Yard Work and Assessment

How does yard work connect to the classroom ... and to assessment?

Quite simply, I need yard work to get me through the school year. Let me explain.

I don't love yard work, yet I really need it. Yard work is good for my soul, like laughter, good conversation, and therapy.  I imagine educators understand what I am talking about ... I need to work for an hour and see immediate progress. In addition to spending time alone with my thoughts and reflecting on the week as I weed a flower bed or mow the lawn, I can look back on my work and enjoy a sense of accomplishment.

I bet most educators need something like yard work; for some teachers, "yard work" is painting or house projects or woodworking or model trains ... something that will provide that instant feedback and satisfaction about their work.

Educators often look negatively at students' need for instant gratification, but this is more of a human characteristic rather than a problem in students. We all need immediate feedback and a celebration of progress, so let's stop complaining about it and embrace it in the classroom.

Assessment is a powerful tool to provide feedback, check progress, and to give a sense of accomplishment for both teachers and students.

We often talk about assessment from the perspective of measuring learning, re-teaching, and guiding further instruction, but, unfortunately, it has degraded into a negative experience for the students. Currently, assessment (testing/grading) is absolutely NOT good for the soul ... in fact, it brings about stress and anxiety for students. But, can assessment ever be good for the soul ... like yard work?

Absolutely! It will take a paradigm shift in many classrooms and school systems, but assessment can be a celebration of learning and a genuine progress check. Instead of being a dreaded part of the school environment, it can be good for the soul for both teachers and students.

Here are a few powerful practices to consider:

1. Focus on the positive and celebrate learning. After teaching high school English for years, what a shift in my classroom culture when I started highlighting great sentences rather than circling (in red ink) mistakes.
2. Assess students more frequently. While this seems counter-intuitive, more assessments lower the stakes of each individual assessment and helps to create a daily classroom rhythm of checking on learning progress.
3. Allow for self-reflection / assessment. Reflection is an important socio-emotional skill, and providing a system/scaffold for students to learn this skill is a true gift.
4. Don't grade formative assessment (other than completion grades). It is amazing the negative impact that grades add to assessment, and the collective sigh of relief when students realize something is not graded (or not graded yet).
5. Provide Meaningful Feedback. Effective feedback takes a ton of teacher/classroom time, but research supports how important feedback is to true learning.

By shifting how we check progress and celebrate learning, assessment can truly become good for the soul!

Beating the Summer Slump

"Summer Slump" is a new educational phrase that refers to the atrophy that happens to the brain over the summer months. This concept is similar to muscle atrophy that happens when a broken leg is in a cast for a few months. The assumption is that the brain grows more during the school year and stops growing during the summer with the conclusion that school helps foster cognitive development. But, the brain is not a muscle ... is Summer Slump a real thing or is it just a term educators invented to self-promote the importance of school?


Clearly, cognitive (brain) development is actively happening during the school year as students attend school daily ... brain growth is one of the primary goals of school.  We have the empirical data to support this. At my school we have students sit for standardized testing each fall and spring; these tests focus on cognitive development, i.e., Reading, Language Usage, Mathematics. Our goal is to increase a student's test score from the fall to the spring during the same academic year, and this goal is often achieved. However, when we look at spring scores from the previous year and the fall scores from the next year (with summer in between), we also often see flat growth or even a decline in student scores. This metric correlates with the concept of "Summer Slump." However, some students have scores that consistently rise at a regular interval regardless of testing after a year of schooling or after a summer away from school. What is different about these students (nature) or their summer behaviors (nurture)?  Can we institute specific summer practices to mitigate summer slump or even facilitate academic growth?

Christie Blazer, an educational researcher has looked at research on summer learning loss, and her findings not only align with the theory of Summer Slump but also point to the importance of academic interventions like going to the library or bookstore for summer reading, "educational" vacations to national parks and museums, and attending summer concerts or cultural events, as ways to reduce learning loss during the summer months.

• Blazer, C (2011). Summer Learning Loss: Why Its Effect Is Strongest among Low-Income Students and How It Can Be Combated.

Some educators use this data to promote year-long schooling (or modified calendars) and summer school programs, but the conclusions seem to point stronger to summer academic interventions than a restructured school calendar.

Recent research has called into question the reality of the Summer Slump, as educational researchers trying to replicate the findings were not able to do so.

• von Hippel, P.T. (2019) Is Summer Learning Loss Real?

I don't know why some students plateau or decline on standardized tests after the summer months and why some scores continue to increase. Clearly, more research needs to happen. One hypothesis (supported by the "Summer Slump" theory) is that academic interventions throughout the summer reduces Summer Slump. Without jumping fully into the Summer Slump debate, I think that we can affirm Christie Blazer's assertions that academic interventions to keep brains active during the summer are beneficial for students.

So ... how can we activate students brains over the summer?

Image from https://marinlibrary.org/whats-summer-slide/

1. Summer Reading - While you may have expected this suggestion, summer reading continues to be one of the best ways to engage our brains. Parents should encourage an "always reading" mentality; students should always have a book that they are reading (and not just during the summer). Most public libraries have summer reading programs for students. To avoid frustration and boredom, utilize Lexile scores (see lexile.com) to find books at both the appropriate reading level and interest for your student.


2. Take Educational Vacations -- Plan your vacation to stop at historical sites, museums, and cultural centers en route or at your destination. No, don't use the term "educational" when talking about your upcoming vacation (you'll probably need to trick them into learning). Of course, we think about a big summer vacation trip, but start small and local. Most cities have small, historical museums that can easily be planned for a Saturday morning visit (ending with a stop at the ice cream shop, of course). Discover your local community; many cities even have walking tours or scavenger hunts ... or make up your own.

How Playing an Instrument Benefits Your Brain

3. Take Music Lessons -- Extra time during the summer can be used to learn a new instrument (or make progress on one that you currently play).  Playing music is one of the most powerful ways to grow your brain ... see this short TEDed video on the brain benefits of music (link in caption).



4. Attend a Summer Camp -- Day or overnight summer camps are often filled with academic interventions, often in non-traditional learning environments/subjects. Many camps have themes and areas of interest to allow students choice and learning enrichment. This is a great way to encourage students to dig deeper into a subject area that they love and experience outside of classroom learning. Of course, this is also an opportunity for Social Emotional Learning as students attend with friends and interact with new people, environments, and social situations.


5. Enroll in a Class -- While this sounds like "summer school" (with all of its negative connotations), many educational organizations offer fun, enrichment classes in non-traditional subjects.  Summer classes today include a wide range of topics: cooking, robotics, fly fishing, photography, or first aid. Students can explore a new hobby or future profession ... definitely a powerful way to pique interest and ignite future learning.

Keeping your brain active is an important thing all summer ... and all year. A summer learning plan can jump start a habit of lifelong learning and continual cognitive development.

As you start summer break ... keep learning!