3 essential study skills to make exams less stressful for everyone w/ Deena Kara Shaffer

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Dr. Deena Kara Shaffer (00:00):
when you reread and reread and reread,

(00:02):
that's not studying.
When you review, not studying.
flip through your notes, notstudying.
When you review your teacher'sslide decks, not studying.
Students aren't sleeping enough,Students are lonely.
They're not connecting in socialways We want students to have
more time to take care ofthemselves and to do the things
that they wanna do, but theirso-called strategies are often
inefficient because they are nottaught them.

Vanessa Vakharia (00:28):
Hello.
Hi, it's me, Vanessa, and I amhere to say welcome to another
episode of Math Therapy.
Okay, let's be real.
It's June, which for most of us,aside from the ones who are done
already, I'm looking at you,Texas, we are in the thick of
exam season.
Like, it's happening right now,and that's why I decided I
needed to have a conversationwith someone who is an expert

(00:51):
learning strategist, whoseliteral life mission it is to
make sure that every singlehuman on the planet understands
what it means to prioritize, toorganize, to actually learn
anything in a way that leads tomeaningful retention.
Because the thing is, anxietyaround exams and around math,
it's never just about content.
It's often about feeling toooverwhelmed to even see the

(01:13):
content for what it actually is,and today's guest, Dr.
Deena Shaffer, is going tocompletely change the way you
look at learning.
Deena is a keynote speaker,author, mentor, training
facilitator, and the founder ofAwakened Learning.
She has spent over twenty yearspromoting more equity and
justice in learning and enablingthe success of more than five

(01:34):
thousand students, educators,and business leaders through
learning strategies.
And if you're an educator likeme, I know that you know that
part of the reason students areso anxious in math and in school
is because no one has taughtthem how to learn.
Isn't that crazy?
They go into this building tolearn all of this content,
English, science, math,whatever, but no one teaches

(01:56):
them how to learn it.
They're just expected to knowthe, like, scientifically backed
best practice for taking notes,retaining information, solving
problems, getting unstuck.
But I always say that learningto think, learning to study,
learning to engage, and learningto learn should be taught the
same explicit way we teachcontent.

(02:17):
These are skills that we need tolearn.
Learning is a skill, just likefactoring.
We need to teach it.
But because we don't, I haveDeena here today to finally shed
light on, number one, the onething we all get wrong about
to-do lists.
Number two, the best and worstways to study for a math exam
and any exam.

(02:38):
Number three, how we can use AIethically, not to do our work
for us but as a true study tooltailored for each of our unique
learning needs.
You're gonna wanna take notesbecause this episode is that
good, and you're going to wantto share it with every student
and educator you know who's inthe midst of exams right now.
This episode is the one that isgoing to move the dial

(03:00):
immediately.
So let's get into it.
Deena, hi.

Vanessa.

There's so many reasons I wanted to talk to
you today.
Recently, I released an episodeof the podcast where I
essentially had, I was on theverge of a meltdown, you know?
And I was, like, talking myselfthrough it, and at the same
time, you know how, like,sometimes the algorithm, like,
does exactly what you need it todo?
the same time, like, you poppedup on my feed, and there was a
quote.
I think you had done this onbreakfast television, and I

(03:31):
believe the quote said somethinglike,"Having a to-do list does
not mean getting stuff done," orsomething.
What was it?

Dr. Deena Kara Shaff (03:38):
C-correct.
It's insufficient to gettingwork done.
The to-do list does not equalthe work getting done.

That, okay, well, that blew my mind, because
for the past three weeks, Ihave, no joke, been obsessed
over finding the perfect to-dolist that will allow me to feel
organized, because I think, Ithink if I have the right to-do
list, I'll get shit done, andI'll feel organized.
So yeah, we're, we're herebecause I need this therapy from

(04:07):
you but also because haverealized that this whole being
organized, prioritization, allthe stuff we're gonna talk
about, is a key reason why somany kids struggle in math, and
we never talk about it.
We focus on the math, and wedon't focus on these skills.
So hello, welcome to thepodcast.
You have a lot of work to dohere today with me.

Hi, I'm so excited, and obviously this
is like a three-hour long formmulti-session.
Like there's so much I wannarespond to.
I love it.

with a question, because that's how
podcasts should work.
Um, question is, why don't youtell us a bit about what you do,
because I actually think it's socool, but I want you to say it
in your words.
Like, what is your thing?

Yes.
Great.
Thank you.
I'm a learning strategist, Ihelp any learner of any age, of
any learning profile, of anydiscipline, subject, program
learn how to learn.
I help them learn with lesssuffering.
I help them learn in a way thatfeels like relief and sometimes
even joy.

(05:12):
So we have, in the agency I run,Awaken Learning, we have math
strategists.
So we combine math tutoring withexecutive function,
social-emotional education,psychoeducation, where you won't
even need us for very long.
We're gonna teach you how tomove through the next math quiz,

(05:33):
math homework, mathpresentation, math data
collection and analysis.

I would like you to walk me through what a
math tutoring combined withexecutive function
socio-emotional learning hourlooks like versus a just one
hour of tutoring math.
Like, what, what are you doingwith that student?

So what we're trying to do at the same
time, of course, this learner isbringing in, I've got math
homework, I've got a math test."But what we're also trying to go
is,"Well, here are bestpractices around studying, and
what did you get on that lastexam?
How are we gonna integratefeedback?
How do you even, um, integratefeedback when it's difficult?
Oh, you've got a math projectwith other people, but you hate

(06:15):
working with other people.
You just do the, like, divideand conquer group work method,
which isn't really a method."What we do is we bring in this
layer of you can carry forwardthese strategies around really
solid study practices,test-taking practices.
What if it's multiple choice?
What if it is short answer?

(06:36):
What if you have to presentabout it?
What if you have to readsomething in math, like a word
problem, but your eyeballs aredarting everywhere and you feel
overwhelmed?

