2024 – Page 5 – Education & Teacher Conferences

Erik Jahner, PhD

May-17-2024

Anxious Generation by Jonathan Haidt

From the author of The Coddling of the American Mind, The Righteous Mind, and The Happiness Hypothesis, comes another compelling social commentary that helps us better understand and take part in our social evolution. Jonathan Haidt, a social psychologist at the Stern School of Business (NYU), once again asks what kind of society we want to create and empowers us with the knowledge to become agents of change.

In Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness, Haidt identifies a critical period between 2010 and 2015 when our phones and computers became more than tools for communication and work, but they became “platforms upon which companies competed to see who could hold on to eyeballs the longest.” (p. 115) Not coincidentally, it was during this same industrial change that the western world saw a rapid increase in anxiety and depression among teenagers, revealing a society unprepared for the technological upheaval it faced.

Haidt contends that the “virtual world” is disembodied, limiting communication to language without the physical contact and expressive synchronous communication that our brains evolved to master. It’s a world with little real physical risk, offering bursts of addictive dopamine as we scroll from post to post. Individuals can join many communities online but often do so without the social investment and learning necessary in face-to-face interactions. It’s a new world, one which has capitalized on our biology, but one we have not yet biologically or socially evolved to handle in a healthy way.

But this is not an anti-technology book, it’s a book about how two “experience blockers” disrupt the natural trajectory of development, making us lonelier and more anxious. Changes in parenting practices are the second “experience blocker.” Our efforts to keep teens safe have been changing over the decades, we’ve overprotected and overscheduled them, denying them the necessary risk-taking and discovery opportunities essential for brain development during adolescence. We have denied them even the basic joys of unstructured play. But our protections have been unbalanced, linked to his first point, we’ve failed to protect them in the digital world, where there’s no consensus on rites of passage or developmentally appropriate use of technology.

Haidt refers to these combined issues as the “Great Rewiring.” The book provides an excellent historical overview of changes in parenting and adolescent behavior over generations. You’ll see reflections of your parents, grandparents, and children, noticing the significant differences in practices and the physical environment for development. Effective images and graphs drive home his main arguments without overwhelming the reader with data points. The data presented speaks for itself, but lest you have doubts Haidt effectively handles and incorporates arguments he has gotten and wondered over the years. Allow him to open your eyes to the data that led him to writing this book.

While directed at parents, this book is important for socially responsible technologists, scientists, legislators, and educators. Throughout the book, Haidt offers a social scientist’s and parent’s perspective on guidelines for teens’ interaction with technology and social experiences. Supporting his thesis with reams of extensive but easily accessible research, Haidt explains the skills we need to rekindle and the new skills we need to develop to overcome the mental health damage inflicted on a generation by changing parenting practices and social media. He provides specific developmental timetables and strategies, backed by research and parenting experience, explaining how and when certain types of technology should be introduced. While you may not agree with every perspective or suggestion, Haidt’s chapters provide essential talking points and critical issues that must be addressed in our changing world.

Haidt assertively demonstrates that a laissez-faire approach to technology has led to an era of psychological problems that can only be combated with collective change of which we are all individually a part. As technological change shows no signs of slowing, his insights are more crucial than ever. We need to invest individually and in communities through real-world interactions preparing for our future.

Updating the Great Cold-Call Debate: Does Gender Matter?

Andrew Watson

May-11-2024

Updating the Great Cold-Call Debate: Does Gender Matter?

Edu-Twitter predictably cycles through a number of debates; in recent weeks, the Great Cold-Call Debate has reheated. (You see what I did there.)

Team A argues that cold calling — that is, calling on students who haven’t raised their hands — is a vital strategy to increase student participation and learning. (Additional benefit: it allows teachers to check for understanding with strategic rapidity and flexibility.)

Team B argues that cold calling raises students’ stress levels, and thereby hampers their learning. (Additional detriment: it especially raises stress for students who face a variety of classroom difficulties–from trauma to special educational needs.)

This “debate” mostly involves making strong claims — “it’s vital!”; “no, it’s dreadful!” — but rarely draws on research to explore its key contentions.

In fact, the debate doesn’t often turn to research because we don’t have much research. But given the energy of recent arguments, I thought I’d check to see if any recent studies can help us out…

Picking Up Where They Left Off

A few years ago, I wrote about a 2013 study done by Dr. Elise Dallimore and Co. This research team — working with college sophomores — found that cold calling increased voluntary class participation and decreased class discomfort.

That is: compared to students in low cold-calling classes, those in high cold-calling classes spoke up more on their own, and expressed greater levels of comfort in class.

That sounds like a win-win.

Of course, all studies include limitations — no one study can explore everything. Team Dallimore spotted an obvious concern with their first study: it didn’t consider the effect of gender on class participation.

We have LOTS of research showing that women feel less comfortable participating in class discussions, and — unsurprisingly — speak up less often than men.

So, picking up where they left off, Dallimore and Co. wanted to see if cold calling reduced or increased this gender split.

In other words: if cold calling benefits students overall (the 2013 study), does it have a different effect on men and women?

Important note:

Dallimore’s first study more-or-less supported Team A as described above: “cold calling encourages class participation.”

Her second study starts to address the the concerns of Team B. We might reasonably worry that women — who (on average) go into many classes feeling stressed about participation — will feel EXTRA stress if that participation becomes mandatory.

This second study explores that plausible concern.

Take II

Like her first study, Dallimore’s second study looks at class participation in several college Accounting classes.

They divided those classes into two groups: “low” cold-calling (less than 25% of the questions were framed as cold call), and “high” cold-calling (more than 33% — and as high as 84%!!).

According to survey data, male and female students went into these classes with roughly the same perceptions of class participation.

