Is struggling vital for a student's success?

    Merriam-Webster's dictionary defines struggle as making strenuous or violent efforts in the face of difficulties or opposition. This doesn’t sound like something that would happen much in a classroom. I mean, violence is definitely not something I’d wish to see in a classroom. However, the reality is that struggle is an integral part of being a student.

    For the sake of clarity, I should tell you, that the type of struggle that I’m referring to is productive struggle. The difference here is that productive struggle is where a student is actively engaging with a problem to push their understanding. Rather than facing a difficult situation and turning towards frustration and stagnation, which is how I’d describe unproductive struggle. Productive struggle is what can allow a student to take steps toward growth and understanding. This is because it builds resiliency, deepens understanding, and encourages a growth mindset. 

    Undoubtedly, not every student who enters your classroom is going to come ready and excited to struggle. It can be so discouraging to feel not smart enough, drowning in assignments, or even inferior to peers. But these are all very real and common feelings to be felt as a student. As a teacher, it is your job to help your students through these moments. Not by lessening their workload or giving them an easy way out, but rather by encouraging them to lean into a productive struggle mindset. 

    One impactful way to help students foster a productive struggle mindset is by setting an example for them. After all, you are their teacher, their authority, someone they should be looking up to and learning from. Let your students in on the workload and struggles that may be on your plate, but model resiliency. Show them that even when your responsibilities pile up, you can still push through it. When you have a lot of grading to do, lessons to plan, or research to publish. Share this with your students, but also share that you’ll push through it despite the struggle it may produce. 

    One other really important part of helping students foster a productive struggle mindset is creating a failure-friendly classroom that focuses on process over product. According to research done by Georgia State University, the fear of failure ranks among the worst fears that the country endures. I think one of the reasons this can be exemplified in education is because it is merely the beginning. Education is the beginning step that is meant to set you up for success in the future. I know as a student myself, struggling in the classroom has placed an exorbitant amount of doubts about my personal capabilities and chances of success in my future. Which can be so heavy and discouraging in an environment that isn’t failure-friendly. 

    Having teachers who support failure with grace and provide guidance in times of need is imperative to growing a productive struggle mindset. Acknowledging that homework assignments and lessons are a time of learning and ultimately failing. When these failures happen to your students, let them. Don’t jump in to rescue your students. Let students find the motivation to figure it out, ask for help, and try again. This is when both academic and intellectual growth will transpire in students. Remember, learning cannot be done without starting at a base level with little to no understanding. Failing is bound to happen, and that’s okay. It is important that students are told and shown that failure is part of growth and should be applauded when handled the correct way. That being, handled with resiliency and embrace instead of frustration and stagnation. 

    Struggle will happen. It should happen. As an educator, it is your job to model a productive struggle mindset to your students and foster a failure-friendly classroom so that your students are set up for success despite the struggle that you might induce in their lives. 

By Ava Werning

References 

https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1051&context=ays_cslf_workingpapers#:~:text=1%20Interestingly%2C%20fear%20of%20failure,population%20endure%20in%20this%20country. 

https://www.goyen.io/blog/productivestruggle#:~:text=This%20kind%20of%20deep%20engagement,connections%20between%20texts%20and%20ideas.&text=When%20students%20learn%20to%20embrace,abilities%20can%20grow%20with%20effort. 

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/struggle

Homework: Helpful or Harmful?

There is always question and conversation among math teachers on the subject of homework. Do you assign homework daily? Practice makes perfect, right? How many homework questions should I assign? Again, practice makes perfect, right? Do you grade homework by completion or correct answers? As an educator, you desire your students to get the correct answer, right? But what about the learning process? How do I handle the issue of students cheating on homework?  

Recently in my Math 371 Technology for STEM Educators course, we discussed platforms on which students often cheat on homework, such as Photomath, Symbolab, Mathway, and several other AI math solvers. We noticed after doing some research that there are tons of math solver apps or websites that are available to use, and that those platforms are being used by students in the classroom. Math solver software is especially used on assigned homework. This poses the question, if students are cheating on their homework, then how helpful is the homework? Knowing that there are math solver applications available for use, is there still a purpose for assigning homework?  

As a class, we discussed that some educators and researchers suggest that math solver applications aren’t harmful to students and are almost helpful because students are shown the steps on how to solve a problem when they are stuck on their homework. Sounds legit right? Because all of us who have used math solver programs felt like we understood the concept of the homework better after allowing the software to do the problem for us, right? I’m guessing most would disagree. Although some math solver programs can be helpful in showing steps or processes on how to solve a particular problem, sometimes the software isn’t as accurate as it appears, but more importantly, you learn best by doing, and using AI or math solver software hinders the learning process.  

Even if we are aware that it is more beneficial for our students to work problems out on their own and assess their mistakes to learn from them, how do we avoid students cheating or using AI or other math solver applications to complete homework? Do we forget about homework altogether? I’d like to suggest what is, in my eyes, a better solution to the situation many teachers (not just in math classes) find themselves in when pondering assigning homework in class.  

