Source: https://senecalearning.com/en-gb/revision-notes/teacher-cpd/cpd-cognitive-science-for-teachers-level-2-seneca-certified-educator/1-1-2-daisy-christodoulou [Revision notes](https://senecalearning.com/en-gb/revision-notes.md) › [Teacher CPD](https://senecalearning.com/en-gb/revision-notes/teacher-cpd.md) › [CPD: Cognitive Science for Teachers Level 2 - Seneca Certified Educator](https://senecalearning.com/en-gb/revision-notes/teacher-cpd/cpd-cognitive-science-for-teachers-level-2-seneca-certified-educator.md) › Daisy Christodoulou # Daisy Christodoulou CPD: Cognitive Science Level 2, topic 1.1.2 ## Daisy Christodoulou Daisy Christodoulou is famous for her best-selling books: *Seven Myths about Education* and *Making Good Progress? The future of Assessment for Learning*. ### Knowledge and facts ![Knowledge and facts](https://image-v2.cdn.app.senecalearning.com/2018-09/73d35e89-2ebd-4dbd-a75a-18d839fe0b06/brain-1845962_1920.jpg) - Christodoulou says the biggest myth in education is that knowledge and fact do not matter. That it would be better to teach students skills. - She argues that a large chunk of evidence tells us that knowledge and facts matter a lot. - To be able to think, we need to have secured facts in our **long-term memory**. - The more facts we have stored, the easier it is for use to use our **working memory** to analyse and critically evaluate ideas. ### Direct instruction (DI) ![Direct instruction (DI)](https://image-v2.cdn.app.senecalearning.com/2018-09/e4dc28ad-27f8-4c91-8820-1dc5aed3fbcc/teach-teacher-learn-.jpg) - DI is heavily based on evidence and on cognitive science. It really works. - However, Christodoulou argues that many educators still insist on using project-based teaching without the evidence that this is beneficial to students learning. - Many educators also associate knowledge-based teaching with "teaching for an exam", when this is not the case. - DI is about breaking down the knowledge students need, teaching them in chunks and getting students to practise each of these chunks a lot. ### Chunking ![Chunking](https://image-v2.cdn.app.senecalearning.com/2018-03/597bb8a5-5783-4a9e-b1f3-c77158ae0477/shutterstock_526929742.jpg) - It is fundamental to chunk the skills and the knowledge that will be taught. - Christodoulou gives an analogy to explain that. - Imagine that you want to run a marathon and are preparing for it. Running the marathon is your end goal. - How do you prepare for that? Obviously, you will not be running marathons every day. You will do work-out sessions, sprints, longer tracks, swimming. You will think about sleeping and eating patterns. ### Chunking ![Chunking](https://image-v2.cdn.app.senecalearning.com/2018-09/48aebd73-4676-49b6-97f4-595e3345bb94/writing-write-.jpg) - It is the same idea when we think about teaching. - If our end goal is to teach the students how to write an essay, we cannot simply give them multiple essays to write. - We need to teach them each part of that skill and that knowledge. ## Daisy Christodoulou Daisy Christodoulou is famous for her best-selling books: *Seven Myths about Education* and *Making Good Progress? The future of Assessment for Learning*. ### Comparative judgment ![Comparative judgment](https://image-v2.cdn.app.senecalearning.com/2018-08/ceef0317-0275-4ff2-9074-a6e03a3199b2/unequal-balance-.jpg) - Humans are bad in making objective judgments. Christodoulou advocates that texts and essays should be marked using **comparative judgment**. - Instead of grading each essay individually, teachers simply compare pairs of essays and chose the best one using their guts. - When you get hundreds of teachers doing that with the same sets of essays, you end up with a sophisticated model that will help students learn how to improve their own writing. And it will save teachers marking time. ### The knowing-doing gap ![The knowing-doing gap](https://image-v2.cdn.app.senecalearning.com/courseImages/physics/3.1.1%20Changing%20Wave%20Motion/mind-the-gap-1876790_640-min.jpg) - Some teachers say that a knowledge-based curriculum helps kids to memorize things but not know how to use the knowledge. They say that a project-based curriculum or skill-based classes would do a better job. - Christodoulou disagrees. The way to reduce the knowing-doing gap is to focus even more on knowledge and facts, but give students plenty of opportunities