So Dallimore’s questions were:

First: Did students’ behavior change based on high- vs. low-cold-calling? And,

Second: Did gender matter for any changes?

In answer to the first question: over time, students volunteered more in the high-cold-calling classes than the low-cold-calling classes.

Whether you’re counting the percentage of students who participated or the number of questions that students asked, those numbers went up.

So, cold calling INCREASED voluntary participation.

Better and Better

Of course, we’re happy to see that cold calling increased participation. However, that finding simply replicates the 2013 study. What about the second question: did gender matter?

Well, both men and women voluntarily participated more in high-cold-calling classes. And, women’s participation increased more than men’s participation.

Specifically: 57% of men voluntarily participated in the low-cold-calling classes, whereas 73% did in the high-cold-calling classes. That’s a difference of 16%.

For women: 52% voluntarily participated in the low-cold-calling classes, whereas 82% did in the high-cold-calling classes. That’s a difference of 30%.

We get the same result if we look at the number of questions asked. Men asked more questions in high-cold-calling classes than in low-cold-calling classes; the average number went from 1.78 to 2.13.

Women asked LOTS more question: the average went from 1.33 to 2.6.

In brief: high-cold-calling classes increased participation for everyone — especially women.

Not So Fast

So far, Dallimore’s 2019 study seems like a slam dunk for Team A. It says, basically: “cold calling does help and doesn’t hurt.”

At the same time, I don’t think we can now rush to conclude “all teachers must cold call all the time.”

I have three reasons to hesitate:

First: both Dallimore’s studies were done with college students. As I’ve written elsewhere, I don’t think that college students make great proxies for K-12 students. On average:

College students know more than K-12 students.

They have higher level of academic and personal maturity.

They probably have higher levels of academic motivation — they’re in college!

So, these findings might apply to K-12 students…but we don’t have research (that I know of) to demonstrate that conclusion.

Second: as I wrote in a blog post last fall, bad cold calling does exist. As the research study described there explains, we need to refine our question.

Instead of asking: “is cold-calling a good idea?”

We should ask: “how can we hone our cold-calling technique to get its benefits without its potential harms?”

Let’s get some really good answers to that second question before we insist on spreading the practice.

Third: At least so far, research suggests that Team B’s concern — “the stress that results from cold calling hampers learning” — doesn’t hold true for most students.

At the same time, our goal is not that most students learn, but that all of them do.

We should accept the almost certainly true statement that cold calling will stress out a few students to the detriment of their learning. Part of “honing out technique” — described in my second point above — will be identifying and working with those students.

To Sum Up

Despite all the heated debate about cold calling, I think we have the beginnings of a persuasive research pool. So far — at least — it seems to encourage class participation (which should, in turn, increase learning).

Yes: we need to be good at this technique for it to work. Yes: we should respect important boundary conditions.

And, based on the research I’ve seen so far, I plan to keep using cold calling myself.

Coda

After I wrote this blog post, I discovered that LOTS of people have been adding to this debate.

Here’s Bradley Busch.

Here’s Tom Sherrington.

No doubt others have got wise ideas!

Dallimore, E. J., Hertenstein, J. H., & Platt, M. B. (2013). Impact of cold-calling on student voluntary participation. Journal of Management Education, 37(3), 305-341.

Dallimore, E. J., Hertenstein, J. H., & Platt, M. B. (2019). Leveling the playing field: How cold-calling affects class discussion gender equity. Journal of Education and Learning, 8(2), 14-24.

Can students “catch” attention? Introducing “Attention Contagion”

Andrew Watson

May-05-2024

Can students “catch” attention? Introducing “Attention Contagion”

Every teacher knows: students won’t learn much if they don’t pay attention. How can we help them do so? (In my experience, shouting “pay attention!” over and over doesn’t work very well…)

So, what else can we do?

As is so often the case, I think “what should we do?” isn’t exactly the right question.

Instead, we teachers should ask: “how should we THINK ABOUT what we do?”

When we have good answers to the “how-do-we-think?” question, we can apply those thought processes to our own classrooms and schools.

So, how should we think about attention?

Let me introduce “attention contagion”…

Invisible Peer Pressure

A research team in Canada wanted to know: can students “catch” attention from one another? How about inattention?

That is: if Student A pays attention, will that attentiveness cause Student B to pay more attention as well?

Or, if Student A seems inattentive, what happens with Student B?

To study this question, a research team led by Dr. Noah Forrin had two students — A and B — watch a 50 minute video in the same small classroom.

In this case, “Student A” was a “confederate”: that is, s/he had been trained…

to “pay attention”: that is, focus on the video and take frequent notes, or

NOT to “pay attention”: that is, slouch, take infrequent notes, glance at the clock.

Student A sat diagonally in front of Student B, visible but off to the side.

What effect did A’s behavior have on B?

Well, when A paid attention, B

… reported focusing more,

… focused more, got less drowsy, and fidgeted less,

… took more notes, and

… remembered slightly more on a subsequent multiple-choice quiz.

These results seem all the more striking because the inattentive confederate had been trained NOT to be conspicuously distracting. NO yawning. NO fidgeting. NO pen tapping.

The confederates, in other words, didn’t focus on the video, but didn’t try to draw focus themselves. That simple lack of focus — even without conspicuous, noisy distraction — sapped Student B’s attention.

Things Get Weird

So far, this study (probably) confirms teacherly intuition. I’m not terribly suprised that one student’s lack of focus has an effect on other students. (Forrin’s research team wasn’t surprised either. They had predicted all these results, and have three different theories to explain them.)

But: what happens if Student A sits diagonally BEHIND Student B, instead of diagonally in front?

Sure enough, Forrin’s team found the same results.

Student B caught Student A’s inattention, even if s/he couldn’t see it.

I have to say: that result seems quite arresting.

