Avoding Test Burnout (RSS feed post 1)

Edutopia posted an article titled, "How to Avoid Testing Burnout" posted by Ben Johnson and I found it fitting for this time of the year, especially as I return from up north and got a taste of summer :) I enjoyed reading this article right after posting about Richardson's first chapter of our text because there is so much out there that we can do to enhance student learning, and that we must stay up with out students! Johnson makes a claim that by allowing students to choose activities, we can avoid burnout. Johnson claims there are two parts: one, "The teacher part is coming up with creative ideas...Look through magazines, books and talk to colleagues to mine them for ideas and create a list of doable learning activities that would bring variety to enhance the learning engagement of students", and two, "The students' part is to pick three or four learning activities they would like to do from the list as a class". Johnson goes on to say that by giving the students a choice in their learning activities will better prepare them for their testings. He suggests having students rank the activities and to do them all in class while working up to the "favorite". While we all begin to review for our final exams, we can come up with a few engaging activities, and let students rank them in order from lowest to highest "want". The first activity will be the one that received the lowest amount of votes and from there, students will work up to their "want" activity, or the one with the majority vote.This adds anticipation, review time that counts, student-centered/chosen activities, and more responsibility for them as the learners. I plan to implement this idea when I start my review week towards the end of May. I love the idea of letting students take charge of their learning...even though I have it all planned out.  :)

Johnson, Ben. "How to Avoid Testing Burnout." Weblog post. Edutopia. N.p., 03 May 2013. Web. 05 May 2013.