Ever tried putting together flat-pack furniture without using the instructions?

Nope – me neither – partly because I’ve heard too many horror stories, and partly because I’m too much of a ‘follow the rules’ type-a-gal for that ?

But I do remember as a kid challenging myself to put together a lego-model without the instructions, just the pic on the box.

(Must’ve been having a rebellious moment, or just extremely bored on a wet English afternoon. Most likely the latter)*

Did I manage it?…

It was a pirate ship and me and my sister had made it plenty of times before, WITH the step-by-step instructions.

And how did this ‘no instructions’ version of said pirate ship work out?

Well I did it.

Eventually.

It wasn’t perfect, but it was pretty good. Let’s say it was a B grade pirate ship.

But it also took a lot longer of course.

A few false starts and quite a few episodes of taking bits apart and re-doing sections where I’d used a part I then realised I needed somewhere else.

Just like when students try to write an essay or complete an assignment without a clear set of steps, a template, a checklist or a clear plan to help them move step by step towards a clear end result.

In fact I see many students fumbling their way through an extended task, with no real idea of what they’re even aiming for, what it should do or say or look like at the end.

They’re working without even having the picture of the pirate ship from the box!

Let alone having any instructions for all the pieces.

So to take this a step further – let’s call the picture of the finished model, the ‘Model Response’ (geddit) 😉

Or the A-grade exemplar.

Sometimes students will be shown a model response for a similar task or question

and in exams, these are printed in the retrospectives and marking guides.

And they can be reeeeally helpful, for sure.

Just like putting together the pirate ship was a hell of a lot easier with the picture to look at.

BUT –

(yep, there’s always a ‘but’, right?!) 

Being given a model response isn’t enough if students are going to be able to work confidently and efficiently on their own task.

Because they don’t necessarily know WHY that’s an A-grade response, or what process the other student went through to create it, or what elements in there specifically make it an A-grade response.

That’s why they need to be clear on all the components AND the ways they’re put together AND how to do that for themselves.

That’s why I’m such a fan of giving students resources and trainings that are what I call ‘universal’.

Not spoon-fed ‘fill in the gaps’ type scaffolds that can only be applied to one particular task , but proven systems or blueprints if you like, that can be applied to a particular type of task across all different subjects and topics.

Like:

A checklist and system that can be used to proofread any piece of writing effectively.

Or:

A template that can be used to construct a response to any type of evaluation level essay.

And:

Proven steps to brainstorming and then selecting an A-grade idea or topic for an open-ended task.

So that they’re not just haphazardly trying to piece together whatever knowledge they have and aren’t having to re-do or re-draft or edit multiple times before they come out with a great pirate ship.

Sorry, I mean great essay/assignment 😉

Let me know your thoughts on this!

Does your teen love steps and clear instructions?

Or perhaps they’re the more creative type who is capable of crafting a ship that’s even better than the box cover (not me at all by the way. I’m not the creative type, but I play to my strengths – structure and systems)!

Whatever your feedback, let me know in the comments below.

Let’s make this a fantastic week.

Katie 🙂

*Definitely the latter. Rebel was not in my vocabulary. Still isn’t to be honest. Unless you count the time last week I jumped the take-out queue at a coffee kiosk. I’d never been to it before and I hadn’t realised there was a queue the other side… til I was stood waiting for my cuppa and saw the four people around the other end of the counter – oops!  So I guess even that doesn’t count, and I’m good with that ?

Many students struggle at times with researching, finding valid sources (i.e. NOT Wikipedia) and referencing.

Yet one of the best resources for this very task is in schools and just waiting to help!

The problem is that few students even realise this ‘resource’ is there or on offer, and even fewer use them.

Here’s a message I got from a Y10 student back in the middle of Term 4.

She said:

“Hi Katie, I’m trying to do research for my science assignment and I’m really struggling to find good resources. I’ve found a bit of info about the different compounds in laundry detergents but it’s not very scientific and I can find hardly anything on the effects of how it pollutes the rivers and water. I’ve used Google Scholar like you said, but I’m not sure about how to find any journals like you suggested in school. Do you have any other advice?”

I replied to Eliza at the time and she took my advice, and I’m going to share with you in just a moment exactly what I told her to do.

Because she emailed me again a couple of weeks ago to tell me her assignment result and how happy she was with it…  aaaannnd how brilliant that piece of advice was and how well it worked for her.