Forrin and Co. suggest that Student B could hear Student A taking notes — or not taking notes. And this auditory cue served as a proxy for attentiveness more broadly.

But whatever the reason, “attention contagion” happens whether or not students can see each other. (Remember: the confederates had been trained not to be audibly distracting — no sighs, no taps, no restless jostling about.)

Classroom Implications

I wrote at the top that teachers can use research to guide our thinking. So, what should we DO when we THINK about attention contagion?

To me, this idea shifts the focus somewhat from individual students to classroom norms.

That is: in the old days, I wanted that-student-right-there to pay attention. To do so, I talked to that-there-student. (“Eyes on the board, please, Bjorn.”)

If attention contagion is a thing, I can help that-student-right-there pay attention by ensuring ALL students are paying attention.

If almost ALL of my students focus, that-student-right-there might “catch” their attentiveness and focus as well.

Doug Lemov — who initially drew my attention to this study — rightly points to Peps Mccrea’s work.

Mccrea has written substantively about the importance of classroom norms. When teachers establish focus as a classroom norm right from the beginning, this extra effort will pay off down the road.

The best strategy to do so will vary from grade to grade, culture to culture, teacher to teacher. But this way of thinking can guide us in doing in our specific classroom context.

Yes, Yes: Caveats

I should point out that the concept of “attention contagion” is quite new — and its newness means we don’t have much reasearch at all on the topic.

Forrin’s team has replicated the study with online classrooms (here) — but these are the only two studies on the topic that I know of.

And: two studies is a VERY SMALL number.

Note, too, that the research was done (for very good reasons) in a highly artificial context.

So, we have good reason to be curious about pursuing this possibility. But we should not take “attention contagion” to be a settled conclusion in educational psychology research.

TL;DR

To help our students pay attention, we can work with individual students on their behavior and focus.

And, we can emphasize classroom norms of focus — norms that might help students “catch” attention from one another.

Especially if more classroom research reinforces this practice, we can rethink attention with “contagion” in mind — and thus help our students learn.

Forrin, N. D., Huynh, A. C., Smith, A. C., Cyr, E. N., McLean, D. B., Siklos-Whillans, J., … & MacLeod, C. M. (2021). Attention spreads between students in a learning environment. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, 27(2), 276.

Should Teachers Be Excited about “Neural Synchrony”?

Andrew Watson

April-28-2024

Should Teachers Be Excited about “Neural Synchrony”?

This blog — and this company — exist to give good advice to everyone who cares about learning and teaching.

To accomplish that mission, we rely — as much as possible — on solid research.

An important part of our mission: to warn against bad advice. And, of course, we’re especially worried about people who give that bad advice with the label “All The Research Shows…”

So:

No, learning styles are not a thing.

No, Brain Gym doesn’t do anything special for your brain.

And no, “brain food” shouldn’t really grab your attention.

Like Celine Dion’s heart, the list could go on and on.

The Potential Joys of “Synchrony”

In recent years, I’ve seen an increasing number of claims about the importance of “neural synchrony.”

The claim sounds something like this:

“When students are working effectively together in groups, we see an increased level of neural synchrony among them.”

The technical definition of neural synchrony is complicated enough to stun a badger, but sounds more-or-less like what you think it would be: “neural networks in different people firing in ways that kinda rhyme.”

The good news about “neural synchrony” is that … well … it’s good. Right? I mean, it SOUNDS really good.

If my neurons are firing in ways that align with my students’ neurons, we can reasonably assume that something special and good is happening. Can’t we?

Before I answer that question, I want to back up a step and talk about the difference between psychology and neuroscience. (I promise: I’ll get back to all those synchronous neurons in a few paragraphs.)

Grab a Scalpal, or Grab a Quiz

As teachers and school leaders, we’re really interested in “stuff going on inside students’ heads.”

We have — to oversimplify things a lot — two basic academic approaches to studying “stuff inside the head.”

We might think like a biologist, and study all the damp and sticky stuff: neurons, and the pre-frontal cortex, and neurotransmitters, and blood flow, and the amygdala, and so forth.

We call this field neuroscience.

Neuroscience often requires gloves and scalpels, and occasionally fMRI and EEG gizmos.

Or, we might focus on mental function, and study things like attention, or memory, or motivation, or learning, or critical thinking, or curiosity.

We call this field psychology.

All of those mental functions result from something biological (studied by “neuroscience”), but we can study them without putting on gloves and grabbing a scalpel.

So, I might give my students a retrieval practice quiz and then measure how much they remembered a week later. This research involves psychology (I measured “remembering”) but not neuroscience (I didn’t look at biological stuff).

Here’s why we care: “neural synchrony” lies squarely in the world of neuroscience. We’re talking biology here.

The Charms, and Perils, of Neuro-Advice

Why does the difference between psychology and neuroscience matter? Here goes:

We live in a cultural moment when people REALLY CARE about neuroscience. If you want to get people excited about whatever you’re saying, throw the word “brain” into your title.

I mean, if eating blueberries benefits the brain, then we should all eat blueberries! Because: brain!! (Caveat: I don’t know of any special brain benefits to eating blueberries.)

For this reason, I assume, people seem to have gotten very excited about the topic of “neural synchony.”

Alas, our cultural fascination with neuroscience leads us to a willingness…even an eagerness…to believe neuro-guidance MUST be true.

If a teaching strategy helps my brain synchronize with my students’ brains, it must be gold standard. No?

No.

The ever-wise Pedro de Bruyckere has recently written about a study looking at “neural synchrony” between parents and children.

This study gets a bit complicated because it combines neuroscience (“neural synchrony”) with psychology (“attachment theory”).

But the headlines should force us to reconsider our all-too-easy assumption that “neural synchrony” must be a good thing.

Why?

