A presentation from the inaugural TeachMeet Kununurra, held at the Kununurra Community Library on 14 November, 2013

1. How to Incorporate
Study Skills into the
everyday classroom!
By Tarryn Audas
Secondary English, Health and Physical
Education
Kununurra District High School
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2. 5 Steps to Incorporating Study Skills
1.Setting Classroom Priorities
2.Setting Achievable Goals
3.Establishing what obstacles in concentration
can occur
4.Creating a Positive Study Environment
5.Creating a Study Plan– time management
strategies
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3. Setting Priorities
 Plan:
• Class discussion with students about their extra-curricular
activities and commitments – what do they do after school.
• Get students to write down their out of school commitments
in their subject book.
• Students then write down what is expected of them at
school in the subject area. (English)
• Then students rank what they have written down in order of
importance to them.
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4. Setting Priorities Continued
 How to set priorities?
• Discuss what priorities are? Why it is important to have the
right set of priorities. Definition: Precedence, especially
established by order of importance or urgency.
• Ask students to think about their ordering of priorities and
see if they would change anything. Discuss Changes.
 Discuss with students the consequences of having the wrong
priorities, particularly related to achievement at school
particularly in that subject area.
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5. Priorities In My Classroom (English)
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8. Setting Achievable Goals
 What is Goal Setting? Goal setting involves establishing specific, measurable,
achievable, realistic and time-targeted (SMART) goals.
 Establish with class the “Daily Priorities” of the classroom or subject area. What
are the “must dos” and “plan to dos?”
 List the classroom priorities, have them displayed so students can refer back.
(These can be the school’s behaviour expectations)
 Each student is to write 5 short-term goals that correspond with each priority.
 For example – KDHS

I AM RESPECTFUL – short term goals: I will use polite and encouraging words, I will listen to
others etc.

I AM RESPONSIBLE

I AM PREPARED

I AM SAFE
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9. Obstacles in concentration – Creating a
Positive Learning Environment
 Create a mind map on what is a positive learning environment
with students.
 After the mind map activity ask students to journal write for 5
minutes about where and how they study?
 Whilst they are writing, teacher is to cause distractions, talk
loudly, whistle, hum, sing, open and shut doors and windows
etc.
 After students have finished journal writing, in pairs they will
need to actively brainstorm external and internal obstacles to
studying and create smart solutions.
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10. Creating a Study Environment
What works well for one student in one family environment may
not work for another.
Creating an individual study plan.
Ask students to visualise themselves studying effectively. What
do they picture? What are some good places to study and best
times to study?
Students to write a journal entry with pictures describing their
ideal studying environment.
Class discussion about how they can create this environment at
home.
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11. Creating a Study Plan – Time Management
 Get students to come up with some estimations around how
much time they sleep, eat, watch TV, play sport etc.
 Students are to then conduct research on how they spend their
time over a three day period. (see attached hand out)
 Follow up activity – students reflect on their time sheets and
come up with three ways they can better use their time.
 Lastly incorporate a individual study plan – ask students to
block out all extra curricular activities first and then ask them
to fill in study periods 4 times a week for your subject area.
(Minimum ½ hour per session).
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12. Any Questions?
 Please see me after presentations if you have any
questions?
 After these 5 techniques have been incorporated into
your class, you can teach other specific study skills like
note taking, creating efficient study notes,
summarising, paraphrasing, quoting etc.
 Sample high school and primary school hand outs if
you are interested.
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