Skip to main content

Elizabeth Warren uses cold-calling in the classroom, too!

​An important technique of my classrooms has been cold-calling, using random selection of students. 
Here's a progressive politics rationale for that!
https://chroniclevitae.com/news/2244-what-elizabeth-warren-can-teach-us-about-teaching

Actually, they don't fully describe her classroom process, as it sounds like she's only  random with a subset.  But the general idea is there!
At least she's not simply calling on those with their hands raised--that's patently unfair, in my book.

What methods have I used? 
The best I've found, for K-12 students anyway, is the popsicle stick method, with a can that contains one stick with each student's name on it.  I publicly display the can, ask a question, then publicly select a stick.  Everyone pays attention.  Nobody's left out.  (I admit to occasionally cheating, in unusual cases, to avoid calling on someone.  But even then, I go through the motions so that the process seems fair.)  

I have also built an excel spreadsheet that selects a random name from a given list; or builds a randomly-sorted list of names.   The latter works well for assigning, say, parts in a play, or group work.  But the computer seems too artificial and slow to use during a (necessarily) fast-paced classroom discussion. 

I have also used an iPhone app that displays a random name from among a given list -- again, that's artificial and not as patently obvious as the sticks.  Unless it's actually mirroring an onscreen display, the answer is not patently obvious to the students.

I have also, when lacking any of the above tools, simply tried my own obviously-human random selection, sometimes by patently waving my hand above a list and pointing at a name.  This reassures us all that my point is to randomly select someone -- students like the "fairness" of that.  Or at least they cannot complain, because it is more "fair" than the traditional teacher method of calling on hand-raisers or purposely calling on perceived slackers.  

The randomness is important from both the student and the teacher point of view -- it keeps us both on our toes.  I need to be sure that my question is reasonably answerable, given what I have covered in class.  Again, I confess that in a weak moment I have called on The Student Who Is Sure To Have The Answer That I Want;  or the student who is dozing.  But in general I try to follow random selection for cold-calling.







Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Review: Jerusalem, Jerusalem: How the Ancient City Ignited Our Modern World

Jerusalem, Jerusalem: How the Ancient City Ignited Our Modern World by James Carroll My rating: 4 of 5 stars Fascinating comprehensive worldview, with Jesuitical logic in a broad sweep that links religion in a circular way to violence and the solution to violence. The author shows a great command of history and religion, with extensive endnotes to support or expand upon most of his claims; however, some sweeping indictments will certainly be resisted by the more fundamentalist People Of The Book (that is, the Abrahamic religions). A core symbolic thread is Abraham's near-sacrifice of Isaac on Mt.Moriah, the supposed site later called Jerusalem -- the author deftly cites that scene throughout the many centuries since the original event, demonstrating the human tendency to misinterpret that near-sacrifice in order to rationalize our own tendency to violence and scapegoating. I started the book in audio form, but found it unlistenable -- the author's c...
Post a Comment
Read more

Kite Runner is with us again

 Six or so years ago, I taught The Kite Runner to three successive sets of tenth-graders, and marveled at the effect the novel had on me and on these adolescents.  That age is a marvelous time for a humanities teacher, as we see callous children grow out of their self-centered cocoons and flex their world-empathic feelers.  They grow into the world outside them and realize they truly have agency -- or will have agency and responsibility for human actions.  Amir, the main protagonist of Kite Runner is so identifiable with those adolescents learning to take responsibility for their callous actions.   And of course we think of Kite Runner now that Afghanistan once again plunges into Taliban rule -- we particularly worry about the fate of the Hazara (news stories already cite random executions of Hazara men).   We can only wring hands and pray that the Taliban will have to adapt and tolerate more than they did before -- but I am not optimistic. ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Related Reviews: This Is How They Tell Me the World Ends: The Cyberweapons Arms Race then Attack Surface

This Is How They Tell Me the World Ends: The Cyberweapons Arms Race by Nicole Perlroth My rating: 5 of 5 stars And the hits just keep on coming! This excellent book details an unrelenting onslaught of cyberattacks, and outlines the author's own gradual realization of the dangers of internet warfare. It is a lengthy but worthwhile read -- actually, I lost the book for a while because I did not want to read it at bedtime, for fear of nightmares or disrupted sleep! Indeed the book is changing my stance toward online security -- multi-factor authentication, definitely! As with most of us, the author first downplayed the fear tactics promoted by sellers of security packages; but after years of research she has come to wonder that more disaster has not happened yet. She briefly but baldly calls out the recent presidentical administration for wreaking havoc on US defense, by eliminating a cybersecurity department, incensing the Iranian and Chinese gover...
Post a Comment
Read more