Kids have to be in school. But they don’t have to pay attention.
Image made using Adobe Stock + Adobe Express
The idea for this week’s piece was born from a comment on my last article which read: “Tom, I love how you’re giving us a reason to pay attention.”
Now, you might think I am trying to shine a light on a complimentary comment for narcissistic or self-aggrandising reasons.
I would think the same if I was you, (knowing me)...
But instead my wish is to be fully transparent about my motives: I have been actively trying to “give you a reason to pay attention.”
This is a conscious effort of craft.
Anyone who has even the slightest grasp of marketing, copywriting and advertising will be familiar with this idea. Anyone who knows an inch about screenwriting (see last week’s article) or storytelling will understand this type of deliberate writing structure.
Hooks (dare I say a bit of clickbait). Suspense. Storytelling.
It struck me when I saw that comment written that it would be a great slogan or strapline for innovative educators or curriculum designers:
“Giving them a reason to pay attention.”
For anyone yet to put the pieces together, I started out my journey as an aspiring filmmaker. I wanted to direct moving pieces of cinema and elicit emotional responses from an audience.
I got into working in schools as kind of an accident.
I am often a bit ashamed that I didn't actively get into teaching to make a difference or inspire and shape young minds. At the time, it was more of a practical and financial decision to begin working as a teaching assistant, whilst I pursued filmmaking on the side.
The long and the short of it was that my video editing skills led to familiarity with the workings of computers, so I ended up teaching a computing club, replacing the Computing teacher and eventually gaining qualified teacher status. But that’s a story for another time.
The key to this tale is that I found myself standing in front of classes of 30 children with the job of teaching them about computers.
But I have never been the “because-I-told-you” type of educator. Sure if it was about kindness or being hurtful to others I had a strong position and would take action accordingly.
But I never felt that the children had to listen to me. Or at least I could understand if they didn’t want to, especially given that they found themselves in a situation not of their choosing.
So I transposed my filmmaking instincts over to the classroom: I tried to give them a reason to pay attention.
Made using Adobe Stock images in Adobe Express
Think about a really boring internal training session you have attended where you were a few blinks short of completely falling asleep. It’s likely this session wasn’t crafted with the motivation of holding your attention. It was probably just the relaying of important information or an update of policies and plans.
This is because they don’t have to hook in the audience. You have to be there. You’re being paid to be there.
Whereas anyone from the world of marketing or copywriting or social media knows that their audience can not only leave at any time, they can choose not to even engage from the very start!
Kids have to be in school.
But they don’t have to pay attention.
In fact, many struggle with this exact effort. And thousands of teachers struggle with the children who struggle with this exact effort.
The first thing educators should be doing is giving their students a reason to pay attention.
Every one of my lessons over the last 10 years has been an experiment to find out the special sauce that achieves just this.
I’ve been like a social media marketer studying the analytics of their Instagram posts to see why some had such high engagement whilst others faded off into obscurity off the bottom of the feed.
And any time I failed, you could feel it so obviously in the room. Less engagement, more silliness, more off-task behaviour.
The actual subject content they had to know could never be delivered as is, like in an internal training session.
The job of an educator is to think creatively about how to deliver and structure this learning to make it highly engaging and motivating for the learner, as well as ensuring inclusivity, accessibility and that all students make progress.
I used many methods to GTARTPA (now that’s an ugly acronym):
Games-based learning with apps like Prodigy Education , codeSpark , Kodable Education
Project-based learning using Minecraft Education
Student-led creative media projects using tools like Adobe Express
Simple imaginative roleplay scenarios like running your own zoo or pitching your own app idea
The skills of an educator should necessarily require the kind of skills associated with storytellers, marketers and social media masterminds.
We share the same problems. We desire similar results.
So next time you struggle with disengagement, poor behaviour, low effort or you just want to create a powerful learning experience that will have your room abuzz with positively-directed energy, ask yourself:
Have I given them a reason to pay attention?
