Professional Development : Teacher to Teacher :
Building Scaffolds in Your Classroom
By Sandra Feldman
Scaffolding is a great technique to help students master skills first with assistance, and then independently
Learning to ride a bicycle gives children a wonderful sense of accomplishment. Many of us can recall running alongside a child, holding the bike steady as the youngster gained speed and then wobbled off independently, unaware that he or she was pedaling without support.
In many ways, this is similar to what teachers strive to do in their classrooms every day. Whether teaching students to read or showing them how to add fractions, teachers work tirelessly to help students master skills first with assistance, and then independently. The teacher's role is to provide the help students need to accomplish tasks they wouldn't be able to do on their own.
Erecting a structure
One way to assist students through this learning process is through a technique educators call "scaffolding," a way of providing support to students as they learn a concept or carry out an unfamiliar task. The term "scaffold" is borrowed from construction, where a structure is erected when a project extends beyond workers' reach – the scaffold is dismantled when the job is complete. The same idea applies to education. As the student masters the work, the teacher's guidance can be scaled back.
Through scaffolding, teachers share "tricks of the trade" with their students – the techniques or shortcuts an experienced learner uses. These hints might include offering simplified problems that are parts of a more complex one, "thinking aloud" while solving a problem, and using physical prompts, such as cue cards and checklists.
An important part of scaffolding is asking students questions as a way of helping them work through a problem. Only when a student doesn't notice his or her mistake will the teacher point it out. After the same question is asked in different ways, the student actively participates in his or her own learning.
Fix-up strategies
Scaffolding is most useful when students are just learning a task or when they are experiencing some trouble. Teaching students "fix-up strategies" – approaches they can use when they get stuck – is an important part of scaffolding. For example, a student who comes across an unfamiliar word might look at context for clues about the word's meaning, read ahead to see if the word is explained or refer to a dictionary before proceeding. As students develop such strategies, they become more independent and less reliant on the teacher's support.
Scaffolds for Students
- Think aloud while modeling a process. Describe – step by step – what you are doing to solve a problem as you work through it.
- Provide partially completed answers. Sometimes this is enough to jog a student's memory or to prompt an "Aha!" moment.
- Give hints as to how to proceed. Remind a student of a law or rule he or she has learned, or suggest an approach he or she hasn't yet tried.
Simply good teaching
One potential drawback to scaffolding is that students can learn to rely on it too much. An important part of effective scaffolding is "fading," or gradually decreasing the amount of help you give. As students become more experienced with a task, they should require less help.
Whether you call it scaffolding or simply good teaching, it's not a big stretch to liken life's journey to riding a bike. Getting started, you need someone to support you and help you along. But it's when you've gained some independence that you really take off! For more information about scaffolding, be sure to check out www.aft.org/teachers
Sandra Feldman is the President of the American Federation of Teachers.
October 2003, Vol.34, No.2
