What It Is
This activity allows students to review their notes while the concepts are still fresh in their minds. They can clarify what they wrote while they still remember why they wrote it. They also can encode their notes with stars to indicate the most important concepts, and then numbers indicating the ranking of the three most important points.
This is an excellent wrap-up activity that is perfect for when you have a few minutes left at the end of your presentation. It is simple to do and can be planned or implemented on the spot. At the end of this activity, allow time for students to make any additions to their notes once they have thought about what their peers selected.
How It Works
At the end of a teacher-led presentation, ask students to do the following:
- Review their notes and place stars next to the most important concepts.
- Select the three most important concepts and create a summary sentence for each concept.
- Rank the three summary sentences in order of importance, placing a 1 on the most important, and a 2 and a 3 on the next two most important concepts.
- Allow students to share what they starred and ranked in small groups; then as a whole group, or as a Chalkboard Splash, record their top-ranked concept (in the form of a summary sentence).
How to Ensure Higher-Order Thinking
This activity lends itself to analysis. By having students read over their notes and determine the importance of what they’ve read, students are analyzing the concepts on which they took notes. By following this up with a top-three ranking, you are further requiring the students to analyze, because unlike the starring component, the ranking forces them to choose and rank only the three most important concepts. For those students who might tend to place a star on nearly everything they write, this is a final way to require analysis.
Source
Himmele P., and Himmele, W. Total Participation Techniques: Making Every Student an Active Learner. ASCD, 2017, pp.104-105.