Because: mothers who have a good enough relationship with their child (“secure attachment”) show LESS neural synchrony than those who have a difficult relationship with their child (“insecure attachment”).

Yes: in this one study, increased neural synchrony correlates with decreased quality of parent-child relationship.

De Bruyckere quotes the press release describing the study:

“Increased brain-to-brain synchrony may reflect a neural compensation mechanism to overcome otherwise less attuned interaction elements.” (emphasis added)

In brief, in this research, “neural synchony” doesn’t show that upliftingly good brain things are happening; it shows a compensation strategy for difficulties.

To be clear, I think it’s entirely possible that brain synchrony might — under other circumstances — reveal basically good things.

But we shouldn’t assume that “more neural synchrony” = “more good stuff.”

The Bigger Picture

Longtime readers will recognize a theme here.

Over and over (and over) again, teachers get neuroscience-flavored advice — advice that sounds really persuasive because it’s got brainy words attached.

Teach this way because oxytocin!

Start your lessons this way because amygdala!!

Schools should do this because neuroplasticity!!!

In every case, neuroscience research might make a teaching strategy plausible. But — and this is a really important point — we have to test the advice with actual students in actual classrooms first.

That classroom research will almost always be psychology (memory, attention, motivation) not neuroscience (neuron, fMRI, prefrontal cortex, EEG, dopamine).

So: should we be excited when we read about neural synchrony?

Only if the teaching advice that follows has been tested in classrooms first.

For teachers, neuroscience research is fascinating; psychology research is useful.

Improving Multiple-Choice Questions: A Thought-Provoking Pause

Andrew Watson

April-21-2024

Improving Multiple-Choice Questions: A Thought-Provoking Pause

Many teachers carry strong ambivalence about multiple-choice questions (handy abbreviation: MCQs).

On the one hand, MCQs offer the benefits of simplicity — not a small feature in our complex lives.

On the other hand, they seem altogether too cheap and surface-y to promote our goal: long-term, flexible, and useful knowledge.

If only well-designed MCQs could offer us the good stuff (“simplicty”) without the bad stuff (“merely surface learning”)…

But wait just a moment…

The Story Before the Story

As I’ve written in the past, we do have some easy strategies to improve the quality of MCQs.

One easy approach: make the alternative answers plausible.

That is: When I ask my students “Who is Laertes?”, the potential MCQ answers could be:

a) Ophelia’s brother, a foil for Hamlet

b) Bugs Bunny’s alter ego

c) My cat

d) The star of an upcoming Marvel movie

Or the answers could be

a) Ophelia’s brother, a foil for Hamlet

b) Macbeth’s partner, whom he later murders

c) Othello’s advisor, who betrays him

d) Prince Hal’s companion, famous for appetite

Obviously, the first list doesn’t require the students to think hard. (My cat’s name is “Pippin,” thank you very much.) So, they won’t learn much from that MCQ.

However, the second list provides several plausible answers. To get this question right, students have to think about various Shakespearean plays.

Because “memory is the residue of thought,” and this MCQ requires more thought, it will almost certainly result in more memory (a.k.a. “learning”).

With this example to guide us, are there other ways we might improve MCQs?

Take a Moment

A recent study explores another handy way to encourage our students to think more.

Step 1: show the MCQ — but not the potential answers;

Step 2: pause just a bit;

Step 3: okay, NOW show the answers.

In theory, students just might use that strategic pause to see if they can think of the answer on their own.

That is:

If I ask, “Who is Laertes?”

My students might think “Gosh, that’s from some Shakespeare something. Could be Othello…or, wait, I’m thinking Hamlet. That’s right…he fought against Hamlet in that swordfight. Something about a ‘palpable hit.’ “

When — after the pause — the students see the answers I’m offering, they can confirm the answer they started with. (Or, check themselves against the other possibilities.)

In other words, this strategy offers yet another way to prompt students to think.

Clearly this idea makes sense in theory; does it work in practice?

From Esperanto to Swahili

The research team tested this question with word pairs: either Dutch-Esperanto, or Dutch-Swahili.

In addition to all the research techniques we like to see, this team added two not-altogether-common steps.

First: they ran four different experiments — not just one. In this way, they were able to explore nuances and details to build up a more-complete-than-usual picture.

Second: they tested the students’ memory of those word pairs several days later.

Researchers often assess “learning” by retesting after several minutes, or an hour. Because this team waited a few days, they’re giving us a more plausible reason to believe that students did (or did not) “learn.”

So, what did the researchers and their extra-admirable methods find?

Conclusion #1: the wait just a bit strategy worked.

That is: students remembered more word pairs when they had to wait to see the possible answers than when they didn’t.

Conclusion #2: the benefit came from effortful thinking.

Students who used the pause to try to recall the word pair remembered more pairs than those who just waited for the potential answers to show up.

Conclusion #3: the “make the alternative answers plausible” strategy still works.

This team re-tested the strategy explained above. Sure enough, making the distractors plausible prompts students think harder. And, therefore, they remember more.

It’s almost hard to believe that such a simple strategy could help … but these four studies offer good support for that conclusion.

TL;DR

If you want to have your students learn more from multiple-choice questions, build in a short pause between the question and the possible answers.

And, encourage your students to think during that pause: what will the right answer be?

The more thinking, the more learning.

van den Broek, G. S., Gerritsen, S. L., Oomen, I. T., Velthoven, E., van Boxtel, F. H., Kester, L., & van Gog, T. (2023). Optimizing multiple-choice questions for retrieval practice: Delayed display of answer alternatives enhances vocabulary learning. Journal of Educational Psychology.

