My meeting today made me reflect on how the conversation changes each week as I look at student work and set some individual goals. The format I am using is as follows:
- Title of piece of work:
- Context of work:
- Feedback and mark received:
- student observations on own work:
- GG Goals, Moving Forward (in summary):
The format allows me to ask the student questions about their own piece of writing, and this gives me some insight into each students' thinking about their own writing and development in this subject. This has been particularly good in terms of the 'student observations on own work'. Before I indicate where I think they have done well and could improve, the student has a chance to self-reflect; often their own thinking guides the conversations from here.
Today, Tristan showed me an essay he had written last year on a comparison of tragedy, looking at Macbeth and Oedipus Rex. He felt, looking back, that he had rather over-relied on context and that this was something which in some ways typified his approach. We then talked about the idea of the question he was responding to, and what the 'heart of the matter' might be in this case. As a goal, I have asked him to consider writing essay questions in his own words, in several ways, to identify this 'heart' and then to consider whether it is possible to 'collapse' some of the contextual points in his essays to develop this central focus further.
Today's conversation, in other words, was quite different from last week's one. This would seem to indicate how just twenty minutes with a student can help me to see their thinking and working in a way that could help guide their work for the coming term.
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