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At least, I think I saw something about an identified need on a slide in the Middle School
Then today my sister explained their high school's block scheduling.
So naturally I've been on a Google mission from God looking for the good stuff.
Didn't take long:
Effective Instructional Strategies for Block Scheduling
In 2000 Jenny Burrell, Stephanie McManus, and I identified and reviewed several instructional strategies that are suitable for blocked classes.48 However, we admit that, just as a 90-minute lecture is inappropriate, a 90-minute discussion session is probably too long too. We found that teachers should change activities every 10 or 15 minutes. blah blah blah
Cooperative learning. blah blah blah
Case method. blah blah blah
Socratic seminar. blah blah blah
Synectics. In the early 1960s, William Gordon developed an approach that, through the use of analogy, enabled students to associate a new topic with prior experience.50 The teacher asks students to describe the similarities between a given topic (the concept) and some unrelated item (the analogue). For example, a biology teacher might ask her students to describe the similarities between the parts of an animal cell and the parts of a city. After reviewing these similarities, students are asked to "become" the concepts and analogues by using first-person statements of feeling. The teacher may elicit such statements as "I feel strong when my cell membrane keeps out impurities." If obvious differences exist between the topic and the comparative element, the teacher can address these differences while being careful not to destroy the links previously made. Finally, students create their own new analogies to enable them to better retain the original concepts. This method serves well as a review activity and can be a valuable tool in assisting students to retain facts and concepts.
Concept attainment. blah blah blah
Inquiry method. blah blah blah
Simulations. blah blah blah
source:
Block Scheduling Revisited
Syncretics.
That's a new one.
3 comments:
"We found that teachers should change activities every 10 or 15 minutes. This will prevent student boredom, encourage class interaction, and force teachers to focus on the needs of diverse learners."
Excuse me but WTF??
Is it any wonder kids don't have much for attention spans these days? I know it's fashionable to blame TV and video games but could it perhaps have something to do with the way schools, where kids spend such a huge amount of time, seem driven to break their attention spans into smaller and smaller chunks.
And bear in mind: these people are primarily talking about high school students.
--We found that teachers should change activities every 10 or 15 minutes
I actually took this to mean something sane. Maybe I'm wrong.
I took it to mean:
after 10 minutes of lecturing, do an example on the board. After 15 minutes of examples on the board, go back to lecturing or calling on students or discussion or whatever it is you do. so as to change the Speaker's "Activities" not the students. The students sit there, and pay attention, but it's easier to keep track of whether they are sleeping or not if you don't have your back to them for 50 minutes at a time.
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