18 Education Research Links

Opinions and assumptions have their place in the world of education. I'm more of a cold hard numbers person. It's part of why I teach math I guess. This is a list of eighteen different links that I have gathered over the past two years as part of my daily reflection in the "Link of the Day" section that I found to be specifically enlightening on education related topics. 

1. Education Endorsement Foundation (EEF) - This is a UK based (London to be more specific) grant-making charity and quite simply the best resource I have seen for evidenced based research on what works at changing the achievement gap. According to their research the most beneficial interventions were also some of the cheapest: self-regulation strategies, feedback, mastery learning (breaking content into units with objectives that are pursued until learned), peer tutoring, and homework (forgive me young people!). The least beneficial intervention was retention and it actually had a negative impact on students as well as the highest cost associated with the interventions that were explored.
2. How Diversity Makes Us Smarter - The title hides this a little, but just also be prepared for diversity to create arguments (not necessarily a bad thing). Definitely something to consider with collaboration in the classroom and could even read it to the students to sell them on the value of not working with their friends.
3. Learning Old Concepts with New Concepts - This article from NPR discusses the ancient education model called "block learning." It basically says that instead of focusing on solving ratios with tape diagrams exclusively for homework or classwork, there should be a reteaching or more practice with a previously learned concept so your brain isn't just using rote to solve problems the same way.
4. Daydreaming Leads to Creativity - Another good read from NPR. This would be an appropriate share for students to help guide their use of cell phones and teach them about "multitasking.
5. Multitaskers Are Lousy at Multitasking - Research from Stanford shows that by doing more than one thing at a time, people are actually worse at each of those things than they would be doing them individually. With so many alerts coming in at once, it's a problem students will have to confront to reach their potential.
6. Knowing the Most Common Wrong Answers - This research from Phillip Sadler and Gerhard Sonnert indicated that teachers who know the most likely misconception for students on a science test see larger gains by the end of the school year.
7. Edudemic - This site offers insights into a variety of education related topics.
8. MTBoS - The best professional development I've encountered. All of these links really came to me because of people and organizations like the people that make up this group. Here is a list of everyone in the MTBoS "network."
9. The Gender Pay Gap - One of the reasons that this is still an issue in 2016 is because less women are entering STEM fields and according to the article written by Betsey Stevenson - an associate professor on economics and public policy at the University of Michigan. Women are also more likely to leave STEM fields because of the macho culture according to Stevenson's research.
10. Women Technophobes - According to a report from EMSI, who is a partner of job advertiser CareerBuilder that tracks analytics for college to workforce, roughly 75% of all tech jobs belong to males.
11. The Glass Ceiling Index - This measurement from The Economist of women in the work place looks at nine different factors and comes up with a weighted average for all countries. The United States ranks 17th and out of the 28 countries measured the U.S. ranked dead last in paid maternity leave.
12. Are Attendance Rewards Counterproductive? - According to research done by the University of Hong Kong, students that generally struggle to come to class will get worse in the long term with regards to attendance when they are presented with a reward. The book Drive by Daniel Pink never cited this research, but it would fit with the overall theme that intrinsic motivation trumps extrinsic motivation.
13. Think-Time - According to ERIC Digest research, changing the amount of time between a question to an answer from 1.5 to 3 seconds will allow teachers to ask more varied and flexible questions, increase student volunteers, and increase the length and correctness of a response among other benefits. Think-time opportunities are also available within a student response and immediately following the student response. All that silence (which could be longer than 3 seconds) can only be achieved by the gold medalists of classroom management (which I am not).
14. The Jen Ratio - According to University of California psychologist Dacher Keltner, this ratio can basically determine your happiness. In the denominator are negative events (getting the coin stuck in the vending machine, receiving a low grade on an exam, or watching the first couple minutes of the news) and the numerator is positive events (UConn Husky girls basketball fans watching a UConn Husky girls basketball game, getting invited to the girl you like's party, or a dog warmly greeting its owner). The higher the ratio, the higher the happiness.
15. Mindset for Parents - Taken from NYMag, this is a cliff notes version of how to explain the damage that a fixed mindset can have for students to their parents.
16. YouCubed - Brought from Stanford University (home to Carol Dweck of Mindset fame) this is a little bit more of an in-depth look at nine different factors to help shape the way teachers and students approach their jobs.
17. ADHD Correlating with Less Playtime? - In this short article, neuroscientist Jaak Panksepp (his TED Talk on emotions here) claims that a lack of play is to blame for a rise in ADHD in schools.
18. Power Shortages Impacting Aftrica - While there have been strides made in education in Africa, the eastern part of the continent is still particularly having trouble getting teachers and resources to educate their youth. As a result, online learning could be a powerful solution, but 60% of the African population is without power according to the article from the BBC.