Inspire 2e Students to Double-Check Their Work
I recently got an email from a mom about how to get her 2e son to double-check his work before he turns it in.
A quick definition, for those who don’t know: “2e” is a shortened form for the phrase “twice exceptional.” This is a descriptor often used for intellectually advanced students, otherwise known as “gifted,” who also have a learning disability such as, but not limited to, dyslexia, ADHD, or autism.
When we hear the phrase 2e, we don’t know exactly what this student’s combination of strengths and challenges is, but we do know that he is both extremely gifted in some cognitive domains and extremely challenged in others.
So what’s the exact question? Let’s hear it in the mom’s own words:
Hi Gretchen, I am a mother of two neurodivergent children, age 11 & 12, and have truly appreciated your Study Cycle to share with my kids. My daughter has inattentive ADHD and these tools will really help her.
However, my son is twice exceptional. He definitely doesn’t need repetition most of the time to retain material and until this year almost received 100% on all of his assignments and tests and scores 99% on standardized tests.
This year though he is starting to make mistakes. He will get back his work and be so mad at himself b/c there are “silly mistakes.” We have told him many times to double-check his work, and he says he is. I’m sure this story doesn’t surprise you in describing a neurodivergent kid.
Do you have “tools” for teaching students how to best double-check their work so they don’t make mistakes on material they actually know well?
Oooh. Such a great question that I bet a lot of parents and educators of neurospicy students have. Let’s dig in.
Start with understanding
First, I want to acknowledge that it’s always a trick to motivate students with quick brains to slow down enough to double-check their work. I myself suffer from “gallop too fast through mindless tasks” syndrome, so I understand the impulse to get it over with.
I’m not sure if this is your kiddo’s experience as well, but it could be good to ask for more information about what exactly is driving his quickness, from his point of view.
🤔 Is he bored?
🤔 Does he “feel” he knows the information?
🤔 Is he thinking about other things while he does the work?
🤔 Does he feel some discomfort in his body while he’s working?
🤔Something else?
I just love it in when kids try to find the words to describe their inner experience. It’s hard for some kiddos to do, but I’m often surprised by the brilliant self-awareness when I think to ask.
I would also be curious about what he thinks about the suggestion to “double-check his work.” Does he agree this would be good to do? Does the idea annoy him? Does he not understand how he would do that? There are so many good questions to ask him to understand what it’s like, and to empathize with him.
A final question I always love to ask is whether the student is willing to brainstorm some non-annoying ideas about how he can double-check his work more consistently and effectively. This kind of question is part of a motivation framework I call “The Consent Burger” and you can find learn more about it here in my free Unlock Student Learning course.
Let’s now assume that this student is willing to hear some ideas! What’s next?
Make a checklist
Because it’s been a few years since I’ve worked directly with a 2e client (now that I’ve moved on to educator training), I was curious about what strategies the Certified Anti-Boring Coaches inside the Anti-Boring Learning Lab would offer. They’re in the trenches with students right now, after all. I posted this mom’s question inside our Anti-Boring Learning Lab chat lounge, and we got great responses!
First up, academic and writing coach Ivy Sandz shared:
One idea is to make a checklist of what to do once work is finished. This can include checking over work, re-reading answers, etc. The checklist can be laminated so it can be re-used.
Yes! Ivy’s comment reminded me that this was my main strategy back when I was coaching 2e students. We would break down exactly what it means to double-check one’s work, and then turn the verbs into a checklist, a process I call “verberization.” The more specific the better!
Conduct a “mistake analysis”
Next to comment was Susannah Cole, a student success consultant and co-author of the book Flexible Mindsets in Schools:
Double-checking is a great strategy for students who process/comprehend information quickly; however, when they hear someone say “check your work” they don’t necessarily know what that means and may simply scan over their work. It can be helpful for them to identify the top 1 to 3 common mistakes they make (and this might be different depending on the subject) so they have something specific to ‘check.’
I love Susannah’s tweak of the “checklist” idea by identifying the student’s most common mistakes first. This strategy perfectly aligns with the Anti-Boring Study Cycle that the mom referenced in her original question. If you haven’t learned the study cycle yet, I highly recommend you grab the Unlock Student Learning free course; you’ll get a short video and a PDF describing the Study Cycle and how to teach it to students.
A quick refresher for those of you who know:
The Study Cycle summarizes the complex science of learning into three doable steps:
Step One refers to the students’ first exposure to the information. We call this step “encoding.”
Step Two refers to the action that has been found to be the most powerful for consolidating learning and remembering it long term. We call this step “retrieval,” which refers to the act of testing ourselves to see what we know or don’t know.
Step Three refers to the action students need to take when, as a result of their retrieval practice, they find information they do not yet know. At this point, the student needs to “encode in a new way,” which refers to manipulating the information in a different way than they did the first time they tried to learn it.
I bring up the Study Cycle because one of the main points is that our brains are designed to learn best when we make mistakes! This means that skilled students are detectives, eagerly seeking out the mistakes they tend to make so they can figure out an anti-boring way to correct them!
In regards to this student, the mistakes he makes are not due to difficulty with the content. Instead, they point to a challenge in his process! Process-oriented mistakes are equally as valuable to uncover as content-specific mistakes. However, a 2e student might not see these process mistakes as valuable, because our culture’s orientation to knowledge is that content is king! As long as you understand the info, you’re good to go!
