Teaching Vignette #2

Using Charts to Get Students to Make Mental Maps of Course Content

Preview: Two different charts, partially filled in, are used to get students to recognize information in a passage of reading (such as information a teacher has targeted for a quiz or test) and to rehearse the information with additional data for deeper learning.

Learning from This Vignette: Ignore the grade level and treat this as a simple example. Terms: "EAL" means English as an Additional Language, but of course that's irrelevant to the value of helping the struggling students in your class. "DART" = Directed Activity for Reading and Thinking, a task led or monitored by the instructor to guide students to learn a concept from data they read. In this case the teacher reads aloud, which is useful for difficult material but not crucial to the method. The ending, of course, is lame; a teacher ordinarily would follow up the charts with a practice quiz (with a sample answer to complete the demonstration) or a real quiz.

Another Example from Chemistry

Reading: Using Charts for pH

Preview: A chemistry teacher has students fill in a chart as they test several substances for pH and gets them to state results from the chart. Further, the teacher gives students a practice matching exercise in chart form to lock in the parts of a standard lab report.

Learning from This Vignette: Treat this example as an easy example rather than dismissing it due to grade level or the fact that the students are girls. The second chart on verbs should be irrelevant to college students, but the bottom chart of Using Charts for pH might help students who had no high school science course.

Following Up: Another simple example charts textures but could easily be adapted to chart acid vs. alkaline or other properties. The point of this chart is to help students talk about contrasting characteristics of materials in terms that make sense.

Copyright3.gif (24311 bytes) 1999-2011+ by the Virginia Community College System. Prepared for the VCCS by Professor Eric Hibbison, 1998-2001 MRCTE Chair and Chief Chair of RCTE from 2000-2005. Permission is granted to use this content for professional development or other educational, nonprofit purposes. Animations used on this site are either part of the Front Page theme or from a royalty free collection called "Web Clip Empire 250,000" Š1997, 1998 by Xoom, Inc., and its Licensors.

Reminder for folks new to the Web: UNDERLINED WORDS (and some graphics images) ARE HOT LINKS. To preview them, hold your mouse on the hotlink (the arrow becomes a hand as you "mouseover" a link) and read the "URL" (Web address) in the "status line" (bottom) of your maximized Web browser. To visit, just click.