Gradual Release of Control --- I Do, We Do, You Do

I’ve been doing lots of thinking lately about those “hard to teach kids”and why they have such difficulty ever operating independently in the classroom. (I’m sure that will really surprise those of you who know me well!) But seriously, what is that elusive magic trick? What is it we, as teachers , can do to help our struggling students take on the learning and jump on the road to independence? 

I think we would all agree that there are as many instructional techniques at our disposal as there are, say, phonemes in the English language, all of them claiming to get ‘er done! But alas! They do not always prove successful, even when delivered with the utmost skill and efficacy. So what is a teacher to do?

    I keep coming across this notion of gradual release of control, and although it is really not a new concept in the educational world  I think the skilled and consistent delivery of the technique may be just the magic we are looking for. Well, at least some of the magic! Jerome Bruner, Lev Vygotsky, Madaline Hunter, and Pearson and Gallagher (Your friends and mine!) have each put their twist on the use of scaffolding and  gradual release as a reliable instructional strategy.  More recently it has been the work of Douglas Fisher and Nancy Frey who are reviving and refining its use. Fisher and Fry suggest a purposeful, yet gradual release of responsibility for learning from teacher to student. To make this transfer of responsibility ( or control) we must give students supports that they can hold on to as they take the lead. It is these supports, along with the perfect pace of gradual release, that they suggest will give us the independent learners we all so desire.

     Here are the basic components of gradual release of control, along with some of the suggestions from Fisher and Frey for successfully fine tuning the technique. Think------I do, We do, You do.

Focused Instruction---Here is where we need to really model our thinking for the students. Use lots of “I” statements such as “I predict that the boy will ________ because right here the author said______” They need to hear our expert thinking continually modeled out loud, so they will in turn do their own. Guided Instruction---Don’t tell the students the answers when they struggle. Instead, employ well worded questions, prompts, and cues during this time. This encourages them to do the cognitive work, which is where the gains in learning happen. Collaboration---Students need to interact in many ways using the language of instruction. (Yay! ELPs strategy !)      4. Independent Learning---Make sure not to jump to this phase in the process too  soon. Even homework , which is a form of independent learning, needs to           be assigned over skills the students are fairly successful with. ***Throughout each phase, the teacher is either modeling and thinking aloud or   commenting and responding in a manner that nurtures student independence…..control!

     If you think you may have drifted away from a good strong lesson cycle in your day to day teaching, try consistently and gradually releasing the responsibility of the learning to your students and see if you work a little bit of magic in the process!