How do Students Learn and Retain New Information? A Practical Application of the Deans for Impact Report, The Science of Learning

Abstract

This article is a practical application of the 2nd Key Question in Deans for Impact Report, The Science of Learning. The second question of the Report is, “How do students learn and retain new information?â€Â  There are two cognitive principles which support this question. 1) Information is withdrawn from memory just as it went in.  To support this principle several strategies and examples were provided, such as: Cooperative learning, Mnemonics, and Question Generation.  2) Practice is essential to learning new facts, but not all practices is equivalent.  3) strategies also support this principle: Deliberate Practice, Quizzing, and Feedback.  The Deans for Impact Report is supported by the strategies and examples in this article.