Scribe's Record
Determined to change her students' response of "nothing much" when parents asked what they did that day, Inspired Teaching Founder Aleta Margolis came up with Scribe’s Record.
By capturing what your students most want to remember learning, you can accomplish a number of goals that support an Inspired Learning Environment. You’ll strengthen students’ skills of analysis and synthesis. You’ll build productive habits of mind so that students think, each day, “What are the critical ideas or activities I want to remember from today’s class?” – as opposed to thinking, “Is this going to be on the test?” And you’ll get consistent feedback, on what students value, enjoy, ponder, and recall about each day’s class activities, as well as what’s interesting and what’s not.
Filling the walls with student-produced work, questions, and accomplishments – like what they are learning – helps students take ownership over the space. They benefit from spending time in a classroom that reflects both their intellectual and emotional development and their potential for future growth.
REMOTE LEARNING MODIFICATION: Instead of a physical wall for posting the scribe's record, consider a set of Google slides that you continuously add to and update. Students can have access to this slide deck via a link on your virtual classroom page and when you update them as a community you can share your screen and type in their comments. Depending on the age of your students, you can enhance the class's ownership of this document by having a different student share their screen each week and lead the updating.
What you will need
Time estimate
Budget at least 5 minutes to teach, daily or weekly
Materials
Chart paper (optional), paper/ index cards, pens/ pencils, tape/ staples
For remote learning a Google slide deck, Jamboard, or Padlet can be used.
Directions
REMOTE LEARNING MODIFICATION: Instead of a physical wall for posting the scribe's record, consider a set of Google slides that you continuously add to and update. Students can have access to this slide deck via a link on your virtual classroom page and when you update them as a community you can share your screen and type in their comments.
-
Set up: Find a place to accommodate one sheet per day or week of the school year – on the walls, across the ceiling, in a publicly accessible scrapbook/ binder, etc.
-
Tell students that at the end of each day / class period / week you will ask them to select 3 things they have learned or done or ideas they have investigated that they want to remember from that day / class period / week.
-
Brainstorm on chart paper or a white board, etc.
-
If time permits, you can engage students in a reflection on the day’s / class period’s work, asking questions like, “Which was more important, this test or that unplanned discussion?”.
-
Then have students vote on the three they would like to capture.
-
-
Assign or ask a student to volunteer to be the Scribe. (This role should rotate throughout the year so that every student is the Scribe at one point.) Once the three items are chosen, the student fills out the Scribe’s Record for the day / class period / week and places it in a designated location in the classroom.
-
At the end of each unit, each month, each school year, offer students the opportunity to review what they’ve learned: Do a gallery walk, spark a discussion reflecting on what the class has accomplished, and/ or have students turn the papers into a binder to take home.
