Using Learning Intentions and Success Criteria to Engage Students

By Prince Brewington, Richland School District One

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Summary: EWithout student engagement, teachers' efforts are inefficacious. Moreover, teachers are burnt out because they expend copious amounts of energy motivating their students with little to no avail. What if I tell you that there is an instructional strategy derived from the Visible Learning framework, which allows students to drive their own learning, essentially enabling teachers to do one thing that we all love to do, teach.

Student engagement is often a conundrum that many educators face. Teachers plan engaging lessons that are culturally relevant and applicable to the real world, yet their efforts prove futile. To increase academic achievement, we need our scholars to own their learning. On the continuum of engagement, we need students devoid of passive engagement to invest in their learning. The aforementioned statements beckon the question, how? Cognitive, behavioral, and emotional engagement encompass the three dimensions of classroom engagement. Within the context of classroom activities (tasks), engagement can be defined in a multitude of ways that outline how students assimilate into the learning environment. Nevertheless, students become more engaged when they can visualize the pathway to success. 

The Visible Learning Framework: Learning Intentions

Visible Learning is derived from John Hattie's research. According to Hattie, Visible Learning and Teaching transpire when students become their own teachers. How teachers facilitate student engagement is fostered through Learning Intentions. Learning Intentions (LIs) are statements that outline what students are intended to learn by the conclusion of the unit or lesson. There are two types of Learning Intentions (LIs): Overarching or Unit Learning Intentions and Lesson-Specific Learning Intentions. Lesson-Specific Learning Intentions are recommended because learning should happen every day. Furthermore, probing for evidence of student learning should be the impetus behind daily updates to Learning Intentions (LIs). How teachers effectively craft LIs has significant ramifications for student engagement. When crafting LIs, teachers must write from the perspective of their students. They must consider their students’ dispositions, Lexile levels, and other asset-based experiences that all students bring to the classroom. This means LIs should be written in student-friendly language. But here is the caveat, I believe educators must maintain as much of the terminology of the standards as reasonably possible. More specifically, domain-specific vocabulary and academic vocabulary. 

The Visible Learning Framework: Vocabulary

Domain-specific vocabulary refers to words that are germane to specific subjects. Words and phrases like photosynthesis, Pythagorean Theorem, Imperialism, etc. are all important words, specific to a particular discipline. Conversely, academic vocabulary refers to terms that are applicable across all subject areas. Analyze, cite, evaluate, etc. are academic terminologies that transcend beyond a particular subject. Succinctly, students should have some form of exposure to and reoccurrence of academic vocabulary throughout their educational experiences (i.e. state exams). Because students are unfamiliar with domain-specific vocabulary, the lack of familiarity provides the perfect opportunity to actively engage students with Learning Intentions (LIs). The unfamiliarity with domain-specific vocabulary segues into effective questioning beginning the process of metacognition with the goal of providing our students with the opportunity to conduct an introspective examination of their current knowledge. 

The Visible Learning Framework: Success Criteria

If Learning Intentions (LIs) articulate what students are learning for the day, then Success Criteria (SC) provide evidence of mastery of the Learning Intentions. Learning Intentions are important, but what truly engages students is what success looks like. According to Hattie, students should metacognitively answer the Success Criteria beginning with the following sentence stem, “I know that I am successful when I can…. (Insert the Success Criteria).” There is so much student empowerment when students can visualize the natural pathway to success. The Success Criteria (SC) enables students to cognitively, emotionally, and behaviorally plan how they will meet the challenges chronologically outlined. What is profound about SC, students can immediately engage with them, if they believe it’s attainable. If LIs and SC are written in student-friendly terms with the appropriate amount of challenge (Rigor), the probability of student engagement increases immensely. Moreover the probability of engagement increases when LIs and SC are written using goal-based strategies.

The Visible Learning Framework: SMART GOALS

To increase the efficacy of LIs and SC, it is paramount to implement SMART goals. There is a school of thought that believes LIs should be written broadly, while SC more specific. Nevertheless, I believe that broadly written LIs are poorly defined, which makes them vague and open to misinterpretation and misconceptions. The ambivalent nature of LIs is potentially counterproductive because students cannot specifically determine what they are learning for that day's lesson. Therefore, LIs and SC that are Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Timely are more effective, because students can clearly and independently evaluate their own learning juxtaposed to clearly defined LIs and SC.  

