Structuring and Delivering Lessons
Technique 17: Ratio
What is Ratio?
Ratio is a strategy that teachers tend to use in order to wean students off of their guidance and allow them to participate more in class. The idea of this strategy is so that students will be doing increasingly more of the “cognitive work” rather than relying on their teacher to provide them with steps and answers to the assignments. In an elementary school setting, the teacher typically asks leading questions such as, “What comes next in this equation?” or “Why is the main character afraid of the dark?” so that students can answer them while gaining a better understanding of the concepts. Follow up questions usually occur so that they are thinking less of the direct answer and more behind the reasoning. For example, with the question, “Why is the main character afraid of the dark?” the follow up question could be, “What are some ways the book showed s/he could conquer that fear?” This technique can be used in nearly all grade levels with just varying styles of facilitation being the difference, while still expecting the same outcome.
Ratio is a strategy that teachers tend to use in order to wean students off of their guidance and allow them to participate more in class. The idea of this strategy is so that students will be doing increasingly more of the “cognitive work” rather than relying on their teacher to provide them with steps and answers to the assignments. In an elementary school setting, the teacher typically asks leading questions such as, “What comes next in this equation?” or “Why is the main character afraid of the dark?” so that students can answer them while gaining a better understanding of the concepts. Follow up questions usually occur so that they are thinking less of the direct answer and more behind the reasoning. For example, with the question, “Why is the main character afraid of the dark?” the follow up question could be, “What are some ways the book showed s/he could conquer that fear?” This technique can be used in nearly all grade levels with just varying styles of facilitation being the difference, while still expecting the same outcome.
Why Does This Work?
The Ratio strategy should work well in the classroom because it includes the renowned psychologist, Lev Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory. Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory explains that what matters most is learning social interaction. Vygotsky states that interpsychological (interaction between people) and intrapsychological (connection within the child) functions in a child’s cultural development appear in voluntary attention, logical memory, and the formation of concepts. By guiding a class in open-ended questions in a way that the students are leading the discussion with their answers, they are able to interact with their peers through discussion. Not only that, but the teacher would be acting as the more knowledgeable other in this situation, and provide scaffolding to the students as they learn about Charlotte’s Web. Scaffolding is hints or clues given by the more knowledgeable other (MKO) to let students make that next step in order to grasp the concept they are learning about. The Ratio strategy will allow students to further develop through social interaction, according to Lev Vygotsky.
Secondly, the Ratio strategy allows students to work on their retrieval methods from their long-term memory. By asking the students questions about parts of the book that they have already read, they have to answer based off what they can recall. Retrieval memory can have multiple factors affect it, including: emotional overtones, multiple connections with existing knowledge, and more specifically, wait time. It is essential as a facilitator to wait long enough, ideally over ten seconds instead of the usual one to two, for the students to begin answering before s/he jumps in and starts giving them more guidance. The Ratio strategy can give the facilitator more practice in patience along with helping the students learn different ways to retrieve information from their long-term memory, whether it is stemmed from a personal memory or has a strong emotional connection to them in some way.
The Ratio strategy should work well in the classroom because it includes the renowned psychologist, Lev Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory. Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory explains that what matters most is learning social interaction. Vygotsky states that interpsychological (interaction between people) and intrapsychological (connection within the child) functions in a child’s cultural development appear in voluntary attention, logical memory, and the formation of concepts. By guiding a class in open-ended questions in a way that the students are leading the discussion with their answers, they are able to interact with their peers through discussion. Not only that, but the teacher would be acting as the more knowledgeable other in this situation, and provide scaffolding to the students as they learn about Charlotte’s Web. Scaffolding is hints or clues given by the more knowledgeable other (MKO) to let students make that next step in order to grasp the concept they are learning about. The Ratio strategy will allow students to further develop through social interaction, according to Lev Vygotsky.
