Appelrouth Tutoring Services | Appelrouth Tutoring Services

To forget is human.  In many ways, the brain was designed to forget, thus allowing us to continue to function in this world brimming with incessant flows of new information.  But some things we want to remember, even if they don’t automatically stick in our long term memory banks.  At times, specific memory strategies are appropriate to help us overcome our forgetting instinct.

What can we do to help our students remember the rules, the strategies, and the content that will serve them on standardized tests and help them achieve success in the domain of high school academics? For some students, a single exposure to a new concept will be enough to firmly implant it into their memory banks. For example, if you teach these students how to “pick numbers” for an algebra problem, they will employ that strategy every time they are exposed to algebra problems in the future. Other students need multiple exposures to new material before they begin to integrate and apply it. At a superficial level, these students may “know” what to do, and if you cue their memory, they may be able to retrieve the concept; but on their own, without your input or retrieval cues, they will not independently use the concept.

All students, and all humans for that matter, have idiosyncratic memories.  Certain individuals have a “bear-trap” memory for pictures or images, but a weaker memory for numbers or names. Others have a gift for figures, data, or statistics, but struggle to recall sequential information, narratives or story lines. Everyone has a unique level of ability for recalling certain content, based on how one’s brain is designed, ones’ interest level, and the importance assigned to remembering particular content. If a student is lacking the will to learn the material, a tutor can address that through motivational channels, but if a student is trying in earnest to learn the content and is not succeeding, other strategies exist to help the student improve retention and study “smarter” rather than harder.

There are two specific strategies I want to offer that you can use to help students who are struggling with retaining concepts covered in your sessions.

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Note: This post was originally written as a memo to ATS tutors.

I’m doing some research for my Memory and Cognition class, and I found some information that has relevance to our work. I wanted to pass on some info about the mind and how we can better serve our students.

Some of our students have anxiety around high-stakes tests. They envision the worst, they get nervous, they anticipate freaking out, and their fears can become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

We have several pathways to address student anxiety.  I will briefly mention two and then dive deeper into the third: the power of the imagination.

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I applied to 16 colleges when I was a senior in high school.  First of all, that’s waaaaaaay too many schools to apply to – I think I wrote essays every day for 3 months in order to fill out all the applications.  I didn’t know where exactly I wanted to go, just that I wanted to get far away from home.  A friend’s older sister had gone to Bowdoin College and had loved it.  I went to the their Web site and decided that it was definitely the school for me.  I loved the nice glossy photos of the beautiful campus, the school’s great academic reputation, the statistics about the student body’s activist population, the cool class choices and major options, and the fact that it was in Maine – just about as far away from Alabama as possible.  I could just see myself cozied up in a dorm with a cup of hot tea surrounded by other young activists as we discussed world events and designed petitions for Amnesty International.

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