The Psychology behind Sticky Notes and how to effectively use them in teaching practice to encourage Collaborative Learning

Kevin Dajee November 29, 2018 0 Comments

The Psychology behind Sticky Notes and how to effectively use them in teaching practice to encourage Collaborative Learning 

 

Sticky Notes: An accident that turned out to be a huge benefit to teachers!

In 1968, Chemist Spencer Silver invented sticky notes by accident, he created a “low tack” adhesive. Although Silver wanted to create a super strong adhesive, he ended up creating an adhesive that wasn’t as strong but could be repositioned to other locations. Silver later worked with Inventor Art Fry and Sticky Notes were created in 1974. Silver’s accident has turned out to be a huge benefit to teachers.

Why do we as teachers and our students enjoy writing on sticky notes? Whenever I have left a sticky note message for a student or have asked them to note down an idea on a sticky note, my requests were never refused or ignored. So, what’s the psychology behind these bits of sticky paper?

The Psychology behind Sticky Notes

A set of experiments by Psychologist Randy Garner (2005) in the US found that a) adding a personal touch, and b) making someone feel like you’re asking a favor of them can bring about impressive results when done in tandem. In one variation of his experiments Garner wanted to see what was necessary to generate compliance in completing surveys (which are often quite lengthy and tedious) by fellow professors at a university. In one experiment, he sent surveys to three separate groups of 50 professors (150 professors in total). The wild card factor in his experiments were the use of sticky notes. Three groups received three different requests, and results are as follows:

	The Request Given by Garner to Participants	Results
Group 1	Received a survey with a sticky note attached asking for the return of the completed survey.	76% of the professors returned the survey
Group 2	Received a survey with the same handwritten message on the cover letter instead of an attached sticky note.	48% of the professors returned the survey
Group 3	Received a survey with a cover letter, but no handwritten message.	36% of the professors returned the survey

Garner carried out several variations all finding an increase in communication and compliance when using a sticky note to facilitate and direct. Generalising this experiment in other contexts (like education and collaborative work) simply requires an understanding why the sticky note worked so well. It seems to represents many powerful behavioral triggers all in one little object: Garner suggested the following about why they work:

1. It doesn’t match the environment- the takes up space and looks a bit cluttered. The brain, wants it gone.
2. It gets attention first because of 1^st It’s difficult to ignore.
3. It’s personalized. (That’s the difference between Groups 1 & 2 compared to Group 3 in the experiment).
4. Ultimately, the sticky note represents one person communicating with another person—almost as if it is a favour or special request, which makes the recipient feel important. We engage in reciprocal behaviour.

In the Classroom- A quick experiment to gain views!

I tried a sticky note activity with 2 different classes to encourage some collaborative learning (Write Your Own Technique- see below). In groups, each student prepared questions that got passed on to another student and then once answered passed on to another student for correction of the answer.

Class 1 used sticky notes for this activity and Class 2 carried out the same task on pieces of their own line-ruled paper. Both classes engaged but students engaged more with the sticky notes. Class 1 clearly enjoyed the process of writing on stick notes and were more engaged than Class 2. Students also seemed to take extra care in writing on the sticky notes, it seemed to mean more to them that I had requested that they write on these bits of adhesive paper! 92% in Class 1 reported that they worked harder to complete the task on the sticky note. When asking students about why they enjoyed engaging using sticky notes they responded in ways that fit with Garner’s suggestions of why they work so well: “Because they stand out”, “They are colorful”, “I feel I have to write on it”, “I Can’t leave a Sticky Note blank!”

7 Strategies to Use Sticky Notes to increase Collaboration in the Classroom

There are lots of ways to use sticky notes in the classroom, the focus here is to explore how to use it in a collaborative way to enhance the learning experience. Presented below are 7 strategies, some have been adapted from well-known techniques that are used in industry and design but incorporate sticky notes. Teaching students how to be thoughtful thinkers by planning and generating and organising ideas is an important role of the classroom teacher. Having students work together during the planning and generating ideas process can foster the development of critical thinking through discussion, construction and clarification of ideas as well as evaluation of others’ ideas.

1) Write Your Own

A simple but effective strategy. There are lots of possibilities with this technique. In groups, each student prepares questions that get passed on to another student and then once answered passed on to another student for correction of the answer. So works best with groups of 3 students. Each student will be working on formulating questions, answering and checking answers.

“Instruction to student: You are assessing the learning of another student on the topic of ………………….. Write 3 questions (1 question on each of the sticky notes) that you would like to ask this student (1 closed question and 2 open questions)”.

