What makes students effective learners than high scorers

Schools that teach kids to become effective learners instead of just teaching them how to secure good marks, are the ones where kids score higher grades, a new study has found.

Washington, Aug 16 : Schools that teach kids to become effective learners instead of just teaching them how to secure good marks, are the ones where kids score higher grades, a new study has found.

The UK's Economic and Social Research Council's Teaching and Learning Research Programme (TLRP) undertook the challenge of finding out the factors that make some schools more successful than others in their 'Learning How to Learn' project.

As part of the study, Professor Mary James and colleagues worked with 40 schools to see how pupil assessment can help people become more effective learners instead of being a barrier to success.

The study found that children at school usually worked on their own or in the whole class. They noted that properly run work in smaller groups could help learning.

Giving children an old mobile might be of more use than buying them a computer in helping them to gain more from information technology.

The study noted that changing schools might disturb children, and that a structured exchange of knowledge between school and home, involving conversations, objects and pictures, could make it much easier and less disruptive.

"Our research showed that many teachers want to help pupils develop their own learning skills. There are big differences in how successfully different teachers manage to develop learners. But teachers who have proper professional development and support can help children to take responsibility for their own learning. These pupils can think about what they are learning and how, and, improving their own learning," James said.

"The government says it wants to put less focus on targets when it assesses how well public services are doing. The work we have done shows that this new emphasis is the right one. A school where everything depends on paper results and performance does not develop children as learners. And teachers who are forced to work in this way cannot become more effective and responsible," she said.

ANI