Chapter 10 Teaching and Learning Strategies

1. Chapter 10Teaching and Learning Strategies

2. Agenda • Good News • Educational Current Events:  • Jimmy Butts • Corey Taylor • Chapter Portion • Erin Dutton

3. Why teach learning strategies? • Many students simply do not know how to get started • Others do not know how to complete a task • Instead they tend to develop coping strategies to avoid embarrassment rather than succeed at the task • Teach them the strategies that successful students use • Learning strategies help students learn and perform by providing them with a specific set of steps for: • (a) approaching new and difficult tasks, • (b) guiding thoughts and actions, • (c) completing tasks in a timely and successful manner, • (d) thinking strategically.

4. Knowing When Students Need Instruction in Learning Strategies • Determine when students are not being successful in learning tasks and activities • Notice when you are helping individual students and repeating instructions about a particular task • Consult with special education teachers in your school

5. Are students meeting task demands? • What is expected of my students? • Where is student performance not meeting my standards? • Academic demands, secondary teachers expect students to gain information from lectures and written material, demonstrate knowledge on tests, and express information in writing • Secondary students face social demands, such as following rules in and out of school; • participating in social activities, discussions, and conversations with peers and adults; • accepting criticism and help; • recruiting assistance when needed; resisting inappropriate peer pressure; • being pleasant in social interactions

6. Difficulty with motivation • Plan for timely task completion and set short-, intermediate-, and long-term goals. • Executive demands that require them to • work independently with little feedback, • apply knowledge across content areas, • solve problems, and • organize information and resources. • Executive demands require students to think about how they learn best and make decisions about what they will do.

7. Are many students asking for help as they experience similar difficulties? • Pay attention to extra support you routinely provide students during learning activities • Sometimes the teacher recognizes that a number of students are having the same problem and may pause to clarify a point or process for all students.

8. Are there colleagues who can help me identify why some of my students are not being successful? • When deciding whether or not to teach students effective learning strategies, it is important to consider, • (a) the demands your students face every day in and out of school • (b) whether you find yourself repeating the same instructions over and over to students • (c) the results of consultations with resource personnel, like special educators and other teachers

9. Principles of Strategy Instruction • Three features that should be part of any learning strategy you develop • The steps in a strategy should cue students to do something like read, survey, or examine. • The strategy should offer a way to remember the steps to follow in using the strategy. • The strategy should address a process that students find difficult.

10. GRADE strategy • Gather missing information from your notes by asking the teacher or a friend for his or her notes. • Reread and highlight notes using different colors to code different levels of information. • Ask yourself questions as you study your notes. • Draw a visual device, like a chart, or graphic to organize the information. • Engage in positive self-talk after studying your notes so you will be mentally prepared when you take the test.

11. The Paraphrasing Strategy – “RAP” • “R” cues students to “read a paragraph” • “A” cues students to “Ask themselves, ‘What are the main idea and details in this paragraph?’” • “P” cues students to “Put the main idea and details into your own words”

12. Teaching Learning Strategies • Students learn when, where, and how the strategy can be used for maximum benefit • Students learn how to state main ideas and corresponding details in their own words • One good system for structuring information is to provide headings for main ideas and subheadings for details • Not only provide a specific set of steps for approaching a task, but they also guide thinking and performance.

13. How should I teach learning strategies? • Students must learn and apply strategies before they will experience any benefits. • Mastery, maintenance, generalization • Teaching learning strategies to your students is accomplished most effectively when • (a) students understand the purpose of the strategy, • (b) learn how, when, and why to use it, • (c) learn different ways to remember the strategy, • (d) develop goals for learning the strategy • (e) see the strategy modeled several times • Students must understand the purpose for a strategy and how learning it will benefit them personally. • Students must learn how, when and why to perform the actions of the strategy-both physical and cognitive actions.

14. How should I teach learning strategies? • Students learn different ways to remember the strategy to enable independent use in the future. • They can be encouraged to develop the habit of writing the memory device for a strategy on tests or written assignments. • As instruction progresses, students should monitor their own progress and set short-term goals for learning each step of the strategy. • Students should see the strategy modeled several times and hear how the teacher thinks through the process, using reasoning and problem-solving, as the process unfolds. • When you are teaching learning strategies to your students, you may want to use controlled materials initially • Teach when to use strategies in other settings

15. Developing Your Own Learning Strategies • To be effective and efficient, a learning strategy must • Address the learning demand of the task and setting • Provide steps to guide thinking and performance • Present the strategy in a format that students can readily learn and apply • Address problems that students are currently experiencing

16. Developing Your Own Learning Strategies • Identify one learning task or skill demand you have seen students repeatedly have trouble with in learning the content of you course • Develop a strategy that you can teach your students to help them address the problem. • No more than seven steps • Develop a plan for teaching the strategy to your students. • Evaluate your work – maintain good communication with students as you implement strategies instruction. • To fully evaluate the learning strategy you have developed, you need to teach it to students, and your students need to master it and use it.

17. Successful Strategy Instruction • Students internalize the steps of the strategy, understand when and where to apply it, and realize how it can help them learn and get better grades. • Provide students with cues to use the strategy. • Model the strategy. • Provide feedback on how well students are using the strategy. • Integrate strategy use with daily instruction and materials.

18. Supports for Learning Strategy Instruction • Teachers can help with ideas about how to practice and assess a particular strategy, as well as share strategies they have developed. • Parents can support strategy instruction in school and at home by prompting students to use the strategies they have learned in school to complete homework assignments and study for tests. • Provide classroom support by giving feedback, grading strategy practice attempts, and developing materials used to practice strategies. • Professional development opportunities.

19. WEB SITES • http://www.ldonline.org • articles related specifically to learning strategies can be found as well as a comprehensive reference list of research articles related to teaching learning strategies across the curriculum • http://www.teachingld.org • articles discussing the methods used to teach a range of learning strategies in classroom, as well as the resulting achievement of students • http://www.ku-crl.org • Strategic Instruction Model • http://www.ash.udel.edu/ash/teacher/standards.html • National Curriculum Standards