#happydance

So, this wasn’t something I specifically ended up helping her with – which is awesome news because that means ANY student can go do this 🙂

(And I know from experience that there are a lot of students out there who struggle with this, hence this blog video).

So, here’s the I advice I gave Eliza, and what any student can do to get extra help with their researching and referencing:

Go see the school’s Teacher-Librarian.

In my experience, they are one of the most under-used ‘resources’ (people!) in schools.

In most cases they are a qualified teacher and qualified librarian who therefore just loves helping students find info whilst also having a knowledge of how assignments and assessments work.

Perfect Combo!

*spreading fingers of both hands and inter-locking them together*

What’s more, because they work in the library, chances are they spend most of their time, with books and a lot of jobs that involve managing new orders, organising and admin.

Which is all good, but isn’t necessarily using all their skills and experience.

Which meeeeeans that when an actual real student – and a keen student at that – comes up to them asking for their expertise and assistance in the things they absolutely love to talk about and teach and work on, then chances are they’ll go all out to help them!

In fact – don’t tell them I said this and don’t get your hopes up too much, but I’ve even seen it happen where the teacher-librarian almost sits and does it all for the student, because they got so into it all. Not that that’s a totally perfect situation of course, but the student I saw this happen to, did thankfully sit and watch and listen avidly, following along with them so they could definitely do it themselves again next time.

But anyway, my point is, these staff are skilled in the exact thing students are struggling with and can’t wait to share everything and help those who ask for it.

So be sure to have your teen give this a go next time they have to research for an assignment or inquiry, and let me know how it goes when the time comes 🙂

Yours,

Katie

It seems everyone loves a good Google hack.

After last week’s video with the ninja trick to finding the date for referencing websites, I’ve had some super-appreciative feedback, so I’m gonna share more…

Here are my top three non-technical Google-Hacks that I think could be super-useful to your teen.

So I’ve had a ton of feedback basically loving last week’s video all about the ninja trick to finding the date for referencing websites, plus I’ve had a few suggestions of other tips and tricks.

I have to admit, I knew of all of them, BUT the more technical ones I always forget,

so in case it’s the same for you,

I’ve come up with my top three that I think could be super-useful to your teen.

Ok, so Google hack number 3 is

(we’re doing this countdown style-ee here, okay) 😉

*start the music chart countdown backing track*

(3)

Adding the subject or topic in the search box in addition to the key word that your teen is searching.

This is because just searching for the name of the person, place, event or concept often gives too wide a variety of results, which then just leads to hours upon hours of trawling a ton of websites and results including many which are totally irrelevant.

The example I always give for this is adding in the subject when researching the definition of ‘depression’ – because of course you’re going to want verrrry different results depending on whether you are researching this word for History, Business Studies, Economics, Biology or HPE, or even for an atmospheric depression in Geography or Science.

Just adding in the subject or topic is going to give much more focused results.

Onto Google Hack number 2:

(2)

Putting quote marks around the word or phrase that is a must-have search term and in the order/exact phrase you have typed.

Often Google gives results that have a sneaky little greyed out bit of text below that shows the part of the search that isn’t included in that result… which, can sometimes be the main thing you really wanted it to find!

So using our previous example, if I was researching the dates for the great depression for history, I might actually include the words –

history date

and then type

“the great depression”

with quote marks before the word the and after the word depression.

This means that the words ‘The Great Depression’ as a whole phrase must appear in any search results. So no more wasted time clicking on results only to realise they don’t actually have the key info or topic I was after.

And – drumroll please – here is my fave google hack for students.

Well, it’s not really a hack – more of a ‘I can’t believe how many students don’t know about this whole other thing’ kinda thing.

But Google Hack number 1 – is ….

(1)

Google Scholar.

This gem of a search engine searches all academic papers and publications, like scientific journals, peer reviewed articles and academically acclaimed books, websites and other publications.

So your teen can say goodbye to good-old Wikipedia

‘Urgh.’ I can tell you that no teacher ever wants to see Wikipedia in a reference list beyond Y7, maaayyyybe Year 8. At a push.

and they can say hello to more sophisticated, more reliable and credible sources for their research.

This is at scholar.google.com

Or, of course, you can just type in Google Scholar into Google!!! *There’s gotta be a meme or other joke-y-joke of google-ing for Google out there, right?*

But extra tip – make sure you’re in google scholar.com, rather than .com.au – which is where it’ll take you if you search it from google.com.au.

