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In Action
Fiorella & Mayer's Generative Learning in Action
Generative Learning in Action helps to answer the which activities can students carry out to create meaningful learning? It does this by considering how we, as teachers, can implement the eight strategies for generative learning set out in the work of Fiorella and Mayer in their seminal 2015 work Learning as a Generative Eight Learning Strategies that Promote Learning. At a time when a great deal of attention has been paid to the teaching and learning from the perspective of effective instruction, Generative Learning looks at the flip side of coin and considers what is happening in the minds of the learner. This book takes a teachers-eye view of a range of theories of learning and keeps their application to the classroom firmly in mind through the use of case studies and reference to day to day practice. Generative Learning in Action also discusses the key considerations and potential limitations of each of the strategies, as well as how you could implement these in your own practice and more widely across a school. The authors bring a wealth of experience to this topic. Zoe Enser was a classroom English teacher for over 20 years as well as head of department and school leader in charge of improving teaching and learning. She is now lead specialist advisor for Kent with The Education People. Mark Enser has been a geography teacher for the best part of two decades as well as a head of department and research lead. He is the author of Making Every Geography Lesson Count and Teach Like Nobody's Watching as well as a TES columnist.
120 pages, Kindle Edition
Published September 18, 2020
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
February 2, 2022
Possibly the biggest mistake I made before reading this book was to read the actual original research paper published by the original researchers before reading the book which effectively made reading the book fairly pointless! This isn’t too difficult, this is up to the paper in Google scholar actually has a link to be original research.
I’m not sure that the effective paraphrasing of the major points made in the regional research paper really added very much their fundamental ideas being outlined by Fiorella and Mayer.
One thing that does surprise me given that it’s now 2021 is the lack of consideration for the ways in which digital tools would be relevant in this context for facilitating and guiding the kinds of responses made by students name using digital tools. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised given the generally tech phobic nature of the teaching profession in the UK, but as an international educator who is fortunate to work in a school where every student has their own device it strikes me that this framework has a huge amount of potential when applied within a digital environment, please allow me to outline some possibilities here:
Dgital tools have a huge amount offer here, arguably way more than trying to utilise many of these activities with traditional teaching tools and methods. In particular...
Summarising:
The affordances of a digital work word processing environment makes this far more feasible, working on a text paragraph by paragraph, especially as students can refer to the original paragraph and then delete it (or use strikethrough if the teacher would like to refer to the original text to ensure that their summary is appropriate) once the text they’ve written in summary can be assured to have done this task effectively. Another added bonus here is that with a simple click it’s easy to consider alternative phrasing, terms and definitions in order to assist with the process of summarisation. This is especially the case with EAL students.
Mapping
Digital mind maps have so much to offer in this context, not the least of which is the ease with which a starter digital map made by the teacher can be easily duplicated by students to work on, easily facilitating the scaffolding that is recommended, but of course also the ease with which illustrations/imagery can be added. But perhaps the most powerful is the fact that the space is effectively unlimited, students have far more flexibility in terms of expanding the scope of the map, and of course we visiting revising and editing it as their understanding develops/changes.
Drawing
Or to put it another way “visualising“ ... the plethora of imagery easily and quickly available online makes finding the fundamental elements to communicate understanding relatively quickly, these elements can then be combined on an digital whiteboard to communicate overall understanding, this gets around the challenge indicated in the research with students who find drawing challenging, it also vastly accelerates the process and ensures that the focus is upon the meaning of the images and not on the construction of the images themselves. Even more exciting, recent technological developments now even enable students to turn rather crude sketches into clearly understandable images using Google Auto Draw (Integrated into Google Jamboard)
Self-testing
Digital Technology radically transform this with the simplicity of the ease of execution, there is a plethora of online self testing tools available, many of these are free, and they facilitate the simple and efficient self testing that is outlined in the research, and it enables any misconceptions to be addressed immediately as there is no time delay in terms of waiting for the teacher to review the test responses to highlight any misconceptions, a digital platform indicates these errors and misconceptions immediately. This frees the teacher to do the far more interesting and important work of addressing those misconceptions rather than wasting time with determining what those misconceptions may be. Some of these platforms such as Quizlet even enable students to either select from pre-constructed testing materials or to construct their own. The software is even clever enough to facilitate different testing formats from the same core content such as matching, cloze passages, MCQs, flashcards et cetera.
Self-explaining/teaching
With the effective use of screen casting and screen recording effectively these two generative learning techniques can be essentially combined. Students create tutorial videos ostensibly for other students to use to help them learn certain skills and understanding, but we know that the fact is that this research clearly shows that even if no other student ever uses the tutorial video created by the student, there is still value for the student in creating the video as if it would be. In terms of the teaching component this can easily be facilitated through the option of students leaving comments on the video in terms of key questions they would like clarified or points they need to deepen their understanding of.
Another really practical point here is that often the student the veracity of the content created by the student can be determined by the nature of the questions being asked by the students who have watched the video as opposed to the teacher needing to watch all of the videos themselves.
