Here’s What Happened When I Made My College Students Put Away Their Phones
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Reading the textbook before class helps me pay attention to things I missed in the reading, and rereading it after class helps me recall stuff I ignored in my lecture notes. I have never found value in reviewing lectures, and my test scores were pretty good.
These were humanities classes, where I'd pick up some nuance in the lecture/ discussion i had missed. We had textbooks but there was a lot of stuff in the lectures that weren't in the text.
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I disagree that writing by hand is magically improving information absorbtion/retention. Source: I've been doing it through all of my school and all of my uni. Being half-asleep, pondering something completely irrelevant, and in general course material flying completely over my head while I write it down was a norm most of the time. And lecturers dictating their stuff at high speeds didn't help either. Maybe there is some temporary novelty effect after you switch from one way of writing to another, but I wouldn't expect that last long.
The more muscles and senses you engage in learning the better you will retain the information.
One method is not necessarily the best for everyone, but studies show that writing notes by javd does improve retention.
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Handwriting sucking is irrelevant. You don't need to read it afterward to get the benefits the study is talking about. The point of handwriting is that you need to process and summarize the information.
If you review the information later, the difference between the two will be negligible.
I personally almost never review lecture notes and instead go to the textbook. Professors can make mistakes, books are usually more accurate, but a lecture is more interactive so both have value. But I definitely prefer the text over my notes regardless.
What we did in school and uni never required processing and summarizing anything. Teacher/lecturer would simply dictate and we had to write down anything that what explicitly preceded by "write this down". I'd agree processing and summarizing helps with learning, but that's totally irrelevant and doesn't have anything to do with writing,
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How are you harming the other people in the class? I'm assuming here that you're being reasonably discrete, have the volume off (or have ear buds in), etc. You not paying attention doesn't really harm anyone else.
Lower class participation, impact on grading curves, and distracting behavior all have an effect on others.
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How are you harming the other people in the class? I'm assuming here that you're being reasonably discrete, have the volume off (or have ear buds in), etc. You not paying attention doesn't really harm anyone else.
Think of it this way .. if you sign up at a karate dojo, there are a ton of rules and norms you'll need to follow. And those rules and norms will be very different dojo to dojo. That's an understood expectation. It's similar to college. The professor is empowered to dictate the structure and norms of their course.
And sure... The professor will dictate their expectations on day 1. If you don't like the structure, you have 2 weeks to change the course with no penalty.
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“I paid for it” isn’t an excuse to do whatever you want.
The fuck it isn’t
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Lower class participation, impact on grading curves, and distracting behavior all have an effect on others.
The second would be a net benefit on the rest of the class, no?
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In most of the classrooms I've been to, there's like one outlet for every 10 people. That's not a reliable option, especially if you pack classes back to back like I did.
I can't say I've ever been to classes that have that issue or have heard anyone with a similar complaint.
If it's really that much of a problem for your specific school, class, or just you (for some reason), then it can easily be remedied with a power strip, or several if that's really how bad it is.
I'm reluctant to take your word at face value, though. Lots of hyperbole going on on these forums.
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How are you harming the other people in the class? I'm assuming here that you're being reasonably discrete, have the volume off (or have ear buds in), etc. You not paying attention doesn't really harm anyone else.
Taking a seat in a full class to fuck around on your phone could fit that bill. Someone else might have wanted to be in your seat. In this scenario, your actions in that class could have repercussions beyond just the classroom.
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no I meant the expectation that people will just comply without complaint. especially if its not been stated otherwise in the lesson plan or syllabus.
this guy makes it seem like he magically was able to charm people into not using their laptops. and then wrote praises to him for such a thing, and quite frankly I'm certain all of that is embellishment.
I'm all for being more productive in classrooms, but banning note taking methods that quite a few people rely on is just silly.
if people want to join classes where note taking is analog only, that's great and I encourage it. but let me know its that way ahead of time so I don't waste my time having to get a refund for the course.
I'm sure a few people like you dropped the class...
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no I meant the expectation that people will just comply without complaint. especially if its not been stated otherwise in the lesson plan or syllabus.
this guy makes it seem like he magically was able to charm people into not using their laptops. and then wrote praises to him for such a thing, and quite frankly I'm certain all of that is embellishment.
I'm all for being more productive in classrooms, but banning note taking methods that quite a few people rely on is just silly.
if people want to join classes where note taking is analog only, that's great and I encourage it. but let me know its that way ahead of time so I don't waste my time having to get a refund for the course.
Just record it and use a transcriber app. Then you can fully focus on the presentation and worry about notes later
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The second would be a net benefit on the rest of the class, no?
No, I don’t think being assessed relative to subpar students is a benefit. You’d get a better letter grade, sure. But likely a worse education due to “lowering the bar”, which is what you paid for. Educators often can’t grade on absolute scales because the pass/fail ratio of the students factors into their own performance assessment.
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The fuck it isn’t
Ok Karen
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Only barbarians take notes by hand. A TRUE GREEK PHILOSOPHER would simply memorize all the requisite facts. Paper is dissolving the very moral fabric of our society. Smash that /s button for more bug facts!
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There's a lot of comments about how digital devices are viable/helpful for note-taking and just as good as a pen. I think that's missing the crucial point: virtually every device we own today is designed as a distraction machine.
A pen + paper isn't going have any notifications or reminders or updates or emails or texts or ads or alarms or alerts. If there's any device without those that's as reliable and as cheap as a notebook, I've never heard of it.
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No, I don’t think being assessed relative to subpar students is a benefit. You’d get a better letter grade, sure. But likely a worse education due to “lowering the bar”, which is what you paid for. Educators often can’t grade on absolute scales because the pass/fail ratio of the students factors into their own performance assessment.
Grades don't indicate the quality of your education anyway, they indicate your performance in a class. If someone else does poorly and that benefits your grade, the quality of your education hasn't changed, only your grade.
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There's a lot of comments about how digital devices are viable/helpful for note-taking and just as good as a pen. I think that's missing the crucial point: virtually every device we own today is designed as a distraction machine.
A pen + paper isn't going have any notifications or reminders or updates or emails or texts or ads or alarms or alerts. If there's any device without those that's as reliable and as cheap as a notebook, I've never heard of it.
Putting a device on airplane mode removes the distractions.
If I play a video game while the lecture is going on, well that is on me, or the lecture, or both. -
My issue is that I type faster than I write. I think instead they should push for something like audio/memo recorders.
For me it was always about:
- listening
- understanding
- figuring out what's relevant
- writing the relevant parts down
Being able to take notes with a pen wasn't about how fast I wrote but about how little I wrote. Notes were there only to help me remember what was covered and write down some concrete values/dates/names that are hard to remember.
