Today I taught monoclonal antibodies to Year 11; the first time I’ve taught this since the mass release of lateral flow tests, so it was so exciting to have an incredibly relevant example to work with. I thought I’d share how I approach it (AQA specification).
I find it’s important to start off by explaining that monoclonal antibodies are not a “natural” thing. Biologists have learnt about how the immune system works and have utilised the cells and proteins in the system to develop a new technology. This is important as I’ve had some students early on misunderstand and think this all happens naturally in an organism. I explain that biologists know antibodies are a very specific shape and will bind to one specific shaped antigen (all by Q&A to see what they recall from last lesson). I describe antibodies as Y-shaped proteins with two “grabby hands” (antigen binding sites) – each one can “grab” (bind to) one antigen. The “hands” are all slightly different shapes depending on which antigen they bind to. I have a toy antibody from Giant Microbes which is a useful prop, but you could cut out a Y-shaped piece of card.
My next step is to show them the great video on the BBC Bitesize website (blank diagram and question sheet in the resources section below. We review the theory of how monoclonal antibodies are made by annotating the diagram below and checking our answers to the questions that accompany the video.
Then we discuss what monoclonal antibodies can be used for. It seemed daft not to discuss lateral flow tests as most of the students have been using them regularly! I showed them Prof. Mark Lorch’s fantastic LFT dissection video on YouTube to start with (@Mark_Lorch on Twitter). For a bit of added drama, one of the students volunteered to take an LFT live in the lesson – I chose someone who had taken a negative test this morning to avoid the nightmare situation of it turning positive in front of my eyes. This led to an interesting side discussion about false positives and false negatives.
After that we checked what we understood from the video by acting out how a monoclonal antibody test kit worked. I used to people on my front row to be the “Test” line and the “Control” line (see image below). I used the soft-toy antibody and it’s removable antigen to assist me. I held the antigen and told the class I was in the “Sample” section of the test kit. I then took a few steps along to the section where the antibodies were. The antigen and the antibody joined. I took another few steps along to Ben who was an antibody in the “Test” window; he could grab any antigens that moved past him. I explained in reality there would be many antibodies so some of them wouldn’t bind. I took a few steps on to Zak who was an antibody in the “Control” window. He could grab any unbound antibodies. We repeated the demo without the presence of an antigen and they could see how only the control line would change colour.
We then discussed other uses of monoclonal antibodies, including a bit of revision of the plant disease topic we did in Year 10. There are some more examples on the PowerPoint in the resources section below, but another important one I tell them about is rapid testing for HIV, and how revolutionary that was; it led to a good discussion about the advantages of a monoclonal antibody test over a blood test. The notes I gave the students are straight from the specification and are shown on the image below.
Finally, we had around 25 minutes left of the lesson so I had them complete some past paper questions (see resources section below) about monoclonal antibodies. HUGE thank you to @Alex_Crone who saved me time this weekend finding new-spec past paper questions for them to have a go at.
I posted about my love of booklets a few years ago, but I’ve recently been asked to share a strategy in a staff meeting that could be useful in supporting students in the classroom and my mind immediately went to the use of booklets.
What is a booklet?
Obviously there’s no universal definition of what a booklet contains, but mine all follow the same structure. They are an A4 paper booklet which holds content for one topic; they have a front cover, the relevant section of the specification, space to record independent study, notes, space to make notes, diagrams, knowledge check questions, past paper questions and activities. I use them for all year groups; Year 7 all the way up to Year 13. The vast majority of students work on paper but some students with SEND keep them electronically and a few of the Y13s prefer to work electronically. It’s taken two years to make them, trial them and edit them and now my next project is to put QR codes into them to link to videos I’m made during lock-downs or good YouTube videos to students can re-watch them easily. Here’s an example of one of my Y10 booklets (name removed but shared with permission):
WE ABSOLUTELY LOVE THE BOOKLETS! THEY COVER ALL THE REQUIRED WORK AND ARE EASY TO FOLLOW. THEY ARE PARTICULARLY USEFUL FOR <Y10 BOY WITH ADHD>, AS HE STRUGGLES TO ORGANISE NOTES IN CLASS AND KEEP UP. IT’S MUCH EASIER AT HOME TO SEE WHAT HE’S MISSED AND PROMPT HIM TO COMPLETE. HAVING EVERYTHING IN ONE PLACE MAKES REVISION SO MUCH EASIER. THE REVISION QUESTIONS AT THE BACK ARE REALLY HELPFUL TOO. IN SHORT THEY ARE A GAME-CHANGER!
