Organizational Aids
InTASC Standard 8: The teacher understands and uses a variety of instructional strategies to encourage learners to develop deep understanding of content areas and their connections, and to build skills to apply knowledge in meaningful ways.
Introduction
When I first started teaching, California was in the process of transitioning from the California State Standards to the Next Generation Science Standards for high school chemistry. At the time, there were no curriculum maps, pacing plans, or textbooks that were aligned to these new standards. While each of my students were provided with a textbook for state compliance purposes they were not aligned to the new standards and were not very useful for instruction and learning. To overcome this obstacle, each student has a personal three-ring binder that we use to essentially construct our own textbooks as we go through the year.
When new material is being presented in my classroom, we often begin with a brief segment of direct instruction. While I am delivering direct instruction—with many embedded checks for understandings and breaks for collaboration and student practice—students are filling out a set of guided notes or a graphic organizer. Student can then use these notes as a reference when completing various collaborative classwork activities, labs, and independent practice. At the end of each period, student store any new papers and handouts in the proper section of their binder according to our classroom organization system. These binders can be left in assigned spaces in the back of my classroom or taken with students to study. By having a uniform system of storage and organization, we can easily reference back to old material as we build upon it in future lessons. Laying out all of the information in one place also allows us to spiral standards and learning to ensure students gain a deep understanding of the content and they can see how all of the information is connected.
While the primary goal of my classroom binder system is to overcome the potential obstacle presented by lack of textbooks—there are several other secondary benefits for students. I strive to make my classroom as applicable to the real world and life outside of my classroom walls as possible for my students and to give them frequent opportunities to apply new skills in meaningful ways. To do this, I attempt to incorporate 21st century skills, habits of mind, and life skills as often as possible. I have found that this binder system works to teach students many valuable non-content skills that can be applied in other classes and their life outside of school. Organization is not a skill people are born with—it requires a skill set that must be learned and practiced like any other skill. However, in my experience, teaching these skills and giving students an opportunity to practice is often overlooked in our education system. Strong organizational skills are crucial for success in any desired field and in adult life. My classroom binder system is designed to assist students as they develop and strengthen this skill set.
Direct Instruction
The first instructional strategy I use to build content knowledge and organizational skills is direct instruction. However, I try to use this strategy for the minimum amount of time possible each day. My school places a heavy emphasis on collaborative grouping structures and activities. My administration would prefer if we cut out direct instruction entirely. However, many chemistry concepts are dense and would be difficult to comprehend through collaborative activities alone. Direct instruction is necessary to explicitly state these new concepts when they are first introduced.
As you can see in the video on the left, I have a set of PowerPoint slides projected on my SMARTboard during direct instruction. These are formatted the same way as students’ guided notes to allow them to easily follow along with the lesson. Within each PowerPoint presentation, there are embedded checks for understanding and practice problems. The guided notes from this lesson are included below.
Direct instruction sample for guided notes
Direct instruction sample for class example problems
When a new concept is introduced there are typically three types of practice included within the slides. First, a class example—shown in the video on the left—is included that we complete together as a whole group. Second, there is an example that students should complete with their purposefully assigned collaborative table groups. While students are working, I am able to circulate the room and provide additional support to students who require it. When every table group has attempted the problem, a student—or multiple students—will come up to the white board and solve the problem. We have a rule that the student at the board is the new class teacher until they have finished explaining the problem. Other students are free to ask them questions—like they would ask me—and we call them “Mr. _____” or “Miss _______.” This eliminates some of the stress from being in front of the class and students have a lot of fun with this routine. Finally, there is an independent practice question. I am once again able to circulate the room and assistant students who require additional support.
Guided Notes and Classwork
Students pick up guided notes from the table next to my classroom door at the start of every lesson. They contain the catalyst questions, a spot for new vocabulary terms, and fill in the blank sections for key concepts. This allows students to spend time during direct instruction listening and looking at visuals instead of having to write down large chunks of text. This system also draws specific attention to key terms and main ideas. Students can use these guided notes as a reference when completing collaborative classwork, labs, independent practice, and to study. Guided notes also directly link to the daily learning target, the primary activity for the lesson and the exit ticket. In the documents below you will find sample guided notes—and accompanying classwork and independent practice—related to the topics of chemical bonds as well as acids and bases. Within the documents, there are annotations embedded to explain how each of the documents links together within the larger unit and how each set of guided notes connect to the included classwork.
The document on the left shows several samples of guided notes from our unit introducing the three main types of chemical bonds. Several student samples of classwork and independent practice, that were completed after guided notes were filled out, to demonstrate mastery of the concepts learned are also included. Please use the embedded zoom feature for a clearer picture of the text and annotations.
