From the findings by researchers at McGraw Hill, understanding and applying strategies based on the principles of learning science can help change the way educators and students experience education beyond the classroom.
Just remember, applying more effective teaching strategies will help students learn better, but as an online educator, you don’t have to master all of it. Focus on one or two and you’ll be off to a good start!
Interleaving
This is where you would guide your students as they switch between interrelated topics during an online tutoring session. This strategy helps students in the long run because it works in real-world, extended use. There is in fact increase with the passage of time, that is, students tend to forget less.
Retrieval
This strategy is where you help your students to deliberately recall information. They would force themselves to pull their knowledge “out” and examine what they know. Often, students think they’ve learned some piece of information, but they come to realize they struggle when they try to recall the answer. It’s precisely this “struggle” or challenge that improves a student’s memory and learning – by trying to recall information, they strengthen their memory, and be able to identify gaps in their learning.
Dual coding
Visual learners rejoice! This strategy is where you combine verbal materials with visual materials to help your students learn. There are many ways to visually represent material, such as infographics, timelines, diagrams, and graphic organizers. What you would want your students to get out of this, in the end, is for them to work their way up to the point where they can put away class materials and both write out the ideas in words and draw pictures or diagrams.
In the TutorOcean online classroom (watch a short video here!), you can open many Whiteboards, making it easy for tutors to help students with the interleaving, retrieval, and dual coding learning strategies. The online classroom provides ample canvas for students to show their work and visualize their thoughts.
Elaboration
This is where you would guide students to consciously associate material they want to learn with previously learned material. Asking them to answer “Why?” questions encourages them to think more deeply about the new concepts and explore the connections to related topics, thus increasing the quality of learning. Explaining why something is the way it is (or is not) requires a deeper level of thinking compared to simply restating facts.
At TutorOcean, we put our users first. For tutors, you enjoy the flexibility to teach when you want and charge as you wish. On top of that, our platform allows you to choose the logistics of your lessons such as date, time, location, and more. Sign up for free as a tutor!
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