Impacting Student Learning
June 28, 2007 – 7:40 am
When I teach new instructor candidates, I always include statistics about how different teaching strategies can impact learning. To be honest, I never knew the source of the information I was using until a couple of days ago. My son was doing research on effective teaching methods for block systems and one of his resources was a book entitled, “Teaching Foreign Languages in the Block” by Deborah Blaz. She attributed the following information to William Glasser, an educational authority:
Glasser’s Learning Scale
We Learn…
10% of what we read
20% of what we hear
30% of what we see
50% of what we both see and hear
70% of what is discussed with others
80% of what we experience personally
95% of what we teach to someone else
Blaz says that she keeps a large version of the scale posted in her classroom as a reminder as she prepares exercises for her students. The trick is to try to move down the scale to increase the level of learning. For instance, just providing a vehicle for students to discuss an issue that you presented verbally will increase their learning level from 20% to 70%. This is good information to include in any instructor development course.