to practice each small chunk of knowledge they are learning. ### Feedback ![Feedback](https://image-v2.cdn.app.senecalearning.com/2018-08/eee6bab5-d6a7-493a-8fb2-39322a189cd0/exam-sheet-answers.jpg) - When giving feedback, teachers should not focus on generic, subjective skills like “you need to identify a larger number of features in how the writer uses language”. - The feedback should be helpful in practice. So “how to identify features in the text. What are the most important features to look for”. - Useful feedback like those is usually knowledge-based. - The end goal of education should be skilled, critical and creative people. But, to get there, they need facts and knowledge. ## Test yourself on Daisy Christodoulou - What is the most effective type of feedback? [Practise this topic for free](https://app.senecalearning.com/classroom/course/aebdbb79-c863-4eca-ab3f-31e5120f5fb0/section/2a9a2719-dab5-48b3-8751-42caae814249/session) - Previous topic: [1.1.1 Mary Myatt](https://senecalearning.com/en-gb/revision-notes/teacher-cpd/cpd-cognitive-science-for-teachers-level-2-seneca-certified-educator/1-1-1-mary-myatt.md) - Next topic: [1.1.3 Alex Quigley](https://senecalearning.com/en-gb/revision-notes/teacher-cpd/cpd-cognitive-science-for-teachers-level-2-seneca-certified-educator/1-1-3-alex-quigley.md) ## CPD: Cognitive Science Level 2 contents ### 1 Important Educational Researchers Currently - 1.1 Interesting Current Educational Researchers - [1.1.1 Mary Myatt](https://senecalearning.com/en-gb/revision-notes/teacher-cpd/cpd-cognitive-science-for-teachers-level-2-seneca-certified-educator/1-1-1-mary-myatt.md) - [1.1.2 Daisy Christodoulou](https://senecalearning.com/en-gb/revision-notes/teacher-cpd/cpd-cognitive-science-for-teachers-level-2-seneca-certified-educator/1-1-2-daisy-christodoulou.md) - [1.1.3 Alex Quigley](https://senecalearning.com/en-gb/revision-notes/teacher-cpd/cpd-cognitive-science-for-teachers-level-2-seneca-certified-educator/1-1-3-alex-quigley.md) - [1.1.4 David Didau](https://senecalearning.com/en-gb/revision-notes/teacher-cpd/cpd-cognitive-science-for-teachers-level-2-seneca-certified-educator/1-1-4-david-didau.md) ### 2 How to Have an Evidence-Informed Classroom - 2.1 How to Have an Evidence-Informed Classroom - [2.1.1 6 Steps by the Evidence Based Teachers Network](https://senecalearning.com/en-gb/revision-notes/teacher-cpd/cpd-cognitive-science-for-teachers-level-2-seneca-certified-educator/2-1-1-6-steps-by-the-evidence-based-teachers-network.md) - [2.1.2 3 Steps by the George W. Bush’s Institute](https://senecalearning.com/en-gb/revision-notes/teacher-cpd/cpd-cognitive-science-for-teachers-level-2-seneca-certified-educator/2-1-2-3-steps-by-the-george-w-bushs-institute.md) - [2.1.3 5 Steps by the University of Birmingham](https://senecalearning.com/en-gb/revision-notes/teacher-cpd/cpd-cognitive-science-for-teachers-level-2-seneca-certified-educator/2-1-3-5-steps-by-the-university-of-birmingham.md) ### 3 Interleaving - 3.1 Optimum Interleaving - [3.1.1 Optimum Interleaving](https://senecalearning.com/en-gb/revision-notes/teacher-cpd/cpd-cognitive-science-for-teachers-level-2-seneca-certified-educator/3-1-1-optimum-interleaving.md) ### 4 Curriculum - 4.1 Cognitive Sciences and SEND - [4.1.1 Cognitive Sciences and SEND](https://senecalearning.com/en-gb/revision-notes/teacher-cpd/cpd-cognitive-science-for-teachers-level-2-seneca-certified-educator/4-1-1-cognitive-sciences-and-send.md) - 4.2 Curriculum Design - [4.2.1 Curriculum Design](https://senecalearning.com/en-gb/revision-notes/teacher-cpd/cpd-cognitive-science-for-teachers-level-2-seneca-certified-educator/4-2-1-curriculum-design.md) - 4.3 Christine Counsell: Senior Curriculum Leadership - [4.3.1 What is Senior Curriculum Leadership](https://senecalearning.com/en-gb/revision-notes/teacher-cpd/cpd-cognitive-science-for-teachers-level-2-seneca-certified-educator/4-3-1-what-is-senior-curriculum-leadership.md) - [4.3.2 The Curriculum as a Narrative](https://senecalearning.com/en-gb/revision-notes/teacher-cpd/cpd-cognitive-science-for-teachers-level-2-seneca-certified-educator/4-3-2-the-curriculum-as-a-narrative.md) ### 5 Future Questions - 5.1 Future Questions - [5.1.1 Future Questions](https://senecalearning.com/en-gb/revision-notes/teacher-cpd/cpd-cognitive-science-for-teachers-level-2-seneca-certified-educator/5-1-1-future-questions.md)