At the end, he returns to the questions so that students can both see some potential answers and understand that they have learned something that day.įor example, in a session of his “American Government” course that focused on the separation of powers, the first question of the day might be: “What problem is the separation of powers designed to address?” And the last: “What forces have eroded the separation of powers?” Those questions are also available to the students in advance of class, to help guide their reading and homework. Class then proceeds in the usual fashion. At the beginning of class, he shows four or five questions on a slide for students to consider. My colleague Greg Weiner, an associate professor of political science, puts those ideas into practice. But if you know the question, the answer may be quite interesting.” On its own, the answer is almost never interesting. “The material I want students to learn,” he writes in his book Why Don’t Students Like School?, “is actually the answer to a question. Another favorite education writer of mine, the cognitive psychologist Daniel Willingham, argues that teachers should focus more on the use of questions. In this column, I offer four quick suggestions for the first few minutes of class to focus the attention of students and prepare their brains for learning. But on most days, we should be able to do better. Logistics and organization certainly matter, and may be unavoidable on some days. Unfortunately, based on my many observations of faculty members in action, the first five minutes of a college class often get frittered away with logistical tasks (taking attendance or setting up our technology), gathering our thoughts as we discuss homework or upcoming tests, or writing on the board. It seems clear, then, that we should start class with a deliberate effort to bring students’ focus to the subject at hand. Their bodies may be stuck in a room with us for the required time period, but their minds may be somewhere else entirely. They walk into our classes trailing all of the distractions of their complex lives - the many wonders of their smartphones, the arguments with roommates, the question of what to have for lunch. The opening five minutes offer us a rich opportunity to capture the attention of students and prepare them for learning. The same principle, I would argue, holds true in teaching a college course. If you can’t grab and hold their attention with your opening, you are likely to lose them before they get to your hard-won insights 10 paragraphs later. In that very short space, I explain to them, most readers will decide whether or not to continue reading the rest of your essay. I work frequently with students on their opening words, sentences, and paragraphs. When I teach my writing course on creative nonfiction, we spend a lot of time analyzing the opening lines of great writers. That sentence makes us want to keep reading. It’s hard to disagree: The sentence plunges us immediately into a drama, acquaints us with a character on the brink of death, and yet intrigues us with the reference to his long-forgotten (and curiosity-inducing) memory. In a conversation I had with Ken Bain, my longtime mentor and favorite education writer, he cited that quote - the first sentence of Gabriel García Márquez’s novel One Hundred Years of Solitude - as one of the great openings in literary history. If you're unsure, ask a pharmacist for advice.“Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendía was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice.” Make sure you follow the instructions that come with the medicine. This vaccine is given at 8 weeks, 16 weeks and 1 year old. It's recommended that you give your baby liquid paracetamol after the MenB vaccine to reduce the risk of a high temperature.
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