Okay.
Well, this is so fascinating andso timely because been noticing,
you know, exams are coming up,so we're tutoring a lot of
students.
Would say there's a nice littlemarriage here between what I see
in my tutoring

Yeah.

And the b-- a big similarity is idea of we use
these words, right?
We use these words like showyour thinking, show your work,
study, learn, and, uh, takenotes.
This is a really I found.

Mm.

Notes.
Students will literally be like,"Okay, yeah, I'm supposed to
take notes," but no one hasshown them how to take notes.
No one has shown them how tostudy.
So like, to your point, theycould be doing this thing they
call studying, studying means Iopen the book and I read the
problem 10 times in a row.
I look at the solution, Imemorize how to do it.
So they are studying, butthey're not studying in an

(07:31):
effective way.
So why do we not teach this inschool?

Yes.
I mean, my life is dedicated tothat.
I don't really know the answer.

I can tell you this (07:39):
it is not taught in teacher education, so
we recycle ideas about whatstudying is there are academics
who are studying learningscience that doesn't translate.
It doesn't get rippled down.
So I don't really know howcurricular changes come to be,
except where does funding comefrom?

(08:00):
Who gets to influence policy?
But I'm so impatient for that tohappen, and it always feels so
political about what happens tobe on trend, and then there's
always this pendular swing, andthen everyone gets mad at that
particular way of doing things.
And I just think, listen, thisis an equity and student mental
health and academic performancepiece.

(08:21):
You would solve, like amulti-solving co-benefit
approach would be if you taughtdirectly the skills of how to
learn.
Because when you reread andreread and reread, that's not
studying.
When you review, not studying.
When you flip through yournotes, not studying.
When you review your teacher'sslide decks, not studying.

(08:44):
Not studying.
And if we add to this, so thisis like let's bring in more of
the learning strategy piece orthe holistic learning strategy
piece, students aren't sleepingenough, right?
So we want, we wanna buystudents more time.
Students are lonely.
They're not connecting in socialways and in community ways.
We want students to have moretime to take care of themselves
and to do the things that theywanna do, but their so-called

(09:06):
strategies are often inefficientbecause they are not taught
them.
Do you know what studying is?

I like, like...
don't even know what to sayright now because I'm like,"Oh
my God, all of those things youlisted, go through the slide
deck, review your note." Thoseare the things I was taught to
do when you are engaging in theact of studying.
No, what is studying?
What is studying?
Tell me.

are only two things that count as
studying:

my God.
What?

Practice questions and practicing them
over time.
If you go to a test or exam, areyou asked to rewrite notes?

No.

are asked to solve problems.
The only thing you need to do toup your confidence and your
marks on your next quiz, test,or exam is practice questions.
Here's the other funny thingstudents do.
So they'll get maybe a mock examto prepare for, maybe it's like
final exam season.

Yeah.

they'll give, be given a package by your
beautiful folks, or they'll AIit.
There's wonderful ways, right?
We can use NotebookLM, we canuse, um, Wolfram Alpha, we can
use lots of different AI tools.
Beautiful, beautiful tools.

we're gonna have to go back but

I obsessed with these ethical AI
tools in a massive way.
So you can get a practice testmade for you,

Okay.

For my mock exam.
I have to prep- I have to studyfirst." No.
Take the practice test first.
No notes- No phone, just do thepractice test.
And it will be a struggle, andit will be frustrating, great.
That's a diagnostic that willtell you exactly what you need

(10:52):
to ask questions about, go backand reteach yourself, do extra
practice questions with.

Oh my-- Well, and I imagine, like this is the
thing, is so many students in mypractice think that the problem
is that they are not good atmath,

Yes.

in math.
I'm not a math person." But I'mlooking at this and being like,
"No, no, no, no, no.
This is not a skill issue

Yeah.

or not learning

Yeah.

you ca-

Right, and

trying to read the textbook.
Or, oh my God, the thing thatdrives me the most nuts, they'll
be like,"Oh yeah, I did all thepractice questions." And I'll be
like,"Okay, did you check theanswers?" And they'll be like,
"Well, no." And I'm like,"Oh myGod!" so you could just be
practicing them all the wrongway though, And also now you
feel, the student feels they

Yeah.

trying.
So it's not even like they'renot trying.

Yeah.

been fucking studying.
They spent hours doing homework,da, da, da, da, da.
But they were doing it in a waythat did not allow them to
actually learn for real theinformation,

Yeah,

like shit.

And maybe in a textbook there are a
few questions that they canpractice from, and they do them,
but there was one that wasreally difficult for them.
But they did it, and they'relike,"Okay, well, I guess I
learned it'cause I did that onepractice question." No, no, no,
no, no.
Take a picture of that practicequestion, run it through
NotebookLM, say,"Give me fivemore variations of this." And so

(12:16):
then we get to zero in on whatis difficult instead of just
like,"Oh, linear, I did the fivepractice questions.
I am done." You get topersonalize your own skill
building that will change what,how you perform o- on the next
quiz, test, or exam.

What does that look like?
Like, I have a-- someone has amath test, they have a math
exam.
What does distributed practicefor that assessment look like?

The first thing I wanna say as a
rough guide, and obviously itdepends if you're in grade six
or it depends if you're in thirdyear.
a general rule, if it's a quiz,I want students studying one
week in advance.
If it's a test, I want themstudying two weeks in advance,
or if it's an exam, three weeks.
Distributed practice then says,"Don't study every day.
Study every other day.

