Smart MOVES

I’m convinced: our schools need to give fitness a place in the curriculum. Let me clarify one thing. By an emphasis on fitness, I’m not recommending more or longer recess periods (though they may help), nor more or longer physical education classes (though, again, they may help). I fear some schools may reach these conclusions and implement changes without additional thought. Such an approach would be a mistake as schedule changes are only part of a good response to the growing body of research.

An emphasis on fitness is different from merely increasing unstructured play time or adding more days of dodgeball into the schedule. (Forgive me, PE Teachers. I know that many of you do not consider dodgeball to be a beneficial way to spend a physical education class. I’m speaking to the erroneous perception, not your work!)

Dr. John Ratey, who literally wrote the book on this subject, uses a school in Naperville, IL to illustrate an emphasis on fitness. During one physical education session Ratey observed, students ran a mile while wearing heart rate monitors. In addition to completing the distance, students focused on reaching a target heart rate and on improving their times recorded in earlier previous sessions. Ratey then explains this focus:

The essence…is teaching fitness instead of sports. The underlying philosophy is that if physical education class can be used to instruct kids how to monitor and maintain their own health and fitness, then the lessons they learn will serve them for life. And probably a longer and happier life at that. What’s being taught, really, is a lifestyle. The students are developing healthy habits, skills, and a sense of fun, along with knowledge of how their bodies work…[The] effects [of this emphasis] have shown up in some unexpected places—namely, the classroom.1

Sure, I’m concerned about the childhood obesity rate (estimates put the number around 23 million children in the US—more than thirty times the number during my youth). Being overweight influences movement, both physical AND cognitive, and it’s this latter impact that interests me.

Consider these recent findings:

Fit children possess more of the neural geography used in learning and thinking. For example, in-shape children have “significantly larger basal ganglia, a key part of the brain that aids in maintaining attention and ‘executive control,’ or the ability to coordinate actions and thoughts crisply.”2 (Executive function is “an umbrella term for the complex cognitive processes that serve ongoing, goal-directed behaviors,” including goal setting, planning, organizing and initiating behavior over time, flexibility, attention, working memory capacity, and self-regulation. It comprises abilities to plan for the future, control impulses, and make sense of incoming data.3) In a similar study, fit children possessed larger hippocampi—more than 10% larger— and scored significantly higher on tests of associated memory than their less fit peers. (The hippocampus is a brain structure associated with memory, both encoding and retrieval.) The researchers concluded that “interventions to increase childhood physical activity could have an important effect on brain development.”4 In short, fitter children develop brains with the potential for better learning and thinking.

Childhood fitness also affects capacities that uphold and empower learning. For example, children engaged in regular fitness activity score higher on tests of self-regulation, an executive function that provides critical support for learning. Self-regulation is the ability to consciously suppress or delay responses in order to work for a higher goal. It predicts academic success better than IQ. It also better predicts GPA, standardized test achievement, homework completion, the potential for GPA gains during the course of a year, and even SAT scores. Self-regulation is like the support struts of a bridge; it is not the roadway to learning, but without it, an individual lacks the emotional and cognitive control that optimize learning. Researchers have also discovered relationships of fitness and academic achievement. A recent study focused on students representing four different categories: 1) children who possessed high physical fitness levels in fifth grade and maintained those levels in seventh grade, 2) students who were fit in fifth grade but lost their fitness by seventh grade, 3) students who were not fit in fifth grade but were physically fit by seventh grade, and (sadly) 4) students who were not physically fit in fifth grade and remained not fit in seventh grade. In reading, math, science and social studies, the fit in fifth, fit in seventh group outscored their peers. The students who gained fitness between fifth and seventh grades had the second best scores. The students who lost fitness from fifth to seventh grades had the next to lowest scores, with the never fit group scoring the lowest. Researchers conclude that physical fitness actually shows up in academic performance.5 Schools minimizing physical education classes to spend more time on academic subjects may actually dampen the academic performance of their students.

However, not all types of fitness show similar results. Teenage boys with higher cardiovascular fitness outperformed their peers in intelligence, education, and even income as adults. The researchers from this study stress the importance of cardiovascular fitness: “In every measure of cognitive functioning they analyzed—from verbal ability to logical performance to geometric perception to mechanical skills—average test scores increased according to aerobic fitness.”6 Weight training alone did not provide the same effect.