Insight into a Bright Mind by Nicole Tetreault

Erik Jahner, PhD

April-17-2024

Insight into a Bright Mind by Nicole Tetreault

Insight into a Bright Mind: A Neuroscientist’s Personal Stories of Unique Thinking is a profoundly personal book, authored by Nicole Tetreault who finds neuroscience deeply meaningful on a personal level, shaping her understanding of herself and the world around her. The book is a neuroscience-informed exploration of her own personal reflections as an individual who is twice exceptional, recounting experiences with teachers, peers, and her children and interpreting the often-misunderstood lives of other exceptional individuals. The narrative reveals how the author’s early encounters with neuroscience have been intricately woven into a deeper understanding of herself, transforming the book into a piece of literature rather than mere information. You will be introduced to her personal experience from running, to Barbie, mathematics, and coloring with her mother. You will experience her pain, frustration, and joy. This emotionally evocative narrative not only ignites curiosity but also prompts introspection into one’s own development and story.

The book excels in translating neuroscience into culturally relevant ideas including autism, giftedness, gender, intelligence, and creativity just to name a few. This is an example of how neuroscience can enrich our understanding of ourselves and others beyond appreciating biology alone. Crafted with aesthetic expertise, each paragraph is not only enjoyable to read but also brims with a fascinating array of information about the brain.

Prior to reading this book, I had assumed that the topic might not interest me, deeming it too specialized and applicable only to a niche audience. However, the book defies these expectations by delving into the stories of exceptional minds and brains, shedding light on what they can reveal about ourselves and our interactions. Celebrating diversity, it aims to elucidate and dispel misconceptions that arise when attempting to confine individuals into narrow categories.

Unlike typical neuroscience for the layperson or confessions from a research bench that require diligent study and note-taking, this book seamlessly integrates neuroscience into an exploratory narrative, leaving readers eager for more. While packed with neuroscience, the text remains accessible due to the author’s adept translation and incorporation into an engaging writing style.

Each chapter within the book serves as a compelling essay into the exceptional experiences and the unique nature of each brain which defies categorization. The initial chapters provide a solid foundation in neuroscience, dispelling common myths and the development of the brain, showcasing its uniqueness akin to a snowflake and a development that is equally complex as it unfolds and interacts with our world. Subsequent chapters delve into the intellectual, personal, and sensory experiences of gifted individuals, offering readers a profound appreciation for their exceptional perspective. As the narrative progresses, emotions and attention are explored in depth, each chapter contributing to a deeper understanding and enjoyment of the subject.

We then see an intriguing exploration of neurological uniqueness beyond descriptions of autism spectrum to enlighten the reader with a deeper more appreciative understanding of some of the differences that get lumped together into some diagnoses. We then get a surprising connection between the brain and the gut that is sure to only further tantalize your curiosity and expand your dinner conversations. Moreover, the book offers invaluable advice for parents throughout, presenting alternative perspectives on situations that may initially seem discouraging from a child’s developmental standpoint. It not only encourages parents to embrace their child’s unique abilities but also offers insights into how these abilities may not always align with the development of other skills. The lesson offered is clear. Help your child identify their strengths, those strengths may often be hidden by asynchronous development, and then foster an environment with love and informed support to help your child explore their potentials. The last chapter gives some concrete steps you will enjoy putting into practice as a parent or teacher.

Furthermore, Insight into a Bright Mind transcends being merely informative, emerging as a creative masterpiece in its own right. I believe this book hits a specific area where neuroscience, culture, and creativity meet. Few authors have been able to achieve this, and I would place this book in the realm of Oliver Sacks with a pinch of Walt Whitman or Maya Angelou bringing together science, story-telling, and poetry. Elegantly structured and vividly written, it tantalizes the senses, resembling a captivating novel as readers delve into the author’s mind and, in turn, reflect on their own.

Andrew Watson

April-14-2024

Just In Case: Improving Online Learning

We teachers benefit A LOT from research-based guidance, but we do have to acknowledge a few drawbacks:

We can easily find LOTS of contradictory studies out there — so confusing!

The students or curriculum being researched might not be a good match for our own — so puzzling!

And

Research takes a long time — so frustrating!

In other words: we REALLY needed advice about online teaching during the pandemic-related Zoominess. But — because “research takes a long time” — we just didn’t have lots of relevant studies to guide us.

Of course, we’re now starting to get those studies we needed a few years ago: better now than never, I say.

To be sure, few of us hope to return to full-time online teaching. But:

Some people do this work for a living (I have a friend who devotes herself to this work).

Some school districts use Zoom during snow storms (or eclipses).

Sometimes, online teaching is just practically required. I recently led a 2 hour PD workshop in Singapore…while I was in London.

So, we still benefit from learning about this online teaching research — even if most of us hope we’ll use it only rarely.

What useful nuggets have come to the surface?

Defeating the Blahs

If you’ve taught online, you know how quickly the blahs set in.

No matter how interesting our content or how lively our presentation, the students quickly settle into polite apathy.

Screens wink off.

We can practically SEE the mind-wandering in thought bubbles above our students’ heads.

Is there anything we can do to counteract this seemingly inevitable lethargy?

A research team in Germany set out to investigate this question.

Specifically, they wanted to know if “interaction-enhanced online teaching” could overcome the blahs.

What, you ask, is “interaction-enhanced online teaching,” exactly?

The researchers used several interactive techniques:

Students in this group kept their cameras on,

answered questions at random times during the lecture,

and took a quiz on the material at the conclusion of the lecture.

So, did these changes help?

The Envelopes, Please…

To answer this question, researchers focused much less on students’ learning and much more on the students attention. Specifically, they focused on a sub-component of attention called “alertness.”

This subcomponent means exactly what you think it does: “how much physiological energy is the student experiencing at this moment?” (Teachers typically face two “alertness” problems: too much [students running around with scissors] or too little [students falling asleep, with or without scissors].)

