December 2003
In this month's newsletter we lay down the law on sleeping, give you some bad news and some good news, hear a Tale of Two Schools and share some correspondence. Don't forget to visit our re-vamped website.
A nation of sleepyheads
Recent studies conducted by scientists in Israel showed that losing an hour of sleep a night can have a noticeable effect on a child's learning performance. Dr Irshaad Ebrahim, a consultant sleep physician, says the study reflected just how hectic children's lives were in the information age. He said it was important that children went to bed at a predictable time so that their bodies got used to a regular routine.
Children are now falling asleep to television shows, computer games or videos. Over half of the parents surveyed as part of the research said their children had televisions in their bedrooms. Up to two-thirds of children in the UK are not getting enough sleep. By the time a child reaches their seventh birthday, they have missed out on as much as 4,500 hours sleep compared with recommended levels. One in eight children actually sleep less than the amount recommended for adults.
Among children whose parents are out of work the figure is one in four. The research also found that one in 10 of the 500 parents surveyed admitting that they had never read their children a bedtime story.
Professor Jim Horne, of Loughborough University, an expert in sleep deprivation, said: "Bedrooms are changing from place of rest and tranquillity to places where there are lots of things to keep children awake, such as computers and televisions.
"I would not allow a child to have a television or a computer in their bedroom or at least place firm limits on their use."
Scientific evidence shows that adequate night-time sleep is just as important as healthy eating and regular exercise for children to develop and become better learners.
It is believed that sleep deprivation may harm neurological development and can contribute to school-related problems including attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
How much sleep does your child need to become a good learner?
Age two: 13 hours ( actually get 12 hours)
Age three: 12 hrs (10.5 hrs)
Age four: 12 hrs (10 hrs)
Age five: 11 hrs (10 hrs)
Age six: 11 hrs (10 hrs)
And as if that wasn't bad enough…
A study, presented to a conference at the Royal Society in London earlier this year, found that people with a low sense of self worth are more likely to suffer from memory loss as they get older, and their brains were more likely to shrink compared with those who have a high sense of self esteem.
Dr Sonia Lupien of McGill University in Montreal surveyed 92 senior citizens
over 15 years and studied their brain scans. It was found that the brains of those with low self-worth were up to a fifth smaller than those who felt good about themselves. These people also performed worse in memory and learning tests.
However, Dr Lupien believes that if those with a negative mind set were taught to change the way they think they could reverse their mental decline:
"This atrophy of the brain that we thought was irreversible is reversible - some data on animals and some data on humans shows that that if you enrich the environment, if you change some factors this brain structure can come back to normal levels"
Researchers are studying which psychological treatments work best. According to Dr Felicia Huppert of Cambridge University, the early signs are that fairly simple techniques can have an enormous impact:
"There are interventions which talk about focusing on positive things in everyday life and savouring good moments even at times when life is difficult little tiny things may give you pleasure so there are skills involved in how to derive pleasure from the ordinary things in life".
Your worrying days are over! Join the fight to get onto the Alite Making it Happen Programme, launched for the first time in January and designed to help build a strong sense of worth.
A Tale of Two Schools
Maureen Cain describes her role as Headteacher of two schools.
In July of 2002 I was asked by the Local Authority to become the Acting Headteacher of a school placed in Special Measures following an Ofsted Inspection. My major challenge was to motivate all the staff, giving them a sense of belief in themselves and a greater understanding of purposeful teaching for learning.
There were some similarities between my own school, Newchurch and Burtonwood and parents at both schools were supportive. At Newchurch, they had high aspirations for their children and were keen to engage in discussions with teachers regarding their children's attainment. However, whilst Burtonwood's parents were supportive, the school tended to be the one they had attended as children and expectations were related to their own childhood experiences.
School One
When I began at Burtonwood we had implemented many of the ALPS recommendations into my own school. We had been using them for a year as a whole school when I was awarded a Best Practice Research Scholarship (BPRS) for a project to trial AL strategies to motivate under-achievers. Together with two other teachers who were using the strategies to good effect in their classroom, I examined the effect of mind-mapping, pole-bridging and visualisation on the group. We used self-esteem questionnaires at the beginning and end of the project and used children's interviews of themselves as learners and of their belief in their ability to learn through mind-mapping to support the findings. It was a very worthwhile project, which yielded excellent results.
