Effective Teaching

In this episode, I discuss the importance of teaching our students how to take notes well and engage with content for learning rather than simply consuming it. I talk about some of the key aspects of good note taking and why it is effective in improving learning when done well and why it helps prepare students for a life-long learning.Taking notes and engaging with content by Daniel Jackson is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.Join the Facebook CommunityTheoryTaking notes requires the learner to:Be selective of content that is important for the learning outcomeOrganise this content into some form of system for later revisionHowever, note taking also:places a significant cognitive load on the brain, as the student listens/watches and takes notes with more information coming as they write. - Annie Piolat et alWhy?Taking notes will help students as they want to quickly refer back to something that they have already coveredIt mimics real life, where we take notes for later referral. This could be a meeting, conversation, or when we do our own research to learn about a new topic.It helps prepare students for a future when they might need to learn a new skill or piece of content as they learn how to identify key ideas and concepts and how to string them together themselves.How?It is important that we remember the cognitive load that note-taking adds and adjust the process to help students focus on the new items and connecting them rather than trying to listen and write at the same time.One way to help this is to show students how to interact with the content. If it is a piece of text, explain how to identify key pieces of information, and highlight, circle, underline etc the text. Get them to write notes on the text or arrows for how concepts connect.Make sure any notes taken are not verbatim but instead are the key ideas written in their own wordsPam A. Mueller and Daniel M. Oppenheimer found that “laptop note takers’ tendency to transcribe lectures verbatim rather than processing information and reframing it in their own words is detrimental to learning”Try to make sure that notes are not taken live. I.e. don’t ask students to take notes while you talk. This will increase their cognitive load and make the processing and learning or information or skills difficult.InsteadRecord what you would normally speak or present as either a video or audio that they can then control… ie) pause, rewind, fast forward etc as they take notes. This will help to reduce the load and allow them to focus on structuring the information and making connections.Note taking is also very specific to its context. Notes in Science, for example, have a different focus to those in art or history. So it is important that you teach your students how to take notes for the subject matter at hand and learn to adapt their notes to the context and the learning goals/outcomes.One example of note taking is the Cornel method, which is used a lot in flipped learning. Here students break the page into 3 areas, one with the general notes, one with the key terms and ideas that come out of the notes and the last area as a summary of the page.https://youtu.be/Lu7WM_fmR1khttps://youtu.be/ogHIyREqLd4I would also recommend including guiding questions or comments. When I flip I often use tools such as EdPuzzle and Insert Learning because they allow me to guide the student's notes and keep them focused. I might ask open-ended questions from the reading or video that helps them identify key items and then another that helps them connect them.I can also highlight key items as they watch or read so they know that it is important and should pay attention to it.It will also show me if they have learnt the information and concepts etc as I look at their answers… before class.I also like to get my students to mind-map items to show the connections betw..