(PARENT OF A Y10 STUDENT WITH ADHD – SHARED WITH PERMISSION)
Why bother with booklets?
One feature that can link students with dyslexia, dyspraxia or ASC is problems with organisation. Booklets can remove the need to keep pages in order. They also act as discrete chunks for revision; for some reason when I surveyed my students, the majority of them said they found it easier to revise from (that baffled me a little as it’s pretty much the same content as I would historically have had in an exercise book). Maybe it’s the fact their revision is already broken down for them into small chunks rather than several exercise books full. I also find that they can force students who like to write lenghly, detailed notes at the expense of actually applying knowledge to limit themselves in terms of how much they write.
They have been an absolute godsend during both lock-downs and now as students are isolating at home; I can send a video link from YouTube and a text book page reference and tell them to complete pages 7&8. It’s made it so much easier to see who is missing work when I’m marking; I can attach a photo of missed work from class.
In class, booklets can reduce cognitive load; students don’t have to try and think and write at the same time as many of the important notes are already in place, or just require a fill-in-the-blanks. Trying to multitask in this way can be especially difficult for our dyslexic and dyspraxic students. The booklets do sometimes contain full sets of notes, but we use class time to understand concepts and then to apply the notes to exam questions; most lessons my Y10 and Y11 students tend to have a go at some past paper questions to check their understanding – less time making notes means more time thinking!
I prefer booklets by far because if I do something purely on devices I’m probably never going to look at it again, and it takes a lot of continual organisation to print things off and put them in the right places (for me). I also prefer them to exercise books too because the information is already there. I don’t think writing the information down myself helps, because (for me) I can’t think when I’m writing. Usually if a teacher is also talking, I’ll just be focused on scribbling everything down so that I have it in my notes instead of listening to what they’re saying or actually thinking about the topic we’re learning about. Folders aren’t bad, but its difficult to carry all of them around and they always break at some point and/or get crushed. For revision, booklets are definitely the best, it’s so useful to have one for each topic. It’s also very nice to have the spec in the front of each booklet as well as practise questions.
Year 11 student
From a purely selfish point of view they have saved me so much time in the long term. I used to spend every morning by the photocopier getting sheets of questions copied for the day ahead. Now I can just get everything done in one go and rarely have to print anything else. Yes, they took a little time to make (I made them over one year, trialled and edited them the next year). Why not just try them out with one topic?
How do I use them in class?
I have my own copy which I use alongside powerpoints, practicals, verbal explanations and videos. I use my visualiser (genuinely the best piece of teaching kit I’ve ever used) to fill in my own copy of the booklet. I can model to them how I would make notes, or how I would tackle exam questions (modelling is a key part of metacognitive teaching). I might model to them how I would tackle a question and then set them off doing more.
If students are absent I can take a quick photo of my copy of the booklet and attach it to their Firefly task. At the end of a topic I sometimes send them a full scan of my booklet, along with any mark-schemes, and one homework will be for them to check over and correct everything and upload a full scan of their booklet so I can check it’s complete.
What do the students think?
I sent all of my students a quick question to ask them if they could use any method for making notes and organising work next term, what would they choose. The overwhelming majority wanted to stick with booklets. I asked them if they had any feedback and some of the comments are summarised below.
Concerns about booklets
Aren’t they expensive?
Balanced against the cost of a couple of exercise book per student, a glue stick and photocopying, they still work out a little more expensive than writing in exercise books
Don’t take ages to make?
I found I had a lot of notes, question sheets and diagrams already as Word documents so it didn’t actually take too long to bodge a basic booklet together. As I used a booklet for the first time I scribbled edits that I needed to make on the front cover and asked students which pages need more space, or where they needed more questions. I then used some gained time in the summer to edit them ready for next year.
