How to Teach Engineering to a 5-Year-Old 08-27

Here’s a neat (and short) lesson from Washington state’s latest Teacher of the Year, Camille Jones. Camille teaches science and engineering to students as young as 5 years old. When she visited my office earlier this year, I asked her how she talks to such young kids about engineering. Take a look at what she showed me:

One thing I love about this is that it takes ideas that can seem very abstract, like pressure and tension, and makes them concrete. Camille told me the lesson was designed by the Museum of Science in Boston—a great example of how putting great lessons and other tools in the hands of talented teachers can lead to magical moments in the classroom. Technology is making it easier for teachers to find these tools, which is one of the things that makes me hopeful about the future of education.
You can read more about my visit with Camille here.


Education, at its most engaging, is performance art. From the moment a teacher steps into the classroom, students look to him or her to set the tone and course of study for everyone, from the most enthusiastic to the most apathetic students. Even teachers who have moved away from the traditional lecture format, toward more learner autonomy-supportive approaches such as project-based and peer-to-peer learning, still need to engage students in the process, and serve as a vital conduit between learner and subject matter.


Camille Jones is the kind of teacher I wish I would have had when I was in school, someone who could peak a kids interest in science and engineering instead of a nun who just whacked you across the knuckles with a ruler if you were holding your pencil too tight or the wrong way! 

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The Troublemakers 01-23

When students act out, why do we seek out flaws in their character? Shouldn't we instead search for the flaws in our schools and our teaching, holding us, the adults, primarily responsible?

When students act out, why do we seek out flaws in their character? Shouldn't we instead search for the flaws in our schools and our teaching, holding us, the adults, primarily responsible? Shouldn't we find better ways to understand the problem children, the ones we label the troublemakers?

I dreaded my first-period class. It was big and early — 29 bleary-eyed 11th- and 12th-graders yawning and slurping extra-large iced coffees. My students, recent immigrants and refugees from more than 25 different countries, spoke English with varying degrees of fluency, making my task of connecting with each particularly challenging.

And then there was Joe. 

He was funny, opinionated, and unceasing in his running commentary on our U.S. history class.

Sometimes it was a clarification: “It’s due when?” More often it was an opinion: “Those Nazis, I mean that’s messed up!”

He had one volume: loud. And he shared ideas as soon as they popped into his mind, unable to contain them a moment longer. His interjections could come at any time — during silent reading, group work, or while I was explaining an assignment. I was forever reminding him, “Please, Joe, try not to call out.” “Remember to raise your hand.” Sometimes I simply looked sternly in his direction.

He was always polite: “I got ya, Ms.” “Sorry, Ms.” “My bad, Ms.” He really would try. But three minutes later…

We teachers all have our Joes. Our students who consistently call out, talk back, refuse to participate or sit down or stay on task. They throw our lessons into disarray, make our heads pound. They keep us up at night strategizing, worrying. How can I connect? What strategies might work tomorrow? When, occasionally, these students miss school, class is unusually calm. Guiltily, we sigh with relief.

How do we reach and teach our troublemakers? Most teachers have binders brimming with ideas: shuffled seat assignments, tracking systems, rewards for on-point behavior. But when these fail, what can you do when it’s you alone in your class balancing 29 personalities, the clock ticking and your 40-minute-long class is almost up?

Too often schools’ response to misbehavior is exclusion: timeouts, visits to the principal’s office, suspensions, expulsions. It is the easy way out — often a form of triage when too many classes are overcrowded, understaffed, or undersupported. But, whatever the reason, exclusion damages our students’ futures.

Carla Shalaby, Ed.M.’09, Ed.D.’14, a former elementary school teacher, urges us to see and teach our most challenging students differently in her new book, Troublemakers: Lessons in Freedom from Young Children at School.

Shalaby introduces us to four rambunctious first- and second-graders: Zora, Lucas, Sean, and Marcus. These four have already been labeled as problems — by both school staff and peers. 

Shalaby set out to see school through their eyes. She followed them into classrooms and on school field trips. She accompanied them to the park with siblings, to karate class, and back home with their families. These four children leap off the page. They are daring, charismatic, silly, curious, creative.

But at school, they are outcasts. Shalaby paints a stark, but painfully recognizable portrait of a typical American classroom. School has “good students” and “bad students.” To be good is to follow teacher directions and rules, sit quietly, listen attentively, do what you’re told, conform. Those who deviate, question, or rebel are often excluded. And their exclusion sends a sharp message to their peers “that belonging to the classroom community is conditional, not absolute, contingent upon their willingness and ability to be a certain kind of person.”

