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I coached my high
school's science team at a local college annual competition incorporating a
battery of multiple choice tests in physics, chemistry, biology, and general
science as well as a team test where each school had its members gather in
separate rooms to solve problems collaboratively. I opted to be a 'runner' and
took materials to the various classrooms in the college and noticed the
engagement level as students worked intently to answer the challenging
questions. It was fascinating.
They were huddled
together, everyone contributing, working like a team, their body language
revealing a unique camaraderie I rarely observed in
my classroom. It was a contest, a valued exercise, and everyone had the
potential to contribute some nugget that would lead to a victory.
Memorable was the look
of maturity and happiness on the faces in the room holding my students:
extemporaneous, mature, and collaborative, as if they were friends for life. They were purposeful,
in control of the knowledge flow, setting the agenda on how to solve each problem,
maintaining a focused demeanor for the 30-minute interval.
It mirrored what
Csikszentmihalyi and Hunter stated in their
research report after surveying eight hundred students during a week for happiness:
"Teenagers ascribe happiness to their moods when they are in situations of
relative freedom, in the company of age-mates, able to engage in flow activities
that stretch their skills and makes them feel alive and proud."1
Did I miss something?
How could I draw out that kind of enthusiasm and camaraderie back at school?
Apparently, that sense of happiness arises outside of school when children are
with friends, goofing around, participating in activities that stimulate their
minds, in situations that they regulate, behavior in the classroom that would
be construed as inappropriate. However, could the happiness and productivity I
witnessed at that competition be carried over to my classroom? Other than
laboratories, my students were mostly in rows and rarely performed tasks
collaboratively. Giving the reins to students would occur later in my career
and with some classes quite frequently.
Social physics
Interestingly, Dr. Alex
Pentland, computer science professor at The Massachusetts Institute
of Technology, investigated group dynamics in a very objective way to determine
styles of interaction that maximize productivity and creativity. His team did not simply eyeball employees in business
settings and take notes but accumulated digital data.2
That is, a small device
about the size of a cell phone called a sociometer, was strapped over the employees' shoulders, and an
assortment of data from infrared, sound, and movement detectors monitored their
interactions. They did not record words (like a tape recorder) but monitored
parameters used in physics labs:
a) Infrared detector: how much time users were talking and their
relative position to others in a room;
b) Microphone: frequency of talking, interruptions, listening, and
prosody – patterns of stress and voice intonation to derive nonlinguistic
social signals;
c) Accelerometer: human
movement and gestures (turning, sitting,
stand up, displacement).
In his latest book, Social Physics: How Good Ideas Spread-The
Lessons from a New Science, Pentland discusses the
results of large-scale studies using the sociometer and then formulates
definitive steps to derive maximum productivity in various settings.3
The combination of
signals from the sociometer were received by a
computer and quantified to derive what Pentland and his team
described as honest social signaling. (p.107) From a
compilation of a group's workday data using mathematical algorithms, an assessment of the company's network intelligence was compiled.2 (pp. 68-70).
It is not an evaluation
of the words voiced by the subjects but rather, as Pentland refers, an unconscious channel of communication based on
their gestures interpreted by the sociometer. They have amassed data from hundreds of
participants from many venues and are able to predict outcomes of dating
situations, job interviews, and salary negotiations.2 (p.146)
Successful
collaboration
From hundreds of
thousands of hours of data collection encompassing diverse work and social
settings, the MIT group found that the most productive and creative
collaborative situations include:
Substantial number of ideas: many short
contributions rather than a few long ones;
Dense interactions: a continuous, overlapping cycling between
making contributions and very short (less than one second) responsive comments
(such as "good," "that's right," "what?" etc.)
that serve to validate or invalidate the ideas and build
consensus; and
Diversity of ideas: everyone within a group contributing ideas
and reactions, with similar levels of turn-taking among the participants.3 (p. 89)
Social physics
and the teacher
Even with the best
practices in my career as a science instructor that included engaging
pedagogies ranging from teacher-led discussions in a quick pace all-inclusive
manner, along with well-illustrated PowerPoints, the most effective classroom instruction occurred when
the facilitators were student leaders coupled with collaborative exercises,
approximating the three Pentland tenets above. In
those group scenarios, the students used well-crafted sheets and laboratory
exercises, and were encouraged to engage in a free flow of exchange between
classmates.
They used social
dynamics to maximize engagement and thus completed tasks successfully.
Impressive, too, was the elevated level of inclusive sharing as their
camaraderie matured.
The power of engagement
paralleled what Pentland observed in his
research: "direct, strong, positive interactions"3 (p. 65)
and that is what generates assertive behavior in people.
I found this to be true
in my teaching career because it promoted trust as members praised and
admonished one other while carrying out tasks expeditiously, seemingly
instinctive as the research related to eye contact in Katalin Gothard's
study revealed. Moreover, I witnessed peer social pressure to cooperate and the
drive to complete tasks. The students demonstrated kindness and valued their
teammates' talents and contributions, too, during the cooperative banter.
Pentland also found one or
two dominating talkers did not produce universal assertiveness as much as groups
with conversation turn-taking equality – where collective intelligence
peaked. In other words, the best predictor of productivity was
"the extent to which everyone is in the loop"3 (p. 94).
The students working in teams of six at that science competition was evidence
of that dynamic.
