Independent Practice: What Teachers Need To Know
As a teacher, your goal is to help students learn and succeed. You try to find the best materials, use science-based strategies, and implement the right scaffolds so they understand what you’re teaching. However, the only way to truly know what they learned and retained is to allow them to work on it independently and try it for themselves.
Today, we’ll explore what you need to know about the benefits of independent practice and give tips about the best ways to construct your student practice activities for the classroom.
What is independent practice?
Independent practice is any activity, assignment, or dedicated working time that allows students to apply lesson skills and concepts without direct teacher guidance. It’s the “You Do” component of the “I Do, We Do, You Do” strategy. Examples of independent practice activities include:
Performance tasks
Student response cards
Work stations
Guided practice vs. independent practice
Guided practice typically comes before independent practice. It’s the “We Do” part of the “I Do, We Do, You Do” strategy. During this phase of a lesson, you work with students to help them learn new information and skills.
The purpose of guided practice is to give step-by-step instructions and work through them with your students to scaffold applications of what you modeled during the “I Do” phase of the framework. This helps give students more responsibility and control to prepare them for independent practice.
Is independent practice graded or ungraded?
Independent practice can be graded or ungraded, depending on your goals for each activity. Some forms of independent practice—like reviewing flashcards before a test—are inherently ungraded activities. The goal of doing flashcards is to practice and improve so that students can do better on the graded test.
Other independent practice activities may be graded or ungraded formative assessments. For example, you may grade homework worksheets for correctness sometimes. Other times, you may give completion points or share the correct answers with the class and review tricky questions as a group rather than providing a grade for the assignment.
You know your students and grading system best, and you can make decisions based on those and other factors to determine what types of practice should be graded or ungraded.
Benefits of independent practice
Independent practice benefits students in any grade or subject. If they’re learning new information or a new skill, practice helps them use, retain, and recall it later. Here are some key benefits of incorporating independent practice into your daily lessons:
Increases fluency and recall
Students' fluency and automatic recall increase when they practice new or semi-new material and skills. How they collect and store information in their brains plays a significant role in this process.
Most of what students learn in school are acquired skills. They’re not born knowing how to do these skills, and they must practice them often—and receive explicit instruction and support from someone who’s already mastered them—to make them stick.
Teaching acquired skills is tricky because you have to be conscious not to overload students’ working memory during instruction. Working memory is a part of the brain that processes new information. It has a limited capacity and shuts down if it becomes overloaded. This makes it difficult—if not impossible—for students to learn new skills until the load decreases.
Guided and independent practice both help students move information from their working memory into their long-term memory, where it’s chunked, stored, and more easily accessible for future use. Then, their working memory empties, allowing them to take in new information once again.
Gives students room to make mistakes—and learn from them
Independent practice is the “try it out” phase of a lesson. It’s when students can dive in and play with the information they’ve learned or test out a skill. Unlike during an assessment, independent practice is often lower stakes.
Students can get familiar or comfortable with doing something new on their own without the pressure of getting the perfect score or grade hanging over them. Instead, they’re free to try, make mistakes, and learn from them, so they’re prepared when testing and grades come around.
Encourages student independence
Working independently or in small groups—without direct teacher guidance—helps students take more ownership of their learning. It not only increases their investment in their schoolwork, but it also builds confidence in their knowledge and abilities.
In addition to confidence, independent practice helps build problem-solving and decision-making skills, self-discipline, and time management, all of which are important inside and outside the classroom.
Shows teachers what students learned and where they need additional support
Finally, teacher-assigned independent practice activities give you the information you need to determine whether your students understand the concepts and skills you taught. You may walk around and listen to students work in groups, look through collected homework, or use a rubric to grade projects. The method doesn’t matter, but the data you collect from each independent practice session or activity should give you insights into student learning.
You may find that students understood what you taught and can apply skills and concepts easily. The activities may also highlight areas where they need additional support and a return to guided practice before trying independent practice again. Either way, the data can influence your current and future instruction.
9 features of the best independent practice activities
The best and most effective independent practice activities have a few things in common, like:
1. Timeliness
Independent practice works best and is most effective when it directly follows the lesson where you teach the concepts and skills students have to apply. This doesn’t mean you have to do all three “I Do, We Do, You Do” steps in one 40-minute class. Sometimes, teaching a lesson takes a few days, and you may spend more time on the “I Do” or “We Do” stages to better prepare students for independent practice.
But you shouldn’t move on to another lesson until you’ve given time for independent practice. That could look like assigning homework at the end of class, making class time for practice, or assigning a project.
2. Lesson-objective-matched activities
Independent practice activities should always match the lesson objectives. Tasks shouldn’t include skills or concepts you haven’t already taught. They’re not extension activities where you may try to teach new skills or vocabulary to challenge high-performing students. Instead, you want them to use, review, and apply what they learned in a particular lesson.
Plus, using lesson objectives and standards can help guide independent practice activities to keep them focused and relevant.
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3. Clear teacher expectations
When assigning independent practice activities it’s important to make sure students understand their goals and your expectations—both of which you can align with lesson objectives! Providing clear instructions in multiple formats—like written, verbal, and visual—helps, and so does adding guide rails to help students stay on track.
For example, you may give students a five-minute warning before you plan to review the practice problems they’re working on. Having the right instructions and guidance helps orient students to your expectations. It also influences how they prioritize their work and structure their time while working independently.
4. Realistic teacher expectations
While it’s important that students know your expectations for independent practice, it’s also vital that your expectations are realistic. You know your students and their needs best. Independent practice should be challenging, not too easy, and not overwhelming.
Consider factors like your students’ individual learning needs, the material you covered, the lesson objectives, the resources available, and the time you can dedicate to practice. After reviewing these factors, you can determine if you’re setting realistic expectations for each lesson.