Why is it, Shalaby asks, that when kids act out, we seek out flaws in their character? Shouldn’t we instead search for flaws in our schools and teaching — holding us, the adults, primarily responsible?

It is a question all educators should be asking.

Joe and I came to a head in late April. A guest speaker was finishing a presentation. Just as we were wrapping up, Joe shouted out, “Hey, you’re hot!” I regret to say I snapped. “Joe!” my voice loud and stern. “Come up here right now.” The bell rang, the class streamed out, and Joe shuffled up to my desk.

Troublemakers is not a book of strategies. Shalaby is clear that we cannot support our most disruptive students with cookie-cutter “behavior management” techniques. Rather than prescribe what to do, she offers up ideas for how to be, urging teachers to act first and foremost from a place of empathy, love, and understanding for all students.

But how do we as teachers go about putting this into action? In rereading the stories of these four young people, I was struck by six important truths these students teach us.

1. Keep children in class.

When we exclude our students, we are telling them: You don’t belong here. Exclusion shuts down opportunities for dialogue and understanding between us and our students. And exclusion triggers a vicious cycle. When we send students out, they miss essential academic content and skills. They return to class behind, confused, and even more likely to act out. These missed lessons add up and have long-lasting consequences. According to the Annie E. Casey Foundation, students who struggle to read proficiently by third grade are four times more likely to drop out or to fail high school. Across the country, approximately 3.5 million children are suspended from school annually. And African American and Latino students are three times more likely to be suspended than their white peers, according to 2014 data from the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights.

2. Let children be heard, and really listen when they speak.

To be heard is to be respected and valued. I see the importance of this simple truth whenever I speak at length with a student. They come during lunch, or linger after school, seeking advice on how to talk with friends, parents. When I see a student upset, unusually surly, or argumentative, I try my best to carve out time to check in and see if they want to talk. Being open to listen, and being aware to ask, reinforces to our students that we see them and we value them. Frustratingly, too often rigid school schedules leave little space to meaningfully connect.

Joe and I finally sat down to talk, and to listen, on that late April afternoon. He shared with me his frustrations. I shared with him mine. We examined how I might feel when he interrupted the class and we examined the same interruption from his perspective. I shared my hopes for what he could achieve in my class; he shared his hopes, but also what he needed from me to achieve them. It was not a wholly

comfortable conversation for either of us, but it was a starting point.

In the following weeks and months, Joe still called out, still offered spontaneous commentary at full volume, but he did so less frequently. More often than before I intentionally asked him to lead a discussion or to share an opinion — creating space for him to be included, and to be heard.

No one wanted to work with Jenny. In groups, she argued, she was dogmatic, and she sulked when she didn’t get her way.

Mostly, Jenny was unpredictable. Some days she walked in with a bounce and a smile, eagerly pulling out her binder, taking notes in a flurry, and jabbing her hand into the air to confidently answer questions. Other days she slunk into class, slouching in her back corner seat, glowering.

In groups, she was the same. She could be full of ideas, ready to work and ready to encourage others to tackle assignments — be it a PowerPoint presentation on labor unions or an op-ed for our local paper. But other days she would stubbornly talk over her peers. When they didn’t comply, she refused to do any work at all.

I was at a loss about what to do.

3. Partner with families.

Teachers’ most powerful partners are our students’ families. They are the experts, our students’ first and most important teachers, and their fiercest advocates. Our families know their children’s strengths, their passions, and their struggles. Resounding research tells us that strong family partnership in schools is essential for student success, school success, and for our own success as teachers. These partnerships are perhaps most important for our troublemakers. We often only see one or two dimensions of our charges. What is more, we only see our students in a collective — as one of maybe 30 personalities vying for

attention. As Shalaby shows us when we follow Zora, Lucas, Sean, and Marcus outside classroom walls and school halls, we see strikingly different sides, personalities, and strengths of these young people. As teachers, we must try to know more of these dimensions.

Early in the fall I met with Jenny’s mother. Sitting together one evening I heard about Jenny’s journey to America, the family she left behind, her struggle to fit in. Her mother shared her hopes for Jenny’s future and some of the challenges she faced. We exchanged phone numbers and emails, and for the rest of the long year we checked in regularly.

