I just love this comic to show the D.I.R.T acronym in a nutshell! If you are wondering what DIRT stands for you are in the right place!

Read on to find out how you can get your DIRT on, in teaching… 

D.I.R.T is an acronym that stands for Dedicated Improvement and Reflection Time. It’s the time you allocate for pupils to reflect and act upon your feedback and suggestions for improvement. Research shows that by allowing for DIRT time you are ensuring that the pupils act upon your recommendations thus supporting their progress.

DIRT time can take as long as you feel is necessary, it may be part of a starter activity or a plenary. It may also be a whole lesson; it is up to the teacher and the policy of the school. There are many ways to evidence DIRT in children’s books but one of my favourite ones is using a box, which is mentioned in Ross McGill’s book, ‘Mark. Plan. Teach.’. He suggests that a section of work is boxed by the teacher, which is then marked thoroughly offering feedback, either verbal or written. The box, in theory,  allows students to go back and act upon the feedback given with a clear specific framework. However, it will only work if time is allocated within lessons for children to go back to make the suggested improvements and if they are up to date.  See here for information from the man himself. 

Another great way to show progress of your pupils and a way of them seeing the improvements that they have made, is to get them to complete their ‘DIRT’ work in a different colour, that way it stands out and children can see that their writing is work in progress.

How D.I.R.T.y is your teaching? 

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Comment below with your DIRT ideas. What works for you? 

Till next time…

 

Photo by Stephen Murphy on Unsplash