Working Memory
For those of you who read my newsletter article in our last edition, I would like to explore in a little more detail the importance of developing our working memory. It is said that the difference between someone who is good at mathematics and someone who is not so good, is the strength of their working memory. How much information can you remember? What strategies do you use to memorise information? How do you recall information? The good news is that you can improve your working memory if you exercise it.
In my Year 3 maths class I have recently introduced a memory activity to start the lesson. Not only does it get students to tap into their Frontal Cortex and set the scene for an engaging lesson, but they also love it. The first memory activity required students to look at a sequence of 8 dice for 30 seconds, turn the page over and re-create the pattern from memory. They then had to look at a series of 3x3 grids for 30 seconds that contained different pictures and from memory, select the 9 images from a larger group of 15. The students found these relatively easy but wait until they see what I have install for them next time.
Starting each lesson with a 10-minute memory challenge immediately gets students exercising their memory. Research shows that regular memory exercise will improve your capacity to recall more information from your working memory, thus potentially improving your performance in subjects such as Mathematics that rely heavily on a students’ ability to recall facts. Did I mention that the students also love it?
Developing working memory in our students is something that I wish to explore further and introduce on a larger scale across the Primary school. It is a terrific way to start a maths lesson and get the students engaged and thinking from the very first minute.