Today I met with another adult client. What a surprising turn my business is taking: that I’m attracting more and more adult learners who are going back to school.
It is so impossibly sweet to see these grown-ups sincerely wanting to learn and feel competent, but feeling so stuck as they relive the learning trauma they experienced when they were young.
This client — who is extremely visual and kinesthetic — is drowning under the verbal barrage of instructions that hurtle out of his teacher’s mouth. Before he has time to integrate the first instruction, out comes the next one. Bam! Bam! Bam! Soon, he’s completely lost, frustrated, and down on himself for not being able to keep up.
I’m not sure what’s more helpful: my love, empathy and reassurance, or my toolbag of tips and tricks for studying. Luckily, I have enough of both to go around.
For example, this client needed reassurance that he’s not crazy, that he has a legitimate learning style that just happens to be anathema to his teacher’s instruction style. I recommended trying out the Smart Pen, so that he can can record the teacher’s instructions while he’s taking notes. We then worked out a study process for how to process the recorded instructions when he gets home. Finally, we decided that he needs to seek out his teacher during office hours, show his teacher his notes, and ask what’s missing.
I’m looking forward to next week’s update about whether these tips helped this grown-up find more ease in the classroom!
Mar
12
2012
What’s Your Theme Song For Organizing?
Last week one of my 6th grade coaching clients spontaneously started singing James Brown’s “I Feel Good” while we were cleaning out his binder:
“I feel good! nuhnuh, nuhnuh, nuhnuh nuh…
“So organi-ized nuhnuh, nuhnuh, nuhnuh!”
We sang together while he purged, hole punched, and filed.
I couldn’t help but think how much I love my job. He seemed to be enjoying himself, too.
What’s your theme song for organizing?
Mar
10
2012
Artful Systems Make Organizing More Fun
I just finished collaging the cover of a new spiral notebook, and now I can’t wait to write in it! Art makes such a difference in our lives.
I often have my academic coaching clients decorate their planner covers for this very reason. Just yesterday a senior in high school told me that she has already started collecting pictures for next year’s planner, when she is a freshman in college. This from a client who usually has a terrible time planning ahead.
How might you incorporate more artfulness into the mundane systems in your life?
During my in-take interviews with new families, their child’s distractibility is one of the most common complaints. How do we get them to FOCUS?! Especially when they’re on the internet?
I totally get it, partially because I experience the same distractability in my own life, and I know many adults who do as well. This problem is certainly not isolated to teens.
Recently a friend who is a professional playwright and poet was complaining about her own difficulties focusing. Evidently, when she is momentarily stumped in the midst of her writing, she involuntarily opens a new tab and begins browsing the internet and falling down the rabbit hole of google.
I call this phenomenon the Technology Twitch, and it happens to me all the time. The second my brain bumps up against difficulty, my hand clicks onto facebook before I’m even conscious of what I’m done. That’s why I call it a “twitch”; it seems uncontrollable.
When she wants to circumvent the Twitch, my poet/playwright friend swears by the new software called Freedom. It’s easy-to-use interface allows the user to shut down the internet for a specified amount of time.
I tried it the other day, and found it an invaluable tool! I needed to read my friend’s dissertation, and every time I read a complex idea that required me to stop and think, I felt the “twitch” happen in my body. However, the internet was no where in sight (and my iphone was conveniently hidden in the next room)! So I simply noted the feeling of discomfort, and then moved my attention back to the difficult passage. What a relief!
I highly recommend Freedom to distractable students and parents. A word of caution, though, when it comes to doing homework: blocking the internet will require that you plan out your homework regimen before turning Freedom on. So many assignments these days require the internet. Review all your homework assignments for the night, make a list of the ones that require the internet, and then plan out what you are going to do first, second, third, etc.
If Freedom seems too extreme, check out this list of other software designed to diminish distractions.
If you try Freedom (or any of the others on the list), let me know how it works for you! Your reflections will help me recommend various tools to my academic coaching clients.