Enacting
Interestingly the assumption made by the researchers here is that the enacting has to be physically performed with hand movements, which makes me wonder how effective this might be if then enacting took the form of the digital animation of objects, if this is true then there are many very powerful digital tools that quickly enable students to assemble elements and animate those elements in order to be able to communicate understanding of a particular concept...
I’m not sure that the effective paraphrasing of the major points made in the regional research paper really added very much their fundamental ideas being outlined by Fiorella and Mayer.
One thing that does surprise me given that it’s now 2021 is the lack of consideration for the ways in which digital tools would be relevant in this context for facilitating and guiding the kinds of responses made by students name using digital tools. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised given the generally tech phobic nature of the teaching profession in the UK, but as an international educator who is fortunate to work in a school where every student has their own device it strikes me that this framework has a huge amount of potential when applied within a digital environment, please allow me to outline some possibilities here:
Dgital tools have a huge amount offer here, arguably way more than trying to utilise many of these activities with traditional teaching tools and methods. In particular...
Summarising:
The affordances of a digital work word processing environment makes this far more feasible, working on a text paragraph by paragraph, especially as students can refer to the original paragraph and then delete it (or use strikethrough if the teacher would like to refer to the original text to ensure that their summary is appropriate) once the text they’ve written in summary can be assured to have done this task effectively. Another added bonus here is that with a simple click it’s easy to consider alternative phrasing, terms and definitions in order to assist with the process of summarisation. This is especially the case with EAL students.
Mapping
Digital mind maps have so much to offer in this context, not the least of which is the ease with which a starter digital map made by the teacher can be easily duplicated by students to work on, easily facilitating the scaffolding that is recommended, but of course also the ease with which illustrations/imagery can be added. But perhaps the most powerful is the fact that the space is effectively unlimited, students have far more flexibility in terms of expanding the scope of the map, and of course we visiting revising and editing it as their understanding develops/changes.
Drawing
Or to put it another way “visualising“ ... the plethora of imagery easily and quickly available online makes finding the fundamental elements to communicate understanding relatively quickly, these elements can then be combined on an digital whiteboard to communicate overall understanding, this gets around the challenge indicated in the research with students who find drawing challenging, it also vastly accelerates the process and ensures that the focus is upon the meaning of the images and not on the construction of the images themselves. Even more exciting, recent technological developments now even enable students to turn rather crude sketches into clearly understandable images using Google Auto Draw (Integrated into Google Jamboard)
Self-testing
Digital Technology radically transform this with the simplicity of the ease of execution, there is a plethora of online self testing tools available, many of these are free, and they facilitate the simple and efficient self testing that is outlined in the research, and it enables any misconceptions to be addressed immediately as there is no time delay in terms of waiting for the teacher to review the test responses to highlight any misconceptions, a digital platform indicates these errors and misconceptions immediately. This frees the teacher to do the far more interesting and important work of addressing those misconceptions rather than wasting time with determining what those misconceptions may be. Some of these platforms such as Quizlet even enable students to either select from pre-constructed testing materials or to construct their own. The software is even clever enough to facilitate different testing formats from the same core content such as matching, cloze passages, MCQs, flashcards et cetera.
Self-explaining/teaching
With the effective use of screen casting and screen recording effectively these two generative learning techniques can be essentially combined. Students create tutorial videos ostensibly for other students to use to help them learn certain skills and understanding, but we know that the fact is that this research clearly shows that even if no other student ever uses the tutorial video created by the student, there is still value for the student in creating the video as if it would be. In terms of the teaching component this can easily be facilitated through the option of students leaving comments on the video in terms of key questions they would like clarified or points they need to deepen their understanding of.
Another really practical point here is that often the student the veracity of the content created by the student can be determined by the nature of the questions being asked by the students who have watched the video as opposed to the teacher needing to watch all of the videos themselves.
Enacting
Interestingly the assumption made by the researchers here is that the enacting has to be physically performed with hand movements, which makes me wonder how effective this might be if then enacting took the form of the digital animation of objects, if this is true then there are many very powerful digital tools that quickly enable students to assemble elements and animate those elements in order to be able to communicate understanding of a particular concept...
March 8, 2021
'Generative learning falls into a broadly constructivist model of learning in which learning is viewed as something that happens in the mind of each learner and is shaped by their own experiences and the prior knowledge that they bring to the topic.'
The book begins with a foreword by the educator Logan Fiorella whose mission is to shift from the recitation of facts to the ability of applying these facts to new situations. This has often been lost in educational institutions were recitation is favoured, and the ability to actively make sense of the information is concealed. Generative learning lends it influence to constructivism, and in turn, its educational purpose is to convert students from being 'passive tape recorders' to 'active sense makers'. Generative Learning draws heavily from the SOI model of Richard E Mayer. The thesis of that model is that learners meaningfully learn by a three-step model of: selecting, organising and integrating information into their existing schemata. As with Jean Piaget, the emphasis is that memorisation is not enough. Indeed, memorisation is laborious and misses the essential component of learning (better explained in Sonke Ahren's 'How to Take Smart Notes', of finding connections between what is to be learned with prior knowledge and amongst the content itself.) For any 21st century student, Jeffrey Karpicke's active retrieval is anointed as the gold standard. However, in my experience, active retrieval is heavily missing some of the most essential features of being an effective learner. How can one make the connections between the presidencies of John Adams and FDR or the connections between Abigail Adams and Eleanor Roosevelt if a person uses active retrieval as their primary method? As learners, we should be building connected bridges between our knowledge rather than erecting stand-alone islands.
