The Friday Mindset - Issue #37

The headlong dash for the staff car park is over. The river of fleeing teachers has slowed to a trickle and the stragglers, crushed in the energetic crowds, have picked themselves up, dusted themselves down and limped to their vehicles.

On the ring road, commuters are queuing home in their metal boxes. But us? We're still here, just for a little while longer. The staffroom is empty so you can safely snaffle a leftover slice of that birthday cake the science department were sharing earlier, brew up and settle down for a quick read and a think before the weekend begins.

Welcome along, let's get started!

Something to try...

Runshaw College are an outstanding FE college in Lancashire that use VESPA across their courses. Recently, they've been discussing it at their CPD sessions and via their Youtube channel.

A couple of things struck us as interesting in the short six-minute video we've provided a link to. Firstly, the VESPA shield (starts at 1:40) - an idea that struck us as a nice one; a reflective and timely activity where students consider their strengths and weaknesses. We're going to give this one a go!

The discussion of which VESPA activities to use in the classroom takes up the bulk of the video and is well worth checking out, but the other idea that struck us as new is the use of Woebot (starts at 5:40) as an attitude activity.

At the time of writing it's fair to say we know very little about Woebot, an app designed to provide AI interaction, reflection and therapy, so this isn't an endorsement - simply a mention of it's possible use in educational contexts. We're going to have a look at the phone app and explore it further.

If you're interested, the Runshaw video is here:

Revisit VESPA to support learners to develop independent study skills and cope with low-level mental health

Something we've been reading...

We hope you can access this link - we've long-since reached our limit on the number of free articles The New York Times allows us to read. It's an op-ed by Susan Dynarski (professor of education at Harvard Graduate School) called 'Laptops are great, But not in a meeting or a lecture hall.' Check it out:

A growing body of evidence shows that college students generally learn less when they use computers or tablets during lectures. That is probably true in workplace meetings, too.

It's been on our mind recently because we've been running sessions at a few independent schools and staff have told us of a problem they've got. The schools in question have issued every student with their own laptop, and the kids bring them to class and take notes electronically. But with exams approaching, they're finding learners are revising on laptops too, and are reluctant to pick up a pen and write in the way the exam will require them to. It's the thin-end of a wedge that will affect us all soon enough as the cost of electronic equipment continues to tumble.

If you can't access the NYT piece, this one will do the job just as well. We don't want to appear as luddites, but we're both firmly of the opinion - supported by ample evidence - that learning is more effective with pen and paper. Read, digest, and share with colleagues:

Susan Dynarski’s latest Brookings piece, “For better learning in college lectures, lay down the laptop and pick up

Our latest offer…

Don't forget our crash-course in Motivating Students. It’s part research-based, and part practical, including five new activities. We’re going to run it again on Wednesday 19th January from 3:45 - 4:30pm and it's free.

If you’re interested, give us an email at the usual address, and we’ll send you a Zoom link!

And if you want a deep dive into effective revision a Network for Learning session entitled The Exam Mindset on January 20th, is running from 4:00-6:30pm. Martin will be going through lots of techniques to boost student revision, and there’ll be 15 activities shared (many of them new!) To come along, or recommend the course to a colleague, check out the details here:

The Exam Mindset – Preparing Students for Effective Revision ... , Powered By Finetune CMS

And that's it for this week! Take it easy, rest up, and we'll be back next Friday.

All the best,

Steve and Martin