Several seniors with whom I work have recently been assigned their first nonfiction (read: non-textbook) book: The Future of Freedom by Fareed Zakaria. This is not light reading, and several of them feel lost. It’s a big jump to go from a textbook that force feeds you main ideas and subheadings, to a nonfiction book where main ideas have to be hunted down and highlighted.
It’s especially a big leap if the student has never really *thought* about how ideas are structured, whether in textbooks or otherwise. So much of my job as an academic coach is to get students to slow down and pay attention to structure — of learning activities, the teacher’s lecture, or their own thinking. Perhaps I should call myself a meta-cognition coach!
My client Toby was writing a book review for The Future of Freedom and needed to identify Zakaria’s main ideas. However, Toby struggles with dyslexia and slow processing; he felt overwhelmed by the volume of ideas in the book and didn’t know how to glean the main point.
I pointed out that most nonfiction books are structured like a 5 paragraph essay, only longer. In a five paragraph essay we are guaranteed to find a concise statement of the main idea/theme of the book at the end of the introductory paragraph. Similarly, a nonfiction book will usually have a concise statement of the main idea in towards the end of the introductory chapter.
Toby and I checked it out; we scanned the final pages of the introduction looking for a clue, and sure enough: we found a paragraph that began with the words, “This book is a call for…”
Aha! I got really excited. If a book is “a call for” something, that’s a verbal clue that what follows will be a main idea!! As Toby and I read through the rest of that paragraph, it sure seemed like Mr. Zakaria was pointing to a main idea; however, before totally trusting what we’d found, Toby and I needed to double-check our thinking.
“Where else in a 5 paragraph essay can we find a concise restatement of the main idea?” I asked. “The conclusion?” Toby responded. Yes, yes! So we scanned the conclusion chapter of the book, to see if there was a repetition of the main idea we’d found in the introduction. Again, success!
By the time Toby left our session, he had not only figured out the main idea of The Future of Freedom, but he’d learned a great deal about how authors structure their own thinking. Plus, he’d discovered that the 5 paragraph essay structure is not just a method of torture, but it’s a basic way that anyone — even the most accomplished authors — often organize their ideas.
Not a bad lesson from a 40-minute coaching session.
If you would like a free 15-minute consultation about how academic coaching might help your student become better at thinking about thinking, please contact me. I’d be happy to help.
Dec
08
2011
What Makes Homework Different Than Studying
Many of my academic coaching clients have a devil of a time studying for tests. The reasons are varied, but one major stumbling block I’ve uncovered is this: students do not understand the purpose that homework plays in preparing them for tests! Our current education system rewards students for mindlessly following teacher’s instructions, rather than thinking about the purpose behind the instructions. I’ve repeatedly discovered that it’s my role as an academic coach to help students uncover the connections between homework and what’s on the test.
Let’s look at two clients in particular, who are learning to understand the distinction between studying versus doing homework, and how both tasks are a crucial part of test preparation.
Michaela and Grant are both 9th graders who are consistently scoring Cs and Ds on their history tests. The other day I asked Michaela to show me her homework assignments, and sure enough: it appeared to me that she had copied the definitions from the textbook into her homework assignment.
Technically speaking, Michaela is answering her homework questions correctly; however, when she copies the definitions, she’s not actually internalizing the information she’s supposedly “learning.” When I asked her if she even pays attention to the meaning of what she’s writing, she confirmed, “No, I don’t. I just scan for the answers and write them down. That’s what I’m supposed to do, isn’t it?”
It hadn’t occurred to Michaela that the purpose of homework is to be introduced to new information, and then to practice that information with the purpose of learning it. If she mindlessly reads and answers questions, she *might* get a 100% on her homework assignment — but she’s making studying for the test extra hard.
We then discussed the difference between doing homework (when the teacher structures the learning activity, and you make sure you’ve learned it) and studying (when you structure your own learning activity to make sure that you’re understanding the information).
Michaela was shocked, and a little disheartened, to learn that test prep begins waaaaaaay back when she first does a homework assignment. It’s important for her to:
a) think actively when completing the teacher-assigned activity, so that she is aware of of what she is learning as she learns it (this is homework), and then
b) take some time to determine her strengths and weaknesses, and then (using multiple modalities) drill the weak areas and reinforce the strengths (this is studying).