(12:58):
Study twenty-five minutes or tenquestions." You can do it by
amount of time, or you can do itby number of questions, but
enumerate it somehow.
Like have a constraint so thatinstead of studying, which if we
go back to to-do lists, is oneof the worst things you can
write on a list'cause how do youknow what you're doing when
you're studying and how do youknow when it's over?
Studying isn't a lot of fun, andwho wouldn't want to avoid a

(13:21):
generic word like studying?
But if you say,"ten practicequestions," great.
I'm really clear.
Uh, it's defined.
There's a beginning and an end.
So I would want ten questionsevery other day for depending
upon if it's a quiz, test, orexam.
We like the idea of touching thematerial at least four times,
like at a bare minimum becauseof what we understand about

(13:42):
forgetting.
So you and I will have thisconversation.
We might talk about somestrategies around humane
prioritization or non-toxicproductivity.
We might talk about somedifferent methods that really
kick to-do lists butt.
But if we don't talk again or ifwe don't revisit it by the end
of the conversation or bytomorrow, like half of that is
lost.

(14:03):
So it's the same with a student.
They might understand everythingin a math class.
am getting it.
I am locked in.
I really understand what theteacher is getting at today,
then I look at the material aweek from now, two weeks from
now, I'm like,"I could not tellyou what any of this means." Can
salvage that.
We can protect that if wepractice a little bit tomorrow,

(14:24):
and then we practice two dayslater, and then we practice a
few days later.
So we really wanna keep touchingthe material, but we never have
to do it for very long, likelittle increments over time.

What are your thoughts on homework?
Like, do you think, like, kidsneed to be doing homework in
order to be touching thematerial?

It's such a beautiful question, and,
and for some reason, I justdon't-- it doesn't land as very
provocative to me.
Homework feels like an activepractice.
The mistake sometimes withhomework is there's just, like,
a sheet of questions, likeuninspiring, that would just

(15:02):
suck the joy out of anybody.
So what we practice at our homeis can you do a couple?
Can you do one from each column?
Can you do three from eachcolumn?
You have a student who has firstsemester high school math and
then doesn't have math for anentire year, including a summer,

(15:24):
uh, we could call it homework.
That's just humane to, topractice the material again in
small doses.
So I am not about homework thatis purposeless.
do think homework is humane, butnot when it just goes on
endlessly, and not when it's thesame question over and over and

(15:45):
over again.
I like things like quizzes.
I really love low-stakesquizzes.
I think they are a beautiful wayto keep material at the
forefront of a student's mindand heart.

So the way we're talking about this too,
like it sounds...
Okay.
Oh, yeah, and this reminds me, Iwanna just go back to your
question about AI,'cause Iactually don't know about these
things that you're talking aboutthat sound very cool.
I know you're gonna

not

blow my mind in two seconds.

excited.
I'm so excited

No, no, I love that.
That's what I was gonna say too.
But the, the reason I bringeverything up in this moment is
because I'm like, this soundslike unless you had a parent at
home or an older sibling who canhelp you, this sounds very
self-guided.
Like, e- especially being like,"Oh, I haven't had math in a
semester.
I'm not gonna have it until nextSeptember." You're kind of like

(16:35):
putting it on the student to belike,"I am going to give myself
self-guided practice for thenext eight months," right?
Like, that sounds not likesomebody is...
I'm not saying they can't, butthat sounds like a lot for like
a young person, right?
This could happen in grade nine,right?
You're 13 years old.
Like, is it realistic to expecta 13-year-old to do that for

(16:55):
themselves or to be able to, toeven know how?

Not at all.
And so that's why I go out andteach teachers all the time.
I be-- It's not in teachereducation, and it's way too
onerous.
How would a student even know?
So that's why I think aboutlearning strategies as an equity
issue.
It is around justice.
If a student happens to have aparent who's an educator who
knows about learning strategies,if a student happens to have had

(17:19):
a teacher or mentor who, whoknows this work, I hate luck.
Uh, luck is so unreliable.
So I want all students to getlearning strategies and, and my
mission is to get it at scale.
I want families, I want studentsto, but I also want teachers to
have what is not yet, um, inteacher education.

(17:41):
So in the meantime, that's why Irun a learning strategies
agency.
It's like I was impatient.
So I'm a, I'm a prof also at,Toronto Metropolitan University.
I teach 250 students everysemester learning how to learn,
I don't want it to beinstitution specific.
I wanna reach every student andstudents much sooner than they
get to my class or when they getto being on probation or when

(18:04):
they have to withdraw becausethey have failed a course.
I wanna get in there way sooner.
So yes, I think it is too muchfor a student to do on their
own.

But like, let's say right now, I mean, we
have exams are coming up for usin Ontario.
If a student was like,"Okay,yeah, I wanna, I wanna do some
stuff.
Like, I wanna start this, Iwanna start three weeks in
advance,"'cause actually trulymost of our students don't,
don't start that early, right?
They have, four to eight exams,and they are just like triaging
basically.
But imagine they're like,"Youknow what?
It's May.
This is a great opportunity tojust get started.

(18:36):
What's the first thing I cando?" Like, I've got-- most of
them actually don't even havetextbooks anymore, but they've
got a bunch of worksheets.
They've got old tests.
Like what is the first thingthey can do?
How can they make themselves athree-week program?
Like what, what would yousuggest?

are two wonderful starting places.
of who I support, there are manystudents with ADHD, there are
many students with autism, thereare many students who have, um,
anxiety, uh, OCD, uh, eatingdisorder.
Like, we, we work with anystudent, particularly students
who are having a tougher time.
So here's what I imagine.
That student might also havemissed a class.
That student might have beensick, they might have been in an

(19:12):
athletic, uh, commitment.
So I want them to use NotebookLMand put in from Google Classroom
or whatever the LMS, theLearning Management System that
their teacher uses, any missedclasses or classes that they're
like,"I was there, but I wasn'treally there."

Hmm.

And if you put in those lectures, those
slide decks, those lesson notes,even if you were like,"I loved
how Crash Course taught that.
I loved how at the, at, at yourtutoring studio, somebody gave
me a, a worksheet and supportedme." Put all of that in
NotebookLM, which protects yourIP.
Like, it's a very, verybeautiful self-contained...

