Tag Archives: close reading

Paying Attention Is Learned Not Innate

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Mark Twain wrote, “In America, we hurry… what a robust people, what a nation of thinkers we might be, if we would only lay ourselves on the shelf occasionally and renew our edges!” (Following the Equator, 1897) Thinking and considering a topic takes time. However, we are quick people.” Twain was writing about the quickening of the American attention span 130 years ago. If being in a hurry was true for Twain in the 1890s, we are in a mega-hurry today. In the last two decades, the average human’s attention span decreased from 12 seconds to 8.25 seconds. Gen Z’s attention span is a little less than eight seconds!

Average attention span

What does this mean for educators? We either must learn to talk and teach faster or learn how to increase the attention span of the children we teach.

What do we know?

First, we know that educating children does not live in a vacuum; teaching and learning are influenced by our greater culture. A child’s attention span at home and at play is the attention span they bring to school. As we watch children at school when they are not engaged in teaching and learning, they clearly live in micro-moments of conversation and activity. Like honeybees, children flit from one activity to the next, often in no discernible order. If busy is a child’s nature, children are nurtured by a parenting culture that purposefully keeps them busy.

At school, part of their hurry before, during, and after school is caused by a school day that does not give them down time. There is barely enough time for toilet stops and nutrition as we shuffle them on and off buses, from classroom to classroom, and to a lunch break with more time standing in line than eating. Organizationally, we literally chase children through a school day.

Why, then, are we surprised when these same children lose interest in school assignments? Why do we frown when they look up and fidget two minutes into reading three, four, or five pages of material? Why do we feel agitated when constantly repeating to students “now, pay attention, please!”  We know the answers. Too often, schoolwork does not match children’s attention spans, and we do not teach children to extend their abilities to pay attention.

Second, we know that an attention span is a real phenomenon. By definition, attention span is the length of time an individual can concentrate on one specific task or other other item of interest.”

APA definition

Is an attention span important for life and learning? You bet it is. “Attention span is a crucial cognitive function that influences our ability to focus, learn, and accomplish tasks. As we progress through various stages of life, our attention span undergoes significant changes, influenced by diverse factors such as brain development, environmental influences, and individual differences. Understanding these changes can help us optimize our learning and productivity at different ages.”

Attention Span by Age

Third, we know that attention spans change. A person’s attention span naturally develops over time. Infants to age three have rapid-fire attention spans, ranging from a few seconds to several minutes. Their entire environment engages them simultaneously and they do not focus on isolated things for long. Children from birth to age three hear, see, and do many things for the first time and all their world is exciting and stimulating.

Early childhood children grow their attention spans to between five and fifteen minutes in duration. However, they also can be easily distracted. Play-based instruction helps young children to piggyback learning onto their play and use play to learn.

Children in the primary and intermediate ages continue to lengthen their attentions spans. As a generalization, they add five minutes of attention span each year in this age group. By the age of ten, children can focus for up to thirty minutes.

Adolescence is troublesome for children to focus attention. “Raging” hormones, social interactions, and technology can interrupt their focus. On their good days, teenagers typically focus for extended periods of one to several hours. But there are days and times when they cannot.

The demands of schooling contradict what we know about paying attention.

If the speed of a school day is a problem, so are the curricular demands we place on teaching and learning. From the get-go, every grade level and subject area course has more curriculum than can be taught in a school year. After 55 years working with teachers, I am not aware of a single teacher who ran out of assigned curriculum to teach before the last day of school. School curriculum is the proverbial ten pounds of learning in a five-pound bag.

Additionally, we never diminish curriculum; we only add more to it. Everyday and every year adds new history, new science, new literature, and new topics deemed as important for children to learn. Have you ever been to a school board meeting where an agenda item was decreasing what would be taught and learned? Never happens.

It is no wonder that paying attention is so difficult when we do not present an attentional education.

Can we grow a child’s attention span?

Knowing the above, can educators help children to increase the quantity and quality of their attention span so they can learn better in school and in life? Yes, we can.

