Issue 4
5 tips for helping with a student’s memory, memory, memory... By Robert Watson
Memory is an odd thing. I teach languages, and I notice how tough students can find it to remember and retain things. I know I’m not alone and that this isn’t just confined to my subject area, as I do teaching and learning work across the curriculum. So, what weird and wacky ways can help to improve students’ memory?
Make it memorable What do WE remember most: the good times, the funny stories, the things that were unique? So, if I’m trying to get my students to remember something I give it a story or a silly notion. For example: Get your students to envisage the idea, or word, or fact, or piece of information as a picture in their brain. Recently I was teaching year 8s to remember words or phrases (in German) that describe where you live. “An der Küste” means “by the sea”, so I got the students to imagine a sea of custard (sounds like Küste). Sure enough, now, they remember this rather daft, but effective, link.
Give the game a name Playing a game? Want to jazz up that activity you know works so well? So, when I’m working on getting students to improve the quality of their sentences or paragraphs, I use “Pimp My Paragraph” as the name of the activity. It’s certainly nothing ground-breaking, but just that slight tinge of humour gets more students engaged. It links it the first suggestion here in that it makes it more memorable as well. Suddenly the dreary-looking faces at the back and almost comatose kids by the cupboards look more alert; “Sir’s about to tell a joke”, or “oh, something just got more interesting”. The key to this is, you’ve got them interested and they’ll remember what ensues.
Memrise Users can sign up to use Memrise within about 20 seconds and either use the “courses” already created by community members (Search: ‘Archies’ if you want to see the spectacular ones I’ve made for my students…) or create your own! You may have seen this site on Blue Peter or BBC Breakfast…
Video Making a video using a mobile phone, then uploading it to a site such as YouTube, can save you loads of time in the long run AND help your students remember stuff. I’ve recently started making vocabulary videos to help my students learn things at home as part of homework. If you give a student something to take home and learn, no matter how much advice you give in the classroom, or peer ideas for improving their memory they hear, some will still struggle. This is natural. So, by making videos and putting them online, students can access these at home and remember the words / facts etc more easily. You can also repeat the handy memory tips from lessons in your film. FYI – I choose not to appear in person on the videos, because, believe it or not, I’m quite camera shy, so I film my computer screen (usually with a slide of the information to learn on screen). I have been known to use a German teddy as the “presenter”. Yes, wacky is an accurate adjective.
“Kawaii” or “Weapons of Mass Cuteness” Perhaps you thought the previous ideas were too much, or too daft? I apologise, as this final one takes the biscuit. According to research by a university in Japan, kittens or other baby animal pictures can help people remember things. Pop pictures of kittens and puppies etc. on slides (or whatever medium) to help students to remember. There seem to be millions of kitten pictures in a variety of poses out there on the web, and students enjoy them! In my experience of sticking such images on slides, students do pay more attention and they do appear more engaged. For me, engaging the students and giving them hooks to hang their knowledge on gets the memory working better.
Finally, it’s important to be more serious for a moment. Whilst it might seem some of these methods are a bit “gimmicky”, they have real cognitive logic behind them. We all remember things better when they have more interesting aspects to them. I’ve found the above ideas to work. I’m teaching Year 8s and Year 10s with a lot of these strategies and their memories are improving due to them. http://www.innovatemyschool.com/industry-expert-articles/item/1023-5-tips-for-helping-with-astudent%E2%80%99s-memory-memory-memory.html
Learning to pass is failing to learn By Jane Basnett
How often have I heard a pupil ask “but do I need to know this for my exam?” Indeed, how often have I said to myself “time is short, do they need to know this?” No matter who says it or thinks it, it is equally frustrating. As teachers we have become slaves to league tables and all that that entails. Pupils have to get the grades because they have hopes and aspirations and there is so much competition. I do want them to get those top marks because I genuinely want them to realise their dreams. However, how can I get them to see that learning uniquely for an exam is not the best, nor the most important, approach? What matters is that they learn to love studying, that they learn to discover the art of studying and that they realise that there is always another step that can be taken, another fact that can be considered, and another equation that can be solved.
So, how can I set them on this path? I am surely an integral part of the process? I must be the catalyst. It is in the questions I ask and the tasks and challenges I set. The verbs that I use should move my pupils beyond simply identifying, memorising and describing. It is in reflecting, solving and hypothesising that pupils will eventually achieve more. I do not doubt that initially they will stumble and this will cause them concern. Yet, does this really matter?
How good would it be, for example, if I could teach my pupils to fail? Or at least that it is alright to fail. I believe it is in failing that we learn so much more and can thus make progress. One of my favourite plenaries is “what is the best mistake you have made today?” My pupils are happy to enlighten me; they no longer just tell me what went wrong, they also tell me what they learnt from the experience. Failing and then reflecting on this failure is to consider where we have gone wrong and learn how we can correct our mistakes.
It may sound clichéd, but best learning is often about taking one step forward and two steps back. Once pupils accept and understand this then, as learners, they are effectively liberated and empowered to learn simply for the sake of learning. The fear of failure has been swept away from under their feet and although initially they may feel unstable and unsure, pupils are left with a greater understanding about the power of learning. This approach goes some way to helping pupils become lifelong learners as they finally set foot on the path of discovery. That joyous desire to absorb information, work things out for themselves, reflect and consider that they once had as toddlers and youngsters in primary school is brought to the fore again. This is all for the better. Discovery and thinking that does not have assessment as its goal is far more empowering and advantageous for learners.
Furthermore, in all this discovery and learning for learning’s sake, pupils inadvertently attain the goals set out in the assessment criteria. However, they have not gone about it in a blinkered manner where only exams matter. They have gone beyond the confines set out by examination demands and in doing so they have surpassed the requirements laid down by assessment criteria. In learning to fail they have learnt to pass and, what is more, they have learnt a far greater lesson: to learn for life, and that is undoubtedly one of the best lessons they could have asked for.
http://www.innovatemyschool.com/industry-expert-articles/item/939-learning-to-pass-is-failing-tolearn.html