tag:theconversation.com,2011:/fr/topics/student-learning-17057/articlesStudent learning – The Conversation2023-07-26T12:18:56Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2100992023-07-26T12:18:56Z2023-07-26T12:18:56ZDo smartphones belong in classrooms? Four scholars weigh in<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539214/original/file-20230725-23-c94xjl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C8%2C4099%2C3671&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Academic performance improves when schools ban smartphones, research shows.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/happy-teenage-girls-in-class-looking-at-cell-phone-royalty-free-image/1011461988?phrase=smartphones+classrooms&adppopup=true">Westend61 via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Should smartphones be allowed in classrooms? A <a href="https://www.unesco.org/gem-report/sites/default/files/medias/fichiers/2023/07/Summary_v5.pdf">new report</a> from <a href="https://www.unesco.org/en/brief">UNESCO</a>, the education arm of the United Nations, raises questions about the practice. Though smartphones can be used for educational purposes, the report says the devices also disrupt classroom learning, expose students to cyberbullying and can compromise students’ privacy.</em></p>
<p><em>About 1 in 7 countries globally, such as <a href="https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2023-07-04/mobile-phones-to-be-banned-from-dutch-classrooms-next-year">the Netherlands</a> and <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/12/12/570145408/france-moves-to-ban-students-from-using-cellphones-in-schools">France</a>, have banned the use of smartphones in school – and academic performance improved as a result, particularly for low-performing students, the report notes.</em></p>
<p><em>As school leaders in the U.S. wrestle with <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/02/the-schools-that-ban-smartphones/673117/">whether or not to ban smartphones</a>, The Conversation has invited four scholars to weigh in on the issue.</em></p>
<h2>Daniel G. Krutka: Use smartphones to encourage ‘technoskepticism’</h2>
<p>While the issue of smartphone use in schools is complicated, evidence suggests that spending more time on smartphones is <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/emo0000403">associated with young people being less happy and less satisfied with life</a>.</p>
<p>Technology scholars have long argued that the <a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/132784/technopoly-by-neil-postman/">key to living well with technology</a> is in finding limits. However, in banning smartphones, I worry educators might be missing opportunities to use smartphones to encourage what I and other researchers refer to as <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/00317217231168262">technoskeptical thinking</a>; that is, questioning our relationship with technology.</p>
<p>For example, students might be encouraged to consider the benefits and drawbacks of using navigational apps to travel from one place to another, as opposed to old-fashioned paper maps. Or, students might explore their social media feeds to critique what algorithms feed them, or how notifications get their attention.</p>
<p>In <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=Zj0urDUAAAAJ&hl=en">my research</a>, I have looked at how teachers can encourage students to go on <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2018.03.009">techno-fasts</a> – that is, abstaining from the use of technology for a certain period of time. This, I argue, will give students time to reflect on the time they spend <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2018.03.009">away from their devices</a>. </p>
<p>Policy debates often focus on whether or not to put smartphones out of reach during the school day. But I believe educators might find it more beneficial to make the phones an object of inquiry.</p>
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<img alt="A group of kids in a classroom looks at a phone." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539365/original/file-20230725-25-4vcd0n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539365/original/file-20230725-25-4vcd0n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539365/original/file-20230725-25-4vcd0n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539365/original/file-20230725-25-4vcd0n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539365/original/file-20230725-25-4vcd0n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539365/original/file-20230725-25-4vcd0n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539365/original/file-20230725-25-4vcd0n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Massachusetts Commissioner of Education Jeffrey Riley recently said the state may begin encouraging school districts to ban cellphone use in schools.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/group-of-high-school-students-looking-at-message-on-royalty-free-image/976330346?phrase=cell+phone+classroom&adppopup=true">monkeybusinessimages/iStock via Getty Images</a></span>
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<h2>Sarah Rose: Consult parents, teachers and students</h2>
<p>While there is evidence that classroom phone usage <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/hbe2.229">can be a distraction</a>, it can also promote <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/0161956X.2019.1702426">engagement and learning</a>. While research about the potential positive and negative consequences of classroom phones can be used to inform school phone policies, the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2016.11.007">views of those</a> who are most directly impacted by the policies should also be taken into account.</p>
<p>The views of parents matter because their views <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2016.11.007">may influence</a> the extent to which their children follow the policy. The views of children matter because they are the ones being expected to follow the policy and to benefit from it. The views of teachers matter because they are often the ones that have to enforce the policies. Research shows that enforcing cellphone policies is <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2014.05.011">not always a straightforward issue</a>. </p>
<p>In my research, I have found that children – aged 10 and 11 years old – in collaboration with their parents, were able to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/chso.12583">come up with ideas for ideal policies</a> and solutions to help enforce them. For example, one parent-child pair suggested mobile phone use in school could be banned but that a role of “telephone monitor” could be given to an older pupil. This “telephone monitor” would have a class mobile phone that children and parents could use to contact each other during the school day when necessary.</p>
<p>This recommendation reflected how parents and middle and high school students – whether from rural and urban areas – felt cellphones were important to keep in touch with each other during the school day. Beyond safety, children and parents also told us that phones were important for keeping in touch about changing plans and for emotional support during the school day.</p>
<p>I believe policies that simply ban phones in schools may be missing an opportunity to educate children about responsible mobile device use. When parents and children are involved in policy development, it has the potential to increase the extent to which these policies are followed and enforced. </p>
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<img alt="A group of kids in a classroom look at their phone." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539366/original/file-20230725-23-ju7ly8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539366/original/file-20230725-23-ju7ly8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539366/original/file-20230725-23-ju7ly8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539366/original/file-20230725-23-ju7ly8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539366/original/file-20230725-23-ju7ly8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539366/original/file-20230725-23-ju7ly8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539366/original/file-20230725-23-ju7ly8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">According to the National Center for Education Statistics, in 2020, cellphone bans were in place in 76% of U.S. schools.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/multi-ethnic-group-of-students-using-smartphones-royalty-free-image/962475588?phrase=cell%2Bphone%2Bclassroom">gorodenkoff/iStock via Getty Images</a></span>
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<h2>Arnold L. Glass: Cellphone use in college lectures hurts performance in ways that are hard to see</h2>
<p>The intrusion of internet-enabled electronic devices, such as laptops, tablets and cellphones, has transformed the modern college lecture. Students now divide their attention between the lecture and their devices. Classroom studies reveal that when college students use an electronic device for a nonacademic purpose during class, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/01443410.2018.1489046">it hurts their performance on exams</a>.</p>
<p>When attention is divided between an electronic device and the classroom lecture, it does not reduce comprehension of the lecture – at least, not when measured by within-class quizzes. Instead, divided attention reduces long-term retention of the classroom lecture, which hurts performance on unit exams and final exams. </p>
<p>When some students open electronic devices, it also negatively affects the performance of all the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2012.10.003">students around them</a>. Research has shown that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2012.10.003">student performance on final exams was worse</a> when electronic devices were permitted during classes that covered exam material versus when the devices were not.</p>
<p>Many students won’t think their divided attention is affecting their retention of new information. It may not be for the moment, but a couple of weeks later or down the line, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2012.10.003">research shows</a>, it does.</p>
<h2>Louis-Philippe Beland: Bans help low-achieving students the most</h2>
<p>Numerous studies indicate that low-achieving students stand to benefit the most from the implementation of mobile phone bans in schools.</p>
<p>In a 2015 study, my co-author, <a href="https://www.richardmurphy.org/">Richard Murphy</a>, and I <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.labeco.2016.04.004">examined the impact of banning mobile phones on student performance</a> in high schools, using data from England. By comparing schools with phone bans to similar schools without the bans, we isolated the effect of mobile phones on performance. Our study found that banning mobile phones significantly increased test scores among 16-year-old students. The effect is equivalent to adding five days to the school year or an extra hour per week. Low-achieving students benefited more, while high-achieving students remained unaffected. </p>
<p>Similar <a href="https://doi.org/10.1108/AEA-05-2021-0112">studies in Spain</a> and <a href="https://openaccess.nhh.no/nhh-xmlui/bitstream/handle/11250/3069282/_%2016_00464-33%20thesis_abrahamsson%20732139_2_1.PDF?sequence=1">Norway</a> using a similar approach demonstrated compelling evidence supporting the benefits of banning mobile phones. In Spain, grades improved and bullying incidents decreased. In Norway, the ban raised middle school students’ grade-point averages and their likelihood of attending academic high schools while reducing bullying. Evidence from <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/kykl.12214">Belgium</a> suggests banning mobile phones can be beneficial for college student performance. </p>
<p>Psychological research sheds light on potential mechanisms behind the impact of mobile phones and technology on student performance. Multitasking, common with mobile phone use, has been found to hinder <a href="https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0903620106">learning and task execution</a>. Taking notes by hand has been shown to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/03634523.2013.767917">better enhance memory retention</a> compared to typing on a computer.</p>
<p>In sum, banning mobile phones in schools can yield positive effects, improve academic performance and narrow the achievement gap between high- and low-achieving students. However, it is crucial to acknowledge that mobile phones and technology can also be valuable educational tools when used appropriately.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/210099/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Louis-Philippe Beland receives funding from SSHRC insight grant and SSHRC insight development grant.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Arnold Lewis Glass, Daniel G. Krutka, and Sarah Rose do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The 2023 Global Education Monitoring Report proposed restrictions on the use of technology in the classroom.Louis-Philippe Beland, Associate Professor of Economics, Carleton UniversityArnold Lewis Glass, Professor of Psychology, Rutgers UniversityDaniel G. Krutka, Associate Professor of Social Studies Education, University of North TexasSarah Rose, Senior Lecturer in Psychology and Child Development, Staffordshire UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1843132022-06-15T20:01:56Z2022-06-15T20:01:56ZTime in hospital sets back tens of thousands of children’s learning each year, but targeted support can help them catch up<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/468635/original/file-20220614-18-r7p1do.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C4718%2C3147&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="https://www.nap.edu.au/">NAPLAN</a> scores can tell us about a child’s learning, but can they also help us to support learners who have had a serious injury or a long-term chronic illness like asthma or epilepsy? </p>
<p>Children who spend time in hospital for these reasons miss out on time in class and are at risk of performing below the <a href="https://www.nap.edu.au/results-and-reports/how-to-interpret/standards">national minimum standard</a> (NMS) in numeracy and literacy as measured by NAPLAN. A serious injury or chronic illness can have a cumulative effect, resulting in lower educational performance, non-completion of high school, and potentially limiting their social, educational and later employment opportunities. </p>
<p>Knowing these risks in advance means parents and educators can plan to support children before the shock of poor school or NAPLAN results. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/every-teacher-needs-to-be-a-literacy-teacher-but-thats-not-happening-in-most-australian-schools-184557">Every teacher needs to be a literacy teacher – but that's not happening in most Australian schools</a>
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<p>Serious injury, asthma, mental health, epilepsy and diabetes impact more than a million children each year. More than 100,000 end up in hospital. </p>
<p>We compared their NAPLAN results with kids of the same age and gender who lived in the same area but who had not been hospitalised for those conditions. We found spending time in hospital for these conditions did set back learning, with the exception of type 1 diabetes. </p>
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<h2>What did the study find?</h2>
<p><strong>Injury</strong></p>
<p>About <a href="https://doi.org/10.1186/s12887-021-02891-x">70,000 people</a> under the age of 16 are hospitalised with an injury each year in Australia. This can disrupt their ability to attend school or concentrate and learn. </p>
<p>Recovery from injury can be unpredictable. Some young people may fully recover. Others experience ongoing difficulties at school.</p>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1186/s12887-021-02891-x">Compared to matched peers</a>, students who had been hospitalised with an injury had a 12% higher risk of not achieving the NMS in numeracy on NAPLAN and a 9% higher risk of not achieving the NMS in reading.</p>
<p><strong>Asthma</strong></p>
<p>Around <a href="https://www.aihw.gov.au/reports/children-youth/australias-children/contents/health/asthma-prevalence-children">460,000 young people</a> have asthma in Australia. If asthma is not adequately controlled, it can have a wide-ranging impact on their lives, including on their performance at school.</p>
<p>Our <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/cea.14022">analysis</a> of 28,114 young people hospitalised with asthma showed a difference between the sexes. Young males’ risk of not achieving the NMS was 13% higher for numeracy and 15% higher for reading compared to matched peers. In contrast, females hospitalised with asthma showed no difference.</p>
<p><strong>Mental illness</strong></p>
<p>Around 14% of young people experience a mental illness in Australia that can affect their health, relationships and school life. In our <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/00048674211061684">study</a> of 7,069 young people hospitalised with a mental illness, young males had almost twice the risk of not achieving the NMS on NAPLAN for both numeracy and reading compared to their peers. Young females had a 1.5 times higher risk of not achieving the NMS for numeracy and those with diagnosed <a href="https://www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/health/conditionsandtreatments/conduct-disorder">conduct disorder</a> had twice the risk of not achieving the NMS for reading.</p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-transition-into-adolescence-can-be-brutal-for-kids-mental-health-but-parents-can-help-reduce-the-risk-180487">The transition into adolescence can be brutal for kids' mental health – but parents can help reduce the risk</a>
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<p><strong>Epilepsy</strong></p>
<p>Across the country, about <a href="https://epilepsyfoundation.org.au/about-us/media-room/#:%7E:text=1%20in%20200%20Australian%20children%20live%20with%20epilepsy.">one in 200 children</a> are living with epilepsy. Epilepsy can affect attention, concentration and memory, all which can be a barrier to performing well at school. </p>
<p>Our <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.seizure.2022.05.014">study</a> of 2,383 young people hospitalised with epilepsy found young males and females had a three times higher risk of not achieving the NMS on NAPLAN for both numeracy and reading compared to peers.</p>
<p><strong>Type 1 diabetes</strong></p>
<p>Type 1 diabetes was the exception and showed no adverse impact on school performance. In Australia, an estimated 6,500 young people have type 1 diabetes. Our <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/pedi.13317">analysis</a> of 833 young people hospitalised with type 1 diabetes did not find any difference in achieving the NMS in numeracy or reading on NAPLAN compared to matched peers.</p>
<p>This finding is likely explained by improved glucose control and type 1 diabetes management. It is also possible that school assessments, such as NAPLAN, do not capture everyday difficulties that students with diabetes experience.</p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/what-parents-can-do-to-make-a-childs-chronic-illness-easier-41359">What parents can do to make a child's chronic illness easier</a>
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<h2>How can we support these students’ learning?</h2>
<p>It is essential that we identify students who are likely to need learning support because of an injury or chronic illness. Supports can include online learning options, flexible programming or mobilising peer support to enable sharing of class notes and homework activities. </p>
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<p>Monitoring students’ progress when they return to school will help to identify ongoing learning support needs.</p>
<p>There are also ways to manage symptoms and enhance performance at school. With asthma, for example, a comprehensive asthma management plan, using medication to manage symptoms, and <a href="https://www.schn.health.nsw.gov.au/find-a-service/health-medical-services/asthma-improvement">healthcare co-ordination</a> between GPs, hospitals and community services can all reduce the chance of ending up in hospital. For epilepsy, learning to identify seizure triggers, lifestyle and medication management are <a href="https://www.epilepsy.org.au/strong-foundations/overview/">key</a>.</p>
<p>Improving teachers’ understanding of symptom management for chronically ill or injured students is important too. For example, a New South Wales program, <a href="https://education.nsw.gov.au/early-childhood-education/whats-happening-in-the-early-childhood-education-sector/resource-library/asthma">Aiming for Asthma Improvement in Children</a>, encourages self-paced training for school staff on asthma management and first aid, along with resources for managing asthma in schools. For epilepsy, Strong Foundations provides <a href="https://www.epilepsy.org.au/strong-foundations/learning-and-participation/">advice</a> on the skills children with epilepsy need to manage in the classroom and playground.</p>
<p>Early identification and recognition that an injured or chronically ill student may need learning support at school and at home are critical to ensure they are not left behind academically.</p>
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<p><em>This article is part of The Conversation’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/topics/breaking-the-cycle-119149">Breaking the Cycle</a> series, which is supported by a philanthropic grant from the Paul Ramsay Foundation.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/184313/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rebecca Mitchell has received funding from the NHMRC, the MRFF, the ARC, and various state and federal government departments for past projects. This research was funded by a philanthropic donor to Macquarie University. This article is part of The Conversation's Breaking the Cycle series, which is about escaping cycles of disadvantage. The series is supported by a philanthropic grant from the Paul Ramsay Foundation.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Anne McMaugh has received funding from the Australian Research Council for past projects. This research was funded by a philanthropic donor to Macquarie University</span></em></p>A study of thousands of students hospitalised with an injury or illness confirms they are likely to fall behind their classmates. But good management and targeted help with learning cut the risk.Rebecca Mitchell, Associate Professor Health and Societal Outcomes, Macquarie UniversityAnne McMaugh, Senior Lecturer in Educational Psychology, Macquarie UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1796172022-03-29T12:36:04Z2022-03-29T12:36:04ZI no longer grade my students’ work – and I wish I had stopped sooner<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/454740/original/file-20220328-15-h11bc5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=8%2C0%2C5599%2C3741&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Evaluating student work and offering feedback doesn't mean there has to be a grade.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/finally-someone-who-studied-royalty-free-image/187131634">PeopleImages/E+ via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>I’ve been teaching college English for more than 30 years. Four years ago, I stopped putting grades on written work, and it has transformed my teaching and my students’ learning. My only regret is that I didn’t do it sooner.</p>