For this student, I would recommend explaining to him
the power of mistakes, and
the difference between content and process mistakes
I would then ask this student if he’d be willing to perform an “analysis” on his mistakes to see what kinds they are, and to see if we can find any patterns in the types of mistakes he makes. This is what I mean by “a mistake analysis.”
He will undoubtedly discover that he makes more process than content mistakes, and he might even notice that there are several kinds of processes he’s more likely to miss.
He can then choose one to three mistakes that he’s willing to work and, and put them on his checklist of things to double-check after he’s finished his assignment. Once he’s gotten good at checking for and correcting those mistakes, he can layer in additional ones.
Develop a homework and test-taking routine
But what about students who simply forget to check their work? When they are done with the assignment, it feels so satisfying to have answered the last question that their brain just turns off?
I often had my clients turn their checklist into an acronym they write at the top of their test page or assignment at the start of the assignment. I suggest a routine in which, as soon as the test is passed out, they write their name at the top of the page and add the acronym somewhere that they’ll see it when they’re DONE with the assignment. Maybe this is after the last question?
By doing this, they are actually accomplishing a couple tasks simultaneously:
They are reminding their brains about the common mistakes they make. This might actually alert their brains to check for these mistakes while they’re answering questions.
They are also ensuring that they will remember to check their work when they have finished the assignment.
Developing any routine takes practice, so the student might not remember to do this the first time. It would be amazing if classroom teachers guided students through this “mistake analysis” process, creating an acronym to help them remember their checklist, and then writing the acronym on their test page. However, it’s also possible to put systems into place whereby, over time, the student will be able to remember (which is more ideal anyway).
Unpack internalized ableism
I’m always inspired when the academic coaches and tutors in the Anti-Boring Learning Lab help me see old problems in new ways.
This happened for me when Nicola Lott, founder of the Canadian Academic Interventionist’s Hub (CAIHub), posted her thoughts, pointing out some hidden ableism behind the framing of the question:
Respectfully, I think part of the problem is that we label these mistakes as ‘silly mistakes.’ Having difficulty with the small details, particularly in math, is a real thing and a real struggle for some neurodiverse brains. The common way of referring to them as ‘silly’ minimizes the real struggle that people have with this (Einstein struggled with this) and adds a little side serving of shame, because the underlying message is ‘you didn’t <insert verb here> enough.’ (If you are a neuro-minority, there is a whole list of things you didn’t <verb> enough. It’s triggering.)
I love both Susannah & Ivy’s responses above. They both identify the need for explicit instruction. It seems that we have a system developing here.1. Identify the common mistakes.
2. Make a checklist so you can check for them.
3. Rename to reframe the errors. If the errors are -/+ switching then call them that. If the errors are b/d switching call them that. Let’s target the issue at hand. The 1990s are calling, they want their emotional subtexts back.
From a more concrete perspective, I’m a big fan of highlighters. Some brains become overwhelmed by the density of text in math equations and have a hard time seeing the wood for the trees. Strategic use of highlighters can help. (For example, if -/+ signs are an issue, go through and highlight them so they stand out more.)
If the errors are cropping up more in compositional subjects, then there are a bunch of ways to support that either with high or low-tech methods depending on preferences.
Let’s do this! Let’s dismantle systemic ableism piece by piece 😄
I will never think of the phrase “silly mistakes” in the same way again! Thank you, Nicola, for reminding us to practice more neutral framing of the challenges students’ experience, and to de-shamify our language.
This student simply makes certain kinds of process-oriented mistakes more often than content-oriented mistakes. That happens! And now, let’s strategize how to respond to these mistakes to improve our learning and our performance!
Use a highlighter
With that, I’d thought the conversation had ended. However, Ivy Sandz wrapped back around with this final piece of advice:
Speaking of highlighting , another strategy I use for testing is to have students make a highlight mark on their paper next to anything they are unsure about and want to go back to later or any problems they skipped to go back to. I started doing this with a student who would skip some problems, but then would forget to go back to work on them. This strategy could also be used for homework; it lets someone who wants to go fast through what they are sure about first, and provides a visual reminder to go back to where they were unsure or skipped.
In reaction to this idea, executive function specialist Crista Hopp (my go-to EF resource) posted a final thought:
This is a great strategy, but I’m finding the more digital tests are used, the harder this becomes. I’ve actually had it added as an accommodation for some students to their IEP/504 to only have paper/pencil tests.
Phew! What a good reminder from Crista that it’s a legitimate accommodation to have students take paper and pencil tests, instead of digital ones. This way they can use more hands-on tools to guide their attention while doing the assignment and double-checking their work.
What else?!
I hope the mom in question finds a few options here to try with her son, and wraps back around to comment below about how it all went.
I’m also curious if YOU have additional ideas for how to help students be willing to double-check their work? If so, please post below. The more the merrier.
Finally, I want to thank the incredible educators who bring their brilliant selves to our Anti-Boring Learning Lab community. I’m always so honored that they find the Anti-Boring Toolkit so valuable, and that they share their own expertise so generously with our community.
The educators who chimed in on this conversation are also Certified Anti-Boring Coaches. If you are a parent looking for an academic or executive function coach, check out the full list of certified Anti-Boring coaches here and consider hiring one of them!
If you are an educator, consider joining their ranks by joining the Anti-Boring Learning Lab, be still my beating heart! I’d love to meet you, and you can find out more here.