#21 - Notes on Play, Research and Failure

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Hello World,

In each edition of this newsletter, I will share five inspiring web resources that I have curated after hours of research to ensure that you have the best education coffee in your inbox. I also hope to share some lessons from the classroom in these upcoming editions of the newsletter.

I am teaching Grade 5 again from September 2022 to June 2023. I finished four months in the classroom. I am learning and growing everyday. Here are some notes and professional insights from my journey in the past month. Click the button below to subscribe to this newsletter.

1) Academic Research for Teachers Series by Cult of Pedagogy

I love this six part series from Cult of Pedagogy on accessing academic research for teachers. After completing my Master’s degree , I realised that there are so many insights for teachers about effective classroom instruction and management that are hidden in education journals. I also realised there was a considerable gap in how classroom teachers access and review education research. Here are some tips for the same:

1. Read a systematic academic review or meta-analyses that summarizes the main findings in a field in a single paper or a series. Here is a review on project based learning from pbl works.

2. Follow academic researchers from education faculties around the world. You can also find profiles of PhD students and their research topics from these websites. You can find a list of papers, social media profiles and email ID’s. Here is the faculty directory for the Harvard Graduate School of Education.

3. Understand how to read an analyse data in academic research by evaluating methodologies, differentiating between correlation and causation and understanding the background of the researcher. This article from the Australian Bureau of Statistics does a good job to explain the difference between correlation and causation.

2) How Play Helps a Kid’s Brain Grow | Jesse Ilhardt | TED

In this talk Jesse Illhardt describes how play between adults and children helps both groups develop skills, build social connections and develop creative problem solving skills. Play is as important as letters, numbers, shapes and colors according to Illhardt.

3) Specific Oral Feedback through periodic 1:1 Student Conferences

Give lots and lots and lots of oral feedback. Give this feedback in 1:1 conversations you have with each student through the day. I have realized that doing this multiple times in a day helps the student understand that they are accountable to someday for their work. It is hard for students to understand where to improve when they get their assessments periodically through formative and summative assignments. Daily oral feedback is a great substitute for periodic weekly and monthly assessments. Using the sandwich method is also an effective strategy to support student growth. Provide some positive feedback before you provide some critical feedback and then wrap it up with a positive comment. Here is a another great video from the team at TED about becoming better at giving great feedback. My favorite part of the video was the emphasis on asking good questions and providing specific relevant examples on ways to improve and grow. When your students are open to feedback they will grow really quickly in both academic and social outcomes.

4) Discuss and accept failure as a stepping stone to success

I have developed a ritual where I talk about the important of making mistakes to learn and grow as essential steps to mastering academic concepts. The first time you learn something new you will always be unfamiliar with that information. I see my kids fail in creating properly punctuated sentences, solving division problems and drawing parts of the human body on a day to day basis. But I also developed this ritual to create low stakes spaces for my students to fail repeatedly in a safe manner. For instance one of my students struggled with a division problem. We tried the same set of problems multiple times and the student was just not making the conceptual connection. After ten questions the student figure it out. But I waited patiently till then and asked the student to keep trying. I worked with them 1:1 to provide them support and guidance in a constructive way. Kids are amazing. They often do not have fixed concepts of their ability in a subject and will try something multiple times before they get unmotivated or start slacking. Teachers need to jump in with the right information to make sure students do not get de motivated when they are hitting a wall. But it is vital to let the student fail and slowly make those connections rather than you solving the problem for them.

This article summarizing Martin Covington’s research on failure by Vicki Zakrzewski on the Greater Good website guides the educator to rebrand failure as a learning opportunity. The highlight of the article was the emphasis on practicing self-compassion when you fail and reducing public scrutiny of student grades and performance in learning environments.

5) Learning Stories Episode 15 - Dr. Traci Scheepstra

I started a YouTube Channel called ‘Learning Stories’. This is a show where we interview a diverse set of learners from the 21st century. Each guest profiled here has a unique story to share about how they acquired a set of valuable skills and knowledge in a creative and innovative manner. In the process, we hope to uncover a new understanding of learning as conceptualized, imagined, and narrated in these learning stories. These conversations have given me so many insights on the learning process within and beyond the classroom.

On Episode 15 of #LearningStories we chat with Dr. Traci L. Scheepstra. She is a teacher educator, educational researcher, and personal development coach practitioner. With close to three decades of teaching experience in a variety of educational settings with learners of all ages, Traci’s work focuses on curriculum, pedagogy and research in the fields of arts-based education, restorative justice practices, conflict resolution and communication, bullying initiatives, and gender-based school violence. Traci has a PhD from the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto. In 2014 Traci became a certified Life and Executive Coach Practitioner. The Coaching Collective was established in 2016. Traci is currently the founder and CEO of Embodied Learnings that has a vision to create thriving classrooms where students spend more time moving and less time sitting so the whole body can be engaged in the process of learning. Traci lives in Ontario, Canada with her husband, father-in-law, two children, and beloved dog Lili.

Show Notes

1. Teaching through cognitive processes alone fails to meet the emotional, mental, and physical needs of students. When teachers include the body in their teaching practice it allows students to make meaning of themselves, others, and the world around them in new and profound ways. By bringing attention to the body, we also bring attention to each individual student and their lived experiences.

2. It is important to advocate for the inclusion of the body through dance education and movement integration in the elementary classroom. 

3. Teachers are researchers too. They can tap into their experiences as educators to conduct studies that may contribute to the larger body of knowledge on educational practices.

4. There are several different ways to be a teacher. You can be a teacher in the formal system and a teacher beyond the formal system as well. Traci was an educator that fulfilled her life’s calling by running and implementing arts based programs at her creative arts centre in Pickering, Ontario.

5. Share your work and insights as a professional with other professionals and peers in the form of newsletters, blogposts, or videos. 6) Your family's support is so essential to your growth in your profession and their love and support can be the foundation to allow you to chart new paths and take calculated risks going ahead.

Please do send me your thoughts and resources on any edition of this newsletter through email at abhishekashokshetty@gmail.com or on twitter @AbhishekShetty_. I love taking these discussions forward on those platforms.

Abhishek

17/01/2023