Students Teaching Each Other Why it works!

Learner-Centered Learning An activity, in which students each teach their fellow students a specific computer skill. Everyone learns the skill better, while also achieving the Learning Outcomes of the course. I going to share a Learner Centered activity which I use in my Business Computer Proficiency course. Using this activity students teach their fellow students a specific computer skill. Everyone learns the skill better, while still achieving the Learning Outcomes of the course. A little background about my course: Students should gain skills in Word, Access and Excel, and potencially pass 4 MOS (Microsoft Office Specialty) exams.

Layne Bishop This is Layne Bishop, one of my current great students. He is at the front of the classroom, while I am observing from the back of the classroom, as he teaches his fellow classmates how to complete a CountIF Funcion in Microsoft Excel. I love seeing this happen in my classes – student’s aren’t just listening to me, but are engaged with each other. Teaching his fellow classmates how to complete a CountIF Function in Microsoft Excel

Learner-Centered Teaching Maryellen Weimer – Author of Learner-Center Teaching Five characteristics of learner-centered teaching Engages students in the hard, messy work of learning.  Teaching includes explicit skill instruction. Encourages students to reflect on what they are learning and how they are learning it. Teaching motivates students by giving them some control over learning processes. Teaching encourages collaboration. I accepted the challenge of creating a Learner-Centered teaching activity while completing the Online Teaching Certification course at DSU this past summer. As part of that course we studied the work of Maryellen Weimer. In her book Learner-Center Teaching, she explains the Five characteristics of learner-centered teaching.

One Characteristic: Select a skill from four lists of MOS Skills “Engage students in the hard, messy work of learning.” Select a skill from four lists of MOS Skills Learn how to complete the skill Prepare a file to use in teaching classmates Provide file to teacher – Uploaded into Canvas Assignment Instructions and Rubric One of those characteristics really stood out to me, “Engage students in the hard, messy work of learning.” The learner-centered activity I developed gives students some control over the learning processes, because they get to choose how their task is learned by themselves, and their fellow students. Instead of passively following the instructor, they are digging into resources, figuring out how to accomplish a task, and why it needs to be accomplished. This learner-centered activity encourages students to reflect on what they are learning and how they are learning it, because as they decide how to teach the skill, they are also deciding why and when the skill will be used, the rationale for the skill. I used this Learner-Centered activity for the first time during Fall Semester 2018, with great success. After evaluating and refining the activity instructions, I am again using the assignment with good success this Spring Semester 2019. Steps of Activity.

Layne’s MOS Skill Lesson: Students select a skill from one of four lists of MOS Skills (over 300 possible skills). Layne selected the skill of Performing Logical operations by using the CountIF function. He created a file and sent it to me before class, so that I could upload it into Canvas, so that it would be available for the rest of the students. You see his file in the MOS Skill Lesson Start Files module of Canvas. I provided students with two examples at the beginning of the semester. This is the file he created. Interested in sports so his file includes data from SuperBowl games played, and from Real SL.

Student Participation Part of the grade student’s receive for this assignment is participation in lessons presented by other students. This is a sheet I use to keep track of his student’s lesson date and participation

Added Benefits (Besides Learning the Skill) “The more students discover the less the teacher has to cover” Different voice “Getting to know you” – my collaboration with individual students “Getting to know each other” – learning names and interests New methods to complete tasks Repetition of skills