Educational Trends Exposed

How to be a Critical Consumer

David Armstrong, Gill Armstrong

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• eBook ISBN:
  9781000510508
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Educational Trends Exposed explains and critically reviews eighteen of the most prevalent trends sweeping schools, colleges and universities over the last decade and beyond. Amid the buzz from news outlets, websites and social media peddling 'this works' approaches and 'quick fix' solutions, this book provides educators with a practical tool to help answer important questions such as: what does this trend actually involve? Is it worth the investment of time and resources? Does it work – what does research say? Do the claimed benefits to students outweigh any downsides?

In this timely book, David Armstrong and Gill Armstrong cast a critical, expert eye over these trends, referencing the latest research and offering a framework for considering educational trends, empowering readers as informed critical consumers. They argue that trends disclose deeper truths about the state and direction of contemporary public education in Australia, England and the US and provide original, thought-provoking analysis. This book demonstrates that a greater understanding of trends can teach some important lessons, including how parents, teachers and educational decisions makers can agitate and collaborate for a modernised and more socially equitable education system.

Educational Trends Exposed is essential reading for pre- and in-service teachers, and all educational decision makers who are faced with a choice of which trend, if any, to follow.

1Performance-enhancing trends

Brain Gym®, direct instruction and synthetic phonics

DOI: 10.4324/9781003247159-2

The idea that teachers/schools are underperforming and should boost educational outcomes for children has become a pervasive idea in certain sectors of society in Australia, England and the US. The release of Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) data by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in December typically prompts negative national comparisons in the media each year and calls to boost children’s performance in reading or mathematics (Davis et al., 2020). The establishment of high-profile national inquiries into the teaching of literacy or numeracy in public schools implies that there is substance to this view and has cemented the perception that professional practice in classrooms is deficient (Baroutis and Lingard, 2018) Performance-enhancing trends detailed in this chapter, draw from this concern with their promise to improve student academic performance if adopted by schools and/or funded by government. One common strategy used by proponents of performance-enhancing trends outlined in this chapter is to say that the trend promoted is evidence-based and therefore will likely lead to improved classroom performance by students if applied by teachers. As is suggested in entries on synthetic phonics, direct instruction and Brain Gym®, these claims do not stand up to critical scrutiny. Research cited as supporting ‘evidence’ by advocates of these trends is often much more circumspect or mixed in findings. In some cases, as with BrainGym®, the evidence supporting this trend appears non-existent. The dynamic of this ideological maneuver is, however, revealing about how trends grow and gain popularity in education communities.

Synthetic phonics (SP) is discussed at length in this chapter as an important and influential example in the group of performance-enhancing trends identified. Indeed, the increasing popularity of SP in schools as a method to teach reading can be seen as a stock of tactics or templates used by advocates of other trends such as direct instruction (DI) and evidence-based practice and which also promise to boost children’s performance by solving perceived shortfalls in professional practice by teachers. The success of SP in achieving orthodoxy around reading instruction in the US, England and, increasingly Australia, seems to have encouraged those promoting other performance-enhancing trends. As we point out, this outcome risks encouraging an unhealthy problem-solution cycle in education, with schools constantly responding to criticism of teacher practice and whereby practitioners jump through the metaphorical hoops generated by educational initiatives featuring trends claimed to be ‘evidence-based’.

The overt political agenda associated with several trends in this group, notably SP, is curious and concerning. The ‘importance of teaching’ (DFE, 2010) is often emphasised in public discussion of performance-enhancing trends along with a cocktail of socially conservative claims about the purpose and conduct of education. Arguments based on cost-effectively raising standards in public education sit alongside nostalgic visions of a return to orderly classrooms from schools in the 1950s – untroubled by children with diverse needs (Armstrong, 2014).

SP, together with evidence-based practice and DI, have been claimed by these toxic agendas as part of strategies intended to change the education system and undo progressive features such as public schooling or efforts to achieve social justice, notably educational inclusion. An ‘ethic of competitive individualism’ often also pervades these discourses about education, as children and schools are ranked on academic performance as captured by standardised tests (Slee, 2014, p. 7). Although research evidence is extensively cited as justification, the result of these ideologically driven efforts intends the very opposite of a socially progressive, inclusive and modern education system which is informed by research. This curious contradiction is counterintuitive but central to the way in which SP, evidence-based practice and DI have been used as wedges for greater control over classroom practice, schools and the teaching profession in the US, England and recently, in Australia.

A sharply critical evaluation of literacy policy in England by Clark et al. (2018) comes very close to this conclusion, commenting on how research is uncritically cherry-picked by policymakers to legitimise an exercise in naked power. Clark et al. (2018) comments:

While frequently declaring their policies ‘evidence-based’, evidence which does not support current policy is ignored by politicians who dictate not only what should be taught in schools, but how it must be taught. This is backed by an accountability regime which forces teachers to adhere to these policies, even if in their professional judgement they have concerns.

(p. 2)

In the face of these exercises of power and in the interest of balance, this chapter offers a critical evaluation of SP and DI, charting recent efforts in Australia to adopt the same strategy of control over what is taught in Australian schools and how it is taught.