And in the classroom, I shaped an approach from what I had learned. Every day I made a point of checking in — often in those few moments as students filtered in. “Today’s a bad day, Ms. Lander,” she would share with me. “I’m so sorry to hear that. Would you like to tell me why?” Often she would. Sometimes it was another class or friend that was proving frustrating; other times it was an argument with her mom. For such days we developed a pact. “What support can I give you?” I would ask. Jenny would think for a moment and then provide an idea. Maybe she needed to work solo, or maybe it would be helpful to write thoughts in her notebook. Sometimes simply sharing her mood seemed sufficient to help Jenny turn things around.

4. Seek out our students’ strengths.

All students have strengths. Perhaps they are avid photographers, basketball players, coders, or poets when not in school. But when it comes to our troublemakers, it can be easy for their assets to be overshadowed by behaviors that disrupt the carefully cultivated cultures of our classrooms. We cannot lose sight of these strengths. Yet it is not enough to know that our troublemakers are budding artists, scientists, and entrepreneurs. We must also seek to reframe and better understand the qualities we find most frustrating. Zora shouts out a reaction during read-aloud; her teacher labels her impulsive. But what if, Shalaby counters, we saw Zora’s expression as fearlessness? Sean is forever asking why. His teacher describes his behavior as badgering, but Sean’s mother sees him as questioning and curious.

In class, Jenny was often stubborn, demanding that other students follow her ideas, growing upset when they didn’t. What if I reframed her behavior? What if I saw Jenny’s obstinacy as confidence, a young woman unafraid to share ideas? Jenny had a powerful skill her peers could learn. What Jenny needed were strategies to help her leverage her confidence and tools to help her become a generous leader.

At lunch one day, I shared with her some of my observations. To my surprise, her eyes grew wide. Quietly she asked, “You think so, Ms. Lander?” “Yes I do, and I think you have real potential to be a class leader.” She was grinning.

And so we began, taking time in quiet moments to break down leadership skills, discussing elements she could practice. Jenny attacked each with a determined nod. She still struggled at times, still had bad days. But what I saw more and more was Jenny volunteering to lead and, slowly, succeeding.

I was worried about Henry. It was only week two, but already I could see him slipping into a pattern. He barely took notes and chattered continuously with the boys next to him. He had yet to turn in a piece of homework. But I noticed too that in discussions he was engaged, offering thoughtful comments about the growth of cities during the Industrial Revolution. I held Henry back one afternoon. I shared my observations. How could I support his learning? He looked around the empty classroom.

“I should probably move seats,” he mused.

“That sounds like a strong idea. Where would be best for you to sit?” I asked. We talked through different possibilities and he settled on a spot across the room, among another, more studious, but also silly group of boys.

The next morning, Henry strode confidently to his new seat, and as the class progressed, it was as if another child had walked in that morning. He took notes, led discussions, and was quick to throw his hand to the sky with an idea about the impact of the growth in business monopolies. The new Henry showed up again the next day, and the day after.

5. Strategize with students.

We can only guess as to why a student might call out or fail to do homework. Rather than assume we know the answer, ask. From our students we can better learn what hurdles they face and in what ways we can support their success. And in doing this we demonstrate our commitment to our students.

As fall chilled to winter, Henry flourished in my class. He still forgot his homework sometimes, still had to be occasionally reminded to stay on task. But he had found a group of friends who could be goofy and yet also grapple with charting the effects of the Spanish American War. I watched excitedly as he grew in confidence, one of the first to raise his hand to answer a question or share an opinion.

A few weeks later, I learned that this was not the Henry that appeared in his other classes. He confided this to me one afternoon when he came seeking advice. In other classes, he described, he was always the troublemaker, always being sent out, always blamed for something. He didn’t know what to do. Many of his teachers seemed to have such a negative opinion of him. Most importantly, he was upset because he wanted so deeply to make his father proud.

I saw an opportunity.

“I see you in my class,” I told him, my voice slow, deliberate. “I see how hard you work and how well you can do.” He nodded a little shyly. Together we could talk through strategies that might help in other classes. But I also had another idea, a challenge.

6. Create opportunities for students to realize their potential and be publically recognized for their academic achievements.

All students are capable of achieving remarkable things, they just might need our help to do so. In raising the stakes, but also the support, we can create opportunities for students to explore at the edge of their capabilities. And when they do succeed, celebrate these achievements. Our troublemakers are too often only publicly acknowledged for their disruptions. We can change this pattern by intentionally creating opportunities to publicly recognize their strengths.

