An Inquiry into Effective Learning Environments Through Humor, Movement, and Student Autonomy Sarah Lloyd Day School Teaching Residency University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education February 4, 2018 Defining Learning and Learning Environments Learning is, fundamentally, the action of retaining new information through experience, instruction, or study that can be used in the future. It can inform the ways in which people react in situations, both new and previously experienced, their interactions with people, and their interpretation of events in the world. Learning can occur in solitary or by cooperation between more than one person. Learning is both a practice of adaptation—ensuring that the person can cope with their environment and different situations—and one of knowledge-building, which is vital for an individual to advance through society, particularly in the professional realm. Simply put, learning is critical for human survival.[1] Humans are innate learners and learn for their whole lives, even if it is not evident to them. From the moment they are born, babies learn who their parents are, the difference between what feels good and what does not, and whether crying will gain attention. Babies learn from their parents about the world around them—the safety of their environment, whether food is readily available, and how their parents might respond to different cries. These new parents, too, learn from their baby—they learn what different cries indicate, how long they can reasonably assume their baby will sleep, and how to be patient with someone who does not understand language just yet. Neither of these parties are particularly aware that they are learning, but the adaptations they make in order to accommodate a new baby or to adjust to a brand new environment outside of the womb are fundamental instances of learning by experience. Learning happens all the time, but humans are not always aware of it. The most obvious learning takes place in schools, where students are actively trying to absorb information that may or may not appear immediately useful to them at the time it is presented. Students learn from teachers, who present the material that the student is required to learn, either by memorization or through the process of making connections between their prior knowledge and the new material that is presented to them. Nakkula and Toshalis describe the ideal relationship between teachers and students as a “meeting of minds,” where the teacher’s intentions, thoughts, and reasoning behind each lesson are transparent to the student and where the student bring their own meaningful effort and attention to the classroom in order to maximize learning.[2] A teacher must be aware of how their students think in order to meet their students in a place that will optimize learning for them—a teacher cannot share their thinking with a student if they do not first attempt to understand the thinking of their students. Collins, Brown, and Holum also emphasize the importance of making learning visible to students the way that apprenticeship had done prior to the institutionalization of mechanization of schooling.[3] The emphasis on making learning visible is fundamentally about creating a relationship between the teacher and the student that emulates that of a master and apprentice, so that learning is personal and intrinsic. This “meeting of minds” has a great deal to do with the environment in which learning takes place. A successful meeting of minds can make for a successful, positive learning environment that is conducive to retention of material. A positive learning environment is one free from unwarranted or unnecessary stress that allows students to achieve to their full potential. An effective teacher also finds ways to create personal relationships with students in order to enhance the learning environment. Benedict Carey suggests that the ways that a student feels during study time or instruction can—and do—have an impact on the amount of information a student retains.[4] This claim is also emphasized by Parker J. Palmer in his book The Courage to Teach, which lists emotional well-being of the student and the teacher as critical components to effective teaching.[5] In effect, a student who feels threatened or uncomfortable in a class will not learn as much as a classmate who does not feel that way. Teachers have a crucial role to play in the way a student feels in a class—a respectful working relationship between students and teachers allow students to make mistakes and feel comfortable doing so, which enhances learning because they are able to confront their uncertainty in a subject area.