Belonging: school attachment lite?

Initiatives which refer to student belonging are increasingly popular in education settings in Australia, the UK and US. Typically, these initiatives seek to strengthen psychological attachment by students to setting or to education more generally and are associated with wider efforts to support student wellbeing. Belonging appears, however, to be an increasingly distinct term with distinct goals and features, for instance, in marketing efforts by universities to promote brand loyalty. Furthermore, belonging claims many of the same benefits as the less well-known concept ‘school attachment’ (Slaten et al., 2016) but arguably, with a smaller research base.

Identity and belonging

Belonging emerged as a popular educational concept post 2010, although its roots can be traced back to the 1990s if not earlier (Goodenow and Grady, 1993). Like many of the trends surveyed in this book, there is no widely understood definition of what belonging precisely means when applied to students. This lack of clarity, of course, lends belonging a woolly usefulness when applied in educational practice: it can mean whatever the user argues it means. Research literature about belonging, however, suggests that belonging is essentially about the pursuit of positive academic identity and connected, positively, to a student’s motivation to learn. An early study of these connections by Goodenow (1993), for instance, of 301 African-American, White/Anglo and Hispanic students in two urban junior high schools reported that: ‘School belonging was significantly associated with several motivation-related measures – expectancy of success, valuing schoolwork, general school motivation, and self-reported effort’ (p. 60). Allen and Kern (2017) argue, similarly, suggesting in their book devoted to the topic, that ‘Belongingness is a fundamental human need’ (p. 1). Identity formation is, however, a complex philosophical topic as Peers and Fleer (2014) amply demonstrated with their complex philosophical discussion of belonging as used educationally in the Australian Early Years Framework (p. 916) and in examination of the slogan ‘Belonging, Being and Becoming’. The relational and conceptually complex philosophical aspects of belonging act against the straightforward implementation of belonging as part of initiatives designed to elevate student motivation and psychological wellbeing. If it is to have any real substance and impact, belonging has to be implemented in a philosophically informed way with subtlety and care.

The more precise and evidence-based term ‘school attachment’ has co-existed alongside belonging (Mouton et al., 1996). Indeed many of the positive attributes connected with belonging (e.g. greater motivation to learn in school) are also explored by research on school attachment. In their study of aggression by students, Hill and Werner (2006), for instance, report that, ‘Several decades of research have demonstrated that student attachment to school is consistently associated with positive social, emotional, and academic adjustment’ (p. 231). In contemporary educational settings, efforts to promote belonging often boils down to efforts to promote a sense of positive academic selfhood amongst students (Allen and Kern, 2017) and in more mundane efforts to promote institutional loyalty and branding – for instance, appearing in strategic plans, business plans and marketing documents (Clayton et al., 2012).

What does belonging consist of?

At the time of writing, belonging appears to be a trending concept across education settings in Australia, the UK and US. Educational initiatives to strengthen student wellbeing, engagement and academic performance are often connected with belonging in educational practice, in literature and in the media. A report by the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER) in 2018, for instance, was widely-reported in the Australian media, and the report by ACER cited ‘worrying’ student data from PISA 2015 on the subject of wellbeing which gauged students’ sense of belonging (Thomson, 2018). The reported headline, popularised by an article in the The Conversation (Pedler, 2018) and on Australian TV (Special Broadcast Service) was that approximately one in five Australia students did not feel a sense of belonging at school. Students from low socio-economic backgrounds or who are indigenous were highlighted as ‘at risk’ of experiencing low states of belonging to school (Thomson, 2018). Studies in the US and Finland, which suggested a decline in belonging as high-school progressed, were also cited by The Conversation article – which was, interestingly, based on an un-examined/uncompleted doctoral study by a student based at Southern Cross University at that time (Pedler, 2018).

One further possible reason why belonging appeals to education institutions is because it connects well with marketing and brand promotion in a competitive educational market. Indeed, marketing is, arguably, built on the production of identity by associating them with brands and products. From this perspective, belonging is a marketing exercise designed to enhance brand value in an educational policy environment promoting free-market choice end competition. A careful study by Rowe and Lubienski (2017) uses Australian-based secondary data to examine free-market dynamics of public high schools enjoying a strong marketing brand. Rowe and Lubienski (2017) arrive at some disturbing conclusions commenting:

Thus, what can be a rational choice for individual parents can lead to undesirable, if not irrational, operations in the choice system for public education. We argue, while these choices may seem rational in the logic of the market, policies that promote choice are undercutting social cohesion, fairness and inclusion within quality, well-resourced education.

(p. 353)

When used as a marketing tool, belonging operates as part of this free-market system and, as Rowe and Lubienski (2017) state, undermines a progressive educational system built on social cohesion, fairness and inclusion.