What do we do with such convincing evidence—evidence that suggests the best tool to improving learning may be a pair of running shoes for each child? What do we need to change besides perceptions and schedules? Since physical movement seems to improve cognitive “movement,” how do we help our students get smarter by moving more?


I’m going to ponder these questions as I head out for a run. Anyone care to join either the run or conversation? Looking forward to your comments! For now, I’ll give John Ratey the last word:

The notion that [fitness can influence learning] is supported by emerging research showing that physical activity sparks biological changes that encourage brain cells to bind to one another. For the brain to learn, these connections must be made; they reflect the brain’s fundamental ability to adapt to challenges. The more neuroscientists discover about this process, the clearer it becomes that exercise provides an unparalleled stimulus, creating an environment in which the brain is ready, willing, and able to learn…”7.

References

1. Ratey, J., SPARK: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain (New York: Little, Brown & Co., 2008), 12.
2. Parker-Pope, T., Phys Ed: Can Exercise Make Kids Smarter? http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/15/phys-ed-can-exercise-make-kids-smarter/?emc=eta1
3. Meltzer, L., Executive Function in Education: From Theory to Practice (New York: Guilford Press, 2007), 1.
4. ScienceDaily., Children's Brain Development Is Linked to Physical Fitness, Research Finds. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/09/100915171536.htm.
5. ScienceDaily., Students' Physical Fitness Associated With Academic Achievement; Organized Physical Activity. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/03/100302185522.htm.
6. ScienceDaily., Fit Teenage Boys Are Smarter—But Muscle Strength Isn't the Secret, Study Shows. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/12/091207143351.htm.
7. Ratey, 10.

Images

• ‘Running Shoes’ http://www.flickr.com/photos/64015205@N00/46324600
• ‘Morro Bay, CA High School Physical Education+class+-+teen+girls+run+up+and+down+the+Morro+Strand+State+Beach’ http://www.flickr.com/photos/72825507@N00/3253894179

Do You Speak "Academia"?

If our profession exists to enable understanding of new ideas, should we really have our own language? Consider the following opening paragraph from a recent journal article:

“Education is an all-encompassing institution where schools can be found in each and every continent, culture, and society; their functional principles, organizational structure, and modus operandi are quite universal.”1

The paragraph, from an article with content I appreciate, illustrates several “rules” of academic writing. As a result, it violates several principles of good writing.

To begin, the opening main clause, “Education is an all-encompassing institution,” makes little sense, and the rest of the sentence fails to clarify its meaning. The use of “each and every” is redundant; if each continent and culture, then, by default, it is every continent and culture. After the semicolon, good verbs become weak adjectives: functional and organizational. The entire paragraph could be restructured as an easily understood sentence: In every society, schools organize, function, and operate similarly.

Lest I be guilty hypocrisy, here’s a sample of my own convoluted academic writing:

As a causal-comparative study, instructional time represents an uncontrolled factor. Teachers in each fifth grade classroom made decisions about instructional time based on the required time to complete activities dictated by the reading program in use. It is likely that instructional time varied between the classrooms, but the decisions about instructional time were based on the independent variable used to define the groups. Any variance developed, in part, because of the independent variable being examined.

Interpretation: The teachers in each fifth-grade classroom were not given minimum or maximum time limits. They determined how much time to spend on reading each day by considering their students’ needs and the activities recommended by their reading programs.

So what? Why pick on paragraphs pulled from their contexts? If you read (or try to read) educational journals, you’ll find that these examples are not isolated. They illustrate the “academic style” characterizing such periodicals. These periodicals, their supporters argue, provide the link between research and classroom practice. But the poor communication—the academic writing—requires the reader to add steps to the usually efficient cognition of comprehension. The reader is forced to pause and ask, “What does that mean in plain English?” It’s not that different from reading text in a second language, one in which the reader may be knowledgeable but not proficient.

