Actively Learn - Teaching Tips

How to Build Vocabulary

• Encourage students to define unfamiliar words in the directions of the assignment.
• Ask students to define words and read aloud the definition during class readings.
• Add notes that model using the vocabulary words that you want students to focus on.
• Add questions that prompt students to try using the new vocabulary in their answers.
• When reviewing student answers, provide feedback on how to they used the vocabulary words.

How to Cultivate Metacognition

• Add Poll questions to help students reflect on their attitudes before reading.
• Add notes that model your metacognitive reading process such as advising a section has key information and to slow down while reading that section to ensure they do not overlook the information.
• Have students monitor their understanding while they're reading by sending notes to their teacher for parts they are confused about.
• Provide feedback to student responses to questions and allow for revisions.

How to Encourage Strategic Annotations

• Customize annotation categories to fit your preferred strategies. This will remind students to think in a particular way as they construct meaning from the text.
• Model and scaffold on student annotations by creating your own notes for students to view while they are reading. This allows students to view what expert annotations look like to better create their own.
• Scaffold annotations within the directions provided by students by listing what you would like to see in their annotations.
• Provide feedback on student annotations by responding to their notes. This encourages students to annotate as their notes are being seen by their teacher and classmates.
• Integrate annotations such as notes by using them as starting points in discussions.

How to Facilitate Discussions

• Dedicate more time to class discussions.
• Encourage student-led discussions. Do this by having students share at least one of their notes and reply to at least one note created by a classmate. This allows students to have discussions within the text.
• Create a discussion question within a note to prompt students to respond.

How to Improve Accessibility

• Adjust visual presentation of text. Students can change the text to accommodate their learning needs such as adjusting the spacing of the text, the text size, and the font of the text.
• Use text-to-speech, the dictionary, and translation features.
• Add questions that chunk the text together into shorter sections for better understanding. Students will only be able to read the text up to the point of the question and will have to answer the question before they can move forward with reading the text.

How to Model Expert Reading

Highlight particular reading strategies and include notes for students, encouraging them to reciprocate what you've shown them. This will help students understand the purpose of these specific strategies.

How to Build Background Knowledge

• Pre-teach essential information by adding teacher notes of what students should know before they start reading the text.
• Create notes that provide knowledge while students are reading.
• Sequence instruction. This will help students deepen their understanding of a topic or learning objective.