At the risk of escalating the Meta War, I think “be specific” and “be concrete” are themselves too general and abstract to engender good exercises. They look more like “do algebra” than “factor a polynomial”. Not that you wouldn’t get some interesting responses if you said, “We need ideas for teaching how to do algebra,” but most of them probably wouldn’t make students better at factoring a polynomial—analogously, I like the “teach me to sharpen a pencil” game, and it would make a fun and striking activity, but I’m not sure it would help students learn to explain their business plan better in an interview. If you want students to communicate judgements and opinions better, teach them to do that.
In this case, I would unpack “specific” into two parts: concrete and relevant. To make a statement more concrete, you talk about how qualities can be measured or observed (“Yellow is a color” becomes “Yellow is the color of a dandelion” or “yellow is the color of the emission spectrum of sodium”). To make it more relevant, you relate it to a goal or higher-level question (“These scissors are dull” becomes “I can’t use these scissors to cut hair”).
For a straightforward activity, give students a list of statements, and have them classify them as vague, concrete, relevant, or concrete and relevant. Example:
Tom is too short.-- vague
Tom is too short to play basketball.-- relevant
Tom is 5′6″.-- concrete
Tom is 4 standard deviations below the mean height of a college basketball player.-- concrete and relevant
For a higher-level activity, give students a vague statement, and ask them to make it concrete and relevant. Example:
Having a car gives me more flexibility.
becomes:
Having a car lets me get from my home to the southwest corner of town in 30 minutes; other transportation options would take more than an hour and a half. There are many employment opportunities in that part of town, so I have more work options with a car.
At the risk of escalating the Meta War, I think “be specific” and “be concrete” are themselves too general and abstract to engender good exercises. They look more like “do algebra” than “factor a polynomial”. Not that you wouldn’t get some interesting responses if you said, “We need ideas for teaching how to do algebra,” but most of them probably wouldn’t make students better at factoring a polynomial—analogously, I like the “teach me to sharpen a pencil” game, and it would make a fun and striking activity, but I’m not sure it would help students learn to explain their business plan better in an interview. If you want students to communicate judgements and opinions better, teach them to do that.
In this case, I would unpack “specific” into two parts: concrete and relevant. To make a statement more concrete, you talk about how qualities can be measured or observed (“Yellow is a color” becomes “Yellow is the color of a dandelion” or “yellow is the color of the emission spectrum of sodium”). To make it more relevant, you relate it to a goal or higher-level question (“These scissors are dull” becomes “I can’t use these scissors to cut hair”).
For a straightforward activity, give students a list of statements, and have them classify them as vague, concrete, relevant, or concrete and relevant. Example:
Tom is too short.-- vague
Tom is too short to play basketball.-- relevant
Tom is 5′6″.-- concrete
Tom is 4 standard deviations below the mean height of a college basketball player.-- concrete and relevant
For a higher-level activity, give students a vague statement, and ask them to make it concrete and relevant. Example:
Having a car gives me more flexibility. becomes: Having a car lets me get from my home to the southwest corner of town in 30 minutes; other transportation options would take more than an hour and a half. There are many employment opportunities in that part of town, so I have more work options with a car.