Group dynamics
and the brain
The effectiveness of
the teamwork Pentland described is a
function of the motivational centers in the brain. Humans are a pleasure-driven species, and in addition to sex and eating, people
derive pleasure from social encounters. We learn from each other and are
ego-stroked from kind words and acknowledging facial expressions.
The inclusiveness of the talking, as well as the nodding and
other gestural aspects in close spatial proximity, signals to the prefrontal
cortex that the engagement is purposeful and
satisfying. It is affirming. The group is not just 'participating' but
validating one another with the dopamine secretion sustaining attention for extended
periods.
Just as the Chinese
team discovered in their brain scans of human encounters: "multimodal
sensory information integration and turn-taking
behavior between partners may
underlie successful face-to-face communication,"4
and people are motivated to participate in these productive scenarios knowing
they are valued members.
People find task-work
pleasurable knowing they are accepted by the members, can think creatively to
solve problems, and be respected as contributors. By experiencing group
encounters repeatedly, the social-sensitive amygdala is quieted by
prefrontal cortex messages of peer
acceptance as well as cultivating a sense of empathy toward others. The
mission ends up being high in intensity because the reward center knows that a
goal can be reached with the nucleus accumbens flooded with
dopamine, the neurotransmitter that keeps a person
alert as they work to achieve a reward or accomplish a goal. Moreover, the
banter stimulates the members as they near task completion.
I agree with
Csikszentmihalyi and Hunter that students seem
to be at their best when they are affirmed, that is, "able to engage in
flow activities that stretch their skills and makes them feel alive and
proud"1. What I found most interesting during my observations
was not that students were absorbed during small group and student-led sessions
but their interpersonal need to derive
pleasure from the process of
collaborating with peers was more important than learning the material because the
conclusions of Pentland and Csikszentmihalyi
and Hunter related to the
productivity of collaboration is biologically
driven and rewarding. We need to consider as educational leaders that students attend to tasks with greater
satisfaction when they are the players, setting the agenda during the knowledge
flow while interacting with peers.
More Sociometer Conclusions
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Pentland's group drew several additional
conclusions from sociometer data. Here are a few:
Direct, strong, positive interactions
between people are vital to promote trustworthy, cooperative behavior. It
then generates the social pressure needed to build culture, complete tasks,
and be productive. These cooperative sessions develop a social intelligence
because the members learn to read each other's social signals. Women do
better than men in this area. Idea flow and consequently productivity are at
a maximum when the social signals are prevalent such as tone of voice,
face-to-face positions, facial and hand gestures, with equality of talk among members.
Pentland compares levels of creativity with bee
close-order dance communication to acquire food sources. Highest levels were
demonstrated when teams not only conferred in an intense manner described
above but also when members met with other teams within the institution and
then relayed the new-found information back to their group. This explorative
oscillation maximizes idea flow because it builds up a more diverse store of
experiences. They noted that groups with socially intelligent charismatic
connectors, that is, individuals that were curious and asked questions made
organizations more successful.3 (p. 37, 38, 63
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Validate and Empower: Helen Keller and Anne Sullivan
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Helen Keller at age 8
with Anne Sullivan (1888)
New England Historic Genealogical Society
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Anne Sullivan, blind
for much of the first part of her life, was determined to get an education to
escape poverty, enrolled at the Perkins School for the Blind in Boston, and
became the valedictorian of her class. At 20, she was employed to school the
deaf and blind Helen Keller in
1887.
As the 1957 play The Miracle Worker so effectively dramatized, Sullivan’s
breakthrough with Keller came when she placed one of Keller’s hands under
running water; on the other, spelled “w-a-t-e-r.” Soon, Keller could express
herself far beyond the series of primitive signs that had been her sole means
of communication up to that point. Thanks to Sullivan's instruction, Keller
learned nearly 600 words, most of her multiplication tables, and how to read
Braille within a matter of months. News of Sullivan's success spread, and
Keller became a celebrity, meeting the likes of Thomas Edison, Alexander
Graham Bell, Mark Twain, and Andrew Carnegie. Despite the physical strain on
her own limited sight, Sullivan helped Keller continue her studies at
Radcliffe College in 1900, spelling the contents of class lectures and
textbooks into Keller's hand. As a result, Keller became the first deaf-blind
person to graduate from college and eventually a successful writer, lecturer,
and activist. At Sullivan's funeral, Bishop James E. Freeman commented that "Anne
was among the great teachers of all time. The touch of her hand did more than
illuminate the pathway of a clouded mind; it literally emancipated a
soul."
Famous Teachers in
History: Anne Sullivan, Biography.com, Joe McGaskosep, 2017
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References
1. Csikszentmihalyi,
M., Hunter, J., (2003). Happiness in Everyday Life: The Uses of Experience
Sampling, Journal of Clinical Psychology,
185-199.
2. Pentland, A.,
(2008). Honest Signals: How They Shape
Our World, Bradford Books.
3. Pentland, A.,
(2014). Social Physics: How Good Ideas
Spread-The Lessons from a New Science, Penguin Press.
4. Jiang, J., Dai,
B., Peng, D., Zhu, C., Liu, L, Lu, C., (November 2012). Neural Synchronization during Face-to-Face Communication, The Journal of Neuroscience, 7, 32(45): 16064-16069.
