Interested in Music Therapy? Music therapy, which is often used with children with autism, can also be used in the classroom to help children learn patterns. In this interview music therapist Kamile Geist talks about types and techniques of music therapy along with her research in this fascinating field. On the website Kamile talks about courses and programs that will prepare you to be a music therapist, as well as how insurance programs deal with this type of therapy.
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Resources on Music Therapy

• Here is a link from an article in Ohio University’s research publication about Kamile’s work with music and speech therapy (Kamile’s last name was O’Donnell at the time).
• Here is the American Music Therapy Association website which should give you some general information about music therapy.
• Here is a link to our current article published in NAEYC’s national journal Young Children on Math and Music
• Here is a link to the Music Therapy program at Ohio University where Kamile Geist teaches.
• Kamile Geist’s bio page on the Ohio University website.
• Here is an interview with Kamile and her colleague Louise Steele in which they talk about Music Therapy with autistic children.

 

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Could it be that the roots of math anxiety lie not with math itself but with the way math is taught? In this episode I am extremely fortunate to speak with Dr. Eugene Geist, Associate Professor at Ohio University - Athens, Ohio and specialist in early childhood education. We talk about math anxiety - how it develops and what can be done to help kids overcome it. So if you have math anxiety, are a parent of a child with math anxiety or are a teacher of math you’ll want to hear what Dr. Geist has to say about this topic. Don’t let your kids say “I hate math!” Children are, as Dr. Geist will point out, natural born mathematicians and you can help them with their math homework and in the process help them overcome math anxiety.

Summary of Dr. Geist’s ideas as to what causes math anxiety

• Understand that, developmentally, young people hate to be wrong. We all don’t like being wrong, but it is especially embarrassing and painful to the developing child.
• Don’t Create Embarrassing situations: Asking students to “come to the front of the class and work out a problem on the board” contains the potential for a publicly embarrassing situation for a child. Use this approach (if at all) very carefully.
• Don’t focus on right and wrong: Math learning is difficult if it occurs in an atmosphere (either school or home) in which there is pressure to use one method to find the right answer. Allow some room for exploration and for the child to find one or more ways to find the best answer.
• Focus on Concepts instead of Math Facts and Processes. Focus math on applications and uses in daily life. When teachers focus on teaching only the processes or procedures of solving math problems and not on helping students understand conceptually why we do those procedures, then students will focus on learning processes (ex: “invert and multiply”) and not on seeing how those processes make sense. Fluency with the multiplication table can come later - first make sure students understand what is going on and why.
• Let Students Work On Their Own. Let students try to figure math problems out first on their own and let them debate with each other about the right answer. You’ll find that they enjoy learning math this way and are more likely to understand it better.
• Don’t Let Math be a Mystery: It is no wonder that math can seem like a mystery and create anxiety in many children when it is taught in the ways described above.
• Don’t Give The Right Answer. Give a try doing what Dr. Geist mentioned in the podcast: give students a problem, but don’t give them the answer right away. Let them think about it until next class when you give an answer - but tell them that it may not be the right answer. Let them tell you if it’s right or wrong and why.

What to do if Your Math/Statistics Teacher’s approach Isn’t Working For You

• Study in Groups: work with other students in your class to see how they are coping with the situation. Students can be great at explaining things to other students.
• Look online for help. Search YouTube - there’s lots of tutorials there on math made by other teachers. Also, iTunesU may have a lecture from a teacher on the topic you’re stuck on.
• Put up a question on Yahoo Answers. Yahoo Answers is a place where students ask other students questions about a whole range of topics. Check it out. See if some other student somewhere in the world would be willing to answer a math/stats question. Experts also drop by to answer questions on Yahoo Answers. I go there myself every once in a while to see if there’s a question I can answer.
• Rewrite Your Notes After Class. I know - this one sounds dull, but I did it when I was taking a class and was really confused. Re-writing your class notes - immediately after class - can really help clarify things for you.
• Use Your Textbook. Most textbook authors bend over backwards to explain things clearly. You paid for it - use it. And don’t forget to use the website that accompanies most textbooks.