Aren’t they spoon-feeding the students?
I don’t think so, in terms of content. Students are actually spending more time doing harder thinking and less time copying from the board. In terms of organisation, they are scaffolding the skills they may need in the sixth form or uni. With the GCSE and A-level students, I’ll often use the booklets to model how to take notes, or get them to make notes within the confines of a box in the booklet.
Aren’t they a bit of a straight-jacket in terms of how you teach?
I still go off on tangents all the time in discussions with students and do practicals that aren’t in the booklet. I just don’t bother writing them down. I stick to what’s in the specification in terms of note-making. I’ll sometimes stumble across a new set of questions or an interesting work sheet and print those separately or just post them on Firefly.
Don’t they make everyone in the department teach in an identical way?
Of the four main teachers in our department, two use booklets and two don’t. I made the booklets and another teacher edits them to suit her own needs. Personally, I wouldn’t like to be forced to use a booklet I didn’t make because mine really reflect my style of teaching and the resources I use. I love the ability to be able to share AND edit them as needed. I think if I was teaching out of subject I would appreciate them, especially the questions in them, but again I would like the ability to edit them.
What criticisms to the students have?
The main criticism is that sometimes there isn’t enough space to write in. Interestingly, this mainly comes from students (frequently girls) who like to write long, pretty notes at the expense of actually thinking. On some occasions though, they’re right – I’ve made boxes too small so I edit them for next year.
Some students have also said that they worry if they lose their booklet they have lost their work for the entire topic but that’s true of working in an exercise book or losing a folder.
Two students said that they have to make notes themselves to process the content and don’t like having pre-made notes. This is a valid comment, but I will always ensure they have to engage with the content and apply their knowledge.
6:30am: Got up, grabbed iPad and Apple pen out of the make-shift home office and headed downstairs for a few cups of coffee. Spent an hour and a half checking through work that has been submitted overnight (some of my students are becoming nocturnal!). Left some audio messages on Firefly for students who needed a little clarification and marked some random work. Sent a few “Just checking you’re ok because I didn’t recieve any work from you yesterday” kind of emails. Responded to a few emails that had come in overnight; mainly from parents arranging to collect some of my form’s books that I’d picked up from school for them yesterday, a reference request for one of my sixth form students, and a bunch of whole-school and departmental admin to read. Breakfast provided by the chef (husband).
8:00: Headed up to the spare bedroom which is my day-time home. Got everything ready for my Y7 science lesson first thing. Got Zoom set up and the breakout rooms pre-labelled for ease.
8:45: Zoom registration with my form! We chatted about end of year assessments and a few bits of admin. They’re getting really good using Zoom now.
9:10: Lesson 1 and 2 – double Year 7 Science. We had a Zoom lesson looking at 26 different taxonomic groups as part of their Classification topics. They worked in groups in their breakout rooms and I popped into rooms that needed help. Rosie the rabbit popped upstairs for a scamper and kept me company.
10:25 – Said goodbye to Y7 and headed to break in the staffroom (kitchen). Yesterday I got myself dehydrated so I’m trying to drink lots today. Topped up the Vimto. Grabbed a cheeky chocolate biscuit.
10:45 – I have a double free now (we’re sticking to timetable). I got my email inbox down to zero, prepped my Year 7 lesson for tomorrow and recorded a video for my Year 12 Psychology class about their end of year assessment. Scheduled Zoom sessions ready for tomorrow.
12:00 – Lunchtime! Fish finger sandwich, slice of plastic cheese and tartar sauce on a white roll. Food of champions. A few times last week we went out for a walk at lunchtime. Did about 5k in 50 mins so just fits in nicely. Would never feel able to do that if I was in school – too much going on at lunchtime. Sat downstairs, browsed Twitter and the news. Mr M came back from his day on the duty rota supervising the children of Key Workers in school. Put all of his clothes in a hot wash and made sure everything he’d take into school was disinfected. That’s another 10 days of mild anxiety ahead…
1:15 – Double Year 9. I’d pre-recorded their lesson the day before as they’re doing lots of practical work and I can’t really Zoom from the garden – it doesn’t make sense to do it live and I don’t have WiFi out there. They were doing the second half of the mark, release, recapture practical they started yesterday. I sat and marked their work as it came into me, checking their calculations. Oscar asked a great question about his snails being eaten so I checked something with my friend who is an ecologist. They had a drop-in Zoom session scheduled in case anyone was struggling, but no one dropped in today (I wasn’t surprised – I tried to make my videos crystal clear). One of them emailed me to ask for help with the equation.
