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Improving Cognitive Structures—ideas for DI. K. Knox 2008. What might be triggers for extra cognitive support in DI for those “difficult but not defiant” ones ?. A student one or more GL behind A student who chooses not to read or write A student who can’t seem to get math facts
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Improving Cognitive Structures—ideas for DI K. Knox 2008
What might be triggers for extra cognitive support in DI for those “difficult but not defiant” ones? • A student one or more GL behind • A student who chooses not to read or write • A student who can’t seem to get math facts • A student who “just doesn’t get it” • A student who can’t seem to concentrate or have motivation to persist • A student who seems to require extrinsic motivation • The guesser/passive/distracted/impulsive/ avoidant student who only enjoys art or music
Mental Picturing of words or directions Spatial orientations
Spatial orientation “checks” in online lessons • Spatial orientation helps students define types and characteristics of space in various forms. • Check facility with observing and using boundaries (math, science, geography), • Check the ability to differentiate objects and distinguish relationships, • Check the ability to visualize settings. • Check and clarify existing mental imagery.
Examples… • Use of 3-D and 2-D representations • Share your own pictures; in lessons promote use of “stop and imagine” from time to time, and then check retention referencing those mental images (ie: visualization of a molecular structure; visualize perimeter, or a setting, going backward on a number line, or an art process, visualize map info—check for retention) • Teach perspectives: who is seeing, what is being seen, where the character is focusing, who else is seeing what from a vantage point
Story Structuring • As a cognitive tool, stories shape experience into forms with emotional meanings • Narrate with skill and emotion: “What’s the story on this?” “Can we connect with discoverers?” Whale story • The majority of what we want students to “get” is plotted into the story
Metaphor • Create metaphors together to frame lessons and provide a framework for retention • To compare and contrast information • To make connections across ideas • To help focus on relevant information • Ask students to consciously identify when they are seeing with their eyes and when they are seeing with their mind. • “Consilience can connect”
Consilience (uniting seemingly-unlike characteristics) CELL GEODE LAYERS OF EARTH MEDIEVAL PAINTING
Binary Opposites • Students often bring order into their world by dividing everything into opposites; this gives “grappling hooks” to learners • Whales: the frame is mystery and vulnerability
Small successes through good pedagogy: • Time for chunking and reflective awareness through inquiry; wait time • Open “thinking” questions: “Would this always be true?” “What will happen to this addition problem in base 5?” • “What do you notice??” (uncover naïve thinking) • Jokes and humor, silly vocabulary
The answer is… • BLUE! • Abraham Lincoln! • … what is the question??
Summary with visuals • do oral and visual “summary stops” in direct instruction, include music (optional) and include directed mental visualization/picturing (describe using metaphor) then “Can you see that? What do you notice? From the top what does it look like?” • “Give it back” in quick written or picture form (monitoring thought processes via quick feedback loop)
A sense of Mystery… • What would our world be like if we could see radio waves? • What’s in air? How can such huge animals as whales survive on krill? • can we do the same operation in the opposite way in math and get the same result?
Three more ideas to engage students and increase retention: • Associations and identification with the Heroic and “the journey” in any subject area • Give incomplete outlines • Engage by the extremes of experience
Try it yourself! • Choose a lesson • Choose one of the cognitive structures that you haven’t used before to integrate into the lesson • Share your thought(s)
Choose two of these to include in a specific Elluminate session: • Story structuring • Metaphor • “Stop and imagine/picture” or “stop and summarize” • Binary opposites to frame understanding • A sense of mystery • Associations with the heroic or “the journey” • “give it back” in quick written or illustrative form • Consilience • Extremes of experience
National Standards for Online Teaching • Rate yourself in each domain and make some notes about how to improve effective engagement with all students