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Pause procedure

Students are given time during class to process information and focus on relevant topics.
  • Individual
  • Pairs
  • <5 minutes
  • Assessment
  • Remember
  • Understand

When to use it?

  • When you want to hold students' attention when you notice it's starting to wane.
  • When you want to stimulate active listening.
  • When you want to provide time for students to catch-up with their notes.
  • When you want to assess how students are grasping the topics that are discussed.

Activity instructions

Preparation

  • Structure your lesson in chunks of 12-15 minutes or per key topic.

Activity steps

  1. Instruct
    2. Let the students know at the beginning of your lesson that they will have time during the lecture to fine-tune their notes. Start teaching a 'chunk'.
  2. Pause
    Give the students 2-3 minutes to catch up on their notes and write down the key takeaways and/or the questions they still have
  3. Share
    Have students share either in pairs or as a group their key takeaways and possible questions.

Tips for implementation & variation

  • Online teaching: You can use the chat or the built-in whiteboard of the video lecture tool to let students share their 3-5 key takeaways and/or any questions they might have.
  • You can ask your students to discuss their notes with different students per pause. That way they can learn from others than just their friends.

Supporting tools

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