<p>Starting in elementary school, teachers rate student work – sometimes with stars and checkmarks, sometimes with actual grades. Usually by middle school, when most students are about 11, a system of grading is firmly in place. In the U.S., <a href="https://everydayeducation.com/blogs/news/grading-systems">the most common system</a> is an “A” for superior work, through “F” for failure, with “E” almost always skipped. </p>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1187/cbe.cbe-14-03-0054">This system was widely adopted only in the 1940s</a>, and even now, some schools, colleges and universities use other means of assessing students. But the practice of grading, and ranking, students is so widespread as to seem necessary, even though <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/views/2020/01/27/advice-how-make-grading-more-equitable-opinion">many researchers say it is highly inequitable</a>. For example, students who come into a course with little prior knowledge earn lower grades at the start, which means they get a lower final average, even if they ultimately master the material. Grades have other problems: They are <a href="http://www.alfiekohn.org/article/case-grades/">demotivating, they don’t actually measure learning</a> and <a href="https://www.ascd.org/el/articles/taking-the-stress-out-of-grading">they increase students’ stress</a>. </p>
<p>During the pandemic, many instructors and even whole institutions <a href="https://www.edsurge.com/news/2021-05-26-pass-fail-grading-was-an-act-of-pandemic-compassion-is-it-here-to-stay">offered pass/fail options</a> or mandated pass/fail grading. They did so both to reduce the stress of remote education and because they saw that the emergency, disruptive to everyone, was <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2021/02/23/the-covid-19-pandemic-is-hitting-students-of-color-the-worst.html">disproportionately challenging for students of color</a>. <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/digital-learning/article/2020/08/12/many-colleges-will-return-normal-grading-fall-will-semester-be">Many, however, later resumed grading</a>, not acknowledging the ways that traditional assessments can both perpetuate inequity and impede learning. </p>
<p>I started my journey toward what’s called “<a href="https://www.jessestommel.com/ungrading-a-bibliography/">ungrading</a>” before the pandemic. In continuing it throughout, I have seen the effects, which are like those observed by other researchers in the field.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/454745/original/file-20220328-19-45dtbp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A person sits at a desk reviewing papers" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/454745/original/file-20220328-19-45dtbp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/454745/original/file-20220328-19-45dtbp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454745/original/file-20220328-19-45dtbp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454745/original/file-20220328-19-45dtbp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454745/original/file-20220328-19-45dtbp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454745/original/file-20220328-19-45dtbp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454745/original/file-20220328-19-45dtbp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A teacher evaluates students’ work.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/IndianaLegislatureSchools/bb5d84fcf64d496bab9c052c1754ae74/photo">AP Photo/Darron Cummings</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Three reasons</h2>
<p>I stopped putting grades on written work for three related reasons – all of which <a href="https://www.jessestommel.com/why-i-dont-grade/">other professors</a> have <a href="http://www.susanblum.com/blog/ungrading">also cited</a> as concerns. </p>
<p>First, I wanted my students to focus on the feedback I provided on their writing. I had a sense, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-0663.78.3.210">since backed up by research</a>, that when I put a grade on a piece of writing, students focused solely on that. Removing the grade forced students to pay attention to my comments.</p>
<p>Second, I was concerned with equity. For almost 10 years I have been studying <a href="https://facultyhub.richmond.edu/programs/inclusive-pedagogy.html">inclusive pedagogy</a>, which focuses on ensuring that all students have the resources they need to learn. My studies confirmed my sense that sometimes what I was really grading was a student’s background. Students with educational privilege came into my classroom <a href="https://wac.colostate.edu/docs/books/labor/chapter6.pdf">already prepared to write A or B papers</a>, while others often had not had the instruction that would enable them to do so. The 14 weeks they spent in my class could not make up for the years of educational privilege their peers had enjoyed.</p>
<p>Third, and I admit this is selfish: I hate grading. I love teaching, though, and giving students feedback is teaching. I am happy to do it. Freed from the tyranny of determining a grade, I wrote meaningful comments, suggested improvements, asked questions and entered into a dialogue with my students that felt more productive – that felt, in short, more like an extension of the classroom.</p>
<h2>It’s called ‘ungrading’</h2>
<p>The practice that I adopted is not new, and it’s not my own. It’s called “<a href="https://www.jessestommel.com/ungrading-a-bibliography/">ungrading</a>,” though that’s not entirely accurate. At the end of the semester, I do have to give students grades, as required by the university.</p>
<p>But I do not grade individual assignments. Instead, I give students extensive feedback and ample opportunity to revise. </p>
<p>At the end of the semester they submit a portfolio of revised work, along with an essay reflecting on and evaluating their learning. Like <a href="https://wvupressonline.com/node/844">most people who ungrade</a>, I reserve the right to change the grade that students assign themselves in that evaluation. But I rarely do, and when I do, I raise grades almost as often as I lower them.</p>
<p>The first class I ungraded was incredulous. After I explained the theory and the method, they peppered me with <a href="https://www.jessestommel.com/ungrading-an-faq/">many of the questions</a> that other ungraders have also faced. “If we ask you, will you tell us what grade we have on a paper?” No, I answered, because I really won’t have put a grade on it. “If we decide halfway through the semester that we’re done revising something, will you grade it then?” No again, because I’m grading an entire portfolio, not individual pieces. “Will you tell me where I stand?” My comments on your work, and our conferences, should give you a good sense of how you’re progressing in the class. </p>
<p>As for motivation, I asked them, What do you want to learn? Why are you here? Like most college professors, I teach classes across the curriculum, but I started my ungrading journey in classes that students were taking to fulfill basic graduation requirements. They were stopped short by the question. They wanted a good grade, and fair enough: That is the currency of the institution. </p>
<p>As we talked, though, we uncovered other motivations. Some took my children’s literature class because they thought it would be a fun or easy way to fulfill the requirement. They confessed, sometimes reluctantly, to anxieties about reading, about writing. They weren’t confident in their skills, didn’t think they could improve. These were exactly the students I was hoping to reach. Without putting grades on their work, I hoped – like my fellow ungrader <a href="https://pressbooks.howardcc.edu/ungrading/chapter/ungrading-in-a-general-education-science-course/">Heather Miceli, who teaches general science courses to college students</a> – that these less confident students would see that they could improve, could develop their skills and meet their own goals.</p>
<p>In my more advanced courses, students had an easier time identifying content-related goals, but I have also found surprisingly similar results in their reflections: They, too, want to overcome anxieties about speaking in class, concerns that they aren’t as prepared as their classmates, fears that they can’t keep up.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/454749/original/file-20220328-25-8su2lr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Young people sit around a table in a classroom" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/454749/original/file-20220328-25-8su2lr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/454749/original/file-20220328-25-8su2lr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454749/original/file-20220328-25-8su2lr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454749/original/file-20220328-25-8su2lr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454749/original/file-20220328-25-8su2lr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454749/original/file-20220328-25-8su2lr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454749/original/file-20220328-25-8su2lr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Some students say they want to learn new ways of thinking and working, rather than focusing on grades.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/students-of-smcc-english-professor-kevin-sweeneys-news-photo/469478792">Whitney Hayward/Portland Press Herald via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>How did it go?</h2>
<p>That first semester, students participated in class, did the readings and wrote their papers. I read and commented on them, and if they chose to, they revised – as often as they wanted. </p>
<p>At the end of the semester, when they submitted portfolios of revised work, their reflections on the process and assessments of their learning tracked closely with my own. Most recognized their growth, and I concurred. One student, a senior, thanked me for treating them like adults. As for my interest in equity, I found that students who were less well prepared did indeed develop their skills; their growth was substantial, and both they and I recognized it. </p>
<p>[<em>More than 150,000 readers get one of The Conversation’s informative newsletters.</em> <a href="https://memberservices.theconversation.com/newsletters/?source=inline-140K">Join the list today</a>.]</p>
<p>The system takes time to implement, and I’ve revised it over the years. When I began, I was inexperienced at coaching students to develop their own goals for the course, at helping them to reflect, and at guiding them to think about assessment in terms of their own development rather than following a rubric. And I’ve found that students need time to reflect on their own goals for the class at the outset, at a midpoint, and again at the end of the semester, so they can actually see how they’ve developed. They need encouragement to revise their work as well – my comments help, but so do pointed reminders that the process of learning involves revision, and the course is set up to enable it.</p>
<p>Students in introductory classes require a bit more direction in this work than advanced students, but most eventually take the opportunity to revise and reflect. Now, I see students from all backgrounds recognizing their own growth, whatever their starting point. They benefit from my coaching, but perhaps even more from the freedom to decide for themselves what really matters in their reading and writing. And I benefit too, from the opportunity to help them learn and grow without the tyranny of the grade.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/179617/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Elisabeth Gruner is affiliated with the Professional and Organizational Development (POD) Network in Higher Education, which focuses on professional development for faculty.</span></em></p>Grades don’t actually measure learning, and they can increase students’ stress and decrease their motivation. A college professor explains an alternative to grading students’ work.Elisabeth Gruner, Professor of English, University of RichmondLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1500692020-11-18T18:54:08Z2020-11-18T18:54:08ZGroup tables, ottomans and gym balls: kids told us why flexible furniture helps them learn<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/369930/original/file-20201118-19-1owvy0g.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption"></span> <span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The COVID pandemic has meant many students learnt from home for a lot of the year.
But with schools returning to normal across Australia, how will students readjust from learning at the kitchen table (or couch, or bedroom) to being at desks and chairs in classrooms? </p>
<p>We conducted a study to find out how primary school students feel about different types of classroom furniture. </p>
<p>The students we spoke to clearly explained the reasons why they prefer certain types of furniture. They know furniture can suit their physical and learning needs, and they talked about how they actively set up their own environments to get them ready for learning in the way they know works best for them. </p>
<p>Teachers and students have the opportunity to think about how the learning environment can be re-imagined to best support students’ (and teachers’) needs. </p>
<h2>What do classrooms look like?</h2>
<p>Research shows <a href="http://www.iletc.com.au/publications/reports/">three quarters</a> of primary and secondary students in Australian and New Zealand schools learn in traditional classrooms. The majority of these classrooms have uniform desks and chairs facing the teacher at the front of the room. This type of classroom is a hangover from the <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/tl.77">industrial revolution</a>. </p>
<p>While some teachers can teach well in such traditional settings, evidence suggests more <a href="http://www.iletc.com.au/publications/reports/">flexible learning environments are associated with deeper learning</a>. <a href="https://teaching.unsw.edu.au/sites/default/files/upload-files/deep_and_surface_learning.pdf">Deep learning</a> is when students go beyond learning facts. They instead apply knowledge to their context, <a href="http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEFUSA_NewVisionforEducation_Report2015.pdf">using critical and creative thinking</a> skills to engage in learning they are curious about.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/knowledge-is-a-process-of-discovery-how-constructivism-changed-education-126585">Knowledge is a process of discovery: how constructivism changed education</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
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<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/369923/original/file-20201117-13-ggh8yz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Students sitting at rows of desks facing the teacher, with their hands up." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/369923/original/file-20201117-13-ggh8yz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/369923/original/file-20201117-13-ggh8yz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/369923/original/file-20201117-13-ggh8yz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/369923/original/file-20201117-13-ggh8yz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/369923/original/file-20201117-13-ggh8yz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/369923/original/file-20201117-13-ggh8yz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/369923/original/file-20201117-13-ggh8yz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Classrooms where desks are in rows, facing the front, are a hangover from the industrial revolution.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/education-elementary-school-learning-people-concept-303888209">Shutterstock</a></span>
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</figure>
<p>Flexible learning environments have a range of furniture options including ottomans, stools, multi-height chairs and different height tables. A mix of private retreat spaces and public group spaces means the teacher is everywhere — there is no front to the classroom.</p>
<h2>What students say about classroom furniture</h2>
<p>We are <a href="https://www.ecu.edu.au/schools/education/research-activity/innovation-in-policy-and-practice/related-content/lists/projects/spatial-learning-@-vasse-what-impact-does-innovative-furniture-have-on-student-engagement-and-teacher-practices">conducting</a> a three-year <a href="https://www.beparta.com.au/">industry-funded</a> study investigating how flexible furniture affects student learning in primary school classrooms. </p>
<p>We surveyed 300 students in Years 3 to 6. About 93% said flexible furniture helped them learn better.</p>
<p>The most popular types of furniture were high tables with height adjustable stools, round or triangular-shaped tables that promoted collaboration, and soft seating like ottomans. </p>
<p>Students said having options meant they could choose furniture to meet their physical and other learning needs. </p>
<p>More than half (54%) of students said comfort was the main reason for their furniture selection. They preferred furniture where they could adjust their position if working in one place for long periods of time. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/369959/original/file-20201118-15-14qtbhc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A classroom with flexible furniture and soft areas for independent learning." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/369959/original/file-20201118-15-14qtbhc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/369959/original/file-20201118-15-14qtbhc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/369959/original/file-20201118-15-14qtbhc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/369959/original/file-20201118-15-14qtbhc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/369959/original/file-20201118-15-14qtbhc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/369959/original/file-20201118-15-14qtbhc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/369959/original/file-20201118-15-14qtbhc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Flexible learning environments include different furniture options, including soft chairs, and no ‘front’ to the classroom.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>They also liked it when the furniture could suit their body types or manage injuries. One student said he preferred a higher table with a stool because it “helps my back because its strait [sic] and you can’t wobble on it”. </p>
<p>Another said about a multi-height table:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>… [it] allows me to either stand or sit while being comfortable.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Students also chose furniture they said helped them learn better. They preferred furniture they could move to support concentration, and facilitate independent and collaborative work. </p>
<p>Students said they made decisions about the arrangement of furniture to manage their behaviour in class. One student told us:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>It helps me to stay focused because I have to turn my head to socialise with my friends and if I do that too much my neck will start to hurt.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Portable furniture was also important for students who felt they had extra energy to burn. Small bounces on a gym ball while working helped some relax and stay focused.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/kids-spend-nearly-three-quarters-of-their-school-day-sitting-heres-how-to-get-them-moving-during-lessons-131897">Kids spend nearly three-quarters of their school day sitting. Here's how to get them moving — during lessons</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
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<h2>Flexible furniture helps teachers too</h2>
<p>Teachers spend more time talking at the students, and delivering content, when they are facing the students sitting at rows of desks.</p>
<p>But flexible furniture allows teachers to use more student-centred ways of teaching. This means they give students more autonomy to be active learners, participating in collaboration with peers or leading their own work.</p>
<p>In our study, we noticed teachers spent more time giving instructions to the whole class when using the traditional furniture arrangement. But when flexible furniture was available they gave instructions to smaller groups, making it easier to tailor specific tasks to students and help those who may need it.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/explainer-what-is-inquiry-based-learning-and-how-does-it-help-prepare-children-for-the-real-world-115299">Explainer: what is inquiry-based learning and how does it help prepare children for the real world?</a>
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</em>
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<p>The type of teaching in classrooms with flexible furniture aligns with educational outcomes such as those in the <a href="http://www.educationcouncil.edu.au/Alice-Springs--Mparntwe--Education-Declaration.aspx">Alice Springs (Mparntwe) Education Declaration</a>, which call for students to become autonomous, confident learners.</p>
<p>We also found teachers felt they built better relationships and trust with students when they were working in flexible furniture arrangements.</p>