If she does her homework with conscious attention to what she’s learning, and then several times a chooses to study what she’s learned, she will be much better prepared for the eventual test.
Another client named Grant was working on a history worksheet during our coaching session. At one point, the worksheet asked Grant to make a list of the five beliefs shared by the enlightenment philosophers. Just as Michaela had done, Grant copied the beliefs directly from the textbook. When I asked him, “Do you even understand what you are writing? Would you be able to remember what these mean for the test?” he answered honestly, “Probably not.”
Together we practiced going back, rereading the textbook, looking up confusing words, summarizing the information, and only THEN writing it down into his homework. Although this kind of mindful attention is more time-consuming, it saves time in the long run because Grant will not need to re-learn the information the night before the test.
I know it will probably take Michaela and Grant a couple of years before they fully “get” the distinction between studying and doing homework and how both impact their time efficiency and performance on tests. Both students have learning disabilities which make them slower processors, which makes the entire learning process — as well as thinking about their own thinking — a bit harder for them. Many students don’t fully integrate these processes until college!
In the meantime, Michaela and Grant will practice, practice practice. I’ve been an academic coach for long enough, I know that by the end of their sophomore year, they will (most likely) turn the corner and be more interested in improving their learning processes. One step at a time…
If you’d like a free fifteen minute consultation about your student and whether he or she could benefit from academic coaching, please contact me. I’d be happy to talk in more detail.
Photo by icanhascheezburger.com.
Nov
30
2011
MuseCubes Help Stave Off Cancer?!
Sitting might cause cancer?! It sounds extreme, doesn’t it?
That’s the announcement in a growing body of research. According to the American Institute for Cancer Research:
As many as 49,000 cases of breast cancer and 43,000 cases of colon cancer occurring in the U.S. every year are linked to a lack of physical activity.”
Furthermore, sitting for long periods of time can increase indicators of cancer risk! Evidently, doing a high intensity workout at the gym doesn’t help if you end up sitting for the rest of the day.
All the research is pointing to the importance of taking multiple breaks in the midst of your workday.
So, if sitting too much increases your risks for cancer, and if MuseCubes encourage you to take breaks from sitting, does it follow that MuseCubes decrease your risk of cancer? Hmmm. Perhaps that claim is a little far fetched.
However, a set of MusesCubes conveniently placed near your computer is a great little reminder to take an occasional break.
I keep MuseCubes in several strategic spots in my office. Sometimes I choose to roll them; other times I simply look at them and think, “Oh, right! Move my body!” Then I’ll get up and take a walk or go wash the dishes — anything that gets me up and moving.
Do you need a set of MuseCubes to serve as your take-a-break reminder? Or do you know someone who does? If so, contact me and I’ll hook you up with a set or two. You can also check out the free iPhone app.
Many educators — myself included! — have espoused learning styles as an important factor in increasing student motivation and performance. When I was a classroom teacher, I had students take learning inventories, and then I would use the results of this inventory to help individualize student learning. As an academic coach, I used to have students take the same inventories and then use the results to help the students maximize their learning.
In the last few years of coaching, however, I’ve stopped giving these inventories. I DO still believe that every person learns differently, and that it is important for students to understand — and advocate for! — learning methods that reveal their strengths.
However, I’ve noticed that too much of an emphasis on learning styles makes students less inclined to learn in ways that are *not* their learning preferences. I’ve observed that most students need both:
- permission to study in ways that are more interesting/pleasurable to them (this includes learning styles), AND
- an understanding of the importance of studying in multiple ways, regardless of the student’s dominant learning style.
During our academic coaching sessions, I point out when I see a student exhibiting certain learning strengths or preferences, and I ask students to reflect about what kinds of activities help them learn best. But when we discuss test preparation, I consistently give my students what I fondly refer to as the “study senses” lecture. It goes something like this:
I ask them to draw a box on the board, divide it into four quadrants, and then draw a specific picture in each box.
I then tell clients that each picture represents an important method of studying. If they only study in one method, the information is not going to stick as well as it would if they used multiple “senses.”