Ideas on What Teachers and Parents Can Do to Avoid Fostering Math Anxiety in Children

• Have the right attitude toward math: math is not inherently “hard”. Math is about puzzles and kids love puzzles
• Work together with the child when working on math problems. Don’t stand over the child holding onto the “right” answer, ready to judge the child if he/she doesn’t get it right. Work collaboratively with the child to solve the puzzle.
• Model problem solving with the child. “Now let’s see, what should we do…?”, “How about if we try this…?”, “You know, I think I may be wrong here - let’s try a different approach.”
• Take a constructive approach to wrong answers: “Gee, that seems like a really big number. Do you think that’s right? I mean, how could….lead to….?” and, “I’m not sure about that one. Can you show me how you got that answer?”
• Get kids to work with each other to solve a problem. When they come up with different answers, have them work together to see who has the right answer.
• Make math learning not about long pages of worksheets, but rather an adventure in puzzle-solving.

Resources on Math Anxiety

• Dr. Geist has written and spoken widely about the topic of math anxiety as well as about the teaching of math and about constructivism. Here is a link to his website, and here is just a sample of some of his publications:
  • Geist, E.A. (2008 In Review) Because I SAID So: Power Relationships in Teaching Mathematics
  • Geist, E.A. (2008 In Review) What Is The Self-Fulfilling Prophesy and What Does It Have To Do With Learning Mathematics?
  • Geist, E.A. (2008 In Review) Dealing with Math Anxiety in Early Childhood Teachers and Students
  • Geist E.A & Geist K. (2007 in press) Do Re Mi:That’s how easy math can be: Music interventions to support mathematics concepts in infants, toddlers and preschoolers. Young Children
  • Geist E.A. & Janson G. (2007 in Review) Timed Tests and the Effects of Anxiety of Learning Mathematics.
  • Phillips, S.K., Duffrin, M.W. and Geist, E.A. (2004). Scientific salad and apple analysis: Take food out of the kitchen and into the classroom to teach mathematics, science, and more. Science and Children, 41(4), 24-29.
  • Geist, E.A. (2002) Annual Editions - Early Childhood Education 03/04 Children are Born Mathematicians: Encouraging and Promoting Early Mathematical Concepts in Children Under Five. p.174-179 McGraw-Hill; Guilford CT
  • 1993 Jacksonville State University - Jacksonville, Alabama - What is Constructivism: Beyond Just a Buzz Word.
  • 2000 Research Council on Mathematics Learning - Las Vegas, NV - Constructivist VS Traditional Methods of Teaching Mathematics.
• Here is the word problem Dr. Geist discusses in this class:
  

  A man buys a horse for #20 and then he sells it again for $30. He then he buys the horse back for $40 and sells it to somebody else for $50. Did he make money or lose money and how much did he make or lose?

• Here is the link to the web site called Project Construct. Here’s a blurb from their website telling what Project Construct is all about:
  

  Project Construct is derived from constructivism—the theoretical view that learners construct knowledge through interaction with the physical and social environments. Through “hands-on, minds-on” experiences, students in Project Construct classrooms attain deep understandings in the core content areas, while they also learn to work collaboratively with adults and peers and to be lifelong problem solvers.

Books

• Dr. Geist highly recommends the books of Constance Kamii. Here is a link to one of her books on Amazon: Young Children Reinvent Arithmetic: Implications of Piaget’s Theory (Early Childhood Education Series (Teachers College Pr))
• Dr. Geist also recommends the work of Catherine Twomey Fosnot. She has a number of books on Amazon as well: Young Mathematicians at Work: Constructing Fractions, Decimals, and Percents

 

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Tired of rote memorization? Tired of NCLB? Try mindful learning. In this episode I explore psychologist Ellen Langer’s concept of mindful learning. What does it mean to teach and learn in a mindful way? How does this concept differ from what is being encouraged in the new report on the teaching of math called the Foundations of Success? Find out the answers to all these questions in this episode of The Psych Files podcast.

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Resources on Mindful Learning

• Here’s an excellent powerpoint presentation on Ellen Langer’s concept of mindful learning (clicking on this link will download a pdf version of the presentation). This presentation was created by Micah Fierstein, Ed.D, Assistant Professor of Educational Leadership at the University of Alaska in Anchorage, Alaska. Dr. Fierstein has created exercises he calls “practice fields” (safe spaces for students to engage in deeper learning) based on Langer’s work. You can contact him at micah@uaa.alaska.edu for more information on his work with mindful learning.
• Here’s a short article by Ellen Langer in which she discusses mindful learning (a pdf file). This article appeared in Current Directions in Psychological Science.
• Here is Ellen Langer’s homepage at Harvard University.
• The Power of Mindful Learning
• Mindful Learning: 101 Proven Strategies for Student and Teacher Success
• Here’s a nice summary of the main points in Ellen Langer’s book.