I am a journalist as well as a teacher, and I believe it is critical that my students learn to write clear and powerful prose. Halfway through the year I had my class embark on an op-ed project, writing on issues they cared about, the very best selected for publication in the local newspaper. Sitting with Henry on that fall afternoon I proposed an idea. What if he worked toward being one of those 10 students whose op-eds were published?

These six ways of being are not enough. Shalaby argues, and rightly so, that our troublemakers are “canaries in the coal mine.” These children, in their defiance, are warning us of something fundamentally destructive — in Shalaby’s words, toxic — about our schools and our expectations for all young people.

School is a place that prioritizes the group at the cost of the individual. Too many schools require students to conform, to sit silently, to do without questioning. Too few schools allow time for creative student-driven exploration or provide space to form meaningful relationships with peers and adults. Such school structures hurt all our students’ futures, but it is only our troublemakers who rebel forcibly enough to make us take notice.

I think of my own classes packed with close to 30 teenagers. I see them for barely 40 minutes a day. In that time I try to connect with and support this diverse collection of individuals. But I have never felt that I have succeeded — or can succeed 100 percent. This failure weighs heavy.

Shalaby urges us to reimagine the classroom. We must also reimagine schools. Top to bottom we desperately need to question the structure, the curriculum, the role of teachers, the role of students. We need a system of education that supports all types of learners, not just some learners. We need a system that will support teachers in reaching every student. And we need schools that nurture our students’ curiosity and individual strengths.

A week after Henry and I talked, he came into my classroom all fired up. His father, he told me, was very excited about Henry’s determination to write an op-ed. He was hoping to support him at home and might even put a down payment on a computer to help his son write. “If I get my op-ed published,” Henry confided, “I’ll make my father so proud.”

These six ways of being are not enough. Shalaby argues, and rightly so, that our troublemakers are “canaries in the coal mine.” These children, in their defiance, are warning us of something fundamentally destructive — in Shalaby’s words, toxic — about our schools and our expectations for all young people.

School is a place that prioritizes the group at the cost of the individual. Too many schools require students to conform, to sit silently, to do without questioning. Too few schools allow time for creative student-driven exploration or provide space to form meaningful relationships with peers and adults. Such school structures hurt all our students’ futures, but it is only our troublemakers who rebel forcibly enough to make us take notice.

Throughout December and January Henry doggedly worked to research, write, and edit. It was not always easy — he needed many reminders and cajoling — but we kept at it. As we approached the deadline, Henry began showing up early and staying late to edit.

In February, nine student op-eds were published in the paper. Henry’s was one of them. It was one of the strongest. I couldn’t have been more proud.

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Three Reasons to Ditch Technology in Your Flipped Classroom 08-21

What would happen if you were to arrive to your classroom, unplug the devices, turn off the
projector, and step away from the PowerPoint slides … just for the day?

What would you and your students do in class?

This was the challenge I presented to 100 faculty members who attended my session at the Teaching Professor Conference in St. Louis this past June. The title of the session was, “Using ‘Unplugged’ Flipped Learning Activities to Engage Students.” Our mission was to get “back to the basics” and share strategies to engage students without using technology.

Why Use “Unplugged” Strategies the Flipped Classroom?

Most of the conversations about the flipped classroom include discussions about technological tools. What video recording tool should I use? What tools are best for producing a podcast? What quizzing tool should I use to assess the pre-class work?  What types of clickers should I use in class to assess learning? With all of this focus on technology, why would we want to consider flipping a class without it? Here are three reasons:

1. To focus on the process. For many faculty, the “flip” means something more than how technology is used in and out of the classroom. In my work, for example, the FLIP is when you “Focus on your Learners by Involving them in the Process.” When you FLIP, you intentionally invert the design a learning environment so students engage in activities, apply concepts, and focus on higher level learning outcomes during class time.

This definition encourages us to think strategically about the learning experiences we are designing with our students so they can achieve the learning outcomes. The focus is not the technology. It’s the process. It’s the process of involving our students in applying and analyzing course content, making decisions, critiquing a topic, or evaluating a data set. It’s the process of creating something together to demonstrate understanding or to express ideas. Sometimes technology can help with this process, but sometimes it can become a distraction which could hinder the process.

2. To improve learning and retention. Scholars continue to analyze the pros and cons of technology in the classroom and its impact on student learning, retention, and engagement. For almost every study published on the advantages of technology, you can find another study on the disadvantages. Ultimately, the learning outcomes should inform how (or if) technology is used in the classroom.