2:30 – Double Year 12. I saw them on Tuesday for a live lesson but today they were learning about Succession and conservation, so I’d build a little sand pit in the garden represent the beach and found little plants to represent pioneer species etc and I’d pre-filmed it for them to watch. They then needed to answer some past paper questions. I had a Zoom drop in. One student popped on at about 4pm for 10 mins to query a word she didn’t know in the markscheme and to check a couple of marking points. Spent the lesson checking their work, and marking some odd bits of Y9 work that had come in.
4:30 – Sat downstairs and carried on marking the odd piece of work that were coming in. Added some celebratory photos to our departmental Twitter feed. Replied to a few more parental emails that had come in during the afternoon. Tesco delivery! Whoop! Food! Had a think about the best way of checking the progress of my Year 12 Psychologists in a few weeks. It’s not their Alevel course, so it’s not high on their priority list, but I want to keep their memory ticking over. I think I’m going to set them multiple choice questions because I can cover more topics and it relies on less revision, plus they have a little bit of recognition recall going on to help them. I have plenty of time to work on evaluation skills next year.
6:00 – Ate dinner. Ridiculously hot penang curry cooked by Mr M. I’m sounding like I do no cooking here but he just fancied cooking. Plus I stuck some fish fingers in the oven for him at lunchtime. Watched an episode of House of Games. Love that show.
6:30 – Did some multi-tasking. A bit of email, a bit of marking. Made sure tomorrow’s tasks are all online ready for students. I pre-set the date so they should pop up on their tasks list after midnight tonight. Tried to faff around with my laptop trying to get a microphone (purchased with my own money) to work to give my Zoom calls and videos better sound quality. No luck. Popped on Twitter to ask for tech help. Muted and blocked a few journalists who kindly suggest teachers are doing no work.
7:40 ish – The biologists had a kind of department meeting via email and Whatsapp trying to plan for the next few weeks. Checked in with some other colleagues to figure out how they’re approaching effort grades next week.
8:30 – Started writing this while multitasking with the final few bits of Y9 work coming and replying to emails. Had a check of some work some Y11 students have done on an optional Psychology course I’ve been recording for them.
9:30 – I’m going to call it a day. I’ve had a good day. I’m not feeling too stressed. One low period after a bit of a ‘forceful’ email but I’m ok now. It’s been a 15 hour day (minus 2 hours for food and chilling). I’m not moaning, but please can we stop with the headlines about teachers not working. Also, how the heck do you do this with little kids of your own at home?!
Throughout the Covid 19 pandemic it’s been interesting to hear politicians and journalists refer to “The Science” as if it is a single, fixed entity. Some people have used “The Science” to say we should wear masks, while others argue “The Science” tells us face masks are unnecessary. The same can be said about what “The Science” tells us about children acting as viral vectors and reopening schools. Why does “The Science” in the UK appear different to “The Science” in South Korea? As science teachers we can use these examples to help students understand more that “Science” isn’t a fixed body of knowledge to learn, it is fluid and changes as a result of more data being collected. It can help students understand the words “replicable”, “repeatable”, “valid” and “bias” amongst others.
At this time of year, with Year 11 and Year 13 students have finished the taught element of the course and are busy preparing for their public exams. Whilst there are a lot of ‘fun’ activities they could do to prepare, in my opinion there is nothing more useful than practising exam questions. I think we need to send the message to our students that there is no magic revision pill, and that learning requires hard work. Making and playing board games etc could well take an hour of useless messing about for a ten minute gain.