[6] Effective teachers strive to create a positive and welcoming learning environment in order to support their students’ learning through a variety of tactics, which include using humor, movement, and allowing students autonomy in the classroom. Each tactic can be used to effectively to engage students and maximize retention of material, but each teacher uses these tactics differently, with varying results. There are pitfalls and triumphs that each method has—and there are others, of course, that can be employed—but humor, movement, and student autonomy can contribute greatly to a sound relationship with students that can enhance learning and help students achieve in the classroom. An Investigation into Humor in the Classroom A personal relationship between the teacher and students is one of best ways to ensure that there will be sufficient engagement in the classroom to maximize retention and learning. Teachers play a huge role in students’ emotional and social development, as well as an educational role, so strong relationships are vital to effective learning environments.[7] One facet of a strong relationship is the presence of humor between two people. The ability to joke and engage in humorous activity is indicative of comfort between the two individuals, which enables stronger, more profound bonds to be formed as a result. Mr. Malkus’ senior LGBTQ literature elective is rife with humor, both thrown at the students, but also by the students. There is a comfortable, genuine rapport between Mr. Malkus and the boys from Gilman, as well as girls from Roland Park Country School and Bryn Mawr School who elected to take the coordinated course. The atmosphere is laid back and genuinely funny—Mr. Malkus has a self-deprecating kind of humor that allows all 18 of his students to laugh at him, joking about his age and his apparent ineptitude with the technology in the classroom. The small, intimate classroom ringed with desks is an ideal location for his humor to manifest—everyone can hear him, everyone can see him, and nothing has to be redone or repeated, despite the abnormally large class size. His students also have the liberty to joke with each other and with him; on more than a couple of occasions they were able to throw a few jokes his way, as well. The jokes all around are witty, with more than a hint of sarcasm and it is obvious that the humor is genuine for everyone. Mr. Matthews’ freshman history class that studies world cultures and globalization also incorporates humor, but very differently from Mr. Malkus’ class. While Mr. Malkus’ humor is reciprocal, Mr. Matthews most often uses his quick wit and sarcasm to help point out to the boys in his class when they have misspoken, made an unfair assumption, or need to change something. Boys leaning back in their chairs will often be greeted with a salutation of “Captain Kickback,” which is his cue to put all four feet of the chair back on the ground. Sarcastic, rhetorical questions also feature heavily in Mr. Matthews’ arsenal to bring boys back to the topic at hand. Oftentimes, it is also situational humor—Mr. Matthews inserts himself into the boys’ conversations before class in order to help develop the relationship between them. The boys respond favorably to Mr. Matthews, making an effort to include him in discussions about which restaurant is better: Red Robin or Olive Garden.[8] In both instances, humor is used as a tool to connect with the students and to alleviate some of the stress that might come with stepping into a classroom where hard work is required of them. Nakkula and Toshalis emphasize the need for joy in a classroom and the responsibility of educators to foster that joy within their students[9], which humor encourages. Not only does humor foster a lower-stress environment when used correctly, but it can also contribute to the actual act of learning. Carey argues that situations that one might consider memorable produce situational learning—contextual clues often help a student remember a piece of information.[10] If a student can place a particular instance or event with information they need, they are more likely to recall it during a testing situation than if they information was given in a vacuum or mundane atmosphere. This logic suggests that a student might remember a piece of information vital to the upcoming test better if there was a particularly memorable event that occurred in the same instance or very near to the giving of that piece of information, such as a joke or situational laughter. Understanding the connection between learning and humor is fundamental to responsibly using humor in the classroom to foster an effective learning environment for every student. An Investigation into Movement in the Classroom Mr. Matthews’ freshman history class of 13 boys, arranged in two rows of desks facing the whiteboard at the front of the classroom, is silently writing a journal entry for the last fifteen minutes of class. Mr. Matthews himself is circling the room—not unlike a bird of prey, waiting to perceive a weakness in its prospective prey—watching intently as the boys write. He weaves in between the desks, looking over the shoulders of the students to see what they are writing. Some boys sit there with blank stares on their faces until they realize Mr. Matthews is moving in their general direction. This realization pushes their pens into action and they begin to furiously write on their page, pretending that they have been writing the whole time.