It is interesting to consider how the findings of this recent study on taking notes by hand versus on a laptop has been shown to increase conceptual thinking (Mueller & Oppenheimer,2014). And, for those of us who use slides and videos in our flipped classrooms, it’s important to note the combination of images, text, videos, and our voice can be too overwhelming for some students, especially when they are introduced to new information. Using “unplugged” strategies in some of your lessons can reduce the cognitive load and help students remember what they’ve learned (Madda, 2015).

3. To enhance creativity and encourage real connections.

When I use unplugged strategies in my teaching, my students often say it’s “refreshing” to do something different. They often comment on how “tired” they are of slides and online discussion forums. When they disconnect from the devices, they tell me it helps them think of new ideas, and they appreciate the opportunity to connect with other students who are not distracted by a screen.
Likewise, when I use unplugged strategies in faculty development workshops, faculty often say that they appreciate the opportunity to put away their phones and laptops so they can make real connections with their colleagues (and get away from feeling obligated to answer emails!).

Flipping Faculty Development: Unplugged!

Speaking of faculty development, in my conference session, I wanted to engage faculty in the process of using “unplugged” tools in class to engage and involve students. To demonstrate how it can be done, and with the goal of “practicing what we preach” when it comes to faculty development, I flipped the session and placed faculty in the center of the learning experience.

The faculty participated in activities using five different “unplugged” tools: sticky notes, index cards, dice, a deck of cards, and poster paper. Each group was asked to analyze a case study using each of the tools and then brainstorm different ways these tech-free tools can be used in the classroom to increase student engagement and improve learning. I told workshop participants I would share their work in a Faculty Focus article and on my blog. As promised, here are some of their ideas:

Goal: To encourage students to ask more questions during class time.

Unplugged Tool: Dice

Strategy: Faculty member rolls the dice and the number rolled is the number of questions the students in the class must ask before class is dismissed.

Goal: To encourage students to analyze and prioritize information.

Unplugged Tool: Index cards

Strategy: Give students a case study. Ask them to individually decide which piece of information in the case is most important and write that information on an index card. Put students in groups and ask them to discuss and prioritize the cards from most to least important. Integrate their ideas into a class discussion.

Goal: To help students put information in an order.

Unplugged Tool: Sticky notes

Strategy: Give students a stack of index cards. Ask them to write each step of a procedure or process on the card and place the cards in the correct order from first step to last. Other groups can critique and change the order if needed. Use for class discussion.

For more unplugged teaching strategies created by the participants and to see the case studies, view my post on 25 Unplugged Strategies.

An important part of faculty development is to share ideas so we can all learn from each other. So, let’s keep the conversation going! What “unplugged” tools or strategies have you used in class to engage students and improve learning?


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Restoring pedagogical sanity ... and I would encourage others to keep it going.

Ex-ISRO head K Kasturirangan to head panel on National Education Policy 06-28

The above image is a famous cartoon by the late R. K. Laxman on School education in India.

It is a good news....

The education policy needs a frequent relook. In 2011. CCE (Continuous Comprehensive Evaluation) in Schools was implemented based on Prof. Yashpal committee report.
...

Now CCE has is being replaced by making evaluation a multiple area assessment with curricular, extra curricular, areas along with academics being part of the total evaluation.

The aim is to decrease the workload on the student by means of continuous evaluation by taking number of small tests throughout the year in place of single test at the end of the academic program. Only Grades are awarded to students based on work experience skills, dexterity, innovation, steadiness, teamwork, public speaking, behavior, etc. to evaluate and present an overall measure of the student's ability.

This helps the students who are not good in academics to show their talent in other fields such as arts, humanities, sports, music, athletics, and also helps to motivate the students who have a thirst of knowledge.

Thus the arenas of learning stood, evolved, expanded and diversified.

The policy will move ahead from this to a more radical approach to education and imparting.
But then, nothing can match, what we had in the ancient Indian culture and tradition of Gurukul.
Here we had the establishment of an emotional bond between the teacher and student. A relation which was a little higher in order to that between a parent and the child.

Seeing the quality knowledge and experience of the members of the committee and of course the knowledge and expertise that the hon. minister for HRD Shri. Prakash Jawadekar has in Academic domain, we can expect the team to almost create a revolution in the future educationin the country.

Of course it will take us a lot of time to reach that stage of evolution in Education, imparting, and achieving a teacher, student equilibrium.

We are still not as enabled, empowered, or enlightened as the Rishis and Munis of that era were.

The Development................

The HRD ministry has also chosen eight other experts and educationists, including former IAS
officer KJ Alphonse and Ram Shanker Kureel. 