There are numerous tangentials we can manipulate to increase our students’ span of attention

  1. Physical activity. Before requiring children to concentrate, provide them with a stretching or in-place exercise to relieve their need for physical action and make ready for mental activity. Five to 15 minutes of body movement is good preparation for larger amounts of concentration. And insert physical action breaks purposefully between mental activities. Break up learning into chunks and insert physical activity between chunks.
  2. Attention exercises. Teach children what “paying attention” looks and acts like. Have children sit or stand appropriately so they physically are prepared to concentrate. Create mental exercises, like jumping jacks for the brain. Give them material to read or problems to solve. Start a timer and instruct them to focus their attention on reading or finding solutions. Stop the timer after a predetermined time and ask children to describe their concentration and what it felt like to concentrate. Repeat by increasing the time.
  3. Work within time framed expectations for children of different ages. As a rule of thumb, expect children to concentrate on one task for two to five minutes per their years of age. For example, 10 to 25 minutes for a five-year-old and 12 to 30 minutes for a six-year-old. For practical purposes, start all children at the beginning of their age time frame. Within these frames, identify which five-year-olds can focus for 10 minutes and which can focus for up to 25 minutes. Over time, focus activities to increase all children of the same age towards the upper end of their time frame.
  4. Remove visual distractions. For children struggling with their concentration, remove visual clutter. The only thing on a child’ desk or table should be what the item for their focus. As children need other materials and resources, provide them in their order of need. Keep brains focused on the task at hand not looking at stuff not yet needed.
  5. Keep classroom walls and spaces quiet. Bright and colorful and detailed posters and signs draw their peripheral vision and then their attention. Older children with stronger attention spans can handle busier environments.
  6. Use memory exercises. Integrate card, board, and on-screen games that require children to remember facts, chronology, and variations in details. Children today are gamers so game their brains with knowledge and skill building games. All games, however, should involve competition against the learning outcomes, how much a child can do and how well, not against other children.
  7. Have each child rate the challenge of their assignments and keep  track of the rating and where the child begins to lose focus. Children quit engaging in activities they label as hard and too hard. Use their self-ratings to provide each child with an appropriate challenge. As they succeed incrementally, their attention span for sticking with a challenging activity will grow.

https://www.edutopia.org/discussion/7-ways-increase-students-attention-span

Emphasize study to increase attention to study.

The root definition of “student” in verb form means “to study.” A student is a person engaged in study for the purpose of learning. To keep students, busy in school, we assign them an abundance of “doing” tasks and connote the doing of the task with learning. Children do a lot of reading and a lot of math without really knowing how to read for learning or how to learn from the math they do. Decrease the “doing” by increasing the “learning.”

  • Read with academic purpose. The trend in school is to have students read sections or abbreviated editions of texts not whole texts or content-rich editions. We think we do this to keep their attention, but the outcome is minimized learning AND minimized attention. At the end of the assignment, they do not know and understand deeply. They achieve less learning because we settle for less in our assignments.
  • Teach close reading. Or focused and strategized reading. We know reading is not an innate act for humans. We speak and hear innates, but we read and write only through learning how to read and write. So, teach children to read more intensely. With the right reading tools, their attention to reading and learning from their reading will increase.
  • Successive readings. Teach children to read a text assignment three times. Seems like redundancy, but each reading is different. Read first for main ideas and structure. Read second for specific details, vocabulary, and structure of the text. English lit is not biology and biology is not history. Each uses different words and structures for using those words. Read a third time for conclusions – this is what I know now.
  • Active reading. Teach children how to underline, highlight, take notes, select the most important sentences in a paragraph and paragraphs in a chapter. Teach them to “mark up” a text on paper or digitally.
  • Main points and evidence. Teach them to identify, mark up, and look at the main points of a text assignment. They do this by breaking using reverse essay writing techniques. In the structure of the texts and paragraphs, what are the leading statements and closing statements and what supporting evidence lies between.
  • Read whole texts.
  • Do not cheat students by assigning only sections for their reading and study. Give them the satisfaction of reading an entire poem or essay or text or novel. This means deeper and more purposeful teaching to support their reading of whole documents. Deeper study and learning does require deeper teaching.

The above only addresses how to read as a part of studying. Teaching for more complete and deeper knowledge, understanding, application, and evaluation of what is being learned applies to all school courses and subjects.

The Big Duh about attention span!

We really do get what we settle for. And children get what we settled for them. Attention span is a product of age and brain development. It also is a product of educational training. Educators have a child’s captive attendance through compulsory education, if not parental needs for childcare. As we have their physical presence, we can maximize their intellectual focus by explicitly teaching each child to be more intellectually attentive, to know and use deeper studying and learning techniques, and to own their personal learning.

Teach Up to Cause Children to Meet Higher Expectations

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One of the most common phrases in school mission statements is “we have high expectations.” These words are used to describe school goals for academic learning, athletic and artistic performances, student behaviors, and rankings in state report cards. School boards and school leaders use the phrases “we have high expectations” and “we expect great things” as if just saying the words makes it so. They do not. What usually is not explained is what the school or teachers, coaches, and directors will do to move student achievements from “usual expectations” to “higher expectations.” The action necessary is teaching up, coaching up, directing up, and reinforcing up so that “ups” are achieved. The conversation about the actions needed to move achievement upward and the commitment to those actions is what bridges the distance between having high expectations and achieving high expectations.