Developing exam technique from the start of the course:
I don’t just confine this type of practice to exam classes; year 9, 10 and 12 have many of their homework’s based around practising past paper questions. With Year 9 and 10 especially I try not to mention exams too often during lesson time and just enjoy learning about the content, but I do introduce GCSE skills from Year 9 (we have a three year GCSE). My current year 9 class have tried out quite a few GCSE questions now and are getting too grips with their requirements for precise language. A few weeks ago I was looking at a respiration question with 9AG and we talked about including “magic words”! We looked at a 3 mark question and I asked how do I know how many magic words to put down. Joe replied “4” which is what I’ve been training them to do. We discussed the “magic words” to include (oxygen, energy, anaerobic, lactic acid, fatigue) and then they put them into sentences.
Year 10s get past paper questions for each topic so they can see them kinds of things that get asked. They’re currently working on Required Practical 10 and can see that the same points crop up over and over again in the mark schemes, and are making a careful note of these.
Year 12 (and 13) have chapter by chapter past paper question booklets which they generally do for homework. I try and include pretty much every past paper question I’ve found on the topic by going through past papers and having millions of tabs of Word open. I make markscheme booklets too. They’re due for an update as I need to include more some new specification questions. Because they’re topic specific they tend to be AO1 and AO2 questions. I actually love it when the students start to moan: “Argh not that question again! I’ve written that same answer out 3 times now! Mutation changes the DNA sequence, thus the primary structure of the protein. Hydrogen bonds form in different places. Tertiary structure changes. Active site changes shape. Enzyme substrate complex can no longer form” I know my Year 12s could answer that question with their eyes shut now, so if they get it in their Alevel they can zoom through it and spend more time on the more taxing AO3 questions.
An example of an Alevel past paper question booklet
Once a topic is complete we make a Common Exam Questions sheet (affectionately known as a yellow sheet to the students because I have them printed on yellow paper to make them stand out). The aim of this is to check wording against the markscheme and make a note of the points accepted year after year. Here’s an example of a “yellow sheet” for one of the Alevel topics.
Preparing for the GCSE examination
Although much of the leg work is done throughout the course with the ideas mentioned above and frequent retrieval practise, the remaining term in Year 11 and Year 13 is dedicated to practice. Each student in our department is given a stack of topic by topic past paper questions with markschemes and is expected to work through them in lesson time and at home. I have sticker charts to monitor progress and harness the power of peer pressure for good! My Year 11s have a few taught sessions about skills, but then crack on independently. I do not re-teach content and I do not run extra revision sessions outside the lesson; in my opinion this sends the message that it was not important to pay attention the first time around. Having said this, I will always spend time with students who have tried to help themselves but have hit a brick wall.
In my current year 11 lessons I circulate around the room, offering help where needed. Some work on their own, and some prefer to sit in pairs and talk through the question together. We work hard for 30 minutes, then stretch our legs for 5 minutes then crack on again for the rest of the lesson. I encourage them to “work hard and play hard” – in class they need 100% focus and when relaxing they need to completely switch off.
They quickly spot how to answer questions by using the markschemes and get faster and faster at answering. When it comes to their exam, their cognitive load will be greatly reduced, allowing them to dedicate more of their memory to new questions. Year 11 students have 22 topic question packs, but together by my HoD, and the 10 required practicals with associated questions as you can find on my blog. They also have a booklet of maths questions and a booklet of “how science works” questions to work through. I strongly dissuade them from making pretty notes – notes and flash cards etc have been made throughout the course for end of year exams and mocks; now is the time to practise.
Preparing for the Alevel examination
In much the same way, my Year 13 students are spending their time looking at past paper questions, as well as some taught sessions on skills. They too have their own sticker chart (because you’re never too old for stickers). Again, this harnesses the positive power of peer pressure and drags along some of the less motivated students. It amazing to see how excited 18 year olds get at the start of the lesson, putting their stickers up!
Their chart has sections for topic-by-topic question packs which I have told them are their responsibility to do at home, maths and stats practise, something I call “How Science Works” (a term from an old spec – concepts like experimental design, placebo effect, sample size etc), required practical questions, full past papers and old spec synoptic papers. A colleague is working on the synoptic essay with them. We have managed to sit down and talk through four required practicals per lesson for the last three lessons, and they’ve completed some past paper questions at home. I hope to be able to upload some of this material this weekend if I have time.
Apologies if I’ve misused practise / practice in this post; I tried!
