Enhancing Well-Being while Boosting Self-Esteem and Closing the Achievement Gap

Format

Individual Presentation

First Presenter's Institution

Anderson County Schools

Second Presenter's Institution

NA

Third Presenter's Institution

NA

Fourth Presenter's Institution

NA

Fifth Presenter's Institution

NA

Location

Westbrook

Strand #1

Academic Achievement & School Leadership

Strand #2

Social & Emotional Skills

Relevance

This proposal relates to and supports two of the five strands. They are as follows:

I. This interactive presentation offers kinesthetic strategies that support the modules, build number sense and critical thinking, and increase a student’s fluency and ability to focus and understand. The kinesthetic strategies are based on research that suggests that moving during learning facilitates muscle memory, an important factor with children whose abstract thinking skills are not fully developed. It is also based on research suggesting that cross-body movements integrate the left and right hemisphere of the brain. These movements wake up a “sleepy” brain and help to cement newly learned material in the memory. Kinesthetic learning incorporates physical exercise, stretching, cross-body movements, and yoga. It has been proven to increase skills among all students, close achievement gaps, and turn around low-performing schools.

II. Kinesthetic learning empowers children to learn skills they thought they could not learn, thus vastly increasing their academic resilience. This helps students who have struggled to learn using more traditional audio and visual methods to recognize they are not “broken,” they just have a different learning style than what is normally used in school. Children suddenly realize they can be successful in school. Their self-esteem rises dramatically, their engagement in school increases substantially, and their physical health and well-being increases systematically as movement is used (decreasing obesity and stress-related concerns). Not surprisingly, test scores reflect this higher level of understanding, skill, and over-all well-being. We have also seen students who were the “struggling” math students become the leaders of the math club and volunteers at family events as they want to share the kinesthetic strategies that helped them so much.

Brief Program Description

You can have increased well-being (physical, mental, and emotional!) and increased test scores…in just 15 minutes per day. In this session, understand how movement affects learning and well-being, review the data on a program that ramps up key skills, and understand how easy it is to help your students succeed!

Summary

This session is geared toward giving teachers, administrators, and counselors a good understanding of how kinesthetic learning shifts students’ skills rapidly and easily.

Marcia Wade will demonstrate how you can simultaneously shift the well-being and achievement paradigms in your school. She will show how kinesthetic learning strategies rapidly increase wellbeing and academic achievement levels. The presentation will engage participants in active learning, giving them a personal experience of the power and impact that kinesthetic learning can have on their brains and bodies. Research shows that all students benefit from movement-based learning activities which decrease obesity and increase academic success.

This presentation will be fast-paced and interactive. Participants will be taught a series of math-movements and will be invited to participate in the movements. The movements are simple exercises that offer "brain breaks" or “energizers” while simultaneously building number sense and critical thinking, and increasing a student’s ability to focus and learn.

During the session, you will see participants out of their chairs, hopping on colorful literacy and math mats, clapping and yelling letters and numbers. And laughing. You will also see them reaching their right hand to their left foot, their left elbow to their right knee, etc., and calling out numbers as they move. And laughing. You will see them stop and listen as Marcia Wade shares the brain science behind the process. You will see their faces light up with understanding and excitement for what this new information can do to transform students’ lives. You will see relief wash over their faces and through their whole bodies as they realize the broad impact kinesthetic learning events can have on their schools and communities.

Key Takeaway 1: To use movement-based learning to develop and strengthen key literacy skills and boost student achievement.

Key Takeaway 2: To integrate reading practice into the PE and academic classes, before school, after school, and during transition times.

Key Takeaway 3: To give teachers a way to use movement based strategies within intervention groups.

Key Takeaway 4: To inspire teachers to become the champion of movement-based learning.

Key Takeaway 5: To share the success stories of teachers who have used movement to transform the reading and math abilities of their students.

Evidence

This presentation includes the work of Jennifer Houstona, Pamela Kulinnaa, John Ratey, Eric Jensen, Sheila Tobias, and Jean Blaydes. Primary data will include change in test scores for classrooms/schools that implement movement-based learning. For example, at a Title I school, a group of 3rd graders was tested at the beginning and end of one academic year. At the start of school, 55% of the students were reading below grade level and 1% were reading above grade level. At the end of the year, the same group of students had changed to 27% of students reading below grade level and 56% reading above grade level. Thus, the number of students reading below grade level was cut in half! Ms. Wade will present this information and share other examples of how kinesthetic learning radically changed the level of students’ academic success and positively impacted their resilience and leadership skills.

Biographical Sketch

Marcia Wade is a PE Teacher in the Anderson County Schools district in Tennessee. She’s been using kinesthetic teaching strategies for 14 years and has been presenting on them for seven. She is committed to sharing the effectiveness of these strategies, thus ensuring more children are able to be successful learning critical math and reading skills! She is uniquely qualified to provide this presentation because she has the understanding and experience of using kinesthetic teaching strategies in many different ways. She has seen people empowered and lives shifted at foundational levels. She has the strong belief that her work matters on a deep and lasting level. She is also a skilled presenter with the ability to engage any audience in the material she teaches.

Keyword Descriptors

movement, achievement, self-esteem, success

Presentation Year

2018

Start Date

3-6-2018 2:45 PM

End Date

3-6-2018 4:00 PM

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Mar 6th, 2:45 PM Mar 6th, 4:00 PM

Enhancing Well-Being while Boosting Self-Esteem and Closing the Achievement Gap

Westbrook

You can have increased well-being (physical, mental, and emotional!) and increased test scores…in just 15 minutes per day. In this session, understand how movement affects learning and well-being, review the data on a program that ramps up key skills, and understand how easy it is to help your students succeed!