What is NotebookLM?
Like let's, yeah

is a free Google product And you
don't have to sign up.
If you are under 13, get yourparents to sign you onto it.
And instead of scraping fromgarbage Google, it just is the
container that you put in thematerial, and then you can do a
bunch of stuff with.

(20:14):
You can ask for practicequestions.
Give me five multiple-choicequestions.
Make me flashcards.
Make me an infographic.
But there is, there are two,from a neuroinclusive
standpoint, there are twounbelievable features.
One is called an audio overview.
So you put the material in, andyou click on audio overview, and

(20:35):
in about five minutes, it willmake you an under 20-minute
podcast of two pe- two peoplewith very real-sounding voices,
like you

Oh my God, David,

with--

you hate this?

It is exceptional, but I'll explain
why.
So even if Dave isn't on board,I will get David on board, okay?
Here's why imagine you have astudent who for, whether
disability reasons or not, lovesreassurance.
They wanna ask 15 questions.
They wanna ask 50 questions.
Can I check this?
Can I check this?
We don't want any student tofeel shame.

(21:07):
You and I are in the work ofdissolving shame for learners.

Hmm.

But what that single student needs might
be in tension with classcommunity and what the teacher
is able to really provide ifthere are 30 students in that
class who have much differentneeds.
You make that audio overviewpodcast of whatever, this
particular calculus unit, notonly will it create this broad
strokes, kind of filling in thegaps, beautiful content based on

(21:35):
what you've given it, you caninterrupt the podcast in real
time and say,"I don't understandthat metaphor.
Can you give me a differentexample?" You can ask the
podcast your 15 or 50 questions,and it will recalibrate,
recalibrate, recalibrate.
So now there's no shame orself-consciousness for the
student who needs what theyneed.
So here's why it's so beautiful.
In learning strategies land,which I really understand is so

(21:57):
boring, but it's not boringThere's something called an
advance organizer.
Advance organizer, again, boringwords, but what we need is a
filing cabinet new informationto come.
need to have prior knowledge fornew knowledge, right?
You can't just go to grade 12calc because you've done all of
the stuff up, that leads up toit.

(22:19):
But what if I had mono?
What if there was a loss in myfamily?
What if, what if, what if, whatif, and I

What if whatever?
Yeah

How am I, what am I, how am I, how do I
study if I missed classes?
Use NotebookLM for the classesyou missed to fill in the
information so it begins to makesense.
We can combine

How?

you get the slide deck of whatever you
missed.
Teachers

Oh,

Classroom, like,

okay.

Okay, I'll get the notes from a peer.
If you're like,"This doesn'tmake sense to me," look up a
crash course.
What's the corresponding, orKhan Academy, what's the
corresponding lesson that I kindof get?
that all in there.
You can put websites, documents,PDFs, pictures.
Take a picture of a pal's noteif they let you.
Put that all into NotebookLM.

(23:07):
for an audio overview, and nowyou have less than 20 minutes.
Take that podcast for a walk.
Now we're incorporating movementand wellbeing.

I am losing my-- I'm-- Okay, hold on, hold
on, hold on, hold on.
Okay, I'm freak- out becausealready I'm like, how am I
doing?
What am I doing?
So I have a question.
Okay.
So first of all, I love this somuch.
I love this because I love theaccessibility standpoint, number
one.
I, I'm totally...
Like, if I'm listening to anonfiction anything, it has to
be in my ears.
I am not reading it.
It will not go into my eyeballs,into my brain.

(23:38):
So, like, I love that.
For NotebookLM, personal,personal question, do you have
to input stuff, like, so itwon't scrub the internet?
It's, it's making it...
Oh, so it's making it...

your, what you give it

But how is it filling in gaps?
Like, what if you have notes?
Like, imagine I had notes from aclass and I was, like, I took
some notes, but I, like, kinda,like, got it, like, mid.
Like, it was like the notes werereally a six out of ten on what
the whole lesson was.
How can it fill stuff in?

It's just-- So,

Oh

and the great thing is it's not gonna be
inaccurate.
So if you're like,"I'm doing sixout of ten notes," great.
What's the textbook it's basedon?
What's the material it's basedon?

Okay

external sites would you include?
then you know that it's notgonna be hallucinatory.
It's not gonna take you offtrack.
That's the beauty.
For me, that's not the risk.
It's like the opportunity of it.
But it gets even better.
It

Why are you not sponsored by them?

I know.
But imagine that you listen tothat podcast, and you're like,
"Ugh, I still need a little bitof support." You can ask for it
to create a video overview, andthat takes about 15 minutes for
it to create, it will create foryou a Canva-style voiceover
presentation the material withdiagrams, with beautiful

(25:03):
background.
So if that wasn't provided, ifyou happened to have a supply
teacher that day, and it waslike mer, mer, you can have an
uplifting, visually appealingand accessible walkthrough of
material you missed or didn'tquite grasp.

The reason we are talking about AI, though, is
because of what you said whenyou were like, studying, really
studying comprises of twothings.
One of them is practice, and oneof them is practice over time,
basically.
The g-- Like, you know what

Yeah

so we're, AI can give us more ways to
practice because often I willhear from students,"Well, I did
all my homework, so I havenothing left to practice.
Like, I redid the testquestions.
I have nothing left topractice." And like, you know
what I mean?
This is the best way for them tobe able to feed something in and
be like,"Give me more questionslike this.
I actually struggled with thisquestion.
Make me more like this." Right?

(25:56):
So that's actually great.
Here's what I wanted to, to, tojust focus on for a second.
This is a podcast about a lot ofthings, but it's supposed to be
a podcast about math trauma andmath anxiety.
So I wanna know, in yourexperience, how many students, I
mean, or learners of any age doyou see come to you with this

(26:16):
idea that they are not smart,then realize that it is simply a
learning strategy issue that canbe rectified, and then all of a
sudden they're like,"Holy shit,I am capable of learning this
thing I never thought"?