Unfortunately, it’s not just our journals that speak their own language. This same gap often exists between students and their textbooks. Consider the following passage from an advanced high school biology text:

The technical aspects of life involve the complex chemical interactions that take place among the several thousand different kinds of molecules found in any living cell. Of these, DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) is the master molecule in whose structure is encoded all of the information needed to create and direct the chemical machinery of life. Analysis of the flow and regulation of this genetic information among DNA, RNA (ribonucleic acid), and protein is the subject of molecular genetics.2

Rather than “A-ha!,” such writing often elicits, “Huh?,” as a recent study highlights:

Middle and high school students who read fluently in English class and on the Web may find that they cannot understand their science texts. And their science teachers may be ill prepared to guide them in reading the academic language in which science information is presented.3

This issue is so prevalent that some experts recommend we teach students “academic language.”

This additional distance between the writer and reader decreases the likelihood that the journals will actually be read. And if the journals are not read by teachers, the research will be slow to influence educational practice, if it does at all. With some research, a “translator” will eventually convert the findings into easily understood material for teachers. Research that does not attract the attention of such a translator may remain unknown and unused. We are spending time, effort, and sometimes money on research doomed to remain idle because it’s not communicated well. The poor writing prevents worthwhile application.

Similarly, our textbooks may alienate students and hinder learning. If understanding depends on translating the language, students who struggle with this prerequisite may lack the motivation or inertia to think beyond, or even through, the interpretation. We’re making understanding more difficult—a seeming antithesis to our role as educators.

Does academia serve its purpose by maintaining its own language? Why can’t “academic” journals and textbooks utilize common principles of good writing. Why do we insist on communication complexity when our goals would be better served by simple clarity?

Tradition? Are we trying to honor the past by continuing to insist on outdated standards? If so, then we should rethink our goals. Journals are not meant to influence the present but to carry on conventions of the past. Textbooks are not meant to inform but to complicate learning. If this is their purpose, teachers and students ignoring journal and textbook content should not be considered a problem.

Status? Are we insisting on “academic writing” because it separates journals from the “rags” intended for the masses or textbooks from the unlearned? If so, our goal must be to maintain some perceived elite readership—a readership probably not teaching or sitting in our classrooms. And thankfully so! Who wants children to be in a classroom where the teacher communicates with consistent complexity? ‘Children, today the teacher (the academic style outlaws use of the personal pronoun I!) will initiate a discussion of the upper atmosphere in post-sunset conditions.” In other words, “Today we’re going to talk about stars.” SImplicity produces clarity; complexity produces confusion.

Alignment? Do we think that our research and subject matter is complicated, therefore our communicating should also be complex? This is so contrary to logic and sound teaching that it’s an oxymoron. A basic principle of writing (and teaching) rebuts this argument: A complex topic requires simple writing, especially when the reader likely lacks the author’s background knowledge and experience. This is almost always the case when a researcher seeks to address individuals who were not part of the research team or involved in similar research themselves, or when experts in a field seek to articulate concepts for students.

As an example, consider the topic of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) previously discussed in the textbook example. Complex? Absolutely, yet note how beautifully and simply John Medina writes about it:

One of the most unexpected findings of recent years is that DNA, or deoxyribonucleic acid, is not randomly jammed into the nucleus, as one might stuff cotton into a teddy bear. Rather, DNA is folded into the nucleus in a complex and tightly regulated manner. The reason for this molecular origami: cellular career options. Fold the DNA one way and the cell will become a contributing member of your liver. Fold it another way and the cell will become part of your busy bloodstream. Fold it a third way and you get a nerve cell—and the ability to read this sentence.4

Medina presents ideas simply and in ways known to foster learning. As the brain engages in elaboration, it overlays new data with known experiences, making connections that help construct understanding. Medina relates a new, complex topic to a familiar childhood activity—origami (even though he is not writing for children). By giving us a reference point for understanding DNA, he equips us with the tools needed to construct understanding. Isn’t this what we should be striving for, both in our textbooks and our journals?

Why, then, do we not insist that good, clear writing characterize our journals, the journals researchers want us to read and heed, and the textbooks we use in our classrooms? We’re educators. Let’s write like we want people to actually learn something.