At Newchurch, I needed to encourage colleagues to step outside their comfort zone and consider new possibilities for their teaching.
Not long after beginning the work at Newchurch we held an evening for parents to describe the methods we were using. I gave an introduction and overview before the teachers each explained what they were doing differently in their classrooms.
Again, it was an edge of the comfort zone event for them, but it was excellent that we were all delivering and listening to the same coherent message Now it is not unusual to hear teachers talking to parents about how best they could support their children at home using positive affirmations and strategies to build self-esteem. Since the introduction of the new techniques, I have experienced the growth of the teachers as they began to talk with confidence about the different styles of learning and the strategies they would use to teach to those differing styles. These methods were reaching out to all learners in the wider community and were raising our communal level of emotional intelligence.
Chapter 2 - School Two
I felt very strongly that these methods, ideas and practices used in one school successfully, would transfer equally well to another and provide a strong vehicle for change by raising awareness of teaching and learning and, ultimately, whole-school development. I believed that a whole-school approach to teaching and learning, guided by the ALPS programme, was the way forward. This programme would improve the culture of the school by refreshing and renewing teachers' interest in their profession and their desire to improve educational provision for all learners, children, teachers, teaching assistants and parents. At a variety of levels and with a variety of dynamics, it would provide the catalyst for change.
We also needed a language for common usage, so that in all meetings and discussions about children and the curriculum we could share the same words and phrases and have a shared understanding of the concepts. This language would include using positive affirmations of the children and their learning, the language of different learning styles and the language of different methods for teaching, giving feedback, mind-mapping, physical breaks, pole-bridging, visualisation, etc.
Starting the two-term placement I became aware of the level of under-performance that was generated unwittingly throughout the school. A major reason for this was the lack of informed leadership and opportunities for staff to experience new ideas to share with others. I knew that the teachers were all hardworking but were not all aware of new developments in education and had not been encouraged to improve their practice.
Chapter 3 - Starting the Ascent/Assent
In October, the month after I had started, I presented the ALPS model to the teaching staff only. I wanted them to feel confident and comfortable about introducing new ideas to their classes before the teaching assistants came on board. Although they were overwhelmed with new materials and resources which they were obliged to assimilate, I presented this new programme as a model of effective primary practice which would seem very familiar to them. It was introduced not as something new, but as a programme that would build on the practices they were already using. When I began describing some of the methods there were some nods of recognition and comments along the lines of "I do that in my classroom". I was able to give the programme credibility, as I had already introduced many of the practices into my school with great success, particularly with reluctant learners.
I started the programme of development with VAK. Because of my NLP training I focused very much on the need to address these different learning styles and so emphasised their importance for every lesson. In my own school, the use of VAK is shown in every teacher's weekly plans. I also emphasised giving the big picture and the importance of chunking information. Much emphasis was placed on mind-mapping, which, it was stressed, was a useful tool for reviewing especially.
I wanted to support the teachers by recognising their value, not just as teachers, but also as people with the potential to raise their game. This would be the method through which they would be coached; it would sit alongside all curriculum development, under-pinning and reinforcing their own good practice. It would also provide a whole-school culture of positive and achievable goals.
Chapter 4 - Making Progress
All members of the teaching staff had been provided with the ALPS resource book and given sections to read in preparation for the staff meetings. This was a method I had used successfully before, identifying certain passages which could be discussed for implementation throughout the school. All the ideas were to be seen through the eyes of the children in each year group, so staff would come prepared for the meeting not only with the theory, but also with their ideas for implementation.
I was aware of a real turning point at Burtonwood one day during a staff meeting where everyone had been given the section to read on twenty positive strategies. It was thrilling to listen to them sharing their good practice with each other with a confidence that was a delight to witness. There was much laughter and encouragement of each other, and the energy and synergy at that meeting was tangible.