<p>While we don’t yet have enough evidence to say using flexible furniture results in higher student achievement, it is clearly a factor that affects students’ learning experience.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/150069/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Julia E. Morris receives funding from a range of government and industry sources, including Beparta (designers of classroom furniture) who are funding this three year study.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Wesley Imms receives funding for research from the federal government and various industry sources, including Beparta (designers of classroom furniture) funders of this study.</span></em></p>Our study of over 300 primary school students showed they preferred certain types of classroom furniture, and they clearly explained how it helped their learning experience.Julia E. Morris, Senior Lecturer, Visual Arts Education, Edith Cowan UniversityWesley Imms, Associate Professor, The University of MelbourneLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1456802020-09-25T01:40:17Z2020-09-25T01:40:17ZTelevising school sport could put too much focus on performance, a price too high for young athletes<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/359238/original/file-20200922-18-1kw9ff7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=104%2C0%2C1967%2C1145&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock/Racheal Grazias</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>A new deal to televise and live stream more secondary school sports in New Zealand has attracted significant <a href="https://www.rnz.co.nz/programmes/the-detail/story/2018763093/televised-school-sport-great-exposure-or-breeding-elitism">attention</a> and <a href="https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/300093746/rob-waddell-grilled-over-controversial-school-sports-broadcast-deal">debate</a>.</p>
<p>First XV secondary school rugby in New Zealand has been televised for some time on Sky Sport. The attraction of new revenue for broadcasters and other sporting organisations is clear, but what might the cost be for young athletes?</p>
<p>The new broadcast deal is a collaboration between the <a href="https://nzsportcollective.co.nz/">New Zealand Sport Collective</a> (created by former Olympic rowing champion Rob Waddell and representing more than 50 sports) and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/skysportnext">Sky Sport Next</a>, a YouTube channel run by Sky TV.</p>
<p>The deal evolved after consultation with several bodies including the New Zealand Secondary School Sports Council (<a href="http://www.nzsssc.org.nz/">NZSSSC</a>), which coordinates secondary school sport. </p>
<p>It is easy to understand why some school students would like to be on television. But there are moral and ethical issues that need to be considered by those charged with governing school sport.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/children-have-fun-playing-sports-and-dont-need-to-satisfy-adults-ambitions-115373">Children have fun playing sports and don't need to satisfy adults' ambitions</a>
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</em>
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<p>Some principals claim the partnership was <a href="https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/300093746/rob-waddell-grilled-over-controversial-school-sports-broadcast-deal">not discussed with them in advance</a>.</p>
<p>The increased television exposure adds to concerns of an <a href="https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/121953593/urgent-conversation-needed-to-address-overheated-secondary-school-sport-climate">overly professionalised</a>, “win at all costs” culture that already exists in some school sport.</p>
<p>In response to these concerns, the NZSSSC set up a <a href="http://www.nzsssc.org.nz/newsarticle/92570?newsfeedId=51035&newsfeedPageNum=4">broadcasting charter</a> in an attempt to protect the health and well-being of students and allow those who do not want to be televised to opt out.</p>
<p>But in reality, the power imbalances at play and other influences mean the charter is unlikely to be effective in many situations. For example, rather than opting out, some schools may feel pressure on them to stay in, to please players and parents. </p>
<h2>Health vs performance</h2>
<p>Adult high-performance sport must constantly balance health and performance, but secondary school sport must prioritise health.</p>
<p><a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1994-03969-001" title="Athletic identity: Hercules' muscles or Achilles heel?">Evidence suggests</a> professional, high-performance athletes are at increased risk of a “high athlete identity”. This is the degree to which someone defines themself based on their athletic role, and looks to others for confirmation based on that role. This can have both positive and negative consequences. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/359282/original/file-20200922-14-14j0rqz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Two players in a game of school rugby, one running with the ball." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/359282/original/file-20200922-14-14j0rqz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/359282/original/file-20200922-14-14j0rqz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=331&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/359282/original/file-20200922-14-14j0rqz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=331&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/359282/original/file-20200922-14-14j0rqz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=331&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/359282/original/file-20200922-14-14j0rqz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/359282/original/file-20200922-14-14j0rqz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/359282/original/file-20200922-14-14j0rqz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">School sport should be more about promoting health.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock/taka</span></span>
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</figure>
<p>A performance culture in school sport increases the likelihood of students developing a high athlete identity and this has been linked to <a href="https://nsuworks.nova.edu/tqr/vol22/iss10/18/" title="Attrition in School Rowing in New Zealand: A Qualitative Descriptive Study">dropout from sport</a>.</p>
<p>Given only a very small number of students will become professional athletes (<a href="https://theconversation.com/lets-get-real-with-college-athletes-about-their-chances-of-going-pro-110837">possibly less than 2%</a>) the potentially negative consequences on mental health are a major concern. </p>
<p><a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31810972/" title="Mental health issues and psychological factors in athletes: detection, management, effect on performance and prevention: American Medical Society for Sports Medicine Position Statement-Executive Summary">Research</a> in adults and US college athletes shows greater difficulty adjusting to a lack of sporting success and more frequent psychological issues in people with higher levels of athletic identity. </p>
<p>A recent secondary school rugby <a href="https://openrepository.aut.ac.nz/handle/10292/12554" title="Secondary school first XV rugby players’ perceptions of the coaching environment: A qualitative descriptive study">study</a> in New Zealand found high performance expectations often led to a fear of failure. The expected commitment was too much alongside academic workloads. </p>
<p>On the physical side, there is real concern about attitudes to injury. The <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/02640414.2020.1749409" title="What they know and who they are telling: Concussion knowledge and disclosure behaviour in New Zealand adolescent rugby union players">under-reporting of concussion in rugby</a> is associated with the perceived importance of a match. More than <a href="https://pnz.org.nz/Attachment?Action=Download&Attachment_id=1338">50% of players</a> across multiple secondary school sports say they’ve seen a player play on when they thought they were concussed. </p>
<p>Beyond concussion, <a href="https://www.nzherald.co.nz/sport/news/article.cfm?c_id=4&objectid=12065350">80% of secondary school netball and football players</a> say they have played while injured, and 50% report being pressured to do so. Increased intensity, driven by a performance culture, has also contributed to <a href="https://openrepository.aut.ac.nz/handle/10292/11754" title="Early specialisation, sport participation volume and musculoskeletal injury in early adolescent New Zealand children">increased injuries at even earlier ages</a> in intermediate school sport (ages 12 and 13). </p>
<p>Recent data from the Accident Compensation Corporation (<a href="https://www.acc.co.nz/newsroom/stories/significant-surge-in-kiwi-kids-side-lined-by-sports-injuries/">ACC</a>) and <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1440244020300505" title="Ten-year nationwide review of netball ankle and knee injuries in New Zealand">Netball NZ</a> reveal a rise in injuries in the 10–14 age group over the past ten years.</p>
<h2>Protecting young athletes</h2>
<p>In response to concerns, Sport New Zealand recently launched its <a href="https://balanceisbetter.org.nz/">Balance is Better</a> initiative, which promotes an evidence-based, developmental approach to youth sport.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/mg9RN_Asm0w?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">We’re all about competition, but …</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This philosophy does not seem to align with increased television exposure for school sport. It led to <a href="https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/ninetonoon/audio/2018763404/televised-school-sport-is-a-governance-role-needed">questions being asked</a> about the mixed messages emanating from our government agency and their lack of leadership on this issue. </p>
<p>In New Zealand we appear to be at a crossroads in relation to youth sport. As researchers concerned about some of the costs associated with the increasing professionalisation of youth sport, the Balance is Better philosophy suggests we were moving in the right direction. </p>
<p>But increased exposure on television risks extending the high-performance culture in which success is measured solely by the scoreboard. This is increasingly irreconcilable with a culture in which healthy competition contributes to positive youth development.</p>
<h2>School sport for all</h2>
<p>At a time when the current culture of youth sport is a <a href="https://sems-journal.ch/8021" title="Health for Performance: a necessary paradigm shift for youth athletes">concern in many countries</a>, is validating participation through the televising of youth sport the direction we want to go? </p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/lets-get-real-with-college-athletes-about-their-chances-of-going-pro-110837">Let's get real with college athletes about their chances of going pro</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
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<p>School sport should be an inclusive form of physical activity. It should be strategically aligned with health and developmental benefits for all students. It should engage as many students as possible, for as long as possible.</p>
<p>A performance-driven culture in school sport, fuelled by television exposure, promotes an <a href="https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/49/13/878.long" title="Detecting and developing youth athlete potential: different strokes for different folks are warranted">inefficient and ineffective way</a> to identify and develop talent. There is little evidence success in school sport predicts future adult sporting success. </p>
<p>The priority for schools should be to develop healthy, high-performing people, not high-performing athletes. School sport can (and should) be a highlight in the educational experience of youth, potentially enhancing physical, social and cultural development.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/145680/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>School sport should prioritise development of the person, not the athlete. A new TV deal has some worried there hasn’t been enough debate as to how this will impact the culture of school sport.Chris Whatman, Associate Professor, Sport and Exercise Science, Auckland University of TechnologySimon Walters, Senior Lecturer in Sport and Recreation, Auckland University of TechnologyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1201442019-09-03T11:17:21Z2019-09-03T11:17:21Z7 tips on how to take better notes<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/284984/original/file-20190719-116586-pbm29.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Research shows that students who take detailed notes do better in class.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/beautiful-smart-students-using-books-making-588272498?studio=1">VGstockstudio/Shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In a graduate-level educational psychology course at Florida State University, my professor didn’t allow students to take notes. He reasoned that taking notes prevented students from reflecting on the lesson. </p>
<p>Yet, the professor also thought students needed a good set of notes to review later for exams. So he provided students with complete notes following each lesson. Most students appreciated this arrangement. I, however, did not. I was a copious note taker who believed in the value of recording one’s own notes.</p>
<p>So instead of obeying the professor’s note-taking ban, I sat in the back of the classroom and took notes secretly, scribbling feverishly on a small notepad whenever the professor looked away – until I was eventually caught pen-handed and had to fib about writing a letter to a friend back home. This episode prompted me to study note taking – something I’ve done for the <a href="https://cehs.unl.edu/kiewra/">past four decades</a>. My objective has been to determine the value of note taking and how to best take notes. Here are seven note-taking tips.</p>
<h2>1. Do take notes</h2>
<p>Students who <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1207/s15326985ep2001_4">take notes</a> during a lesson achieve more than those who listen to the lesson without note taking. This is because the act of note taking staves off boredom and focuses attention on lesson ideas more than listening without taking notes.</p>
<p>The primary value of note taking, though, is more in the product than the process, more in the reviewing than the recording. Students who record and then review notes almost always <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01443410500342070?scroll=top&needAccess=true&journalCode=cedp20">achieve more</a> than students who record but do not review notes.</p>
<h2>2. Take complete notes</h2>
<p>The more notes students record <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2013-01039-013">the higher their achievement</a>. But many students are <a href="https://cehs.unl.edu/images/cehs/soar/articles/Note%20Taking%20on%20Trial.pdf">incomplete note takers</a>, usually recording just one-third of important lesson ideas in notes.</p>
<p>Incomplete note taking is perhaps due to human limitations. <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/23369241?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents">Lecture rates</a> fall between 120 to 180 words per minute, but most people can only <a href="https://theconversation.com/modern-tablets-with-pens-may-save-handwriting-from-certain-death-by-computer-54922">write or type</a> a fraction of those words per minute.</p>
<h2>3. Take detailed notes</h2>
<p>Students are actually fairly successful noting a lesson’s main ideas. They <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1988-34161-001">falter</a> when noting a lesson’s vital details. Suppose, for instance, an instructor says:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Short-term memory has a limited capacity (level 1). Its capacity is just seven items (level 2). Capacity can be increased by chunking information into smaller bits (level 3). For example, a 10-digit phone number can be chunked into three smaller bits, 560-642-1894, and easily held in short-term memory (level 4).”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In one study that examined <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1988-34161-001">missing details</a>, students noted about 80% of a lesson’s main ideas (level 1) but progressively fewer subordinate details: 60% of level 2 ideas, 35% of level 3 ideas, and just 11% of level 4 ideas. Students especially omit examples from notes even though examples can be crucial to understanding lesson ideas. One study showed that students recorded just <a href="https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ774122">13% of lesson examples</a>.</p>
<h2>4. Look for note-taking cues</h2>
<p>Students should be on the look out for lecture cues that signal idea importance or organization and enhance note taking. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/284995/original/file-20190719-116579-1166sxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/284995/original/file-20190719-116579-1166sxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/284995/original/file-20190719-116579-1166sxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=828&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/284995/original/file-20190719-116579-1166sxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=828&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/284995/original/file-20190719-116579-1166sxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=828&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/284995/original/file-20190719-116579-1166sxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1041&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/284995/original/file-20190719-116579-1166sxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1041&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/284995/original/file-20190719-116579-1166sxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1041&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Look for cues from professors on when important points are being made.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/professor-giving-lecture-145684757?src=YIUciIvmcbCs5omYFlVzJw-1-63&studio=1">sirtravelalot/Shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10510970109388552">Importance cues</a> can be verbal, such as when an instructor says, “Note this” or “This is really critical.” Sometimes, it is not what is said but how it is said. For instance, an instructor may say an important point louder or softer than less important points, repeat the point or pause afterward for effect. </p>
<p>There are also nonverbal signals, such as pointing, clapping, or a piercing glance that cue students to important ideas.</p>
<p>Organizational cues involve statements that reveal the lesson’s organization, such as “Let’s next discuss the atom’s three parts” or “Let’s address two limitations of string theory.” Paying attention to organizational cues can add
<a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/223046788_Spoken_organizational_lecture_cues_and_student_notetaking_as_facilitators_of_student_learning">45% more details</a> to students’ notes.</p>
<h2>5. Revise your notes</h2>
<p>Note taking has long been considered a 2-R process: record and review. </p>
<p>Recent research has shown a third R-step: <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/291811658_Revising_lecture_notes_how_revision_pauses_and_partners_affect_note_taking_and_achievement">revision</a>, which occurs between record and review. </p>
<p>Revision should be done soon after a lecture or even during a lecture when the instructor pauses. During revision, students should try to use existing notes to prompt the recall and addition of missing lesson ideas. </p>
<p>A student in a psychology class might have noted that “short-term memory has a limited capacity.” During revision, that note might help the student recall this related detail: “short-term memory holds just seven items.” That additional lesson idea is then added to notes during revision.</p>
<h2>6. Replay lectures</h2>
<p>Students should take advantage of lessons posted online by viewing them more than once to maximize note taking. That’s because when students view a lesson multiple times, they record more complete notes and raise achievement. In <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/291811658_Revising_lecture_notes_how_revision_pauses_and_partners_affect_note_taking_and_achievement">one study</a>, students viewing a lesson once recorded about 38% of lesson details in notes. Those who viewed the lesson twice or three times recorded about 53% and 60% of lesson details, respectively. A fourth group viewed the lesson a single time but they could pause, rewind, and fast-forward the lesson as they pleased, and recorded about 65% of lesson details. </p>
<p>In classes where lessons are not posted online, students can ask permission to record lessons with their smartphones so that additional viewings are possible.</p>
<h2>7. Take handwritten notes</h2>
<p>There are two reasons students should take notes longhand instead of on laptops. First, research has shown that students who use laptops in class spend <a href="https://www.winona.edu/psychology/media/friedlaptopfinal.pdf">considerable time multitasking</a>, leading to curtailed note taking and lower achievement. The multitasking students reported checking mail (81%), surfing the web (43%), playing games (25%) and using laptops for other non-class purposes (35%). In all, students spend more than half a typical class period using laptops for things that have nothing to do with the class. The same study found that laptop use also distracted nearby students.</p>
<p>Second, research has shown that <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/325792070_Laptop_versus_longhand_note_taking_effects_on_lecture_notes_and_achievement">laptop notes are inferior</a> to longhand notes. Laptop notes are more verbatim than longhand notes, and verbatim note taking has been associated with shallow, non-meaningful learning. In addition, laptop note takers fail to note vital graphic information, such as graphs, charts and illustrations, which longhand note takers easily record in notes. Because longhand notes are qualitatively better than laptop notes, reviewing them leads to higher achievement than reviewing laptop notes. </p>
<h2>Guess my professor was right</h2>
<p>Turns out that my educational psychology professor was largely on the mark in forbidding note taking and providing complete notes for students to study. After all, the primary value of note taking comes in the review of notes, and students tend to record sketchy notes.</p>
<p>The problem is, in my experience, most instructors do not make complete notes available to students, and students are left with their own incomplete and ineffective notes to review. Hopefully, my research and this article help students record more effective notes on their own.</p>
