Reading Horizons presents The Big 3 Questions to Inform and Improve Instruction by Laura Axtell. For the full text of the article, visit http://www.readinghorizons.com/blog-roll/mid-year-inquiry-the-big-3-questions-to-inform-and-improve-instruction How can teachers use the valuable assessment data they are given at mid-year? This post for Reading Horizons answers that question.

1. The Big 3 Questions to
Inform and Improve Instruction
By Laura Axtell for Reading Horizons
For full article, visit: http://www.readinghorizons.com/blog-
roll/mid-year-inquiry-the-big-3-questions-to-inform-and-improve-
instruction

2. The Inquiry-Based Model as a Teacher Tool
Inquiry-based learning has been used in classrooms for several decades. It
invites participants to formulate “academic content by posing, investigating,
and answering questions.” Using inquiry in this way encourages the
formulation of questions and answers to work toward a discovery or solution.
Teachers, too, can benefit from using this method to work toward their own
pedagogical discoveries.

3. The Big 3 Questions:
What? So What? Now What?

4. What?
• What data do I have and what does it show about the class as a whole?
• Where are students currently performing on a specific set of skills?
• What results are different than what was expected?
• What information about individual students is surprising?

5. So What?
• If these trends continue, what are the likely effects on individual students
and the class? How important would those effects be to overall student
achievement?
• What seems to be working effectively and how important is that to student
progress?
• What isn’t working as well as it needs to and how important is that in the
long term?

6. Now What?
Identifying the What? and So What? enables teachers to create the Now
What? Developing an effective plan for the next four to five months is based
on the knowledge, experience, and willingness of the educator to more deeply
address the instructional needs of the class. Teachers often find the greatest
success by choosing one or two strategies that can be easily added to lesson
plans and implemented in upcoming weeks.

7. Now What?
• Increasing Checks for Understanding
• Experiment with Different Instructional Methods and Strategies
• Flip the Classroom
• Scaffold Instruction Using The Gradual Release of Responsibility Framework
• Incorporate More Review
• Incorporate More Differentiation and Allow Students to Choose
For more information on these strategies, view the full article.

8. The Big 3 Questions to Inform
and Improve Instruction
By Laura Axtell for Reading Horizons
For full article, visit: http://www.readinghorizons.com/blog-roll/mid-year-
inquiry-the-big-3-questions-to-inform-and-improve-instruction