The AHA! Moment: Effortful Thinking
Assistant Head of Academics for Middle School Joel Bezaire shares insight on effortful thinking, one of the signature practices throughout USN's middle school.
In last week’s AHA! Moment, I introduced our Middle School “Signature Practices.” As a reminder, our signature practices are not new initiatives, but rather our Middle School division planting our flag in the ground we have already claimed and stating that our plan is to continue to make progress in these areas division-wide. Our three signature practices are:
- We believe that all instructional time is important, and we want to use every minute wisely.
- We believe that attention is the gateway to learning, and all classrooms should be attention-conducive.
- We believe that all students have the right to be engaged in and held accountable for effortful thinking in every class.
5th-grade English teacher Lauren Gage is having students study homophones. For those like me who need a reminder, Homophones are words in the English language that have the same pronunciation but different meanings and/or spellings. “New/Knew” and “Their/There/They’re” are frequently referenced examples.
If I think back to my experience learning homophones, I remember essentially nothing; I am certain, however, that the activity was teacher-driven and probably involved a handout for me to fill in definitions. Certainly, the activity was a way for me to pay attention to the words and their various spellings/meanings (our second Signature Practice), but it was not necessarily a way for me to engage in effortful thinking (our third Signature Practice).
Enter Ms. Gage with a new, improved plan.
She “deputized” each student to become an expert in a certain pair of words. Their job was not just to master the spelling and explain the different definitions of the homophones but to come up with strategies and mnemonics to remember the difference between the words. Each student created a slide, which was added to a class-wide slide deck, and students gave brief presentations on their pairs of words: The words, their definitions, and how they remember the difference between them.
The very act of giving students the initial ownership of their learning in this way is an example of “effortful thinking.” In coming up with ideas and answers to the prompt “How will you share with your classmates the way you remember the difference between ‘blue’ and ‘blew’?” Students are engaging a different part of the brain than they would if they simply filled in blanks on a study guide from information provided to them by a teacher.
Ms. Gage was clearly prepared with her own ideas about how students could remember the differences between the words. After each student presented, she deftly negotiated a whole-class conversation under the direction of the student already deemed the “expert” of the two words. She was able to get her own ideas included along with the presenter’s ideas and other ideas from around the classroom. Students left the activity equipped with multiple avenues to remember the difference between, for example, “ate” and “eight.”
Why the big deal around “effortful thinking”? Why might an approach like this have a greater benefit for student learning than a more traditional approach?
This is a simplistic diagram, but it underscores what research tells us about memory and how students learn:
Our second signature practice, focused on attention, brings new facts, concepts, or procedures into a students’ working memory. In order to transfer that to long-term memory, effortful thinking must be involved. The process is really more cyclical than linear, but our teachers are committed to providing students ample opportunities to cement their learning into their long-term memory through effortful thinking.
And their they’re there you have it! Thanks, Ms. Gage!
The AHA! Moment
Joel Bezaire
Assistant Head of Academics
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Phone: 615-321-8000
Fax: 615-321-0889
Email: info@usn.org
River Campus
1200 County Hospital Road
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2000 Edgehill Ave.
Nashville, TN 37212
Phone: 615-321-8000
Fax: 615-321-0889
Email: info@usn.org
River Campus
1200 County Hospital Road
Nashville, TN 37218
USN Mission:
University School of Nashville models the best educational practices. In an environment that represents the cultural and ethnic composition of Metropolitan Nashville, USN fosters each student’s intellectual, artistic, and athletic potential, valuing and inspiring integrity, creative expression, a love of learning, and the pursuit of excellence.
University School of Nashville models the best educational practices. In an environment that represents the cultural and ethnic composition of Metropolitan Nashville, USN fosters each student’s intellectual, artistic, and athletic potential, valuing and inspiring integrity, creative expression, a love of learning, and the pursuit of excellence.