<p>[ <em><a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=expertise">Expertise in your inbox. Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter and get a digest of academic takes on today’s news, every day.</a></em> ]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/120144/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kenneth A. Kiewra does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Looking to earn good grades? Good notes could help, an expert says.Kenneth A. Kiewra, Professor of Educational Psychology, University of Nebraska-LincolnLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1043032018-10-21T13:02:55Z2018-10-21T13:02:55ZEducators must commit now to tackle grade inflation<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/241304/original/file-20181018-67182-1caahu8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Many classroom assessment strategies have a positive impact on student learning but, because they are not standardized, can also contribute to the problem of grade inflation. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Thousands of students received unsettling news this fall regarding the rigour of their high school grades. They learned that at least one university in Ontario — the University of Waterloo — <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/4405495/waterloo-engineering-grade-inflation-list/">assesses new engineering applicants partially on the basis of which high school they attended</a> and not solely on their grades.</p>
<p>By tracking high school students’ graduating averages and comparing them against their first-year university GPA, the university was able to determine the average percentage drop of students from different schools when they moved to university. </p>
<p>Schools that exceeded the provincial average drop (in this case more than 16.3 per cent) were flagged — so that grade inflation was considered for their students during the admissions process. </p>
<p>In practical terms, this means that high school students with an identical graduating average from different schools are not considered to be the same in the eyes of this university. They use an “adjustment factor” as one mechanism to “level the field” in program admissions.</p>
<h2>The trouble with grade inflation</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/3552406?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents">Educators have been studying grade inflation for decades</a>. However, this recent news suggests serious fairness issues may become a pervasive feature of our education system. It alerts us to the fact that some students, presumably from high schools with more generous grading, have a false sense of their academic ability which may lead to a rude awakening at university.</p>
<p>An inflated sense of one’s academic achievement is problematic and <a href="https://www.macleans.ca/education/uniandcollege/are-todays-students-too-confident/">will become worse if a correction to the system is not forthcoming</a>. Starting university is difficult enough without anxiety and frustration from excessive drops in first year grades.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/241299/original/file-20181018-67185-d9hdjf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/241299/original/file-20181018-67185-d9hdjf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/241299/original/file-20181018-67185-d9hdjf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/241299/original/file-20181018-67185-d9hdjf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/241299/original/file-20181018-67185-d9hdjf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/241299/original/file-20181018-67185-d9hdjf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/241299/original/file-20181018-67185-d9hdjf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">University standards can be a rude awakening for some.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Even more disconcerting is the prospect that a student, who had the misfortune of attending a high school with more rigorous grading procedures, may have lost out on a spot in a coveted university program — to a peer with slightly higher, inflated grades. </p>
<p>In the province of Ontario, where education is largely publicly funded, schools should present equitable opportunities for learning with grades that reliably reflect student achievement. This is the first “fundamental principle” of <em><a href="http://www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/policyfunding/growSuccess.pdf">Growing Success</a></em> — Ontario’s 2010 provincial assessment and evaluation policy document. </p>
<p>Similar policy statements exist in nearly every province and territory. Clearly, the use of adjustment factors suggests Ontario, and likely all Canadian provinces, have work to do in supporting grading and assessment in schools.</p>
<h2>Standardized assessment is not a fix</h2>
<p>Perhaps the simplest solution to this problem is to emulate other jurisdictions around the world and rely on standardized tests to make decisions about post-secondary admission. </p>
<p>This can be very appealing as it eliminates variability between teachers, schools, districts and provinces — so that students are judged against one another in a reliable fashion.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, standardized admissions tests, such as <a href="https://collegereadiness.collegeboard.org/sat">the SAT used in the United States</a>, have their own flaws. Such tests have been shown to have <a href="https://www.tcpress.com/sat-wars-9780807752623">significant gender and racial or cultural biases</a>, among other measurement issues. </p>
<p>Similarly, the use of the SAT or related measures does not necessarily reduce grade inflation at the high school level, as the evidence suggests that <a href="http://www.gradeinflation.com">grade inflation continues within universities and colleges in the U.S. and Canada</a>.</p>
<p>External standardized measures also diminish the importance of daily classroom assessment strategies and their power to positively influence student learning. </p>
<p>In fact, a broad group of “assessment for learning” strategies — such as questioning techniques, feedback without grades, peer assessment, self-assessment and the formative use of summative assessments — have been shown to <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/003172170408600105">have a significant positive impact</a> on student learning, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/1478210314566733">regardless of school district and jurisdiction, within Canada and internationally</a>.</p>
<h2>Teachers unprepared for fair grading</h2>
<p>How do we navigate this tension within classroom-based assessment, which can both effectively support learning but also contribute to detrimental grade inflation? </p>
<p>The solution rests within universities across Canada, which are largely responsible for the training and education of teachers. At the heart of this issue is teachers’ competency to effectively use assessment to support student learning and to accurately report on that learning — a <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11092-015-9233-6">competency we call “assessment literacy.”</a></p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/241302/original/file-20181018-67167-g8mztc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/241302/original/file-20181018-67167-g8mztc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/241302/original/file-20181018-67167-g8mztc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/241302/original/file-20181018-67167-g8mztc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/241302/original/file-20181018-67167-g8mztc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/241302/original/file-20181018-67167-g8mztc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/241302/original/file-20181018-67167-g8mztc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Teachers must have the skills and knowledge to ensure their evaluations are reliable and fair for their students.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The research shows that teachers feel largely unprepared for assessment in schools, with <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/0969594X.2010.516643">new teachers feeling particularly vulnerable</a>. So we must find ways to effectively prepare teachers — so that they are better able to make fair assessment and grading decisions.</p>
<p>Both pre-service teacher education programs and in-service professional learning opportunities are <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781526402042.n54">sites for enhancing teacher assessment literacy</a>. </p>
<p>While pre-service teacher education programs have increased levels of direct instruction in the area of assessment over the past five years, there appears to be a need for additional work. Importantly, this must extend out of the classroom and into the field — both during initial teacher placements and through professional development later in a teacher’s career.</p>
<h2>Impetus for change</h2>
<p>The grade inflation problem requires a long-term educational change initiative. And this requires commitment from across institutions, provinces, school boards and ministries of education.</p>
<p>One must concede that there is always going to be some variability across schools as <a href="https://doi.org/10.3102/0034654316672069">teachers must exercise their professional judgement when arriving at final grades</a>. Grading is inherently a subjective evaluation of assessment evidence. </p>
<p>However, the key is to ensure teachers have the skills and knowledge to ensure their evaluations are reliable and fair for their students — in relation to provincial curriculum expectations. </p>
<p>Unless we — university programs, ministries of education and school districts — better support teachers’ assessment literacy then we will continue to see the negative effects of grade inflation across our educational systems.</p>
<p>With enough data, one can envision adjustment factors across all provinces, universities and specific programs. But this solution does not address the root cause of the problem. </p>
<p>Perhaps the recent news — and the knowledge that universities might be partially “correcting” for inflated students’ grades — could be the impetus we need for a conversation in schools across Canada. And this could enable us to better support our teachers in student assessment.</p>
<p><em>This is a corrected version of an article originally published on Oct. 21, 2018. The earlier story referred to “new applicants” to the University of Waterloo instead of “new engineering applicants.”</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/104303/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Louis Volante receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC).</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Christopher DeLuca receives funding from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.</span></em></p>Recent news that at least one Ontario university adjusts for grade inflation during the undergraduate application process is a call to action – for long-term educational change.Louis Volante, Professor of Education, Brock UniversityChristopher DeLuca, Associate Professor in Classroom Assessment and Acting Associate Dean, Graduate Studies & Reserch, Faculty of Education, Queen's University, OntarioLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/722082017-02-08T15:36:50Z2017-02-08T15:36:50ZBetter note-taking can help students who struggle with English<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/154945/original/image-20170131-13261-mkv1t5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Proper note construction helps students identify the gaps in their understanding.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Starting a university degree can be something of a culture shock. Students enter university after spending years in a closely structured school learning environment. They discover that there’s a different expectation in higher education: the onus of learning falls mostly on them.</p>
<p>In South Africa, another complication arises for those students who speak English as a second (or even third) language (ESL speakers). That’s a large number, given that English is only the country’s <a href="http://www.statssa.gov.za/census/census_2011/census_products/Census_2011_Census_in_brief.pdf">fourth most commonly spoken</a> home language. They are not learning in their mother tongues. And “code switching” – the alternation between their home language and English, while fairly common in school classrooms, isn’t practised in most university lecture halls. </p>
<p>In some subjects, like the Sciences, ESL students find themselves negotiating not only the language of instruction and communication, but also the unfamiliar terminology of the discourse. This demand on their cognitive attention places a huge strain on students’ ability to adopt deep approaches to learning inside and outside the classroom. They have to expend a lot of energy on decoding the material they must learn. </p>
<p>We wanted to know what might be done in South African universities to scaffold independent and effective learning among students who are second language English speakers. So we focused on an area that many lecturers probably ignore: <a href="http://sajs.co.za/impact-mother-tongue-construction-notes-and-first-year-academic-performance/shalini-dukhan-ann-cameron-elisabeth-brenner">the practice of note taking</a>.</p>
<p>We found that when ESL students were taught to personalise their notes and incorporate content from various resources, they were better able to form links and connections between new knowledge and their current understanding of concepts.</p>
<h2>Extra burdens</h2>
<p>During apartheid, English was taught only at a basic level to black pupils. With the shift to democracy in 1994, pupils learned in their mother tongues until Grade 5, when they are around 11 years old. Thereafter teaching and learning is expected to be done in English.</p>
<p>There’s been a global, ongoing debate about the link between the language of instruction and successful student learning. And recent research has shown the benefit of teaching pupils in their home language. </p>
<p>Different research has also revealed just how <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13670050802153137">prevalent code-switching</a> is in some schools, all the way through the final Grade 12 year. It’s especially common when teachers want to explain complex content but extremely rare at university. This means ESL students lose another plank of support.</p>
<p>Learning is very much an independent activity at university. Students are expected to use resources like textbooks or research articles to supplement the material that’s covered in class. However, this becomes an extra burden for ESL students. They have to spend excessive amounts of time decoding the content before they can begin to make sense of it. </p>
<p>University courses tend to move fast. ESL students may try to keep up by using surface learning strategies like rote learning, since their limited exposure to English means they struggle with comprehension and meaning-making. They risk building only foundational concepts instead of deepening their understanding, which profoundly affects them in class <em>and</em> out of class learning. </p>
<p>These students are also affected during tests and exams, where their lack of language fluency affects their ability to interpret and answer questions appropriately or satisfactorily. All of this increases their risk of failure.</p>
<p>Our research suggests that improved note-taking practises might help these students considerably.</p>
<h2>The value of writing for learning</h2>
<p>Research has shown that the process of writing can be used as a tool to stimulate and encourage deep learning approaches. Lecturers traditionally take little responsibility for the quality of notes that students produce during lectures. Students receive little, if any, feedback about their notes. But these notes are important, serving as an “external” storage mechanism for information and knowledge. Their quality is critical for learning.</p>
<p>With limited support, first year students tend to fall back on their school experience to guide them. They end up learning the skeletal points provided in lectures, although these are usually just guidelines for content covered in class and don’t represent the breadth of material lecturers expect students to understand. </p>
<p>Our research was conducted with three first-year cohorts of an introductory biology course at a South African university, over three academic years. The students attended a series of writing workshops that focused on the development of their reading and writing ability. The workshops were also designed to develop critical thinking skills: students learned how to identify the main line of argument, construct an effective argument and take meaningful notes relevant to what they understood from lectures.</p>
<p>The students also had weekly assignments in which they had to provide observations about experiments conducted during laboratory sessions. Here they needed to answer in short paragraphs, which honed the development of their critical thinking through writing. Each week they also had to read and answer questions based on articles. And they had to write one essay per term in which they provided an argument for their opinion on any topic in science.</p>
<p>Teaching assistants were trained to provide feedback. Students used this feedback to reconstruct and transform their class notes into something far more personalised. </p>
<p>The results were encouraging. Our findings indicate that students who personalised their class notes generally performed better on assessments. </p>
<p>The process of writing to reorganise and refine their notes proved to serve as a scaffold and enabled the development of processes associated with a deep approach to learning. Students were able to independently find gaps in their knowledge. This allowed them to develop the necessary insights to improve their level of understanding and, consequently, their <a href="http://sajs.co.za/impact-mother-tongue-construction-notes-and-first-year-academic-performance/shalini-dukhan-ann-cameron-elisabeth-brenner">academic performance</a>.</p>
<h2>Training and support</h2>
<p>We recognise that students need to take responsibility for their learning. But it’s just as important for academic staff to play an active role in incorporating skills development that helps to bridge the gap between students’ school and university experiences. </p>
<p>This could be done through academic development workshops that focus on developing critical reading, comprehension and note-making. The learning from these workshops can be deepened if lecturers embed such training in the context of their courses. </p>
<p>This training could be provided at the beginning of first year. The progress and development of students’ writing skills could then be tracked and supported through the course of the year, giving them a feedback mechanism. </p>
<p>In this way the students’ skill in writing can be used as a tool to scaffold the development of their cognition. </p>
<p>Our research shows that lecturers can play a vital role in transforming the quality of their students’ notes – and, ultimately, their academic performance.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/72208/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Shalini Dukhan receives funding from National Research Foundation and Wits University. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ann Kathleen Cameron and Elisabeth Ann Brenner do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Learning is an independent activity at university. Students who don’t speak English as a mother tongue struggle to decode the content, let alone make sense of it.Shalini Dukhan, Lecturer of Biology/Life Sciences (research in Science Education), University of the WitwatersrandAnn Kathleen Cameron, Head: Science Teaching and Learning Centre, Faculty of Science, University of the WitwatersrandElisabeth Ann Brenner, Associate Professor in the School of Molecular and Cell Biology, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/621552016-09-30T01:18:23Z2016-09-30T01:18:23ZWant to understand your child’s test scores? Here’s what to ignore<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/139806/original/image-20160929-27026-zjhukn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">What do you need to know about test score reports?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-425607436/stock-photo-mother-helping-daughter-with-her-homework-at-the-table-in-the-dining-room.html?src=1d99UY_Zz1bXOZR4tlBnTg-10-40">Mother image via www.shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Now that the first month of school is over, parents can get ready for the next milestone of the school year – they will soon get reports of the state tests their children took last year.</p>
<p>My estimates show that approximately 26 million students in public schools took statewide tests in reading and math last year. Many of them also took statewide tests in science. These tests provide important information to parents about how well their children are doing in school. </p>
<p>However, my research also shows that when parents receive their child’s test score report, they may have a tough time separating the important information from the statistical gibberish.</p>
<p>What’s more, the results might not even give them accurate information about their child’s academic growth.</p>
<h2>Is your child ‘proficient’?</h2>
<p>The No Child Left Behind law, enacted in 2002, required all states to set “achievement level standards” in reading and math for grades three through eight, and for one grade in high school, typically 10th or 11th grade. States were also required to develop tests to measure students’ level of <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/legislative_sap_107-1_hr1-r">“proficiency”</a> on each test. </p>
<p>The new federal law passed in December 2015, the <a href="http://www.ed.gov/essa">Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA)</a>, will continue this practice. </p>
<p>As a result, the test reports parents receive classify children into achievement levels such as “basic” or “proficient.” Each state decides what these classifications are called, but at least one category must signify “proficient.” </p>
<p>These achievement level categories are described on the test score reports, and so this information is easily understood by parents. For example, I find it helpful each year to see if my sons reach proficiency in each subject area.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/139810/original/image-20160929-27037-up5dft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/139810/original/image-20160929-27037-up5dft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=461&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139810/original/image-20160929-27037-up5dft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=461&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139810/original/image-20160929-27037-up5dft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=461&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139810/original/image-20160929-27037-up5dft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=579&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139810/original/image-20160929-27037-up5dft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=579&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139810/original/image-20160929-27037-up5dft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=579&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">How is student growth being measured?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-352138571/stock-photo-boy-climbing-the-stairs-made-of-books.html?src=GDQj56a0VhPLyUbHVilZ9g-1-40">Student image via www.shutterstock.com</a></span>
