Our understanding of intelligence, learning, the brain has exploded in the last 30 years. We’ve discovered multiple types of intelligence, neural plasticity and realized that you can teach an old dog new tricks. One of the most important discoveries is that Dewey was right: metacognition or “thinking about your thinking” can improve learning and students with math anxiety who write about it before the exam, perform better than those who just take the exam  (Ramirez & Beilock, 2011). Two different studies, one led by Marsha C. Lovett, (2013) and the other by Mary-Ann Winkelmes (2013), demonstrate how metacognition and reflection can be used to improve study habits, exam performance, and  ultimately, new, easy and fast techniques to creating more critical thinkers.

From Socrates “self-examination” to William James’ “introspective observation” and Jean Piaget’s “directed thought” self-regulation is the foundation of critical thinking (Silver, 2013). In How We Think (1910), John Dewey describes it as “Active, persistent and careful consideration of any belief or supposed form of knowledge in light of the grounds that support it, and the further considerations to which it tends.” (p. 6) For Dewey, our job is to find problems and “forked-road situations.” The critical thinker will be able “to maintain the state of doubt and to carry on systematic and protracted inquiry.” (p. 13). This “tolerance for ambiguity” is highly desired by employers and the ability to hold two opposing ideas at once without making up your mind would make an excellent graduation requirement.

Self-regulation, however, begins with self-awareness, noticing and active-monitoring. Mary-Ann Winkelmes (2013) and The Illinois Initiative on Transparency in Learning and Teaching have demonstrated that
(1) discussing the rational of assignments,
(2) connecting “how people learn” data with activities and
(3) debriefing grades, tests and assignments in class,
significantly improve student learning, increase retention and are especially beneficial to under-represented groups, transfer students and non-traditional students. YES! Read that again!! Simply being more transparent in class (F2F!) about why we assign what we do and connecting it to stated learning goals is especially beneficial to students with less family experience of college.  (Their website, http://www.teachingandlearning.illinois.edu/transparency.html provides much more detail about exactly which techniques were most important in which disciplines and inwhich types of classes.)

At the same time, Marsha C. Lovett, (2013), and her colleagues at Carnegie Mellon have demonstrated that exam wrappers, provide a quick and easy way to improve student learning, connect learning and thinking habits across disciplines. Exam wrappers are a very short survey (online or a single sheet of paper) given to students with assignment or exam feedback. You can find their excellent examples of their math and science wrappers at www.learningwrappers.org

I like to call these “cognitive wrappers” since the research point I like to remember is that we help students become critical thinkers most, by helping them learn to self-regulate. Ultimately, only the students themselves can decide to adopt a more complex mental model, but we have to provide the situations that generate “optimal conflict” (again Piaget, but also James Mark Baldwin, Heinz Werner and Lawrence Kohlberg) in what Robert Kegan and Lisa Laskow Lahey (2009) summarize as:

• “The persistent experience of some frustration, dilemma, life puzzle, quandary, or personal problem that is…
• Perfectly designed to cause us to feel the limits of our current way of knowing…
• In some sphere of our living that we care about, with…
• Sufficient supports so that we are neither overwhelmed by the conflict nor able to escape or diffuse it.” (p. 54)

I find it significant that the neurologists, developmental psychologists, the organizational business gurus, residential life professionals, therapists and educational theorists have all come to the same conclusion. Kegan and Lahey are writing about organizational change, but their formulation seems remarkably like Dee Fink’s version of how we craft significant learning experiences or William Perry writing about Harvard students in 1970.  It is not enough just to care, or just to have high standards, or even just to provide provocative situations for students. Pedagogy and learning design are essential if we want to move students to more advanced models of thought.

Note that metacognition is a complex set of skills including self-awareness (knowing your strengths and weaknesses), understanding learning goals, planning an approach to learning, monitoring, evaluating performance, reflecting and adjusting. Metacognition (like critical thinking) is often discipline specific and is best learned with subject content: generic study skills courses have not proven effective. Repeated exposure to transparently announced and labeled critical thinking in different contexts, however, greatly helps students to create more transferrable thinking skills.

So cognitive wrappers provide an easy way to get your students thinking about how they learn and how they might self-regulate more. I think we might extend this idea in two ways. First, I work in an art school, and preparation for lessons, rehearsals, performances and classes, is just as important and requires just as much self-regulation as preparation for exams. Why not use wrappers for some of these very different activities? Second, while not an explicit part of the Carnegie Mellow exam wrappers, some of their examples provide a rationale for the assignment, and are given to students at the beginning. Here is a model for a four-part wrapper:

Rationale: This is only to help you improve.
Reflection: How did you prepare for this exam?
Comparison: What kinds of mistakes did you make?
Adjustment: How will you prepare differently next time?

Wrappers work best when they are discipline specific, but used simultaneously in different contexts in different classes. How is studying for an art history exam different than practicing for a lesson or doing calculus homework? Students need both to understand that (a) self-regulation is a part of improving each of these activities and (b) the adjustments will be different for each type of learning.

Writing, for example, is activity that really consists of multiple types of work and preparation. So the wrapper for a paper might ask:     What % of your preparation time was spent on each of these activities?