The Union ministry of human resource development has appointed former Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) head Krishnaswamy Kasturirangan to head the much-awaited committee to draft the National Education Policy, officials said on Monday.

According to officials, the HRD ministry has also chosen eight other experts and educationists from various backgrounds. They include former Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer KJ Alphonse and Ram Shanker Kureel, who has a wide experience in the field of agricultural sciences and management.

MK Shridhar, who has served as member secretary of the Karnataka State Innovation Council, TV Kattimani, an expert on language communication, Mazhar Asif, a professor of Persian at Guwahati University, and former director of education, Uttar Pradesh, Krishan Mohan Tripathi will also bring a wealth of experience to the panel, sources said.

The committee also includes renowned mathematician Manjul Bhargava, who teaches at Princeton University, US, and vice-chancellor of SNDT Women’s University Vasudha Kamat, sources added.

“It took us some time but the panel that has been appointed has members from diverse background especially in the field of education,” a source said.

The National Policy on Education was framed in 1986 and modified in 1992. The government has now appointed a committee to draft the final policy document. Consultations on the policy started during the tenure of the previous HRD minister Smriti Irani.

However, it courted controversy after some of the suggestions were found to be regressive by educationists. Her successor, Prakash Javadekar, restarted the discussion on by inviting suggestions from various political parties, educationists and institutions.

Officials said this diversity would help the panel to understand the diverse issues that have to be kept in mind for the formulation of such a key policy document, the sources said.  


Please contribute your insight through comments here or on the social media platforms. 


Best Wishes, 


Shyam

A Favorite Subject Returns to Schools: Recess. 06-14

After playtime was dropped amid focus on academic performance, educators now take playground breaks seriously

Kindergarten students take to the playground at Oak Point Elementary, in Oak Point, Texas, where recess went from 30 minutes a day to one hour a day. Photo: Brandon Thibodeaux for The Wall Street Journal Three kindergarten girls looked close to taking a spill as they sat on the high back of a bench on a playground at Oak Point Elementary. Feet away, several administrators looked on, not making a move to stop them because at this school outside of Dallas, playtime is revered.

“As long as they’re safe, we allow kids to be kids,” said Daniel Gallagher, assistant superintendent for educational services in the Little Elm Independent School District.

That’s the mantra in this small school district, where schoolchildren are transitioning from one daily 30-minute recess to one hour a day, taken in four 15-minute increments. School officials say children are better focused with more unstructured breaks and do better in school.

School districts throughout the country are reassessing recess—with some bringing back the pastime or expanding it, citing academic and health benefits.

On Tuesday, the Minneapolis school board is expected to consider moving from a recommended 20 minutes of daily recess to a required 30 minutes daily. And in Florida, parents are hoping the governor will soon sign an education bill that includes a required 20 minutes of daily recess for elementary-school students in traditional public schools.

In the past year, the state of Rhode Island and school districts in Dallas, Portland, the Jefferson Parish Public School System in Louisiana, and Orange County and Manatee County school districts in Florida, are among those to implement a daily-recess requirement.About 21% of school districts required recess daily for elementary-school students in the 2013-2014 school year, according to the latest study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Bridging the Gap Research Program. That’s an increase from 16% of school districts with the requirement in 2006-2007.
It’s a change after years of recess taking a back seat to testable core subjects like math and reading, with a noticeable decline in playtime after the rollout of the now-defunct 2002 No Child Left Behind education law that put more focus on holding schools accountable for academic performance.

The Center on Education Policy, a national research group, found in a 2007 report that 58% of school districts increased time spent teaching English language arts, while 45% increased math time, after the 2002 education law. Meanwhile, 20% of school districts decreased the amount of time spent on recess, at an average of 50-minutes less a week. (The CDC recommends at least 20 minutes of daily recess for elementary-school students.)

Supporters of daily recess often point to a 2013 study by the American Academy of Pediatrics, which says in part that “recess serves as a necessary break from the rigors of concentrated, academic challenges in the classroom.” The study also found that “safe and well-supervised recess offers cognitive, social, emotional, and physical benefits that may not be fully appreciated when a decision is made to diminish it.”

“Recess resets their brain,” said Lowell Strike, superintendent in the Little Elm district, where children have recess as long as the wind chill is at least 13 degrees and the heat index is no higher than 103.

But there has been some pushback. Some school administrators and lawmakers have spoken against state bills to mandate recess, saying it takes away flexibility from schools. This year, the Arizona School Boards Association opposed a bill in the state that would have required 50 minutes of daily recess in elementary schools.

