The Six-Word Way to Enhance Learning

During a September 2008 brown-bag brainstorm, UI instructors and staff members from the Center for Teaching and ITS-Instructional Services brainstormed the following ideas for using six-word memoirs as a teaching tool. Email us with your own ideas and if you used them in a class, let us know how and why you think they helped enhance your students’ learning.

• As an icebreaker
• Write a six-word memoir about yourself that you can share with the class.
  
  Comment: This idea was used in a Fall 2008 class and the instructor believed it worked well to get students active on the first day. She said students liked the idea and were eager to participate. The concept took time to explain, however, and expressing complex ideas in six words requires time to think and time to edit. The instructor therefore felt this format would be more effective as an assignment rather than a first-day, in-class activity.
• As an assignment
• Write a six-word piece about __________________ [a topic relevant to the course].
  
  Comment: Like an in-class “minute paper,” this task could require students to demonstrate knowledge, understanding, application, or analysis of course content or to apply a skill learned in the course: or it can also serve as a way to gather information about whether they are confused or about your teaching in general (for more information about minute papers, see Handbook for Teaching Assistants, http://centeach.uiowa.edu/library/handbook/TAhandbook.shtml, page 17). This assignment could be graded or ungraded.
• Assignment redux
• A six-word assignment may lend itself to later review and reflection. If so, periodically ask students to:
• Revisit their six-word pieces and rewrite them in light of what they have learned in the course.
• Reflect on why they changed or didn’t change their previous six-word writings, and assess how they have learned in the course.
• Analyzing form and process.
• Discuss with students the power of a six-word writing. Ask them:
• How did you go about writing your six words?
• What happens during the processes of writing and reading when each word bears so much “weight”?
• Can a six-word piece be a complete narrative or only a vignette?
• Is such a short format necessarily poetry, or does poetry require other elements besides brevity?
• How can writing “short” help you convey information effectively in different disciplines, whether they are in the sciences, social sciences, humanities, or technical fields?
• What words did you choose, and why? Which words did you discard, and why?
• How can you enhance your editing skills?
• Collaborative writing
• Once students are comfortable as a community of learners, try an in-class collaborative writing exercise. Ask them to write three words. Then tell them to pass their paper to someone else in the class, who is to finish the piece by writing the next three words.
• Share your six-word pieces aloud.
• Discuss:
• Does the process of writing beginnings differ from writing endings?
• Did you feel inspired or hampered by having to complete the work of someone else?
• How can teams of people best to produce collaborative writing?
• This could also lead to a discussion of teamwork, including:
• How can a group of people determine the roles of team members?
• How can team members assign, monitor, and assess work within the team?
• How do teams agree on the end product and the process of achieving it?
• How can a team ensure that no member plagiarizes (takes credit for work done by other team members)