Category: Effective Teaching Approach

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Effective Teaching Approach Kindergarten Primary School Education Secondary School Education

Simple ways to improve learning

An article published by the Association for Psychological Science argues that educational outcomes can be improved by helping pupils to better regulate their own learning. The authors discuss ten techniques that might help them to do this. The techniques were selected on the grounds that they should be relatively easy to implement, and the article itself gives a clear review of each technique. The authors looked at all of the available evidence for each technique, and considered how easily the technique could be rolled out in different contexts, issues for implementation, and an overall assessment of its utility – low, moderate, or high.

The authors gave two techniques an overall high rating since they benefited learners of different ages and abilities, and were able to boost performance across many tasks and educational contexts:

  • The first of these was “practice testing”, which is usually self-testing outside the classroom.
  • The second was “distributed practice”, essentially the opposite of “cramming”, where study activities are spread over a single session or across multiple sessions.

Some of the techniques with low- or moderate-utility ratings also showed promise, but there was insufficient evidence for a higher rating. The techniques with moderate-utilitiy rating included elaborative interrogation, self-explanation, and interleaved practice.

 

Source: Dunlosky, J., Rawson, K. A., Marsh, E. J., Nathan, M. J., & Willingham, D. T. (2013). Improving students’ learning with effective learning techniques: Promising directions from cognitive and educational psychology. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 14(1), 4–58.… Read the rest

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Effective Teaching Approach Kindergarten Primary School Education Secondary School Education

Unpacking the evidence on cognitive load theory

Cognitive load theory – the theory of how the human brain learns and stores knowledge – is supported by a number of randomised controlled trials and has significant implications for teaching practice.  A report from the Centre for Education Statistics and Evaluation in New South Wales, Australia, examines the existing research on cognitive load theory and what it looks like in practice. The first part of the report explains how human brains learn according to cognitive load theory, and outlines the evidence base for the theory. The second part examines the implication of cognitive load theory for teaching practice and describes some recommendations that are directly transferable to the classroom. These include:

  • Worked example effect– pupils are shown a problem that has already been solved (a “worked example”), with every step fully explained and clearly shown. Pupils who are taught using lots of worked examples learn more quickly than pupils who are asked to solve the problems themselves.
  • Modality effect– evidence suggests that working memory can be sub-divided into auditory and visual streams, so presenting information using both these methods of communication can increase working memory capacity – for example, when using a diagram and text to explain something, the written text can be communicated in spoken form.

The full report also discussed implications of other effects such as “the redundancy effect” and “the split attention effect”. The authors suggested these evidence-backed recommendations could benefit educational practice, especially for teaching novice learners in ‘technical’ subjects like mathematics, science and technology.

 

Source: (Open Access): Centre for Education Statistics and Evaluation. (2017). Cognitive load theory: Research that teachers really need to understand. Sydney: NSW Department of Education. … Read the rest

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Effective Teaching Approach Language Development Primary School Education

New guide to foundational reading skills

A What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) practice guide focuses on the foundational reading skills that enable students to read words, relate those words to their oral language, and read connected text with sufficient accuracy and fluency to understand what they read.

The authors conducted a thorough literature search, identified studies that met protocol requirements, and then reviewed those studies against WWC standards. The review focused on studies published since 2000. The guide, Foundational Skills to Support Reading for Understanding in Kindergarten Through 3rd Grade, provides four recommendations that can be used to improve literacy skills from kindergarten to third grade (Years 1–4). Each recommendation is assigned a level of evidence based on the quantity and quality of the research:

  • Teach students academic language skills, including the use of inferential and narrative language, and vocabulary knowledge (minimal evidence)
  • Develop awareness of the segments of sounds in speech and how they link to letters (strong evidence)
  • Teach students to decode words, analyse word parts, and write and recognise words (strong evidence)
  • Ensure that each student reads connected text every day to support reading accuracy, fluency, and comprehension (moderate evidence)

The practice guide is a companion to another WWC practice guide, Improving Reading Comprehension in Kindergarten Through 3rd Grade.

