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Step 1: students build their understanding of concepts individually.

Step 2: students build their understanding of the conceptual relationship question.

Step 3: shifting context(transfer) to build schema

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Harness natural curiosity for conceptual understanding!

Young children are naturally curious, asking deep questions about complex concepts. This tendency is a talent that can be nurtured so that children grow to be deep thinkers and innovators later in life. However, in our complex world, it is impossible to teach students everything they need to know. Pushing more factual content ignores what we know about how children learn and endangers their love of learning. Concept-based teaching helps young learners uncover conceptual relationships in a way that is developmentally appropriate. Readers of this guide will learn:

*Why conceptual learning is a natural fit for children
*Strategies for introducing conceptual learning
*Instructional strategies to help students uncover and transfer concepts
*How to write lessons, assess understanding, and differentiate in a concept-based classroom
*How concept-based teaching aligns with best practices and initiatives

Written for educators who strive to cultivate conceptual understanding while honoring students' innate curiosity, this is a must-have road map for implementing concept-based teaching in elementary classrooms.

"This book provides the research and resources educators need to help students take ownership of their learning. It fosters students' curiosity about their environment and it allows them to explore and become life-long learners."
Ellen Asregadoo, Fifth Grade Teacher
Public School 190, Brooklyn, NY

"This is an important book for all teachers. We need to be honoring our students as thinkers who deserve developmentally appropriate intellectual rigor in the classroom. We will not achieve this in our traditional coverage based classroom. I am so inspired and can't wait to start this journey (making mistakes and learning along the way!)."
Sarah Gat, Second Grade Teacher
Ecole Arbour Vista Public School, Guelph, Ontario

Teachers will learn:

Why conceptual learning is a natural fit for young minds

Strategies for introducing children to conceptual learning

Instructional strategies to help students uncover and transfer concepts

How to write concept-based lessons

How to assess for conceptual understanding

How to differentiate in a concept-based classroom

How CBCI aligns with other current best practices and initiatives (like PBL, CCSS, etc.)

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Tools for Teaching Conceptual Understanding, Elementary

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Concept-based teaching helps students uncover conceptual relationships and transfer them to new problems. Written for elementary educators, this is a ...

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These are programs that we might not be able to see until next year - use clever to access our reading programs.

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When working with standards, we need to look to this. A healthy combo of curriculum and standards.

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Nouns=concepts (know/understand)

Verbs=skills (do) often we need to break apart verbs in standards.

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Watch how we use and reuse our verbs!!

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Think about vertical planning.

Plan backward, then go foward.

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From a top down perspective - What do we want then to know?

This aids better to skills transfer

"let go of that security blanket of facts."

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Write within the Freyer model.

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The teacher MUST provide the "state" to avoid the google effect.

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These are the drivers of the concept

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Chapter 1: Unit Planning Steps (pages 19-20)

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Chapter 1: Unit Planning Steps (pages 19-20)

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Step 1: Create Unit Title

Step 2: Identify Conceptual Lens (what is your focus?)

Step 3: Identify the unit strands

Step 4: Web out the unit's topics and concepts

Step 5: Write generalizations you expect

Step 6: Brainstorm guiding questions

Step 7: identify critical content

Step 8: Identify key skills

Step 9: Write common summative assessment/rubric

Step 10: design learning experiences

Step 11: Write the unit overview.

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1. Set up a place for exploration

2. questions are a tool for learning

3. set up a positive community for learning

4. intellectual journals

5. Partner coaching (think/pair/share)

6. place for discussing change in beliefs/learning

7. building common language

8. contrasting traditional/concept based learning

9. Help students appreciate iterative learning

10. Avoid over simplistic thinking

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Organizing idea containing attributes derived from examples.

Learning is not like a pile of papers, but rather file folders.

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It is a pleasure to have a full length treatise on this most important topic, and may this focus on transfer become much more debated, taught, and val…

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Science curriculum for busy teachers. No fancy materials needed for our simple labs. Lab demos are included for each NGSS skill.

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Control+F creates a search menu for standards then it highlights the standards

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The knowledge gap- lends to our group’s goal

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Winner of a silver medal from the Nautilus Book Awards in the category of Social Sciences and Education

"Is it possible to create a more inclusive and fairer education system? The Knowledge Gap shows the way." Daisy Christodoulou, tes.