[11] Boys who were not paying attention received more visits from Mr. Matthews than those who were more on task for more of the time, but each student experienced proximity to their teacher. He utilizes what Doug Lemov terms the “circulating model”, to bring his students back to the task at hand.[12] Earlier in the class period, it was the students themselves who moved. Asked to group together with people next to whom they do not sit, the students physically had to move around the classroom to discuss the reading from the previous night. When they had collaborated on the answers to questions that they had been given, they were required to go up to one of the many whiteboards that line the room and write bullet points on the board to answer the question. This changed the mood of the classroom, which had been fairly lethargic before. Suddenly the boys were laughing and talking with each other, as well as really starting to think about the material they had covered. Mr. Matthews was also moving around the classroom during this activity, but this movement was more to keep tabs on where each group was in the work instead of to keep them directly on task. His class spanned the whole gamut of movement, which made the classroom literally more dynamic. Mr. Malkus’ classroom, on the other hand, was not quite as dynamic. Perhaps this has something to do with the size of the physical space—Mr. Malkus’ LGBT Lit classroom is much smaller and very differently arranged than Mr. Matthews’ freshman history classroom, so the physical space for movement is more limited. But the nature of the class is different as well—the class is focused more by discussion than by lecture-like instruction. Group work, however, does still exist. While Mr. Malkus did not do much moving around the space, his students did, and even had the freedom to leave the classroom during a group work exercise. Students chose to sit on the floor and bring desks together as well, dynamically changing the space for the better part of 20 minutes. During this time, Mr. Malkus was static, seated at his desk at the top of the circle of desks, quietly observing the work that was being done. The differences in use of movement may have two factors—the age of the students and the preferences of the teacher. Some teachers will move more than others, some lessons—such as group work—are more conducive to movement than others, such as lectures, which have been studied for efficacy based on the perceived distance between the teacher and the students.[13] Movement is emphasized as a way of bridging that gap and creating a proximity that is productive for learning. Effective teachers, according to Lemov, “break the plane”—or the imaginary line of the classroom where the desks start—in order to add energy to the classroom, but also to make the students aware that the teacher is in control of this space.[14] Different ages require different methods of movement and different teachers use movement differently to interact with their students. Mr. Matthews teaches freshman who require much more monitoring during silent or group work than Mr. Malkus’ seniors, who have matured enough to know how to take notes, do work independently, as well as work with their classmates in a productive way. For younger students, the proximity of a teacher has been linked to increased attention and diligence during a specific task, which Lemov emphasizes to help “to stress accountability and eliminate behavior problems.”[15] This is especially effective with younger students who are less capable of regulating their emotions and priorities than older students, as outlined by Nakkula and Toshalis in their discussion of Erikson’s model of human development. Organizing skills and values is a core dilemma for adolescents, who exist in the fifth stage of Erikson’s development model.[16] Mr. Malkus’ movement is less about monitoring his students—who are seniors—and more about creating proximity and effective conversations between himself and his students. Both teachers allow their students to move, which Collins, Brown, and Holum argue facilitates student exploration and is linked to student autonomy, which often plays hand-in-hand with movement.[17] An Investigation into Student Autonomy In both classrooms that have been previously discussed in this paper, student autonomy factors into each and every lesson. Group work was a common theme for both teachers, who emphasized the need for collaboration while working with a text or a topic. Collins, Brown, and Holum stress the need for a “community of practice,” in which the students engage with material through shared experiences and communication with others.[18] A community of practice exists when teachers allow students to actively engage with one another in a way that “exploits cooperation”—working together in a way that fosters cooperative problem solving.