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<p>But children’s test scores in a given year, and their achievement level, are not the only information reported in some states. A new statistical index, called a “student growth percentile,” <a href="http://kuow.org/post/state-releases-new-student-achievement-statistics-experts-balk">is finding its way into the reports</a> sent home to parents in 11 states. Twenty-seven states use this index for evaluating teachers as well. </p>
<p>Although a measure of students’ “growth” or progress sounds like a good idea, student growth percentiles have yet to be supported by research. In fact <a href="http://www.umass.edu/remp/news_SGPsResearchBrief.html">several studies suggest</a> they <a href="http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED563445.pdf">do not provide accurate descriptions</a> of student progress and teacher effectiveness. </p>
<h2>What does it mean?</h2>
<p>What exactly are “student growth percentiles”?</p>
<p>They are indexes proposed in 2008 by <a href="http://nepc.colorado.edu/author/betebenner-damian-w">Damian W. Betebenner</a>, a statistician who suggested they be used as a descriptive measure of <a href="http://www.nciea.org/publication_PDFs/normative_criterion_growth_DB08.pdf">students’ “academic growth”</a> from one school year to the next. The idea was to describe students’ progress in comparison to their peers.</p>
<p>Like the growth charts pediatricians use to describe children’s height and weight, student growth percentiles range from a low of one to a high of 99. However, their calculation involves a lot more error than physical measurement such as height and weight. Our research at the University of Massachusetts Amherst indicates <a href="http://www.umass.edu/remp/pdf/WellsSireciBahryEE_in_SGPs.pdf">substantial error</a> in their calculation. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/139797/original/image-20160929-27014-ql2gha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/139797/original/image-20160929-27014-ql2gha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139797/original/image-20160929-27014-ql2gha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139797/original/image-20160929-27014-ql2gha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139797/original/image-20160929-27014-ql2gha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139797/original/image-20160929-27014-ql2gha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139797/original/image-20160929-27014-ql2gha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The scores do not actually measure children’s growth.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-140540089/stock-photo-school-kids-using-laptop-at-lesson.html?src=uKm7oF4uF6kcagm27-o61A-1-74">Children image via www.shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
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<p>Student growth percentiles are derived from test scores, which are not perfectly accurate descriptions of students’ academic proficiency: Test scores are influenced by many factors, such as the questions asked on a particular day, students’ temperament, their level of engagement when taking the test or just the methods used to score their answers. </p>
<p>Each student’s growth percentile is calculated using at least two different test scores, typically a year or more apart. The most recent test scores of a student are then compared to the most recent test scores of students who had similar scores in previous years. This is to see which of those students had higher or lower scores this year. </p>
<p>The problem, however, is that each of the calculations carries some measurement error. Further calculations only compound that error. So much so that the results end up with twice as much error. <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/emip.12062/abstract">No statistical sophistication</a> can erase this error. </p>
<p>The question is, why are so many states using such an unreliable measure?</p>
<h2>Using it for accountability</h2>
<p>The use of student growth percentiles is due in part to a desire to see how much students learn in a particular year, and to link that progress to accountability systems such as teacher evaluation. </p>
<p>In 2010, the <a href="http://www2.ed.gov/programs/racetothetop/phase1-resources.html">Race-to-the-Top grant competition</a> invited states to come up with innovative ways of using test scores to evaluate teachers, which paved the way for this new measure of “growth” to be quickly applied across many states.</p>
<p>However, the use of student growth percentiles began before research was conducted on their accuracy. Only now is there a sufficient body of research to evaluate them, and all studies point to the same conclusion – they contain a lot of error. </p>
<p>In addition to our research at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, research on the accuracy of student growth percentiles has been conducted by education nonprofits such as <a href="http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED563445.pdf">WestEd</a>, <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/emip.12062/abstract;jsessionid=EE60D9A2ECD66164111467AE5D35F001.f04t01">Educational Testing Service</a> <a href="http://epm.sagepub.com/content/early/2016/07/27/0013164416659686">and</a> other <a href="http://www.aefpweb.org/sites/default/files/webform/AEFP21.pdf">research institutions</a>. Researchers <a href="http://cepa.stanford.edu/events/jr-lockwood">J.R. Lockwood</a> and <a href="http://epm.sagepub.com/search?author1=J.+R.+Lockwood&sortspec=date&submit=Submit">Katherine E. Castellano</a> <a href="http://epm.sagepub.com/content/early/2016/07/27/0013164416659686">recently concluded</a> that “A substantial research base already notes that student growth percentile estimates for individual students have large errors.”</p>
<p>However, many states seem to be unaware of these research findings. Massachusetts even goes so far as to <a href="http://www.doe.mass.edu/mcas/2015/pgguide/g3-8-10English.pdf">classify children with growth percentiles</a> less than 40 as “lower growth” and children with growth percentiles greater than 60 as “higher growth.” </p>
<h2>Measuring teacher performance</h2>
<p>As I mentioned earlier, 27 states are using student growth percentiles to classify teachers as “effective” or “ineffective.” Research on the use of growth percentiles for this purpose indicates they could <a href="https://www.ets.org/research/policy_research_reports/publications/article/2015/juff">underestimate the performance</a> of the most effective teachers, and <a href="http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED563445.pdf">overestimate the performance</a> of the least effective teachers – the exact opposite of what these states are trying to do with their teacher evaluation systems. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/139811/original/image-20160929-27058-1c00i9a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/139811/original/image-20160929-27058-1c00i9a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=423&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139811/original/image-20160929-27058-1c00i9a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=423&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139811/original/image-20160929-27058-1c00i9a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=423&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139811/original/image-20160929-27058-1c00i9a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=531&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139811/original/image-20160929-27058-1c00i9a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=531&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139811/original/image-20160929-27058-1c00i9a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=531&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">These measures are being used for teacher performance as well.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-405849895/stock-photo-education-school-teacher-student-digital-tablet-technology-concept.html?src=jySilPadj2412PVoZS0XYw-1-41">Teacher image via www.shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>A recent report by WestEd evaluated the use of student growth percentiles for evaluating teachers and <a href="http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED563445.pdf">concluded</a> they “did not meet a level of stability” that would be needed for such high-stakes decisions. </p>
<h2>Let’s go back to traditional measures</h2>
<p>I believe student growth percentiles have taken us a step backwards in the use of educational tests to improve student learning.</p>
<p>Traditional measures of children’s performance on educational tests, such as whether they are “proficient” in a given year and their actual test scores, give a good idea of how well they performed in math or reading in a particular year. </p>
<p>These traditional percentile ranks are still reported on many educational tests, just like they were when we as parents were in school. Traditional percentile ranks compared us to a national or state group in a given year, rather than comparing us to how other kids in the nation or state were “growing” across different tests they took in different years, as student growth percentiles attempt to do.</p>
<p>Given what we now know about student growth percentiles, my advice to parents is not only to ignore them on their children’s test score reports, but also to contact their state department of education and ask why they are reporting such an unreliable statistic. </p>
<p>Developing measures of how much students have learned over the course of a year is a good goal. Unfortunately, student growth percentiles do not do a good job of measuring that.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/62155/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Stephen Sireci does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Eleven states have introduced a new test score. Here’s what you need to know.Stephen Sireci, Professor of Educational Policy, UMass AmherstLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/582662016-06-23T10:05:11Z2016-06-23T10:05:11ZHow community schools can beat summer learning loss for low-income students<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/127775/original/image-20160622-7158-76f0rs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">School closure over the summer widens the achievement gap between classes.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/cat.mhtml?lang=en&language=en&ref_site=photo&search_source=search_form&version=llv1&anyorall=all&safesearch=1&use_local_boost=1&autocomplete_id=&search_tracking_id=bP6aCjJu5mIxxYLo1bYQQw&searchterm=summer%20no%20learning&show_color_wheel=1&orient=&commercial_ok=&media_type=images&search_cat=&searchtermx=&photographer_name=&people_gender=&people_age=&people_ethnicity=&people_number=&color=&page=1&inline=387777430">School chair image via www.shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>This article is a part of The Conversation’s series on summer learning loss. For other articles in this series, read <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-summertime-means-for-black-children-60152">here</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/giving-students-choice-in-reading-helps-stem-the-summer-slide-42735">here</a>.</em></p>
<p>My children spent summers reading Harry Potter, playing chess, swimming and hiking the Adirondack high peaks in upstate New York. </p>
<p>As a single parent with a career as a social worker and academic, I wasn’t rich. But I had enough to make sure that my children had what they needed to excel in education and enrichment outside of school. </p>
<p>While middle-class homes can often provide for summer enrichment activities, studies show a different reality for children from low-income families. These children and youth often lose <a href="http://asr.sagepub.com/content/72/2/167.abstract">months of reading and math skills</a> over the summer, widening the achievement gap between the classes. </p>
<p>What can schools do to address this learning loss?</p>
<h2>Summer slide</h2>
<p>The learning loss for youth in low-income communities adds up dramatically over the years. By ninth grade, about two-thirds of the academic achievement gap between disadvantaged youth and their more advantaged peers can be explained by <a href="http://summerlearning.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/SummerCanSetKidsOnTheRightOrWrongCourse.pdf">how they spend their elementary school summers</a>. </p>
<p>What makes this of concern is that a majority of U.S. students in public schools are now from low-income families. A 2013 study found that for the first time in U.S. history, <a href="http://www.southerneducation.org/getattachment/4ac62e27-5260-47a5-9d02-14896ec3a531/A-New-Majority-2015-Update-Low-Income-Students-Now.aspx">a majority (51 percent) of public school students</a> in the United States were eligible for a free or subsidized school lunch, indicating that they fell below the government’s low-income cutoff. </p>
<p>The majority of these students lack quality summer activities.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/127779/original/image-20160622-7196-muif73.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/127779/original/image-20160622-7196-muif73.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/127779/original/image-20160622-7196-muif73.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/127779/original/image-20160622-7196-muif73.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/127779/original/image-20160622-7196-muif73.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/127779/original/image-20160622-7196-muif73.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/127779/original/image-20160622-7196-muif73.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A majority of kids do not have quality summer activities.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/cat.mhtml?lang=en&language=en&ref_site=photo&search_source=search_form&version=llv1&anyorall=all&safesearch=1&use_local_boost=1&autocomplete_id=&search_tracking_id=sAlhNvprNYJ_faTiRyXxjg&searchterm=children%20playing%20USA&show_color_wheel=1&orient=&commercial_ok=&media_type=images&search_cat=&searchtermx=&photographer_name=&people_gender=&people_age=&people_ethnicity=&people_number=&color=&page=1&inline=139406240">Children image via www.shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Furthermore, these issues do not exist in isolation. Children from low-income communities who often experience summer learning loss also often face multiple related challenges that impact their ability to attend school or focus when they’re there. These challenges include insufficient access to health care, poor nutrition, community violence and lack of adult supervision, among others.</p>
<p>Partnerships between schools and communities can help students’ academic success. The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), which replaced the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) law in December 2015, addresses the achievement gap between children from low- and middle-income families.</p>
<p><a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-9604.2011.01502_4.x/abstract">Title IV of the ESSA</a> under the program, “Community Supports for Success,” calls for a range of partnerships between schools and communities so students (especially those from low-income families) can gain access to services they need for academic achievement (e.g., physical and mental health care, adequate nutrition, supervision and access to healthy activities beyond school hours). </p>
<p>How can schools implement these partnerships?</p>
<p>Earlier this year, New York State Governor Andrew Cuomo <a href="http://www.chalkbeat.org/posts/ny/2016/04/01/breaking-state-lawmakers-reach-budget-deal-with-big-wins-for-charters-community-schools/#.V2lIlpMrLUI">announced a US$175 million plan</a> that demonstrates a way to enable such partnerships. Cuomo’s plan aims to convert schools with the lowest test scores and graduation rates across the state into “community schools.”</p>
<h2>Providing comprehensive services</h2>
<p>So, what are community schools? And how do they help with student learning?</p>
<p><a href="http://www.communityschools.org/aboutschools/what_is_a_community_school.aspx">Community schools</a> pursue a unique learning model whereby they supplement classroom-based instruction with out-of-school (before school, after school and summer) learning. They provide support to students whose families do not have access to academic support beyond the classroom. Their support is not limited to the school term, but continues all through the year. </p>
<p>My <a href="http://cup.columbia.edu/book/school-linked-services/9780231160957">research on community schools across the U.S.and the world</a> shows that they look different in each community as they develop in response to each school’s specific needs. </p>
<p>The idea behind this learning model goes back to the late 19th century. The first set of school-linked services (precursors to community schools) can be traced back to the 1890s. Back then, they were developed in response to the massive changes being brought about as a result of immigration and industrialization.</p>
<p>As teachers struggled with new sets of challenges in their classrooms, this model provided additional support. For example, in 1894, doctors visited Boston schools on a daily basis – a practice that <a href="https://www.princeton.edu/futureofchildren/publications/docs/02_01_01.pdf">helped bring down</a> rates of communicable diseases.</p>
<p>The amount of school-linked services and their gold standard – community schools in the U.S. – have ebbed and flowed over the years. In the last few decades, there has been a marked increase in the number of community schools. </p>
<p>Many individual schools, several counties and an array of cities have incorporated the community school model to reduce the achievement gap between students from low- and middle-income homes. These include Multnomah County (Portland, Oregon), Broome County (upstate New York), Cincinnati, Chicago, Hartford, Tulsa and more recently, New York City, among others. </p>
<h2>What’s the impact?</h2>
<p>The community school model has shown numerous successes. </p>
<p>For example, Oyler School in Cincinnati had fewer than 20 percent of its students reaching 10th grade in the late 1990s. After implementing a community school model in 2010, <a href="http://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ965251">82 percent of students graduated</a> high school. </p>
<p>Many of these schools provide <a href="http://www.familiesinsocietyjournal.org/doi/pdf/10.1606/1044-3894.4306">extra outreach efforts</a> to involve families that may be hard to reach in the education of their children – a critical component of the partnership. A recent study of the impact of family engagement in elementary and secondary schools found positive correlations between engaged families and <a href="http://uex.sagepub.com/content/47/4/706.abstract">improved academic achievement</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/127781/original/image-20160622-7170-1l8z9p2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/127781/original/image-20160622-7170-1l8z9p2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/127781/original/image-20160622-7170-1l8z9p2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/127781/original/image-20160622-7170-1l8z9p2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/127781/original/image-20160622-7170-1l8z9p2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/127781/original/image-20160622-7170-1l8z9p2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/127781/original/image-20160622-7170-1l8z9p2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Oyler School in Cincinnati.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/withoutsound/3390421423/in/photolist-brdbQX-6aAPcF-6aEYem-6aEY1Y-6aANst-6aEYaq-6aANn2-6aEYpb-6aEYkd-6aANG6-6aEYtq-6aEXsY-6aANaM-6aANx2-brdbYB-brdbHP-brdc12-brdbWx-brdbBt-brdbHa-brdbKP-brdbVr-brdbFM-brdc28-brdbEk-o9G5cQ-brdc4K-brdbSc-brdbNB-brdbJT-brdc3x-brdbMk-brdbCK-brdbTz-brdbPt-bVBXoK-brdbxP-nUeXvb-obzXB3-nUfN5p-obqYqT-obE59m-nUeXMy-obqZ9r-nUf3vc-dKK59-o9G531-pzvzRi-dq3HwH">Sean Biehle</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>School-based health centers are another frequent component of community schools. Studies indicate when there are school-based health centers, lost class time as a result of sickness <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20618619">reduces by as much as three times</a>.</p>
<p>Summer programs are often part of community schools. These programs provide enriched summer activities for students, such as music, dance, crafts, athletics and academics. This enables teachers in high-poverty neighborhoods to begin teaching new content at the start of the school year, without losing months backtracking over content forgotten from the previous year. </p>
<h2>Why we need community schools</h2>
<p>The community school model has been so successful that universities too are making this a focus of college students’ civic engagement efforts. </p>
<p>In 1985, the University of Pennsylvania took the lead in <a href="https://www.nettercenter.upenn.edu/sites/netter_internal/files/Harkavy_Hartley_Hodges_Weeks_Peabody_Journal.pdf">developing a university-assisted community school approach</a>. College students work with the community schools <a href="https://www.nettercenter.upenn.edu/programs/university-assisted-community-schools">to integrate knowledge gained</a> in their UPenn classrooms.</p>
<p>An example is the Moelis Access Science program where UPenn faculty and students provide STEM (science, technology, math and engineering) professional development to teachers serving students in West Philadelphia neighorhoods, which are marked by extreme poverty, violence and low educational attainment. </p>
<p>Over 20 universities are now <a href="http://www.communityschools.org/about/universityassistedcommunityschoolsnetwork.aspx">part of the network of university-assisted community schools</a> including Binghamton University (SUNY), Columbia University and University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). </p>
<p>In an increasingly diverse society facing more complex social problems, the traditional model where education occurs completely within the school building, provided solely by teachers from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. and from September to June, needs reviewing. </p>
<p>That <a href="http://www.timesunion.com/opinion/article/Schools-are-trapped-in-the-past-4221901.php">calendar was designed long ago</a> to leave youth free to work in their families’ fields in the summer. Since farming is no longer a major role for the vast majority of students, time outside the classroom can either enhance academic year learning or diminish it. </p>
