| In her years as a teacher in Houston, Texas, Joellle Trayers has made valuable contributions to gifted education, most notably in her work with younger scholars (K-1). A few years ago, her blog, Not Just Child’s Play, caught the attention of Ian Byrd and Lisa Van Gemert, authors of The Gifted Guild’s Guide to Depth and Complexity, and they included a section in the book about how she uses thinking tools with very young students. If you work with primary students, you can learn more about her thinking-skills approach in the amazing videos on this page. In this post, Joelle outlines an authentic problem-solving lesson relevant to students. |
By Joelle Trayers
The ultimate goal we have for students is for them to apply what they learn in the real world. It’s challenging sometimes to make those connections.
A big part of our students’ world is school, and I wanted to reinforce problem-solving skills in a way that was relevant and meaningful to them.
This activity with third graders turned out to be a great way to guide students in the process of identifying and addressing problems they recognized at our school. It can easily be modified if you’d like to try this with older students.
We began by discussing the steps we take to solve a problem: first, we identify the problem. I love to incorporate literature, so here are three great read-alouds you can use to introduce this.
In a brainstorming session, students came up with a variety of problems, such as bullying, too much testing, and not enough time to eat lunch.
I chose one and modeled the rest of the process with the whole class. Students thought there should be more recess. We discussed how we know this is a problem. Students had some ideas, and then we found studies show that adequate recess is important to children’s health and development. So, a lack of recess could have a negative effect on kids.
Next, we researched to see what our state’s laws were regarding recess at school. It is important to me that my students understand what sources we can trust online-and that was a whole different lesson- but I always try to reinforce that as we research together.
We also brainstormed solutions, and the class voted on the solution they felt was the best. We discussed why we thought it would be a good solution.
Then, together, we wrote a letter to the principal. We outlined (1) the problem, (2) how we know it’s a problem (from our research), (3) a solution, and finally, (4) why we think that solution would work.
After practicing the process together, I divided the students into groups, and each group identified a problem they wanted to address.
Following the same steps I had modeled, they began with research. In some cases, a survey or an interview might be needed, and I had the opportunity to discuss various methods used in researching a problem.
| NOTE: If you’re working with advanced or upper-grade students, you might: (1) Incorporate field research and statistics into the data collection in the research phase. Have students quantify findings in the school by, for example, timing the average amount of time students spend playing at recess versus lining up, walking to and from the classroom, etc.;(2) challenge students to consider multiple perspectives by asking, “Why would the principal see this as a problem?” “Who else would be interested in our findings?” |
The students were 100% engaged in group discussions and couldn’t wait to write their letters to the principal. They brainstormed possible solutions and chose what they felt was the best one to propose in their letter. Each letter also included a note about what students expected to result from their solution idea.
I provided a template for the letters to our principal, but older students could elaborate on each point in a formal letter. One note: In the examples below, students did not cite the sources of information gathered during research. This is something I would spend more time on in the future.
Of course, the letters were forwarded to our principal, and every time the students saw him in the hallways, they asked him about them! Here are copies of some of their letters:
I think giving students a voice and an opportunity to go through the problem-solving process with an issue that has meaning for them was very successful.
If you’ve done something similar to this with your students, please comment below to share!
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