Have you ever found yourself despairing when you’re grading an assignment and discover that either the same student as always, struggled immensely on the worksheet, or that a large portion of the class got many questions wrong that you specifically went over in class with them or spent a lot of time teaching those concepts in the lesson.

I mean, hello, TEACHER FAIL, right?! Teacher friends, I’ve been there, too!  

Now while there are a myriad of strategies to attack this series of problems head on, I want to suggest one that does not require any preparation on your part.  It’s quick and super effective, and it’s called affirmative checking.  

I first discovered the strategy of affirmative checking from Teach Like a Champion [1]. It is, in essence, a means of getting a quick picture of student understanding of concepts after your direct instruction, while also giving brief feedback to students as to whether they are on the right track or not.  What it looks like in practice is, while students are doing independent practice after you have walked them through the lesson and guided practice, you walk around with the answer key…. And give everyone the answers! Ah, just kidding, we all know that would be of ZERO help whatsoever. 

No, you keep the answer key as a reference and use it to mark your students papers AS THEY ARE WORKING, with either a check mark for a correct answer, or circle the problem if it is incorrect.  Or, perhaps they are solving a multi-digit multiplication equation and only the hundreds place is incorrect, you can just circle that digit.  

The idea is this: either way, check or circle, you are giving immediate feedback.  This is why it is so important to walk around and do this immediately, while students have just begun working, and to continue throughout the assignment, because all worksheets have different concepts scattered throughout.  The purpose is so that students will know when they are on the right track and they can continue to practice the skills correctly, while bringing attention to the students who are not doing everything correctly, so they can take a second look at it themselves and correct their mistakes. 

The reason you will circle incorrect problems, or parts of incorrect problems without stopping to help them right away is that is puts the responsibility for learning on the student.  Once they encounter the mistake, they need to learn how to employ the strategies they’ve learned to correct it, or they need to use their own reasoning to find where their mistake lies.  This engages their critical thinking skills while also increasing their awareness of their own abilities and misconceptions.  

The very first time you employ this strategy, be prepared for a plethora of reactions: a small handful may accept the challenge right away, eager to figure out what needs to be fixed, a few will probably be apathetic and not even try to fix anything,  some will be a little (or a lot) defensive of their answer, and others will sit and stare (or maybe even whine) at their answer because they are now experiencing a bit of negative emotions they are trying to process. 

Even though you will have explained to the class ahead of time what you’re doing and why, you’re still going to have these responses… and it’s perfectly OK! 

In the case that you come back around and find a student staring at a circled problem with tears in their eyes (speaking from experience), that is when you can stop and offer some guidance and reteaching if necessary.  However, it is important for students to be able to SIT IN THE MIDST OF A PROBLEM they don’t know how to solve right away.  It is a skill that will continue to be necessary as they progress through more and more difficult concepts in school and into the work-force where problem solving is a daily part of life. 

In order to employ their own critical thinking and problem solving skills, they need to be able to see the problem without crumpling to the floor in despair and WITHOUT RECEIVING HELP RIGHT AWAY. 

You mean, you don’t swoop in and save them? NOPE!

And you let them just sit there and expect them to figure it out? ABSOLUTELY! 

You don’t even engage with an offended student who wants to argue that their incorrect answer is correct? HECK NO!  

Here are 8 go-to responses when students are struggling with affirmative checking.  

1. Look again. *Smile* 5. Have you double-checked everything?

2. Did you re-read the directions? 6. You don’t need my help on this one.

3. I know you can figure this out. 7. Did you read your answer to yourself?

4. Did you use your resources? 8. Take a deep breath.... Read it again.

These auto-responses are especially helpful because it reinforces your belief in each students’ ability to think deeply about their work and self-correct their mistakes. I may even write them on the board and point to them as each student reacts. 

Affirmative checking cultivates responsibility and ownership in students and it will create a culture where your learners will ultimately feel CONFIDENT to solve their own problems and become more independent critical thinkers.  It will also dramatically decrease the large amounts of papers you are grading where you are surprised and exasperated at the outcomes because you will have already checked a large portion of their papers and corrected many of those misunderstandings.  Can I get an AMEN and HALLELUJAH?!

But in all seriousness, this is a strategy I use daily because of how simple and easy it is to implement, and equally because of how great the impact is in growing my students’ problem solving skills.  You literally have NO excuse not to implement this in your classroom immediately.

What is the most common hold-up for your students in fixing their mistakes in class?  

What are some other quick strategies you use to check for understanding during independent and guided practice in your lessons?

[1] Lemov, D. (2015) Teach Like a Champion 2.0 : 62 Techniques That Put Students on the Path to College. San Francisco :Jossey-Bass.