Identifying the problem, understanding why it exists, developing solutions and evaluating the results give the reason to the student why he or she should learn the subject.

Memory, also called storage, as teacher we must give the storage's keys to the students in order for them to utilize what has been stored inside!!!!

I'm so glad to see a discussion of mnemonics. I teach the dining room service course in a culinary arts college and use mnemonics every time I lecture/demo on how to set a table for formal dining service. It really helps students remember more easily what they need to do. Our mnemomic is "4's on left, 5's on the right" meaning that a fork (f-o-r-k has 4 letters) goes on the left (l-e-f-t has 4 letters). Knife and spoon have 5 letters and they go on the right (5 letters). Works everytime !!!

Guided notes help when students are uncertain about what to study. THis keeps them focused and teaches them to decode inforamtion.

In South Florida there are many immigrants for which decoding do not work well. Often times these learners do not have a large vocabulary and therefore are unable to comprehend many concepts. Their rush and need to get an education so that they can earn a living often deters them from adequately preparing for school by attending ESOL classes.

It was noted in the reading that adult learners do not like to be held up in cumbersome regulations. In preparing students for the healthcare field having them to follow the rules and regulations that they sometimes feel are cumbersome is very important. Employees’ failures to follow some rules and regulations in the healthcare field cause many patient deaths and/or serious illnesses.

Hello Everyone! In reviewing the lesson, it is important to share with students various techniques that will effectively assist them in retaining information. Through varying strategies students are able to make the best of their learning environment and truly strive for success. As instructors, it is important to share these various strategies and give them numerous opportunities to be successful.

I just had a quick question. In the overview it states that the brain is fully matured at the age of 25. However, I thought there has been more recent studies indicating our brains are actually continuing to mature and develop even through our fifties,sixties, and beyond.

I have found that MI has really empowered my students in the learning process. WB

It's important for the instructor to meet the needs of the student in his/her place of comfort with respect to learning styles. WB

The process of decoding is so vital to our students. The 'largeness' of the project is frightening in light of the new educational experience. To that end, I have a system of starting my students on the tricycle and then taking the training wheels off during the mid-term/latter section of the course. WB

It is so true that by the time the student reaches the evening class he or she has so much stimulus from the events that occurred ealier in the day. The instructor has to create an atmosphere inwhich she or he can grab the student's attention in preparation for the new learning that is needed.

Thank you Matthew McKinney for inspiring me to think about this particular topic. You mentioned the importance of being sensitive to older students as a young teacher (which happens to me my case). I would like to raise a similar point which involves young teachers teaching young students. I started teaching at the earliest possible legal age of 21. I was teaching secondary students who ranged in age from 15 to 19. Obviously, this was a bit awkward. On several occasions I had the guys inviting me to keg parties and the girls flirting with me. Furthermore, being 21 and still in college, sometimes I might be seen in public after a party in not-so-good condition. And you can only imagine the concerns that the parents had. So how do young teachers handle young learners? I found it to be very difficult, not only because of the age similarity, but also since it was my first year as a teacher. I felt the need to be an authority figure; I accomplished this by dumping tons of time into my lesson planning, thus making very authentic- and credible-looking lessons. I also tried to act more mature than I actually was, which turned out to be a failed tactic. In the end the strategy that worked best for me was to simply identify with the students. I was careful not to get to close with them, but at the same time, I let myself come down to their level to a certain extent. Most of them eventually started to see me more as an older-brother type of role model instead of a formal instructor. They thought, "Wow, if I study hard and focus, I can be in *COLLEGE* just like him in only three years!" Then there were the hecklers. "Hey, Mr. Richter, how old are you anyway?" I would calmly answer, "I'm older than fifteen and younger than thirty-five." That usually answered the question. Then they would ask, "Hey, Mr. R., do you have a GIRLFRIEND?" And I would calmly respond, "Maybe yes, maybe no." And that usually answered their question. The only really awkward question that got me was from a homosexual student who once openly hit on me in front of the entire class. That was a tough one! So the message here is that, as a proactive teacher, one can anticipate some of the likely questions that may come from students. In this sense you can think ahead about how you might handle the answers, thus poising yourself for a clam response instead of an embarrassing blunder. I'm now 29 years of age and still teaching. I currently have a wide age range of students and no longer see age as a factor in terms of my comfort level in teaching. Thoughts...?