Metacognition

The ultimate goal and the key to engaging with LIs and SC is to elicit a metacognitive response. The idea of metacognition stimulates cognitive, emotional, and behavioral responses. Students engage in metacognition when they think about their thinking. When students interact with LIs and SC for the first time, the initial goal is to trigger a response that enables them to think about where they are, how they will get there, and how they will know they are successful. To facilitate this phenomenon, teachers must provide scaffolds in the form of guided questions. 

Plan, Monitor, and Evaluate (PME)

Teachers are encouraged to reference Learning Intentions (LIs) and Success Criteria (SC) at least three times during each lesson. This practice aligns with the metacognitive strategy known as PME, which stands for Plan, Monitor, and Evaluate. At the beginning of the lesson, students plan the steps they will take based on their prior knowledge to achieve the LIs and SC. In the middle of the lesson, they monitor their progress, using teacher feedback to assess the effectiveness of their initial plans. At this point, students decide whether to adjust their approach or continue with the fidelity of their original plan. Finally, toward the end of the lesson, students evaluate their success by checking their understanding and mastery of the SC. This process of assessing their achievements fosters intrinsic motivation and builds momentum for subsequent lessons. Additionally, the tangible nature of checking if their efforts prove effective exponentially ameliorates the experiences of students who suffer from learned helplessness, because they can visibly see the correlation between effort and success.

Benefits of PME

Students who appear disengaged or demonstrate a high level of learner's apathy may have an underdeveloped and often misidentified executive function called Initiation. Initiation is an executive function that encapsulates effective planning, goal setting, and the ability to independently complete tasks. The Plan, Monitor, and Evaluate (PME) strategy helps mitigate issues of procrastination by disaggregating complex tasks into smaller, manageable chunks. With this strategy, students are concurrently developing their executive skills while learning new content. The ability to replicate this strategy can prove efficacious in enhancing student achievement, if used with fidelity over the course of an instructional calendar, students who are deficient in this executive function will have mastered this skill, leading to greater student engagement.  

PME Student Work Samples

The Frayer Model

One effective strategy for enhancing student engagement through Learning Intentions (LIs) and Success Criteria (SC) is the Frayer Model. This instructional organizer allows teachers to implement Dual Coding, which combines visual and auditory elements to actively engage students. Multilingual students and those with limited exposure to subject-specific vocabulary particularly benefit from Dual Coding, as it supports their language development, improves retention rates, and reduces cognitive overload. Additionally, allowing them to read aloud both LIs and SC, congruent to the visual connection, enhances their language acquisition of academic and domain-specific vocabulary. These advantages collectively strengthen all three components of student engagement. I must advise you to only use images that are essential to reducing potential barriers. Irrelevant photos and images are distracting and confusing. Only use pictures that amplify the pupil’s ability to engage.

PME and Frayer Model in Action

The Frayer Model: Homophones

The purpose of LIs and SC is to engage all learners. A Frayer Model’s use of dual coding is pertinent to English Language Learners (ELLs). Without the use of dual coding, English Language Learners (ELLs) Specifically, those in the early stages of English language acquisition may reasonably confuse words like “Pi” and “Pie” or 'Write' and 'Right' when instruction relies solely on auditory input without visual word references. Furthermore, the use of words and auditorial reference may prove to be even more confusing without the use of visual aids. For example, the word “table” in math can be confusing because an ELL may think of an actual table. Another common misconception is hearing the phrase, “Cite with strong and relevant contextual evidence.” From the perspective of an English acquisition learner hearing, “Cite” can be misinterpreted as “Sight.” or even “Site.” Visual references can circumvent these issues while allowing ELLs to engage in the lesson, because the goal of Visible Learning is clarity. Remember, if students are confused, we risk disengagement, particularly students with limited resiliency. 

Conclusion

The espousal of visibility cannot be overemphasized. Just imagine the power of GPS. Our GPS provides a bevy of information, such as our current position, directions, traffic stops, estimated time of arrival, and alternative routes, allowing drivers to plan, monitor, and evaluate their current route as they proceed to their destination. The same ideology holds true with Visible Learning. Through metacognition, students are in the driver's seat, allowing them to make decisions, ask questions, and assess their learning. Just like referencing a GPS, students are constantly evaluating their learning (current knowledge) against Learning Intentions and Success Criteria. It’s the ability to have a point of reference, which grants students the opportunity to engage in the inculcation of the lesson.

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About the Author

Dr. Prince Brewington currently serves as the Assistant Principal of Instruction at Crayton Middle School. His duties encompass professional development, instructional, and behavioral support with the goal of improving student outcomes. Dr. Brewington believes teachers transcend generations, positively transforming the world through a shared belief that all students can be successful. Connect with Dr. Brewington at: prince.brewington@richlandone.org