In today’s post, I want to share a cool, relatively new paper by Simon Cullen and Daniel Oppenheimer from Science Advances (1). The paper is titled, Choosing to Learn: The Importance of Student Autonomy in Higher Education. The methodology is …
All in For Teachers
Digest #177: Podcast Episodes for Parents and Educators
I have been following Brown University Professor and Economist Emily Oster for a number of years, basically ever since I started my journey of becoming a parent. Now, I listen to her podcast and read her newsletters (and the newsletters from the endocrinologist on her team, called “Hot Flash”) to hear from Emily and experts on data-driven parenting. I also …
GUEST POST: Can Gamified Technology Be Used to Enhance Students’ Intrinsic Motivation?
Technology is increasingly transforming the way students engage with learning materials. One prominent use of technology in education is gamification, where game-like elements are applied to non-game environments to enhance engagement and motivation...
To Prompt or Not To Prompt: Effects of Prompt-Questions and Educational Videos on Learning
Educational videos are often used in the classroom setting to support instruction of content. On the positive side, these videos can help scaffolding a topic which can lead to better understanding of it. They can also increase situational interest in students because...
GUEST POST: Reflections on a “Spaced Practice Challenge” with Community College Students
PTK decided to conduct a challenge where students were required to log two hour-long study sessions a week for the final three weeks of classes. We offered multiple incentives to encourage student participation...
Effective Learning Strategies depend on Prior Knowledge
If we can understand new information in the context of what we already know, we are more likely to to retrieve it later on. As students go from novice to expert they will learn most effectively if they go from direct instruction to independent, problem-based, or inquiry-based approaches.