does Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank address the following ideas? isolation, youth and coming-of-age, identity, religion, virtue, friendship and loyalty, adolescence, the horrors of war, generosity and greed during wartime
• How does The Odyssey by Homer address the following themes?  heroism, hospitality, family, loyalty, perseverance, justice, vengeance, piety, pride, temptation, fate vs. free will, appearances vs. reality, spiritual growth, cunning vs. strength, suffering, rules, tradition, customs
• How does Romeo and Juliet address the following themes? love, fate vs. free will, hate, youth and maturity, foolishness and folly, gender and masculinity, marriage, mortality, transience, exile, feuds and grudges, sex 
• How does the Declaration of Independence address the following ideas? all men are created equal, all men have basic human rights given to them by God, autocracy, government must be by the consent of the governed,  unalienable rights, governments are built for the sole purpose of protecting these basic rights, the abuse of leadership and power and its consequences, sovereignty and justice, people have the right to rebel against and overthrow their government
Notice the difference between how these questions are posed.  Yes, the answer of what is the central idea or theme is provided in the question.  However, these good questions can be used to set the instructional focus and serve as summative assessments for the texts being read and reviewed.  They can also inform students what is the intent or purpose for reading and responding to the particular text being reviewed in class.
Also, consider how broad and global these ideas and themes are.  These are dynamic issues and topics that not only address the meaning of life but are interpreted and perceived by different perspectives, philosophies, and points view.  Just look at the ideas and themes of love, life and death, greed vs. generosity, wealth vs, poverty, or family.  What is the formal definition of each as defined in a dictionary?  What is the scientific explanation, the religious perspective, the social connotation, or even the students' own personal philosophy?  All of these are good universal essential questions we can ask students to deepen and extend students knowledge, understanding, and awareness.  They can also prompt deeper conversations and discussions amongst their classmates and with you.  However, be sure to facilitate the discussion rather than direct or lead it.  Remember - we want our students to think and come up with their own impressions and interpretations based upon the definitions they acquire and discussions they have.  
Also, consider how broad and global these ideas and themes are.  These are dynamic issues and topics that not only address the meaning of life but are interpreted and perceived by different perspectives, philosophies, and points view.  Just look at the ideas and themes of love, life and death, greed vs. generosity, wealth vs, poverty, or family.  What is the formal definition of each as defined in a dictionary?  What is the scientific explanation, the religious perspective, the social connotation, or even the students' own personal philosophy?  All of these are good universal essential questions we can ask students to deepen and extend students knowledge, understanding, and awareness.  They can also prompt deeper conversations and discussions amongst their classmates and with you.  However, be sure to facilitate the discussion rather than direct or lead it.  Remember - we want our students to think and come up with their own impressions and interpretations based upon the definitions they acquire and discussions they have.  
Once a clear definition or explanation of these broad and grand ideas and themes are established within the classroom, we can then ask students how does the text as a whole or a part of the text address this idea or theme.  For example, we could ask students to explain how does Chapter Two of Charlotte's Web address the theme of friendship - specifically, the friendship of Wilbur and Fern or how does Act 3, Scene 1 of Romeo and Juliet  address the theme of gender and masculinity.  Good questions such as these could serve as the instructional focus as well as formative assessments for individual lessons taught as part of a literary analysis or genre study.
Asking good questions about central ideas and themes in this format also emulates how these questions are phrased on standardized assessments.  They also educate students how to recognize the specific details and realize the logical inferences made within a text that strengthen and support the central idea and theme - which is the essential skill students must develop and demonstrate.
To develop and deliver instruction using these good questions, take the following steps:
1. Identify what is the central idea or theme of the text being read and reviewed in class.  Look at what supplemental study guides such as CliffsNotes, Spark Notes, or Shmoop identify as the central ideas and themes.  (Trust me - if you don't look at and use these resources, your students will.)  Challenge yourself to come up with your own impression or interpretation of what you think the central idea or theme is.
2. Phrase your good question to ask How does [the text being read and reviewed in class] address the following themes? and list the themes.  You can have this question serve as the instructional focus and serve as the summative assessment for a literary analysis or genre study or a text.
3. For each part of the text such as a passage or a chapter, choose one of the themes that part addresses one of the ideas or themes listed.  Engage the students in a whole class or small group conversation about the broad or global idea or theme.  Have them research the formal definition, investigate how the idea or theme is interpreted  in different aspects of life, and to consider their own perception or philosophy on the issue or topic.  Then, once the class has a clear and comprehensive understanding of the broad and global issue, ask the students to examine and explain how does [the part of the text] address [the idea or theme being defined and discussed]?
4. Provide students the opportunity to develop, demonstrate, and differentiate their talent and thinking by asking them a good affective question that asks what do you think is the central idea or primary theme of [the text being read and reviewed]?  You could have them choose from one or more of the ideas and themes provided or come up with their own impression and interpretation they must defend, explain, justify, and support by citing specific evidence and making logical inferences from the text.  You could also further challenge students by prompting them to argue which central idea or theme do you believe is not addressed clearly in [the text being read and reviewed].

or theme of a text is half the battle.  Students must also be able to analyze and explain how the central idea and theme develops by citing specific details and making logical inferences.  Students must also develop deeper understanding and awareness of the broad and global issues and topics central ideas and themes of texts address.  By posing good questions about central idea and theme in this format, students will not only engaged to demonstrate and communicate deeper knowledge and thinking about the text and topics they are reading and reviewing but also develop extensive understanding and awareness about how these ideas and themes extend beyond the the text.

Erik M. Francis, M.Ed., M.S., is the lead professional education specialist and owner of Maverik Education LLC, providing professional development and consultation on teaching and learning for cognitive rigor. His book Now THAT'S a Good Question! How to Promote Cognitive Rigor Through Classroom Questioning will be published by ASCD in July 2016.  For more information, please visitwww.maverikeducation.com.