Making Learning Stick

A few years ago I was sitting with a new fifth grade teacher, brainstorming with her on how she could improve her craft.  She was not new to education, just new to fifth grade. We went over her curriculum and discussed the areas of hardship. "If I am overwhelmed by the amount of material, why won't the children be?" she moaned.  

We discussed mastery, and that is when a thought struck me.  If the goal of teaching is learning and for learning to be retained, what better way than to constantly review?  I hear you muttering, "Duh.  Of course we all have review going on in our classrooms."  But what if, instead of reviewing just before tests, review happened once a month, on EVERYTHING learned until that point?  Or once a week, every week?

The teacher was willing. She liked the idea of "grounding the knowledge" before it flew away, and the idea of tangible mastery.  Together we designed the program. She took out four large manila envelopes and labeled each one; Science, Social Studies, English, and Math. She made sure she had a good supply of index cards handy.  

I met up with the teacher a few months later.  Her eyes shone.  She practically grabbed me, leading me to her room to see the bulging envelopes. She proceeded to explain how the program evolved for her class. Every time a key word  or a key concept of a subject was taught, or a key word appeared in one of the textbooks they were using, the word or concept was discussed and then ceremoniously copied onto an index card and placed in the appropriate envelope. Once a month the class moves their seats into four tables and they are handed one of the envelopes. They pass the envelope around and every child takes a turn to hold a card up for the group to review the meaning of the card. Whole lessons were remembered as children laughed, remembering a funny lesson, or got excited recalling a particularly engaging one. At preset intervals the teacher rang a bell and the envelopes were passed to the next table. It was incredible to watch.

Today, four years later, I bumped into the teacher on a visit to her school. She proudly stated that she is still doing the envelopes, and is taking them out once a week now. Her experiment became her routine as the data showed the outstanding results; at the end of the year the all the children in her class, bright to weak,  can recall and explain every single main concept and topic of learning covered since the beginning of the year on their individual levels!

To quote the Greek playwright Aeschylus:  "Memory is the mother of all wisdom."

The teacher might feel successful, but her class feels smart!