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Allow for Quality Over Quantity

Tags

Special Education (IEPs & 504s) All Ages Strategy

Skills

Auditory Processing Processing Speed

Allow for Quality Over Quantity

If your student works slowly or struggles significantly with a skill

How To Apply It!

  1. Students who work more slowly might need extra encouragement and allowances to focus on the quality of their work rather than rushing to meet requirements for length of writing, reading, or number of problems finished.
  2. Focus on the progress the student has made relative to his previous performance without drawing comparisons to other students.
  3. Find opportunities to minimize focus on a student's rate or quantity of work:
  4. Avoid giving writing assignments with a minimum length. Or, give the student a specific target that you think is best for him.
  5. When selecting books, opt for shorter books with comparable comprehension rather than longer books.
  6. When choosing an app or workbook, pick those that do not require an excess amount of reading or writing for the given task. For example, do not pick math apps that require too much reading. Or do not pick language arts workbooks that ask the student to re-write and copy sentences.
  7. Use apps that do not have timers or allow you to disable the timer. Even seeing a timer, regardless of whether or not there are time constraints, might feel stressful.
  8. Give the student a maximum amount of time to spend on an assignment and then he should stop. When you get the work, focus only on the quality of the work that was completed and not what was left unfinished.

Why It Works (the Science Of Learning)!

Students with slower processing speed, weaker working memory, or limited attention should be particularly encouraged not to focus on the volume of work completed. The overarching goal for all students should be deep learning. You want to be sure students are still producing the same work as their peers. However, when time is a factor you want to help students who work at a slower pace maintain their confidence in the face of potential peer pressure. Help them learn how to balance quality over quantity and decide when quality is far more important. This will be an important life skill.