- Angela Ho, EDC
- Chan Chi Hung, Learning to Learn Project
Helping Students Learn to Learn: - What Do Your Students Need? What Do You Need?
Learning to Learn - What do your students NEED?
Learning to Learn: What do students say they need? - To know the aims of learning
- To set learning goals
- Improve our thinking process
- Skills to answer questions
- Learn to apply in daily life
- To know more about real world situations
- How to learn efficiently & effectively, i.e. less time to learn more, less effort to get more returns
- Learn the different ways for learning different subjects e.g. ICT, IT
Learning to Learn: What do students say they need? (I) - My relatives ask me “What do you do with the subject you’re studying?”, I don’t know what to say, …… In fact, I am quite lost. (Lacking understanding of learning goals)
- We are completely lacking thinking skills and don’t know how to transfer our learning.…I have no idea what has to be interpreted. … We learned a lot of things, but we don’t know how to apply these in work (Badly lacking thinking/cognitive skills)
Learning to Learn: What do students say they need? (II) - The most difficult is the project. We have to take care of everything from the beginning…. We have to form groups with someone we are not familiar with
- The teaching of writing reports, we only know the heading, we do not know what should go under it. (Lacking skills for specific learning tasks)
Helping students learn to learn - What are the more efficient methods?
Learning to Learn - Stand alone course on learning skills
- Learning to learn in the context of teaching, learning & assessment
Preference for learning to learn in-context of teaching, learning & assessment - The following all suggest that in-context L2L is preferred
- Empirical evidence in the literature
- PolyU experience
- Students’ opinions
Empirical evidence in support of in-context learning-to-learn - A meta-analysis of the effectiveness of 51 learning skills interventions
- … the typical study skills training package is indeed not so effective as metacognitive and contextualised intervention, but is significantly better than nothing -- clearly so in the case of younger students, and only marginally so in the case of college students.
- (Hattie, Biggs and Purdie, 1996: 129)
PolyU experience - Stand-alone L2L efforts
- Students found materials very useful, BUT seldom refer to them afterwards
- In-context L2L support
- Detailed feedback on assignments
-
- Students reported to have more impact on their learning
Students’ words suggest that in-context L2L is more appropriate - Difficulties in learning perceived by students are mostly related to the programme or to the teaching / learning process
- Students prefer L2L help
- To be given in relation to a task
- To be given when they need to work on the task
Helping Students Learn to Learn Learning to Learn in-context of teaching, learning & assessment - How can the learning of learning skills be integrated with the learning of content knowledge?
- What teaching & assessment methods foster the development of learning skills?
- How to appropriately provide students with guidance on learning skills?
- What knowledge and abilities do teachers require for the teaching of learning skills?
Learning to Learn - Developing students’ Cognitive, Motivational & Interpersonal strategies for learning
Participating departments 3 handbooks for helping students learn to learn - Help in the cognitive domain For the Success of Your Study
- Help in the motivational domain Getting the Most out of Your University: Becoming a Successful Learner and a Preferred Graduate
- Help in the interpersonal domain Working Your Way through a Group Project
What do students say about “For the success of your study”? - This is the first booklet I’ve come across which is so systematically written to tell me what to do in my learning.
- In the past, I tried my best to put in everything which I thought the teacher wanted. Now I realise that I need to select and organise.
- Teachers asked me to elaborate but I didn’t know how to. Now the thinking tasks have inspired me what to do.
- I started to realise why those classmates who explained their steps in calculation got better results than me. I used to focus on calculating the answer only.
What do students say about “Becoming a successful learner and a preferred graduate”? - I know what I should do and learn in these coming 3 years. And the most important is that I have to learn in a correct way in different learning activities.
- I helps me understand deeply what I can do after my graduation and to realise what employers want employees to have.
- University is a new life to me … This workshop can help us to cope with the new ways of learning.
- It helps me to set a goal and to understand the things I should learn besides textbook knowledge.
What do students say about “Working your way through a group project”? - This clarifies what it means by a project
- It is useful because I need the skills to handle our project. It really can help us solve the problems.
- It can help me to increase my responsibility in a group.
- I find the the part on communication and leadership skills useful.
- I will try to have an evaluation for each section and make sure that each members can learn from each other and the process.
What do students say about a 2-day L2L programme? - the workshop raise my awareness of my thinking method and help me to think about how I should work with my group members in the coming projects.
- I also enjoyed the Learning to learn workshop. Things I got in the workshop:
- knew more friends from other groups. e.g. xxx
- had deeper thinking in some aspects. e.g.learning approach, communication with other, work and organise project--improvement!!
- And I still keep thinking them after the workshop.
Helping Students Learn to Learn – Simple Things that Teachers Can Do - Helping students learn to learn: What do your students need? What do you need?
- Motivating students to learn by helping them see their learning goals
- Helping students to achieve higher level learning outcomes
- Helping students to get the most out of group project work
Approaches to Helping Students Learn - Study skills training approach
- Learning strategies teaching approach
- Student development approach
- Contextual approach
Study skills training approach - mostly skills for “managing study to pass exam” -- peripheral to “understanding”
- out-of-context of the subject
- prescriptive skills
Learning Strategies Teaching Learning strategies from Cognitive psychology - Rehearsal
- Elaboration
- Organisation
- Comprehension monitoring
- …...
Methods for teaching learning strategies - courses/workshops
- integrating the teaching of learning strategies into regular teaching (Metacurriculum)
Student-Development Approaches - Developing self-awareness
- Changing conceptions of learning
Rationales for Student-development approaches - Different techniques suit different people
- Research has shown that “peripheral” skills are NOT related to learning outcomes
- Many “study skills” advice are based on experiments absurdly unlike student learning
Developing self-awareness - stimulates thinking about own learning (the processes, decisions, purposes … that make up studying)
- encourages sharing of experiences
- facilitates development of an armoury of suitable approaches to be used in appropriate conditions
Contextual Approach - to
- Improving Student Learning
Factors affecting student learning - Curriculum
- Teaching method
- Assessment method
Research findings on - Effectiveness of different approaches
Martin & Ramsden (1987) - Students’ comments
- Learning outcomes
Students comments Learning outcomes comparing participants with non-participants Learning Outcomes Comparing participants in study skills programme with non-participants - Final exam -- No difference
- Essay assignment -- No difference
Learning Outcomes Comparing participants in student development programme with non-participants - Final exam -- No difference
- Essay assignment -- Participants performed significantly better than non-participants
Common topics in study skills training courses - Time organisation
- Study management
- Using text-books or reference materials efficiently
- Revision techniques
- Note taking
- etc.
Looking at Approaches to Helping Students Learn - characteristics of the approach
- examples
- research findings on effectiveness
Helping students learn to learn - What What are their “learning to learn needs”?
- When? When is the best time to provide help?
- How? How best to help them?
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