How To Support Student Learning

One of the great tragedies of the modern era is the wonderful research we have on education and how children learn best and the lack of sharing and applying this research that happens in schools, homes, and education departments. The following will explore some of the things we know about how to best support students learning.

Kids Learn Best Through Play

This verdict has been out for a long time, yet it is mostly ignored. Children learn best when they’re playing. This means that directed education involving games and fun activities is the most effective way of guiding kids towards learning. This also means that when we think a kid is doing nothing but goofing off, they’re actually doing a lot. More than we could ever imagine is happening inside the plastic brains of children when they’re making up games.

Children Tend To Learn One Thing At A Time

This is another discovery that has been all but ignored. Kids tend to learn only one thing at a given time. This is why babies who talk early tend not to walk early. When we’re trying to support childhood learning, we need to understand that we can’t rush things and stuff fifteen subjects into one week. Kids need to work through topics with focus, not drilling reading for half an hour and then math for half an hour and then another topic. This isn’t how their brains work. If a kid is developing in one academic subject, progress is happening, and this is a good thing. Shoving another topic into the discussion can slow down this progress.

Beyond this, there are multiple things kids need to learn that aren’t part of the academic curriculum. This research applies to those things too. Sometimes a kid isn’t learning to read on schedule, but they’re learning to share or cooperate or take responsibilities. These learning processes should not be sacrificed for academic aims. 

If this sounds completely foreign to you, take Finland’s literacy as an example. Rather than drilling kids on their alphabet and encouraging reading at a young age, schools in Finland don’t teach reading until age seven. Opting instead to allow more child-directed play and emphasis on learning social skills, Finnish kids are illiterate longer than most other educated children. Despite this, they have the highest literacy rate in the world.

Bridge The Gaps With A Support Program

Given the flip-flop nature of education recently, with students being sent home, called back to school, sent home, and called back again, we can’t blame kids for feeling a bit like the ground on which they stand is unstable. The people behind Positive Action say that programs or systems that are designed to help balance the ever-tipping educational scales can offer students more level ground to stand on. With parents going back to work and back home, schools opening and closing, and general hysteria going on all around, kids need more support than ever. When considering a support program, look for one that understands the role trauma plays in childhood development (make no mistake, just like wars and famines, pandemics cause childhood trauma). You want a program that doesn’t shove depression or anxiety under the rug.

Take Things Outside

For most of human history, the majority of learning happened outside. Our bodies work synergistically with nature to help us calm down and focus. Spending time outside boosts our immune system, lowers symptoms of depression and anxiety, and encourages sensations of psychological transcendence (a term which sounds like hocus pocus but refers to how closely linked a person feels to the world around them). When kids learn in nature, all these factors work together to improve educational outcomes.

Teens Need To Sleep In

Science has been saying this for years, and we’ve been ignoring it for years. Teenager’s circadian rhythms are doing their own thing, coupled with hormones and rapid growth; this means that teenagers sleep differently than babies or kids, or adults. Letting teenagers sleep in and not starting school until later on in the morning can make a huge difference in how much they’re able to learn. It’s heartbreaking really, they’re trying their best to keep up, but every part of their biology is telling them they need to be sleeping at seven in the morning, not rushing to catch the bus.

The above tips should offer you some methods of supporting a child’s learning during this unprecedented time. Of course, every child is different, and this list only means to serve as a jumping-off point. Take the time to listen to children and understand what they’re struggling with. Something that might seem unrelated to learning could be preventing them from giving their full attention to the new information they need to be digesting.