Knowledge Transfer from Short
to Long Term
BY SERIK YUNUS EMRE ANATOLIAN HIGH SCHOOL
13-02-2014 / BÜNDE / GERMANY
How do we learn?
 Learning is a complex task that requires a student to use and
apply a range of cognitive skills. A student’s ability to retain
information while performing concurrent processing, often
referred to as working memory (WM), is critical to the
acquisition of increasingly more complex knowledge and
skills.
 WM is often linked to successful learning and student
academic achievement. According to the academic literature,
WM is a very useful measure of a student’s capability to
acquire new information.
 Most students are able to successfully respond to classroom
instruction that requires them to rely on their WM to acquire
new knowledge or skills. Unfortunately, some students
struggle and ultimately fail to process information effectively
which, in turn, negatively affects the outcome of instruction.
What is working memory?
 WM requires students to move information from
short-term memory to long-term memory, where it is
stored indefinitely.
 The term “working memory” is defined as a person’s
ability to temporarily hold and manipulate
information for cognitive tasks performed on a daily
basis (e.g., following directions and performing
mental math).
 WM is frequently described as a “mental scrapbook”
that allows a person to store and manipulate
information while engaging in other tasks.
How should teachers read “WM”?
 Most teachers can attest to the fact that some
students have WM deficits, which results in their
being slower and less accurate in processing
classroom instruction in class. These are the students
who have problems determining the most relevant
information and screening and “blocking out”
irrelevant information, a problem that diminishes
their WM capacity. For that reason, limitations on a
student’s WM capacity often are associated with
academic deficits in reading, mathematics, writing,
and in the area of social skills.
Working Memory in the Classroom
 Students who have difficulty paying attention to
specific information struggle with the encoding of
information. Attention, the cognitive process that
supports WM, is very important for students to make
efficient use of WM in the process of learning.To be
successful, a student must be able to move
information from WM to long-term memory, where
it is stored.20
What should teachers do to awaken WM?
 Teachers should refer to attention as the cognitive
process that allows WM to hold information when people
perform cognitive tasks, and that regulates their behavior
according to the demands of a particular task.
 For example, a student’s thoughts about an after-school
ball game might serve as a distraction during instruction.
Furthermore, the constant demands placed on students’
WM during the school day may adversely affect their
academic performance — especially those students who
have WM deficits.If a teacher knows that students with
WM difficulties need to make a greater effort to respond
to daily classroom demands, they can take steps to lessen
the challenges these students face — for example, by
repeating directions before students are required to do
the assigned tasks.
Differences Between Short Term and
Long Term Memory
Information is only stored for a short period of time in
your short term (working) memory. For no longer
than 30 seconds usually. What, or how much is taken
in depends on your attention span, but whatever that
is, the information is mostly forgotten when new
information comes along. On the other hand, your
long term memory space can never be filled (it’s
infinite), and information can be stored there for the
rest of your life.
Conditions for Transfer of
Information to Long Term Memory-#1
Your Attention: If you’re not focused on the subject
you’re studying, it will be impossible to remember all
the facts. Therefore, it is important to keep the
learning curve in mind when you study. That is: we
are more inclined to remember the information
discussed at the start and end of a study session.
Conditions for Transfer of
Information to Long Term Memory-#2
What the Information Means to You. The chance
of remembering something increases significantly if
the meaning is important or of relevance to you.
Conditions for Transfer of
Information to Long Term Memory-#3
How Well the Information Matches With What
You Already Know. Existing memories are a
magnet for related information. This is also why it’s
important to re-read the material you study. Every
time you go through the material, you will associate
more of it with the knowledge you already have.
Conditions for Transfer of
Information to Long Term Memory-#4
How Unique or Exceptional Information is.
Everybody remembers the most popular girl or boy
in school, some can remember the least popular, but
almost nobody will remember the average students.
It’s the same with information. You automatically
remember what amazed you or what spoke to your
imagination, but the rest of the material takes a little
effort.
Conditions for Transfer of
Information to Long Term Memory-#5
If Information is Connected or Can Be
Associated. We remember information that is
linked to our senses, is repeated in the text, or is
connected by rhyme or rhythm.
The Role of Attention
 The inability to regulate attention is directly related to
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student academic performance.
Attention controls the amount of time a student needs to
maintain information in WM, especially in visual WM.
Many factors influence student attention, such as
motivation, anxiety, and fatigue.
If, for any reason, a students’ attention is disturbed, his
or her opportunity to learn is diminished because
attention is essential to maintain information in WM.
If a student cannot control his attention, interfering
information will not be filtered out and learning will also
be adversely affected.
Strategies for teachers to apply
to prevent an overload of a
student’s WMs
Strategy #1: Provide short, simple, and
sequential directions, one at a time.
 Say:
“ - Open your math book.
- Find Page 78.
- Do problems 1-5.
- Wait for teacher’s feedback.
- Do problems 6-10.”
 Don’t say:
“Open your math book to page seventy-eight and do
the first ten problems.”
Strategy #2: Use visual cues and modeling
to reinforce oral directions or
explanations
 Visual cues: activate student’s prior knowledge
i.e. pictures, class rules, or any kind of posted
reminder
 Modeling: a very effective research-based
instructional method demonstrating step-by-step
how to perform a task or skill
Strategy #3: Use rehearsal, visual
imagery, and coding as ways to facilitate
the transfer of information from shortterm memory to WM to long-term
memory
 Rehearsal: the repetition of verbal information.
Verbal rehearsal results in some learning but
probably is the weakest of the three strategies for
encoding information.
 Coding: the semantic elaboration of information
through strategies such as acronyms
 For example, the mnemonic PENS can help students
remember the steps of a sentence-writing strategy:
Pick a formula
Explore words
Note the words
Search and check
 Visual imagery
Word to be learned: photosynthesis
Keyword: photo – “a good photo needs sunlight”
Strategy #4: Use semantic maps or
networks to connect a main idea to related
ideas
Strategy #5: When conveying visual
information, use the spatial contiguity
principle.
Strategy #6: Make information
meaningful by connecting the students’
prior experiences to the new information
Teacher:
 What do you know about rain forests?
Students:
 It rains a lot. It is hot and humid all year around. It has lots of trees.
It has lots of plants and animals. It has rivers or oceans nearby.
Teacher:
 Good! We live in ____________________. Do we usually have
a lot of rain? Do we have rivers or oceans nearby? Do we have lots of
trees? Is it hot and humid all year around here?
[Students respond]
Teacher:
 How is where we live the same or different from a rain forest?
[Students respond]
Teacher
 Why do you need to learn about rain forests?
Students
 Because rain forests produce oxygen we need for living.
It gives us clean air and clean water.
Teacher
 When and how can you use this information?
Students
 When people want to clear the rain forest for
development or logging, we can argue that it will affect
clean air and oxygen.
Strategy #7: Provide advance
organizers prior to beginning a lesson
to help students more easily organize
information to be learned.
 Today we will learn about blood types.
We will conduct an experiment.
We will make conclusions about mixing blood types
Strategy #8: Teach organization of text
such as story structure to facilitate
comprehension of narratives.
Title
Setting
Characters
Problem
Attempts to solve the problem
Feelings of characters during the
attempts to solve the problem
Solution/conclusion
Strategy #9: Use hierarchy to organize
information
Some other strategies…
 Review information frequently.
 Implement teaching routines and provide a
structured and consistent environment.
 Divide study time into sessions.
 Have students practice the new skills in the
same context in which they will be assessed.
…THANK YOU…
ARZU MACIT
ANTALYA-TURKEY