Activity 1: Information Retention Without Note-Making

Activity 1: Information retention without note-making
Purpose:
To introduce students to the reality of trying to retain new information without activity
recording it in some way.
This activity starts toward the beginning of the session, but the quiz based on this
activity takes place towards the end. This allows students to compare the difficulty in
completing this quiz versus the Activity 3 quiz, in which they are allowed to make and
consult their notes.
Topic paragraphs:
Version 1: Brief history of the modern Olympic Games
Version 2: The Tunkguska Impact Event
Materials:
o One of the two topic paragraphs
o Quiz (with key)
Timing:
10-15 minutes (spread over the session)
3-5 minutes for reading the paragraph
10 minutes for the quiz
Instructions:
1. Have the students put away any recording devices, such as phones, laptops,
pens/notebooks, etc, under the instruction that no one is allowed to take
notes
2. Read them one of the topic paragraphs out loud to the students
3. Continue with the session
4. Toward the end session, administer the Activity 1 quiz to the students
i. I administer the quiz using Kahoot! and as a team activity
5. Discuss the difference in information retention, even within a single hour, for
information they haven’t recorded versus information they have recorded.
Activity 1 Version 1
Paragraph:
The first modern Olympic Games – also known as the Games of the 1 Olympiad – were
held in Athens, Greece, from 6-15 April 1896, 1,503 years after the last ancient games
took place in 393 AD. The modern revival of the Olympic Games is attributed to Baron
Pierre de Coubertin, who presented the idea in 1894. Athens was unanimously chosen
by the first International Olympic Committee (IOC) on June 23 rd of that same year, at a
meeting held in Paris. The opening ceremony of the first modern games coincided with
both Easter Monday and with the 64th anniversary of Greece’s independence from the
Ottomon Empire in 1832. In total, fourteen nations participated in the first modern
Olympic Games, including Australia, Austria, Bulgaria, Chile, Denmark, France,
Germany, Great Britain, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United
States. The majority of the medals were won by Greece, although the United States
won the majority of the gold medals. The most successful individual athlete was the
German wrestler and gymnast Carl Schuhmann, who won in four events. The first
Olympic Games was open exclusively to male athletes; it wasn’t until the Summer
Games in Paris in 1900 that women were allowed to compete, in five sports. The
modern Summer Olympic Games ran without a corresponding Winter Games until
1924, when the 1 Olympic Winter Games were held in Chamonix, France. The tradition
of having both games in the same year every four years held until 1992, after which the
events became staggered with a two-year period between one Summer Olympics and
the following Winter Olympics. The next Winter Olympics were held only two years later,
rather than at the regular four year interval.
Quiz key:
1d, 2b, 3c, 4b, 5a

Quiz:
1. Which of the following European countries did not participate in the first modern
Olympics?
a. Sweden
b. France
c. Switzerland
d. Finland
2. The modern revival of the Olympic Games is attributed to:

a. Baron Jean-Pierre de Coubertin
b. Baron Pierre de Coubertin
c. Baron Pierre de Coultelin
d. Baron Jean-Paul de Coultelin
3. The first modern Olympic Games were held _____ years after the last ancient
games:
a. 1,603
b. 1,533
c. 1,503
d. 1,493
4. The first Winter Olympics following the new alternating schedule with the Summer
Olympics were held in:
a. 1924
b. 1994
c. 1992
d. 1936
5. Which country had the most medals won by a single athlete in the 1896 Olympic
Games?
a. Germany
b. Great Britain
c. Greece
d. The United States
Paragraph:
In the morning of June 30th, 1908, an explosion producing 185 times more energy than
the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima ripped through a remote Siberian forest in the
Tunguska River region, roughly 500 miles north of Lake Baikal. The explosion smashed
windows in the nearest town, 35 miles away, flattened over 2000 square kilometers of
forest (approximately 80 million trees), killed hundreds of reindeer, and registered as a
5.0 on the Richter scale, creating tremors that could be felt as far away as the UK.
Despite the magnitude of the blast, there were no officially confirmed deaths, and the
remoteness of the blast, along with growing political unrest in Russia, meant the
incident went unreported. It wasn’t until 1927 that the blast area was officially explored
by a Russian science team led by mineralogist Leonid Kulik. In spite of the nearly
twenty-year gap between the explosion and the expedition, Kulik found the damage
from the blast was still apparent – trees in the 5 mile radius around ground zero were
still standing, but burnt and stripped of all their branches, while trees further away, in an
area extending up to 31 miles, were flattened in a butterfly shape, knocked down away
from the blast site. To date, no impact crater has been discovered for what is
considered the largest meteorite impact in recorded history. Although Kulik originally
proposed that the crater was covered by the region’s swampy terrain, the current
scientific consensus is that the meteorite exploded in the atmosphere (approximately 3
to 6 miles up) rather than actually impacting.
Quiz key:
1a, 2d, 3c, 4b, 5c, 6a

Quiz:
1. The Tunguska event happened on:

a. 30th June, 1908
b. 3rd June, 1908
c. 30th June, 1905
d. 3rd June 1905
2. The first official scientific exploration occurred in:

a. 1909
b. 1917
c. 1918
d. 1927
3. The event is:

a. The largest explosion in recorded history
b. The largest meteorite impact in history
c. The largest meteorite impact in recorded history
d. The largest explosion in history
4. The blast:
a. Had a radius of over 2000 square miles
b. Registered at 5.0 on the Richter scale
c. Did not kill anything
d. Was widely reported outside of Russia
5. The explosion produced ___ times more energy than the Hiroshima bomb:
a. 186
b. 187
c. 185
d. 188
6. No impact crater has been found because:

a. The meteorite exploded in the atmosphere
b. The crater is beneath Lake Baikal
c. The crater is buried beneath the swamp
d. The meteorite disintegrated in the atmosphere

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Activity 1: Information retention without note-making

1d, 2b, 3c, 4b, 5a

2. The modern revival of the Olympic Games is attributed to:

1a, 2d, 3c, 4b, 5c, 6a

1. The Tunguska event happened on:

2. The first official scientific exploration occurred in:

3. The event is:

6. No impact crater has been found because:

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