Pew FTLC Library
Teach Students How to Learn
What is preventing your students from performing according to
expectations? Saundra McGuire offers a simple but profound answer: If
you teach students how to learn and give them simple, straightforward
strategies to use, they can significantly increase their learning and performance.
For over a decade Saundra McGuire has been acclaimed for her
presentations and workshops on metacognition and student learning
because the tools and strategies she shares have enabled faculty to
facilitate dramatic improvements in student learning and success. This
book encapsulates the model and ideas she has developed in the past
fifteen years, ideas that are being adopted by an increasing number of
faculty with considerable effect.
The methods she proposes do not require restructuring courses or
an inordinate amount of time to teach. They can often be accomplished
in a single session, transforming students from memorizers and
regurgitators to students who begin to think critically and take
responsibility for their own learning.
Saundra McGuire takes the reader sequentially through the ideas
and strategies that students need to understand and implement. First,
she demonstrates how introducing students to metacognition and Bloom’s
Taxonomy reveals to them the importance of understanding how they
learn and provides the lens through which they can view learning
activities and measure their intellectual growth. Next, she presents a
specific study system that can quickly empower students to maximize
their learning. Then, she addresses the importance of dealing with
emotion, attitudes, and motivation by suggesting ways to change
students’ mindsets about ability and by providing a range of
strategies to boost motivation and learning; finally, she offers
guidance to faculty on partnering with campus learning centers.
She pays particular attention to academically unprepared
students, noting that the strategies she offers for this particular
population are equally beneficial for all students.
While stressing that there are many ways to teach effectively,
and that readers can be flexible in picking and choosing among the
strategies she presents, Saundra McGuire offers the reader a
step-by-step process for delivering the key messages of the book to
students in as little as 50 minutes. Free online supplements provide
three slide sets and a sample video lecture.
This book is written primarily for faculty but will be equally useful
for TAs, tutors, and learning center professionals. For readers with
no background in education or cognitive psychology, the book avoids
jargon and esoteric theory.
Publisher's description
Call number: FTLC LB 1025.3 .M356 2015
Volumes in the Pew FTLC library are cataloged through University Libraries. You
are also welcome to stop by our office (068 James H. Zumberge Hall)
and browse the collection.
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