As Madyson Stricherz mentioned in her blog about “The Flipped Classroom” on January 30, a flipped classroom model is one where students complete projects, activities, or homework in the classroom instead of at home or outside of the classroom. This could be one solution to avoiding AI or math solver applications being used to complete homework; this way, the teacher is allowed to monitor how the students complete the homework and can be there to answer students' questions while they work through the problems. Secondly, as we did in Math 361 Geometry for Teachers, assigning “discussion” and “turn-in” problems could be a good way to keep students from using AI or other applications to do their homework for them. This strategy of assigning homework could look like assigning some key problems for students to try on their own, knowing that they can bring any questions to class the following day and the class would discuss the problems as a group. Additionally, turn-in problems may be only a few problems that demonstrate the particular skill or concept that is being learned at the time and could be due to “turn-in” at the next class period. Also, you could allow the class to discuss how to start the turn-in problems but still complete them on their own, but having the material and the knowledge from working on and discussing the “discussion” problems could help the students be able to better apply what is talked about in class to completing problems on their own.  

Ignoring the technology that is out there is not going to solve the problems of cheating on homework or less understanding of classroom content. Finding creative ways for students to still learn by doing, but taking the temptation or even the option of using technology in an unhelpful way to do their homework for them can help solve the question of homework: is it helpful or harmful?  

By Katelyn Wittnebel

Boredom in the Classroom: What it Means & How to Respond

Many teachers are inspired to become educators because of experiences they had in the classroom as a student. This is not the case for all teachers or prospective teachers, and it is not the case for me. To be clear, throughout my education, I have had many wonderful teachers who have both inspired and supported me. However, my high school chemistry teacher did not inspire me to become a chemistry teacher. During my first trimester of high school chemistry, at the end of 2019, I distinctly remember a class period in which the entire class was asleep, except me and a few other students, who likely wished they were asleep. Even the teacher seemed bored. He was lecturing on something I don’t remember, but I do remember the response from the class: boredom.

Even with innovative instructional techniques and high pressure for improvement in every facet of education, teachers can contribute to this problem without realizing it. It can be easy to have the same structure for each class, and some teachers might feel that there is no other way to teach their subject. But with too much repetition, even a more engaging approach, like a flipped classroom, can get boring. Boredom is often an overlooked emotion in classrooms because it is easy to blame the student; It is easy to think that they should just pay more attention, or put more effort in, or that they have such a short attention span because they watch too much TikTok.

Many scientific studies say that boredom decreases intrinsic motivation and interest, which is something I have experienced as a student. In general, researchers tend to think that boredom in the classroom contributes to overall negative emotions experienced by students in school. They aren’t interested in what they’re learning, so they don’t see the value of putting forth any effort or paying attention. And if they don’t put forth any effort or pay any attention, they don’t learn.

Boredom can, however, be a useful feedback tool for teachers. Boredom shows teachers that the students aren’t learning anymore. If a teacher notices this signal and responds accordingly, they can often reengage their students and regain the classroom’s overall focus. The problems arise when teachers ignore the boredom signal, and when they continue the same instruction, which further disengages the students.

One way to fight boredom and to respond to the students’ signals is to provide variation in instruction. For example, using the previously-mentioned innovative and research-based techniques is a great way to accomplish variation. Similarly, providing activities and opportunities for collaboration can also help. Additionally, varying classroom instruction also allows students to learn in a variety of ways. Rather than focusing on one method of learning, providing varied instruction engages students in a multitude of ways, including vocal, visual, and kinesthetic. This more holistic approach is more likely to be effective in engaging all students and solidifying the knowledge you’re trying to learn.

Another way to fight boredom is to shift to a student-led approach and incorporating choice into the classroom. Choice can be an important tool because it gives students autonomy and ownership over their education. Teachers can incorporate choice in many ways, including “choice boards,” in which different options are available for learning, or assignments, or practice, or whatever the teacher wants. For example, a student could have the option to learn content by listening to a podcast, reading articles, or watching videos. This gives students the opportunity to learn how they want to, tailoring their education to their specific strengths or feelings. In their book The Shift to Student Led, educators Catlin R. Tucker and Katie Novak compare student-led learning to a coffee shop. At Starbucks, there are so many options of drinks to choose from that the customer can order what fits their needs at that time. The same is true in a student-led classroom. Students can choose what path will benefit them most. If students are in charge of their learning, so they are no longer observers, but active learners.

Boredom is a normal part of life -- and can sometimes even be beneficial -- but it is important that teachers recognize and respond to boredom in the classroom to reengage students. By doing so, educators have the power to make education more interesting, which puts the responsibility of learning on the student and makes each student’s education more impactful.

 Sources:

https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/189494588.pdf

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10648-015-9301-y

https://dl.acm.org/doi/abs/10.1145/3318396.3318409

https://onlineteaching.umich.edu/articles/the-myth-of-learning-styles/

https://www.gse.harvard.edu/ideas/ed-magazine/17/01/bored-out-their-minds

Tucker, Caitlin R, and Katie Novak. The Shift to Student-Led. Impress, LP, 1 June 2022.

Emily Nikolaus