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LEARN TO LEARN/BUILDING LEARNING POWER

Situation

You’ve probably read many lists of positive learning dispositions. And you’d very much like your pupils to develop them. But focusing on these attitudes alone can only get you so far. Being positive towards their learning, still doesn’t stop pupils …

  • Failing to organise their thinking
  • Not knowing how to study effectively
  • Losing focus and becoming easily distracted
  • Having poor memory
  • And as a result, start to lose their positive disposition? 

Simply feeling positive is only half the story. You need to develop in your pupils both the skill as well as the will of learning.

 

Solution 

Using visual tools gets to the heart of successful learning by showing your pupils exactly how to organise their thoughts. Learning with visual tools makes this process explicit, memorable, and reliable. And it promotes positive learning dispositions.

 

Benefits

When visual tools are used as an integral part of the learning process throughout the curriculum, you can expect to see your pupils:

  • - Becoming absorbed in the flow of learning
  • - Adopting an enquiring approach by probing below surface descriptions
  • - Providing reasons for their thoughts and conclusions
  • - Thinking ahead, working through their ideas and organising them into plans for writing
  • - Reviewing their own work as it progresses and not leaving it to a final review
  • - Approaching problem solving methodically
  • - Persevering with challenges by applying trusted methods
  • - Collaborating with their peers in productive group learning
  • - Reflecting on their own learning habits and making changes

 

Experience 

In Luton, during 2006-2007, Model Learning provided training for key individuals from schools and the authority who were looking to build learning power among their black pupils (The BPAP Programme: Black Pupils Attainment Program). This included work–based learning, twilight sessions with parents, alongside delivery of the two–part Model Learning for Teachers Programme.

 

Links 

Click the following to read about the benefits of using visual tools in Thinking Skills, Emotional Intelligence, Literacy.