Teaching Sequencing skills to older students

Strategies in the Classroom:

Organizers/Planner/Notebook: Get your student to use weekly and monthly planners. Allot five minutes of your class to enter information into the planner and to review due dates. Use color coding to high light what comes first, second, etc.

Graphic/Visual Organizers: Remember the lifecycle of the frog in eighth standard? Do you remember the whole text or the life-cycle diagram? That’s right—the diagram helped us remember the stages and we were able to elaborate on the significant points (gills vs lungs, etc). Time lines are excellent visual aids for historical dates while lists are great for steps in experiments.



Mnemonics & Acronyms: I had fun with this one:) I remember learning the colors of the rainbow as VIBGYOR while my friends in the US used ROY G BIV. My friends contributed a slew of these
Put Eggs On My Plate Please Henry--Cenozoic (Paleocene, Eocene, Oligocene, Miocene, Pliocene, Pleistocene, Holocene)
Never Eat Soggy Wheat—North East South West (mmm we learnt the directions as NEWS but I like this better as it follows the order on the compass)
My Very Educated Mother Just Served Us Nine Pizzas--the planets. There are several variations to this apparently and with Pluto gone there will be more I'm sure.
There's A RAT in separate—no way will they forget that spelling.
King Philip Came Over For Great Soup—Kingdom Phylum Class Order Family Genus Species (lots of variations on that one)

Key Words For Writing Projects: Who, What, Where, When, How, Why…answering these questions will help the students organize their writing assignments. You can make a booklet with the key words on index cards, especially when the student first begins to use the strategy. After each question, students can flip the page to the next. With practice, they can remember the words themselves.

Understanding Implicit Information: Students with sequencing difficulties misread or misunderstand directions. The complexity of directions increases in older classes and information is implicit rather than explicit. It could be a detailed history lesson, a word problem in geometry or a tricky test taking direction.

Teach students to identify the main expectation—“What do you have to do?”

Highlight the main point(s) of the Para/problem or direction.

If there is more than one step, make sure they identify what needs to be done first, second, etc.
For those who need memory support, write these steps on post it notes or index cards or just on a piece of paper. Student can check each step after it is completed.


Track Changes: One of my favorites (my organizational skills are in the medium range—always room for improvement).

Track changes in software programs is a great visual aid while teaching students to edit their written work. Students can compare the original order of their ideas and the edited sequence.

Yes, this means we should allow our students to type or email their assignments. Teachers, you won’t have to struggle to read poor handwriting.

Prepare for the upcoming lesson: Ever wonder how those top scorers seem to know the answers to most of the questions in class? Yes, they read the lessons beforehand. Not a bad strategy, especially for those who need the extra support.

At the end of the class, let your students know your plans for the next time you meet. Ask them to look up the topic and come with some ideas…from the text book, internet or any other source. Being prepared increases their confidence and gives them a framework for understanding the new information.

Ms. S