Secondly, the Ratio strategy allows students to work on their retrieval methods from their long-term memory. By asking the students questions about parts of the book that they have already read, they have to answer based off what they can recall. Retrieval memory can have multiple factors affect it, including: emotional overtones, multiple connections with existing knowledge, and more specifically, wait time. It is essential as a facilitator to wait long enough, ideally over ten seconds instead of the usual one to two, for the students to begin answering before s/he jumps in and starts giving them more guidance. The Ratio strategy can give the facilitator more practice in patience along with helping the students learn different ways to retrieve information from their long-term memory, whether it is stemmed from a personal memory or has a strong emotional connection to them in some way.
Specific Classroom Example:
There are many ways that this specific teaching technique could be used in a classroom, regardless of the grade or age. Currently, my second academic concentration is English; so in my third grade classroom, I would like to focus on the material of a book my students have to read as a class. For instance, if my class is reading Charlotte’s Web by E.B White, I would dedicate one of my class periods to discussing Wilbur: his hardships, his triumphs, his characteristics, and his relationships among his friends. An example of a lineup of questions I might have for my class could be:
“What is one of the most difficult challenges Wilbur has to face on Mr. Zuckerman’s farm?”
“How did Wilbur react during this challenge?”
“Who helped him the most during this?”
“How did s/he help Wilbur overcome this challenge?”
“What is another challenge Wilbur had?” (Repeat the question sequence)
"Where do you have proof of this in the book?"
“Who is a character that Wilbur seemed to struggle with? Why?”
[At any moment when necessary, jump in and have someone add more to an answer]
These example questions cover multiple methods within the Ratio strategy. These methods include: unbundle, rephrase, repeated examples, supporting evidence, and whys and hows. Unbundling is breaking a large question up and asking multiple questions instead so that each point gets specific attention. In this example, asking students the individual question, “Who helped Wilbur the most during his challenge?” and then adding the second question, “How did s/he help Wilbur overcome this challenge?” gives multiple students the opportunity to answer and show different perspective. This set of questions also utilizes the “whys and hows” method. This method is intended so that students have to think more about the question and scene, and even possibly discover a not-so-direct answer. The method of repeating examples in this scenario is shown when I asked about another challenge presented in the book and continued with the same follow-up questions as before. This allows the students to think of different characters who helped Wilbur and different scenarios where Wilbur needed help, showing different characteristics and methods of certain characters and broadening the students’ concept of the book and understanding of secondary and main characters. By asking the students to provide concrete evidence (a page number) to back up what they are claiming in the classroom, I am using the supporting evidence technique. Supporting evidence is making an argument but being able to confirm that argument when asked. This method helps with the students' growth in cognitive development. Lastly, rephrasing is a method used when necessary by a teacher if a thought from a student isn’t necessarily thorough enough for clarity. If my student didn’t answer the question well enough but had the concept correct, I would ask another student to add their thoughts to the pervious student’s answer. This will help clarify and also give other students another perspective so if they didn’t previously understand, they can have another explanation from a different student.
The remainder of the methods included in the Ratio technique that were not covered in those example questions, but could easily be incorporated are the following: half-statement, what's next?, feign ignorance, and batch process. While asking the class questions about a specific scene of Charlotte's Web, I could start a statement "When they woke up the next morning, the farm animals saw that Charlotte wrote....tell me what she wrote please, Jackson." This will keep the students attentive and give them a chance to finish the statement, proving that they were paying attention and that they read. The What's Next strategy would probably be the most difficult strategy to incorporate in a lesson on a book. A suggestion could be to ask various questions of what happened before, what is happening during the part the class is on, and what do you think will happen next? This strategy is intended to increase the amount of questions asked to students so that more people will have a chance to answer. Another method within this technique is feign ignorance. I, as the teacher, could pretend like I don't know what is going on in the book and even answer things incorrectly so that the student is the one "teaching" the teacher. This is a method that I see often while observing classrooms and seems to be very beneficial to the students. To round off the methods, batch process could be used to facilitate discussion among the students. This is a method that is typically used in upper grades with older students. Batch process is a method used to ensure that students are staying on track with the given topic while discussing with others rather than the teacher asking the questions or doing a worksheet. All of these methods within this strategy will help the students acquire their own answers rather than listening to me lecture. Facilitation will keep them on track while they still feel as though they have control of the situation.