<p>Do community schools that offer year-round programming and supplemental services cost money? Of course they do. But they have <a href="http://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/abs/10.2105/9780875530062ch29">also been shown to save</a> health care costs. They can also save funds that are now being spent on residential treatment facilities for youth, prison and remediation. </p>
<p>With too many youth dropping out of school, the jobs and workforce necessary to compete in a global economy are at risk. Community schools make sense in a country that is committed to opportunities for educational success for any and all students, irrespective of their family income or their zip code.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/58266/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Laura Bronstein oversees the Binghamton University Broome County Promise Zone, which receives funding from the Broome County Department of Mental Health to implement a county-wide system of university-assisted community schools. </span></em></p>The learning loss that occurs over the summer for poor students can lead to a growing academic achievement gap in subsequent years. What are community schools and how do they help low-income students?Laura Bronstein, Dean of the College of Community and Public Affairs Professor, Binghamton University, State University of New YorkLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/561572016-03-23T04:04:29Z2016-03-23T04:04:29ZHow games can hook students with short attention spans<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/115981/original/image-20160322-32306-zqjvai.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Don't dismiss "playing games" as a waste of time - they can be a powerful tool for learning.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Modern human beings have a shorter attention span <a href="http://advertising.microsoft.com/en/cl/31966/how-does-digital-affect-canadian-attention-spans">than goldfish</a>: ours is, on average, below eight seconds while the little fish can focus for nine seconds.</p>
<p>These decreasing attention levels are driven by people’s constant use of technology. One <a href="http://science.sciencemag.org/content/345/6192/75">study</a> found that people’s dependence on digital stimulation has become so high that 67% of men and 25% of women would prefer to experience an electric shock rather than doing nothing for 15 minutes.</p>
<p>Children are no different. They occupy a hyper stimulating world and find it difficult to sit through a 40 minute lesson or focus on a single task. Many schools and universities are now turning to the very technology that can be such a <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-binge-watching-is-to-blame-for-kids-not-learning-51056">distraction</a>. One of the avenues they are exploring is <a href="http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/gamification">gamification</a> - integrating games and their principles into learning.</p>
<p>Our <a href="http://www.teachernology.com/blog/is-it-time-to-up-your-game">research</a> has shown that gamification has the potential to boost student learning and motivation.</p>
<h2>The game is changing</h2>
<p>Gaming has become a huge industry and is now even <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/technology/gamesblog/2009/sep/27/videogames-hollywood">more valuable</a> than the movie industry. A <a href="https://www.commonsensemedia.org/research/the-common-sense-census-media-use-by-tweens-and-teens">recent study</a> found that teens spend an average of nine hours each day on their devices, with nearly four of these hours spent playing games. </p>
<p>But schools are starting to realise that merely putting devices in pupils’ hands won’t <a href="https://theconversation.com/outdated-teaching-methods-will-blunt-technologys-power-40503">magically restore</a> their attention during lessons. Children need <a href="http://www.teachernology.com/blog/laptop-or-ipad-or-is-this-the-wrong-question">new teaching methods</a> to accompany these new devices. To this end, some schools are turning to gamification.</p>
<p>Gamification normally involves game-like elements such as leaderboards, levels and badges. These are underpinned by storylines and delivered using creative and appealing aesthetics. Leaderboards rank participants, while levels typically give the player additional benefits. Badges are symbols of achievement. </p>
<p>In a sense this is how education has always worked. Individual examinations are challenges, passed across a number of years - or levels. Pupils then earn a certificate, or badge. But a qualification is not a gamified experience because it doesn’t adequately fulfil the <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/kenkrogue/2012/09/18/5-gamification-rules-from-the-grandfather-of-gamification/#22bb91906d38">key principles</a> of a well designed game: clearly defined goals, a transparent scoring mechanism, frequent feedback, a personal choice of approach and consistent coaching.</p>
<h2>Gamification of the classroom</h2>
<p>Gamification is slowly proving its classroom mettle. Some research <a href="http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2513469&dl=ACM&coll=DL">suggests</a> that, if it’s properly applied, gamification can improve attendance, enhance understanding of content, encourage engagement and ultimately improve academic performance. </p>
<p>We decided to integrate gamification into an existing fourth year <a href="http://is.ukzn.ac.za/postgraduatecourses/honors/istn731.aspx">course</a> at a South African university. Traditionally, the course is delivered to students through social media platforms. This time around we built in an additional game layer. This created a scenario that saw students pursuing a corporate career and competing for executive positions at a large company. Throughout the course, corporate aesthetics and a corporate style of communication and feedback were adopted.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/115611/original/image-20160318-4436-178ht61.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/115611/original/image-20160318-4436-178ht61.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=277&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/115611/original/image-20160318-4436-178ht61.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=277&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/115611/original/image-20160318-4436-178ht61.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=277&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/115611/original/image-20160318-4436-178ht61.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=349&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/115611/original/image-20160318-4436-178ht61.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=349&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/115611/original/image-20160318-4436-178ht61.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=349&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Gamified course page with corporate aesthetics.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Students were recognised for meeting learning objectives, displaying academic progress, collaborating around activities and socialising with peers. They were awarded badges and points, which opened up opportunities for real-world benefits: marks, privileges like choosing their own project teams, and even letters of recommendation. They constantly competed to appear in the top 10 leaderboard.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/115610/original/image-20160318-4456-pj6zjh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/115610/original/image-20160318-4456-pj6zjh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=381&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/115610/original/image-20160318-4456-pj6zjh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=381&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/115610/original/image-20160318-4456-pj6zjh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=381&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/115610/original/image-20160318-4456-pj6zjh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/115610/original/image-20160318-4456-pj6zjh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/115610/original/image-20160318-4456-pj6zjh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Badges each carrying a point weighting.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Our research found that students were highly motivated by gamification. They worked hard to try and master the content, as well as engaging with their peers about it. Since the game was based on rewarding learning outcomes and sharing their knowledge, students found gamification relevant and beneficial to their learning.</p>
<h2>Crashing the game</h2>
<p>There were challenges alongside the benefits. For starters, students had to invest more time in the course than they might ordinarily. To stay ahead of the game, they had to keep up with their peers. Those who simply couldn’t keep up fell out of the game, which made it harder to re-engage them. Some students also gave up because they weren’t receiving rewards frequently enough for their liking.</p>
<p>Teachers, too, must invest a lot of time in running the game - never mind the demands of the traditional course. Gamifying a classroom requires a significant investment in time and sometimes money. </p>
<p>We also found that there was a need to ensure a balance between competition - something gamified courses encourage - and helping develop socially cohesive students. This requires care from the teachers, who must ensure that collaborative tasks and social skills like empathy and mutual respect are rewarded within the game.</p>
<h2>Levelling up</h2>
<p>Despite the challenges, our research suggests that gamification techniques can provide interesting avenues to motivate student learning. </p>
<p>There are several free tools available to help teachers implement gamification in the classroom. <a href="http://getkahoot.com">Kahoot!</a>, for instance allows teachers to run gamified quizzes where students participate with their own devices and are placed on a leaderboard that the whole classroom can see.</p>
<p>Open badge platforms like <a href="http://www.credly.com">Credly</a> allow teachers to issue their students with badges, while platforms like <a href="http://www.classcraft.com">Classcraft</a> allow teachers to use role play scenarios in their lessons. </p>
<p>Gamification could, quite literally, be a game changer in the classroom if implemented correctly. As a teacher who recently tried gamification for the first time told one of the authors:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The students rush to class even though it is Maths. They often tell me it is the highlight of their day.</p>
</blockquote><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/56157/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Introducing game-like elements into classrooms can boost student motivation and learning.Craig Blewett, Senior Lecturer in Education & Technology, University of KwaZulu-NatalEbrahim Adam, Lecturer in Information Systems & Technology, University of KwaZulu-NatalLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/548392016-03-01T04:28:34Z2016-03-01T04:28:34ZWhy it’s crucial that young scientists are taught the value of being wrong<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/113252/original/image-20160229-4066-s7g3sr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Children are natural scientists. They learn from their mistakes, then try something new.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Albert Einstein is the most famous scientist of all time. From Calgary to Cape Town the image of the wild-haired, contemplative lone genius holed up in a messy office, changing the universe, has evolved into the archetype of how society sees scientists. More than that, it has shaped the social perception of the whole scientific endeavour. </p>
<p>True science, we are led to believe from a very young age, is never wrong. True scientists – the <a href="http://www.history.com/topics/galileo-galilei">Galileos</a>, <a href="http://www.biography.com/people/isaac-newton-9422656">Newtons</a> and <a href="http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1903/marie-curie-bio.html">Curies</a> – stare into the abyss and return with deep truths about the universe we inhabit. Anything less and, well, you might as well throw in the towel. And so scientists spend their careers desperately trying to be right in every classroom, seminar and paper. </p>
<p>But this is not how science works. It’s not even how science is <em>supposed</em> to work. </p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.livescience.com/20896-science-scientific-method.html">scientific method</a> is built on four cornerstones: observation, hypothesis, experiment and the revision of the hypothesis based on the results of the experiment. The last is just a fancy way of saying “admitting that you were wrong”. </p>
<p>And since it is this sequence by which hypotheses evolve into theories which grow into paradigms, science itself cannot progress without scientists admitting – to themselves even more than to society at large - to being wrong.</p>
<h2>Even Einstein erred</h2>
<p>By now, few people are unaware of the recent monumental detection of <a href="https://theconversation.com/gravitational-waves-will-the-global-south-provide-the-next-pulse-of-gravity-research-54583">gravitational waves</a> by the LIGO team. This was heralded as the final great test of Einstein’s General Relativity. </p>
<p>But many people probably don’t know that in 1936 Einstein himself, together with Nathan Rosen, <a href="http://dafix.uark.edu/%7Edanielk/Talks/PhysRev.pdf">submitted a paper</a> for publication claiming that such gravitational waves could not exist. The paper was rejected. Einstein was wrong! It wasn’t the first, nor the last time either. </p>
<p>More recently, in 2014, the <a href="http://bicepkeck.org/">BICEP</a> collaboration announced that it had detected evidence of gravitational waves from the <a href="http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-is-the-cosmic-microw/">cosmic microwave background</a>. After much fanfare in popular media and back and forth in the scientific community, it emerged that they, too, <a href="http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/news/2014/sep/22/bicep2-gravitational-wave-result-bites-the-dust-thanks-to-new-planck-data">were wrong</a>. </p>
<p>So, why is it so important to realise that scientists being wrong is not a bug but a feature of science? </p>
<h2>Guarding the future of science</h2>
<p>First of all, we live in an age where information has never been more <a href="http://google.com/">accessible</a>. Ironically, with this growth of access to information has come a commensurate distrust in the expertise of scientists and even in the very science that has brought humankind to this juncture. </p>
<p>One has only to think of the surge of the anti-vaccine movement, resistance to GMOs, anxiety around wi-fi and even the raging non-battle between evolution and intelligent design. </p>
<p>In each of these cases, a small but vocal body pursuing its own agenda latched onto uncertainties and doubts expressed by scientists. Instead of appreciating this as the natural progression of the scientific process, these groups painted it as a dramatic failing of science and of scientists. </p>
<p>In some cases, as in former South African president Thabo Mbeki’s HIV/AIDS denialism, these views can have <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2008/nov/26/aids-south-africa">life or death</a> consequences. </p>
<p>A second, perhaps more important reason, is for the very future of science itself. Even scientists sometimes don’t take the importance of being wrong seriously enough. This is due in no small part to the <a href="https://www.sciencedaily.com/terms/confirmation_bias.htm">confirmation bias</a> that seems built into our humanity. We are more likely to seek out and place value in information that confirms our own existing beliefs.</p>
<p>These views and the culture in which they form are then passed on to the next generation – our students pursuing science degrees at university.</p>
<h2>The way forward</h2>
<p>The current generation of students go through their degrees petrified of being wrong or of looking “stupid” among their peers and lecturers. This is particularly true in patriarchal environments that pervade Africa, where indeed many young people are taught not to question anything they’re told by elders.</p>
<p>And so no questions get asked. No guesses get made and no risks get taken as students grow more and more uncomfortable with being uncomfortable in lectures. For a continent that’s striving to produce the <a href="http://nef.org/">next Einstein</a>, this is a cycle that desperately needs breaking.</p>
<p>Fortunately breaking the cycle is not as difficult as it might seem. As much as we’d like to think otherwise, being wrong is something we as humans are inherently very good at. It is something that is manifest in how young children learn about the world, through play.</p>
<p>Natural scientists learn by trial and error, without fear of getting the answer wrong. Perhaps we as adults, students and teachers alike ought to take some lessons from them, cast aside our egos and embrace losing to nature. </p>
<p>But what do we know – we’re probably wrong anyway.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/54839/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jeff Murugan receives funding from the National Research Foundation of South Africa. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Amanda Weltman receives funding from the National Research Foundation of South Africa and the Department of Science and Technology of South Africa. </span></em></p>Scientists being wrong is not a bug or a glitch – it’s a feature of science and mistakes can actually lead to new, deeper discoveries.Jeff Murugan, Associate Professor of Mathematical Physics, University of Cape TownAmanda Weltman, South African Research Chair in Physical Cosmology, Department of Mathematics and Applied Mathematics, University of Cape TownLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/502572016-01-12T04:31:14Z2016-01-12T04:31:14ZTechnology is no longer a luxury for universities – it’s a necessity<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/107155/original/image-20160104-29003-1021bb8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Technology is evolving fast and can play a crucial role in educating university students.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In the world’s new <a href="http://www.oecd.org/sti/sci-tech/1913021.pdf">knowledge economy</a>, innovation and technological change are recognised as the primary drivers of progress. Technological and digital literacy will be a <a href="http://www.hsrc.ac.za/en/review/March-2011/knowledge-economy">crucial part</a> of helping many countries move beyond their reliance on material resources. </p>
<p>Such literacy, and an understanding of technology in general, will also be crucial for university students. They will have to develop the ability to collaborate across multiple contexts, filter and synthesise information from a variety of sources. These skills will be necessary if students are to contribute to the world in the 21st century.</p>
<p>We live in a world where the phone in your pocket has more processing power than the computers that were used to put men on the moon. But what is being done to make better use of the <a href="http://www.learning-theories.com/affordance-theory-gibson.html">affordances</a> of technology in higher education? Not much, unfortunately. In general, academics continue along traditional lines of thinking and practice that seem to ignore technological progress and its accelerating rate of change.</p>
<p>To address these challenges, higher education institutions must ask what steps they can take to ensure that their students are relevant in the future. The following suggestions may help the academy to think differently about how technology is used in the classroom.</p>
<h2>Access is increasing</h2>
<p>One common rationale for not bringing technology into the classroom is that access to technology is not uniformly distributed among students. This is especially true in a country like South Africa, where I teach, and on the African continent <a href="http://wiredspace.wits.ac.za/bitstream/handle/10539/8934/19%20Molawa.pdf?sequence=1">as a whole</a>. But access to textbooks is uneven, too, and no-one would use that as a reason to ban textbooks in class. </p>
<p>Things are changing faster than we think. When I started teaching in 2009, incorporating technology into the classroom was challenging. Few of my students had laptops or even computers at home. We didn’t have good access to wifi in lecture halls, so we had to use the computer labs. Now every student in my classroom is encouraged to use phones, tablets and laptops to search for new information that’s relevant to our topic, and to synthesise it for sharing in our discussions. They can do so because smartphones are ubiquitous. Students can also collaboratively author course notes for the module.</p>
<h2>The network is what matters</h2>
<p>But merely providing access to devices <a href="https://theconversation.com/outdated-teaching-methods-will-blunt-technologys-power-40503">does little</a> to help students learn. Many studies still centre on access to the device, as if handing a student a tablet will magically develop the skills needed to use it effectively. It is time to change academics’ thinking to prioritise the network over the device. The device is simply a window onto the network. The United Nations weighed in on this debate in 2011 when it declared that access to the internet should be recognised as a <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/06/united-nations-declares-internet-access-a-basic-human-right/239911/">basic human right</a>.</p>
<p>There is also a shift from vertical communication channels that privilege hierarchies of control to horizontal structures – like networks – that embody coordination, cooperation and collaboration. The power of the internet is not that it provides us with new and innovative means of sharing cat videos. It is a new communication paradigm that is constructed through community engagement and participation. It allows new forms of interaction between people, information and devices.</p>
<h2>Preparing to adapt</h2>
<p>As technology progresses and its influence becomes clear in every aspect of society - apart from higher education - universities need to ask if the next 50 years are going to look anything like the last 50. It seems as if the most important skill people can learn is how to adapt to a constantly changing world. If this is true, then academics may need to radically change what is prioritised in the curriculum, as well as how they teach students to learn. How can academics prepare students to be successful in a world that we can’t predict?</p>
