Vertical Learning: A Powerful Tool

Recently, our team of Collins Associates came across an exciting article by Jennifer Gonzalez on her website, Cult of Pedagogy. Gonzalez interviewed author and professor of math education Peter Liljedahl to discuss his recent book, Building Thinking Classrooms in Mathematics, Grades K-12: 14 Teaching Practices for Enhancing Learning. One of the strategies he introduces for promoting “thinking classrooms” is the use of vertical, non-permanent surfaces. While Liljedahl’s ideas focus on math, we saw a strong connection to one of our key Collins strategies and discovered how we might make our technique even better by embracing Liljedahl’s technique.

In past issues of the Exchange, we have offered tips on using student writing samples to teach and model writing skills, clarify content understanding, and troubleshoot common errors. We focused on the common I-Do, We-Do, You-Do approach, modeling our analysis of student work, encouraging partners to analyze a new student sample, and asking students to reflect independently on a piece of writing. This method is highly effective when we need to calibrate our grading system for students, directly call out a common error and teach students how to fix it, or show students exemplary pieces of writing to help them craft their own.

But we now see another option, one that puts students in the driver’s seat and promotes higher order thinking and higher levels of engagement: vertical analysis of student writing samples. In this scenario,

we tape student writing samples to a vertical whiteboard and send randomly selected groups of three to each taped sample. Students are prompted to analyze the given sample and make notes on the board surrounding their sample. The teacher moves among the groups, watching, listening, and encouraging.

Once students have worked through their sample, the teacher ends with what Liljedahl calls a consolidation activity in which the teacher highlights key elements on each work surface, encourages students to make notes for themselves, or engages students in a short formative assessment to check understanding.

Check out this list of ideas to prompt students' thinking during a vertical learning experience and check understanding afterward.

Read the Collins Writing Exchange from March 2023 for more ideas.