Reading in Content Areas

In her book “Making Connections,” Dr. Renate Nummela Caine says, “Brain research establishes and confirms that multiple complex and concrete experiences are essential for meaningul learning and teaching.” [Caine & Caine, 1994, page 5] She reminds us that toddlers are learning all of the time and quite rapidly, and are NOT in a classroom. The closer we come to “lifelike, enriching, and appropriate experiences for learners” [Caine, p 8] that allows learners to increase the extraction of meaning, the better the learning experiences. From the California Department of Education’s Elementary Task Force Report: It’s Elementary! comes the basis that:

“Children are the seekers of meaning. No sooner do they learn how to talk than they begin asking questions about simple things as well as about the dilemmas of human existence that have perplexed philosophers and theologians from the dawn of time. Children are intensely interested in exploring questions of values, feelings, meaning, and the relationship of self to others (p. 3).”

We follow Dr. Kate Kinsella’s structure to assist in mastering History, Science, and Math content through reading and studying. Her multi-step plan calls for:

1. DAY1 — Peruse the material, and practically memorize the main headings, captions to pictures, and the focus questions. This puts information into the TEMPORARY Memory. If you can recall other pieces of related information, then it has a better chance to “stick”, since a ’scaffold’ is being created in your memory. The main headings should become the scaffold for tomorrow’s learning.
2. DAY 2 — Go back and re-read the title, think about the structure or outline of the material (the scaffold) in the chapter or lesson. Read it all the way through. Then read the study questions at the end of the section. This tends to place the information into INTERMEDIATE term memory.
3. DAY 3 — Third time through the material, take notes, especially the Fold Notes shown in each chapter. Also, answer each question. For each question, go back and re-read the appropriate section. This adds content to the ’skeleton’ or ’scaffold’ previously explored at DAY 1 and then enhanced during DAY2. By DAY 3, the learner is ready to ace any quiz on the subject matter. (As a matter of fact, if there is a quiz, it will even further help to ‘cement’ the learning.)
4. NEXT TIME (no more than 5 days gap to avoid having to do steps 1, 2, and 3 again; this is how to move information into the first stage of LONG-TERM memory.  If it goes too many days between, DAY 3 and NEXT, then a substantial review is required to demonstrate mastery of the information.
5. REVIEW before the chapter test. Go back over the ’scaffold’ or outline of the material, the captions to the pictures, as well as the stems of the questions. Review all of your notes and your complete answers to all of the questions. Mastery on the chapter test is a natural by-product of the learning.

What is much more difficult is scheduling your learning activities. Sometimes they happen naturally in the course of the lessons from one day to the next; however, explicit self-management leads to long-term lasting results.

When this process is followed, the result is the natural retention of information. Memory is characterized strong emotional connections as well as by time periods. The reason that field trips are so valuable for learning, is the student has an emotional connection to the experience, talking with friends on the bus, walking around, chatting about it with classmates (social learning) as well as the excitement of going and doing something new.

In a general way, our memory time periods are :

• Temporary memory — less than 24 hours. While cruising the internet, you see a reference to a webpage that you type into the address bar. You may or may not remember it past the moment.
• Short-term memory –  from 24 to 96 hours. An example might be learning the address of an event so you can tell parents how to get to it, such as to a soccer team meeting. If you make no effort at ‘rehearsing’ that information the next day, and subsequent days, it will probably not be retained or remembered.
• Intermediate memory — from 5 days to 4 to 6 months. That is the reason we review concepts, skills, and ideas from time to time.
• Long-term memory — from 4 months to several years. Many of us as adults are still able to recite the order of the planets and salient points about them many years after the initial learning; however, periodic rehearsal is needed to keep it in long-term memory.
• Permanent memory — You will never forget your family members, as long as your memory stays normal (no Alzheimer’s). To move academic content into permanent memory requires active and explicit effort at all of the previous stages. Teachers learn the material and content into permanent memory by teaching the same subjects year after year. It takes time and concentration and emotional connections to move and hold information into permanent memory.