What are the essential skills and/or learning outcomes you want your students to know and be able to do that relate to cognitive learning?
How might your knowledge of the memory processes guide your instructional decisions?
I want my students to be able to relate previous knowledge to the material we are learning in class and then relate that to future lessons. I think it's important for them to be active learners, so I will constantly ask my students questions to check for understanding. I will also try to give lessons in different ways and try to connect what they're learning to the real world.
I also want my students to be able to make not only academic connections, but emotional connections to material we are learning in class. As we covered in the teaching projects, students are more likely to remember material that has some sort of meaning behind it. Giving students enough time to share stories will not only help them verbalize their own connections, but may trigger memories that other students have.
I think that linking ideas helps students remember things well. For example, when I was in high school we had to make concept webs in my microbiology class. I would remember topics that went together because I literally linked them on my paper. I remembered this flow of ideas and also remembered the way that my concept web looked (I tend to be a pretty visual learner).
I agree that students learn better when they make connections between their own life and the things they are learning. They tend to not only learn more, but it helps with their long-term memory in regards to learning.
ReplyDeleteI totally agree that it is important to build off of the students' prior knowledge, and relate it to things that are meaningful to them. This goes a long way in helping them to store things in long term memory.
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