1. Chen, D., Schooling as a Knowledge System: Lessons from Cramim Experimental School, http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1751-228X.2009.01078.x/pdf.
2. Micklos, D. & Freyer, G.A., DNA Science: A First Course (Spring Harbor, NY: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, 2003) 4.
3. Science Daily Staff, Academic Language Impedes Students' Ability to Learn Science, Expert Argues, http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/04/100422153758.htm.
4. Medina, J., Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School (Seattle: Pear Press, 2008), 53.

Images
'...but there's still so much left' www.flickr.com/photos/8592577@N08/3186580567
'Day #2: Back to the grind' www.flickr.com/photos/45676611@N00/361121941

Learning and the Brain Presentation: Daniel Willingham

Daniel Willingham, a cognitive scientist and author of Why Don't Students Like School, made an insightful presentation at the Learning and the Brain Conference in DC. As you read through these "tweets," keep in mind that I was posting the comments/ideas of the presenter. These do not necessarily represent my conclusions from the research.

These are my "tweets" posted live from Willingham's presentation at the conference.

• Will use initials DW to indicate Willingham’s comments/ideas.
• DW: Title of pres: Why Students Don’t Like School.
• DW: Interest in topic sprung from daughter’s excitement over possible snow days.
• DW: Daughter basically liked school but would have chosen to not have it most days.
• DW: How to make classroom activities more appealing? What drives our choices.
• DW: Factors of choice: 1. Outcome of choice 2. Probability of outcome 3. Costs of choice 4. Personality.
• DW: Outcomes can be concrete, can be emotional. Probability of outcome influences effort.
• DW: Cost: is task easy? hard? Relationship of effort required to probability of outcome.
• DW: Personality factors: self-discipline, carefulness, thoroughness, organization,
• deliberate, need for achievement.
• DW: Appeal of choice=outcome x probability/input x personality (figuratively!).
• DW: Policy-makers only think in terms of personality: “Kids just need more ‘grit.’”
• DW: Teachers think in terms of interest. Better to think about probability—how can we make students successful.
• DW: When psychological pain of risk is higher than psychological gain, people do not want to participate.
• DW: Opportunity to gain more is not the sole factor in choices—e.g., 50% of winning $30 vs. risk of losing $20.
• DW: The potential loss is the weightier factor in choices, not the potential gain. What are student losses.
• DW: Student losses: failure and shame. Fear of loss influences effort.
• DW: Make sure students experience successes. Minimize the “loss”—e.g., failure is not a terrible thing.
• DW: It’s a tough sell, but unique to schools. Kids fail at video games, but see it as learning. Think of academic work differently.
• DW: Dweck’s work indicates beliefs about intelligence contribute to this different view of failure. (More info on student beliefs & learning.)
• DW: At every possibility, emphasize the malleability of intelligence—something you get not something you are.
• DW: “Time discounting”: time between choice & outcome influences power of influence— e.g., ice cream in store vs. ice cream in bowl.
• DW: Example, value of money given now considered more valuable than same amount promised to be given to you later.
• DW: If you want child to value the outcome, the outcome needs to be almost immediate. Promised future rewards have no appeal.
• DW: Most academic outcomes are distant—diplomas, grades, pizza party on Friday.
• DW: Evaluations of outcomes are relative. Framing outcomes example: Tom Sawyer painting fence.
• DW: Software engineers reframing: “It’s not a bug, it’s a feature.”
• DW: Teachers should frame for positive outcomes not negative outcomes. Emphasize reward not punishment.
• DW: Punishment gets compliance only as long as “punisher” is present. Rewards are longer lasting.
• DW: Rewards change behavior, often to the point of internalization—e.g., I’m a kid who turns in things on-time.
• DW: Example of framing: UVA honor system—most profs emphasize the penalty of dismissal rather than how students can live up to idea.
• DW: Reasonable goals for each “session” (e.g., exercise) promote success. Daily targets are better than full goal.
• DW: Example: not “writing my dissertation” but “writing 200 words today.
• DW: Small goals help because they seem achievable. “Good grade” goal—success unknown. “Do this today”—manageable outcome.
• DW: Another approach: fuse a task with a more desirable task—charities do this: attend a concert rather than give $ outright.
• DW: Example in edu: gaming in the classroom (e.g., Jeopardy in classroom).
• DW: Scheduling also helps—daily schedule for completing a term paper works better than just deadlines for final papers.
• DW: Emotional support > guilt. e.g., exercising with a friend (support) vs. working alone.
• DW: Group work where students are responsible to one another—hard to pull-off, but effective if achieved.
• DW: Personality elements: student’s self-image as a student. Students who feel they don’t belong in school are overwhelmed by image.
• DW: How does a student reach this conclusion, this hindering self-image. This is not self-esteem.
• DW: Students need to feel 1) I’m needed here, and 2) I can contribute. How do we encourage this.
• DW: Emphasize classroom as community, everyone has responsibilities, everyone participate in range of activities.
• DW: …everyone tastes success and failure. Curriculum needs to be broad (e.g., science gets only about 5-6% of 3rd grade time.)
• DW: Challenges for teachers: creating community, vulnerability (teacher’s willingness to fail, tendency to control).

