Lessons with the Secret Sauce

To engage students fully in any learning activity, seven ingredients are needed to make it yummy.

1. Relevancy and Social Meaning

Addressing real challenges that face their community motivates participation. The concept, my community, gradually matures from me to my class, my friends, my school into an awareness of the global needs.

2. Lessons That Requires Working With Peers

Service Learning, a team effort, collaboration, an exhibition, sharing, pairing or any demonstration stimulate those neurons. We are social beings, and nothing boosts energy more than the inspiration of an audience, a recipient, or a product that others will use or see.

3. Provide the tools but not the answers.

Begin with a Question. Use the Inquiry based learning model. We learn better when challenged to figure it out for ourselves. Critical thinking moves up the cognitive hierarchy from the concrete to symbols of things to ideas, and eventually become principles or theories. With this model students at different levels of cognitive sophistication can still participate fully.

4. Encourage a variety of demonstrations

Access multiple intelligences. When different talents are valued, we encourage a diversity of brain styles, innate aptitudes, and skills. Respect for divergent thinking allows unorthodox approaches that stretch the imagination.

5 Emotional and Physical Safety.

Make it ok to fail, learn from mistakes, make a mess, to go slowly or quickly. Build in activities for diverse learning speeds and styles like starters or extensions. Teachstudents to tolerate discomfort, struggle, and frustration. Accept everyone as a valued member of the group.

6. Provide Exemplars

When the student can visualize a finished product, they are more likely to understand the criteria and push through their basic levels to create something meaningful.

7 Reflection and Goal Setting

At the finale of each project, a student needs to analyze what strategies worked, evaluate their level of competence and set goals for the next endeavor. Without reflection, students tend to repeat ineffective habits that impede growth. A celebration, or pause from ongoing work consolidates learning and marks the transition into a new project.