4 How Learning Works
Metacognition
Definition: awareness or analysis of one’s own learning or thinking processes (www.merriam-webster.com)
Read this article by James M. Lang, Metacognition and Student Learning, to better understand the important tole that metacognition plays in our lives. Poor metacognitive skills has impede your learning and academic progress. In your new role you can mentor your peers and help them improve their metacognitive skills.
“I cannot teach anybody anything, I can only make them think.”
Socrates
“An education isn’t how much you have committed to memory, or even how much you know. It’s being able to differentiate between what you do know and what you don’t.”
Anatole France, Nobel Prize-winning author
Cognitive and Affective Sides of Learning
Cognitive Side of Learning
In this presentation, Todd Zakrajsek, author of The New Science of Learning: How to Learn in Harmony with your Brain (Links to an external site.), gives an overview to cognitive aspects of learning.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=tYg3sLcyLB8%3Ffeature%3Doembed%26rel%3D0
Affective Side of Learning
Explore the impact of emotions, motivation, and curiosity on learning via a podcast by the author of The Spark of Learning, Sarah Rose Cavanagh. The podcast can be downloaded to Apple, Android, or Google Play.
What does the research say about how learning works?
Ambrose et al. (2010) reviewed more than 50 years of research about learning and developed these 7 principles about learning based on the research
- Students’ prior knowledge can help or hinder learning.
- How students organize knowledge influences how they learn and apply what they know.
- Students’ motivation determines, directs, and sustains what they do to learn.
- To develop mastery, students must acquire component skills, practice integrating them, and know when to apply what they have learned.
- Goal-directed practice, coupled with targeted feedback enhances the quality of students’ learning.
- Students’ current level of development, interacts with the social, emotional, and intellectual climate of the course to impact learning.
- To become self-directed learners, students must learn to monitor and adjust their approaches to learning.
See Michele DiPietro’s full post at https://cetl.kennesaw.edu/how-learning-works-seven-learning-principles
Video Resources
- Six Strategies for Effective Learning
- https://www.samford.edu/departments/academic-success-center/how-to-study
Mindset & Grit
In this lesson you will explore two related concepts (mindset & grit) that impact learning. The following Ted talks are short introductions to each concept. For more information refer to Carol Dweck’s Mindset : The New Psychology of Success and Angela Duckworth’s Grit : The Power of Passion and Perseverance.
Mindset
Exercise
Grit
Resources
- Watch the IUB Student Academic Center’s video on Resilience and Bouncing Back
HOW MEMORY WORKS: learning takes time
Practice & Feedback
In this lesson you will explore the importance of practice and feedback in the learning process by reading chapter 5 from Susan Ambrose and Colleagues’ How Learning Works.
Reflection Exercise
- Explain how one of these concepts applies to your role as a peer instructor/mentor/coach.
- How can you explain metacognition to your peers? How would you explain to them the importance of metacognition for academic success?