Oct

10

Mind the Gap: Creating Links Between Class Sessions

October 10, 2008 | by sotoole 3 Comments

My classes meet twice a week. And while my syllabus presents a carefully planned series of linked readings, writing assignments, and in-class activities, I know my students don’t always experience the course as seamlessly as I might like. How could they with everything else they have to do?

One simple technique I’ve been experimenting with aims to create stronger links between individual class sessions. It’s a version of the strategy I used while writing my dissertation: to end each day’s work by jotting down a single concrete task to get started with in the morning. Applying this strategy to the classroom is easy and takes only a few minutes of class time; what’s more, it can provide an important form of intellectual communication between students and professor.

Here’s what I do:

Step 1. At the end of class, I ask students to reflect in writing on a still unclear point, a key concept just covered, or a remaining question from that day’s activity or discussion. (3-5 minutes)

Step 2. At the beginning of the next class, I ask students to share some of what they wrote at the end of the previous class and we use that as our new starting point. (3-5 minutes)

Building in time to think and reflect at the end of each class in this way can enable students to create continuity in their learning, and develop the good habit of ending a work session by identifying some next steps. In addition, students get practice summarizing and assimilating what they know, what they’ve learned, and what’s still not clear. And instructors get a better sense of students’ experience of the course.

Since the writing functions as a kind of mental bookmark, to be consulted and taken up at the beginning of the next class, there’s no need to collect it (although you might).

This process can be done within a single class session, too. For example, the class might begin with a brief writing assignment: “Write one thing you already know about X. Write one question you still have about the last class session. Write a description of the process you used to do the homework assignment for today.” This can then be followed by reflective writing at the end of class: “One thing I learned today is …,” “One thing I’m still unsure about is …,” etc.

Or, you might build this practice into the middle of a class, especially if you sense the energy levels sagging, to check in with how students are doing, reset their attention, and reinvigorate them for the second half of the class.

So far the results of this have been revealing. Students who might have seemed to follow the material during class suddenly have questions. (You can’t fake it in writing.) Students who have just come from another class or a job or a crowded subway suddenly quiet down and regain their focus. And students who tend to want to sit back and be a passive consumer of education are shown that they have an active role to play.

Meeting twice a week isn’t much, but creating stronger links between class sessions can help us make the most of it.


Comments

3 Comments so far

  1. Keri Bertino on October 10, 2008 11:25 am

    Sean, I think this technique of creating links between classes is wonderful–not just because it helps students synthesize work at the end of class (& because it uses low-stakes writing as a way of thinking!), but also because it gives your students a real sense of ownership and responsibility over the intellectual life of the classroom. In the Writing Center (where the gaps between sessions may be days, weeks, or months) we’re working towards creating this same continuity with our session records. Traditionally, writing center session records are written by the consultant, to record what issues were addressed, what strategies or techniques were worked on, and what the student’s next steps are. Recently, though, we’ve begun encouraging students to author their own session records. We’ve found that it fosters careful & critical thought about what they’ve done over the course of an hour to come to a new point in their writing, and helps students reflect on how to transfer those strategies & processes. I think pushing students towards this kind of metacognition is one of the most important things we can do as teachers to help students grow in their thinking and writing abilities over the long-term.

  2. Tomasello on October 17, 2008 12:03 pm

    I do something similar in my introductory classes for completely different reasons.

    You psychologists, please correct me if I’m mistaken, but I believe that to maximize learning best teachers test recall and review information frequently with time passing in between events or study periods. Essentially by linking sessions, we force students to recall and solidify memory.

    Those of us who have M/W schedules this semester (with all the days off), know how important it was to attack this problem.

  3. Sean O'Toole on October 31, 2008 12:22 am

    Keri, this is a great idea! I do something similar in having students write a cover letter for all their papers, to restate their argument and its main moves, to talk about their process, what they see as the strengths and weaknesses of the paper, what they’d like to keep working on, etc. Students are remarkably candid, and it really helps in responding to know what they are already aware of and working on. (Plus, it’s always nice to know what the student thinks his/her thesis is!) Maybe a good idea for my next post…?

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