Here’s a great teaching strategy you can use to activate and build upon background knowledge at the beginning of a new unit of study.

It’s called: “List-Group-Label”

The steps are quite simple:

1. At the beginning of a new unit have each student generate a list of words/phrases/names that they would associate with the new topic.

2. Next, put students into groups and have them combine their individual lists.

3. Next, have students group their words/phrases/names into categories.

4. Finally, have students label the categories.

For example, I may tell my students to create a list of everything they can think of related to the topic of the American Revolution. Next, I put students into groups and they start combining lists, grouping words/phrases/names into categories, and then label their categories.

Students usually come up with categories such as Causes of the Revolution, Effects of the Revolution, Major Battles, Important Events, Famous People, and Famous Quotes. Each category has items from their various lists written under it.

This activity works great to not only tap into and build upon prior knowledge, but it also effectively sparks the students’ interest in the new topic.

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Are you looking for more teaching strategies?

For more effective teaching strategies that you can start applying to your very next class make sure read eTeach: A Teacher Resource for Learning the Strategies of Master Teachers @ www.TeachingTeacher.com

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