69传媒

Opinion
Teaching Opinion

My 69传媒 鈥楩low鈥 Their Way to Joyful Learning. Yours Can, Too

Prepackaged lessons often stop short of the conditions needed for deep engagement
By Kristin Murphy 鈥 September 05, 2024 4 min read
Whales flying in the sky above dreamlike mountains. Surreal image of creative thoughts. Childhood imagination.
  • Save to favorites
  • Print
Email Copy URL

Does your school day have time for 鈥渇low鈥?

During my 32 years as an elementary teacher, it鈥檚 been a priority for me, but lately, as more prepackaged curricula make their way into classrooms, I am worried about the future of flow.

鈥淔low,鈥 if you don鈥檛 already know, is a state first described and championed by Hungarian-American psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi after observing art students so focused on their craft that they 鈥渓ost themselves鈥 while creating, unaware of the outside world. Csikszentmihalyi realized that whether during play, learning, or creating, students in 鈥渇low鈥 focused almost solely on process rather than product. The enjoyment was in the journey itself.

When students engage deeply, screening out the external world, they transform themselves from extrinsic learners to intrinsic learners, who feel joy, cement concepts, and formulate new questions. Flow creates an educational 鈥渟nowball.鈥

But what happens when much of the school day is governed by packaged content? Some educators laud these programs for their ability to increase efficiency and ease workloads, while others note that the ubiquitous use of scripted curricula takes teachers out of the equation. It makes them simply conduits of tidy鈥攕ometimes antiseptic鈥攍essons instead of creators of instruction tailored specifically for their students.

While implementing packaged curricula can be an efficient way to 鈥渃over鈥 content, if adopted with strict fidelity鈥攁n unadulterated presentation of every lesson without supplementation鈥攖his rigidity prohibits the flow that Csikszentmihalyi recognized as central to learning.

Flow creates an educational 'snowball.'

A steady diet of scripted lessons can subtract spontaneity, deep learning, student passions, and teacher expertise from classrooms. Presenting packaged curricula without deviation gives districts false assurance that students will learn every concept and demonstrate proficiency on standardized assessments and that teachers will deliver uniformly 鈥渆qual鈥 instruction to each pupil. This kind of curriculum creation doesn鈥檛 take into account how a meaningful 鈥渟ide trip鈥 can make a concept more relevant, more interesting, and more memorable to students.

I recently participated in the rollout of a well-regarded published writing curriculum, which offered a dizzying array of detailed lessons, practice, instructional videos, and slideshows鈥攎ore than perhaps could be covered in two sets of 180 days. Some lessons looked similar to my homegrown writing instruction, which I had created drawing from several resources.

The packaged program extended each concept in a gradual evolution of ideas, each lesson building upon the learning of the preceding one with just a tiny variation. But what appeared at first glance to be a curriculum promoting the slow blooming of deep understanding in fact was one with a great omission. Its creators forgot to consider the students鈥 need to experience the ultimate form of flow when writing: drafting and editing a whole story or essay. Instead, they created the conditions for ennui with their iterations of the same basic skill.

See Also

Images shows colorful speech bubbles that say "Q," "&," and "A."
iStock/Getty
Teaching Opinion "Flow" In The Classroom
Larry Ferlazzo, March 26, 2013
12 min read

When one of my colleagues inquired at a midyear professional development session about this omission, the trainer assured us that students completing every lesson would possess advanced ability, rendering them 鈥渁ble鈥 to write a whole narrative, opinion piece, or informational essay. 鈥淭here is no need for your students to complete a summative piece,鈥 she said with the impatience of someone who had answered the same question many times before. 鈥淚f you pause to write, revise, and edit a whole piece, students will miss valuable lessons in the rest of the program.鈥

But without writing a whole piece, students will miss flow. Because I value it in my 3rd grade classroom, I make sure to pause during our writing instruction and allow students a summative experience that encourages not only flow but independence and completion of a real-world task. For example, when studying narratives, after some instruction, I gave students a choice among several open-ended prompts for their stories. They set to work as if their sole purpose on earth was to weave a story to delight the nation. The class cheered every time I released them to do 鈥渢heir writing.鈥 They groaned when writing was over and recess was to begin. When adults walked by the classroom, they saw students sprawled on the floor, hunched over desks, sometimes standing over tables or kneeling on chairs. They saw children applying the most important lessons they had learned. They saw authors in flow, who loved the feeling of being writers.

This is the kind of learning that students remember and extend when they advance to the next grade. Creation like this fuels the happy, productive thrum that is the heart of learning. It is something that rarely results from delivering prepackaged lessons with total fidelity.

Teachers should be free to select the best lessons from a variety of sources and be trusted to use their knowledge and expertise to craft an experience tailored for their own students. 69传媒 should be allowed to lose themselves in flow. This is the way to persuade young students to come to their desks with enthusiasm every single day.

A version of this article appeared in the September 18, 2024 edition of Education Week as My 69传媒 鈥楩low鈥 Their Way To Joyful Learning. Yours Can, Too

Events

This content is provided by our sponsor. It is not written by and does not necessarily reflect the views of Education Week's editorial staff.
Sponsor
Artificial Intelligence Webinar
AI and Educational Leadership: Driving Innovation and Equity
Discover how to leverage AI to transform teaching, leadership, and administration. Network with experts and learn practical strategies.
Content provided by 
This content is provided by our sponsor. It is not written by and does not necessarily reflect the views of Education Week's editorial staff.
Sponsor
School Climate & Safety Webinar
Investing in Success: Leading a Culture of Safety and Support
Content provided by 
Assessment K-12 Essentials Forum Making Competency-Based Learning a Reality
Join this free virtual event to hear from educators and experts working to implement competency-based education.

EdWeek Top School Jobs

Teacher Jobs
Search over ten thousand teaching jobs nationwide 鈥 elementary, middle, high school and more.
Principal Jobs
Find hundreds of jobs for principals, assistant principals, and other school leadership roles.
Administrator Jobs
Over a thousand district-level jobs: superintendents, directors, more.
Support Staff Jobs
Search thousands of jobs, from paraprofessionals to counselors and more.

Read Next

Teaching Opinion 3 Stories About How Teachers Turned Things Around With a Student
Some students struggle with learning how to function in a classroom. With patience and understanding, teachers can change that dynamic.
9 min read
Conceptual illustration of classroom conversations and fragmented education elements coming together to form a cohesive picture of a book of classroom knowledge.
Sonia Pulido for Education Week
Teaching Opinion The Hidden Benefits of Distraction in the Classroom
Distraction can support healthy emotional regulation鈥攂ut only when properly understood. Here鈥檚 what teachers need to know.
Eliya Ahmad & Zi Jia Ng
4 min read
Concept art, idea of brain and psychology, surreal painting, conceptual illustration. Distracted mind, emotional regulation.
Jorm Sangsorn/iStock
Teaching Opinion 5 Urgent Classroom Issues for Teachers, According to Larry Ferlazzo
What educators and researchers need to know.
3 min read
Images shows colorful speech bubbles that say "Q," "&," and "A."
iStock/Getty
Teaching Opinion Struggling to Discuss the Election in Class? These 5 Steps Can Help
For many teachers, political anxiety is the elephant in the classroom. The science of emotional intelligence can offer clarity.
Marc A. Brackett & Robin S. Stern
5 min read
The elephant in the classroom.
iStock/Getty Images