A great friend of mine and an incredible teacher, Timothy Quinn from Westminster School in Simsbury, Connecticut, sent me a link showing how his students’ work on their Hamlet unit made the front page of his school’s website.
Student artwork inspired by Hamlet
Initially I was blown away by the quality of the student work (just read two paragraphs of one of the essays and you’ll see what I mean). The second time I read through the article I was utterly impressed by how well his students responded to the open-ended format of the project. If any of you are looking for shining examples of differentiated instruction in action, this is as good as you’re going to get.
But after reading it a third time, and not surprisingly, Tim’s own comments struck me the most, making me wonder how I too could use public displays of student work to make my students’ education more meaningful. In Tim’s own words:
Additional benefits of the public element of these alternative assessment options were that
- The authenticity of the task in some cases may have raised the bar in terms of student effort;
- The display of art created a buzz for underform students who were able to view the work of the Sixth Form; and
- The various projects made for a more memorable and potentially stronger educational experience for the entire form, who were able to learn not only from their teachers, but also from the ideas of their classmates.