[19] Mr. Malkus allowed his students a good bit of autonomy in an English class during which they were encouraged to work in groups for thirty minutes to discuss and ultimately come back with a presentation on a significant passage from the book. Students were given the liberty of leaving the classroom with the goal of finding a quieter place to work on the assignment, and some students left the room, while others gathered on the floor or in the desks, but all had the wherewithal to begin working after the initial instructions were given and Mr. Malkus rarely had to walk over to reorient a group back towards the goal of the assignment. He explained that he allows his seniors more freedom and autonomy than he would with his freshman class because they have matured to a point where they are capable of taking ownership of the material on which they work. Mr. Matthews’ freshmen boys were also given autonomy, but it was more strictly regulated. This autonomy was presented as options for a short research project that they would conduct throughout the class. The boys were given the choice between four topics that related to the overarching theme of the unit and then had to do some guided research through the school’s databases. This allowed the boys to choose something that they felt interested in, while also making sure that they would still be on task for the duration of the assignment. Rick Stiggins, whose study into formative assessments explained the difference between assessments that rank students and assessments that gather information for student-specific learning, explains that large contributors of student success are “confidence, optimism, and persistence,” which come when students take ownership of their work.[20] Autonomy gives students a way of personalizing their work—the see it as their own, rather than something that their teacher is making them do. Mr. Matthews’ class is in the beginning stages of receiving autonomy—it is scaffolded for them in the form of choices between a set number of options that are carefully monitored and regulated. They receive coaching—Mr. Matthews observes his students while they perform the tasks and offers hints, support, guidance, and modeling in order to help them achieve the desired outcome—and direction from their teacher on what is an acceptable choice within the framework of unit and complete it with as little assistance as they can.[21] The students in Mr. Malkus’ class had received that scaffolding earlier in their careers and are now able to use what they learned through that coaching and scaffolding to work on their own and take ownership of their work. The quality of their work becomes higher because the students care about it personally. Conclusions Humor, movement, and student autonomy are just three of hundreds of methods used in a classroom to create a positive and effective learning environment. Ultimately, the efficacy of the learning environment depends on the different teaching methods and tools’ interactions with each other and the skills of the teacher at employing them. Different teachers have different teaching styles—the implementation of teaching styles and techniques relies as much on the individual teacher as it does the situation in the classroom. Situational factors include the age of the students, physical space of the classroom, and the goal of the instruction. What works for a senior class, such as Mr. Malkus’ LGBT Literature, may not work for a class of freshmen, such as Mr. Matthews’ World Cultures class. Mr. Malkus’ class of seniors was able to handle more nuanced humor than the freshmen in Mr. Matthews’ class, most likely because of the maturity gap between the two. While three years does not seem like much of a gap for adults, the rapid development of adolescents means that seniors are more interpsychologically and interpersonally developed than freshmen—not only are they more relationally skilled when it comes to social interactions, but their own cognitive reasoning skills are higher than their freshmen counterparts.[22] Their brains are more developed, which means that they are able to process some types of humor—such as self-deprecation, dry wit, and sarcasm—more quickly and accurately than younger students. By contrast, Mr. Matthews must use more situational humor to engage with his freshmen class. Their brains are not yet adept enough to fully understand or appreciate more nuanced types of humor, so settling for slapstick-esque jokes is one way that Mr. Matthews can keep his class engaged with the material and create a welcoming environment for learning. The power of humor as a tool is evident—laughing students are happy students and happy students are students who will engage with material and their teacher.[23] Movement, too, must be situational. Mr. Malkus’ smaller, more intimate classroom called for less movement than Mr. Matthews’ larger, more expansive classroom. The physical arrangement of Mr. Malkus’ class—desks arranged in a circle so that everyone can see everyone else—does not necessitate the movement of Mr. Matthews’ classroom, in which all of the desks are arranged in two rows that face the board. Most movement for both teachers is to maintain the focus of the students and to keep tabs on what the students are doing, particularly during independent or group activity. It also allows the teacher to “break the plane” between the students and the perceived no-go-zone of the board area. A teacher’s movement can help facilitate productivity of the students and student movement can encourage different methods of learning. Of