Learning & the Brain Presentation: Martha Denckla

One of my favorite conferences is the Learning and the Brain Conference held at various locations several times a year. The most recent conference was held in Washington, D.C. in early May. I tried to play the role of on-the-spot-reporter and "tweeted" live from the conference.

As you read through these "tweets," keep in mind that I was posting the comments/ideas of the presenter. These do not necessarily represent my conclusions from the research.

Here are my posts from Martha Denckla's keynote:

• Martha Denckla is next presenter. Topic: “The Syndrome ADHD & the Symptom ‘Attention Deficit’ Overlap Only Partially.”
• Denckla is an M.D., director of developmental cognitive neurology at Kennedy Krieger Institute, part of Johns Hopkins.
• Going to use “MD” to indicate ideas/comments from Dr. Martha Denckla.
• MD: Major issue in ADHD: the executive function capacity.
• MD: Officially, ADHD (not ADD) with subtypes of inattentive and hyperactivity (or, in full-blown, both).
• MD: Is there really a “deficit” in ADHD—a quantitative lesser amount? (Denckla suggests
• that there is not.)
• MD: In testing for ADHD, a problem can occur in at least four different “steps” of testing process.
• MD: Many “disagreements” between ADHD scientists are due to differences in study population—not comparing the same elements.
• MD: “Frontal filtering,” or selective deficit, not “bottom up” processing, is associated with ADHD.
• MD: More anticipatory errors occur with ADHD, but not covert orienting attention.
• MD: ADHD children are more dependent on correct cueing. Some studies suggest ADHD deficits worse on left side (rt. hemisphere issue?).
• MD: ADHD child has intact “bottom up” orienting, but slow response to unexpected events—slower to reorient/re-direct attention.
• MD: LOTS of evidence for Attention ALLOCATION Deficit—more descriptive name for actual problem. Not a deficit of attention.
• MD: In ADHD, “distractability” is really “attractability.” Intrinsically rewarding activities are “attractive.”
• MD: Lack of inhibition when required task lacks “attractability,” cannot allocate attention appropriately.
• MD: Specific actions done by the nervous system require inhibition of other actions.
• MD: Inhibition is “other side of coin” of focused attention.
• MD: Suggested title: A-AD, Allocation-of-Attention Deficit. Impulsivity is shared across subtypes; hyperactivity is less common.
• MD: Cognitive impulsivity resembles inattention. ADHD is “radar sweep” attention but weak in “spotlight” attention.
• MD: Sweep of surroundings vs. narrow, steady, intense focus.
• MD: Right hemisphere more involved in “radar” attention; left hemisphere more involved in
• “spotlight” attention.
• MD: Triad of ADHD weaknesses: motor, cognitive, & emotional display control—all executive function issues.
• MD: Motor control in place around age 15; cognitive, around 25; emotional display, around 32—stages of maturity. Interesting minimal age for President of US: 35.
• MD: Motor control issues are often indicators of risk for developing ADHD.
• MD: Girls are typically a year ahead of boys in motor control development until puberty.
• MD: Example of motor control: finger sequencing on a single hand (not moving other hand in tandem).
• MD: Future research: relationship of emotional and cognitive regulation. Emotion plays role in focused attention.
• MD: “Real frontier”: adverse impact of adversity/stress—causes an “amygdala detour” in the brain.
• MD: So, as a child struggles in school, that stress can mimic ADHD when the child actually does not have ADHD.
• MD: “If you don;t have ADHD at age 7 you don’t suddenly develop it at age 9.” The “Oh-we-missed-the-ADHD” idea is usually wrong.

