Hint:
- The use of the flashlight is well suited to conclude a learning content or lesson sequence. Owing to is brevity, it has the advantage that all students get a chance to speak and reflect their learning. However, the flashlight does not replace more comprehensive criteria-oriented forms of dicussion and learning evaluation. See chapter 3d in the introduction.
Procedure:
- Pursuant to a lesson, a presentation, a discussion, etc., each student summarizes in at most two sentences what s/he particularly liked (what s/he thought was very good and/or where s/he finds potential for improvement. (The questions have to be modified, depending on the event to be assessed.) The feedback should be phrased in the I-form, see also #13 “providing feedback”.
- The instructor concludes the flashlight round with an evaluation of 1–2 sentences on her own or a short summary of the student contributions.
Comments:
- Sentence building blocks can help the students with converting their thoughts into sentences. Example: (“The highlight of this … was for me …”, “I had difficulties with …”. “I was bothered by …”)
Variant:
- Sentence gifts: each student pays a one-sentence compliment to a selected classmate or a learning partner (e. g. on the occasion of this person’s birthday). This method must be practiced as well. Finding and expressing genuine compliments as well as accepting them is not easy for many students.