Many slash most.
Many of the students who we workwith have absolutely been
traumatized school.
Some in school, but by school.
School has absolutely beaten medown.
All of my gifts that I thought Ihad, I don't even know if I have
gifts.
Uh, I'm not good at this, I'mnot good at that, I'm not good
at this, I'm not good at that.
Like, the list goes on.

(26:49):
And so we're in the work, yes,of like, here's the toolbox,
here's the toolbox, here's thetoolbox, here are new systems,
here are new approaches.
But really it's like, how can weheal some of that?
How can we mend that so that youcan get on your way to doing
whatever you wanna do?
We want students to be fullyalive in their creativity and
ambition, and we just wanna be astepping stone on their way.

(27:10):
And, and what we also know isthat all of these are
professional skills.
We hear from, um, employers allthe time about new grads who are
struggling with overwhelm.
Struggling, right?
And, and are showing up andbeing like,"What do you mean I
gotta be in a workplace fivedays a week?
What, what do you mean that thedeadlines are firm?" We like
front-loading and directlyinstructing learning skills it

(27:34):
changes the self-conception of astudent.
This is what's possible for me.
These actually are gifts.
I can do this.
We love that

how can a teacher know if they're working
with a student who's strugglingin math?
How do they know if it is a mathissue or a learning issue?
Like, how do they know if it'sthey're not understanding the
material or they don't have thelearning strategies to
understand the material?

That's such an interesting question.
On the one hand, I'm tempted tosay, like, I, I don't even--
does it, does it matter at somepoint?

Hmm.

Everyone in every subject to be
integrating learning strategies.
We want, whether you're anEnglish teacher, a journalism
teacher, or a science teacher,math teacher, to be sharing how
to study, to take a te- how doyou, how do you write, like,
multiple choice.
Multiple choice is taught insuch terrible ways.
In a way, functional impactdoesn't matter.
The student is, like, showingyou.

(28:26):
They're evidencing,"I'm reallystruggling." On the other hand,
how do you solve for that isthat's really helpful where, uh,
teacher collaboration comes in.
They have-- If, if a student isreally struggling, and they
have, and the teacher hascapacity, it's a conversation
with the history teacher, withthe social studies teacher, with
the geography teacher:"How'sthis student showing up in your
class?
Is the, is the student justsaying, like,'I'm bored,' or,
'I'm unmotivated in this class,'but they're not here?

(28:49):
Great.
What helps them feel alive?"It's about watching how that
other teacher teaches.
But I don't say that with anyexpectation.
Teachers are stretched beyondthin.
They're holding so much inteaching spaces.
So, um, what I share all thetime in keynotes and trainings
is that learning strategiesmulti-solving.

(29:09):
They have the co-benefit ofsupporting students, but they
also alleviate teacher burnout,alleviate student retention
challenges.
I'm a big fan of when we canco-benefit.
What would help that studentacross their subject areas?
What would help the teacher feelless burdened?
What would help institutionsactually keep more students?

I do really believe that the way AI is being
used is teaching students hownot to learn, right?
Like, it's like unethical AI islike actually do the opposite of
learning.

For any students who are listening, we
just interviewed to take on asummer student, and we, because
of our commitment toneuroinclusion, we provide the
questions, no matter who we'rehiring, professional or student,
hours in advance.
Why?
'Cause we know that not allpeople are like,"Okay, I'm--
this is-- I'm gonna respond atthis

Okay

We explicitly say,"We just want you
and your messiness and yourheart, but we also wanna honor
that there are all ways andmodes and paces of thinking."
Student comes and is readinglike this the most robotic
answers.
They absolutely did not get thejob, okay?
They absolutely did not get thejob.

(30:23):
And I just want all students toreally understand.
That they want the skill ofbeing able to think and
articulate in situations thatmatter to them, and an interview
is one of those places.
They are gonna interview at somepoint for a job or for a
position that they really want,and they wanna be able to have
their words with them, theirinsights with them.

(30:46):
And there's interesting learningstudies that are coming out
right now that are saying you'rejust shifting the cognitive
load.
You think that it's making iteasier for you, boop, boop,
boop, do my homework.
But then the work becomes, Ihave to fact-check, I have to
triple, uh, proofread.
You're just shifting where thehard thinking work is.

(31:09):
It doesn't make it easier.
And if it does the outlining foryou, if it does the organizing
work, then we don't have thatskill in us, so we do wanna
practice.
Of course, there's a time andplace.
It's almost ubiquitous now.
We have to be careful.
And I'll just say this.
We know pre-pandemic, pre-AIlearning skills were, not my

(31:33):
language, deficient.
It's a study that came out in2019 that looked at
undergraduate students at fouruniversities in Ontario spread
out over five campuses, and whatthey found, learning skills,
fundamental numeracy, literacy,how-- time management, how do
you write a thesis, how do youfind good sources, how do you
write summaries?
Over 50% of students were eitherat risk or outright

(31:58):
dysfunctional in terms of theirability to learn.

Oh my God, that is so concerning.

and pre-AI

because we, again, we've used the word a
lot, but I want to make surewe're defining it.
You were saying they'rebasically deficient, not your
words, in the skills they needto learn.
And learning is what?
Like, if you were gonna definelearning, learning is what?

I don't love, I don't love it.
Learning is experience.

What?

is, is

like when we

new information with what was there
before.
Learning

So it's a whole bunch of things.

it's a

It's a whole bunch.
But I, but I do think it'simportant'cause if we're gonna
be like, if we're gonna be like,these studies are coming out
saying that students don't havethe skills they need to learn, I
think we have to be able toargue to students what that even
means and why it matters tolearn.
What does that even mean, right?
To be like

though is, is that they're deficient in
learning skills, in the toolsand in the practices of doing
the work of school.
So I

Yeah, but that sounds like who cares then?