The idea is that by thinking of a question the student writing the question will have considered the answer already. The recipient will receive a question that they will need to respond to. And a third gets to correct. Can be used together with a timer and is particularly good for a plenary.

2) Ideas mapping

Ideas mapping is a common element of collaborative learning. But sometimes such a session only results in the easiest, loudest, most popular ideas being heard, and higher-level ideas not being developed. Thinking and writing time is important. Here students write first and talk second. When a question is introduced, students first generate ideas on their on their own and write down their ideas on sticky notes. Everyone’s ideas get posted on a wall or board, with (or without) names attached. The expectation is that everyone contributes a post. The group then has a chance to read, think about and discuss all of the ideas generated. This technique provides a level playing field for the best ideas to surface as students combine, tweak and come up with original, higher-level solutions reflecting a collaborative effort.

3) Story and Essay Development

Using elements from Ideas mapping- Develop a map of ideas or storyboard for an essay, using the sticky notes to organize and move ideas around. In this case, one sentence or paragraph per sticky note (if using the wide sticky notes). Once paragraphs have been written the sticky notes can be moved around, laying out the plot of a story or structure of an essay. Sometimes breaking down paragraphs of evaluation allows students to develop, organise and reorganise their points and see the bigger picture.

4) Question Web

This allows students to help develop and answer questions collaboratively. Each group is given a title or stimulus material like an article or piece of research. This group generates collectively 10 questions that should be asked of the material. For example, with the title given ‘Behaviourism as an Approach in Psychology’. I am expecting students to generate questions about this. Such as What is Behaviourism? When was it introduced? The completed question web can then be passed on to another group to now research and answer the questions on the sticky notes.

The key for this task is to think about critically analysing information and developing levels of inquiry. You could give students a prompt sheet to start them off in asking the right questions that contain words that trigger good questioning- see image (right).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

5) Affinity Diagrams

Affinity diagrams are a great method to help students make sense of information when there is a lot of mixed data, such as facts, research evidence, ideas and opinions. Affinity diagrams are all about bundling and grouping information, and this method can be one of the most valuable methods to employ. For this reason, it is used in many phases of Design Thinking, as well as outside of the design context. Students put pieces of data, small documented facts, drawings, ideas, and observations onto sticky notes, and put them up on wall charts and white boards. This creates a wall of associated imagery and the sticky notes allow the students to easily stick up and move pieces of data around in order to create clusters of similar themes, groups and patterns.

 

Students arrange sticky notes by placing similar ideas together and creating new groups when ideas do not fit into an existing cluster. Students can draw connections between individual elements to join the dots and develop new and deeper insights. They will help define the problem(s) and develop potential ideas for solutions. In other words, you go from analysis to synthesis. Remember to sum up the major insights and make connections and stimulate discussion on alternate answers.

 

6) Collaborative Reader Responses

This activity works with shared reading activities, analysing literature and research, it works well with any activity where the whole class or groups of students are reading the same text.

Students first answer the reader response question (given by the teacher) individually (on their sticky note), all at the same time, and when all students in the group have completed their answers, they stick their notes on the group sheet. They then take turns reading their answers aloud to the group. After all answers have been shared, working together, they will reflect on the strengths and areas of need in their own answers to take their individual responses and combine the best parts of them to form the best possible answer, making improvements as they write. As seen in the picture, the group examined each answer and circled the part they would use from each.  This collaborative discussion really helps the students dig into what makes a great reader response – and how the individual parts can work together to make an excellent answer.

 

7) Using LinoIt

LinoIt is a free and easy to use online sticky note service that allows the user to facilitate the collaboration and sharing of ideas. It is a real-time collaborative tool where students can post responses to questions and answers, identify relevant pictures, videos and files, and help to organise ideas and plan research and assignments. Some of the above techniques can be completed using the online sticky note canvas. See separate article on ‘Using LinoIt as a Collaborative Learning Tool’ for a Quick Start Guide on using LinoIt with screenshots and a list of 20 Ideas to Use LinoIt as a Collaborative Learning Tool along with some Video Links should you need further assistance in setting up.

 

Who would have thought that simply putting a bit of semi-sticky glue on the back of a small piece of paper could be so powerful for student learning? Used effectively, it can help students to organise ideas and better understand different reading selections in stories, articles and research. It provides a focused outlet that allows the student to stop, think, and respond to stimulus material and to work together collaboratively. Have fun with sticky notes, they can be very engaging when used effectively and help towards developing and enhancing the collaborative skills of a student; and as a final tip, don’t forget that students can write on the sticky side, too!

References

Garner. R (2005) Post-it Note Persuasion: A Sticky Influence. Journal of Consumer Psychology