Teaching up is a choice.

Carol Ann Tomlinson writes, “Teachers who make the choice to teach up believe, or are at least willing to believe, that all students are capable of much more than they currently show the world. Teachers who make the choice to teach up know that brains are malleable and thrive in rich environments. They also know, perhaps from research, perhaps from their own experiences are learners or as classroom observers, that students who have teachers that set high expectations are more likely to flourish than students who set lower expectations.”

https://ascd.org/el/articles/making-the-choice-to-teach-up

Tomlinson nails it. Teaching up to elevate student achievement is a choice when meeting minimal or usual expectations is a universal expectation or goal. The words “minimal expectations” are not used casually. Too many children and schools struggle to make minimal academic, athletic, and artistic progress. There are a multitude of environmental reasons, including poverty at home and in school financing, lack of home and familial support, lack of food security, challenges in a child’s socio-emotional and mental health, and post-pandemic student apathy that make achieving minimal achievement goals an uphill struggle. Just making minimal achievement goals can take tremendous teaching efforts.

The choice to teach up is to buck the norms in statewide assessments that say “minimal” is good enough or local expectations to be just a little better than a neighboring school and cause children to overachieve.

How much “up” and what does “up” look like?

Once a decision to teach, coach, and/or direct up is made, the real work is identifying how much upward improvement will be the target of higher expectations and the meaningful instructional, coaching, and directing actions needed to elevate student achievements to those expectations. Increasing the desired levels of achievement too much can overwhelm children, but increasing levels too little may seem meaningless. The level “up” should have transferable benefits, like climbing to the next plateau provides a base for climbing to a yet higher plateau on the way to a pinnacle. Increasing knowledge, skills, and dispositions is the scaffolding for future increases in achievement.

Generically, regular teaching is characterized by a teacher making more challenging yet supported assignments for children ready for the challenge. Students are assigned to read texts and materials that are above their current reading level preceded by the teacher pointing out new and significant vocabulary, providing necessary background information and context, and chunking the reading into smaller readings.

Generically, regular teaching is assigning more multiple step math problems, performing more complex music preceded by technical voice and fingering instruction, or diminishing the tolerances in milling a piece of metal preceded by technical instruction in settings, timing, and rate of milling.

Generically, regular coaching and directing is scheduling more successful teams to play and pieces to perform and expecting athletic and performance skills to rise to the level of new competition and expectation.

These kinds of “up” are usual in most teacher’s instruction of children in all subjects and grades, and in athletics and the arts. They are incremental and baked into school curricula.

To be significant, teaching “up” is condensing or leapfrogging usual increments and expectations with the belief that, as Tomlinson wrote, “… children’s brains are malleable and thrive in rich environments…”

“Up” looks like a demonstrably higher sophistication in the quality of student outcomes. To accomplish much higher outcomes requires explicit instruction, coaching, and directing of the knowledge, skills, and dispositions required for significantly higher achievement. Usual or regular teaching will not result in unusual or irregular achievements; it takes stronger instructional knowledge and skill.

Teaching “up” requires “upped” teaching.

Teaching, coaching, and directing “up” requires the teacher, coach and director to study, learn, and master skill sets that cause children to learn and master higher order knowledge, skills, and dispositions. These are not in initial educator preparation programs. We must learn to teach up before children can up their learning. For example, there are specific skill sets required to

  • improve children’s close reading and technical writing abilities to elevate and expand their levels of comprehension, understanding, and analysis/evaluation so that they can create more precise or expressive writings, or
  • improve players’ ability to hit a baseball and putting it in play with more frequency and power, or
  • increase children’s ability to understand the uses of perspective and interest in real life drawing, painting, and photographic creations.

Teachers must commit themselves to mastering improvements and changes in how they teach if they want children to master new learning and achieve higher order outcomes.

Teaching for higher order close reading.

Close reading is more than holding the book closer. It is a set of reading practices that require commitment. Most children give a text assignment a single read. They may take notes or create a brief outline. Better students create flash cards to self-quiz their accuracy and memory retention.

