A question of memory
Feb 28 2008 by Neil Mckay, The Journal
CHILDREN who under-achieve at school may just have poor working memory rather than low intelligence, according to a new report by North East academics.
The researchers from Durham University, who surveyed over 3,000 children, found that 10% of school children across all age ranges suffer from poor working memory which seriously affects their ability to learn.
But poor working memory is rarely identified by teachers, who often describe children with this problem as inattentive or as having lower levels of intelligence.
Now a new tool, a combination of a checklist and computer programme informed by several years of concentrated research into poor working memory in children, will for the first time enable teachers to identify and assess children’s memory capacity in the classroom from as early as four years old.
The Durham researchers believe this early assessment of children will enable teachers to adopt new approaches to teaching, thus helping to address the problem of under-achievement in schools.
Without appropriate intervention, poor working memory in children, which is thought to be genetic, can affect long-term academic success into adulthood and prevent children from achieving their potential, say the academics.
Lead researcher Dr Tracy Alloway from Durham University’s School of Education, said: “Working memory is a bit like a mental jotting pad and how good this is in someone will either ease their path to learning or seriously prevent them from learning.
“From the various large-scale studies we have done, we believe the only way children with poor working memory can go on to achieving academic success is by teaching them how to learn despite their smaller capacity to store information mentally. A checklist, called the Working Memory Rating Scale (WMRS), will enable teachers to identify children who they think may have a problem with working memory without immediately subjecting them to a test.
A high score on this checklist shows that a child is likely to have working memory problems that will affect their academic progress. Recommendations to teachers to improve the capacity of the children to learn include repetition of instructions, talking in simple short sentences and breaking down tasks into smaller chunks of information.
