Faith Venture

It’s Independence Day celebration time again in the US. Like most of our Founding Fathers, I’m uncomfortable mixing politics and religion. That combination does not have a stellar history in the world.

I know that many readers of this blog are not US citizens, but it is worthwhile to get a copy of the Declaration of Independence and what we call the “Bill of Rights”–or the first 10 amendments to the US Constitution. It’s interesting in the history of writing constitutions that the writers had to agree to amendments before adoption. There are many good ideas contained in those writings.

Professors at the university seemed to believe in reading “about” thinkers instead of reading the thinkers themselves. This holds true for math and science as well as philosophy and theology. Drove me crazy. To this day, I believe in reading the source documents first. Think about them. Then dive into secondary sources to further your understanding.

But first–read and think for yourself.

It works the same with the Bible. First, read it. Then ponder and pray. Then study deeper with other sources.

We hear too much about what politicians and journalists tell us about the Bill of Rights and Declaration. Then we color that with our prejudices. Best is to return to the text. Read it again with fresh eyes. Be prepared for the shock of understanding.

Last week I wrote about the need to visualize ideas to help either express yourself or understand. Turns out I had that book (Blah, Blah, Blah by Dan Roam) in my stack of t0-read books. Interesting book.

As I studied Romans a few months ago, I started to sketch out the ideas. This is an unfinished flow chart that I started and captured digitally. (I’m actually playing with a new iPad app called Whiteboard Pro.) You could chart the main ideas. See how they fit together. And then get a sense of the argument. I like to see how the parts fit into the whole. It helps explain the context and avoid the problems that happen when you take things out of context.

This is just a quick sketch from memory, but hopefully you can get the idea. Under each of the main items in the flow chart, you could list Paul’s main examples or points. You could add points that you found important. Then you could get a sense of what the author really means. Try one.

Here is a quick sketch I made of a flow chart of Paul’s argument in Romans.

This is a guest post from Hanna Lindstrom who contributes to the Website Educational Psychology. She saw that I sometimes write on education and offered a post that is timely not only for students in the university but for all of us who remain as students. She actually wrote it for my other blog on manufacturing, but it seemed to fit after yesterday’s post about continuous learning. It’s the first guest post I’ve used in years. So welcome Hanna.

Note-taking’s Role in the Learning Process

Getting a doctorate in Educational Psychology means focusing on the social, ethical, and cognitive development of students, from early childhood to adulthood. It is the study of learning, and it deals with when, where, why, and how kids learn most effectively. “In the classroom, understanding and harnessing the nuanced interplay of disparate concepts like motivation and intelligence can contribute to a student’s long term scholastic (and life) success.” Educational psychologists look at individual differences in learning, studying both gifted and learning-disabled children. They are interested in ideas like the multiple intelligence theory, appropriate learning goals, and the motivation of students to learn. They use this research to build better curricula to improve the quality of education.

Note-taking is of interest to educational psychologists because it helps students learn and write. But even though methods for understanding and for writing are widely taught and practiced by students throughout their schooling, note-taking is a skill that is rarely taught, even at the most basic level. This is true despite the fact that note-taking is expected of students in all of their course-work. In postsecondary school education, where material is not often repeated, note-taking becomes even more integral to success. The practice is particularly important and useful for storing, digesting, and analyzing lecture content.

There is a minimalist view of the skill, which ignores the knowledge and skills that are necessary to produce valuable notes. From this perspective, the practice is seen as little more than transcription, necessitating a working knowledge of condensing techniques, like shortened words and symbols. This view sees notes as a written form of the material it aims to reproduce, which means that the material only becomes useful when referred back to at a future date.

Note-taking can be much more beneficial to student learning. When performed by a skilled student, taking notes not only aims to record information, it is designed to aid reflection and understanding. Building a stable, long-term memory of a topic often involves direct engagement with the material. In higher education institutions, the information transmitted by lectures and readings is only the beginning. It then becomes the student’s task to dissect that information after class. Note-taking can become an effective information-processing tool, which contributes to making judgments, resolving issues, and making decisions about the content. Taking notes can aid thought processes, such as the resolution of mathematical problems.

Though students take notes to record information they will need later, for an exam or to write a paper, the process of taking the notes is not passive. The act of taking notes is part of the memorization process, and it creates a form of “internal” storage. In addition, taking notes relieves working memory, freeing up the mind for comparison, application, and analysis.

There are at least three primary skills that a note-taking course would teach: comprehension through note-taking, producing notes, and how to manage and make decisions regarding the activity, as a whole. The first item can be rephrased as the art of summarization. Teaching students to produce notes by shortening words and changing syntax helps, but it is rarely done. A suggestion for the third item is a “metacognitive questionnaire on note-taking,” which invites students to examine their note-taking activity.

But perhaps the most important and fundamental benefit of note-taking is that it allows students to express themselves, which leads to greater satisfaction with their education. More work needs to be done, both inside and outside the classroom, to emphasize this important practice.

Why? Did you ever notice that when you are studying something and a question is raised, you or someone will answer fairly quickly–probably with the “correct” answer? But a skilled group leader will continue probing until the answers become much more meaningful?

In manufacturing, we have a way of thinking called “Lean.” One of the techniques we use is called “5 Whys.” If you start asking that question, after 2 or 3 you’ll begin getting at the root cause–the real reason.

In a group, the thing to watch out for is that often the brightest person gives that quick, correct response. That’s what they were taught in school. Remember and regurgitate. I had immense difficulty in school–especially with chemistry and math–until I discovered the remember and regurgitate formula. When I discovered math was simply manipulating symbols according to rules, it became easy. But I always asked, “Why?” Or, “How do you know that?” And that got me into trouble.

Asking five whys is a great way to study the Bible and other spiritual writing. If I ask, “What’s the most important thing about Jesus?”, you could say, “He came back to life after dying.” You would be correct. Collect your “A” and go home.

But, you could take that correct answer and ask “Why?” Then ask it again. Pretty soon you will reach the deep meaning that the Resurrection has in your life.

“Why” can be the best friend you have in study. It will lead you toward understanding. It’s not so important how much you know, as it is how deep you go.