Beautiful Work: Critique and Reflection

• Complex work is rigorous: it aligns with or exceeds the expectations defined by grade-level standards and includes high-order thinking by challenging students to apply, analyse, evaluate, and create during daily instruction and throughout longer projects.
• Complex work often connects to the big concepts that undergird disciplines or unite disciplines.
• Complex work prioritizes transfer of understanding to new contexts.
• Complex work prioritizes consideration of multiple perspectives.
• Complex work may incorporate students’ application of higher-order literacy skills in complex text and evidence-based writing and speaking.

• Well-crafted work is done with care and precision. Craftsmanship requires attention to accuracy, detail and beauty.
• In every discipline and domain, well-crafted work should be beautiful work in conception and execution. In short tasks or early drafts of work, craftsmanship may be present primarily in thoughtful ideas, but not in polished presentation; for long-term projects, craftsmanship requires perseverance to refine work in conception, conventions and presentations typically through multiple drafts or rehearsals with critique from others.

• Authentic work demonstrates the original, creative thinking of students – authentic personal voice and ideas – rather than simply showing that students can follow directions or fill in the blanks.
• Authentic work often uses formats and standards from the professional world, rather than artificial school formats (e.g. students create a book review for a local newspaper instead of a book report for the teachers).
• Authentic work often connects academic standards with real-world issues, controversies, and local people and places.
• Authenticity gives purpose to work; the work matters to students and ideally contributes to a larger community as well. When possible, it is created for and shared with an audience beyond the classroom.

When critiquing (either students or staff) it is helpful to follow 3 simple rules developed by Ron Berger. These ground rules mean that feedback is helpful, well-structured and formulated. The three elements are:

1. Be Kind: Presenting work for critique puts the individual in a very vulnerable position, as such this rule is vital and encourages the critique not to get ‘carried away’.
2. Be Specific: This encourages those critiquing not to be vague, but to be specific and to back up comments with actual examples and support.
3. Be Helpful: Critiquing is not just about saying what is wrong but is also about working out how to go about improving that work.