Big Idea: In order to evaluate the effects of differentiation on intellectual autonomy, I need to first establish a baseline of autonomy. Here, I provide autonomy supports without any kind of differentiation and evaluate the results through a student survey.
Roadmap:
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Background
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Data Analysis
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Connection to Literature
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Reflection and Next Steps
References: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2021), McCombs (2010)
Background
Key Idea: To determine a baseline for my students' intellectual autonomy, I provided autonomy supports without any differentiation and collected a survey to evaluate the results.
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After having collected, processed, and analyzed some data on my students’ needs for differentiation, the next step was to gather some baseline data on how my students might respond to autonomy-promoting classroom strategies, absent any intentional differentiation. Using my academic research to back my pedagogical choices, I decided to attempt transitioning my students to intellectual autonomy over the course of two weeks, during our unit on probability distributions and the binomial distribution.
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First, I let my students decide how they wanted to break down class time. Then, I gave them multiple options – text, images, slides, video, and a custom option – for how they wanted to learn the unit’s material. Their culminating assignment was to apply the binomial distribution to one of their passions, hobbies, or interests. I provided a set of guidelines for what kinds of information needed to be on the paper they turned in, but they were free to choose the topic, methodology, and format. While they worked, I actively monitored the room to answer questions, provide guiding feedback, and build confidence through positive narration. I encouraged the students who were progressing the fastest to take a moment and help out their peers. These two weeks incorporated all three of my targets – students were asked to autonomously learn the material, apply it to something they cared about, and create an analysis and corresponding product.
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Later in the week, after they had turned in their binomial distribution assignment, I collected a survey assessing how students felt about their academic autonomy (sans intentional differentiation). My first two questions focused on students’ perceived level of autonomy, with an attempt to uncover any potential disparities between their ability and comfort level. My last three questions asked if my students felt supported in their autonomy by math as a subject, the school, and me, respectively. I asked three questions instead of just one because I wanted to discern where exactly students felt most or least supported. For example, perhaps they felt like mathematics as a whole was very conducive to autonomy, but my classroom may be structured in a suboptimal way to foster that autonomy.
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Data Analysis
Key Idea: While the survey ratings are promising in terms of my students' ability to be intellectually autonomous, the written responses indicate that much more could be done to help transition my students towards that autonomy.
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Looking at the responses to the first two questions, it’s clear that there is no real disparity between my students’ perceived ability to be autonomous and how comfortable they are doing so. Most of the ratings were identical between the two, and those that were not (students 3, 4, 6, 11, 14, 16) only differed by one point. Although this is relatively unsurprising, it is an important relationship to confirm. If students felt like they were great at autonomy but not comfortable doing it, they would likely just need additional practice to increase their familiarity with working autonomously. Conversely, if students felt like they were bad at autonomy but comfortable with it, they would likely need additional help with building confidence. The fact that there is no disparity helps to correlate students’ level of autonomy with the amount of autonomy support they receive, rather than other underlying factors.
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The last three questions give a breakdown of how students feel most supported in their autonomy. When asked if they thought mathematics as a topic was conducive to autonomy, most students gave a 3, followed by a 2 or 4. When asked if they thought the school supported their autonomy, most students again gave a 3, followed by a 4. Finally, when asked if they thought I supported their autonomy, over half the students gave a 5, and the lowest score was two 3s. Looking at this data alone, it appears as though students were largely satisfied with my initial attempts at pushing them toward intellectual autonomy. Since my scores were higher than the school’s scores, there must have been some aspect(s) of my classroom or instruction that students found particularly helpful. The math scores, which were the lowest, indicate that I may need to spend additional time showing my students how they might apply autonomous learning, application, and creation to mathematics as a subject.
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Looking at the written responses, it seems that there are three major trends. The first is that several students (1, 3, 4, 13) feel like they are bad at math, which likely results in their perception that math is not a subject open to autonomy. Second, there seems to be quite a bit of disillusionment with the school’s autonomy support (students 2, 3, 7, 10, 11, 12, 14, 15, 16), even among those that rated the school highly. Finally, the responses give insight into the particular things I do that the students find helpful in promoting their autonomy – going over instructions in detail, assigning competence, providing guiding questions, answering questions, being equitable in giving help, leveraging student interests, and taking student feedback into consideration.
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Connection to Literature
Key Idea: Drawing on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2021) and McCombs (2010), it appears my students would benefit most from differentiation supports that increase their sense of belonging in the classroom and foster their socioemotional skills.
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Two of my research sources are especially applicable to this artifact – the article by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or the CDC (2021), and the one by McCombs (2010) from the American Psychological Association. Since I drew on both of these sources to construct my autonomy supports over the course of the unit, and for the culminating assignment, it seems natural to go back and evaluate the effects of those supports by using each of their proposed frameworks.
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The CDC, aside from giving specific techniques to foster autonomy in the classroom, emphasized the importance of making sure that students feel like they belong. Looking at my survey results, it is clear that this is an area I need to pay specific attention to, given my students’ opinions of their school. Student 2 feels like the school “gives nothing”, student 3 thinks the school “doesn’t fit” everyone, and student 10 thinks that teachers don’t always give the best support. According to the CDC, this kind of thinking results in a decreased sense of belonging, which obstructs learning and autonomy. Based on the responses, it appears as though most students feel like they belong in my classroom specifically. However, I can still work on helping certain students (4, 15) feel comfortable in my statistics class.
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McCombs, on the other hand, puts more of an emphasis on socioemotional wellbeing. According to McCombs, socioemotional learning helps students to control potentially negative emotions that can hinder their motivation and autonomy. Unfortunately, my survey results do not give me a clear indication of my students’ socioemotional strength. However, I wonder if the four students who feel like they are bad at math might benefit from some kind of socioemotional learning. Perhaps their struggle with math as a concept is on more of a socioemotional scale than a cognitive one.
Reflection and Next Steps
Key Idea: This artifact has given me insight into my students' initial thoughts and feelings about intellectual autonomy, which leads me to want to dive deeper into their actual ability to be autonomous in their learning.
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By analyzing this artifact through writing, I have discovered quite a few patterns about my students’ opinions about autonomy, and their perceived level of autonomy support from math as a subject, the school, and myself. I have also discovered quite a few key ideas, including their lack of trust in math and in the school, their various levels of confidence in themselves, and what specific kinds of support they find most helpful.
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From here, there are several different next steps I can pursue. First, I can find ways to further increase the level of autonomy support that my students feel in my classroom, such as through differentiation. Second, I can attempt to help my students feel more supported by math or by the school. Third, I can do a deeper dive into how exactly students are understanding and utilizing their autonomy, so that I can figure out how I can push their autonomy even further.