Well, if they're in

That sounds

school and they're paying tuition, and
if they want to move in thedirection of a goal, then it
really matters.
So it's not school as school,but if they wanna do the thing
that is in their heart, ifthey're like,"Oh my goodness, I
have such big dreams aboutthis," fill in the blank, XYZ, I
wanna become this, and theschool series of courses, this
program is the pathway to thator is a pathway to that.

(33:32):
And because I didn't everencounter how to study or how to
prioritize, I f- I'm likefailing this course.

If our argument to students is,"You
need these skills.
You need to not use AI becauseit's not teaching you the skills
you need to get through schoolto reach your goal," I feel like
a student could be like,"Yeah,but I know how to u-" I, I
honestly think really right nowespecially, you could get
through school using non-ethicalAI, and you could probably get
away with it.
You could pass your courses, youcould whatever.

(34:05):
But that's not the thing.
The thing is kinda what you saidbefore of being like,"No, we
want you to be able to, like, inan interview, be able to think
for yourself.
Like, we want..." And so I dothink learning has to be
positioned, and I really dothink this is what you mean.
That's why I'm like, I reallywanna define our terms.
Like, this is the mathematicianin me,'cause I'm like, I do
really think it's like we don'twant students to just have these

(34:26):
learning strategies that youteach because they need to get
through school.
Like you said earlier, these arelife skills, right?
Like, these, these skills aregoing to help students
ultimately not be overwhelmed bythe very real things they wanna
do that require multiple steps,that require organization, that
like all of this stuff

I'll, I'll just step sideways for a
moment.
And, and part of-- I was doingmy PhD in holistic learning
strategies, I remember themoment that I was in a research
class, and I mean, I can't evenbelieve that I made it this far
and this, I'd never had thissensation before, but the
professor made me feel like Icould generate knowledge, that I

(35:11):
was no longer just a recipientof other people's knowledge
making, a consumer, that I couldmake new knowledge.
I want other students to be ableto do that.

That's so cool.

so

a cool feeling.

to be, to

Yeah

uh, something that doesn't exist I
could put out into the world or

Yeah.

is, that is, that is me.
And so it is absolutely, likethat ship has sailed using AI or
not AI.
I'm just interested in helpingstudents use it ultimately to
their benefit, like withintegrity to their benefit.
And when you say I'm surestudents could do-- Th- there
are public stories of people whohave bragged about going through

(35:56):
really elite school systems,like,"I didn't do a single word
of my own work." It's

Yeah.

that, that's terrifying.
And, and big profiles, and thensuccessful businesses.
Like, o- okay,

But like that's also what happens when we
look at, like, this is a wholeother convo, but not really.
That's what happens when we lookat education as a means to an
end and when, when the entirepurpose of education is to get
through it for a grade to, like,when that's not the destination,
like when the process is not thedestination and it's just like
fucking get through it howeveryou can to get to some end goal,

(36:30):
we actually miss the point ofthe process, which p- probably
is like a full circle moment oflike we all kind of-- University
isn't just about like learningyour content area, it is about
learn...
You know what?
I actually remember I had thisjob second year university in
the summer and my, my, um, boss,she was amazing.
Her na- name was Debbie, and shewas like, she was like,"I only
hire university students." Like,and I was like,"Why?"'Cause like

(36:53):
the job didn't require anythingI was learning in business
school.
Do you know what I mean?
And she goes,"I wanna know thatthe people that are working for
me l- know how to learn, likecan learn something, are
dedicated to learning." I mean,again, this was a long time ago,
so I don't think universitystudents are the only students
who know how to learn.
But her point was, oh, myassumption is if you're in

(37:14):
university, forget what thecontent is that you're learning,
but you're at least interestedin learning things and in doing
the work to learn something.
And I was like, I think, I thinkthat's kind of the bigger
picture here

I love what you are articulating.
When I think about note-taking,note-taking on the surface,
boring, boring, boring.
note-taking isn't just about,uh, like increasing
functionality at school.
You are gonna be in a meetingwhere you are gonna be listening

(37:48):
to lots of people talking, andyou're gonna be like,"I have to
pull meaning out of thisconversation." So what I'm
actually learning when I learnnote-taking techniques is how do
I discern what's important, themany things that are what's
important, when there is a tonof input headed my way?

(38:09):
When I talk about studying, it'sjust around how do I remember
and apply for a situation thathas a little bit of a pressure
squeeze, right?
The, the squeeze of time and thesqueeze of maybe a metric value
that's, okay, this is worth 35%of your mark.
do I articulate what I think,know, feel in a, a circumstance

(38:32):
that's been made harder?
Like, there's always anunderneath worthwhileness.
I am not a big proponent, likecarte blanche with university is
essential for every human.
It's just

Yeah

uh, like experiences to learn life
skills.
These never go away.
Being able to manage your time,it's such bullshit language, but
being able to be in relationshipwith time, how do I sequence
work when it all feels like it'spressing?
These are with all of us all thetime.
How do I harness my focus wheneverything around me is pulling

(39:06):
against it?
So this is my life.
This is my love is learningstrategies.

Okay, but hold on.
How do we do that?
How do I harness my focus?
How do I prioritize?
Like, can we make this moreabout me?
Like, we haven't talked about myissues in the half an hour.
I need help.
I don't know how to do it.

I can help

what would you tell me?
But what do you mean?
Can you help me right now?
Like, what would you tell-- Iknow there's a million
overwhelmed teachers that arelistening right now.
Well, not a million, althoughlet's manifest that.
Being like,"Okay, so like, yes,I feel like I have a million
things to do.
I don't know how to prioritize.
Like, I've learned a millionthings." Like, what would you
say?

The first thing is we let go of the
to-do list being the end, and welet go of the search for the
perfect tool.
So really beautiful work ifpeople ever wanted to read
Oliver Burkeman, a kind ofexistential appros- approach to
time management is it's all kindof an illusion to control.
Stop thinking that your to-dolist equals that it's gonna get
done.
There's enough research aboutthis, like enough.

