When Teaching the Right Answers Is the Wrong Direction

Sometimes, educators often search for right answers as a way to evaluate their teaching skills. We feel if the students get the answer right then we have taught an effective lesson. The weight of producing passing test scores contributes to the anxiety of hearing the right answer. This is a topic my school district needs to read and pass on to every educator.

This is a great post. It is all too true that as teachers and students, it is the easiest thing to give and expect the correct answers from our students. With standardized tests, that seems to be all that students need to know, the straight facts. We are missing the underlying theme of getting an education, gaining an understanding of a concept as a whole and being able to infer answers to questions from our previous knowledge. I have always been taught to use open-ended questions when trying to get the higher Bloom's learning, but I think that it is possible to use with the lower levels as well. Students of all abilities are capable of using open-ended questions. I also love the "Questions that Rock" wall idea. This is something that I will want to use in the future when I get my classroom (I am currently substituting). There are many strategies that I think that I am capable of using at the moment, I just have to be mindful when to best implement them.

I have always encouraged my students to speak their minds in my class. I've even let them explore their thoughts and opinions openly with each other. The constructivist approach to learning is, in my opinion, a great way to reach so many different students and address their different learning styles in doing so.

I have taught in my classroom in a constructivist manner and my students grew by leaps and bounds because of it. I would still get the "is this right?" question, but when they realized that I would not answer that question, it soon faded.

I agree with your lesson on having students journal their thoughts. I have students journal at least two times a week by responding to an open ended question. I enjoy reading their creative writing expressing their unique thoughts. I emphasize on no right or wrong answers, but I expect some depth on their papers. I strongly encourage students to be creative in a collaborative learning environment. I feel that this enhances students to be self motivated and creative thinkers!

I agree totally with all the posts. It is a shame that students, as well as, some teachers and administrators are so caught up in getting the right answer that they sometimes forget that it is not the answer you are looking for, but how you came to get it that matters.I have a student that is so afraid she will make a mistake that she panics when the problem calls for a little more effort than she is used to. Students should not feel the extreme pressures we put on them to get a perfect score. As a teacher, I am much more interested in the manner in which students are able to solve a problem.

I believe tests are not an accurate measure of student success. I have witnessed teachers handing out previous tests and drilling students over the correct answers. Because so much attention has been placed on teacher accountability, teachers desert to spoon feeding the tests to their students, just to get that perfect score.

Why can't getting the wrong answer be the right way to teach? Why do teachers not applaude the efforts put forth by their students? When a student gets an incorrect answer this is the perfect opportunity to teach what went wrong and then steer them back on track. I believe this approach would increase student learning and participation.

After reading the post, I had many connections to the use of inquiry and design cycle of engineering. The school that I teach at is science, technology, engineering, and math based that has more ups and than downs. Students feel so compelled to have the right answer all the time with math and do not understand that it’s the process to get an answer that is more important. By understanding the design process that an engineer takes, students are able to brainstorm and problem solve through all facets of education and life. My 5th graders have been introduced to this process in a program called Project Lead the Way. Since my students started implementing the design process from the beginning of the year, they have improved their thinking on all intelligences. Thinking "outside of the box" is slowly becoming second nature, and I, too, have started using the idea of the design process to create more engaging and thinking lessons even in content areas.

I personally believe that the constructivist view of teaching really could allow students to reach more though provoking heights. If we can use an idea like the engineering design process, it will not only develop students into better thinkers but have them ready for an explosive field in the future!

Rebecca, I really enjoyed reading your post! Teaching students how to think critically and discover the answers themselves is something I think teachers should try to integrate into their lessons everyday. It is such an important life skill for them to have. I sometimes notice myself giving an answer and then regretting it as soon as I said it because I wished I had let a conversation begin among the students so they could figure it out for themselves. Sometimes I get so focused on getting the content/standards taught that I forget about what is really important...teaching students how to discover and think for themselves. That is what will have an impact and will help them to be successful later in their lives.

I love your ideas for how to become an explorer with your students. Some I try to do already and others I have heard about, but have never tried. I hope to incorporate the use of Essential Questions and other forms of questioning in my classroom. I have wanted to implement a more investigative approach in my classroom, so I'm excited to try the ideas you included in your post. Thank you for sharing!