TEACHING IN A MIND WANDERING WORLD

An Application Designed for a Preoccupied Student

Photo credit: Irised.com

William Fleming

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INTRODUCTION

For millennia teachers have used many tools to focus their students in the classroom. This has led
to many different teaching styles, and a multitude of disciplinary actions. Sadly, we have spent
thousands of hours, through countless generations, thinking of how we can coerce a young or
old mind to bend their thinking to understand the world around us. Why cant there be a better
way? Why havent we solved this most rudimentary of problems inside of the classroom? Why
havent we utilized the tools around us to invent way to counteract this critical problem?
Through this document we are going to understand what mind wandering truly is, and how we
can use the tools around us to counteract this often-misunderstood behavior. These tools are
often referred to as novelty items, which may, in the long run, enhance the learning experience.

MIND WANDERING

To begin, we must first look at what this idea of mind wandering truly is. A rough definition of this
psychological problem goes as follows: Mind Wandering is the intentional or unintentional
symptom of a person who cannot focus on a task for long or short periods of time. This is also
known as unintentional wandering or intentional wandering (Seli). This phenomenon happens to
all of us, with varying degrees of duration, and interfere during a task. You may be thinking that
we are speaking of a mild case of ADHD/ADD, but this isnt the case. ADHD/ADD considered
somewhat common with American youth, and is often over diagnosed. The criteria for this
cognitive disorder is as follows:

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Students who happen to exhibit over half of these symptoms (in one column or the other, not
both), could be at risk of being diagnosed with ADD/ADHD. This diagnosis cannot be conducted
by someone who isnt trained to examine a child or even an adult for these criteria. Although
this is the go to illness for children who cannot set still, there could be more that we are not
seeing.

Individuals happen to lose interest in almost all tasks they are completing. We can think of it this
way, there is a positive correlation between intentional wandering and lack of interest in a topic
or action and becomes bored. Their mind will slip away from the discussion and they may start
thinking about what they need from the store. An example of this would be sitting in a classroom
for long periods of time and thinking about something else.

On the other side of this problem we have, intentional wandering. This happens when the person
simply shuts off, and refuses to listen to anything else that is being said or conveyed. This can be
seen when an uncomfortable topic arises. People on opposing sides will often shut off their
opponents talking points, and begin thinking about what they are going to say next. The same
thing happens within the classroom when students shut off the instructor to view Facebook, or
check email.

SOLVING THE PROBLEM

For a very long time, we have noticed this critical problem in our classrooms. Sadly, little has
been studied about this issue, but the facts we do know come from the field of Psychology.
There couldnt be a more perfect place to study this mystery of the classroom and the work
place. When this concept is reviewed, many studies suggest that mind wandering may be a
good thing. The question is, why?

Well this goes all the way back to our days as a caveperson. We were always on the lookout for
things that would kill us, and if there was nothing to harm us, we used that time to ponder new
tools, new hunting methods, and even the interworking of society. This modern classroom
problem, was really an evolutionary leg up.

How do we use what is innate to us and benefit from it once more? This concept has become
very difficult in our modern world, we have now found never-ending ways to preoccupy our
minds, so that we will always be busy. Lucky for us, we have new research that shows that the
use of simple novelty items can enhance our learning experience, and improve our retention.

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TOOLS OF THE TRADE

As these novelty items creep into our lives, we often ask ourselves, are they worth buying? The
short answer is, Yes! But what are the novelty items that we are speaking of? For this paper, I will
keep the list short, but, the list can be pages long. They are as follows:

Stress balls

Fidget spinners

Drawing on paper

Playing with a pencil or pen

These items have been shown to work on unintentional wandering and its effects on the brain
during the instructional period. This was first seen in lab mice who couldnt find a food source
after 24 hours. They were given a novelty pattern to follow and were found to recall the food
source well after the 24 hours mark. "In general, anything that will grab your attention in a
persistent kind of way can lead to [its] activation to enhance memory (How Novelty Boosts
Memory Retention).

This is an important discovery, since this is also very true with humans. We need an attention-
grabbing device in our possession, so we can retain as much as we can without completely
losing focus on the task or lecture at hand.

CONCLUSION

What do we do as our classrooms become populated with more distractions from the period of
instruction? Do we allow for individuals to fall behind, or can we hand them a small device to
improve their retention of the complex information that is being placed in front of them? To me,
the answer is an easy one, run the experiment in your classroom, look at the test scores, and see
the benefits. Remember the only people we are hurting are the youth in our classes. That is
enough for me to give it a shot.

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REFERENCES

"How Novelty Boosts Memory Retention." States News Service, 20 Sept. 2016. Infotrac Newsstand,
go.galegroup.com.liblink.uncw.edu/ps/i.do?p=STND&sw=w&u=nclivewilm&v=2.1&it=r&id
=GALE%7CA464071447&sid=summon&asid=af32040cd244a785591592c5cc165efe.
Accessed 2 June 2017.
Schacter, Daniel, Karl Szpunar. Enhancing Attention and Memory During Video-Recorded
Lectures. Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Psychology Vol. 1 (2015): 60-71. PDF.
https://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/features/st1-0000011.pdf

Seli, Paul, et al. On the Relation Between Motivation and Retention in Educational Contexts: The
Role of Intentional and Unintentional Mind Wandering. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review
23.4 (2016): 1280-7. ProQuest. Web. 31 May 2017.

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