<p>Incorporating technology into the classroom allows academics to help students develop the skill set needed for engaging meaningfully in the 21st century. Academics cannot continue with the notion that higher education is about providing students with access to specialised knowledge. Universities and individual lecturers cannot plan curricula for the lowest common denominator in terms of digital literacy and then base teaching and learning practices on that. </p>
<p>The academic enterprise is about striving to upset established models and paradigms and to push for change in how we understand and work within the world around us. It is time that academics applied themselves to this task - and technology is a crucial way of doing so.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/50257/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michael Rowe receives funding from the National Research Foundation. He is affiliated with Physiopedia, a non-profit organisation that aims to develop and share physiotherapy-specific knowledge, and Snapplfy, a commercial company involved with the development of educational technology.</span></em></p>Technological and digital literacy are crucial for university students who hope to truly contribute to the world in the 21st century.Michael Rowe, Senior Lecturer in Physiotherapy, University of the Western CapeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/470802015-10-30T10:06:56Z2015-10-30T10:06:56ZWhat gets students motivated to work harder? Not money<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/100237/original/image-20151029-15318-bn8vm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">What motivates kids?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/wwworks/6235929403/in/photolist-av3Lyc-4axUZm-5V3DPB-7vSGJC-74mHLE-6Dytu3-dPsvb2-6QX8ro-ai7pAx-cm3kf3-2p6Pd-dUQYm-83zxqq-piRUa-5Dz5Pq-4YDEcH-7k7X8-35pt1b-5SMZaV-81JzpW-4z9Kkf-e9S1dz-5aRGj-t9KYWF-8369Jd-e9SdfF-7Bsm4H-4z9NVY-XT8Ls-e3X6Up-oQJYqR-4PsGWL-7Vc8tX-ypRYZ3-fmpQn1-4z5AY2-8367w1-aocv6i-4z9Q9d-4z9LEf-4z9SCb-saPegH-rVoHpV-81Rq8b-avq84n-e9XLkL-8kqWBn-81FtLe-81JCL1-4z5Bhr">woodleywonderworks</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Rewarding teachers financially for student achievement is an <a href="https://my.vanderbilt.edu/matthewspringer/files/2015/02/Podgursky-and-Springer-2011.pdf">increasingly common practice</a>, despite <a href="http://wol.iza.org/articles/how-effective-are-financial-incentives-for-teachers">mixed evidence</a> as to whether it improves results. Some scholars have instead suggested <a href="http://www.nber.org/papers/w16333">paying students</a>.</p>
<p>But giving kids <a href="http://scholar.harvard.edu/files/fryer/files/092011_incentives_fryer_allen_paper2.pdf">cash for grades and scores</a> hasn’t proved straightforward either. So maybe the answer isn’t monetary. </p>
<p>Could students be better motivated by something as simple as a little formal recognition? </p>
<p>While I was serving as director of the National Center on Performance Incentives at Peabody College of Vanderbilt University, my colleagues and I sought answers in the decisions of various actors in American public schools. </p>
<p>The results may surprise you.</p>
<h2>Which incentives encourage positive behavior?</h2>
<p>Much of public policy can be characterized as attempts to influence individual behavior and decision-making in organizations. </p>
<p>Those who design and evaluate incentives typically operate under the crude assumption that the “target” is a rational actor (processing all available information and quickly identifying the behavior most likely to be the best one for his or her well-being). </p>
<p>So, policymakers end up offering seemingly beneficial public services at little or no cost. But they still meet with disappointment. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/19345747.2015.1017679">Our recent study</a> attempted to better understand the response to a different kind of incentive – for one of the arguably more imperfectly rationale segment of our population: early adolescents. </p>
<p>We explored how incentives – monetary and nonmonetary – might encourage behaviors that lead to increased student learning, such as daily attendance and afterschool tutoring services (free but chronically underutilized).</p>
<p>We found that adolescents do not respond to incentives in ways that can be easily predicted by economic theory. But the right kinds of incentives could well lead adolescents to engage in behaviors likely to enhance their learning. </p>
<h2>Money makes no difference</h2>
<p>Here’s how we did our study.</p>
<p>We selected 300 fifth to eighth grade students in a large southern urban school district who were eligible for free, afterschool tutoring services. </p>
<p>Prior research had shown that these particular tutoring services were relatively high quality and had, in fact, increased student’s test score performance. We then randomly assigned these students to one of three groups:</p>
<ul>
<li>a reward of US$100 (distributed via an online platform) for consistent attendance</li>
<li>certificates of recognition, signed by the school’s district superintendent, mailed to the student’s home, again for consistent attendance</li>
<li>a control group, which received no experimental incentives.</li>
</ul>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/99379/original/image-20151022-7999-1wv6dvd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/99379/original/image-20151022-7999-1wv6dvd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/99379/original/image-20151022-7999-1wv6dvd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/99379/original/image-20151022-7999-1wv6dvd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/99379/original/image-20151022-7999-1wv6dvd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/99379/original/image-20151022-7999-1wv6dvd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/99379/original/image-20151022-7999-1wv6dvd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Offering students money made no difference.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/hocolibrary/8631289513/in/photolist-e9HBEr-e9PdtW-e9HBk4-e9HB84-e9Pf29-e9PeFh-e9Hyqx-e9Pe7Q-e9HAwv-e9HB9D-e9Pep1-e9PePE-e9PeGm-e9Pdsf-eacEVv-eacEUt-eacETt-eaikNb-3aPxuk-54aWnE-6E5y9k-824H9y-ajn2s3-9oupmE-5dxBST-8pvgnD-qkqRmq-rhiwWk-qZT6ew-qZZhVe-rhiybe-rf7q5J-qZT5Ym-qZZ7J2-qkrdm1-91ygwG-7DP8cr-rhmpsC-qZZayR-rhpBMV-rhpZQn-qZThPq-rhmxD7-qZTjaw-qZZo6V-rhmBpd-qkr4Bh-rhpNUz-qkDa2R-rf7DZC">Howard County Library System</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>We found that the students who were offered up to $100 for regular attendance were no more likely to attend sessions than if they were offered nothing at all. </p>
<p>In other words, money made no difference.</p>
<p>Alternatively, when students received a certificate of recognition for attending tutoring sessions regularly, the differences were dramatic. The students in the certificate group attended 42.5% more of their allotted tutoring hours than those assigned to the control group. </p>
<h2>Gender, parents and peers</h2>
<p>Gender also played a role. Girls were significantly more responsive to the certificate of recognition than their male counterparts.</p>
<p>On average, girls in the control group attended only 11% of the tutoring hours assigned to them. However, girls receiving the certificate attended 67% of their allocated hours, representing a six-fold increase. </p>
<p>What’s more, the boys that received certificates attended more than two times as many of their allocated tutoring sessions in comparison to the male control-group students. But the girls in the group that received the certificates attended nearly twice as many of their allocated tutoring sessions than the boys who were eligible for certificates of recognition.</p>
<p>Overall, sending certificates directly to the parents seemed to have been effective. One reason for this could be that parents were more likely to reinforce the child’s extra effort when the certificate was received at home. </p>
<p>Often in school settings, parents are not hearing positive news when they are contacted by their child’s school – and this might be especially true of these students who qualified for tutoring services. </p>
<p>This is one time where the parent heard: “way to go, keep it up.” And they heard it directly from the district superintendent.</p>
<p>In addition, a student’s effort was not necessarily observable to peers, which could have helped facilitate the positive response. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0047272709001406">Prior research</a> suggests that the promise of certificates and trophies presented in a class or at a school assembly in front of peers might not necessarily act as a positive incentive. Academic achievement can often result in diminished social status among peers, especially for minority students.</p>
<h2>Human behavior and education policy</h2>
<p>Indeed, a <a href="http://www.anderson.ucla.edu/faculty/leonardo.bursztyn/Peer_Pressure_Education_Bursztyn_Jensen_Jan2015.pdf">recent study</a> of a performance leaderboard system that publicly ranked students in a computer-based high school course in Los Angeles Unified School District was associated with a 24% performance decline.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.anderson.ucla.edu/faculty/leonardo.bursztyn/Peer_Pressure_Education_Bursztyn_Jensen_Jan2015.pdf">The authors</a> attributed this to students trying to avoid social penalties by conforming to prevailing norms. </p>
<p>For these reasons, working with the family to encourage and reward academic behaviors may hold more promise, compared to working directly through school settings where peer pressures and norms play an important role. </p>
<p>Policymakers and philanthropists in New York and Memphis are currently trying to interrupt a cycle of generational poverty through the <a href="http://www.mdrc.org/sites/default/files/CEO_SIF_2014_ES.pdf">Family Rewards Program</a>. It is providing cash rewards to families who improve their short-term health care, education, and labor market participation and outcomes. </p>
<p>The impact results of this program are still awaited. This program doesn’t test other forms of incentives such as certificates. </p>
<p>But there are important implications for education policy discussions and whether cash should be the primary driver of human behavior, particularly for adolescents. </p>
<p>The results of our study show that children’s learning behaviors to incentives change in unpredictable ways. And these behaviors aren’t easily accounted for by models of individuals as rational decision-makers. </p>
<p>Our study provides evidence that for policies to influence adolescent behavior, they may need to draw from research and theory beyond classical economics or behavioral psychology, including what we are learning about <a href="http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/amp/64/8/739/">the teenage brain</a> and it’s sociocultural environment.</p>
<p>In short, we need to look at policies that are less Adam Smith and little more Friday Night Lights.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/47080/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Matthew G Springer does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>What role does a bit of recognition play for students?Matthew G Springer, Assistant Professor of Public Policy and Education, Vanderbilt UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/479952015-10-21T10:30:52Z2015-10-21T10:30:52ZCan it get more absurd? Now music teachers are being tested based on math and reading scores<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/99095/original/image-20151020-32255-xw0s2t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Music teachers are being evaluated on subjects they do not teach.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Ms Matthews was apprehensive as she opened the envelope containing her evaluation report. She had worked hard over the summer, taking graduate classes to learn some new teaching strategies to help her students improve their music listening and reading skills. She had excitedly incorporated these techniques in her classes. </p>
<p>But the state had just increased the portion of her yearly effectiveness rating based on the math and reading scores of students in her school system from 40% to 50%. Now, her annual evaluation as a music teacher would be determined largely on the scores her students earned on their standardized math and reading tests; not on her ability to help her students learn how to sing, play instruments, compose and improvise.</p>
<p>Ms Matthews was worried that those scores might lower her rating from the previous year’s “Highly Effective” to “Minimally Effective,” or, even worse, “Ineffective.” Two consecutive ratings of “Ineffective” could mean the loss of her position in the high-needs school where she worked. </p>
<p>As a former high school music teacher and school administrator who now studies education and music education policy issues, I have seen the serious misuse of data in teacher evaluation. I know Ms Matthews is not the only one to open the envelope with the evaluation report with trembling hands.</p>
<p>Music teachers across the United States are being evaluated based on test scores in subjects they don’t teach.</p>
<h2>Tools of measurement</h2>
<p>Teacher evaluation today is based on the use of statistical formulas known as “value-added measures” (VAM). The idea behind VAM is that student test scores can be used not only to measure student learning but also the instruction from their teachers.</p>
<p>In simple terms, VAM compares an estimate of a hypothetical group of students’ test scores to a set of test scores from actual students. The average of all students’ differences is the school’s VAM score. VAM scores are intended to measure the contribution of a teacher or school to student learning.</p>
<p>However, much of the <a href="http://dangerouslyirrelevant.org/resources/value-added-measures">current research</a> suggests that these scores are too imprecise and variable to carry much validity as an indication of a teacher’s effectiveness. </p>
<p>Currently, every state in the country <a href="http://resource.tqsource.org/stateevaldb/Compare50States.aspx">requires</a> the use of “student growth measures” in math and reading as a factor in teacher evaluation. As many as 17 states specifically mandate VAM for the evaluation. In these states, as much as 50% of an individual teacher’s rating is now determined by this formula. Many states have been <a href="http://www.fairtest.org/teacher-evaluation-fact-sheet-2014">forced into instituting</a> these forms of evaluation due to pressures exerted by the Department of Education in order “to win federal Race to the Top grants or waivers from No Child Left Behind (NCLB).”</p>
<p>However, this is not the purpose for which VAM was originally intended or designed. The <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/leading-mathematician-debunks-value-added/2011/05/08/AFb999UG_blog.html">initial intent of VAM</a>, according to <a href="http://blogs.sas.com/content/statelocalgov/2015/06/19/the-man-behind-vam-bill-sanders-honored-for-a-lifetime-of-education-service/">William Sanders</a> (known as the “father” of VAM), was to help researchers make sense of huge “mountains of data, using mathematics in the same way it was used to understand the growth of crops or the effects of a drug.”</p>
<p>As a recent statement issued by the American Statistical Association <a href="http://www.amstat.org/policy/pdfs/asa_vam_statement.pdf">stated</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>VAMs typically measure correlation, not causation: Effects – positive or negative – attributed to a teacher may actually be caused by other factors that are not captured in the model. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>These problems are only magnified when VAM is used to evaluate music teachers.</p>
<p>Imagine for a moment, a physician being evaluated based upon their patients’ illnesses or injuries, not on the treatment delivered. Or consider the logic behind evaluating a steakhouse based on the fish you had at the seafood restaurant across the street last night. </p>
<p>This is what is currently happening with VAM being used for evaluation of music teachers.</p>
<h2>Assessment tools</h2>
<p>Numerous <a href="http://pmepd.weebly.com">music education policy groups</a> have begun to <a href="http://www.nafme.org/take-action/music-education-policy-roundtable/">focus their attention</a> on how these practices are impacting school music programs, teachers and students. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/99046/original/image-20151020-32241-l4qwto.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/99046/original/image-20151020-32241-l4qwto.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/99046/original/image-20151020-32241-l4qwto.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/99046/original/image-20151020-32241-l4qwto.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/99046/original/image-20151020-32241-l4qwto.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/99046/original/image-20151020-32241-l4qwto.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/99046/original/image-20151020-32241-l4qwto.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">How can music teachers be evaluated?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/wwworks/5278944151/in/photolist-93tYbt-yT5R7-4vn9cf-4vi5xp-4vi4EZ-4vi5f2-4vi9SH-4vn9v7-4vn8Yu-4vi5rF-atHvrY-qKLQ1t-qGyxkU-2zrDTN-7pUoXX-anwWKE-6CjSzD-EWS1S-EWTu1-7rQAd6-6sQNgD-iH98pX-6Zcfwi-9ufkBR-6ZcgqT-cFVU7U-53hfPP-dXWGch-7Xzt8T-o2BUfj-4Mxcsp-81zgMM-vtZznS-6ZcgEc-79jHSG-cFUM2y-cFVrNQ-cFUG9Q-6Zghgs-4Z7TuA-8bcy7z-dkLXpw-cFVvYw-f1jQbz-cFVtW1-9ERrP3-7wC7B5-8bcyp2-cFVxKf-pKxCUK">woodleywonderworks</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>These groups have <a href="http://pmepd.weebly.com/uploads/4/9/2/4/4924314/evaluation_tool_position_statement_dec_2012.pdf">produced</a> policy briefs and position statements suggesting caution as state departments of education consider increasing the portion of teachers’ evaluations that are based on VAM. </p>
<p>They have also suggested new music-specific evaluation tools that provide teachers with high-quality assessment activities that keep the focus on music teaching and learning – not on math and reading test scores.</p>
<p>For instance, the Michigan Arts Education Instruction and Assessment (MAEIA) initiative has developed a <a href="http://www.michiganassessmentconsortium.org/maeia">database</a> of assessment tools, which are available free of charge to all arts educators.</p>
<h2>We measure what we treasure…or do we?</h2>
<p>But without more thoughtful evaluation systems, even the best data will not result in authentic assessment practices. An example of this comes from the predominant employee evaluation tool in the business world for years, known as “stack ranking.” </p>
<p><a href="http://www.ibtimes.%0Acom/what-stack-ranking-microsoft-ends-controversial-employee-ratingsystem-%0Ayahoo-ramps-it-1468850">At Microsoft</a>, employees were rated “on a score of one to five, with one being the best. Managers were then given a curve to base their rankings on, and forced to give a certain percentage of employees a poor ‘five’ label – even if the managers did not consider the employee to be unsatisfactory at their jobs.” </p>
<p>Often referred to as “rank and yank,” stack ranking did not result in noticeable improvements to employee productivity, and instead contributed to a culture of fear and mistrust at many of the companies in which it was used. </p>
<p>Even as similar systems are gaining traction in public schools in the US, Microsoft, Expedia and Adobe Systems <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/bw/articles/2013-11-13/microsoft-kills-its-hated-stack-rankings-dot-does-anyone-do-employee-reviews-right">have now abandoned</a> the practice of stack ranking. </p>
<p>We often hear the old adage, “We measure what we treasure,” when discussions turn to issues of educational accountability. This saying is often used to provide justification for narrowing the curriculum to math and reading in the elementary grades, and to STEM subjects in the upper grades. </p>
<p><a href="http://nepc.colorado.edu/publication/datadriven-%0Aimprovement-accountability/">According</a> to Andy Hargreaves and Henry Braun, policy scholars from Boston College, “Data driven improvement and accountability (DDIA) in the US has focused on what is easily measured rather than on what is educationally valued.” </p>
<p>For most of us, it is precisely those things that we value the most – our families, our students and colleagues, the beauty of a well-turned phrase – that are the most stubbornly resistant to statistical measurement. </p>
<p>It is our duty as policymakers to be sure that the kinds of data we are using to evaluate all teachers are not only valid and reliable, but are meaningful and used appropriately.</p>
<p>Music education can be a vital, critical component of each student’s educational journey if we can work together to develop policies that support and encourage comprehensive musical experiences for all of our nation’s children.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/47995/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mitchell Robinson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A steakhouse wouldn’t be evaluated based on a fish prepared at a seafood restaurant. But this is what teacher evaluation looks like.Mitchell Robinson, Chair of Music Education, Michigan State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/482102015-10-19T09:55:29Z2015-10-19T09:55:29ZDoes a shorter week help kids with their learning?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/98702/original/image-20151016-25142-1pqs6wt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Should schools rethink their schedule?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/lowercolumbiacollege/7449096110/in/photolist-cmfyKy-836dx3-77wpHX-77AmyG-cmfyJh-4WXVeS-7shU2z-7smT9b-7smUbS-7shV2M-7r8M6u-8r7wJD-7Azuyc-7Az31w-7r8NEs-7shSHp-8raDhQ-axnUsb-9NrqCv-9eTjk3-9CVJge-d2kWaA-d2mtKU-9cjLVZ-d2kSnC-dNr3q4-5xcf8h-oYPGyP-9KgmN5-d2k9od-d2kkD5-d2kfnq-d2ksFu-d2mcT1-d2kmGA-dKxnRw-rsRnRG-d2kY4m-d2kPg1-d2kdf5-dNwAN3-d2m7cJ-d2mgm7-dNwvSw-dNutze-dNA5PC-dNr2qH-dNus4R-7smRH3-8r7wsM">Lower Columbia College (LCC)</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>How would you react if you were told that your local public school planned to change the schedule from the traditional Monday-through-Friday model to a schedule that contained four longer school days? Would you worry about long days for young children, their academic accomplishments and, of course, childcare? </p>
<p>Across the US many public school districts have considered the <a href="http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1832864,00.html">option of schedule change</a> as a way to manage budget cuts and reallocations. A surprising number of schools, especially in the western United States, have <a href="http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB20001424052748704869304575104124088312524">adopted</a> just such a policy. In most cases, students in these schools now attend school Monday through Thursday.</p>