 

Source (Open Access): Foorman, B., Beyler, N., Borradaile, K., Coyne, M., Denton, C. A., Dimino, J., … Wissel, S. (2016). Foundational skills to support reading for understanding in kindergarten through 3rd grade (NCEE 2016-4008). Washington, DC: The What Works Clearinghouse.… Read the rest

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Effective Teaching Approach Kindergarten Language Development Maths and Science Learning

Fostering curiosity can promote academic achievement

A new research article by Prachi Shah and colleagues at the University of Michigan shows that children who are curious have higher academic achievement than those who aren’t. In fact, they see cultivating curiosity in the classroom—promoting the joy of discovery and motivating students to find out answers to life’s questions—as an untapped strategy for early academic success.

Researchers used data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, which has tracked a national representation of thousands of children since 2001. Children were followed via parent interviews and assessing the children at ages 9 months, 2 years, starting pre-K and K, and then looking at the reading, math, and behavioral skills of 6,200 of these children in 2006 and 2007 when they were in kindergarten.

Results showed that:

  • After controlling for other factors that might influence academic achievement, eagerness to learn new things had a small but positive influence on kindergartners’ reading (ES=+0.11) and math (+0.12).
  • This was even more so for children from low SES backgrounds (ES=+0.18 in reading, +0.20 in math).

The authors conclude that while effortful control has been emphasized as an important predictor for early achievement, curiosity is also an important, yet under-recognized contributor.

 

Source: Shah, P. E., Weeks, H. M., Richards, B., & Kaciroti, N. (2018). Early childhood curiosity and kindergarten reading and math academic achievement. Pediatric Research, Advanced online publication. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41390-018-0039-3… Read the rest

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Effective Teaching Approach Maths and Science Learning Primary School Education Secondary School Education

New evidence on mathematics teaching

A new review of evidence, commissioned by the EEF and the Nuffield Foundation, analyses the best available international research on teaching Mathematics to children aged 9–14 to find out what the evidence says about effective mathematics teaching. It highlights some areas of mathematics teaching – like feedback, collaborative learning and different types of textbooks – and considers what the evidence says, and how much evidence there is.

One area where there is strong evidence is using calculators to support learning. The report suggests that:

  • Pupils’ mathematics skills may not be harmed by using calculators as previously thought. In fact, using them in mathematics lessons can boost puipils’ calculation and problem-solving skills if they are used in a thoughtful and considered way.
  • Mathematics homework tends to benefit older pupils, but not those in primary school
  • Teacher subject knowledge is crucial for realising the potential of mathematics resources and interventions to raise attainment
  • High-quality feedback tends to have a large effect on learning, but it should be used sparingly and mainly for more complex tasks

The report also includes a section on the development of mathematics competency to outline the theoretical underpinning of how children learn mathematically.

 

Source (Open Access) : Hodgen, J., Foster, C., Marks, R., & Brown, M. (2018). Evidence for Review of Mathematics Teaching: Improving Mathematics in Key Stages Two and Three: Evidence Review. London, England: Education Endowment Foundation.… Read the rest

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Effective Teaching Approach Language Development Secondary School Education

Effective reading programmes for secondary pupils

Ariane Baye from the University of Liege and Cynthia Lake, Amanda Inns and Robert Slavin from the Center for Research and Reform in Education have completed an update to their report on effective secondary reading programmes. The paper, A Synthesis of Quantitative Research on Reading Programs for Secondary Students, focuses on 69 studies that used random assignment (n=62) or high-quality quasi-experiments (n=7) to evaluate outcomes of 51 programmes on widely accepted measures of reading.

The authors found that:

  • Categories of programmes using one-to-one and small-group tutoring, cooperative learning, whole-school approaches including organisational reforms such as teacher teams, and writing-focused approaches showed positive outcomes.
  • Individual approaches in a few other categories also showed positive impacts. These approaches included programmes emphasising humanities/science, structured strategies and personalised and group/personalisation rotation approaches for struggling readers.
  • Programmes that provide a daily extra period of reading and those utilising technology were no more effective, on average, than programmes that did not provide these resources.

The findings suggest that secondary readers benefit more from socially and cognitively engaging instruction than from additional reading periods or technology.

 

Baye, A., Lake, C., Inns, A. & Slavin, R. E. (2018). A synthesis of quantitative research on reading programs for secondary students. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University, Center for Research and Reform in Education.… Read the rest