Using Data to Drive Instruction

My previous post explained how data hungry I am. I want to know everything. This isn’t out of some psychological control issues. The reason I want it is so I can adapt my instruction accordingly. I don’t put so much time into analyzing the data and noticing that students don’t understand vectors or kinematics very well only to scold myself for teaching it poorly.
Rather, data can be used on the go in class or afterward to inform my next decision about what/how I will teach. This is not an incredibly new concept. In fact, using assessment to drive instruction is an essential topic taught in major teacher ed programs. This is essentially the same idea, except I’m referring to the assessment results as data. Why? Because once the results are computerized and made numerical, I feel like data is the best term. You don’t like that? Whatever.
In my first year of teaching, in the process of losing my mind, I struggled with my students to get them to go to my website. I couldn’t figure out what was wrong with them. It was so easy to go to kadinphysics.googlepages.com or another massive url I had when I was using a free wordpress blog page. Well the students didn’t think so. After watching the hits to my site jump from 0 to 2 on the nights before tests, I needed to figure out what I could do to make them more likely to go. I asked the students to complete a short survey at the end of a test that they took. Question 1) Did you use the study materials on my website when studying for the exam? 2) Did you find the study material helpful? 3) If you haven’t been to the website, why not? Sure enough only a few students said they went to the website, and 50% or so of the students who did not go said they “couldn’t remember address.”  Of course the school does not have an option to share a course website on their main page.

Several days later we spent time in class going over the results of the test and reviewing some concepts they struggled with.  For each question, I showed them the question, and then showed them the slide(s) from an earlier class where the topic was taught.  I showed them the availability of the slides on the course website,  and then showed them that the students who used the website were statistically much more likely to get the question right.  I didn’t let up, for an entire class period, I said over and over again, “if you had gone to the website….”  until the students were sick of me.  I also took their feedback and spent 20 bucks (much less than my XBOX Live subscription) getting hosting for mrkadin.com for 2 years (thanks dreamhost).  This url was much easier for them to remember at home, and on the night before the next test, the number of students visiting the site was not the measly 2 from the previous exam, but the massive 35ish unique hits out of 55 students in the course.  Listening to your students and asking them for feedback, looking at the survey results as data and analyzing the resulting statistics has incredibly value.

I’ll give another example.  My class has been lucky enough to be outfitted with an ARS (Audience Response System).  Essentially, my students each have a wireless clicker which is personally assigned to them.  During class, using the projector, I can ask a multiple choice question, and the students can buzz in, much like “ask the audience” on Who Wants to Be A Millionaire.  Not only do I get the aggregate data (in the form of a bar graph with the number of students who responded A, B, C, or D) but I also can view each student’s response at a later time.  There are several companies that produce these clickers (I_clicker, Turning Technologies, etc), I intend to blog on them more completely later.  Students have become totally accustomed to using these in class, and it is built into my everyday routine. At the end of some classes, I have the students play a quiz game where correct answers are awarded points. The students compete to win the game and earn street cred. Having these quizzes at the end of class provides me with a ton of data.
I can instantly see what the class understands. I can instantly see what the class struggles with. And I can also go back and check later on students who missed all or most of the questions and encourage them to work harder or come seek extra help with me after school. The next day’s lesson can include extra slides reviewing, reteaching, or reinforcing the topics that the game showed the students didn’t understand. The next day, the cycle repeats. The next test comes around, and I have no doubts as to what the students know or can do. The clickers have been telling me for the entire unit.
It’s one thing to seek out data. We all should be doing that too. But we have to USE the data. We have to adapt our teaching. We have to leave our planning malleable enough to move at the pace at which the students move. Weekly planners are completely impossible for me. I won’t know what I can accomplish tomorrow until the data shows me what we accomplished today. That’s the way it should be. The students decide what I teach next, not me. I just know where we’re going, though in the end of the day, it is them who decides how fast we get there.