Be the Change. Listen. Follow-up.

“We need effective, high quality, meaningful professional development,” I wrote in a recent blog post. “Otherwise we do a disservice to hard-working professionals and deserve the bruises their opinions inflict on our egos.”

While leading the best possible professional development session for every teacher in the room is unlikely to ever happen, there are some ways we can help avoid professional development being a “waste of time.”

1. Be the change. Leaders of professional development seem to forget that they’re actually teaching, and that part of teaching is modeling the activity you hope to see adopted. A session devoted to equipping teachers to implement more collaborative learning that is presented via “death by PowerPoint” is an oxymoron, a term originating from a Greek word appropriately meaning “pointedly foolish.” As one teacher recently expressed it, “Why does the worst teaching often happen in sessions on how to improve teaching?” Why, indeed? Modeling is a powerful teaching technique. In addition to communicating that the suggested new approach promotes learning, demonstration taps into some of the brain’s natural learning systems:

This may be because demonstration actually encourages the brain to engage. Specialized neurons known as mirror neurons make practicing “in the head” possible…When a teacher repeatedly performs a sequence of steps, her students’ mirror neurons may enable their own preliminary practice of the same steps. In other words, as a teacher demonstrates a skill, students mentally rehearse it.1

Leading professional development sessions that utilize the instructional techniques and approaches being recommended is more than a courtesy. It increases the likelihood that teachers will appreciate and understand the concepts being shared.

2. Listen. I have a tendency to get preoccupied with my preparation and forget that I’ll actually have people in the professional development session. Not just people but colleagues!

A few years ago, I was asked by another organization to lead a day of professional development for a large school district in the Northeast. I arrived early and began to prepare the room and my materials. The teacher whose classroom was being used as the meeting site was there when I arrived. She shared with me what had been going on at the school. Contract negotiations were underway and not going well; a strike was likely. She informed me that I would have representatives from both the union and administration sitting in for the day and that either or both may speak up at any time to contest any ideas I presented. After thinking of possible escape scenarios, I left the room and found a quiet place to think. I needed to redirect the focus of the group—at least as much as possible—or the day would be a waste.

As the teachers and union/administration reps came into the classroom, I asked them to think back to when they decided to become an educator and to jot down the most influential reasons for their choice. I opened the session sharing a brief account of my decision to become a teacher. I then had them do the same in small groups. As they recounted their original motivations for becoming educators, I could sense the atmosphere change. I mentally collected comments I overheard from the conversations and used them to summarize why we were now coming together to explore how we could do what we wanted to do even better. Surprisingly, there were no objections from either rep during the day. While it wasn’t an ideal day of professional development, it became more beneficial because I listened and had enough flexibility to adapt to the needs of my colleagues.

Though we’ve been invited to lead professional development, we do not have all the answers. Professional development involves merging new research findings with current personnel—i.e., bringing ideas and people together. One way I’ve tried to do more of this recently is to ask teachers if any of them have tried something similar to a new approach I’ve explained. If any have, I invite them to share their experience. This invites elaboration, a critical cognitive process for constructing understanding. If the teacher’s experience was positive, we discuss why the approach was successful. If the teacher’s experience was frustrating, we often find together the reason for it and develop a plan for structuring it better the next time. This give-and-take values everyone, respects the experience present in the session, and allows the leader to be a colleague rather than an aloof expert.

3. Follow up. I’ve written previously about the importance of coaching and the characteristics of an effective coach. A one-time information flood is ineffective, no matter how engaging the session’s leader may be. Teachers need support as they begin to implement new ideas, methods, and approaches. Note that support, not judgement, is needed. Showing up with an evaluation form is a certain way to kill any benefit professional development might yield. Teachers are learners, and we need the time and space to try, to reflect, to try again, to get helpful feedback, and to truly master implementation. We need the opportunity to learn. Coaching provides this opportunity, along with the encouragement and feedback necessary for success.

Let’s not dismiss professional development as useless because of a few bad experiences. Rather, let’s structure professional development so that it truly invests in teachers, providing them with new and effective means of investing in our students.