5. New and different contexts for skills practice
Independent practice is a great way to show students the real-world applications of what they learn in class. It doesn’t have to be all rote, boring, skill-and-drill-style activities. You can find fun, creative ways to help students practice what they learned and work towards standards mastery.
For example, you may have students take on a journalist’s role and write an article to reinforce opinion writing. In math, you may have them set up a pretend in-class store to practice counting money. The more ways you have students apply their skills and knowledge independently, the better outcomes you’ll see.
6. Consistent practice opportunities
Independent practice isn’t a one-and-done activity. You can do it in any class, with any lesson, or any age group. But to make the skills and information stick, students need to practice consistently. Yet, repeating tasks over and over, like drilling math facts, makes students weary. They’re not engaged, and they’re more likely to check out of the assignment.
When this happens, students may rush to finish their practice, which means they’re not reaping the full benefits of the activity. While it’s essential to provide consistent practice, it’s also important to switch up how, when, and where you include these opportunities in a lesson so that students find them valuable instead of a chore.
7. Multiple modalities or student choice options
Giving students choices about how they want to practice their skills can make them more engaged and interested in doing the work. Practice options with multiple modalities—like written, audio, or visual components—can make them more accessible to all students. Plus, offering student choice helps them take ownership of their learning.
For example, students who need to practice creating opinion content may choose from three assignments: Write a newspaper article, develop a movie review, or record a podcast episode. While all three options allow you to see what students learned and let them practice the skill, they can choose the output and activity that’s most appealing to them.
8. Assessment rubrics
When you incorporate multiple modalities and student choice into your independent practice activities, you need a way to measure and track if students can apply what they learned. Rubrics help. In the example above, you could use the same rubric to monitor all three student choice activities and check their understanding of opinion content.
Rubrics give clear, fair, and straightforward explanations of your expectations for any independent practice activity. They can keep students accountable and on track while pointing them toward the right goals while they work.
9. Self-assessment or self-reflection opportunities
Independent practice should include a self-reflection period so students can monitor their own learning and progress. This could look like counting how many answers they got right after going through a deck of flashcards. Or they may check their own homework while you share the correct answers at the beginning of class.
Sometimes, self-reflection is as simple as checking their feelings about the practice session. Students may answer questions about how challenging it felt or if they were more confident after doing independent work.
Common barriers to independent practice
Barriers are any obstacles that keep students from successfully accessing, participating in, or completing an independent practice activity. Teachers can remove some or all of these barriers by differentiating the activities to be more accessible for all students. Some common barriers to independent practice include:
Instruction complexity
Some students may have trouble reading and understanding the independent practice instructions. This can happen for students with individualized education programs (IEPs), those who read below grade level, or who are English language learners, among other reasons. Even if the students can practice the skill or do the activity independently, they may never get the chance to show it if they can’t make it past the instructions.
You can differentiate instructions to make them more accessible and clear for all students. For example, students with IEPs may benefit from chunked paragraphs or step-by-step instructions rather than large blocks of text. Small accommodations like this can make the instructions less complex so students can get the necessary practice.
Access to resources or materials
Students may not have access to all the resources they need for effective independent practice outside the classroom. Creating in-class time for student practice with all the resources or materials—including accessibility accommodations, like screen readers—can help. If independent practice extends beyond the classroom, you can make the resources and materials available for students to check out, borrow, or use at home so they have everything they need.
For resource barriers like devices or internet access, provide additional work times throughout the school day, such as during lunch, extracurricular classes, or before and after school. These windows allow students more practice time and access in school but outside of class.
Modes of response
Students with varied learning needs may practice better when they can respond in different ways. Some students prefer written practice, while others do better with visual or verbal methods. Providing multiple ways to respond during practice helps students get the reinforcement they need in a way that makes sense to them.
For example, if students are studying in pairs for an upcoming test, you may allow them to use flashcards, ask each other questions aloud, or write their responses. Whatever method helps them make the concept stick is what makes the practice most worthwhile.
What should teachers look for when monitoring independent practice?
As a teacher, you’re the kickoff person during independent practice. Think of yourself as a reality or competition show host. You’re there to keep the guide rails up but not actively participate in the activities. This role allows you to observe students while they’re practicing and collect data to influence instruction. While observing, consider the following questions:
Do students understand the material?: Are they using the correct vocabulary in context or applying skills correctly?
Can students show what they know without barriers?: Did you structure the independent practice activities to be accessible to all students?
Are students progressing toward or mastering lesson objectives, standards, or skills?: Even if students are making and learning from mistakes, are they working toward skill or standards mastery?
Could students benefit from more guided practice?: Do you notice any areas where students struggle or get stuck while working independently?
Does everyone participate in group activities?: If students work in pairs or groups, does everyone participate, or do stronger personalities dominate?
Do students self-monitor or reflect during independent practice?: How do students check in with themselves about what they’re learning and how they’re performing?
Create independent practice activities with Formative
Formative makes it easy for you to create independent practice sets for students—or let them make their own and take even more responsibility for their learning and studying. Choose from four practice modes: Flashcards, matching, quizzes, and writing.
You or your students can make practice sets on Formative in just four easy steps:
Create: Build practice sets from scratch, use existing content, or import any .CSV or .TSV file into Formative. You can also generate content with Formative’s AI generator!
Motivate: Promote friendly competition with practice leaderboards.
Share: Send practice sets to other teachers or students to promote collaboration.
Assess: Identify teaching gaps and areas for support with practice insights for teachers, such as total practice time, total sessions, last practiced, and last performance percentage.
Ready to see our student practice sets at work? Log into your Formative account to get started.