Strategies for Improving Student Attention and Memory

It's my last semester of college courses, and one in particular had some good information today. These strategies come from a textbook on teaching special education students, but the ideas are applicable in any classroom.

Five conditions/disorders associated with problems with attention and memory:

a. Learning disabilities

b. Intellectual disabilities (mental retardation)

c. Physical impairments (cerebral palsy, hearing impairments, etc.)

d. ADD/ADHD

e. Autism

Strategies for improving student attention:

a. Plan lessons with structure, clarity, redundancy, and enthusiasm

b. Use interesting & motivating examples

c. Use attention-getting demonstrations

d. Explain directions carefully

e. Use a Direct Appeal

f. Use proximity to your advantage

g. Rearrange the classroom

h. Break up activities/divide tasks into smaller segments

i. Allow sufficient movement

j. Provide student activities

k. Use peers to monitor/promote attention

l. Provide reinforcement for attention

m. Teach self-recording strategies

Strategies for improving student memory:

a. Ensure that students are attending appropriately to instruction

b. Ensure that students are motivated to learn

c. Ensure that students have a positive affective response to the material to be learned

d. Ensure that student interest/engagement is high

e. Teach students “metamemory” skills (knowing where, when, and how to remember)

f. Use external memory devices (planners, physical prompts, etc.)

g. Enhance meaningfulness (provide direct, relevant, personal examples)

h. Use concrete examples, pictures, or imagery

i. Minimize interfering information

j. Use enactments and manipulation (physical engagement)

k. Promote active learning

l. Increase practice (“overlearn”/ “overteach”)

m. Teach clustering & organization (graphic organizers, etc.)

n. Provide elaborations (relate external knowledge/applications)

o. Use mnemonic techniques

Three kinds of mnemonic techniques:

a. Keyword method: provide a “keyword” to link to the concept to be remembered; create an image that joins the keyword and the concept

b. Pegword method: match rhyming words with numbers and create an image that links the rhyming word with the numbered concept

c. Letter strategies: acronyms (NASA) and acrostics (ROY G. BIV)

And on just an interesting note: Our responsibility as teachers in regard to students taking stimulant medications (to treat conditions linked to poor attention) is to "Collect formative data that identifies how the medication affects the student’s behavior both positively and negatively."