“We are absolutely not against school recess,” said Chris Kotterman, the association’s director of governmental relations. “But when it comes to how the school day should be structured, it should be left up to the local school board. We generally try to keep state policy mandates to a minimum.”
Parents in areas around the country are advocating for daily recess.

Angela Browning is among “recess moms” in Florida pushing for a statewide recess mandate. She said the group has successfully pushed for daily recess in a few Florida school districts, including Orange County Public Schools, where her three children attend school. Ms. Browning said she got active several years ago upon finding out from her children that their school didn’t offer daily recess.

“I was stunned,” she said. “Children learn on the playground—leadership skills, social skills, negotiating skills. With all the testing, recess, along the way, got squeezed out.”

Orange County Public Schools started requiring 20 minutes of recess daily for students in kindergarten through fifth grade in the 2016-17 school year.

Recess requirements are usually decided at the campus level, and to a lesser extent at the district level. Studies have found that a majority of schools offer some type of recess, but not always regularly nor with set timespans—and sometimes in conjunction with school lunch. Those who linger over lunch get less playtime.

The CDC advises against taking recess in conjunction with lunch breaks and physical-education classes, saying that it should be unstructured and on a regular schedule.

In Little Elm, teacher Nicole Beal said she has seen firsthand the benefits of her kindergarten students having recess breaks during the school day.

“Their reading is better, they’re more focused,” she said. “Getting outside, it’s a nice break.”
When the children were asked who likes the extra playtime, every hand shot up.

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Video games can mitigate defensiveness resulting from bad test scores, study suggests 04-15

Image credit ; Shyam's Imagination Library

One of the worst feelings a student can have is receiving a bad grade on an exam, whether it's a test they prepared well for or didn't prepare at all. The prevalence of video games in today's society helps mitigate some of the effects felt by students from those low test scores by reaffirming their abilities in another area they deem important.

Video game players can get temporarily lost in alternative worlds, whether it's transforming into the ultimate fighting machine or the greatest athlete on the planet. But no matter the game, the goal is to find a way to put the empty feeling of the bad test at school behind him by reaffirming his excellence in his favorite video game. It's a scene that plays out all across the country, and one that has received criticism at times for placing too much emphasis on the game and not enough on schoolwork.

But John Velez, an assistant professor in the Department of Journalism & Electronic Media in the Texas Tech University College of Media & Communication, says that may not always be the case. In fact, his research suggests those who value video game success as part of their identity and received positive feedback on their video game play were more willing to accept the bad test score and consider the implications of it, something that is crucial for taking steps to change study habits and ensure they do better on future exams.

Conversely, those who do not value success in video games but received positive video game feedback were actually more defensive to having performed poorly on a test. They were more likely to discredit the test and engage in self-protective behaviors. Regardless, the results seem to throw a wrench into the theory that video games and schoolwork are detrimental to each other.
The key, however, is making sure those playing video games after a bad test are not doing it just as an escape, but making sure after playing video games they understand why they did badly on the test and what they need to do to perform better on the next one.

"People always kind of talk about video-game play and schoolwork in a negative light," Velez said. "They talk about how playing video games in general can take away from academic achievement. But for me and a lot of gamers, it's just a part of life and we use it a lot of times to help get through the day and be more successful versus gaming to get away from life.

"What I wanted to look into was, for people who identify as a gamer and identify as being good at games, how they can use playing video games after something like a bad exam to help deal with the implications of a bad exam, which makes it more likely they will think about the implications and accept the idea that, 'OK, I didn't do well on this exam and I need to do better next time.'"

Negative results, positive affirmation Velez said past research suggests receiving negative feedback regarding a valued self-image brings about a defensive mechanism where people discredit or dismiss the source of the information. Conversely, the Self-Affirmation Theory says that affirming or bolstering an important self-image that is not related to the negative feedback can effectively reduce defensiveness.

"If you're in a bad mood, you can play a good game and get into a good mood," Velez said. "But I wanted to go deeper and think about how there are times when you are in a bad mood but you are in a bad mood for a very specific reason. Just kind of ignoring it and doing something to get into a good mood can be bad. It would be bad if you go home and play a video game to forget about it and the next time not prepare better for the test or not think about the last time you did badly on a test."

For the research, Velez was interested in two types of people -- those who identify as placing importance on good video game play and those who do not. How good they were at playing the game was not a factor, just that they identified as it being important to their identity or not.