(39:58):
Yeah.

W- what, what am I reading?
I'm putting it in my Audibleright now

um, is it Meditations for Mortals?
Time Management for Mortals?
Something like that.
It's so good.
I think it's Meditations forMortals.

confirmation.
Confirmation meditation formortals.
Four weeks to embrace yourlimitations and make time for
what counts.

Okay,

Buy with one credit.
Next

that's, that's not strategy, that's just
framing.
The second thing is, just gowith me for a second.
There is a very common timemanagement tool called the
Eisenhower Matrix or the Dumpand Sift or the Urgent and
Important, I don't want to throwit out for people.
It's where there's a matrix ofwhat is highest importance and

(40:41):
highest urgency, and that wealign our work that way.
challenge is, if I were to askyou or any other professional or
any parent,"Hey, how's itgoing?" What would their answer
be?
Just like any student,"I'mstressed, I'm busy, I'm

Busy, yeah

maybe even,"I'm burnt out." If we look
at that matrix, and if we lookat iterations, that high
importance, high urgency isalmost always equated with
crisis.
I have to do what is crisismode.
What is due the soonest?
Da-da-da-da, like it's thatfrenetic energy.
We want to work from a place ofhigh importance and low urgency.

(41:20):
Bring it back to students forone second,'cause it's a really
good example.
You have a student with, uh, whohas eight courses, who has a ton
of assignments due, and theylisten to me on your podcast and
be like,"She's full of shit thatshe wants me to study for an
exam three weeks before." I'd belike,"Great, I really wanna get
into a loving fight with you."Here's what happens for most
students.

(41:40):
Because it's not urgent, it'sthree weeks away, but they have
a lab due, they have a paperdue, they have a presentation
due much sooner, studying getsleft till the end of each night,
and because it is boring andundefined, it gets pushed to the
next day, it gets pushed to thenext day, it gets pushed to the
next day.
What students need to be doingis front loading what is three

(42:03):
weeks away in a much smaller,smaller window that is defined
and starting with that beforewhat is due tomorrow or the next
day.
I'm gonna do twenty-five minutesof studying before any of my
other work.
So if you said to me, Deena, I'mcoming out with my fifteenth
book, uh, and I'm trying torecord another album.
It's all feeling do-do-do-do-do,'cause I've got the-- I'm

(42:24):
running the agency day to day,and I'm putting out the
podcast." Great.
goal, how do we break it up intosmaller increments?
And it's the first thing so thatit can never get triaged to the
next day.
you could be the twenty-firstperson to watch my TEDx where I
actually go all through this,but this is the whole point.

(42:46):
Like what would happen if weworked from a non-adrenaline
fueled, like if that wasn't ourstrategy?

I'm getting simultaneously relieved and
anxious.
Like, I'm like, oh, like I couldstart these things that I have
due in June.
I could just do 25 minutes a daynow, and then when I get to
June, I'd be like, holy shit

I'm done ahead of time

Okay, number three.
What's number three?

I want for teachers who are feeling
overwhelmed and students who arefeeling overwhelmed, if there's
perfectionism, if there isprocrastination and avoidance,
which are enormousconversations, I want them to
use a tool that makes thesmallest, most imperfect, most

(43:33):
incremental initial step.
Because we don't wanna wait,wait, wait to get the perfect
line and the perfect answer tothe formula.
Like, we, we wanna begin smalland messy.
When we talk about getting stuffdone, one is we're trying to get
out of urgency, the, like,toxic, relentless urgency.
Number two is sometimes we don'tstart things because we don't

(43:54):
have the first step.
So my big argument about

Yes!

is learning strategies makes all
work startable, that's that taskinitiation piece, more doable,
so I have some kind of stamina,momentum, motivation, more
finishable, so I'm not stuck inprocrastination a- and, and
perfectionism land, and thenmore sustainable, so that I
didn't just do it all the nightbefore and then I collapse the
day after I hand it in.

(44:18):
That's the big pitch.
So that's how I'm trying toorient getting work done.

Okay.
I think we, this was amazing.
We're gonna stop at three steps.
That sounds like a lot of stuffin the steps.
Okay?
Before we wrap up with the twofinal questions, please can we
answer the question that I stillhave in my brain?
Because look at me carrying theload.
what happens in your course?
What happens in your course?

I teach in my course what I teach in my
book, Feel Good Learning, what Iteach everywhere, everywhere,
which is like, how do you manageyour time?
How do you prioritize?
How do you study?
How do you read?
How do you write?
How do you take tests withoutpanic?
How do you work with otherpeople?
How do you manage your stress?
And I do that in a way that issix two-week experiential

(45:04):
layers.
So I teach all of thestrategies, and I have students
read all of the interestingthings on procrastination, on
sort of screen addiction, I--all of the components that are
true to their life.
But underneath theseexperiential layers, for two
weeks, they focus on theirsleep.
Then they add in, they, for twoweeks, they integrate physical

(45:25):
activity in whatever way theywant.
Then for two weeks, they focuson community, so they have a
sense of belonging.
We know that that's the numberone variable that accounts for
students staying in a programand at an institution.
They feel a sense of connection.
Then we add in social mediaboundaries.
We don't need any moreinformation.
We need them to figure out whatare their strategies, so it
doesn't eclipse their whole lifeand eat their attention.

(45:47):
Then we have them do mindfulnessin whatever form they want, so
they have some kind of stressreduction tools.
And then we have them practicerest that is not the same thing
as Netflix or sleep.

How do we sign up?

Well,

Like, can I

you're

honestly come?

but

No, I'm serious

So you don't have to be a TMU student.
That's why I started a companycalled Awaken Learning,'cause
that's literally what I teach.
So student, you can pay muchless.
So for$39 a month, you can comeand just join what I call the
Learning Strategy Studio, and weoffer workshops to this exact
point.
How do-- like, create your studysanctuary is our, is the topic.

