Planned Discovery Activity

Purpose

The purpose of Planned Discovery Activities is to provide students who have learning problems the opportunity to make meaningful connections between two or more math concepts for which they have previously received instruction which they have previously mastered. It is important to remember that this is a student practice strategy and it is not intended for initial instruction.

What is it?

• A well-planned student practice strategy.
• Contains a high level of structure and teacher support.
• Provides students who have learning problems the guidance necessary for them to successfully "discover" appropriate relationships between previously mastered mathematical concepts.
• Occurs after students have previously received teacher instruction for the relevant math concepts and have demonstrated mastery for those math concepts.

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What are the critical elements of this strategy?

• The teacher plans a well-organized learning activity that clearly guides students toward the learning objective.
• The teacher provides explicit directions for the activity.
• Additional structure is provided through a structured learning sheet (or similar prompt) that provides cues which guide student learning.
• The teacher provides all materials necessary for completing the activity.
• The teacher monitors student work by circulating the classroom, providing specific corrective feedback, modeling skills or concepts as needed, prompting student thinking, and providing positive reinforcement.
• The teacher provides closure to the activity by providing students with answers/solutions and by explicitly modeling the skill(s) required to complete the activity.

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How do I implement the strategy?

1. Determine two or more concepts that have a mathematical relationship which students would benefit from understanding. These concepts must have already been taught and must have been already mastered by the students.
2. Develop a well organized/structured activity that provides students the opportunity to understand the desired mathematical relationship between the selected math concepts.
3. Provide explicit directions for completing the activity.
4. Develop and provide to students a structured learning sheet or other appropriate prompt that guides students toward the learning objective.
5. Monitor students as they participate in the activity. Circulate the classroom, provide specific corrective feedback, model appropriate skills as needed, prompt student thinking, and provide positive reinforcement.
6. At the conclusion of the activity, provide students with the solutions to the structured learning sheet/prompt and explicitly state/illustrate the desired mathematical relationship(s).
7. How Does This Instructional Strategy Positively Impact Students Who Have Learning Problems?

Structure & cueing provide guidance necessary to activate student connection building (circumvents passive learning nature).
Positive reinforcement, specific corrective feedback, & modeling provide students incentive to learn/provides them a "safe" context for learning (reduces math anxiety and fear of failure due to past negative math experiences).

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Additional Information

Research Support for the Instructional Features in this Strategy: Harris & Graham (1996); Kennedy & Tipps (1994); Mercer, Jordan, & Miller (1996); Mercer, Laned, Jordan, Allsopp, & Eisele (1996); Mercer & Mercer (2005); Morroco (2001).

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Videos

Note: The Videos contained below show clips of ...  The Slideshows with Audio provide addiional ....  The Slideshow script is a Word document that can be downloaded  ...

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