Advance Organizer: Examples & Concept

Instructor: Mary Firestone

Learn what advance organizers are, and find out about the different ways you can apply them in the classroom. Read the lesson, and then take a brief quiz to test your new knowledge.

Advance Organizer

An advance organizer is a type of instructional preparation that links previously learned or known material to a new lesson. Usually the new material is at a more advanced level of the same subject. Familiar terms and concepts are re-introduced and applied again, but at a higher level.

Applications

Advance organizers can be applied in different ways. For example:

New material can be described using familiar terms
Material can be introduced in the form of a story, using familiar terms
Students can individually skim previously learned material before moving onto the new material
Students can use graphic organizers to make visual connections between what they've learned previously and the new material.

Method

During the presentation of new material, a teacher should integrate the new while also making connections to the old, reminding students of the connections between the two. Key terms should be repeated. After the old material is reviewed and the connections to the new lesson have been made, students can work in groups to define or summarize key points, or draw comparisons between the old and the new. Or, students can choose an application of the old material to something that hasn't been yet mentioned in the lesson.

Topic Examples

Let's say you've taught a unit on conservation and have focused on human pollution of streams and rivers. You might have focused on the River Ganges for the first unit, and decide to begin the second unit by reviewing this material using the same vocabulary (advance organizer).

You would then shift the focus to another river where changes (for example) in conservation have improved the water quality and river life, while also introducing new vocabulary terms. Or, if you've had a unit focusing on the impact of climate change that included facts and figures, apply those facts and figures to other times in Earth's history and draw comparisons.

Advance Organizer Overview

Terms	Definitions
Advance organizer	a type of instructional preparation that links previously learned or known material to a new lesson
Applications	material described using familiar terms, introduced as a new story, skimming old material, making visual connections
Method	integrating new material while making connections to the old material

Learning Outcomes

After this lesson is completed, students should know how to:

Describe an advanced organizer
Identify how this type of preparation can be applied

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Description

Summary:

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Advance Organizer: Examples & Concept