Starting and getting through the class

In many ways, the beginning of class is important for the whole class. In the first seconds of the class and actually also in the minutes just before class, the students’ impression of the lecturer is determined in a very quick and unconscious process (called interpretation). This impression decides whether the students have confidence in the lecturer and, thus, in the information s/he gives. In other words, the lecturer must radiate competence and kindness in order for him/her to create a positive learning atmosphere for the students: Positive emotions are crucial for good learning outcomes.

The lecturer should stick to the 45-minute lessons. In fact, 45 minutes is the maximum amount of time that an adult can keep his/her attention; and the students need a real break after each lesson. Therefore, short breaks should be inserted three times per lesson (after approx. 10, 20, 30 minutes) to strengthen the attention of the students. The breaks may be mere time-outs, but they may also be think-pair-shares or voting with peer instruction; the latter two types lead directly to reflection, whereas the time-out leaves it to the students to decide what they would like to do.

As to the students’ attention: A lesson always falls into three phases. First, we have primetime 1 with a high level of attention followed by (i) down-time with little or no attention and (ii) primetime 2 with increasing attention that, however, does not reach the level of primetime 1. From phase to phase there are of course gradual transitions, each phase per se being 10-15 minutes long.

What has been taught during primetime 1 is retained best, partly because of the high attention, partly because what is said here will usually be repeated during the whole class. What the lecturer has introduced during downtime is not retained or only retained in fragments, whereas the contents of primetime 2 are retained to a certain degree, but only to a certain degree: Attention has risen, but the topics of this phase will not be repeated much. This is why it is important that the students work with the topics after class.

If a lecturer chooses to go on after 45 minutes with no break (quite a few actually do that), downtime will comprise almost 40 % of the total time, and even though the use of breaks will shorten this period somewhat, much time will be wasted. Again, the large break after 45 minutes is important. If the contents are particularly difficult, working with blocks of 20 minutes followed by breaks of 5-10 minutes is recommended; thus downtime will only comprise 2 minutes, 10 %, and this gap can easily be overcome by the use of activities like the ones mentioned above.