 

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In this episode I continue the interview on Collaborative Problem Solving in the classroom with Dr. Ross Green, author of The Explosive Child. As I stated in the previous episode, there are a variety of classroom management techniques, all designed to help solve the issue of how to discipline children who are having behavioral problems. I think you’ll find that Dr. Green’s approach makes a lot of sense and it can be implemented in the classroom as well as at home. A fascinating interview.
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Here again are the resources on this topic that I think you’ll find useful:

Collaborative Problem Solving Books and DVDs

• The Explosive Child: A New Approach for Understanding and Parenting Easily Frustrated, Chronically Inflexible Children

• Treating Explosive Kids: The Collaborative Problem-Solving Approach

• Parenting the Explosive Child: featuring Drs. Ross Greene and Stuart Ablon

• Calming the Tempest : Helping the Explosive Child

• Check out the Thinkkids website where you can find more information on collaborative problem solving.

Related Episodes on The Psych Files

• Episode 28: Is Timeout Really Effective?

• Episode 33: Timeout Revisited - Dealing with Challenging Kids Part 1

• Episode 34: Timeout Revisited - Dealing with Challenging Kids Part 2

Site Search Tag: Development, Parenting and Childcare

 

 Episode 49: Classroom Management - An Interview with Dr. Ross Green part 2 [32:39m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Classroom management techniques - there are a lot of strategies for dealing with behavior problems in the classroom. It’s time to add Collaborative Problem Solving to your toolkit. Learn an alternative to traditional classroom discipline techniques like timeout or sending the child to the principal. A recent Time magazine article entitled “How to Make Great Teachers” mentions that in a 2001 survey of teachers, 44% listed "student behavior problems" as the reason they left the profession. What can be done?

In this episode I interview Dr. Ross Green, author of The Explosive Child and the upcoming book "Lost in School". He’ll tell you how to use collaborative problem solving with your students. This episode is also for parents, daycare workers, babysitters - anyone who wants to help young people learn to think their way through everyday behavior problems.
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(If I sound like the “chipmunks” on your computer, try this link instead.)

Collaborative Problem Solving Books and DVDs

• The Explosive Child: A New Approach for Understanding and Parenting Easily Frustrated, Chronically Inflexible Children

• Treating Explosive Kids: The Collaborative Problem-Solving Approach

• Parenting the Explosive Child: featuring Drs. Ross Greene and Stuart Ablon

• Calming the Tempest : Helping the Explosive Child

• Check out the Thinkkids website where you can find more information on collaborative problem solving.

Related Episodes on The Psych Files

• Episode 28: Is Timeout Really Effective?

• Episode 33: Timeout Revisited - Dealing with Challenging Kids Part 1

• Episode 34: Timeout Revisited - Dealing with Challenging Kids Part 2

Site Search Tag: Development, Parenting and Childcare

 

 Classroom Management [19:19m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Have you heard about Mashups? What do they have to do with psychology? In this video episode I’ll show you how you use RSS feeds, Google Reader, and Yahoo Pipes to create a mashup that searches the web for the very latest information on psychological terms of interest to you. I’m not clairvoyant (is that the right term for people who can see the future?), but I think this IS the future of of research in psychology. Come take a look.
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Click here to see a larger version of this video.

Resources for this Episode

• Click to take a look at the Psychology Researcher mashup I created on Yahoo Pipes. I’ll be updating it all the time to improve it, but for now if you want to change the search term from "alzheimer’s" to some other term, just click on Edit Source on the Yahoo Pipes page and change the term alzheimer’s in the three search boxes you’ll see on the screen.

• You can set up an RSS reader for free at Google Reader where you can collect all the latest information from the top blogs in psychology.

• One of the great blogs I mentioned in this episode is called PsyBlog. It is run by Jeremy Dean who is a frequent blogger on a variety of psychology topics. Check it out.

• One of Jeremy’s blog posts is a series he created in which he lists a lot of excellent psychology blogs. Check out this post on his site.

