The Learning Strategy Of Highlighting
Strategies such as the group work strategy are an important part of learning experiences during university with peers. Group work is predominantly clarified as work handled by a group of people, working towards a specific goal.
An advantage to this strategy is that in some cases, group assessments are able to be separated into distinct parts that can then be split between group members; giving each member their own specific section to complete and support if needed. Development of group work skills ensures peers learn how to work together efficiently. In addition, a key benefit from doing group work, as reported by students including myself, is the likelihood of forming new friendships; especially peers that are interested in the same career. A possible limitation is roles within group work scenarios. Particular roles can reduce the feasibility of groups achieving their goals, or make it strenuous for peers to focus on the task at hand. From my personal experience in the Preparing for Success Program (PSP), there had been conflict and difficulties in some circumstances in regards to personalities clashing and desires of becoming head of the group. When it comes to group work in the future, I have confidence that it would be particularly beneficial if a group member was allocated as leader from the beginning, as well as allocated roles for each peer.
Highlighting is a learning strategy that draws attention to certain things that are marked as potentially important pieces of information while reading. This strategy is known to be beneficial for a lot of students, as many rely on it. Highlighting might make the marked section of information more memorable as the text will emerge from the surrounding non-highlighted information. The act alone of decision making towards what to and what not to mark may initialize the processing of information at a deeper level for students rather than reading the text as is. Conforming to the idea of marked information and processing for students, highlighting regularly produces better performance. In addition, learner-generated highlighting are likely to generate better test results than experimenter-generated highlighting. Limitations of this technique may include people not highlighting effectively, as they do not know how to. I have also found that a lot of confusion can come with highlighting, especially over highlighting. From this point onwards, I would like to include color coding in regards to highlighting, as it will outline information that may be missed, such as topics or critical information. Highlighting will be continuously used as a learning strategy throughout my undergraduate degree and following.
The Preparing for Success Program (PSP) is an extremely worthwhile program offered to individuals to prepare themselves for learning at higher levels of education, in particular, university. A wide range of skills and techniques are taught to participants, ensuring that they are prepared for involvement in higher education institutions. This course enables participants to have a smooth and positive transition into higher education; along with the understanding of expectations during further education. Skills taught in PSP are influential in providing students higher leveled educational abilities through direct participation and first-hand experiences.