This is an extremely interesting class, but I am thrown off by the confidence of the author. I have done a lot of research in these areas and all of the information is cutting edge science presented without references or research supporting the conclusions. I have a hard time interpreting statements that are known to be controversial without any supporting evidence. The author seems to know much more about the topic than researchers in Cognitive or Social Psych. As an academic, I am trained to reject statements that do not provide supporting evidence or at least a bibliography. I would like to feel like I learned something in this class, but I do not feel comfortable retaining or reciting any of the given information because I do not know how to back up any of the statements.

I ran into an article on the New York Times website (in the "Views" section, but still...), entitled "Forget What You Know About Good Study Habits" [http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/07/health/views/07mind.html?_r=2&pagewanted=1]; it addressed many of the issues we've seen so far in these modules, including the effectiveness of changing the settings in which teaching/learning take place, as well as the importance of testing. Even more intriguing to me, however, was one of the studies cited in this article: originally published in the journal Psychological Science in the Public Interest in December 2008, this review of previously published studies calls into question the existence of the learning styles of which we've heard so much. The abstract of the study: http://psi.sagepub.com/content/9/3/105.abstract The problem: finding scientific evidence for these different learning styles, as established through experiment. The conclusion: "Although the literature on learning styles is enormous, very few studies have even used an experimental methodology capable of testing the validity of learning styles applied to education. Moreover, of those that did use an appropriate method, several found results that flatly contradict the popular meshing hypothesis. We conclude therefore, that at present, there is no adequate evidence base to justify incorporating learning-styles assessments into general educational practice. Thus, limited education resources would better be devoted to adopting other educational practices that have a strong evidence base, of which there are an increasing number. However, given the lack of methodologically sound studies of learning styles, it would be an error to conclude that all possible versions of learning styles have been tested and found wanting; many have simply not been tested at all. Further research on the use of learning-styles assessment in instruction may in some cases be warranted, but such research needs to be performed appropriately." [Pashler, Harold, Mark McDaniel, Doug Rohrer, and Robert Bjork. "Learning Style: Concepts and Evidence." Psychological Science in the Public Interest 09.03 (December 2008): 105-119. Print.] Intriguing, no? If the evidence for these multiple learning styles is merely anectdotal, that does not necessarily mean that these learning styles do not exist? It does take a considerable leap of faith, however, to be structuring our courses based on them. As the study says, more rigorously scientific, experimental study is warranted. There is the possibility, however, that such studies would prove that these multiple learning styles, as we call them, are the outward expression of some other, as yet unknown phenomenon. Thoughts?

Like the last session, I liked the video clip. I think a short silence in class is good thing. I didn't think so before but I have through experience learned that students need time to digest the information and few pauses are healthy for them to be then ready for the next topic. They also respond and regain more information this way.

I begin each class reviewing material covered in prior session next, I outline my lecture material putting outline on board for students to take note of...I stop periodically to question if what I have said is understood by all...The next step is to hand out assignment that relates to lecture material a time is established as to when task is to be completed... when turned in, I can evaluate if my lectures have been understood..

I can remember vaguely from a psychology class that memorizing and language processing is different for children learning 26 letters to words in English, versus children who had to memorize hundreds of characters in Mandarin, for example. Do you know anything about how memory works with ESL adult students whose first languages may use characters instead of letters to form words, and any specific challenges they may face when trying to learn things in an English speaking classroom?

I really enjoyed the video clip. And yes there are students that like to raise hand and ask questions and comment. I have found that these students are usually very smart and eagar to get involved and gain most from the class content. Although they do slow you down and the class and keeps bring you back the topics you have covered already. Sometimes I feel that the class gains from it as we get to discuss previously covered topics and referesh everyone's memory. In addition to that I get a feel for how many students retained the information and to what extent as I tend to involve everyone when I am answering the overly curious student.

I had a teacher in C.I.A that taught french class she was crazy and rambled for 2 hours about french words and there meanings she linked stories to the words and spoke very quickly the first day of class I thought that I was going to learn nothing in her class never experiencing that type of teaching methology but found out going home and studying for her test I new everything she talked about and the stories that went with them and everybody in my class experienced the same outcome. Ive often wondered about here methology and what it was that she did was it the enviroment fast pace hold on to your seat teaching style or the interesting stories that connected the boring information into your long term memory are we ment to recieve information in a quicker fashion or our brains naturaly wonder off or was it the dramatic stories that made it stick? Its kind of like a car wreck its so fast in reality but after it happens you can recall and always will recall every little detail in slow motion.