"The Knowledge Gap is not just a scholarly work. It pulsates with vivid detail as it winds its way through the strange terrain of the Educational Upside Down. Anyone who seeks to understand the quixotic state of educational ideas in American schools and beyond should place it on the top of their summer reading list." Greg Ashman, Quillette

"The best book I have seen on improving elementary schools." Jay Mathews, Washington Post

"The Knowledge Gap makes a persuasive case for attending to the importance of rich content and high-quality curricula in elementary classrooms." Carnegie Corporation of New York

"This book serves as a reminder of our own potential knowledge gap and provides an opportunity for educators to be wiser consumers of information with the ability to 'distinguish between approaches that are likely to produce the outcomes we want and those that will only lead to a heartbreaking waste of precious time.'" Sheryl Ferlito, Perspectives on Language and Literacy

"Wexler ... has made a first-rate case for content. ... If you are among the uninitiated on the value of content knowledge for kids, buy a copy. If you're already among the true believers, buy two copies and put them in the hands of persuadable educators." Robert Pondiscio, Education Next

"In this compelling work, journalist Wexler pinpoints the underlying issues that plague the American public education system, provides context to recent educational reforms, and offers possible solutions." Library Journal (starred review)

"A compelling critique of American elementary schools" that "highlights pervasive problems." Kirkus Reviews

"Illuminating and thought-provoking." Publishers Weekly

THE KNOWLEDGE GAP focuses on a long-overlooked issue lying at the heart of what is known as the achievement gap: the failure of most elementary schools, and especially those serving low-income children, to systematically build knowledge of the world.

Every school day, elementary teachers spend hours drilling students on comprehension skills and strategies like "finding the main idea" or "making inferences," in an effort to boost their reading ability-and their scores on standardized reading tests. Subjects like history, science, and art have virtually disappeared from the curriculum in many schools.

In fact, these schools are doing the exact opposite of what can actually turn students into good readers. Comprehension strategies can be useful-when delivered in limited doses and connected to specific content. But cognitive science has shown that the primary factor in whether you're able to understand what you read is whether you possess relevant background knowledge and vocabulary.

The prevailing narrow, skills-focused approach to literacy instruction can hold any child back, but its effects fall hardest on those at the bottom of the socioeconomic spectrum. Children from more educated families often absorb knowledge about the world at home. But those from less educated families have to rely on schools for the kind of knowledge that will equip them to do well on tests-not to mention in high school, college, and life. Every year they spend in school without getting that knowledge puts them farther behind their more affluent peers. By the time they get to middle or high school, it's often too late for them to catch up.

Through the stories of educators, students, and parents, The Knowledge Gap examines what elementary literacy instruction currently looks like, how it evolved to this point - and how it can be changed so that all students receive a meaningful, rigorous education.

Excerpts from the book have appeared in The Atlantic, Chalkbeat, MindShift, American Educator, and the blog of the Albert Shanker Institute.

Read or listen to interviews with Natalie and presentations about The Knowledge Gap:

TV:

Morning Joe, MSNBC

After Words With Natalie Wexler, C-SPAN

Good Morning Washington, WJLA

VIDEO:

Why Prior Knowledge Wins the Game (two-minute video from Edutopia)

Western NY Science of Reading Conference, November 2022

Iniciativa Educacao, Lisbon (in English)

Why Teaching Social Studies Is Teaching Reading, The OC for Social Studies Conference

RADIO:
Total Information AM South Dakota Public Broadcasting
The Pulse (WHYY/NPR) (episode on comprehension)

On Point (WBUR/NPR)

Leonard Lopate at Large, WBAI

All of It, WNYC

The Record, KUOW

St. Louis in Tune, KWRH

Nightside with Dan Rea, WBZ

PODCASTS:

Through the Educational Looking Glass with Don Sturm and Courtney Eddleson

Lars og pal with Lars Sandaker

Education Uncharted with Amanda Bratten (Propello)

Raising Healthy Kid Brains podcast with Amy Nielson

TeachThought Podcast panel discussion with Emily Hanford and others

The Literacy View with Faith Borkowsky, Judy Boksner, and Mary McCool Berry

Building Knowledge with Kristen Rodriguez

Mr. Nico Summer Schoolin' with Nico Eaglin

Melissa and Lori Love Literacy (with Judith Hochman)