We discuss each picture, and I have the student figure out what the “study sense” is. As you can see in this picture, they include:
- looking (taking in information visually)
- hearing (taking in information aurally)
- speaking (repeating information, usually in your own words)
- doing something active (making flashcards, taking notes, acting out, playing basketball while being quizzed, etc)
Finally, I have the student check off the box that reflects their most habitual form of studying. Most students check off “looking” (because they flip through their textbook as their primary study method), but few others. We end our session making a list of ways they can study actively for each of their upcoming tests, using as many of the “study senses” as possible.
Here is an example of a similar brainstorm (documented in a google spreadsheet because I was working virtually with the student):
One of the reasons I love the “study senses” is that this model gives students specific language to write down in their planner. For example, instead of writing “study for science test” (a pet peeve of mine! so non-specific), I ask them to write the specific action they will take to study. “Review science notes and make Cornell study sheet” or ” have friend quiz me using study guide” are much more actionable than “study for test.”
Furthermore, this model gives students a concrete way to assess their own studying. I’ve had clients tell me, “Well, I didn’t do as well on that test because I only studied with one of those senses.”
So, to all the tutors, teachers, and academic coaches out there, I’m curious: how do you teach students to study actively using a variety of modalities? Do you still find learning styles useful, or have you discovered other techniques?
To parents and caregivers, I’ve discovered that 5-6 sessions of academic coaching with an emphasis on study skills can transform a willing student’s performance on tests. If your student is struggling with tests, I’ll happily provide a free 15-minute consultation via phone or skype, and I work virtually, which means I’m available to anyone, anywhere. Contact me for more info.
Do you remember the first time you realized that everything is connected to everything else? For me, it was first semester of freshman year at Macalester College. I was shocked to discover that each of my classes, disparate as they were (Theatre With a Global Perspective, The Biology of Conservation) kept on resonating with each other. It became a game each semester to notice what themes were emerging across all my classes.
This weekend the theme of Sacred Stories rose up out of the disparate activities of my weekend. On Saturday I attended The Sacred Story Project: Messages to the World. What a sweet workshop offered by Cynthia Winton-Henry, founder of InterPlay. We spent the day telling stories about experiences infused with love and experiences that suck (thanks, Cynthia, for keeping it real!). We were searching for the stories from our lives that we want to tell over and over.
I was in kind of a bad mood on Saturday, so I had a hard time accessing stories that felt nourishing. I kept on thinking about the stories that I DO tell over and over which I’m TIRED of telling. Stories of pain, abandonment, disconnection, dysfunction. Going to therapy seems all about retelling my pain stories over and over. And even in my academic coaching work, although I often ask my clients, “What went well this week?,” we seem to dwell even more on the question, “What didn’t go well, why, and how can we fix it?”
At the Sacred Stories workshop, it occurred to me that I want to start harvesting all the joy stories from my life. There are so many of them! I want to mine my own life for the joy stories, and I want to hear my friends’ stories as well. You can bet that tomorrow at Tuesday Night InterPlay (which also happens to be my birthday!) we will be playing dancing, singing and telling our joy stories. And I’m so curious about my academic coaching clients as well. When was the last time I asked them about what their most joyful moment last week was? I wonder if any of them will tell stories of experiences in the classroom, with teachers, learning?! I hope so. And if not, I hope to start directing their attention towards those small moments of joy in learning.
As I remember my little “game” that I played each semester back at Macalester, I realize how joyful it felt when I discovered a new theme emerging among my classes. Aha!! I’d feel. Look at this revelation I’ve uncovered!! Through my InterPlay teaching and my academic coaching, I hope to help myself and my companions continue noticing their own joy moments and turning them into stories for safe keeping. (By the way, this doesn’t mean we won’t also keep talking about what sucks. Sometimes that’s soooo necessary and empowering! I’m just looking to create some balance…).
Shoot! This blog entry got so long, I didn’t get to tell you about the OTHER event this weekend that was all about claiming the sacred stories in our lives: I went to the Berkeley Rep to see How To Write a New Book for the Bible. I won’t say more, other than that I highly recommend it!
