5 Steps to Leveraging Background Knowledge in Lessons

“OK,” the teacher says, winding up her lesson on the Great Depression. “Does anyone have a grandparent or great-grandparent who has talked about how they got through this time period?”

Kevin’s hand shoots up. He remembers his grandmother baking something she called “Wacky Cake,” a recipe she used her whole life after going through the Depression without eggs. He eagerly shares the example with the class, adding his own two cents that yes, the cake really is that good. 

As other hands go up, Jaime is confused. He’s been lucky enough to know all four of his grandparents and two great-grandparents, but nobody has ever talked about the Great Depression at home. He listens to what his classmates say and keeps his mouth shut, ashamed.

We often underestimate the role of context in relation to student achievement. Kids who have background knowledge about any topic tend to experience better academic outcomes and achieve beyond expectations, which this famous study supports. The benefits of context hold especially true if kids have a preexisting interest or frame of reference for course content. Unfortunately, the playing field in any given classroom is far from level when it comes to what students arrive in class already knowing. 

Furthermore, providing students with the appropriate materials to build contextual knowledge increases equitable outcomes. In 2018, TNTP conducted a comprehensive study titled “The Opportunity Myth,” which demonstrated that students of color were denied access to grade-level content in far greater numbers than their White peers. The study also pointed out that providing context is a required component of giving kids opportunities for growth: “When students ‘do the thinking’ in a lesson, they grapple with the process of solving problems. They might be applying prior knowledge to answer new kinds of questions.” In other words, contextualizing what students already know helps them reach grade-level content.

Step 1: Find out what kids already know

Teachers can think about ways to activate prior knowledge in daily instruction, allowing them to tap into what kids already know. For example, framing each day with an activator helps connect existing knowledge to new content. Suppose that a fifth-grade science class is exploring how plants get materials needed for their growth.

Rather than jump right into the lesson, the teacher can conduct a quick activator, like a class-wide anonymous poll, that asks students to write down their guesses. Another activator option from the same lesson might be to have students write a list of what kinds of materials they need in order to grow as humans, which will help them make connections between their own experience and plant life. Unlike a formative assessment that occurs after the lesson, an activator sparks what students already know in relation to unfamiliar content that is about to be taught. 

From the results, the teacher will discover how many students already know that plants get what they need mainly from air and water, and how many do not have that background information. By getting this valuable data, teachers can then make necessary adjustments to instruction. Most important, we can more easily determine where student knowledge sits in relation to where the class is going.

Step 2: Fill in necessary contextual pieces

When we prioritize the role of context, the goal is to increase students’ access to ideas and information. Whether we use podcasts, videos, or articles, helping students fill in possible gaps using different types of resources is essential.

For example, if a high school English class is about to read The Crucible, by Arthur Miller, it would first be helpful to provide the class with opportunities to explore mixed-media materials that explain not just the history of the Salem witch trials themselves, but also the events surrounding McCarthyism and the role of communism in 1950s America. That way, students will be far more equipped to not just understand the play itself, but also dig into its deeper significance with a more meaningful level of engagement. 

Step 3: Empower kids to share what they know with their peers 

Kids learn better from one another, which we can use to our advantage by grouping or pairing kids strategically to provide peer support. For example, if a third-grade P.E. class is working on movements that incorporate balance, there might be students in the class who have prior experience through extracurricular activities like dance or gymnastics. Rather than have students struggle alone, the teacher can appoint student “coaches” to walk around and help their classmates.

Another option for peer support is to invite students who have some contextual knowledge to share what they know, either in smaller groupings or with the whole class. Suppose that students in a geometry class are struggling with defining course terms, such as perpendicular lines. If a student took a summer “prep” course, that added advantage for them can be leveraged to help everyone as they explain concepts in a way that might resonate more with their peers. 

Step 4: Facilitate connections between students’ experience and prior knowledge

Once students have the background knowledge needed to better approach their work, a next step is to help them tie newfound learning to its relevance in their lives. For example, exploring questions that make student thinking visible, like “Why does this matter?” or “How does this relate to my experience with [fill in the blank]?” spurs critical thinking and improves overall understanding.

Suppose that a seventh-grade social studies class is studying the American Revolution, and students are learning about how colonists resisted the quartering of British soldiers in their houses. To help them contextualize what this experience was like, encourage them to ask questions of their own about what it might feel like to have strangers occupying your home. When students are given a chance to make connections between theoretical experiences and their own lives, they have a better entry point for accessing content with more confidence.

Step 5: Provide activities and tasks that don’t rely on context

We often forget that students who come to our classes with background knowledge have a distinct advantage over their peers, especially if we do not balance activities that require contextual knowledge with those that have less inherent bias. As important as the above strategies are for tapping into student capacity, one way to ensure equitable instruction is to regularly provide tasks that can be completed without any background knowledge. 

Asking students questions that rely on the text in front of them (known as “text-dependent questions”) requires them to use solely what they’re reading to answer a question. For example, a Spanish-language class might be reading a chapter about cultural practices, and then students answer questions about the text by referencing specific lines or passages. Online resources like CommonLit pair questions with informational text in a variety of content areas in order to teach students to look at the information in front of them to find the correct answer, which is also a skill they need for most state assessments. 

Context matters, and its role in student learning is often underestimated. Regardless of what content or age group we teach, ensuring that we provide an accessible entry point to learning in elevating the importance of background information while not relying on it all the time is a delicate but crucial balance.