Get Your Students Hired
I have taught the same subject several times and each time, I adapt my teaching style to suit the needs of that particular class. For example, if I have a student that learns better hands-on, then I may invite him/her to participate in my demo. This breaks up the learning style as well as reinvigorates the students.
Sandra,
I know you are going appreciate the learning results you get from your students with this approach. I wish you much success with it.
Gary
Dr. Gary Meers
Lisa,
I teach long session classes as well so I can relate to your statement about the need to mix things up. I teach from 4 until 10 pm so I have to have a lot of activities planned or I am going to lose my students. Students thrive on variety and change of pace and that is required for courses like those we teach.
Gary
Dr. Gary Meers
Understanding the basics is beneficial because I can modify my teaching approach to better assist students in applying both episodic and semantic memory to retaining information.
The better any porcess is understood, the better a person can operate within it. Knowing how learning happens allows the instructor to offer the best learing experience and give their the student the best chance for success. I have many long classes so I like the idea of mixing things up to re-engage them.
Carol,
This is what connects theory and practice. Having such life experiences and seeing how they can be used as learning platforms is important for students to know and use. This way they can connect the dots between content and application and it will be remembered just as you say.
Gary
Dr. Gary Meers
/we that teach nursing rely on the students real life experiences to make the content more real and gel it in their brain. I may say in class remember that patient you took care of last week that had this condition. What did you see happening with him
Paula,
You have a good foundation from which you can now plan your instruction. By segmenting the content you will be able to help your students get the critical content in a timely and efficient manner.
Gary
Dr. Gary Meers
James,
Your thinking is right on target. The more relevancy and application that can be made with course content the greater value it will be to the students. They start to see an ROI for their efforts.
Gary
Dr. Gary Meers
One main point that can be taken away from this lesson is how much the human brain can hold in working memory at one time (approximately 7 pieces of information). Knowing this and monitoring our students for confusion or signs of when they've reached their limits, an instructor can break down a lecture/class into more effective bite size pieces. Also, appealing to different kinds of memory using a variety of tasks, examples, and critical thinking questions should prove quite helpful to retention of information.
It seems to me that more practical application will help the students so I'll be having them do more application (outlining, writing) for the English and Communications classes.
I see that most are lacking in the discipline of preparing to write a paper of prepare a speech. They tend to go right to the final draft without doing the necessary preparatory work which tends to insure their work will be well organized and clear.
Jane,
I think you will really like the results you get from your students with scaffolding.
Gary
Dr. Gary Meers
Peggy,
Right you are. This is both a challenge and an opportunity for instructors. For sure teaching is never boring because of the different students and strategies that are used.
Gary
Dr. Gary Meers
One of the most important things that was imparted to me in this module was the idea of using a scaffolding for notes. I think I am going to revamp my class notes to allow for students to "fill in the blanks," as they go along in the lecture. It will teach them to take appropriate notes and will make the course more interactive so that they are "learning by doing" as much as possible.
I find that you have to be a versitile instructor. You have to adapt to the needs of the student and often times this can be in many ways in one class. Every student is different and once you identify that you can go from there.
The human brain is amazing how different types of input information can trigger the way it processes. Hands on looks like it stimulates the brain by using more input sense leading it to a 70% collecting and rembering information, great teaching tool.
By understanding the basics of learning I can reach more students. In my classes I use a variety of teaching methods that apply to the different types of learners. I have the students read the material first, then we talk about the info, then I do a demo, and then they have to preform the task. I make the students repeat the information/task until I fill comfortable with their ability in the class.
Understanding the basics of learning gives me the opportunity to successful reach some student who might otherwise not succeed. In addition to talking about how to do something, it is important to provide illustrations, like on a write on board, and all the students to actually practice the skill in the clinical setting.
Jarred,
You have a good plan developed for your instructional planning. Keep up the good work of seeing the big picture and then breaking down the concepts to get to the specifics.
Gary
Dr. Gary Meers
As an instructor one of the things I often have problems with is providing to much information to quickly to the wrong audience. I think that my biggest benefit from this course will be to slow down and break important concepts into key points that my audience (students) can more easily retain. Also it will allow me to build basic concepts into more complex concepts with an understanding of how students can retain the information.