Digest #137: Lessons Learned From Learning Scientists Teacher Workshops
In the beginning of January, we were on tour in England to provide workshops to teachers. We enjoyed this opportunity tremendously because it gave us not only an opportunity to reach out to teachers and to disseminate knowledge about learning and teaching strategies from Cognitive Psychology, but also allowed us to learn what strategies teachers are currently using in their classrooms. Furthermore, we had engaging Q&A sessions with quite hard questions from the audience. We did our best to provide answers, but in many cases it became apparent that research is still a long way from addressing all important practical questions and that further research is needed to close knowledge gaps. This was an exciting experience. In today’s weekly digest we want to take the opportunity to, first of all, thank all teachers in the audience of our workshops for their input and questions: Thank You! Second of all, we would like to highlight blog posts by teachers who took the time to write a reflection on the lessons they learned from our workshops. Enjoy!
*Header image by Mark Miller (@MarkMillerTeach)
1) Senior Leadership: How Can We Help Novices Learn? by Claire Stoneman, @stoneman_claire
Image by Advantage Schools (@advschools)
In this post, the key ideas from our workshop are connected improving leadership skills. This is an interesting perspective because it integrates main findings in cognitive psychology to practical decisions that senior leaders face – and maybe an understanding on how the human mind works can help new senior leaders develop.
2) Lightbulb Moments with The Learning Scientists by Sallie Stanton, @Missis_SCS
This post is structured around six lightbulb moments that the author had during the workshop. Spoiler alert: Most of them map nicely onto the six strategies. In her description the author provides useful hands-on implementation ideas.
Image by Adam Porter (@Adam_Porter2)
3) Discovering Some Cognitive Psychology by Dr. McCormick
This is a reflection of the learning strategies on the background of teaching experience. It provides a personal evaluation of the strategies and ignites further thought and ideas.
Image by Althea Need Kaminske
4) The Learning Linguist Spends Two Days With The Learning Scientists, And Here’s What I Learned by Rebecca Nobes, @BexN91
This is a quick walk-though of all strategies presented during the workshop. This post outlines the main idea and key principle of each strategy as well as examples that make them clearer to a new audience.
5) Revision Tips From The Learning Scientists by Putney High School, @putneyhigh
This is a short statement containing some key messages of the workshop at Putney High School.
Image by Althea Need Kaminske
Every Sunday, we pick a theme and provide a curated list of links. If you have a theme suggestion, please don’t hesitate to contact us! Occasionally we publish a guest digest, and If you'd like to propose a guest digest click here. Our 5 most recent digests can be found here:
Weekly Digest #132: Dual Coding, Visual Note Taking, and Sketchnoting
Weekly Digest #133: Technology for Math Learning
Weekly Digest #134: How to Sleep Well