Chemical bonds—guided notes, classwork, and independent practice
The document on the left shows guided notes, student work samples for independent practice, collaborative group activities, and the end of unit summative assessment designed to allow students to display mastery during our acids and bases unit. The guided notes and accompanying classwork for the lesson shown in the “Direct Instruction” section above are also included.
Acids and bases—guided notes, classwork, independent practice, and summative assessment
Binders
After students have completed their guided notes and daily activities they organize each into a three-ring binder. These binders contain five sections—guided notes, exit tickets, assessments, homework/classwork, and labs. Chemistry content builds on itself and nearly every topic is connected. New lessons build off of material learned from the previous lesson and units build off of each other as well. It is important to be able to reference back to old material when it is relevant for new learning. Sharing a common organization system allows us to easily reference back to older, previously learned material in a timely manner during class. The binders also encourage the development of strong organizational skills and weekly binder check scores act as motivation for students to keep their notes and papers instead of losing them or throwing them away.
Binders also make it simpler for students and myself to determine if they are missing work. If a student comes to me to ask how they can improve their grade my first response is “let’s take a look at your binder.” Nine times out of ten, they are missing guided notes and other work. Before students are allowed to make up or resubmit any missing work they must first show me that they have a properly organized binder with all guided notes filled out.
On the left you will see one of my student’s binder with dividers showing each of the five sections.
Classroom binder organization system
Reflection
Just as I am still developing as an educator, this binder system is a constant work in progress. When I first started teaching, I tried to implement a similar system using a multi-subject notebook with Cornell notes. However, this system was not effective. Many students did not properly fill out Cornell notes. Also if students missed a day their notebooks would be unorganized. Many students would also doodle on pages; rip pages out for other work; and the notebooks would all end up organized differently. It was difficult to look through and see what notes a student had and which they were missing. Furthermore, there was no place to store classwork, labs, and other handouts. Most of the time these papers would be left scattered around my classroom or were immediately thrown away. It was the failure of this original system that showed me many of my students need practice developing their organizational skills and inspired my current guided notes and three-ring binder system.
My original guided notes were also not very effective. I mostly transcribed the text from my PowerPoint presentations into a document and removed random words. Over time, I have started to be more purposeful in the words that are redacted. I now remove key terms that students should give special attention. Originally, vocab words were spread throughout the page as they came up in the slides. It was difficult for students to find the definitions when flipping back through their notes. To remedy this, I added a “new vocab” section towards the top on the front of every page. This allows students to more easily flip through and find all the vocabulary terms and target language for the unit. Finally, my most recent change was adding the catalyst into the guided notes. Catalysts, guided notes, and exit tickets used to be three separate sheets of paper that students filled out every day. I used to collect the catalyst and exit ticket and return both with feedback. This started to be an excessive amount of paper and I was not able to provide adequate feedback due to the sheer volume of student work. By adding the catalyst to the top of students’ guided notes, they are able to self check their work. I circulate the room and check the catalyst for completion, which then counts for points during our weekly binder checks. This allows students to immediately check their work, saves paper, and gives me additional time to give more extensive feedback on exit tickets and other collected classwork.
Overall, I have received positive feedback from students about this system. It is always one of the items mentioned on end of unit, semester, and year surveys. Students have told me that they find it helpful having all of their work organized into one place. They also like that they are allowed to store the binders in the back of my classroom. Many students at my school are not assigned lockers and they have to carry all of their material with them at all times. This causes many students to frequently forget things at home or intentionally not bring materials because they do not want to carry them all day. Having a place in my classroom to keep their binders ensures students always have required materials when they are needed in class. However, students know they can always take binders and notes home when necessary. I have a sign that hangs above my desk with the quote “On Wednesdays We Check Binders” with a picture of the cast of the film Mean Girls. This sign is referenced frequently and it is a running joke in our class.
The biggest sign of success for this system is when I learned that several of my students have begun a similar binder system for their other classes. Teachers in my Small Learning Community (SLC) have noticed some of their students creating math, English, and history binders and have asked me about my system. Students using their knowledge and skills, learned in my classroom and applying them in meaningful ways in their other classes is what pushes me to continue developing and improving the system.
Finally, as previously mentioned, the system of organizational aides in my classroom is still a work in progress. I am consistently looking for ways to make the system more efficient and better for students. I will frequently test out a new idea on a set of guided notes or for a unit and then ask students for feedback. If students give a positive response, the new addition may continue. If they do not find it helpful, I scrap the idea. I frequently ask students during binder checks if they have any ideas about how the organization system or guided notes can be changed and improved. This is to show students I value their voice and their feedback in every aspect of my classroom and their learning.