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Current Articles 

• Good Students Need Good Study and Organizational Skills

• Helping Students Organize for the New School Year

• Time Management A Discussion with High School Students

• Helping Reinforce Spelling Skills

   

 

Good Students Need Good Study and Organizational Skills
by Judith Stern, M.A.
Educational Consultant

Over the years, I have worked with many middle school and high school students, as well as those beginning college careers.  We inevitably end up having a discussion about being smart is not the same as being organized.  Learning to use both your intelligence and strong study skills together help reduce stress, improve assignment quality and increase productivity.  Adolescents and young adults often tell me that nobody ever really taught them how to do the many learning skills that are an important part of being a good student.  Let's look at some of the most important ones:

Time Management

• Prioritizing

• Learning to Schedule

• Understanding Time

• Being Realistic About How Much Time is Needed to Complete an Assignment or Project

• Learning to Spread Out Large Tasks

• Finding Your Most Effective Time to Work and Study

Organizing Materials and Belongings

• Keeping Organized Notebooks

• Keeping Track of Notes, Papers, Books

• Creating a Good Storage System

Reading

• Strategies for reading for information

• Reading strategies that reinforce studying

• Questioning techniques that strengthen meaning

• Reading and taking tests

• Establishing purpose of your reading in order to derive greater meaning

Learning to Study

• Increasing your repertoire of different ways to study

• Preparing effectively for tests in different subjects

• Evaluating your test performance as a means of constructive feedback

• Useful memory tools

The good news is that all of these skills can be learned and strengthened.  With increased skills, students feel more confident and are able to manage the many demands placed upon today's students. 

About the Author:
Judith Stern works with individual and small groups of students from grades 6-12 in the Rockville/Metropolitan Washington D.C. area to improve their organization and study skills throughout the year.  At the end of each summer, she runs a study skills series for students to help them get ready for their return to the school year.  She also consults with parents and schools on learning and attention issues. 

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Helping Students Organize for the New School Year
by Judith Stern, M.A.
Educational Consultant

Sometime around mid-summer, students, parents and teachers begin thinking about the upcoming new school year.  Although the types of thoughts may vary, there is no question that getting off to an organized start is an excellent strategy.
 
Getting students back on to a good sleep schedule should begin a week or two before school begins, so that kids are ready to catch that early school bus each morning.  Cleaning and organizing a child/teen's bedrooms helps create a less cluttered environment for storage, clothing and school materials.  If a student uses a desk in the bedroom or another spot in the home, this is the time to clear it out and stock with papers, pencils, rulers and scissors. A three-hole puncher is important for middle schoolers and high schoolers.  Make sure computers and printers are in good working order.  For older students, develop a filing system, whether it involves a filing cabinet or a rolling file container, so that papers can be stored safely, rather than overflowing in a binder.

Include students of all ages in a time to organize their clothes for the school year.  This may involve trying clothes on, giving away those that no longer fit and making room for new items of clothing.  Whether a child has his/her own bedroom or shares with others, the room should be cleared and organized before school begins.  Younger children may need some parental support in accomplishing this large task, but all students should be involved in this activity.

Establish a place where school books and library books will be consistently stored, so they are easy to find.  Create a specific place where backpacks and jackets should be placed whenever the child/teen walks in the door.

If your child takes a snack to school, develop a system that works well for your family.  You can try keeping healthy snacks in a clearly marked space (cabinets and refrigerator) and have your child pack that the night before.  When the supply is running low, encourage your child to add suggestions to the family shopping list.  Kids really do get hungry during the school day, so make sure to keep some non-perishable options always on hand for those days that the shopping just didn't get done. Have a happy and organized school year!

About the Author:
Judith Stern works with individual and small groups of students from grades 6-12 in the Rockville/Metropolitan Washington D.C. area to improve their organization and study skills throughout the year.  At the end of each summer, she runs a study skills series for students to help them get ready for their return to the school year.  She also consults with parents and schools on learning and attention issues.

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Time Management A Discussion with High School Students

The following is a summary of class discussions held with several classes of ninth and tenth graders regarding problems they experience with homework stress and time management. We  talked about the problems they found in trying to manage time appropriately.  We then worked together to come up with some viable solutions.  This is a good activity for students confronted with heavy course loads and after-school demands.  It is useful as a single discussion or as part of a series of study skills sessions. Judith Stern is available to conduct these discussions, as well as to train teachers and counselors on this topic.

