Hassle-Free Homework®: Study skills classes simply outdated way of learning

May 18, 2010 - PRLog -- Dear Dr. Fournier:

All year long, my son’s teacher has written notes saying my child could do better, needs to prepare more for tests and needs to show more effort. His school and other places are offering a study skills course in the summer. Do you think this can help my child do better in school?

Tonya A.
Bartlesville, OK

Dear Tonya:

No.

Stated bluntly, I believe the concept of study skills is as obsolete as the dinosaur. It’s a term I buried years ago and I refuse to consider today.

ASSESSMENT

The notion of study skills has its roots two or more generations ago when people went to school to prepare for a working world that required sameness of thinking: Many people carrying out the same job description with the same level of productivity.  

This is not today’s working work.

Today’s children must prepare for a working world in which uniqueness of thinking will be rewarded. The focus will not be, “Can you do the same task eight hours a day?” Instead it will be, “Can you find a better way to do it?”

Previous generations focused on studying what their teacher (or supervisor or manager) gave them. But now our children must learn what teachers put on the table by redeveloping it with personal thought and creativity. This allows our children to take ownership of knowledge. Anything less will mold our children into the very workforce dinosaurs that corporations can no longer use. You can see this is the case in the people these corporations have pink-slipped in just the last year to get this message across.

If a course is called Study Skills, the very message is inappropriate today.  

A child should no longer go to school to accomplish studying. Studying should be viewed as only one of the means for learning. Instead , our children must use their uniqueness in developing a complete learning process.

The term Study Skills and the concept behind it preaches uniformity of study habits:

•   Sit at a desk.
•   Have good light.
•   Avoid distractions.  

Unless you live on the moon, it’s unlikely that you can function in such a rigid, sterile way. Our children must develop strategies to confront changing circumstances. You cannot learn how to do this with a system that ignores change and diversity. Your child must develop his or her own ownership of information in a manner that new knowledge and innovation are the goals.

I once worked with a child who had a study skills course as a separate class in which there were tests on study skills. This child went to class to study how to study and then studied at home to be tested on whether he knew the process of studying. Ridiculous!

Telling children how to study is like telling them what size clothes they have to wear.  Some kids will fit that size and those who don’t end up looking silly.

WHAT TO DO

Tonya, before deciding whether your son needs a course in study skills, consider these points:

•   Your son needs to learn how to learn, not how to study.

•   Your son must learn to develop strategies to confront new information and diverse situations. He can’t do this with a one-size-fits-all set of skills.

•   In order to learn how to learn, your son must actually be learning. A sense of purpose is essential for children to enter into self-exploration with the end goal of developing their own knowledge.

This summer, help your son explore his unique interests. During vacation, he may find some of the best processes for learning, whether it’s keeping up with his favorite baseball team or figuring out how to build a tree house.

At the beginning of the school year, help your son set up a notebook that will contain a diary of learning strategies. In this notebook, your son should keep track of the strategies that worked best and those that didn’t work. Take time once a week to review this with your son and help him learn how to set new strategies that will help him adapt to changing tasks and complex situations at school and in all other environments. This is what your child needs to learn for the long-term.

Here’s an example of a strategy for learning spelling words I use with the children I counsel. Writing spelling words three times as one child’s teacher required was not enough for her to learn the words. I had her record the spelling words on a digital recorder and play them back so that she could take her own practice test.

If you have an iPod or other brand of MP3 player, your son can record his spelling words in a digital audio format for playback. Or, if you have an old-school tape recorder, this will work. Just have him record them and play them back.

Help your child use his imagination and creativity to learn and to become someone capable of facing change by changing himself. Your child can’t get this from a static set of study skills.

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For 30 years, Dr. Yvonne Fournier has been helping children become more successful in school. Her column, "Hassle-Free Homework," was published by Scripps Howard News Service for 20 years. She holds her doctorate in education.