You staying with me here?!

So, there are my top 3 Google hacks for your teen – to save them a ton of time AND give them better QUALITY academic sources and references.

I’d love to hear your feedback on these 3 Google hacks – which one will be most useful to your teen and why – tell me in the comments below, and then while you’re there, go ahead and give this a like or a share 🙂

Until next week, let’s make this a fantastic week.

Katie

Does your teen sometimes end up spending waaaayyyyy too much time on their assignments and essays?

This week, after an email from a dad concerned about the amount of time his daughter spends editing, re-drafting and sometimes re-writing whole chunks of her assignments, I’m sharing with you the 3 pillars that underpin the whole reviewing and editing process.

*NEW!*
If you prefer to read rather than watch, scroll down for the written version 🙂

I recently had an email from a dad, concerned about the amount of time his daughter spends on her assignments, in particular, going back over, changing, editing and re-editing her assignments after receiving feedback and in the final days before submission.

And I totally get it. For many dedicated students there is an element of perfectionism at play here, as well as of course, wanting the achieve the best result they can.

This is why my official taglines are to help students get happy, smart and successful and to have them achieve their best possible success AND enjoy the journey along the way. With a lot of emphasis on that AND 😉

That’s what these blog videos are all about and why my 10 Week Program and other Write Like and A-Grader training are centred around making study as EFFICIENT and STREAMLINED as possible for teens today.

So that they do actually have time for other interests and hobbies, to just sit and relax at home, to hang out friends and even do things just for fun.

Now, being efficient in reviewing and improving any piece of work is so much easier when students have a system to follow. Otherwise any changes or edits end up being haphazard and yet more re-reads are needed after each round of edits.

And while I could do a whole video on just each step of the system it’s really more than I can cover in this blog video, so what I’d love to share with you are the 3 pillars that really underpin or rather hold up that whole reviewing and re-drafting process.

Because if your teen can at least be aware of and start to address each of these, then they will not only be producing a higher quality finished product, but they’ll also be on their way to doing it more systematically too.

1. The first pillar is matching up a piece of work with the success criteria or the marking rubric. Students should be provided with this for most longer or larger tasks completed outside of exam conditions.

Your teen needs to go through and carefully compare their work with the demands of the grade they are targeting and also the grade above – in a shoot for the moon and land among the stars kinda way. Because if they slightly miss something in their target grade, but DO have some elements of the grade above, then that should be enough to have them achieve their target.

They need to check – are they addressing all the criteria and giving enough EVIDENCE in their work that they are meeting them at the required level?

For example – if it says ‘gives a variety of sources or uses a wide range of references’ then they need to consider:

> How many they have (the amount required will increase as students move up year groups and will depend on the subject and task).

> Where did they come from – they need to show a range of different types. Again this will vary depending on the subject and task, but they certainly need to be academically credible and reliable sources,.

> How have they integrated them into their writing and USED them within their assignment. Are they discussed, compared and analysed, or are they just shoe-horned in?

2. The second pillar is making improvements to improve their overall communication and writing quality. This might be adjusting the structure, for example re-ordering paragraphs so that the points flow more and have closer linkages.

It might be using more technical vocabulary going to the thesaurus to look for more interesting words. It might be extending an explanation to improve the level of analysis. Or it might be combining or re-writing sentences to make more complex points more coherent in an investigation, or to provide more impact through shorted sentences in a speech or narrative.

3. The THIRD pillar is making corrections – ensuring there aren’t any simple errors.

Because sloppy mistakes can not only cost students in any marks specifically allocated to their writing quality, or the spelling, punctuation and grammar, but even if there aren’t any criteria specific to this, it is important in terms of the impression it makes on the marker about the type of student they are. That can be the difference as to which side of the fence the marker comes down on in any other decisions about ANY and ALL of the other criteria. So, yes – impressions from spelling, punctuation and grammar are important and so solid proofreading is essential.

OK – so quick review :0)

The first pillar of reviewing and editing is matching up their work with the marking criteria.

The second is improving their communication and the quality of their writing,

The third pillar is correcting any slips, errors or mistakes, by proofreading their spelling, punctuation and grammar.

Thanks so much for reading!

Until next week, let’s make this a fantastic week! 🙂

Katie

P.S. I’d love to know whether or not this text version is rocking people’s socks. I’d love it if you’d drop me a quick email or FB message and let me know 🙂