ROUTINES
Thinking Routines are content-free cognitive scaffolds that support educators in putting thinking front-and-central in their classrooms. The power of thinking routines lies in their simplicity, along with the fact that they can be used over and over again in order to make particular patterns of thinking become habitual.
The best place to read more about thinking routines is by visiting the Project Zero website, along with the accompanying websites of the many associated projects, including but not limited to Making Thinking Visible, Artful Thinking, Agency by Design and All-Ed. On this page, I have pulled together some of the thinking routines that I personsally have found to be particularly powerful over the years, with hyperlinks to full descriptions of the routines themselves.
I have categorised the routines with reference to the Understanding Map, a tool developed by Ron Ritchhart, Mark Church and Karin Morrison (2011) presenting 8 powerful thinking moves teachers might like to encourage in service of bumping up both engagement and understanding. In selecting thinking routines to deploy, teachers might first like to identify the thinking move/s they wish to press for in their classroom, and then explore the routines associated with that move listed here. I have also included two additional categories, 'Routines for Passive to Active Learning', and 'Routines for Reflection'.
When following the links to routines below, you will find specific details about the individual, organisation, project, or research team responsible for their development. In compiling this roadmap of routines, I stand on the shoulders of giants, and give full credit to the educators who have created them for the benefit of us all, teachers and learners alike.