Author: Terrell Heick

  What Is Cognitive Dissonance? A Definition For Teaching Understanding Cognitive Dissonance: A Psychological Framework for Growth and Learning Human beings strive for consistency between their thoughts, beliefs, and actions.  When an inconsistency arises—when beliefs and behaviors clash—it creates a sense of discomfort or tension known as cognitive dissonance. This concept, first introduced by psychologist…

by Terry Heick What does ‘critical thinking’ mean? Well, that depends on who you ask. For educators, as a term, critical thinking is similar to words like democracy, global, and organic: You hear people use them all the time, but no one seems to understand exactly what they mean. This kind of etymological opacity lends itself…

by Terry Heick The long-term output of any school should be not just proficient students, but enabled learners. An “enabled” learner can grasp macro views, uncover micro details, ask questions, plan for new knowledge and transfer thinking across divergent circumstances. This doesn’t happen by content “knowledge holding,” or even by the fire of enthusiasm, but…

To grow, teachers must be able to reflect critically on their own performance. Education is ‘actuated’ by teachers. It makes sense, then, that education should also be able to reflect critically on its own performance as well.  Currently, this occurs through the comforting precision of analysis and numbers. The language of math, data, and statistics…

by Terry Heick Simple premise, as titled: what sorts of ‘things’ make teaching unsustainable, and what sort of advice can help teachers reflect on these ideas to mitigate any damage and make the profession more enjoyable, and thus sustainable. 10. Grow a healthy and useful professional learning network. See also 10 Reasons Every Teacher Needs…

by Terry Heick As a follow-up to our 9 Characteristics of 21st Century Learning we developed in 2009, we have developed an updated framework, The Inside-Out Learning Model. The goal of the model is simple enough–not pure academic proficiency, but instead authentic self-knowledge, diverse local and global interdependence, adaptive critical thinking, and adaptive media literacy. By…

by TeachThought Staff Inquiry-based learning is an approach to learning guided by students through questions, research, and/or curiosity. An inquiry-based learning strategy is simply a way to facilitate inquiry during the learning process. It might be useful to think of ways to suppress inquiry to emphasize the strategies that might be used to promote it.…

by Terry Heick What are the different types of questions? Turns out, it’s pretty limitless. I’ve always been interested in them–the way they can cause (or stop) thinking; the nature of inquiry and reason; the way they can facilitate and deepen a conversation; the way they can reveal understanding (or lack thereof); the stunning power…

by Terry Heick Reflection is a fundamental tenet of learning; it is also, therefore, a fundamental part of teaching. Why it happens is a matter of humility. But how and when it happens–and with whom–is less clear. This is partly because there are multiple sides to reflection–length, width, and depth. A Z-axis. It is whole.…

by Terry Heick I first encountered the 40/40/40 rule years ago while skimming one of those giant (and indispensable) 400 page Understanding by Design tomes. The question was simple enough. Of all of the academic standards, you are tasked with ‘covering’ (more on this in a minute), what’s important that students understand for the next…