To track alertness, the research team measured all sorts of variables: the students’ heartbeat, the amount of cortisol in their saliva, and their own self-ratings.

So, did always-on cameras and random questions affect these variables? Specifically, did these students show higher alertness levels than others who simply watched the lecture — without the alertness bells-n-whistles?

The short answer is: yup.

Because those variables (heart rate, cortisol) are frankly rather obscure, it probably doesn’t help to rattle off the numbers. (You can check them out in the study itself.)

But the trends are clear: all that alertness enhancing did the trick. Students had more energy during the online presentation.

Classroom Implications

In my view, this study has lots going for it.

First, its recommendations just make sense.

Both daily experience and a decade or so of research shows that students who have to pay attention — they might have to answer a question soon! — remain alert and learn more.

Second, its recommendations are easy to enact. While creating random questions and post-class retrieval practice might take some additional effort, doing so isn’t an enormous task.

The topic of “keeping the camera on” creates controversy in some places — and I can imagine circumstances where it’s not appropriate. But I suspect in most cases, a “camera on” policy is an entirely reasonable baseline.

Third, this “interaction enhancing” improves alertness — and probably helps students learn more.

The study’s authors are quite cautious about this claim; for technical reasons, it’s difficult to measure “learning” in this research paradigm.

But they found that increased alertness correlated with more learning. And: it certainly makes sense that students who pay attention learn more.

TL;DR

If we must teach online, we’ve got a few simple strategies to promote student alertness:

If we ask students to keep their cameras on, answer questions every now and then, and undertake retrieval practices exercises…

…they pay more attention, and probably learn more.

A Technical Footnote about Vocabulary

In the field of psychology, vocabulary can get tricky. We often have several words to describe more-or-less the same psychological concept. (E.g.: “the testing effect” and “retrieval practice.”)

This thing that I’m calling “alertness” is — in fact — often called “alertness”: so I’m not using an incorrect word. But it’s more often called “arousal”; this research team uses that word in their study.

Now, I’m a high-school teacher — so I do not like that word; as the kids say, “it squicks me out.”

So, in this blog post, I’ve preferred the word “alertness.” If you read the study its based on, you’ll see the other a-word.

Gellisch, M., Morosan-Puopolo, G., Wolf, O. T., Moser, D. A., Zaehres, H., & Brand-Saberi, B. (2023). Interactive teaching enhances students’ physiological arousal during online learning. Annals of Anatomy-Anatomischer Anzeiger, 247, 152050.

Graphic Disorganizers; or, When Should Teachers Decorate Handouts?

Andrew Watson

April-07-2024

Graphic Disorganizers; or, When Should Teachers Decorate Handouts?

Teachers regularly face competing goals. For instance:

On the one hand — obviously — we want our students to learn.

And, on the other hand, we equally obviously want them to feel safe, comfortable, at home.

To accomplish that second goal, we might decorate our classrooms. The more adorable cat photos, inspirational posters, and familiar art work, the homier the classroom will feel.

But here’s the problem: what if all that decoration (in pursuit of goal #2) interferes with goal #1?

What if decorations inhibit learning?

The Story so Far

I’ve written about this topic a fair amount, and the story so far gives us reason to concentrate on that question.

So: do decorations get in the way of learning? According to this study: yes.

Is this a problem for all age groups? Research done by this team suggests: yes.

When I showed teachers all this research, they often raised a perfectly plausible doubt:

Don’t students get used to the decorations? According to this recent study: nope.

Given these studies (and many others), I think we’ve got a compelling narrative encouraging our profession to rethink decoration. While I don’t think that classrooms should be sterile fields … I do worry we’ve gone substantially too far down the “let’s decorate!” road.

“I’ve Still Got Questions”

Even with this research pool, I think teachers can reasonably ask for more information. Specifically: “what counts as a decoration?”

I mean: is an anchor chart decration?

How about a graphic organizer?

A striking picture added to a handout? (If they’re answering questions about weather, why would it be bad to have a picture of a thunderstorm on the handout?)

An anchor chart might be “decorative.” But, if students use it to get their math work done, doesn’t it count as something other than a “decoration”?

In other words: if I take down an anchor chart, won’t my students learn less?

Because practically everything in the world can be made prettier, we’ve got an almost infinite number of things that might be decorated. (I’ve done some work at a primary school that has arrows embedded in the floor: arrows pointing to, say, Beijing or Cairo or Los Angeles. Does that count as “decoration”?)

For this reason, research to explore this question gets super detailed. But if we find enough detailed examples that more-or-less resemble our own classroom specifics, we can start to credit a “research-informed” answer.

Graphic Disorganizer?

A friend recently pointed me to a study about reading bar graphs.

This research team wanted to know if “decorated” bar graphs make learning harder for students in kindergarten, and in 1st and 2nd grade.

So, if a bar graph shows the number of gloves in the lost and found box each week, should the bar representing that number…

Be decorated with little glove icons?

Or, should it be filled in with stripes?

How about dots?

This study in fact incorporates four separate experiments; the researchers keep repeating their basic paradigm and modifying a variable or two. For this reason, they can measure quite precisely the problems and the factors that cause them.

And — as you remember — they’re working with students in three different grades. So: they’ve got LOTS of data to report…

The Headlines, Please…

Rather than over-decorate this blog post with a granular description, I’ll hit a few telling highlights.

First: iconic decorations inhibit learning.

That is: little gloves on the bar graph made it harder for students to learn to read those graphs correctly.

Honestly, this result doesn’t surprise me. Gloves are concrete and familiar, whereas bar graphs represent more abstract concepts. No wonder the little tykes get confused.

Second: stripes and dots also inhibit learning.

Once again, the students tend to count the objects contained within the bar — even little dots! — instead of the observing the height of the bar

This finding did surprise me a bit more. I wasn’t surprised that young learners focus on concrete objects (gloves, trees), but am intrigued to discover they also want to count abstract objects (lines, dots) within the bar.

