I’m back from my travels. I hope everyone enjoyed a peaceful and restful holiday season. And I hope all of us keep our new year’s resolutions – at least through the month of January.
At the end of 2022, The 74 posted an article listing their most significant education studies of 2022. Let’s take a look at what research says when it comes to becoming smarter and stronger.
1. “There’s no conflict between relationships and rigor.”
“According to a 2022 study that examined teaching practices in 285 districts, comparing relationship-building strategies with the flexibility that teachers had in assigning challenging and complex work.”
“The researchers found that the most effective teachers build their classrooms by getting to know their students, being approachable, and showing that they enjoy the work – and then deftly translate emotional capital into academic capital.”
Everyone knows relationships matter. They matter a lot. When you are coaching learning, begin with building a relationship with your young learner. That way, when the work becomes difficult, both the adult learning leader and the young learner (including their family) can depend on a personal relationship that is deep and meaningful.
2. “Highlighting isn’t very effective until teachers step in.”
“Students often highlight the wrong information and may rely on their deficient highlighting skills as a primary strategy, leading to poor learning outcomes, a new analysis of 36 studies suggests. As little as two hours of tutoring, however, can dramatically improve their capabilities.”
“The researchers determined that ‘learner-generated highlighting’ tended to improve retention of material, but not comprehension. When students were taught proper highlighting techniques by teachers, however – for example, how to distinguish main ideas from supporting ideas – they dramatically improved their academic performance.”
I remember a European history textbook I highlighted in college. My future wife told me it would have been easier to highlight the text I didn’t want to remember based on the amount of yellow ink on each page. I needed someone to help me figure out highlighting.
Traditional school doesn’t spend enough time in skill-building – like highlighting. The traditional system relies too much on the young learner’s ability, or not, to teach themselves skills important to learning.
3. “A landmark study strikes a resounding note for inclusion.”
“…a new large-scale study appears to put the matter [of inclusion’s benefits] beyond dispute. When researchers tracked nearly 24,000 adolescents who qualified for special education, they discovered that spending a majority of the day – at least 80 percent – in general education classes improved reading scores by a whopping 24 points and math scores by 18 points, compared with scores of their more isolated peers with similar disabilities.”
Of the 50 young learners in our personalized learning lab school, 8 of them would have earned a special education label in the traditional system. At the end of the three years we worked with them, all 8 showed the same amount of growth as the rest of their learning cohort. Inclusion, better yet with a learning plan a part of it, works.
4. “Sketchnotes and concept maps work – even better than you might think.”
“Simple concept maps, sketchnotes, and other annotated jottings – akin to doodling with a purpose – can facilitate deeper comprehension of materials than more polished drawings.”
In other words, allow the learner to make sense of their learning the way they want to make sense of it.
5. “Brain breaks are misunderstood (and underutilized).”
“Conventional wisdom holds that the development of a skill comes from active, repeated practice: It’s the act of dribbling a basketball that ultimately teaches the basketball star.”
“But recent studies reveal that the intervals between practice sessions are at least as crucial.”
“In 2022, we learned that the kinds of breaks make a difference… One study compared in-classroom breaks like drawing or building puzzles with outdoor breaks like running or playing in sandboxes. In a nod to the power of movement – and free time – it was the kids playing outside who returned to class ready to learn, probably, because indoor games, like indoor voices, required children to engage in more self-regulation, the researchers speculated.”
Learning can happen anywhere and anytime – and it includes brain breaks.
6. “For young children, the power of play-based learning.”
“Children aren’t miniature adults, but a bias toward adult perspectives of childhood, with its attendant schedules and routines, has gradually exerted a stranglehold on our educational system nonetheless…”
“How can we let little kids be little while meeting the academic expectations of typical schools? A new analysis of 39 studies spanning several decades plots a middle path for educators, highlighting the way that play gently guided by adults, often called play-based learning, can satisfy both objectives.”
If play-based learning interests you, read “I Learn From Children” by Caroline Pratt. Pratt founded the City and Country School in New York City, a school built entirely on play-based learning. Pratt’s book changed the way I looked at learning several years ago.
Relationships, personalized learning, play-based learning, flexibility, and inclusion – all important as we enter 2023 based on the latest research. So why doesn’t the traditional system pay more attention to these research-based strategies?
Because that system wasn’t built to pay attention to these types of strategies. So, it’s time to build a new system that does.
It’s good to be back.
Til tomorrow. SVB
A Better Path to Learning 
Leave a comment