In this episode, I talk about the importance of students reflecting on their learning. I discuss how it helps to create life-long learners and some of the ways that you might include this practice in your regular daily teaching.Student Reflection by Daniel Jackson is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.Join the Facebook CommunityWe all know that reflective practice as a teacher is one of the key activities to progress. As we reflect on our lessons, our units and how our students have learnt… or not, we identify areas for growth and begin to see the areas of our programs that need adjustment for the future.Why should students reflect on their learning?It helps students see the importance of their learningIt helps students to know WHY they needed to learn what they learntIt helps students identify and develop how the learning occurred, which aspects made them think, how they found solutions to problems etcIt helps you to see how students are thinking, their thought processes and identify ways that you can help them in their learning.It can be used to assist peer or teacher feedback to the studentIt provides invaluable feedback to us as the teachers to then adjust our practiceThis works really well if we already have established:Learning goals and success criteriaIdentified where the student began and where they are currentlyWhat the next steps will beHow might you get students to reflect?You could provide them with a scaffold of questions to guide a paired discussion.Questions could include:Was there anything that surprised you today? Why?What did you learn today? What was the most important? Why do you think this? Is there anything you would like to learn more about Or that made you curious?Is there anything from today that you can apply to everyday life?What was difficult for you today? Why?What did you do or could you do next time to overcome this or similar difficulties?What are you going to do next to reach your learning goal or subgoal? Why?How did you or could you help someone else with their learning? EtcMY FAVOURITES:How did I help you today?How did I hinder your learning?What would you like me to do more of next time?But it is always important to include the question why at the end of questions to help promote critical thinking and deeper reflection.Mode of reflectionYou could use similar questions to guide a student as they wrote a blog post, or made comments in a digital portfolio.I often get my students to make a Video that they share with me where they answer provided questions. I love using Seesaw to do this, it is a very simple tool that provides a lot of insight. You could also use FlipGrid or something similar to have students work through this process.You could have students send themselves an email with advice for their next lesson. This can be powerful if you then get them to read those emails at the beginning of the next lessonYou could have students respond to questions in a forum or in a Google hangouts chat, orRecord a podcastImportantModel reflections for them, including how you reflect on your practiceMake sure that you can see and take the time to learn from their reflectionsProvide students with the time they need at the end of the lesson to reflect properly… remember this takes time to do wellAdjust what you do based on the student’s reflectionsHow it creates life-long learnersReflecting on learning helps your students identify how they have learnt, what they have learnt and how they can improve their own and others learning. This will have a huge impact on their ability to teach themselves and help them become more skilled in problem-solving life issues. It can also help them identify their successful learning and how this learning can be applied to their life, which helps students to see the importance of learning but also begin to enjoy the..

Dan asks John Hattie what his thoughts are on the most effective teaching strategy is that can create life-long learners and not just prepare students for exams. This leads to a discussion on standardised exams, flipped learning and project-based learning, as well as the Visible Classroom app.

In this episode, I discuss why and how you should use blended learning as well as look at a short example where self-paced blended learning is used well. Listen to the audio above or read through the summary below.Blended Learning by Daniel Jackson is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.Join the Facebook CommunityWhat is blended learning?It is a mash-up of traditional face-to-face teaching and using technology.Personally, when I do it, I often call it an in-flip, where the student’s watch the video in the classroom and I might still provide some direct instruction to some, or when it is needed.Why use blended learning?Free’s the teacher up to spend more time with students on things they need help withSaves timeAllows students to move at their own pace and to use a mastery or competency-based approach to the learning sequence, rather than a timed content approach, where you simply move through the content at a pace you think will work for most.Way better for creating life-long learners. As success in learning brings the happy hormones which help students to enjoy the process.How to blend your lessonsThere are lots of ways that you can create a blended learning environment. You could:Do 50:50 where half watch instruction or are using tech, while the other half is with you doing something else that is relatedYou might put up the lesson instructions on a board or ppt and let the students work through the activities in order, or as a choice board, where they can do them in any orderYou could add more detail to your booklets etc that you hand out so that students can work through them at their own paceYou could create hyperdocs (more on this in a future episode)Self-paced blended learningBlended really allows for self-paced learning. So take advantage of this.Check in with students to see where they are up to and where they are going nextBuild in formative assessment check-points throughout the process, much like you would in a project-based learning environmentUse it for project-based learningPlan clear differentiation in your tasks and activitiesAllow for collaborative tasks, and peer feedbackExampleI saw an example of this recently in a post from Edutopia. A teacher, Kate Gaskill using the blended self-paced approach had a check-in process with her students that was fantastic using what she called a Do Now sheet.The sheet asked the students to:State the objective for the lesson in their own wordsIdentify a strategy that will help them finishWhat lesson they were onHow they were going to keep on pace and also checked in on their emotionsThen she would meet briefly with each studentBriefly run through their sheetAsk if there was anything they need from her Kate Gaskill, History teacher at Eastern Senior HS, Washington DC seen on EdutopiaTry Blended learningCreate 1 blended lesson this weekUse the slip or a modification of it to check in with EACH student during the lessonIf you like the process, see if you can create a 2-week booklet or something similar that the students can use for a blended approach for those 2 weeks and see if their learning increases and if the students begin to enjoy the success they are having in your class.