Third: age matters.

That is: 1st graders did better than kindergarteners. And, 2nd graders better than first graders.

On the one hand, this result makes good sense. As we get older, we get better at understanding more abstract concepts, and at controlling attention.

On the other hand, this finding points to an unfortunate irony. Our profession tends to emphasize decoration in classrooms for younger students.

In other words: we decorate most where decoration might do the most harm! (As a high-school teacher, I never got any instructions about decoration, and was never evaluated on it.)

In Brief

We teachers certainly might be tempted to make our environments as welcoming — even festive! — as possible.

And yet, we’ve got a larger (and larger) pool of research pointing out the distraction in all that decoration.

This concern goes beyond — say — adorable dolphin photos on the wall, or uplifting quotations on waterfall posters.

In this one study, something as seemingly-harmless as dots in a bar graph can interfere with our students learning.

When it comes to decorating — even worksheets and handouts — we should keep the focus on the learning.

Fisher, A. V., Godwin, K. E., & Seltman, H. (2014). Visual environment, attention allocation, and learning in young children: When too much of a good thing may be bad. Psychological science, 25(7), 1362-1370.

Godwin, K. E., Leroux, A. J., Seltman, H., Scupelli, P., & Fisher, A. V. (2022). Effect of Repeated Exposure to the Visual Environment on Young Children’s Attention. Cognitive Science, 46(2), e13093.

Kaminski, J. A., & Sloutsky, V. M. (2013). Extraneous perceptual information interferes with children’s acquisition of mathematical knowledge. Journal of Educational Psychology, 105(2), 351.

To Insta or Not to Insta: That Is the Memory Question

Andrew Watson

March-31-2024

To Insta or Not to Insta: That Is the Memory Question

Here in the US, we’re having something of a national debate about the benefits/harms of social media.

The potential ban of Tik Tok is just the most visible example of the current fervor on the topic.

When we consider such heated question, research offers us several benefits.

Specifically, it helps us get past vast and unproveable assertions:

“Social media is destroying a generation!”

“No! Social media will transform education and allow discovery and dialogue across the globe!”

When we turn to a research-based approach, we start asking narrow questions, measuring precise variables, and following well-established protocols.

So, let’s ask one of those precise questions: “does time on social media help consolidate new learning, or does it interfere with new learning?”

A research team in Germany wanted to know just that…

Let’s Get Quizzical

Happily, memory researchers have lots of experience in measuring this kind of question. So, they could follow well-established procedures.

In this study, sixty seven college students in Germany learned Icelandic-German word pairs.

Immediately after doing so, half of them chatted away on Facebook or Instagram for eight minutes.

The other half put their heads down and rested quietly for eight minutes.

The research team measured their memory for those word pairs the following day.

Did the social-media users remember more, or fewer, word pairs?

I’m so glad you asked…

Possibilities, Possibilities

Before we open that envelope, let’s consider possible outcomes.

We could predict that social media usage would distract these students from the word pairs that they just learned. So much tweeting and ticking and toking will naturally interefere with memory formation.

Or, we could predict that social media will let students explore and extend their thinking. They might be intrigued by a particular Icelandic word, and start looking up cool Icey stuff and sharing Viking-sounding words with their online friends. All these connections might strengthen memories.

So, which is it?

In this case, the answer was clear: time on social media distracted students and reduced learning. (How much? The Cohen’s d was 0.33; not huge, but certainly noticeable.)

When we set our passions aside, ask a precise question, and measure the answer — we get helpful new data.

Not So Fast Now…

Although I (for one) am glad to have these data, we always have to acknowledge the limits of our research-based conclusions.

This research was done with German college students learning word pairs.

Would we get the same results with, say, Brazilian 2nd graders learning math?

Or, Japanese students on the autism spectrum practicing art?

We can’t say for sure, because this study didn’t examine those combinations of participants and disciplines. I don’t see any obvious reasons why the results would be different, but we should remain open to those possibilities.

More substantively, this one study does NOT allow us to conclude…

… students who use MORE social media are worse students than those who use LESS, or

… social media destroys children’s ability to focus, or

… parents should forbid their children from using Instagram or Facebook.

Other research studies might answer the first two of those questions; parental judgment will have to take on the third.

All those caveats being duly registered, I think we can draw this reasonable conclusion:

Common sense suggests that that social media use will distract students from stuff they might want to remember — especially they turn to Instagram right away. This research supports that presumption.

Keeping social media away from active learning experiences is — in most cases we can reasonably foresee — almost certainly a good idea.

Martini, M., Heinz, A., Hinterholzer, J., Martini, C., & Sachse, P. (2020). Effects of wakeful resting versus social media usage after learning on the retention of new memories. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 34(2), 551-558. https://doi.org/10.1002/acp.3641

I Am a Doctrinaire Extremist; S/he Is a Thoughtful Moderate

Andrew Watson

March-24-2024

I Am a Doctrinaire Extremist; S/he Is a Thoughtful Moderate

I recently had an email exchange with an educational thinker and leader who has spent several decades in the field.

After some back and forth, he dismissed my “tenacious belief in the centrality of memorization and retrieval” as ultimately missing the point of learning.

This summary struck me for a number of reasons:

First: it’s true (as far as it goes). I certainly do think that, under some circumstances, memorization can be helpful. And — supported by piles o’ research — I think that retrieval practice helps students form, consolidate, and transfer long-term memories.

Second: this summary implies that I’m in favor ONLY of memorization and retrieval practice. It suggests that I — like Dickens’s Gradgrind — want my students to know facts, facts, facts. (No doubt, someone is aching to use the verb “regurgitate” to capture my purported obsession with facts.)