On the Scene with SST 13 with Mary Williams

The Inquiring Mind with Stanley Goldberg

After the Bell with Cassie Tabrizi
Talking to Teens
Alabama Literacy Network's Podcast with Shelley Vail-Smith

The Charles Love Show (second hour)

Catalysts for Change with Jill Shah

Rethinking Intervention with Emily Freitag

Tests and the Rest with Mike Bergin and Amy Seeley

Filling the Pail with Greg Ashman

Rethinking Intervention with Emily Freitag and Christina Gonzales

PodcastED with Doug Tuthill
EDVIEW 360 Podcast, Voyager Sopris: Righting the Wrongs of the Elementary Education System EWA Radio: Can Schools Close "The Knowledge Gap"?Just a Few Questions with Marc Sims
Education is Power with Chris Stewart (Facebook Live)

Melissa and Lori Love Literacy (second appearance)
More Teacher Talk: Transforming Teaching and Learning for Disadvantaged Pupils Full Prefrontal: A Podcast About Exposing the Mysteries of Executive Function Ed's Not Dead: A podcast covering today's hottest education issues Off the Assembly Line: A Podcast with Rebecca Reed ExtraOrdinary Districts: Ordinary school districts that get extraordinary results Vrain Waves: Teaching Conversations with Minds Shaping Education Science of Reading: The Podcast The Learning Curve with Bob Bowdon and Cara Candel The Report Card with Nat Malkus Education Research Reading Room with Ollie Lovell Principal Center Radio with Justin Baeder Melissa and Lori Love Literacy

PRINT INTERVIEWS AND ARTICLES:
EdSource/KQED, This Literacy Expert Reveals the Key Problem Undermining American Education, April 25, 2024 Edutopia, "Why Our Youngest Readers Need 'Knowledge,' Not 'Skills,' July 28, 2022 Edutopia, "Is It Time to Drop 'Finding the Main Idea' and Teach Reading in a New Way?, July 28, 2020 American Educator, "Building Knowledge: What an Elementary Curriculum Should Do", Summer 2020 EdNC, "Reading instruction needs to improve. Who will lead the charge, and how?", February 17, 2020 Perspectives on Language and Literacy, "The Importance of Knowledge" (International Dyslexia Association), Fall 2019 MindShift (KQED) ,"Why Deeply Diving Into Content Could Be the Key to Reading Comprehension," October 22, 2019 Chalkbeat, "Want better readers? Spend less time teaching kids to find the main idea, 'Knowledge Gap' author Natalie Wexler argues", September 16, 2019 District Administration, "Closing the knowledge gap: Why schools are failing to teach fundamental reading and comprehension skills-and how to change it", October 2019
Click HERE to order The Knowledge Gap through the publisher's website or HERE to order from Amazon. Listen to an excerpt from the audio version, read by the author, below. To order the audio book, click HERE.

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Winner of a silver medal from the Nautilus Book Awards in the category of Social Sciences and Education "Is it possible to create a more inclusive and fairer education system? The Knowledge Gap shows the way." Daisy Christodoulou, tes. "The Knowledge Gap is not just a scholarly work.

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Open-and-go lessons that inspire kids to love science.

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Open-and-go lessons that inspire kids to love science.

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Mystery Science offers open-and-go lessons that inspire kids to love science. The hook, visuals, and activity have all been prepared for you. Less prep, more learning.

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This is a great tool to see what reading lessons and sessions match up with other content areas. You will need to be signed into i-Ready to access this document.

i-readycentral.com/download/?res=58113&view_pdf=1

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iReady math lesson to standard (updated program)

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iReady math lesson to standard (updated program)

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If you need a refresher/reminder of what we discussed Tuesday. :)

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We didn't do all these, but it's a good review of what we covered Wednesday.

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We want our lessons more complex and hard.

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We want our lessons more complex and hard.

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What are assessments telling us what we need to do? 

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What are assessments telling us what we need to do? 

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A format that provides students with personalized feedback and works to keep them from focusing solely on their grade.

©Shutterstock.com/Monkey Business Images

As educators, we know the power of a good rubric. Well-crafted rubrics facilitate clear and meaningful communication with our students and help keep us accountable and consistent in our grading. They're important and meaningful classroom tools.