Technorati: mashup, mashups

 

 Psychological Research Using Mashups: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Taking a psychology class? Confused about Research Methods? Let me know what you think of a new tool I built which I call the "MAPPR". That stands for "Make A Personal Psych Review" (best name I could come up with). Here’s what it does: I’ve selected a typical topic from an Intro Psych course: the scientific method (might be referred to as Research Methods in your textbook) and I chose what I think are the bold terms that most students of psychology would have to learn from the chapter on this topic. I put these terms into a concept map and then recorded my own explanations for what these terms mean. Then (not done yet) I put the concept map and the audio files into a small online application which allows you to choose only those terms you find difficult or which you want to review. So: on the map you click the terms you want to review and then click the "Play" button and hear my explanation of those terms. It’s probably best to check it out yourself.

Let me know what you think!

Click here to go to the MAPPR

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In case you want to download the map itself, click on the image below and then print out or download the jpg image on the next screen.

The gestalt principles of perception - how do they explain how we not only sometimes perceive strange things, but also how we can appreciate works of art? In this episode I take a close look at why people see a lot of strange things around them - including me. We’ll see images on lemon slices, floor panels, building tops, etc. Why do we perceive these things?

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Resources for this Podcast

• Perceptual Set Experiment: go here to do the "Man on a horse" experiment I created. You can run this experiment on your friends, or even use it for a project in class. Have fun with it and let me know if you’ve got any feedback/suggestions. NOTE: The control condition is the "condition 1" button (random pictures which are unrelated to the man on the horse). The experimental condition is the "condition 2" button (pictures of animals which should help the viewer more easily see the man on the horse).

Here are a few sites which further explain some of the Gestalt principles of organization:

• You can learn how psychological gestalt principles apply to web design at the Web Design for Instruction site
• And more about psychological gestalt principles from the Spokane Falls Community College Graphic Design website.
• Here’s the NASA site where you’ll find the "Face On Mars" pictures.
• Here’s a good site which describes the gestalt principles. It’s from the Interaction Design website.

 

 Episode 31: Lemon Slices and a New Face on Mars! Gestalt Principles at Work [19:10m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

You’ve probably heard about the battle between intrinsic and intrinsic motivation. Well, here’s a new competitor to think about: the concept of the Motivation to Learn. What does this idea have to add to the debate about the best way to get kids to read? What does it have to do with the Bourne Supremacy? Find out this week on The Psych Files.

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Resources for this Podcast

• Link to the book: Looking in Classrooms by Good and Brophy on the Allyn and Bacon site. And the same book on Amazon: Looking in Classrooms (9th Edition)
• Link to the book The Explosive Child: A New Approach for Understanding and Parenting Easily Frustrated, Chronically Inflexible Children
• The Think Kids site
• The Center for Collaborative Problem Solving site.
• The book by Ellen Langer that contains the example regarding birth control is not Mindfulness (although that is one of her books), but rather this book by her: The Power of Mindful Learning

Notes

Motivation to Learn: Why read? Because learning is worthwhile, important

People are naturally drawn to:

• Puzzles – what would happen if you…went outside your spacecraft without a suit (“Moonraker” vs. “2001″)? Dropped a feather and a brick from the same height? If you were swinging a weight on the end of a string and the string broke. Everyday example: the “Bourne Supremacy”. The concept of the movie pulls you in: you wake up, don’t know where you are or who you are, yet you seem to have the ability to kill people, and people seem to be out to kill you – why?
• Interesting questions – Why did the dinosaurs die out?
• Problems – the scene from “Apollo 13”: “We gotta make one of these… out of this”
• Open-ended questions: instead of asking “Can you…”, ask “How could you..”. Langer author of “Mindfulness”: Can you make a birth control pill that could be inhaled through the nose? Vs. How could you make a birth control pill that could be inhaled through the nose?
• Contradictions: “Opposites attract” vs. “Birds of a feather flock together”
• Controversy – Did we really land on the moon? Examine the angles of the shadows, etc.
• Suspense – Check out futurelabs http://www.futurelab.org.uk/ – astronauts running out of air http://www.futurelab.org.uk/projects/space_mission_ice_moon/
• Guessing (with no fear of public embarrassment)

Corny joke of the week: Q: Why will you never starve in the desert? A: Because of all the sand which is there!

 

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if you’re interested in how to set up a blog, how to post audio files to the web to create a podcast, and how to use RSS and iTunes to let students know about new audio you’ve uploaded (the technology behind podcasting), I created a video walkthrough which shows how all this is done. Maybe you’ll find this helpful.

Some of this information on how and why to create educational blogs and podcasts can be found in this article I wrote for the PsychTeacher discussion list. A PowerPoint presentation of some of these ideas can also be found on that page.

 

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