I started using booklets a few years back and they seem to be getting pretty fashionable now, so I thought I’d share some of mine as examples and tell you why I love them!
What is a booklet?
The booklets I make are an A4, saddlestitched booklet which covers one topic. They usually have a front cover with a catchy image which captivates students at the start of a new topic and summarises what that topic is about, the specification for that topic to use as a checklist, some bubbles for definitions, some fill-in-the-blank notes, blank summary tables, spaces for practical work, crosswords and other puzzles, some practice examination questions, and sometimes space for revision or feedback from a test. It’s basically a text book crossed with worksheets and practise questions all in one.
Why are booklets awesome?
With my Y8 and Y9 classes at my current school, they are only timetabled for biology either once or twice a week, so retention of knowledge was a little weaker, and I felt like I was spending too much time on getting students to make notes or glue things in their exercise books. With not seeing them very frequently, I find collecting in homework a pain, and helping absentees catch up difficult. With the booklets, I can very quickly see who is missing work and we can spend more time discussing and doing practical work in lesson time. Plus homework sheets don’t get lost and everyone stays nice and organised. I use my visualiser to model how to complete work and the combination of visualiser and past paper questions have been wonderful in helping my Y9s who are new to GCSE skills, get used to how to break down an exam question and understand about command terms and exam technique. On a personal note, it means I have to think about photocopying once a topic rather than before every lesson. Theoretically I could do all of my copying for the whole year at the start of the year (but the storage would annoy me and our repro goddess would kill me).
What are the downsides to booklets?
The obvious one is the expense; each booklet probably costs about 40p to produce and my Y9 have five topics in the year. Though if you balance that against the cost of an exercise book, more glue sticks and printing of homework sheets and practice questions it might well balance out. Another downside is the lack of flexibility; it means I have to pre-plan what I want to do in that topic, and if a student wants to take learning in a different direction, there isn’t room for that in the booklet. I try to leave a couple of blank pages in the back. Last week I winged a practical with Y9 about the effect of different sugars on yeast respiration which wasn’t in my booklet, but thankfully I had some blank pages in the back. The other issue I have found is if a child forgets their booklet you need a back up. I’ve taken to copying one extra booklet for them to look at (but not write in) so they can do the questions etc on paper and copy up at home. I’ve also put the booklets online for them so they could see them on their ‘phones if needed.
Who do I use booklets with?
Most of our department use booklets for Y8. Interestingly, we’ve all adapted the same starting point to suit our own teaching styles which I love. We’ve changed the practicals and questions and examplar materials to suit what we love to teach.
I have started to make them for Y9 due to time restrictions and it’s worked so well. I’ve used them for some Y10 and Y11 topics if they are more self-study topics. Y12 and Y13 biology students have booklets of past paper questions for homework. Y10/11 have work booklets for the required practicals (see seperate blog posts).
I’ve also made booklets for all 8 units of the GCSE Psychology course which has been fantastic, as the course is so discussion-based and I hate pausing to make notes.
Here are some examples of my booklets (school logo has been removed). These match up with the AQA GCSE Biology course. Feel free to try them out and edit them to suit your needs but DO NOT SELL THEM!!
Thank you to Izzy and Katie who let me use photos of their work on here
NEW: Year 7 Science Booklets
We don’t follow the national curriculum so these booklets won’t be usable for most people as they are, but feel free to edit them to suit your own needs:
I’ve just about finished teaching Topic 8 to my Upper 6th Biology students and I’ve been using a left-over 2m length of DNA model that my Y11s made to learn about DNA structure. I’ve cut it up with scissors to show how restriction endonucleases work, and mended it over and over again with sellotape to show how DNA ligase works. I’ve butchered a bit to make a probe (with a yellow circle of card stapled to it) and a primer. It’s looking in a sorry state now but I think it’s made a HUGE difference to how my students have understood chapter 21 compared to the previous two years. I’m giving some consideration to making a permanent model using felt shapes and velcro.
Here are the templates and the powerpoint I use with Year 11 to build it in the first place. The template has instructions for our wonderful reprographics queen, Ali, which will do for a class of 20 but you’d need to scale up or down accordingly for your classes (and the colours don’t actually matter of course!)
