Have you heard of the AVID program yet?

AVID stands for Advancement Via Individual Determination. Although AVID is an elective course tageted to support students in the middle, C to B+ range, who are motivated to go to university, many of the course principles can be adapted for the regular classroom.

A quote from the AVIDonline.org website:

"WICR — or writing, inquiry, collaboration, and reading — forms the basis of the AVID curriculum.

Writing to learn. AVID emphasizes writing in all subjects, with a focus on clarifying and communicating their thoughts and understanding material.

Emphasis on inquiry. AVID is based on inquiry, not lecture. Many activities, from Cornell notetaking to tutorial groups, are built around asking questions, which forces students to clarify, analyze, and synthesize material.

A collaborative approach. The AVID classroom is not a traditional one in which a teacher lectures to passive students. An AVID teacher is a facilitator and an advocate. But students, not teachers or tutors, are responsible for their learning. Tutors function as discussion leaders, while students challenge, help, and learn from one another.

Critical reading. AVID students don’t merely read words on a page. They are taught to analyze, question, critique, clarify, and comprehend the material."

While I was out on the two-week observation, I sat in on a few AVID classes. I was most impressed with the tutorials. How they work is like this:
-Students write down in a specified format two questions they need clarification on in a particular subject. (See liunk below for formatted sheet pdf)
-The teacher groups students in fours based on the subject of the questions.
-Each group has a white board and dry-erase markers.
-The students take turns asking their questions. The rest of the group facilitates learning and review for the entire group. This is accomplished by asking questions of the student whose problem question is being tackled.
-Students are trained to asked higher order questions. They act as socratic tutors or guides to those that need clarification by drawing upon prior knowledge (what DO they know?), and seeing what they've tried to solve the problempreviously...helping them learn, not just giving them the answer. (see the learning process summary flow chart pdf)
-All students write down the discussion/solution to each persons problem questions in cornell note style.

I could just see the light bulbs go off!

Another quote: "Why collaborative learning groups? Because students remember 10% of what they read, 20% of what they hear, 30% of what they see, 50% of what they see, hear and say, 70% of what they discuss, 80% of what they do, 90% of what they say as they do a thing!"

From the AVID literature...the tutorial principles, worksheet, and the learning process flow chart:
http://www.thekurlanders.com/julie/avid/docs/pdf_docs/Tutorial%20Principles.pdf
http://www.thekurlanders.com/julie/avid/docs/pdf_docs/Tutorial%20Worksheet.pdf
http://www.thekurlanders.com/julie/avid/docs/pdf_docs/Tutorial%20Learning%20Process.pdf

www.bced.gov.bc.ca/avid

I know in Greater Victoria, Spectrum and Stelly's have this program...perhaps others will comment on their experience with AVID from the observation period?!