(46:26):
I'm teaching tonight a studyingmasterclass.
Like we-- this is just whatwe're offering.
Always with wellbeingintegrated.
I worked in TMU for six years astheir learning specialist for
students with disabilities.
Then for the next six years atTMU, I co-created an
intervention called Thriving inAction that spread across
Canadian, post-secondary, andinternational, all integrating

(46:49):
what if you taught students howto learn and how to cope so that
they don't have to fail a class,so that they don't have to be on
probation, or if they are, sothey know what to do to move in
the direction of what they arehungriest and what they're there
to do.

The only thing I wanted to say, just so we're
very clear, I actually wanna,wanna know if I'm right.
When you say non-ethical, uh,AI, it sounds to me like you
mean AI that is not like yousaid, scraping bullshit from
Google, but non-ethical AI-- orsorry, ethical AI sounds like AI
you use with your own inputs.

(47:26):
Is that what it means?

inputs, and it's not doing the thinking
or organizing or first round ofcopy editing for you.
That it's not taking over skilldevelopment.
it enhance it?
Yes.
Can it coach you?
Yes.
Can it encourage you to, like,if, if you need somebody to
challenge your ideas, have--Best, best way of using AI, put

(47:49):
in your instructor'sinstructions, their rubric, and
be like,"What's the checklist?"'Cause you know what's so great?
Now I can recreate that for allof my assignments, not just
through AI, through my owncapacity.
Sometimes the questions thatteachers, educators, professors
ask are convoluted andconfusing.
That's another reason whysometimes students
procrastinate.
"I have no idea what thisteacher is asking me to do.

(48:12):
Think about data managementgrade 12.
I'm d-doing a research project.
I don't know what it's asking meto do." The way the teacher
phrases something is hard for mybrain to wrap my head around.
Great.
Have AI decipher it for you.
That's a really helpful tool tohelp you get started on the next
step

But if ethical AI is it's not doing thinking or
organizing for you, how isputting a rubric into AI and
saying,"Put this into steps thatI can understand," not it
thinking and organizing?

I'm talking about where students are
stuck and not starting.
And what I'm also asking is, canyou then recreate that if no one
has ever shown you how to dothat,

Oh, I see.
So, okay.
Okay

done that, if you don't have a
learning strategist to coach youthrough making your own, and you
are not starting the workbecause you don't know where to
start, then what a beautifulfirst step that you can then
take and be like,"That's theprocess?" I know it's really
easy to just have AI do itforever, but if we're going to

(49:19):
do that skill development, wow,I was just shown how to learning
strategy the shit out of thisassignment.
Now I can do that for futureassignments for myself.

Hmm.
Okay, we have to wrap up withthe two questions I ask
everyone, which kind of seemweird, to be honest.
Like, the first one will makesense, the second one won't.
The first question is...
Actually, no, it totally makessense.
So imagine someone's listeningto this.
They're like,"Loved it.
Oh my God, Deena, she's an idol,she's an icon, but I love what
she said, but it, this doesn'tapply to me.
That's not the reason I suck atmath.

(49:48):
Like, uh, some people just can'tdo math.
I'm just not a math person."What would you say?

You can be.

Great.
I love, I love a si- I love ashort answer like that.
Number two, s- I mean, I thinkwe know the answer to this, but
let's just ask you, if there wasone thing you could change about
the way math specifically istaught in schools, what would it
be?

to pair with learning strategies.
Don't just give the question orthe deadline.
Explain to a student how to getfrom the day that something is
assigned, whether it is ahomework or quiz or a lab or
presentation, how to do the workand get from the day it's
assigned to the day that it isdue.

Ooh, what a good answer.
Okay, this was...
Honestly, I came on here formyself.
I'm leaving with so manystrategies for myself, but holy
shit, I just feel like you havegiven us so much.
Thank you so, so much for thework you're doing out there.
Like, this, this really islife-changing work.

Blessings.
It's the thing that I absolutelylove, so thank you.

Okay, I am still not over that point Deena
made about the fact that doingproblems is, like, the only
actual effective way to studybecause it's the only thing that
authentically replicates whatyou'll be doing on actual exam
day.
It seems obvious, but she reallynailed it.
Students waste so much timedoing things that feel like
studying but actually aren'tgoing to move the dial

(51:08):
significantly when the exampaper, like, gets plopped in
front of them.
I'm sending this episode toevery student and parent I know
right now because you guys knowhow it is.
Everyone is frantically tryingto figure out how to cram as
much info into their heads rightnow as possible, and I wanna
make sure that they're allstudying smarter, not harder,
and more importantly, thatparents know that their kids do

(51:30):
not need to be studying foreight hours straight in order to
be effective.
If something in this episodemade you think, text the
podcast.
The link to text us is in theshow notes of whatever app
you're listening to.
We love hearing from you.
And it is June, which means thatone episode this month will
contain a giveaway for thebrand-new Texas Instruments Evo,
so tune in weekly because whoknows when it's gonna happen.

(51:53):
And if you're in exam seasonright now, I am sending you all
the good vibes.
I always tell my students thatexams are, like, just a fun
opportunity to show offeverything you've learned over
the year.
That's it.
It's a chance to try the newstrategies and mindset hacks
you've learned, to bust out theformula you finally mastered, to
think your way through a problemin crunch time, and just try

(52:14):
something you normally would'vebeen too scared to try before.
That's it.
That's all it is.
Happy almost summer, everyone.
You rock.
You're amazing.
Stay real, and I'll see you nextThursday, same time, same place,
same channel.
Peace, love, and pi, bbs.

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}3 essential study skills to make exams less stressful for everyone w/ Deena Kara Shaffer

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3 essential study skills to make exams less stressful for everyone w/ Deena Kara Shaffer

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