Recently we had an INSET session called “Raising the Challenge” by Steve Ingle (via Osiris Education) which was really well presented and focused on Growth Mindset and Metacognition. One of the many things Steve flagged up was the need to encourage students to think about their own learning. He showed us something he called an “exam wrapper” which I’ve been using for years – nothing new – but I adapted my existing ones to encompass some of the things Steve mentioned.
Here are my Word documents for Year 7, Year 10 and Year 12 with small differences between them:
Feel free to edit them in any way you’d like. If you have any useful feedback I’d love to hear it. I’ll add to this post when I’ve done them with my classes over the next fortnight.
Some concepts are tricky for students to visualise and become riddled with misconceptions. Getting some props out and building something for them to see, move and discuss really helps aid understanding and allows you to draw out any misconceptions. We have a great little box in the prep room of random bits to build models. Certain things are always useful; I always save the long cardboard tubes from wrapping paper as my go-to prop. Plasticine, pipe cleaners and a range of different sized balls or counters are also useful. Here are a few ideas:
Using a stool and tubes to represent vasoconstriction and vasodilation:
Kidney dialysis using Bunsen hose
Mitosis and Meiosis demonstrated using pipe cleaners:
I’ll add more as I think of them over the next few weeks but it’d be good to also hear other people’s idea…
I know I’m very late to the party with Carol Dweck’s Growth Mindset theory; I kind of knew what it was but I became much more interested in the details as I was planning a lesson for my GCSE Psychology class. We watched an extract from her TED Talk and it really inspired me to try out some of the ideas with my form and then with older classes. I also loved seeing some of her experiments in practise, showing that children who are praised with the words, “you did so well, you must be really smart” took less risk and challenge, whereas children praised with the words, “you did so well, you put in a lot of effort” opted to try out some more challenging puzzles. It really made me think about how I praise and reward my students, and I’ll definitely be making changes to my practise.
I used our form period this morning to work through a powerpoint (see below) of images to generate discussion. The majority of the wording and scan images from my work are from the material from the Brainology Website which provides great material for schools. We started out by deciding whether the red statement or the blue statement was correct:
We then talked about the brain being like a muscle; the more it is used the more it will grow.
We also looked at a recent tweet by olympic gold medal hockey player, Samantha Quek, who saw a lone girl practising her shots in the cold and dark. It turned out that girl was Erica from our school! This really engaged the students. We discussed what made Erica a great hockey player; was she born that way or did she practise? They all agreed that Erica is fantastic due to the time and effort she puts in to her sport.
We then thought about how the brain actually works. The class had actually looked at the structure of neurones recently in their Biology class and we acted their role out by stretching out our arms to form connections. We talked about the connections being made more permanent by repetition.
We then discussed the evidence for this being correct. James in my form had also seen a great Youtube video (which he’s going to send me the link to) about London taxi drivers having physically enlarged brains due to their memory. They brought up the fact that parents are constantly teaching their babies new words and interacting with them which is what makes their brains develop. I explained the importance of taking responsibility for their own brain growth now they are older.
Next up we thought about what makes one person appear more intelligent than another person. We discussed the importance of challenging yourself to do harder and harder things, as doing the same easy thing all the time will not make new pathways between their neurones. They were quite shocked when I said that no-one should ever get 100% on a test; that’s the sign of a badly written test. There should always be something in there to really challenge them to make their brains grow.
Finally, we looked at the power of the word “YET” and some new ways of responding to set backs. It’s going to be really important that I embed the “YET” statement into everything I do with them from now on so this isn’t forgotten. This mindset has to be lived.
I then asked students to fill in a few boxes about what they learnt (see Word document below).
I’ve asked my form to finish off their sheet at home so that we can revisit it after half term. I’ve also laminated some of the images for the room room, but I’m well aware that Growth Mindset ideas need to be lived, not just stuck on a notice board! It’s something I need to keep banging on about, and expecting from them, as well as rewarding them when they live it. I loved teaching this lesson; it gave me a real buzz, and it was great to see how much the form were engaged in discussion. I hope it’s inspired them to grow their own brains!
Pedagoggles 