Authentic learning for both is what we’re chasing. Catching it requires professional development of the highest quality.

References Washburn, K.D., The Architecture of Learning: Designing Instruction for the Learning Brain (Pelham, AL: Clerestory Press, 2010), 68.

Image: 'Cautious / Suspicious' http://www.flickr.com/photos/15923063@N00/272239167

Learning & the Brain Presentation: Michael Posner

One of my favorite conferences is the Learning and the Brain Conference held at various locations several times a year. The most recent conference was held in Washington, D.C. in early May. I tried to play the role of on-the-spot-reporter and posted on Twitter live from the conference.

To provide readers with a sense of the conference, I'm going to post my Twitter stream from each presentation. These are the actual "tweets" I posted from the conference. I've cleaned them up a little, but other than a few corrected typos, they represent the raw ideas presented at the conference.

As you read through these "tweets," keep in mind that I was posting the comments/ideas of the presenter. These do not necessarily represent my conclusions from the research.

Here are my posts from the first keynote presenter, Michael Posner:

• First speaker is Michael Posner, topic: Brain’s Attention Networks. Will use initials (MP) to indicate speaker.
• Posner is from the University of Oregon and was recently honored by the President for his work in cognitive neuroscience.
• MP: Attention is a central topic for education. New tech giving us new insight into nature of attention.
• MP: Attention is a set of neural networks—at least 3: alerting, orienting, & executive. Each set associated w/different brain area.
• MP: At rest, two brain networks are active, “default state,” which alert brain to change.
• MP: Alerting deficits in early childhood later negatively affect the executive network.
• MP: There are both overt AND covert shifts in attention.
• MP: A deficit in orienting attention network correlates with some autistic behaviors.
• MP: Executive network is associated with conflicts in sensory data and self-regulation.
• Post on importance of self-regulation: http://is.gd/bXdb.
• MP: Effortful control of attention is one self-regulation element of the executive network.
• MP: The anterior cingulate is related to self-regulation; size & activity can predict self-regulation capacity.
• MP: Executive network deficiency is related to most cognitive disorders.
• MP: Individual differences in executive network functioning are wide-ranging.
• MP: For example, the speed in managing conflicts in sensory data correlate w/self-regulation capacity.
• MP: Separate white matter pathways deal with the three attention networks.
• MP: Recent study shows IBMT (form of meditation) actually influences those white matter pathways positively.
• MP: IBMT meditation influences brain state, which positively influences executive functions.
• MP: Differing neurotransmitters are also associated with each attention network. This can help guide gene research.
• MP: When does executive network begin to self-regulate individual? Evidence shows around 7-10 months of age.
• MP: Around 7 months, a child is aware of conflicts in sensory data—e.g., a scene different from expectation.
• MP: Anticipatory looking at 4-7 months correlates w/some self-regulation abilities at 4 years of age.
• MP: Connectivity of the executive network, however, develops slowly—present at age 9 but not fully connected.
• MP: Showing novel objects may help produce connectivity within executive attention networks.
• MP: Gene DRD4 present on a specific chromosone correlates with ADHD. (Genetic basis discovered?)
• MP: If gene is present AND parenting is poor, MAJOR ADHD impulsivity develops.
• MP: “True experts” have “highly elaborated semantic memory,” correlated w/activity in fusiform gyrus.
• MP: High levels of experience influence brain activity for specific areas. Fusiform gyrus active in chess, bird, & dog experts.
• Posner now taking questions from audience.
• MP: Alerting attention deficiency associates w/aging & ADHD disorders.
• MP: Orienting attention deficiency associates w/autism.
• MP: Executive attention deficiency associates w/Alzheimer’s, schizophrenia, addiction, & others.
• MP: Parents not to blame for ADHD children; research shows correlation in extreme impulsivity.
• MP: With research subjects, parenting classes actually decreased children’s impulsivity.
• (As you can imagine, some resistance to these ideas. Posner: “Just sharing what research shows.”)
• MP: My research will be translated to classroom by educators, not me. I’m just a scientist. We need teachers to think this through.