Progress could also be seen in the re-framing of situations to give them a positive slant. "I can see you are just about to sit properly," for example, had a noticeable effect on some children's behaviour. Again my NLP work has contributed to discussions about reframing and positive messages to improve self-esteem.
I am particularly pleased that they are taking on all the ideas of positive language to affect behaviours as if they are their own. The change in language has happened on a multitude of levels in both schools. Discussions in the staffroom are more professional, as everyone talks about VAK learning, mind-maps and visualisation. They talk about giving the big picture and reviewing.
Teachers at both Newchurch and Burtonwood are involved in the process of school self-evaluation and, in their roles as subject leaders, are observing how these lessons are being taught. The Science co-ordinators in both schools have been thrilled at the greater attention paid to allowing children to hypothesise with each other, think for themselves and design their own experiments.
Evaluation sheets were used with the teachers at the end of the first term and with teaching assistants at the end of the two terms. Comments from the evaluations were fed back at staff meetings and SMT meetings for development opportunities.In both schools my own classroom observations would often focus on the teacher's use of AL strategies to support all learners. Teachers knew what I wanted to see so they made sure I saw it. I set the expectation that VAK should be apparent in every lesson and teachers needed to think carefully about how this would happen.
Epilogue
Although I have now returned to Newchurch I expect the momentum and expectations that have built up in Burtonwood to continue in my absence.
Accelerated Learning has reinvigorated the staff and injected enthusiasm back into everyone's learning. The ALPS model has given the teachers of both schools a new framework for improvement within which they can discuss classroom environments, the classroom culture and ethos, and also their own pedagogical skills. All curriculum development and training is now set within the context of 'what will make this a good learning experience for all the children and what do I want them to achieve?' And that must be good for everyone involved in the learning.
To read the full version of Maureen's case study, see Alite 2003 Making it Happen, the book packed with case studies from Alite's annual conference, or visit the website at www.alite.co.uk.
English as an Additional Language
Aretha Campbell, EMA Consultant for North East Lincolnshire LEA is looking for any information regarding the effectiveness of accelerated learning projects in schools with children who speak English as an Additional Language. Email Aretha on Aretha.Campbell@Nelincs.Gov.Uk
Learning via the Co-Op
Mottram St. Andrew Primary School in Cheshire asked their staff to re-consider their reasons for grouping. Two members attended training on Co-operative Learning. This took place in Disneyland in Florida and was run by Spencer Kagan. The focus is on the how of teaching children and adults to interact and learn with and from each other. The school are now embedding these structures into our every day practice. The children report
"I like working together because I can remember things more."
"It makes learning fun."
"It's fair - everybody gets the chance to talk and share ideas."
The approaches have rejuvenated teaching and learning at Mottram St. Andrew.
Team Roles
Heidi Knight at Selwyn Junior School, London is currently teaching Year Three pupils and has been working on emotional intelligence issues with them through the School Citizenship programme. Heidi liked the clarity of team / group roles in our last newsletter and has adapted the titles and roles in order to use these with younger pupils as group guidelines. Heidi also makes a form of 'place' card with the team roles, so that these could be kept close to hand while the children are learning to use the roles. She promises to get back in touch if anything amazing or tragic happens!
NLP in the far north
Janice Simpson is pleased to read of new techniques being used in teaching from our newsletter and particularly those connected with NLP. She says,
"I am a mathematics teacher at Buckie Community High School in the North east of Scotland and am also an NLP practitioner. I am fortunate to have a headteacher who is very supportive of anything that may enhance pupils' learning and enjoyment of education. To this end we have many initiatives ongoing in school - all S1 pupils are 'tested to establish any particular bent towards one learning style ( I oversee this process) ; senior students attend sessions (prior to exams) in the hall, which is set up in exam mode, where I teach them the learning state and anchor positive resource states to the exam situation; I am currently running a series of after school NLP sessions for 18 staff where we are learning communication and language skills that will enable us to become better communicators…. We are a school that is heading in the right direction towards better learning and we would be very happy to share this with other likeminded teachers."