Scaffolding
In the construction industry, scaffolding is a set of temporary supports that holds people and materials until the final building is in place. The same concept applies in education, where teachers provide temporary supports to help students until they can use new knowledge to build explanations that cement learning.1 Some examples of scaffolding include:
- Modeling. Teachers model the desired learning task before requiring students to do it on their own.
- Questioning strategies and expanding. Using another scaffolding strategy, the teacher uses what is correct in the student's response but probes or cues the student to suggest possibilities for broadening the response. (Although the Socratic method of questioning helps expand student knowledge, teachers also need to point out errors in reasoning that would lead students to an incorrect conclusion.)
- Study skills—teaching students how to learn. The teacher models the appropriate thinking or working skills, checks each day to see that students are becoming proficient in using the skills, and gives progressively more responsibility for students to manage study skills on their own.
- Graphic organizers are another type of scaffolding strategy. Venn diagrams, story webs, and a host of other organizers help students build ideas toward a final product. Conference speaker William McBride presented a group of sample Content Area Reading Graphic Organizers (DOC; 241 KB; 44pp.) at the summer 2005 California League of Middle Schools (CLMS) Institute.
- Manipulatives are a classic scaffolding tool. For example, in a geometry class, a teacher gives student teams a set of popsicle sticks and ask them to create specific geometric forms. The teacher can walk among the teams and quickly assess how well students understand the concept. It is a low-risk way that students can test their growing knowledge.
- Cooperative learning groups students who help each other learn the content.
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Footnote
1L. Vygotsky, Mind in Society: The Development of Higher Psychological Processes. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1978.
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