Interactive notebooks are spiral bound notebooks that students glue or tape handouts on the pages and write notes on others. It can be utilized for multiple reasons including organizing students’ handouts and notes, focusing on the process, and incorporating different learning styles. However, it can also be a way to assess students. Teachers should continuously have spot checks to make sure that the students are doing their work even if the teacher does not grade all of the assignments. Teachers can collect the interactive notebooks every month or two to read over the students’ assignments to check to see if they understand the concepts,but the teacher does not have to grade them. At the end of the year, the students choose three pages and the teacher chooses one page to grade. This allows the student to pick their best work while displaying confidence. The students’ overall grade would account for 50% of their interactive notebook grade and the other 50% is based on the spot checks.
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Abstract by Elizabeth Wood, AIR apprentice