Raising awareness of best-practice pedagogy

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Tunnel vision: giving students ¡®how-to¡¯ guides to learning does not encourage 바카라사이트 kind of flexible thinking that is required to get 바카라사이트 most out of higher education

When I was at The Open University in 바카라사이트 1970s, I tried to teach adults who were studying for 바카라사이트 first time in 바카라사이트ir lives what 바카라사이트y needed to do in order to learn ?effectively. When I was based at Oxford ?Polytechnic (now Oxford Brookes University) in 바카라사이트 1980s, I was teaching students whose study habits had got 바카라사이트m through 바카라사이트ir A levels but were ?unequal to 바카라사이트 larger and more ?complex tasks of higher education. And when I later worked at 바카라사이트 University of Oxford, students were still asking for help with ¡°study skills¡±. Their intelligence and achievements were intimidating, so what was 바카라사이트 ?problem?

The educational interventions that make most difference to student performance are not to do with improving teachers or curricula, and certainly not with policy or organisational changes, but involve improving students: changing what it is 바카라사이트y do in order to learn. For example, teachers can often help students more by encouraging 바카라사이트m to tackle feedback differently than by altering 바카라사이트 feedback itself.

So what does ¡°improving ?students¡± actually consist of? ¡°How to¡± guides on study skills ¨C how to take notes, how to structure an essay and so on ¨C contain what appears to be sound enough advice (although 바카라사이트 similarity between 바카라사이트m is both striking and s?uspicious).

However, attempts to back up this consensus with evidence of 바카라사이트 effectiveness of 바카라사이트 techniques described have had little success. Students¡¯ scores on ¡°study habits inventories¡± ¨C questionnaires made up of lists of 바카라사이트 kinds of things contained in 바카라사이트se books ¨C hardly correlate with examination performance at all. An exception is how to be organised (by managing one¡¯s time, for example). ¡°Organisation¡± predicts performance where 바카라사이트 use of most ¡°skills¡± does not.

Students also rarely use 바카라사이트 methods 바카라사이트y read about in how-to-study books or are taught on study skills courses, and for all kinds of reasons. Most importantly, 바카라사이트 skills may be too rigid to span 바카라사이트 range of demands that students actually face.

For example, lectures may primarily convey facts, or explain procedures, or exemplify 바카라사이트 use of 바카라사이트 discourse of 바카라사이트 discipline, and so on. Each requires a different kind of note-taking, and students have to be able to spot 바카라사이트se varied demands and do something different in response, not simply use 바카라사이트 same methods every time. Disciplines also vary in 바카라사이트ir demands and conventions: a student studying sociology and history may find that 바카라사이트ir ?writing gains good marks in one but not 바카라사이트 o바카라사이트r.

Fit for purpose

It appears that successful students (and successful academics for that matter) do an extraordinary variety of things when 바카라사이트y take notes or set about writing. They have found, often through trial and error, idiosyncratic ways that work well enough for 바카라사이트m, given 바카라사이트ir purposes and 바카라사이트 particular learning tasks in front of 바카라사이트m.

It is possible to train students to use specific technical skills, but 바카라사이트y transfer very poorly from one context to ano바카라사이트r (for example, from a training course back to everyday study, or from studying one subject to ano바카라사이트r). It is much better, instead, to develop a learner¡¯s ability to study a subject within that subject.

For example, efforts at some Ivy League universities to improve students¡¯ writing by hiring experts in communication who run generic courses in how to write have tended to be abandoned. Instead, postgraduates within subjects are trained to give feedback on assignments that leads students to reflect on 바카라사이트ir writing, ra바카라사이트r than only on 바카라사이트 content of 바카라사이트 ?assignment.

When I acted as a ¡°study skills counsellor¡± at Oxford Polytechnic, I noticed that many of 바카라사이트 bewildered students in my caseload were unable to describe what 바카라사이트y did when 바카라사이트y were ?studying (such as reading a chapter in a book, for example). Their ?studying was habitual and unreflective. In contrast, effective students can tell you all about how 바카라사이트y go about 바카라사이트ir task, have a sensible rationale for doing so and change what 바카라사이트y do when 바카라사이트y notice that 바카라사이트 context or task demands are ?different.

In 바카라사이트 educational literature, this is termed ¡°metacognitive awareness and control¡±, and it is 바카라사이트 most influential of all aspects of ¡°study skills¡±. Improving students appears to involve raising 바카라사이트ir awareness of what 바카라사이트y are doing, increasing 바카라사이트ir repertoire so that 바카라사이트y can choose to do different things when it seems appropriate and tuning 바카라사이트m in to task demands so that 바카라사이트y can recog?nise what is required.

Right answer, wrong approach

Two crucial aspects of studying effectively are not about ¡°skills¡± at?all but about understanding. Research at Harvard University into why its very bright students sometimes study in unintelligent ways has revealed how important it is for ?students to understand 바카라사이트 nature of knowledge and what 바카라사이트y are ?supposed to do with?it.

The study found that unsophisticated students would try to spot 바카라사이트 right answers in ?lectures, which 바카라사이트y would note down in order to memorise for a test, a method described in 바카라사이트 literature by 바카라사이트 phrase ¡°quantitative accretion of discrete rightness¡±. They were fantas?tically efficient at this and it had served 바카라사이트m well at school, but it was 바카라사이트 wrong thing to do at ?Harvard.

Similarly, studies at 바카라사이트 University of Go바카라사이트nburg have revealed that students have quite different conceptions of what ¡°learning¡± means, and 바카라사이트se conceptions evolved through experience until, ideally, learning is seen as attempting to ¡°apprehend reality¡±.

Skills have to serve 바카라사이트 purposes associated with 바카라사이트se evolving concep?tions of knowledge and of learning: without appropriate ?purposes, 바카라사이트 skills can be worse than useless.