Belonging trend evaluation

In future, belonging could have an evidence base, but at the time of writing, the term is undefined and appears to be randomly applied in education practice often without clarity as to its educational value and purpose. Furthermore, the connection between belonging and marketing as part of an educational free market presents ethical risks for teachers: is the promotion of belonging really in the student’s best interest or is it simply marketing in disguise and part of a value set corrosive to social cohesion, fairness and inclusion? Belonging’s lack of intellectual substance contrasts with the solid evidence base accrued by school attachment examining, for instance, school attachment in connection with ‘burn out’ (psychological exhaustion) amongst students (Yildiz and Kiliç, 2020); and also in efforts to reduce violent behaviour (Varela et al., 2018).

Brain Gym®

Some trends originating in the US have grown to be global educational trends. Brain Gym® is one of these mega-trends and is part of a group of educational trends which call on research about human movement in educational neuroscience for legitimacy. Educational neuroscience itself is described as ‘boundary work’ by Edelenbosch et al. (2015), ‘bridging the gap’ between neuroscience and education science (p. 40). Edelenbosch et al. (2015) further comment:

Even though bridging the gap appears to be difficult, we see a worldwide trend of initiatives aiming to do just that, many of them commercial. For example, different types of educational neuroscience products (or practices) include “brain-training,” representing a $300 million-a-year industry in the United States alone.

(p. 40)

Although Brain Gym® is increasingly used in schools in the US and Australia, attracting support in some research studies in the 1990s, it has attracted substantial criticism in more recent research (Dekker et al., 2012).

Educational kinesiology foundation and Brain Gym®

According to its own website, Paul E. Dennison and Gail E. Dennison ‘founded the Educational Kinesiology Foundation, d.b.a. Brain Gym® in 1987’, which they explain is an ‘International, a nonprofit public-benefit corporation established to provide access to learning theory, experiential training, and instructor licensure’ (www.braingym.com/about/). Paul E. Dennison claims that his own academic difficulties at school, together with his work as a Southern California public school reading specialist (Dennison, 2006), underpinned the insight that sensorimotor abilities, language acquisition and academic achievement were interconnected (www.braingym.com/about/).

Although the Educational Kinesiology Foundation is a non-profit organisation, Brain Gym® instructors are certified and pay for this certification. In Australia, at the time of writing, 61 certified trainers advertise their availability for work on the Brain Gym® Australia website (https://braingym.org.au/practitioners/). In 2020 one Australian practitioner advertised $650 per delegate for a professional learning day (www.brainconnections.com.au/?page_id=139). A range of activities are also associated with Brain Gym® income streams, including book sales and training programs ‘in exchange for a fee’ (https://breakthroughsinternational.org/programs/the-brain-gym-program/licensing-requirements).

What does Brain Gym® consist of?

Brain Gym® is a set of physical exercises that claim to enhance learning for individuals and ‘develops the brain’s neural pathways the way nature does – through movement’, according to its Australian website. (Brain Gym® 2020; Stephenson, 2009). The programme claims that undertaking a combination of 26 scripted movement exercises trigger improvements in ‘concentration, memory, reading, writing, organizing, listening, physical coordination and more’ (p. 110), and Brain Gym® 2020 ‘promotes the view that learning problems arise due to the inability of different parts of the brain to work in a coordinated manner’ (Kroeze et al., 2016, p. 76).

Brain Gym® has been widely adopted in schools in the UK, US and increasingly, in Australia (Kroeze et al., 2016; Stephenson, 2009). Brain Gym® has provoked heightened interest amongst teachers working in special education as a means to support the learning of students with disabilities through physical movement. An article by the Sydney Morning Herald (Jacks, August 12, 2016) reported ‘Brain Gym®, which says it offers an “educational kinesiology” tool for students with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and learning difficulties, is estimated to have been adopted by dozens of Australian schools’ (p. 1). Data from research (Bills et al., 2020) that I undertook in 2018 into Flexible Learning Options (FLO), a large program for students who had dropped out of mainstream schooling, suggested that Brain Gym® was being regularly used with this disadvantaged group in South Australia.

Brain Gym® evaluation: red

Unfortunately, rosy claims about the educational benefits of Brain Gym® are not supported by legitimate research. Several reviews of Brain Gym® by reputable researchers have identified it as a worryingly popular example of pseudoscience (Kroeze et al., 2016; Stephenson, 2009). US-based researchers Kroeze et al. (2016) make the fair but prickly point: ‘Given the limited time children are able to spend in the classroom environment, educators need to implement practices that have been validated by empirical research and not waste valuable time participating in the nuisance of Brain Gym® or other pseudoscientific interventions that claim to provide a magical cure for all that ails humanity’ (p. 78).

These damning conclusions do ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• List of figures
• List of tables
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction: educational trends and the Jupiter Metaphor
• 1 Performance-enhancing trends: Brain Gym®, direct instruction and synthetic phonics
• 2 Technical trends: positive behaviour interventions and supports, neuromyths and response to intervention
• 3 The crumbling orthodoxy: behaviour management and teacher quality
• 4 Cures, therapy and hope: mindsets, mindfulness, school-based mental health and inclusion
• 5 Trends of the near future: evidence-based practice, HITS and neurodiversity
• Summary
• Conclusion: moving beyond trends
• Glossary
• References