<p>Parents can easily imagine that young children would suffer from longer school days. Also, children of all ages could have too many opportunities to forget what they had learned over a three-day weekend. </p>
<p>So, what impact is the four-day-week schedule actually having on student achievement? </p>
<p><a href="http://www.dmarkanderson.com/">Mark Anderson</a>, a faculty member at Montana State University, and I embarked on a <a href="http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1162/EDFP_a_00165#.VgVSMSv0_%E2%80%90s">study</a> to examine the impact of the four-day week on student learning. Our results show a positive impact on student achievement.</p>
<h2>Here’s how we did our study</h2>
<p>When we started, we found only few evaluations of the policy change had been carried out. Furthermore, most evidence was anecdotal and <a href="http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/education/2010-06-04-shorter-school-week_N.htm">simply described</a> the changes in a single district. </p>
<p>We found these descriptions to be unsatisfactory. It allowed for too many other factors that could influence student performance, other than a district’s decision to switch schedules. </p>
<p>For example, if the four-day schedule were adopted in school districts where scores were already going up, the existing trend would confound the effect of the schedule change.</p>
<p>We were not able to do a large-scale experiment whereby we could assign some children to four-day schedules and some others to traditional schedules to examine the impact. But we did the next best thing. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/98703/original/image-20151016-25152-hjvgwd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/98703/original/image-20151016-25152-hjvgwd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/98703/original/image-20151016-25152-hjvgwd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/98703/original/image-20151016-25152-hjvgwd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/98703/original/image-20151016-25152-hjvgwd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/98703/original/image-20151016-25152-hjvgwd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/98703/original/image-20151016-25152-hjvgwd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A four-day week was seen to have a positive impact on reading and math scores.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/departmentofed/9605586109/in/photolist-fCP96B-fCViGz-fCP7mp-fCVjm2-fCViUH-fD6Fkw-fCVjWV-fDcSQy-fCVj8H-fDcWu9-fCViuT-fDcSuw-fCVjQ6-b9x1tT-b9wKpx-b9wtkH-b9wgzH-qBc3K3-8E9YhS-b9w8Yz-b9wtZ8-9AGg8a-mivpf-6aAGF9-3qNkKb-76GVCh-8SMZBJ-jqu2z-c4wwzh-6aAGN3-6aAGsj-dKgYjW-7ZBUHz-6awvTc-6awx5X-6awwsn-6aAGxC-6awvZr-6awvWa-6aAFKC-6aAFbh-6awwGr-6awwiX-6aAFXh-6aAFf1-6aAFjh-6awwYi-6aAG4q-8XwrdT-67NfHY">US Department of Education</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>We gathered data over time for schools that had adopted a four-day week and then we chose a “matched” sample of schools that had stuck with a traditional five-day week. </p>
<p>The schools were “matched” in terms of size and school characteristics, as well as socioeconomic characteristics such as ethnicity and free- and reduced-lunch enrollment. </p>
<p>We could then examine average grade achievement on the state‐mandated tests over a longer period and compare changes in achievement for the four-day-week schools versus the traditional-schedule schools.</p>
<p>In order to avoid the problems in comparing state achievement scores across states, we used data only from schools in Colorado, where over one‐third of the school districts have adopted the four‐day schedule. </p>
<h2>What did we find?</h2>
<p>Our results, based on fifth grade mathematics scores, generally show that achievement rises after the introduction of a four-day week. We found that, even after we take into account the variations due to different socioeconomic levels, the four-day school week is associated with an increased achievement.</p>
<p>We found that, on average, math scores increased by about seven points, meaning that the percentage of fifth graders scoring either proficient or advanced in mathematics went up from about 60% to about 67%, after the schedule change to a four-day week. </p>
<p>These results were statistically significant, meaning there is a very low probability that the results occurred by chance.</p>
<p>The relationship between the schedule change and achievement in reading is also positive, although the increase was smaller. We found scoring proficient or advanced changed from about 66% to about 69%. But in the results for reading, we could not reject the possibility that they occurred by chance.</p>
<p>Overall, we found no evidence that switching to a four‐day week harms student performance.</p>
<p>These results naturally led to speculation on the mechanisms that drove the results. Could teachers be using alternative instruction methods that enhance learning? </p>
<p>Maybe students on a four-day schedule miss fewer days of school; a number of <a href="http://www.nber.org/papers/w2874">prior studies</a> have <a href="http://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ714746">pointed to attendance</a> being a factor in achievement. Or, is it that teachers miss fewer days of school on the alternative schedule?</p>
<p>We did not have enough information in our data to really examine the different possible ways in which the schedule change could improve academic outcomes. Incomplete data on attendance suggested that attendance improved when the schedule was shortened to four days. </p>
<p>But more work would be required on this issue. We also don’t know what is the impact of a four-day week on high schoolers, or how teachers manage this change. </p>
<p>Overall, we believe that the evidence that we found is an important one and should be part of the conversation on education policy.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/48210/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mary Beth Walker does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Some public schools have switched to a four-day school week. What does it change?Mary Beth Walker, Dean of the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/441672015-07-16T04:28:26Z2015-07-16T04:28:26ZWhat it takes to teach a large class – and do it well<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/88226/original/image-20150713-11825-bq3hzo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">It's a little intimidating when all of those chairs are full, but teaching large classes doesn't need to stress you out.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">From www.shutterstock.com</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>You don’t have to suffer from <a href="http://www.glossophobia.com/">glossophobia</a> to hyperventilate at the thought of standing up in front of a large hall full of people. Many university lecturers dread the thought of teaching a large class. That’s because teaching large classes is hard. It can be scary and stressful, and it takes a lot of time and preparation.</p>
<p>Adding to all of that stress, large classes also don’t have a good reputation when it comes to fostering student learning. <a href="https://www.academia.edu/1363546/Introducing_International_Studies_Student_Engagement_in_Large_Classes">We know</a> that students struggle in these contexts to stay engaged, to perform well and to develop important skills like critical thinking. </p>
<p>But large classes are a reality in many developed and developing countries. They form part of the drive towards the <a href="http://www.universityworldnews.com/article.php?story=20120831155341147">massification</a> of higher education. </p>
<p>So what is a “large class”? It can’t be defined by a numerical threshold: instead, it’s a context where student learning is negatively impacted by the number in a class. Large classes have different meanings in different disciplines. A biology class may have more than 800 students before it’s considered “large”, while a sculpture course may be classified as “large” with 20 students.</p>
<p>There are two dominant logics that drive the emergence of large classes in higher education. The first is about efficiency, and suggests that large classes will result in increased <a href="https://www.academia.edu/6182729/Massification_in_Higher_Education_Large_Classes_and_Student_Learning">revenue</a> and decreased costs to the “system”.</p>
<p>The second is a progressive logic which argues that higher education is key to resolving problems of poverty, inequality and economic development. To do this, access to higher education needs <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/poverty-matters/2011/aug/31/consequences-increasing-access-to-education">to be increased</a>.</p>
<p>Neither of these logics places student learning front and centre. Nor do they consider how student learning might be negatively affected. How can we address this?</p>
<p>I don’t think we can solve the challenges of large classes outright – but we can attempt to mitigate their negative effects by adopting strategies that we know are good for student learning and generally good for speaking to large groups. Here are some things that may work, based on research I’ve conducted and <a href="https://books.google.co.za/books/about/Large_class_Pedagogy.html?id=KpT3AwAAQBAJ&redir_esc=y">recently published</a> in book form.</p>
<p>1) Treat your large class like it is a small class. Small classes are great for learning because they allow interaction, discussion and debate. Yet many lecturers actively try to avoid this in large class scenarios. This avoidance is usually justified through concerns about “managing” and “controlling” students. Lecturers argue that a class may become unwieldy if students are allowed to speak. But unwieldiness can be avoided by properly structuring the interaction moment. </p>
<p>2) Integrate problems into the class and get students to figure them out. I start each of my Introduction to International Relations lectures with a problem – usually something that is rooted in a current event. The problem is related to the concepts being discussed that day in class. I get students in my class of more than 400 students to respond to the problem and suggest how to solve it. More than half of the class participates, and it never gets out of control. Such a focused exercise gets them to apply their knowledge and experiences while keeping them connected with the purpose of the lecture.</p>
<p>3) Change your teaching approach every 15 minutes. Students have an average attention span of between <a href="http://teachingcenter.wustl.edu/Journal/Reviews/Pages/student-attention.aspx">ten and 15 minutes</a>. So mix it up a bit. You don’t need to change the subject matter, but change the way it’s presented. I use things like class discussions, YouTube videos and podcasts to deviate from a standard lecture format in the classroom. This keeps students engaged and on topic.</p>
<p>4) Structure assessments to build on each other and make them about responding to problem scenarios. Noticing a theme here? Student engagement and performance in large classes is a big problem. We need to find ways to connect with them, and introducing a practical element to what they are doing can help. Students also need opportunities to learn what is expected from them in terms of assessments. When opportunities for direct guidance from the lecturer don’t exist, like in large classes, we have to find other ways for students to learn from making mistakes. </p>
<p>Structuring assessments to build on each other (some call it <a href="http://www.edutopia.org/blog/scaffolding-lessons-six-strategies-rebecca-alber">scaffolding</a>) is also important. We know that students can adapt to the expectations of our learning environments, but they need opportunities to do so. Continuous assessment allows students to make mistakes and to learn from these without necessarily failing the course. </p>
<p>This adds to your marking load – but even this can be mitigated by adopting different types of assessment approaches. For example, I have two online multiple choice quizzes and three writing exercises. The quizzes are marked automatically online. Great teaching assistants help with the marking of the writing exercises.</p>
<p>5) Don’t be scared to have fun and experiment with different approaches and strategies. Teaching is ripe with opportunities to try different innovations. Some will work and some won’t – and that is OK.</p>
<p>6) Stay positive. Big classes involve lots of different types of students who have different experiences and understandings of the world. Some will be faster than others to get to the conclusions we want. Just remember, though, that if they knew all we do, they wouldn’t need to be in class!</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/44167/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David J Hornsby does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Large classes don’t have a good reputation when it comes to fostering student learning. But there are a few ways for teachers to adapt to bigger classes.David J Hornsby, Senior Lecturer in International Relations & Assistant Dean of Humanities, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/395562015-05-20T10:07:42Z2015-05-20T10:07:42ZStudents cheat for good grades. Why not make the classroom about learning and not testing?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/81928/original/image-20150515-25444-17xya76.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Students' academic goals play an important role in cheating.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/downloading_tips.mhtml?code=&id=81455890&size=huge&image_format=jpg&method=download&super_url=http%3A%2F%2Fdownload.shutterstock.com%2Fgatekeeper%2FW3siZSI6MTQzMTc1MTc4MCwiYyI6Il9waG90b19zZXNzaW9uX2lkIiwiZGMiOiJpZGxfODE0NTU4OTAiLCJwIjoidjF8MTkzNjIzNTl8ODE0NTU4OTAiLCJrIjoicGhvdG8vODE0NTU4OTAvaHVnZS5qcGciLCJtIjoiMSIsImQiOiJzaHV0dGVyc3RvY2stbWVkaWEifSwibDltVTlxWk1uMjc3WkNPd2VLRFpIaGdWQmxVIl0%2Fshutterstock_81455890.jpg&racksite_id=ny&chosen_subscription=1&license=standard&src=tbPt2ayQMHf6OR7zqYPtsg-1-32&el_order_id=">Girl Image via www.shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>We have been hearing stories about academic cheating: from students caught cheating on homework assignments as well as college entrance exams to teachers being caught in cheating scandals, such as the ones in <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/news/atlanta-teachers-cheating/">Atlanta</a>, Georgia, and <a href="http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702303277704579349202004452142">Columbus</a>, Ohio. </p>
<p>Today, <a href="http://www.glass-castle.com/clients/www-nocheating-org/adcouncil/research/cheatingfactsheet.html">between 75% and 98%</a> of college students surveyed each year report having cheated in high school. So, if cheating is happening at that large a scale, is it just inevitable? And can we even blame our students? </p>
<p>In order to figure out how to answer these questions, it’s important to consider why students cheat in the first place. Although the obvious reason seems to be the desire of students to get ahead (eg, to get a good grade, or to avoid a punishment), the real reason is actually a bit more complicated. </p>
<h2>Academic goals matter</h2>
<p>When students do their schoolwork (which includes everything from daily homework assignments to major examinations), they usually have certain goals in mind. These goals vary from one academic task to another. </p>
<p>In other words, if you were to ask a student, “What is your goal in taking next week’s chemistry test?”, the student should be able to tell you what she wants to get out of the experience.</p>
<p>My colleagues and I have been <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0361476X04000232">studying</a> the <a href="http://store.elsevier.com/Psychology-of-Academic-Cheating/isbn-9780123725417/">psychology</a> behind academic cheating for the past two decades, and we have found that students’ goals in their academic tasks are related in very predictable ways to their likelihood of cheating. <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00220970903224636">Research</a> also indicates that teachers and parents can influence those goals, and thus potentially deter cheating.</p>
<p>If the <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1207/s15326985ep4103_1#.VVDk2OsuhxAhttp://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1207/s15326985ep4103_1">sole reason</a> for engaging in an academic task is to get a good grade, then it’s probably easy for a student to justify the act of cheating. </p>
<p>As my colleagues and I <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0361476X04000232">found</a>, some students might have short-term reasons. For instance, for some students, it might be as simple a motivation as the desire to go to a friend’s party on Saturday night. If they think that their parents will not let them go if they fail the test, they might take the easier option to cheat, to be able to go to the party.</p>
<p>For some others, it might be a longer-term reason: They might want a good salary and other luxuries in their adult life and believe that the only path to those things would be a good college. And they might be willing to cheat on their tests to be able to get ahead in their future. </p>
<h2>Students have different goals</h2>
<p>Whereas these reasons may seem selfish and shortsighted to some adults, to many adolescents, who are still unable to consider the consequences of their actions, these goals may seem perfectly reasonable. </p>
<p>We refer to these goals as “extrinsic” goals. Research indicates that students who experience classrooms in which extrinsic goals are common are <a href="http://psycnet.apa.org/psycinfo/1998-00166-007">more likely to cheat.</a> </p>
<p>Clearly, not all students have these goals. Some students are motivated by their desire to learn. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/81929/original/image-20150515-25422-14pcstc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/81929/original/image-20150515-25422-14pcstc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/81929/original/image-20150515-25422-14pcstc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/81929/original/image-20150515-25422-14pcstc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/81929/original/image-20150515-25422-14pcstc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/81929/original/image-20150515-25422-14pcstc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/81929/original/image-20150515-25422-14pcstc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Teachers can create a learning environment that does not motivate students only toward getting good grades.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/cat.mhtml?lang=en&language=en&ref_site=photo&search_source=search_form&version=llv1&anyorall=all&safesearch=1&use_local_boost=1&search_tracking_id=WIzeqySZl9X9C5TdT7-hgA&searchterm=classroom%20teacher&show_color_wheel=1&orient=&commercial_ok=&media_type=images&search_cat=&searchtermx=&photographer_name=&people_gender=&people_age=&people_ethnicity=&people_number=&color=&page=1&inline=144218422">Teacher image via www.shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>So, for some students, the goal might be to truly understand and master the material that is being studied. In other words, whereas some students might have a goal of getting a good grade on a chemistry test in order to get something (eg, to go to a party), others might have the goal of truly learning chemistry: “I want to understand chemistry because I want to develop drugs to help fight cancer; I know that understanding chemistry is essential for me to be successful in this career.” </p>
<p>We refer to these goals as “mastery” goals. Research indicates that students who experience classrooms in which mastery goals are valued and encouraged <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0361476X04000232">are less likely to cheat</a>. </p>
<p>If one thinks about this, it starts to make sense. When students are learning in classrooms where the teacher truly values mastery of the academic content (as opposed to getting a good grade on an assessment), then “cheating” really doesn’t offer any benefits to the students. </p>
<h2>Teachers can help</h2>
<p>The ways in which assessments of student learning are administered are particularly relevant in discussions of academic cheating. If results of assessments ultimately come down to a grade on a test or an assignment (eg, an “A” or an “F”), then students often will come to value the grade more than what they are actually learning. </p>
<p>However, if, in contrast, the assessment truly focuses on a demonstration of mastery of content, then students will focus on mastering that content and not just on getting an “A.” </p>
<p>When students have to demonstrate mastery of material, cheating doesn’t serve much of a purpose – if you truly have to show the teacher that you understand and can apply the information that you learned, then cheating won’t buy you any shortcuts.</p>
<p>Fortunately, there are <a href="http://www.pearsonhighered.com/educator/product/Classroom-Motivation/9780133017885.page">strategies</a> that educators can use to facilitate students’ adoption of mastery goals instead of extrinsic goals. </p>
<p>Here are a few suggestions, based on our <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1207/s15326985ep4103_1">research</a>:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>Make sure that assignments and exams require students to demonstrate mastery of content, as opposed to just requiring the regurgitation of memorized facts.</p></li>
<li><p>When students do not demonstrate mastery on an assignment or a test, allow them to redo the assignment. Educators sometimes don’t think that this recommendation is fair – after all, if one student gets all of the answers right the first time, why should someone else get a second chance? But, if the goal is really to learn or “master” the content, then does it really matter if the student gets a second chance?</p></li>
<li><p>Avoid high-stakes, one-time assessments.</p></li>
<li><p>Always provide students’ grades privately – don’t share results publicly or display distributions of scores; students often will cheat in order to avoid looking “dumb.”</p></li>
</ul>
<p>Ultimately, some students will inevitably cheat. But, by considering why students are doing various academic tasks in the first place and helping them set their “mastery” goals, educators can make a significant dent in the <a href="http://www.glass-castle.com/clients/www-nocheating-org/adcouncil/research/cheatingfactsheet.html">epidemic </a> of academic cheating.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/39556/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Eric Anderman received funding from National Institutes of Health.</span></em></p>Is academic cheating inevitable? Not in classrooms where teachers emphasize mastery of content.Eric M. Anderman, Professor, Educational Psychology, The Ohio State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.