Upping reading has children do the following:

  • Read the text multiple times. First to gain a basic understanding and key ideas included in the text. Second, focus on structure, language, and the author’s writing style. They focus on text-specific questions not just questions assigned to any and every text. And in a third reading, children read and reflect on both the text and relate it to their knowledge and understanding of other texts. Children consistently write notes, annotate, and reflect on key literary and text analysis questions.
  • To focus on reading comprehension, the teacher chunks the text and engages children with reading aloud and thinking aloud. Thinking aloud is reacting and responding immediately to what has been read. Doing things aloud takes time and consideration and these two elements push the reading and thinking upward.
  • Teachers teach children a Socratic discussion model and children use this model to up their comprehension, interpretations, and insights. Children are expected/required to engage in discussions. As children listen to other children, they reflect on, consider, and edit and amend their own thoughts and conclusions. Socratic processing benefits the speaker and the listener.
  • Parallel to multi-step reading and Socratic discussion, children use graphic organizing techniques the teacher has taught them to break down the text into logical parts that aid in their memory and recall. They use and then file these organizers for future references.
  • Children act out a part of the literary text, rewrite a part to create a different outcome, or creatively illustrate the setting of part(s) of the text. For non-literary text, children create chronologies of actions leading up to and after the information in the text or create parallels of what else is happening simultaneously with the text.

These, or all of these, are not usual in classroom instruction focused on knowledge and understanding of the general curriculum. In the aggregate, these teaching/learning episodes move a child’s cognitive, social-emotional, and performance-based achievements to higher order levels. They are demonstrable for the teacher’s peers, administrators and the child’s parents to observe and acknowledge.

Coaching up for improved hitting technique.

I played on several state championship baseball teams in my high school years and never was instructed in hitting. To improve hitting, we took more batting practice and rotated in pitchers with different deliveries and throwing velocities. The only critique when we struck out was “you need more practice.”

Coaching up for hitting involves the following:

  • Having the hitter not just assume a batting stance but analyze the set up and stance. Is the stance balanced on the width of the feet with flexed knees, bend or no bend at the waist, and good weight distribution. The hitter needs to talk aloud with the coach about the stance set up in order to understand how a stance and set up work. The hitter needs to do this in the batters box and in front of a mirror or camera. Too many hitters think they are balanced and flexed when they are not. The coach needs to press hands on the batter to check for balance, flex, and weight distribution.
  • In the stance and set up, are the hands in natural position near the back shoulder, does the head position allow for a clear vision of the pitcher and ball in flight, and are the toes, knees, hips, and shoulders aligned. Hitters don’t do this solo, but under the supervision and critique of the coach. Many hitters think their stance and set up are solid when they are not.
  • Swinging the bat is not just swinging the bat. In preparing to swing, the hitter’s weight should be slightly loaded on the back foot while maintaining a balanced posture. The stride forward initiates the swing and rotation of the shoulders. A hitter’s stride is highly individualized, but if it is too long or too short it disrupts the plane, power, and release of the swing. During the stride, the hitter starts with a hip then shoulder rotation to create torque and power. There is a natural release and forward press of the upper body. Coaches can detect better than hitters when the release and press are not natural.
  • Swinging on a plane is essential to striking a thrown pitch. On plane gets the bat into the hitting zone leading with the hands (bat pointing slightly behind the hands). Hitters need to be consistent with their plane – is it down with bat control for hitting hard ground balls, is it parallel to the plate for hitting line drives with power or is it upward for long fly balls. Gifted hitters can change swing planes depending on game situations. Most hitters need consistency and coach supervision, critiquing, and correction to create and consistently be on lane.
  • Getting the bat to the ball is just the start. Hitters need to extend their arms through contact with the ball to drive the ball. Pitch speed, bat speed, and extended driving through the ball create power. Extension plus rotation to a high finish with the bat behind the lead shoulder almost to the hitter’s back makes a complete swing.
  • Hitting coaches study the art and science of swinging a bat and hitting a ball. They know that each hitter has a different physique and baseball personality. Hence, coaching hitters is a highly individualized and personalized endeavor. Coaches use soft toss and front toss drills, live batting practice, video analysis, and consistent work on identifying a pitch as it leaves the pitcher’s hand. Hitters have fractions of a second to make the decision to swing or not swing at a pitch and if they swing their mechanics need to be designed and practiced for hitting success.

The fact is that most coaches coach a team to play baseball or softball. They have a basic understanding of throwing, catching, hitting, running the bases and sliding, and fielding ground balls and pop flies. They do not have the skill sets to up player performance with explicit instruction in any of the game’s skills. It is the difference between a coach saying, “just do this” and another coach saying “this is the physiology and physics of doing this.” Upping requires knowing what up is.

The Big Duh!

Tomlinson told us that “…all students are capable of much more than they currently show the world.” It is a teacher who causes them either to achieve only the minimum expectations that our world holds for our students, athletes, and artists or to show their much higher levels of achievement and performance. It is both a teacher’s decision to teach up and a teacher’s ability to teach up that moves child achievements upward.