Third: it further implies that I genuinely don’t care about the meaning behind the facts, my students’ interest in them, or the future usefullness or flexibility of them.

I am, simply put, a doctrinaire extremist.

Because I see myself quite differently — heck, I recently wrote a book with the name “Goldilocks” in the title — I was taken aback by this rhetorical move.

I’ve been thinking about my new Gradgrind Status since receiving this email, and have arrived at a few tentative conclusions about the nature of educational debates.

We’re Mostly Moderates (?)

As implied above, I see myself as seeking out a reasonable middle ground in many educational debates

For instance, as I’ve written repeatedly, I think that working memory limitations suggest that novices will benefit from “high-structure” pedagogies more than from more “low-structure” pedagogies. (See this recent blog post for the difficulties in summarizing this “high-vs-low” debate simply, fairly, and accurately.)

At the same time, as I’ve also emphasized, I think students’ increasing expertise should promote them from high- to low-structure pedagogies.

That is: the more my students know, the more they should be challenged with open-ended, creative, quest-like assignments that will help them consolidate, connect, and extend their knowledge. (If you know Adam Boxer’s book Teaching Secondary Science, you know he makes the same argument.)

Given these three paragraphs — so earnest in their moderation — you can see why I’m puzzled (and amused) to see myself reduced to a pitchfork carrier.

At the same — and here I’m guessing — I suspect almost everyone in an educational debate believes they’ve struck up the most reasonable position: probably one in the middle of some continuum.

For instance: my interlocutor explicitly champions a stem-to-stern overhaul of the US educational system.

From his perspective, the system we currently have is so disastrously out of synch with the needs of human flourishing and the genuine truths behind human cognitive and emotional functioning that its wholesale replacement is the only logical option.

That is: although “stem-to-stern overhaul” might sound radical, it is — in fact — an entirely moderate and sensible position given the extremity of the crisis we face.

Just as I think I’m a sensible moderate, he (I suspect) thinks his position is sensible and moderate-given-the-dreadful-circumstances.

We’re all moderates here.

We Are Moderates, but Extremes Exist

When someone accuses me of being a “high-structure extremist,” I have an easy rejoinder at hand: “oh, come on; NO ONE believes any such thing.”

As in: NO ONE follows the Gradgrind method and stuffs students with (facts)³.

In an early draft of that Goldilocks book I was just talking about, I made that very argument. I found a study that contrasts two teaching methods.

Method A: to understand what functions bones serve, students test chicken-bone strength by using vinegar to remove calcium from them.

Method B: students copy down the names of 206 bones from the chalkboard.

I argued — in this early draft — that “no one in the history of the planet has asked students to copy down the names of 206 bones. That’s an absurd straw man.”

A colleague who read this draft took me aside one day and assured me that — sure enough — some schools do exactly that. She, in fact, had taught at such a school.

Now, I’m probably right that no cognitive science research supports this method. But I do have to admit that some people distort cognitive science research to champion this method.

My approach is moderate, but extreme versions of my moderation do exist. In other words: my interlocutor is wrong about me (I think), but not entirely wrong about the world of education.

The Double Flip

This insight, in turn, invites two more aha! moments.

When I worry about the dangers of “low-structure” pedagogy, I might be tempted to highlight examples where teachers throw students overboard into a stormy ocean of cognitive stuff — and ask them to swim to shore. (“In your groups, figure out how to cure rabies …”)

Folks who champion low-structure pedagogies have a handy rejoineder: “NO ONE could misunderstand us to be in favor of such nonsense. That’s an absurd straw man extreme; I’m a sensible moderate.”

And — here’s the first aha! — I suspect low-structure advocates are entirely sincere in this claim. They see this approach as a moderate one, and I’m yoking them to an extreme version of it.

That rhetorical move is as unfair as is my interlocutor’s attempt to make me into Gradgrind.

And yet — here’s the second aha! — those extreme examples do exist; just as extreme versions of direct instruction do.

This tangle of circumstances leads to (at least) two prohibitions:

Low-structure proponents should not say: “those extreme versions of our pedagogy don’t exist!”

Why not? Because they do.

And I should not say: “because those extremes exist, your pedagogy is obviously unsound!”

Why not? Because those extremes are — almost certainly — misunderstandings of their plausibly moderate position.

Honestly, all this moderation is making me a little dizzy.

The Gradgrind Perch

From my new Gradgrindian vantange point, I see two conclusions:

One: although I see myself as a reasonable moderate, others easily perceive me as an extremist — because extreme versions of my way of thinking do exist,

and

Two: although I occasionally see other approaches as extreme, it’s possible/likely that their most thoughtful advocated champion a moderate version of them.

At this point, I’ve maxed out on the even-handed moderation that I can muster. To recover my equilibrium, I’m going to write the names of 206 bones on a chalkboard…

Older posts

Newer posts

Picking Up Where They Left Off

Take II

Better and Better

Not So Fast

To Sum Up

Coda

Invisible Peer Pressure

Things Get Weird

Classroom Implications

Yes, Yes: Caveats

TL;DR

The Potential Joys of “Synchrony”

Grab a Scalpal, or Grab a Quiz

The Charms, and Perils, of Neuro-Advice

The Bigger Picture

The Story Before the Story

Take a Moment

From Esperanto to Swahili

TL;DR

Defeating the Blahs

The Envelopes, Please…

Classroom Implications

TL;DR

A Technical Footnote about Vocabulary

The Story so Far

“I’ve Still Got Questions”

Graphic Disorganizer?

The Headlines, Please…

In Brief

Let’s Get Quizzical

Possibilities, Possibilities

Not So Fast Now…

We’re Mostly Moderates (?)

We Are Moderates, but Extremes Exist

The Double Flip

The Gradgrind Perch

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