course, moving in and around the students allows for instances of humor and bonding between them and their teacher. Student autonomy is situational when it comes to the goal of instruction. Students must be scaffolded through the eventual granting of freedom—for the same reason that younger students do not quite understand more nuanced humor than older students, they are also not quite able to self-regulate well-enough to complete work in a manner that is both productive and educational. Allowing younger students options for research topics, methods of relaying their newly acquired knowledge, and note-taking methods as Mr. Matthews does creates a sturdy foundation for tasks that come along when they are older, such as Mr. Malkus’ charge to work in small groups with minimal invasion from him for thirty minutes. Giving students autonomy and choice fosters ownership and true investment in learning and education. Ultimately, giving students autonomy allows them to recognize their own learning and learning processes.[24] The crux of the matter is that learning occurs in positive, encouraging, and effective environments that are created by caring and skillful teachers. A teacher cannot rely solely on one method of engagement and expect for their students to succeed; rather, they must employ a number of teaching skills in order to create the most effective and learning-inducing environment possible. Humor, movement, and student autonomy are only three of the countless number of methods that can be used to help student achieve their full potential. Each method builds off of the others in a way that, when done correctly, can create classroom environments that are the most positive they can be. References and Bibliography: Black, Paul, et. al. “Working Inside the Black Box: Assessment for Learning in the Classroom,” SAGE Journals, (September 2004): 9-21. Carey, Benedict. How We Learn: The Surprising Truth About When, Where, and Why it Happens. New York: Random House, 2014. Collins, Allan, John Seely Brown, and Ann Holum. “Cognitive Apprenticeship: Making Thinking Visible.” American Educator (Winter, 1991): 1-18. Lemov, Doug. Teach Like a Champion 2.0: 62 Techniques that Put Students on the Path to College. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2015. Nakkula, Michael J. and Eric Toshalis. Understanding Youth: Adolescent Development for Educators. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Education Press, 2015. Observations from Brooks Matthews’ World Cultures class, Jan. 4, Jan. 12, and Jan. 22. Observations from Larry Malkus’ LGBT Literature class, Jan. 5, Jan. 17, and Jan. 24. Overoye, Acacia L. and Bejamin C. Storm. “Harnessing the Power of Uncertainty to Enhance Learning.” Translational Issues in Psychological Science 1, no. 2 (2015): 140-148. Palmer, Parker. The Courage to Teach. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2003. Paul, Annie Murphy. “Are College Lectures Unfair?” New York Times Sunday Review, Sept. 12, 2015. Stiggins, Rick. “From Formative Assessment to Assessment FOR Learning: A Path to Success in Standards-Based Schools. Phi Delta Kappan 87 no. 4 (Dec. 2005): 324-328. [1] Parker J. Palmer, The Courage to Teach (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2007), 3. [2] Michael J. Nakkula and Eric Toshalis, Understanding Youth: Adolescent Development for Educators (Cambridge: Harvard Education Press, 2015), 8-9. [3] Allan Collins, John Seely Brown, and Ann Holum, “Cognitive Apprenticeship: Making Thinking Visible,” American Educator 15, no. 3 (Winter, 1991): 1-5. [4] Benedict Carey, How We Learn: The Surprising Truth About When, Where, and Why It Happens (New York: Random House, 2014), 47. [5] Parker, 2007, 5. [6] Acacia L. Overoye and Benjamin C. Storm, “Harnessing the Power of Uncertainty to Enhance Learning,” Translational Issues in Psychological Science 1, no. 2 (2015): 145. [7] Nakkula and Toshalis, 2015: 251. [8] Mr. Matthews insists that this comparison is not valid because it pits a burger joint against a chain Italian restaurant, which, according to him, exist in two different realms. [9] Nakkula and Toshalis, 2015: 226-227. [10] Carey, 53. [11] Mr. Matthews is very well aware that these kids have, in fact, not been writing the whole time. [12] Doug Lemov, Teach Like a Champion 2.0: 62 Techniques That Put Students on the Path to College (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2015): 183-185. [13] Annie Murphy Paul, “Are College Lectures Unfair?”, The New York Times (New York), September 12, 2015. [14] Lemov, 184. [15] Lemov, 183. [16] Nakkula and Toshalis, 2015: 19-20. [17] Collins, Brown, and Holum, 14. [18] Collins, Brown, and Holum, 16. [19] Collins, Brown, and Holum, 16. [20] Rick Stiggins, “From Formative Assessment to Assessment FOR Learning: A Path to Success in Standards- Based Schools,” Phi Delta Kappan 84, no. 4, Dec. 2005: 326. [21] Collins, Brown, and Holum, 14. [22] Nakkula and Toshalis, 2015: 51-54. [23] Lemov, 444. [24] Paul Black et. al. “Working Inside the Black Box: Assessment for Learning in the Classroom,” SAGE Journals, September 2004, 16.
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