Learning then is not only about pulling knowledge out of oneself, but must be about encoding and sewing that knowledge to other pieces of knowledge, to put that knowledge in several contexts. The eight strategies originally explored in Fiorella and Mayer's 2015 work are expanded upon by Zoe and Mark Enser in this book: summarising, imagining, mapping, drawing, self-testing, self-explaining, teaching, and enacting. Although these seem like distinct strategies, the authors argue convincingly that they share the implementation of the SOI model. Active retrieval is a necessary component of learning but it should not monopolise the activity. To learn is enfolded in making meaning and actively making sense of new material by its interaction with prior knowledge.
I would recommend this book for the foreword and introduction alone, but I would also recommend (for the life-long learner) to check out Sonke Ahren's 'How to Take Smart Notes', to find a system and outline on how we learn by making connections and translating material into our own words.
The book begins with a foreword by the educator Logan Fiorella whose mission is to shift from the recitation of facts to the ability of applying these facts to new situations. This has often been lost in educational institutions were recitation is favoured, and the ability to actively make sense of the information is concealed. Generative learning lends it influence to constructivism, and in turn, its educational purpose is to convert students from being 'passive tape recorders' to 'active sense makers'. Generative Learning draws heavily from the SOI model of Richard E Mayer. The thesis of that model is that learners meaningfully learn by a three-step model of: selecting, organising and integrating information into their existing schemata. As with Jean Piaget, the emphasis is that memorisation is not enough. Indeed, memorisation is laborious and misses the essential component of learning (better explained in Sonke Ahren's 'How to Take Smart Notes', of finding connections between what is to be learned with prior knowledge and amongst the content itself.) For any 21st century student, Jeffrey Karpicke's active retrieval is anointed as the gold standard. However, in my experience, active retrieval is heavily missing some of the most essential features of being an effective learner. How can one make the connections between the presidencies of John Adams and FDR or the connections between Abigail Adams and Eleanor Roosevelt if a person uses active retrieval as their primary method? As learners, we should be building connected bridges between our knowledge rather than erecting stand-alone islands.
Learning then is not only about pulling knowledge out of oneself, but must be about encoding and sewing that knowledge to other pieces of knowledge, to put that knowledge in several contexts. The eight strategies originally explored in Fiorella and Mayer's 2015 work are expanded upon by Zoe and Mark Enser in this book: summarising, imagining, mapping, drawing, self-testing, self-explaining, teaching, and enacting. Although these seem like distinct strategies, the authors argue convincingly that they share the implementation of the SOI model. Active retrieval is a necessary component of learning but it should not monopolise the activity. To learn is enfolded in making meaning and actively making sense of new material by its interaction with prior knowledge.
I would recommend this book for the foreword and introduction alone, but I would also recommend (for the life-long learner) to check out Sonke Ahren's 'How to Take Smart Notes', to find a system and outline on how we learn by making connections and translating material into our own words.
October 13, 2020
A great summary of the 8 strategies and some very interesting short case studies for those wanting to take things a bit further. Looking forward to putting some of the ideas into practice.
August 26, 2025
I'm back to work next week and my brain is definitely not ready for that.
To prepare me for the drastic change, I thought I'd read a few books I've been meaning to - which will hopefully enrich my practice. I was first recommended this book in a CPD session in 2023 but honestly I didn't have the mental capacity for it then.
I picked up a lot of techniques. I already use mapping but I feel I could use that further. I LOVE self-testing; it is the staple of my lessons. I think I could definitely employ drawing a little more. I am definitely going to work on summarising. I'm not too sure regarding enacting or teaching: I think there's too many pitfalls and I'm not sure what my new class will be like.
This book makes you think, and isn't that awesome?
To prepare me for the drastic change, I thought I'd read a few books I've been meaning to - which will hopefully enrich my practice. I was first recommended this book in a CPD session in 2023 but honestly I didn't have the mental capacity for it then.
I picked up a lot of techniques. I already use mapping but I feel I could use that further. I LOVE self-testing; it is the staple of my lessons. I think I could definitely employ drawing a little more. I am definitely going to work on summarising. I'm not too sure regarding enacting or teaching: I think there's too many pitfalls and I'm not sure what my new class will be like.
This book makes you think, and isn't that awesome?
October 10, 2020
Brilliant summaries of generative learning and 8 key strategies. Food for thought...
October 30, 2020
Great book. It’s not too long so it can easily be read in a couple of hours. Loved the ‘try it out’ sections at the end of each chapter which gave me time to really think about each strategy.
November 28, 2020
Useful tool for those leading tracing and learning or curriculum. Great work Enser clan.
April 4, 2021
Nice overview of key strategies. It was good to see these strategies as a partner of excellent instruction. Quick read, enjoyable. The case studies were useful.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews