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Teachers as Persuaders, Problem-Finding vs Problem-Solving and Learning Goals vs Performance Goals

One of our favorite authors, Daniel Pink (Drive), has a new book and was recently interviewed by Larry Ferlazzo for Education Week.  Pink’s new book is titled: To Sell is Human: The Surprising Truth about Moving Others.  In this conversation with Ferlazzo, Pink talks about how teachers can “sell” more to students to help them to become self-directed lifelong learners and how current education practices, assessments, etc. help or hinder us in this goal. (more…)

Is High Quality Early Education a Good Investment?

We have often heard educators say that it pays to invest in early childhood development, but what would an economist say about  early childhood education as a public investment? In his article, “The Economics of Inequality”, economist James Heckman explores that question, not just from the moral equal opportunity viewpoint, but also from the perspective of investment return and the factors that will be most effective in increasing the productivity of the American economy. (more…)

Study Finds that Classroom Design Can Affect Academic Progress by as Much as 25%. 

This year-long pilot was carried out looking at 750 elementary students in 34 classrooms over a full year. The study looked at two sets of data. The first was student data such as age, gender and performance levels in reading, math and writing. Then there were ten different design features evaluating the holistic classroom environment, such as classroom orientation, natural light, noise, temperature and air quality. Other parameters such as flexibility of space, storage facilities, organization and use of color were also evaluated. The study looked at both the design features and use factors, such as adjustments made to accommodate student or learning activity needs.

The results were very surprising.  (more…)

Struggling Learners: Helping Students on the Autism Spectrum Meet Common Core ELA Standards

This is a summary of an article which explores the challenges that students, who may be quite bright but are on the autism spectrum, may have meeting the Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts. The authors believe this process will go more smoothly if educators and parents have a good understanding of three important psychological theories and develop classroom strategies to support students with these deficits.  The theories covered here are: Theory of Mind, Central Coherence and Executive Function. (more…)

Struggling Learner Series

Learning, Anxiety and the Brain:  New Findings Shed Light on Dealing with Math & Performance Anxiety

Math has been identified as being increasingly important for academic and career success in today’s high tech world. Math anxiety has been shown to have serious and life-long consequences: lowering performance, reducing the likelihood of studying math in high school and college and avoiding careers that involve math. A number of recent studies have shed new light on where and how math anxiety forms in the brain and how it interferes with performance. (more…)

Consequences of bullying are much more far-reaching and complex than immediate injury or trauma

Bullying has been recognized as a significant problem which has only been complicated by the advent of social media. Recent studies have shown the dramatic and long-term impact of bullying for all involved. It turns out that not only is the student being bullied negatively affected but studies have shown the negative impact of bullying behavior on those who witness the bullying and, have even shown that the bully was much more likely to be abusing alcohol after a bullying event. Responding to this issue is complicated by perceptions about who is a bully and what bullying really is. (more…)

Remember: Learning and Memory are Largely Under Our Control

Here are 10 quick reminders about how memory works.  These characteristics about memory show how much of memory is in our control whether we are working to recall something ourselves, designing learning opportunities for students or helping students improve their own learning skills.   (more…)

Professional Development that Makes a Difference

Part 3 –  The Critical Component

If increased student learning is the goal of professional development then consistent and generalized transfer of the new learning to the student learning environment is necessary. In the 25 years of research conducted by Bruce Joyce and Beverly Showers the component that had the greatest impact on successful transfer was a system of collaborative implementation teams. Regardless of how good the initial training was, transfer rarely happened without some kind of long-term coaching and staff collaboration. The resulting change wasn’t sustained without the ongoing support of leadership and the alignment of systems within the organization. (more…)

If you want to change beliefs, the best thing to do is change behaviors

We have known since Rosenthal’s study in 1964 that teacher expectations have a significant effect on student performance.  Figuring out how to change teachers’ beliefs about students, however,  has proven to be a challenge.  Attitudes and beliefs can be hard to change and are manifested in amazingly subtle ways. In this study Robert Pinata tries a new approach.  Pianta thinks that to change beliefs, the best thing to do is change behaviors. “It’s far more powerful to work from the outside in than the inside out if you want to change expectations,” he says. In other words, if you want to change a mind, talking about it is usually not enough.

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