JonesLearnUK

*Deep breaths*. OK, so you’re telling me that catering my lesson activities towards visual, auditory and kinaesthetic learners was a waste of time. Oh my. And the classic ‘you retain 90% of what you teach’ stat; also nonsense. Yikes. If you’re not a cognitive scientist, and you’ve been in teaching long enough, then you’ve probably experienced this kind of horror moment. Dealing with the Feeling When you read about the debunking of an educational myth that you’d (to some degree or another) gone along with, it doesn’t feel good. It fact, it feels a little embarrassing. How could I, a degree-educated and (hopefully!) reasonably intelligent person, have gobbled up this stuff with so little critique? It’s somewhat humbling. Hindsight's a great thing though remember.   Denial might be your first response. This doesn't last long though as defending the roundly debunked quickly becomes untenable. Second response: distancing.  I didn’t write a book on any of ...

OK, I admit it. I am a retrieval practice evangelist. I’ve always been a mini whiteboard lover, but my retrieval conversion moment truly came one sunny evening when reading the excellent book Understanding How We Learn: A Visual Guide by Yana Weinstein and Megan Sumeracki with Oliver Caviglioli. Their passage on the reconstructive nature of memory stays with me and, frankly, I have told anyone who would listen about it since! I’m now on a mission to find new, creative and efficient ways to incorporate and implement retrieval practice techniques into my lessons, across my school and beyond! Retrieval Grids & Question Banks Retrieval grids caught my eye on Twitter. To be completely honest they didn’t entice me initially (I think it’s all those jazzy colours!). However, having read further on the topic in the brilliant book Love to Teach by Kate Jones, I was inspired and decided I should give them a go. Retrieval grids are essentially tables (often 4x3) whi...