Click here to see teachers discussing strategies on how to create effective questions in order to keep their 9-12th grade students engaged in the topic they are covering in class.
There are many ways that this specific teaching technique could be used in a classroom, regardless of the grade or age. Currently, my second academic concentration is English; so in my third grade classroom, I would like to focus on the material of a book my students have to read as a class. For instance, if my class is reading Charlotte’s Web by E.B White, I would dedicate one of my class periods to discussing Wilbur: his hardships, his triumphs, his characteristics, and his relationships among his friends. An example of a lineup of questions I might have for my class could be:
“What is one of the most difficult challenges Wilbur has to face on Mr. Zuckerman’s farm?”
“How did Wilbur react during this challenge?”
“Who helped him the most during this?”
“How did s/he help Wilbur overcome this challenge?”
“What is another challenge Wilbur had?” (Repeat the question sequence)
"Where do you have proof of this in the book?"
“Who is a character that Wilbur seemed to struggle with? Why?”
[At any moment when necessary, jump in and have someone add more to an answer]
These example questions cover multiple methods within the Ratio strategy. These methods include: unbundle, rephrase, repeated examples, supporting evidence, and whys and hows. Unbundling is breaking a large question up and asking multiple questions instead so that each point gets specific attention. In this example, asking students the individual question, “Who helped Wilbur the most during his challenge?” and then adding the second question, “How did s/he help Wilbur overcome this challenge?” gives multiple students the opportunity to answer and show different perspective. This set of questions also utilizes the “whys and hows” method. This method is intended so that students have to think more about the question and scene, and even possibly discover a not-so-direct answer. The method of repeating examples in this scenario is shown when I asked about another challenge presented in the book and continued with the same follow-up questions as before. This allows the students to think of different characters who helped Wilbur and different scenarios where Wilbur needed help, showing different characteristics and methods of certain characters and broadening the students’ concept of the book and understanding of secondary and main characters. By asking the students to provide concrete evidence (a page number) to back up what they are claiming in the classroom, I am using the supporting evidence technique. Supporting evidence is making an argument but being able to confirm that argument when asked. This method helps with the students' growth in cognitive development. Lastly, rephrasing is a method used when necessary by a teacher if a thought from a student isn’t necessarily thorough enough for clarity. If my student didn’t answer the question well enough but had the concept correct, I would ask another student to add their thoughts to the pervious student’s answer. This will help clarify and also give other students another perspective so if they didn’t previously understand, they can have another explanation from a different student.
The remainder of the methods included in the Ratio technique that were not covered in those example questions, but could easily be incorporated are the following: half-statement, what's next?, feign ignorance, and batch process. While asking the class questions about a specific scene of Charlotte's Web, I could start a statement "When they woke up the next morning, the farm animals saw that Charlotte wrote....tell me what she wrote please, Jackson." This will keep the students attentive and give them a chance to finish the statement, proving that they were paying attention and that they read. The What's Next strategy would probably be the most difficult strategy to incorporate in a lesson on a book. A suggestion could be to ask various questions of what happened before, what is happening during the part the class is on, and what do you think will happen next? This strategy is intended to increase the amount of questions asked to students so that more people will have a chance to answer. Another method within this technique is feign ignorance. I, as the teacher, could pretend like I don't know what is going on in the book and even answer things incorrectly so that the student is the one "teaching" the teacher. This is a method that I see often while observing classrooms and seems to be very beneficial to the students. To round off the methods, batch process could be used to facilitate discussion among the students. This is a method that is typically used in upper grades with older students. Batch process is a method used to ensure that students are staying on track with the given topic while discussing with others rather than the teacher asking the questions or doing a worksheet. All of these methods within this strategy will help the students acquire their own answers rather than listening to me lecture. Facilitation will keep them on track while they still feel as though they have control of the situation.
Click here to see teachers discussing strategies on how to create effective questions in order to keep their 9-12th grade students engaged in the topic they are covering in class.