about the strategy
At bats is a technique that when it really comes down to it means practice. Give the students the basic knowledge them let them practice it over and over again until the completely understand the concept and larger things can be moved on to. The goal is for the students to be able to complete work independently and to completely understand what they are doing. The only way to do this is by giving them repetition. That is why we practice our basic times tables over and over again until moving on to more complicated math. Completely understanding the basics is the key to moving on to more complicated concepts.
There are three key points to this technique:
Go until they can do it on their own
By the end of practicing the concept over and over again your students should be able to do the work with confidence and with no help.
Use multiple variations and formats
Students should be knowledgable of multiple ways to solve the problems and they should be proficient in these variations. Make sure they can explain all of their work and can tell why some formats work better than others. For example, when teaching reading make sure a student knows you can sound out a word letter by letter or in chunks. Make sure they are aware that certain methods work better with certain words.
Grab opportunities for enrichment and differentiation
Not every student in your class will be on the same level of learning so make sure that the students who learn faster have bonus problems available to them to add more challenge. You want to give all the students time to learn the concept but if some have it figured out you don't want them to get bored so have tougher work available. For example, if you are teaching a class who is just learning to read, keep different levels of books in the classroom so students have opportunities to challenge themselves.
There are three key points to this technique:
Go until they can do it on their own
By the end of practicing the concept over and over again your students should be able to do the work with confidence and with no help.
Use multiple variations and formats
Students should be knowledgable of multiple ways to solve the problems and they should be proficient in these variations. Make sure they can explain all of their work and can tell why some formats work better than others. For example, when teaching reading make sure a student knows you can sound out a word letter by letter or in chunks. Make sure they are aware that certain methods work better with certain words.
Grab opportunities for enrichment and differentiation
Not every student in your class will be on the same level of learning so make sure that the students who learn faster have bonus problems available to them to add more challenge. You want to give all the students time to learn the concept but if some have it figured out you don't want them to get bored so have tougher work available. For example, if you are teaching a class who is just learning to read, keep different levels of books in the classroom so students have opportunities to challenge themselves.
Why this is a working strategy
Lots of information that is taught in schools should be put into a students long term memory. This means the information they learned is stored in their brain for a long duration of time and can be retrieved for later use. Meaningful learning is a desirable form of long term memory because it allows students to create something larger out of the facts that they have stored in their long term memory. Meaningful learning refers to a student learning something, like a fact, then being able to relate it back to another fact they learned to understand a whole concept. This allows students to continue to build on top of their original knowledge of something, like basic math, to be able to understand larger problems and concepts. This is why you want students to have a full understanding of the basics. It will help them turn it into something larger at a later time. At bats comes into play because practice is something that makes retrieval easier for the students. With regular practice the information is more secure in their brain which means it is easier to retrieve when they need to use it. After a concept is practiced over and over, not only is it easier to retrieve but it can also be turned into a larger concept as part of meaningful learning. For example, if John is taught his basic multiplication tables and division tables all year and fully understands them, he can then use that knowledge in multistep math problems. It all comes back to regular practice (at bats) to store the information.
This strategy in my classroom
I want to use the at bats strategy to give my students regular practice because fully understanding the basics will help them with larger concepts later in school. I will use things like warm up activities and worksheets to help the students learn the concepts. I also want to make learning fun so to memorize facts I will use games like "Around the World" in my classroom. "Around the World" is a game where you ask every student to stand by his or her desk then you pick two students who sit next to each other to answer a question. The questions usually relate to state capitals or quick questions that students can find the answer to without written work. You ask the students the question and whoever answers first moves clockwise to the next students desk. You then ask a new question and whoever answers first moves on. The goal is to get completely around the classroom and back to your original desk. Every part of the game is verbal so all the students can hear all the questions and answers which means they are all thinking about the material even if the question is not directed to them. I think this game allows the students to practice the material while having fun in class. Regular practice and work through the at bats strategy is something that is necessary but I think it is fine to take a different approach from time to time.