I've often wondered about the impact of rewards on students. Do they help, or make them dependent and decrease intrinsic motivation? In T1 this week, Harry Fletcher-Wood lays out a thoughtful article on this contentious issue.

The concept of ‘interleaving' is a powerful instructional consideration that represents what I think is some of the lowest hanging fruit in terms of improving teaching. T2 shares a recent study showing the INCREDIBLE impact of an interleaving-based intervention, as well as a good summary on how to apply it in your classroom.

T3 explores what it takes for students to successfully study, and T4 considers whether or not retrieval practice is able to produce ‘stress resistant memories', highly relevant for any teachers of students who are facing high-stakes exams.

T5 and T6 are resources you can use if your students are struggling with their calculator use or you want to promote more structured academic discussion respectively.

In THOUGHT SHRAPNEL I share some musings regarding the impact of leaders creating a space for consensus seeking and refer to the work of Neil Mercer, Christine Howe and Viviane Robinson in doing so.

Enjoy!

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Rewarding students, should we? If so, how?, via @hfletcherwood

Interleaving: More evidence of its importance

What it takes for students to successfully study, via @teacherhead

The impact of retrieval practice on stress, via @effortfuleduktr

How to identify student misconceptions when it comes to calculator use, via @mathsjem

Twenty six sentence stems for higher-level conversations in the classroom

Bullying prevention programs: What works, and what doesn't, via @ConversationEDU

How do I know if the multiple choice questions I've set are high quality? via @BenRogersEdu

Taking tiny breaks is key to learning new skills (motor skills), via @ResearchDigest

Do you know the game set? Here's some ways to use it in your maths class, via @nomad_penguin

England's computing curriculum: How not to design a curriculum, via @laurarpinkerton

Fractions, angles, and rotations, an interesting image from Don Steward

*THOUGHT SHRAPNEL* Leadership: The power of seeking consensus

Whilst recently reading Neil Mercer’s book Interthinking I was particularly struck by his reference to the work of Christine Howe (2010) in exploring the impact of seeking consensus to learning in scientific inquiry activities. Here’s a quote from Neil’s book:

It was found that children obtained significantly better results on these delayed tests of learning and understanding when they were asked to seek agreement on their predictions before testing them. Moreover, it did not seem to matter whether agreement was actually reached, or if contrasting views were reconciled. What was important was that seeking agreement was a feature of their group discussions.

To me this was a really powerful finding, how could it be that the simple act of seeking consensus could increase learning? Considering this more, I thought that perhaps it could be a result of the fact that, in order to seek consensus, participants must undertake more exploratory talk, making propositions, justifying ideas, and going deeper into the evidence and beliefs that underlie various claims.

Whilst considering this, I made a link to my recent discussion with Viviane Robinson in ERRR Episode 28.In it, Viviane spoke about the importance of the Engage’ approach to leadership, whereby it is posited that in order to create deep and sustained change, a leader must inquire into the ‘Theories of Action’ that sustain current behaviours of their team members. From there, the leader must create a safe and exploratory space for those theories of action to be uncovered, and tested against alternate theories of action in order to identify how a change initiative that is being implemented can realistically fit with the beliefs and values of all, or be modified or improved such that it is willingly and enthusiastically undertaken.

The parallel was clear, in both cases different ideas, or theories of action, are tabled and openly debated with the goal of reaching consensus. Viviane’s theory made clear to me the importance of engaging with theories of action, and Howe’s work suggests that such an approach, even if consensus isn’t reached, is likely to help all involved to better recall and understand the key points of a proposed action more deeply.

In short, combining the findings of these studies supports the assertion that leadership that promotes clear, open, exploratory discussion is likely to have longer lasting commitment to a course of action, as well as increased learning benefits to those involved.
Week 2.1, 2019

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