Professional Development: A Defense

Teacher conversations about professional development often include the terms worthless and waste of time, and a general disdain for typical approaches is often evident. The back-and-forth can be a bruising arena for those who actually provide professional development, and I’ve been feeling a bit bruised recently. Don’t worry. The bruises have only been blows to my ego. (The only actual bruise I have came compliments of a concrete planter on the corner of New Jersey & M Streets in Washington, D.C., and that’s not a tale I care to retell.)

I must confess that my own experience supports such derogatory comments. I once spent an entire morning of “professional development” brainstorming alternate ways to earn a living. Though I’m sure the administration’s intent and the presenter’s goals were worthwhile, the session was so poorly designed that worthless and waste of time accurately described the result.

Why, then, do the current perspectives of professional development seem bruising? A few years ago I began an organization committed to “investing in teachers,” a “school’s most valuable asset.” And, yes, professional development is a significant component of what we do. So, allow me to provide a brief defense of professional development based on what it can do when it’s effectively designed.

Professional development can contribute to increased student learning. As we learn more about teaching and related topics, such as findings from neuro- and cognitive science, we discover principles that can improve our teaching. As our teaching becomes more effective, our students understand more. Our growth in teaching influences their depth of learning.

Many times, our growth in teaching relates to our instructional design—an element that directly influences student learning: “Many breakdowns in student learning may be a function of poor classroom curriculum design,” suggests Robert J. Marzano. “...the expert teacher has acquired a wide array of instructional strategies along with the knowledge of when these strategies might be the most useful.”¹ Professional development can equip us with additional strategies for fostering learning.

Professional development can provide a common language for teachers to talk to teachers about teaching. This increases the possibility of collaboration, a practice known to improve practice:

Surgeon and author Dr. Atul Gawande details conclusions of a Harvard Business School study on the learning curve surgeons experience when learning new surgical techniques. Practice in itself proved an unreliable predictor of learning rate and success, but how surgeons practiced made a significant difference. A surgeon leading one of the quickest-learning teams picked “team members with whom he had worked well before” and kept “them together through the first fifteen cases before allowing any new members. He had the team go through a dry run the day before the first case, then deliberately scheduled six operations in the first week, so little would be forgotten in between. He convened the team before each case to discuss it in detail and afterward to debrief.” In contrast, a surgeon who had significantly more experience led one of the slowest-learning teams. He involved different personnel in each surgery, “which is to say that it was no team at all,” and led no pre- or post-operation discussions. Increased collaboration quickened learning rate and improved performance. Most important, patients benefitted from the surgeon’s collaborative approach.²

Educational research reaches a similar conclusion: collaboration improves teacher performance. Unfortunately our learning institutions often impede professional growth by inhibiting collaboration. As a result, we can actually hinder student learning by failing to sharpen one another through collaboration.³ Common professional development can provide a basis and means for such collaboration.

Professional development can provide new research that equips teachers to be more intentional. New research often illuminates why what we already know to be successful teaching is effective. This recognition helps us become more intentional in our use of various methods and approaches. When we understand why something works, we know better how to optimize its effectiveness. A consistently good teacher is an intentional teacher, and the more we understand about teaching and learning, the more intentional we can become. Professional development can do these things, which also means it can fail to do them, and this is a source of teacher frustration and justifiably bruising comments:

Unfortunately, schools provide little help. Most professional development programs for teachers, claims Richard Paul, are “episodic, intellectually unchallenging, and fragmented” with “very little discussion on or about serious educational issues, and when there is such discussion it is often simplistic.”⁴

Those leading professional development sessions have a critical responsibility. In the next post I’ll explore some principles that should be considered when designing and leading professional development. We need effective, high quality, meaningful professional development.

Otherwise we do a disservice to hard-working professionals and deserve the bruises their opinions inflict on our egos.

References

1. Marzano, R.J., What Works in Schools: Translating Research into Action (Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, 2003), 106, 78.


2. Gawande, A., Better: A Surgeon’s Notes on Performance (New York: Henry Holt, 2007), 230.


3. Sergiovanni, T.J., Moral Leadership: Getting to the Heart of School Improvement (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1992), 88.


4. Washburn, K.D., The Architecture of Learning: Designing Instruction for the Learning Brain (Pelham, AL: Clerestory Press, 2010), 191.

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