1. Reading ___
2. Reading and taking notes ___
3. Re-reading ___
4. Finding online content ___
5. Thinking ___
6. Brainstorming or Conceptualizing ___
7. Sharing Ideas with others ___
8. Preparing ___
9. Researching ___
10. Drafting ___
11. Editing ___

While the wrapper for a problem set or science might ask: What % of your preparation time was spent on each of these activities?

1. Reading textbook section(s) for the first time ___
2. Re-reading textbook section(s) ___
3. Reading/studying other materials ___
4. Re-reading and taking notes ___
5. Finding online content ___
6. Solving problems for practice ___
7. Reviewing homework solutions ___
8. Reviewing your own notes ___
9. Reviewing concepts and ideas ___
10. Memorizing formulas ___

The wrapper for a performance class might include: What % of your preparation time was spent on each of these activities?

1. Listening to performances ___
2. Finding new repertoire ___
3. Brainstorming or Conceptualizing ___
4. Experimenting ___
5. Sharing Ideas with others ___
6. Practicing technique ___
7. Working on new material ___
8. Analyzing posture ___
9. Working on problems ___
10. Playing through pieces ___
11. Resting ___
12. Memorizing ___
13. Playing for fun ___

Wrappers should be brief, easy, flexible and specific to both the discipline and the specific task at hand. The idea is to help students understand that they need to understand their strengths and weakness, assess their own performance, identify strategies that work for them and make adjustment. This self-regulation is important for its own sake, as a performance enhancer, but also as a key element of critical thinking. Yoga for the mind.

There is a single general template with lots of types of questions for you to personalize at https://teachingnaked.com/handouts/

• Dewey, J. (1910), How We Think, Boston: Heath.
• Lovett, M. C. (2013), “Make exams worth more than grades: Using exam wrappers to promote metacognition” in Using reflection and metacognition to improve student learning, Kaplan, M, Silver, N, Lavaque-Manty, D., Meizlish, D., ed. San Francisco: Sterling, VA: Stylus. www.learningwrappers.org
• Kegan, R., Lahey, L. L. (2009) Immunity to Change: How to Overcome it and unlock the potential in yourself and your organization 9Harvard Business Review Press)
• Ramirez, G. & Beilock, L. (2011). “Writing about testing worries boosts exam performances in the classroom. Science, 331 (6014), 211-213.
• Silver, N. (2013) “Reflective pedagogies and the metacognitive turn in college teaching. In Using reflection and metacognition to improve student learning, Kaplan, M, Silver, N, Lavaque-Manty, D., Meizlish, D., ed. San Francisco: Sterling, VA: Stylus.
• Winkelmes, M (2013), “Transparency in teaching: Faculty share data and improve students’ learning” Liberal Education 99/2 (Spring 2013), 48-55. See also Illinois Initiative on Transparency in Learning and Teaching, for http://go.illinois.edu/transparentmethods

OK, you still want to see students F2F–faculty interactions after all are consistently cited as the most important learning opportunity in college. (Keep in mind, students rarely see class time as high quality faculty interaction!)  But, the world has changed and there are now many more opportunities for student interaction outside of the classroom.

First, remember, your office is a SCARY place.  You are old. You have degrees many students have never even heard of and you have stacks of these funny old book things. Many students would never consider going to your office hours: it would mean they are failing or trying to suck up.  I advise the Hispanic fraternity on my campus and when we were constructing an academic plan that included study hours and the like, I suggested including ONE visit to office hours. SHOCK!!  Oh no, we couldn’t. Wouldn’t that be a hardship on our professors? Good students don’t do that, etc.  It is actually traumatic for many students. Read Rebecca Cox, College Fear Factor (Harvard Univ Press) if you really want to know what college feels like to many students today.

Second, the barrier to communication is much lower on chat, email or Facebook.  And it may actually be more important for your students to get smaller and more timely interaction than telling you their life story over coffee.  In any case, the prerequisite for F2F interaction is now often social media. (If you really want to know how things have changed, ask students about dating or how they find romantic partners. Yes, there is now an app for that:  Tinder.  fathers of daughters, I’d skip the next part: in other words, if they would rather have casual sex with someone they have only met online rather than a person they meet in a bar, how are you going to get them to come to your office hours as a first step?)

So consider creating an E-communication Policy for your syllabus.

1. Establish how you will communicate   How to contact you is vastly more important to most students than your office hours!

• The best way to contact me is: ________________ (email, FB, Google+, LinkedIn)
•  I will respond to e-mail (or FB chat, messages etc.) within _____ hours,
•           except on ___ or between ________ (9pm and 9am etc.)
•   I also accept/do not accept chat/Skype/Facebook/LinkedIn friend requests.

2. Create a schedule for yourself

• When is the best time or the best day of the week to announce new assignments?
• When are students most likely to need your help?

3. Be clear and consistent about what information is in which channel

• Example: use email for announcements but Facebook for questions.
•  Do not mix the personal and the professional.