Participants in the research were administered a survey to assess their motivations for video-game play and the importance of video games to their identity. They were then given an intelligence test and were told the test was a strong measure of intelligence. Upon completing the test, participants were given either negative feedback on their performance or no feedback at all.

That negative feedback naturally produces an amount of defensiveness for anyone regarding their performance, regardless of the importance they put on being successful at video games.

Participants then played a generic shooting video game for 15 minutes that randomly provided positive or no feedback to the player, and players were told the game was an adequate test of their video-game playing skills. Participants then completed an online survey containing ratings of the intelligence test and self-ratings on intelligence.

What Velez discovered was those who place importance on being successful at video games were less likely to be defensive about the poor performance on the intelligence test.

"Defensiveness is really a bad thing a lot of times," Velez said. "It doesn't allow you to think about the situation and think about what you should have done differently. A lot of times people use it to protect themselves and ignore it or move on, which makes it likely the same thing is going to happen over and over again."

It's the second discovery that Velez didn't expect, the result where those who performed badly on the intelligence exam and don't identify as video game players became even more defensive about their intelligence exam result. Instead, they were more likely to use the positive video game feedback as further evidence they are intelligent and the test is flawed or doesn't represent their true intelligence.

"That was like this double-edged sword that I didn't realize I was going to find," Velez said. "It was definitely unexpected, but once you think about it theoretically, it intuitively makes sense. After receiving negative information about yourself you instinctively start looking for a way to make yourself feel better and you usually take advantage of any opportunities in your immediate environment."

Changing behavior A common punishment administered by parents for inappropriate behavior or poor performance in school has been to take away things the child enjoys, such as television, the use of the car, or their video games.

One might infer from this research that taking video games from the child might actually be doing them harm by not allowing them to utilize the tool that makes them feel better or gives them an avenue to understand why they performed poorly in school and how they must do better.
Velez, however, said that's not necessarily the case.

"I don't think parents should change their practices until more research is conducted, particularly looking at younger players and their parents' unique parenting styles," Velez said. "The study simply introduces the idea that some people may benefit from some game play in which they perform well, which may make it easier for them to discuss and strategize for the future so they don't run into this problem again after playing."

Velez said the study also introduces specific stipulations about when the benefits of video-game play occur and when it may actually backfire.

"If parents know their child truly takes pride in their video-game skills, then their child may benefit from doing well in their favorite game before addressing the negative test grade," Velez said. "However, there's the strong possibility that a child is using the video game as a way to avoid the implications of a bad test grade, so I wouldn't suggest parents change how they parent their children until we're able to do more research."

Therein lies the fine line, because the study also suggests receiving positive feedback on video games doesn't necessarily translate into a better performance on a future exam. Velez said the common idea is that defensiveness prevents people from learning and adapting from the feedback they received. Those who are less defensive about negative self-information are more likely to consider the causes and precursors of the negative event, making it more likely a change in behavior will occur. But this was not a focus of this particular study and will have to be examined further.

Velez said he would also like to identify other characteristics of video-game players who are more likely to benefit from this process compared to increased negative defensive reaction. This could be used to help identify a coping strategy or lead to further research about parenting strategies for discussing sensitive subjects with children.

"What I want to get out of this research is, for people who care about gaming as part of their identity, how they can use video games in a positive way when dealing with negative things in life," Velez said.

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Postsecondary Success 05-10

Content and Data reproduced from Melinda & Bill Gates Foundation website.

America as 100 College Students

America’s postsecondary student population is more diverse than ever. Many students attend school while working part- or even full-time. Some are raising children while in school. And, in many cases, they’re financially independent.

There’s no one-size-fits-all path to (or through) college – and we need to plan our education policies accordingly.

What would America look like as 100 college students?

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Visit the links below to view the related Data.

Gender: National Center for Education Statistics, Digest of Education Statistics. Table 

Age: National Center for Education Statistics, Digest of Education Statistics. Table

Type of School: National Center for Education Statistics, Digest of Education Statistics. Table

Race: National Center for Education Statistics, Digest of Education Statistics. Table

Enrollment: National Center for Education Statistics, Digest of Education Statistics. Table

Employment: U.S. Department of Education, Demographic and Enrollment Characteristics of Undergraduate Students. Table 8.

Financial Aid: National Center for Education Statistics. Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System.

Housing: American College Health Association. National College Health Assessment.

Children: U.S. Department of Education, Demographic and Enrollment Characteristics of Undergraduate Students. Table 1.

Learning Environment: National Center for Education Statistics, Digest of Education Statistics. Table