Usually when we talk about rubrics, we're referring to either a holistic or an analytic rubric, even if we aren't entirely familiar with those terms. A holistic rubric breaks an assignment down into general levels at which a student can perform, assigning an overall grade for each level. For example, a holistic rubric might describe an A essay using the following criteria: "The essay has a clear, creative thesis statement and a consistent overall argument. The essay is 2-3 pages long, demonstrates correct MLA formatting and grammar, and provides a complete works cited page." Then it would list the criteria for a B, a C, etc.

An analytic rubric would break each of those general levels down even further to include multiple categories, each with its own scale of success-so, to continue the example above, the analytic rubric might have four grades levels, with corresponding descriptions, for each of the following criteria points: thesis, argument, length, and grammar and formatting.

Both styles have their advantages and have served many classrooms well. However, there's a third option that introduces some exciting and game-changing potential for us and our students.

The single-point rubric offers a different approach to systematic grading in the classroom. Like holistic and analytic rubrics, it breaks the aspects of an assignment down into categories, clarifying to students what kinds of things you expect of them in their work. Unlike those rubrics, the single-point rubric includes only guidance on and descriptions of successful work-without listing a grade, it might look like the description of an A essay in the holistic rubric above. In the example below, you can see that the rubric describes what success looks like in four categories, with space for the teacher to explain how the student has met the criteria or how he or she can still improve.

A single-point rubric outlines the standards a student has to meet to complete the assignment; however, it leaves the categories outlining success or shortcoming open-ended. This relatively new approach creates a host of advantages for teachers and students. Implementing new ideas in our curricula is never easy, but allow me to suggest six reasons why you should give the single-point rubric a try.

1. It gives space to reflect on both strengths and weaknesses in student work. Each category invites teachers to meaningfully share with students what they did really well and where they might want to consider making some adjustments.

2. It doesn't place boundaries on student performance. The single-point rubric doesn't try to cover all the aspects of a project that could go well or poorly. It gives guidance and then allows students to approach the project in creative and unique ways. It helps steer students away from relying too much on teacher direction and encourages them to create their own ideas.

3. It works against students' tendency to rank themselves and to compare themselves to or compete with one another. Each student receives unique feedback that is specific to them and their work, but that can't be easily quantified.

4. It helps take student attention off the grade. The design of this rubric emphasizes descriptive, individualized feedback over the grade. Instead of focusing on teacher instruction in order to aim for a particular grade, students can immerse themselves in the experience of the assignment.

5. It creates more flexibility without sacrificing clarity. Students are still given clear explanations for the grades they earned, but there is much more room to account for a student taking a project in a direction that a holistic or analytic rubric didn't or couldn't account for.

6. It's simple! The single-point rubric has much less text than other rubric styles. The odds that our students will actually read the whole rubric, reflect on given feedback, and remember both are much higher.

You'll notice that the recurring theme in my list involves placing our students at the center of our grading mentalities. The ideology behind the single-point rubric inherently moves classroom grading away from quantifying and streamlining student work, shifting student and teacher focus in the direction of celebrating creativity and intellectual risk-taking.

If you or your administrators are concerned about the lack of specificity involved in grading with a single-point rubric, Jennifer Gonzales of Cult of Pedagogy has created an adaptation that incorporates specific scores or point values while still keeping the focus on personalized feedback and descriptions of successful work. She offers a brief description of the scored version along with a very user-friendly template.

While the single-point rubric may require that we as educators give a little more of our time to reflect on each student's unique work when grading, it also creates space for our students to grow as scholars and individuals who take ownership of their learning. It tangibly demonstrates to them that we believe in and value their educational experiences over their grades. The structure of the single-point rubric allows us as educators to work toward returning grades and teacher feedback to their proper roles: supporting and fostering real learning in our students.

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A format that provides students with personalized feedback and works to keep them from focusing solely on their grade.

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Bingo dots to grade standards

Green - I got it (and can explain why)

Red - I didn't get it (and can explain why)

(yellow?) - Almost there??

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Students wrote down what they know about a topic/standard, then an assessment was created from their answers. Left shows what they students wrote, then the right was the assessment that was created from their answers.