The article, “How Changes in K-12 Schooling Hampered the Preparation of College Students” Published last month in the Chronicle of Higher Education, explores how reforms in K-12 education, combined with broader societal changes and disruptions from the COVID-19 pandemic, and teacher shortages have affected the academic habits and preparedness of today’s college students, particularly Generation Z. When examining how test-based accountability has impacted curriculum design, policies such as “No Child Left Behind” have prioritized short-term performance over long-term learning.
Teaching became narrowly focused on test-taking skills, such as answering multiple-choice questions and writing formulaic essays, leaving students unprepared for broader academic tasks. “The [K-12] curriculum has been narrowed to mirror standardized tests. Students work on short passages to develop specific skills. Every class has a lesson, and every lesson has an assessment plan and an outcome. So when students arrive at college, they are conditioned to expect that same level of guidance. Ethan Hutt [an associate professor of education at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill], would like to give an assignment that goes like this: Pick a topic, write an essay, and say something interesting. But he finds he can’t — not even with his doctoral students”.
The article argues that, as a result, Students struggle with tasks like reading long texts and writing analytical essays because of a curriculum that favored short passages and responses. The shift away from holistic learning resulted in “atomized” education, where students are conditioned to expect detailed rubrics and granular guidance for assignments. Professors find that students enter college unprepared for the skills that are expected of them. Students often struggle with open-ended assignments, critical thinking, and engaging deeply with academic material. The article concludes that while K-12 reforms and the pandemic have played significant roles in shaping current students’ academic habits, broader systemic and cultural factors must also be addressed. Higher education inherits these challenges and must adapt to better support students’ academic and social transitions.
Based on the content of this article it may be helpful to integrate student engagement and metacognitive practices into first and second year classes such as integrating the Student Engagement Roster into your classroom practice:
SER Roster: The early feedback tool that allows faculty members to communicate with students about how they are doing in a class and make recommendations to improve or deepen their learning. SER also allows instructors to meet two faculty reporting obligations at IUB: Attendance verification and early evaluation grades. More information on those topics is available in the Help and Resources section.
Next week (1/20/2025) Submit SER with Attendance/Participation Feedback for:
Anyone not attending
Anyone already struggling to turn in work
Anyone doing a great job participating
Metacognitive Strategies
Think Aloud Exercises:
Anytime you can talk out loud (‘think aloud’) about how you view a document or a picture or programming an assignment, or share your thinking processes with students you are helping them become more metacognitive in their own approaches to the subject. Once you have modeled for them how you would solve a problem or interpret a piece of writing, have students work in pairs to talk out loud as to how they are thinking about an assignment piece of homework or an assignment.
Concept Mapping:
Learning benefits can be derived from instructor-led or student-constructed concept maps of the connections and key ideas from a course or class. It is best that the instructor demonstrate how to design a concept map of a class or course before students are asked to do the same. Show students how the readings, videos, assignments and activities are connected to the course learning outcomes and other courses.
Design a brief or detailed concept map of the course or sub-components of the course and share with students. Then later on in course students can form small groups and build a concept map as a review activity before a mid-term or as a review of a portion of the course. Students can do for homework or they can do in class and share with each other explaining the interrelationships between each component. Ask the students to draw all the ‘cross-links’ and label them as they see the components connecting fully or partially.
Guided Notes
Guided notes are structured outlines provided by an instructor that include key concepts, ideas, or topics, with spaces for students to fill in additional information during the lecture or while engaging with course content.
Lecture Notes: An instructor provides an outline of the lecture with prompts for students to add definitions, examples, or connections.
Reading Notes: A guided framework for analyzing a reading or resource, directing students’ attention to specific questions or themes.
Problem-Solving Frameworks: In mathematics or sciences, guided notes might include partial steps of a problem-solving process, leaving students to complete the solution.
This technique aligns with various teaching strategies, including scaffolding and universal design for learning (UDL), as it helps to bridge the gap between independent learning and instructor support.
More strategies and resources available here.