Depth of knowledge

Everybody is talking about RIGOR or asking, "What is rigor?" If you do any research on rigor, you will find that rigor does not mean difficulty. Instead rigor means the level of mental processing that must occur to answer a question, perform a task or generate a product. Two widely used measures of rigor are Bloom's Taxonomy and Webb's Depth of Knowledge Levels. Both measures of rigor go from the simple to the complex. Karen Hess' Cognitive Rigor Matrix integrates these models as a strategy…

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There has been a lot of buzz about DoK (Depth of Knowledge) levels by Norman Webb. First and foremost before I go any further on DoK I want to make it very very clear. DoK is not a verb!!! To ma...

Is It Time for a Relevancy Check? You know what you're supposed to teach. It's defined in academic standards implemented by your state and and outlined the curriculum adopted by the district. You know what your students are expected to know, understand, and do and how deeply they need to know, understand, and be aware of what they're learning. It's stated in the performance objectives your state's academic standards and set by the questions, problems, and tasks your students your students…

Categorizing tasks according to the complexity of thought they require is one way for teachers to create a rich learning environment.

We now have an updated DOK chart. Please utilize this chart in your lesson planning. Download it by clicking on the preview below.

How many of you have seen this graphic? Perhaps you were provided this graphic from your district or school to use as a frame of reference for planning instruction and assessment for depth of knowledge. Perhaps this is the image that popped up when you conducted an online search about depth of knowledge. Perhaps some of you are using this to develop lessons and units that you believe prompt and encourage students to demonstrate their depth of knowledge about the concepts and content they are…

Which is more: 36 times one-half or 36 divided by one-half? This post explores what the answer to this question reveals about student depth of knowledge and how a recent experience with a colleague has reminded me of the importance of developing a conceptual understanding of math concepts in order to support procedural knowledge and skills. Through this post, I offer questions for reflection and a link to elementary activities to support higher order thinking about fractions.

What exactly is depth of knowledge? Questioning with Webb's Depth of Knowledge The framework designed by Norman Webb (1997) categorizes depth of knowledge into four levels. D.O.K.-1 questions require students to recall or reproduce knowledge and/or skills to come up with an answer that is either correct or incorrect. Questions at this particular level usually involves working with facts, terms, and/or properties of objects. D.O.K.-2 questions expect students to think deeper about how to…

I had the opportunity to attend one of our districts data review meetings with my principal. It was very interesting to see how personnel from the district office dissect and internalize information. As I sat there listening to the PPT presentation that my principal worked frantically to create for this meeting, her supervisor stopped her […]