After school on Thursday,
December 8, Aspire and Achieve hosted a study skills workshop for 12 freshmen
at Oakland Tech. Specifically designed by Tom Demerath (semiweekly tutor, with
specialty in writing and history) and me (Max Shapiro, weekly tutor, with
specialty in math and science), the workshop consisted of two 25 minute
segments, the first honing in on time management skills and the second
emphasizing studying specifically for math.
The students were divided into two groups of six and rotated between
both workshop segments.
In the time management segment,
Tom (with an assist from Katie Crawford, a career counselor at UC Berkeley)
invited the students to think about their “big picture” goals (e.g., what they
want to accomplish in a year, or in high school, or in college), to share with
the group what tasks those goals require, and to visualize those tasks
superimposed onto a daily schedule (in the form of a pie chart, with more of
the pie taken up by more time-consuming tasks).
Students then learned how to use their phones (via a smartphone application
called “30/30”) to manage their schedules and to measure their daily progress. Students felt appreciative for the reflection
time and empowered to hold themselves accountable for their daily
responsibilities.
In the math study skills segment,
students acquainted themselves with Wolfram Alpha, a Google-like search engine that
is phone-accessible and especially leverageable in a math context. While working on problems in pairs, students
gained experience using Wolfram Alpha to figure out the meaning of unfamiliar
math terminology and to visualize and solve math equations. Students learned that the idea of a “math
person” is a myth—nobody is born with perfect math knowledge, but interested
learners can acquire that knowledge through concerted effort and recourse to relevant
resources.
The workshop was a resounding
success! Many thanks to the students for their attention and effort, to the
Oakland Tech staff members for their permission to use their classrooms, and to
Ike’s sandwiches for their postgame nourishment.