4. Limit the forms of communication.

•    Don’t do everything.
•    Limit duplication (but DO archive all email in your LMS!)
•    Ask students for feedback
•    Stick to your plan; do not randomly change your mode of communication

EXAMPLES:
1. Communication with Me:
Email: prof@XU.edu (I will answer email within 24 hours, usually sooner.)
Facebook: I will respond to questions on the Fb Group page within 24 hours.  Everyone can see the questions and the answers. If someone else has the answer, don’t wait for me.
Physical Office Hours: Mon-Wed 2-3 (just after class in the atrium lounge.)
Chat: I will be in the Google hangout on Tuesday from 7-8. If you see me on Fb or Skype, you can chat with me there too.
Phone: 111 My Office
Appointment: If you want to see me live outside of office hours, email me.

2. Communication:
I am very responsive, but not always at my computer.
Email: prof@XU.edu (I will answer email within 4 hours between 1pm and 5pm, MWF.)
Facebook: This class has a private Fb Group where I will post articles, video and questions. You should check it 3x a week.  I will be there and respond as needed (within a few hours) most MWF afternoons.
Chat: You can also ask me private individual questions when I am on Fb. I will announce virtual office hours when I will do chat and Skype as needed.
Physical Office Hours: If you want to see me live outside of class, email me.
Phone: 111 My Cell: use for texts between 7-9pm most evenings and I will respond.

More examples at teachingnaked.com or in Teaching Naked.

The first day of class is a terrific opportunity to motivate students, demonstrate why your subject matters, create a greater sense of wonder, and surprise students with how your class might change how they look at the world. All of us want class time for what really matters, so here is a way to reclaim your first day.

Do NOT hand out a syllabus. Instead post the syllabus on your course website, in your LMS or in an email you will send later in the day. If you simply must distribute hard copies, then leave by the door at the END of class. Students are shopping the first week, so if you hand them a syllabus, they will immediately look for how much work you are demanding. You don’t have to encourage this behavior. Don’t distract them on the first day.

We are constantly telling students that this is not high school, and that in college they will be required to manage more for themselves, and then we spend the first day of class making sure we read the syllabus to them.

Instead, try an online SYLLABUS QUIZ that is due before the next class. You can do this online in your LMS. You could even use a polling system like Socrative. The important part is that you point them to what really matters in your syllabus: What are the learning outcomes? What will studying for this class be like? What will some of the benefits be? They will figure out for themselves when the papers are due and how many tests there are. (Ok, you might direct them to the late policy in your quiz.)

The benefits of this strategy are many:

1. You free up the first class period for MUCH more important work. Play a game. Do something dramatic. Inspire them with a great example. Just have fun.

2. You will get them in the habit of checking their campus email. You don’t care if they have 6 other emails. But if you tell them this email will be used all semester long for important information –like links to the syllabus and tests—they will make sure they read it. If you don’t abuse this with 12 emails a day—AND you do not make announcements in class– they will read what you send.

3. You also model that class time is valuable and that class is worth attending. That person who skipped the first day, and asked his roommate to pick up an extra syllabus, will find out that class was inspiring, interesting and insightful, and that there were no notes, but the experience was important. Make your class into a gourmet meal instead of fast food: you don’t want the description to be equal or even better than the experience.

4. Students will get feedback right away. All of our research tells us that students need more low stakes assessment and more feedback. They need both nurturing/engaged professors and high standards. It has to be both. One alone does not work nearly as well. Show them immediately both that you care and that they will learn. Have fun and be passionate on the first day and then make sure the first test is hard enough that they have to think. Before the next class it is gone and you and the class more on.

5. It is fast and easy.  Learn how to write better multiple choice questions (that will be graded automatically in your LMS, here (workshop C) or in Teaching Naked.

So start class with only one announcement: “You will get a link to the syllabus and a syllabus quiz immediately after class. The quiz is due before the next class. I will stay after class if you have questions.” Then do what you always wish you had time to do.

You will never get this chance again.

Just in time for your fall prep, Garin Horner and Michelle Hiscock have produced an amazing and searchable list of FREE online technology for the classroom.  All of the basics plus loads for the expert: everyone will find something new and useful here.

Here are a few highlights:

bubbl.us A free mind map and brainstorming tool

http://www.capzles.com  All your media, your life, your stories together like never before: combine documents, photos, video, blogs and music to create rich multimedia experiences.

http://fetchvideo.com Download any video to your hard drive with a simple copy and paste.

 http://www.forvo.com/ the world’s largest pronunciation dictionary, all the words in all languages pronounced by native speakers.

http://www.overstream.net Add subtitles to any video.

http://rubistar.4teachers.org A free rubric tool.

http://www.slideshare.net  One of the world’s most poplar site is really a depository of slide presentations, pots, pdfs, documents and videos.   Free for you to use and alter, no wonder.

You get the idea.  It is a great one-stop shop for your educational technology.

Not on their list, but here is a great new content site: CrashCourse. http://www.youtube.com/user/crashcourse 

These are short (10-15 min) summaries of popular topics in history, chemistry and literature. They are clever, hilarious and beautifully produced at a fast pace that is guaranteed to entertain college students. Many have over 1,000,000 hits, so already very popular.  Just news to me.