Teaching Academic "Know How"

At one point or another, most college teachers have experienced frustration at what appears to be students' apathy or lack of self-reliance as learners. Yet it is important to recognize that many students come to new courses or disciplines not unwilling to learn, but unskilled in underlying academic practices, unaware of the habits of mind involved in learning successfully at the college level--practices and habits that we, as teachers, tend to take for granted and experience as "natural." Frustration and feelings of powerlessness in the face of "hidden expectations," of being "in over one's head," can, in fact, easily lead to low motivation and apathy. The good news, as Barbara Gross Davis has pointed out in a chapter on "Helping Students Learn," is that research shows that we can successfully teach learning strategies. For a copy, contact the CIRT. Even better news is that doing so is a wise time investment; students can eventually become more self-reliant and effective learners with some coaching. The following tips are designed to target areas where we can help students become more self-aware and more strategic as learners.

Reading To Understand

Among other things, as John C. Bean points out, novice readers often assume that expert readers read everything in the same way: quickly, one time only, with perfect understanding, and without any need to write or to stop for reflection while reading. As college teachers know, expert readers, in fact, usually adjust reading speed for different purposes, stop often to reflect upon or reread difficult passages, take notes, raise questions, and otherwise interact with the text. One place to begin helping students in your course is to make the (academic) reading process an explicit topic. Ask the CIRT for a chapter on helping students read difficult texts

• Explain how your own reading process varies depending on what you are reading and for what purpose.
• Demonstrate on an overhead or handout how you might go about deciphering a difficult passage. Show students your own annotations or other notes from readings.
• Ask volunteers to describe their own reading or note-taking strategies. Discuss as a class the pros and cons of different strategies. Keep an ongoing list.

Novice readers often struggle to grasp college-level reading material. While there are many reasons students may face challenges with reading, a number of common problems can be addressed effectively through targeted assignments and discussions of underlying assumptions. Students often have difficulty recognizing the structure of an argument as they read, instead getting lost in details and highlighting virtually everything. In addition, students often resist what is unfamiliar; while they may "mouth" what they believe the text says (and what they believe the teacher wants to hear), they fail to assimilate the new. Finally, students often have difficulty "arguing" with the author of a text, instead taking everything in print as gospel. Consider the following strategies

• To help students follow the structure of an argument, create reading guides or structured study questions. For later assignments in the semester, have students practice devising a reading guide for other students.
• Help students understand that texts are not just collections of facts, but are the arguments of authors who are trying to convince them of something. Bean provides specific trigger questions to get students to reflect.
• Teach students to practice being simultaneously open to and skeptical of what they read by engaging in the "believing and doubting game." Bean provides specifics.

Studying to Remember

Novice learners often believe that being an expert involves only the ability to recall information. Furthermore, they believe that the ability to recall information involves only rote memorization. Experts, on the other hand, are able not only to remember but also to work with information. They remember material when they seek to relate new information to prior knowledge; to create meaningful structures through which to understand new material; to see patterns and relationships.

• Introduce students to representations for active remembering such as matrices and diagrams. Ask for articles on teaching to make representations.
• Show students the kinds of associations or applications you might use to remember some material and make it meaningful to you.
• Give students assignments which ask them first to identify or describe their prior knowledge (or misconceptions) and then demonstrate how new information supports or contradicts it. Ask for copies of Angelo and Cross's "CATs"

Studying as Self-monitoring

Students often falsely believe that expert learners have the ability to perfectly apprehend any given material. On the contrary, expert learners constantly revisit "familiar" content and consciously or unconsciously seek to identify "gaps" in their knowledge or understanding.

• Teach students to use Michele L. Simpson's strategy of "talk-throughs" individually or in groups. Ask the CIRT for a copy of her article.
• Have students keep a "diagnostic learning log" for which you assign a focus for student reflection on their own academic skills and performance. The CIRT has directions for this activity.

Knowing "how" to learn is, of course, only half the battle. As researchers have emphasized, students must also want to learn. Motivation is a key factor in the "skill" + "will" combination. But knowing how to approach reading and studying effectively is at least half the battle. The time we invest in offering students key insights about strategic learning as well as opportunities to practice these has the potential to pay off richly; students may become more sovereign learners and we may face fewer frustrations with apathy.

This Teaching Tip was contributed by Leslie Ortquist-Ahrens, Center for Teaching and Learning, Indiana State University, September 27, 1999.

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