Problems Discussed: 

• Uneven load of work during the year

• Lots of commuting time

• Procrastination

• Extra Curricular Activities take lots of time and commitment

• Other distractions get in the way. Screen time is a big issue.

• Want to maintain a social life

• Need to sleep

• Want time with family

• Keeping in touch with friends-many who live at a distance

• Chores add to time needed several times a week.

• Conflicts of due dates and tests – all clustered together

• Lots of deadlines to meet

• Staying up too late doing work

• Teachers each think their subject is the most important.

• Taking advance placement courses means a lot more work, but students want to be in these classes.

• Not enough time in the day!

Solutions:

• Prioritize when you schedule yourself.  What is most important to get done?

• Use a study sheet to be specific about what to study.

• Make lists, then check off or cross off items as they are finished.

• Re-energize when you get home from school:

• Be honest about your sleep pattern.  Are you getting enough so that you are able to stay alert in school.

• Consider taking fewer AP courses.

• Talk with parents about a realistic load of after-school activities.  Consider spreading out favorite activities over several semesters.

• If screen time is competing with homework time, talk to parents or counselors for advice.

• For large tests, form study groups so that several students can share the load of preparing review notes.

• Use several hours on the weekend to get ahead on assignments, study for upcoming tests, or work on large assignments.  This lessens the load on week nights.

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Helping Reinforce Spelling Skills

Practicing spelling skills does not need to be a boring task.  You can  motivate children to practice spelling words in a variety of formats through strategies that are multi-sensory and engaging:

• Write words in a sandbox with a stick.

• Write in snow, rice or sand placed in a shoe box top.

• Finger paint words using shaving cream on tabletops; or pudding or whipped cream on paper plates.

• Practice writing words on dry-erase boards with colored dry-erase pens.

• Write the words using alphabet manipulatives and tactile letters (magnetic letters, sponge letters, alphabet stamps, alphabet cereal, letter tiles, linking letter cubes). Students can be given these manipulatives in large or small group lessons, to use in order to build words.  (“Let’s spell the word hot; now make the word pot; try to spell spot, plot.”)

• Write silent letters (ghost letters) in a different color. Trace over each word at least three times in different colors (pencils, crayons, chalk, or markers). Then, without looking, write the word from memory.

• Have students use colors to highlight the tricky parts of words (know, knee)

• Color code key elements/features of the word (e.g., prefixes/suffixes, final e). Write the words by syllables in different colored markers. Use mnemonics whenever possible to help students remember and learn memory strategies to apply in the future.  Examples:  Friend    -    I am a friEND to the END; Principal – The principal is your PAL.

• Play games that involve spelling: Hangman, Scrabble, Boggle.

• Create pictures using words. (Write look with o’s drawn as eyes; clown with a funny hat).

• Write words in the air using a stiff arm and large muscle movements, while sounding them out (sky writing).

Use song and movement to practice spelling words

• Pair movement while spelling words aloud (clap to each letter, bounce a ball, use a yo-yo, jump rope). 

• Tap out the sounds or syllables in words (pencil to desk, fingertips to desk or arm, spelling word while tapping with one hand down the other arm (shoulder to hand).

• Spell words standing up for consonant letters and sitting down for vowels.

Other ways to practice, study, and learn the spelling of words

• Make a set of flash cards.  Study each of the words with a partner (or parent).  Put aside the words that were missed.  Restudy them.

• Make up word skeletons.  Example:   _ _ s _ r _ _ e _ t  for the word instrument.  The child needs to fill in the missing letters.

• Practice using the copy, write, cover, check method (CWCC). Use the “Look, Say, Write” method of practice.  Look at the word and trace it with a finger or pencil.  Then say the word, spelling it out loud while copying it.  Next, write the word without looking and check for accuracy.  Fix any errors immediately because it helps with remembering the correct spelling of the word.

• Use word sorts to provide students opportunities to work with words and discover common patterns.  For example, students would place stopping, sitting and cutting in one column, while reading, playing and sorting would go in another column.  Students can be asked to state the spelling rules for each column of words.

• Make the study of words interesting.  Point out spelling irregularities. Discuss languages of origin of various words.  Discuss words spelled with similar patterns and those that look very unusual.

• Encourage a broad range of reading, so that students are exposed visually to a large number of words from fiction and non-fiction texts.

 

 

© 2019, Judith Stern, M.A.