ALT We believe that turning over a relatively small percentage of the total in-class instructional time to informal small-group work can produce a large "bang for the buck" in making conventional lecture-centered formats more engaging for students and more productive for their learning. With these brief activities, there is little risk that teachers will lose control of their classes or encounter other forms of student resistance, an objection faculty sometimes raise against more formal small-group procedures. Once instruc-tors have experienced success with informal strategies, they are often more inclined to commit to more elaborate small-group approaches.

ALT A Lecture Wrapper (LW) is a tool for teaching students self-monitoring behavior as they identify key points from a lecture and then compare their points to the instructor’s list of points… As students list their points and then compare them to the instructor’s points, Lecture Wrappers ask students to think through not only the content of a lecture but also their own learning processes. The Wrapper is typically short enough that students can complete it quickly. This technique is also sufficiently flexible to be used across disciplines and fields. The Lecture Wrapper technique allows students to achieve multiple learning goals. The primary goal is to empower students to be self-directed learners and to take ownership of the learning process. Lecture Wrappers allow students to compare their own judgments of important points to the instructor’s judgment. This helps them to identify gaps in their understanding. In turn, students can improve their judgment skills and learn to think like…