Choice and transparency
I (Emma) still remember one of my very first conversations with Chris when I had moved to Norway to join him at UWC Red Cross Nordic. We were talking about distributing test results, and I said something along the lines of “Well, that's easy. Just display the results on the screen!” to which Chris looked absolutely horrified.
His reply? “That would never happen here!”
I understand now. I'd come from a traditional English ‘public school’, where rankings might be posted on corridor noticeboards or used in seating plans, and where academic selection (through entrance exams) and self-selection (in choosing the ‘harder’ IB Diploma Programme over the national curriculum) meant that pretty much every student aspired to grade 5 or above in every subject.
At UWCRCN, we have students from all over the world with widespread educational backgrounds, united in their ambition to bring peace and sustainability to the world's future. Posting grades for all to see would be meaningless; each student is on an individual trajectory with individual priorities.
However, I would like to make the case for transparency in two other realms of DP Physics:
- Revision scheduling
- IA proposals
I am in the fortunate position of working at a school where (for the most part) students are taught in specific Higher or Standard Level physics classes. It might seem early, but I like to complete my first run through the SL course in time for the February mock examinations in DP2. This is because many of our students haven't encountered science exams before the DP, so it makes sense to leave plenty of time to convert our understanding of physics to exam technique in physics contexts.
After I return the mocks, we'll have 12 lessons (about 15 hours) remaining. And it's my students who will decide how we use the time.
I'll make a shared document, listing what slots are available. They will fill in topics, specific understandings, skills, types of desired resources and past paper question requests. Sometimes the slots will be really broad ("Current Electricity from scratch, please!") and sometimes really narrow ("What kind of Nuclear Physics experimental questions have come up in previous years?"). The students will decide whether to request an additional set of practice papers under timed exam conditions, or whether to do this kind of task in their own time and send their responses to me for marking.
I find this approach helps to engage students right the way through the programme, and it facilitates good role modelling (from the students who already have a clear sense of the ‘Understandings’ they need help with) and differentiation (those with the most gaps can be helped in class time rather than one-to-one interventions).
And, of course, I don't switch off my teaching brain completely. Although my students might think they're in charge, I include a mix of general and trickier questions so everyone progresses.
I continue to carry out IAs during DP1 (following Chris' legacy). This year, bearing in mind Easter and the timing of our DP1 exams, the plan is:
- Start on 16th March
- Experimental work completed by 27th March
- Draft deadline on 10th April
- Feedback ready by 27th April
- Final deadline on 8th May
I will use a shared spreadsheet to keep track of student proposals, in which the students themselves enter the following information (with a simple exemplar from me to help with formatting the information):
- Student name
- Topic
- Investigation type
- Independent variable
- Dependent variable
- Equipment check
- Existing model for this
- Source of inspiration
- Possible extensions or areas for discussion
I then add a final column: “Feedback from teacher”. It's beneficial for students to see what their peers are up to and how I react to each idea. It cuts any risk of inappropriate collaboration (because we can ensure everyone is doing different things) and levels the playing field (those who are doing well still do well, and those who had no experience of science reports before the DP can see ‘what good looks like’ in the planning phase).
While I understand that students must produce individual reports, I aim to foster a collaborative atmosphere before data collection, analysis and report writing begin.
What do choice and transparency look like in your DP Physics lab?