Friday, May 28, 2010

Low Income Affects On Learning

An interesting study being done to assess economic conditioning's affect on learning methodology...could prove useful in learning how to effectively reach all students (of the game)

The research study entitled, “Childhood Poverty and Brain Development: Roles of Chronic Stress and Parenting,” aims to determine how childhood poverty influences adult brain structure and function, and what underlying biological and social mechanisms mediate childhood poverty-brain relationships. Researchers hypothesize that chronic physiological stress dysregulation (elevated allostatic load) as well as harsh, unresponsive parenting during childhood will account for some of the expected linkages between childhood poverty and adult brain structure and function
In one study, he looked at how children filter out irrelevant information and pick up on what is important. To do this, he monitored the electrical activity of their brains when they were asked to listen to a random series of four tones and press a button every time they heard two of those tones.

He found that children from low SES families tend to use far more parts of their brain during the test than kids from middle-income families. It was as if the low SES children paid equal attention to every sound they heard, he says. Children from high-income homes only paid close attention to the two tones they had been asked to identify.
Amedeo D’Angiulli at Carleton University in Ottawa quoted, “I would see this work informing the school system to exploit some of the strengths that are in these children and introduce curriculum that instead of penalizing them would allow them to function”


Coach Hoover said...

I think the biggest negative factor facing children in poverty is lack of parental involvement. Research shows that reading to your child , having books in the home, and being exposed to more vocabulary makes a big difference. We were poor growing up, but I was lucky to have things to stimulate my brain.

The Montessori Method is interesting, although I don't know too much about it and how it could be applied. It seems like it is mostly for younger kids. You go into some homes of players and the TV is turned up loud and people are yelling back and forth inside and outside the house--a very distracting environment. It makes sense that these kids are not able to focus as well at school.

brophy said...

the interesting dynamic of the study was of the neural conditioning these environments create (a way of thinking / processing information). The adaptations to environmental stressors doesn't indicate that these children are less intelligent, just that the curriculum could reach them in a more efficient manner.

Dubber said...

Lay man terms this for me, Brophy, if you please.

Lower income households, with the stress that situations provides, develops thinkers who have trouble filtering unimportant information.

So, a LB may have trouble negating all other movements of the OL and just focusing on his visual key.

While middle income kids can process out and in the important from the filler.

So, do we help kids we identify as having the inability to "mentally prioritize" (for lack of a better term) and help them learn that skill, or do we consider how to teach them information in a manner that fits their way of understanding?

If the former is true, HOW would one do that?

brophy said...

it would appear that the surrounding stimuli (Gestalt 'big picture' concept) would affect the LI kids and the HI kids would be more fixated on the process (step by step).

Meaning, your LI may not have the patience or trust to slowly digest small pieces and may do better to be given an 'organic' learning milieu where they can see the entire thing put together.

Your HI kids may not respond well to that method and would appreciate the step-by-step skill set = performance (putting them in 'big picture' worlds might drown them)

They'll play the game how they play the game, but what we can control is how we deliver the information. Unfortunately, none of this is cut and dry (teach one kid one way, teach another another way), but a mixture of varying environments.

Coach Hoover said...

Would a low income kid be better suited for playing QB and being able to see everything (the front, coverage, potential blitzers) and check to the best protection and the best play better than a kid from a higher income family? Before reading this article, I would probably say no, but the ability to process multiple stimuli may indicate otherwise. I would definitely like to see more research in the area of teaching these children most effectively.

brophy said...

me too...

This obviously is nothing earth shattering, nor is it anywhere near complete (study just started). I do think/hope it will help us develop more fruitful classroom curriculums, and consequently may help us, as coaches, find more efficient methods for delivering information to our players

Kevin said...

I think these studies are interesting, but really will not tell us much more than we already know: Kids learn in different ways. Not just kids, people. Is Socioeconomic Status a factor? Yes. But so is just simply growing up with 4 siblings. Louder house, more distractions. I've taught and coached for 10 years in high school and I've seen kids from the SAME household match up with the HI kid described and the other is like the LI kid. I know the study isn't making that sweeping generalization, but I would like to know more details specifically about how to coach things better, if you DO know how a player learns. Or how to find out faster. In the classroom, it seems easier to me. On the field both the kids and I are in a different mind set. Interesting stuff. Thanks for making me think about it.

Zulu said...

The higher your income, the higher your education. It isn't causation but it is a positively correlated set of data. Schools with one dominant SES pattern (working-class, affluent professionals, etc...) also teach in different manners. The schools with the dreaded "drill by rote memorization and lecture" method tend to be schools with higher populations of low SES children. Children at upper levels tend to have more freedom and more discussion in classes. The creativity tends to stimulate them more, and the focus on doing more of what they want help keep them engaged; whereas kids in lower schools are often bored out of their minds because they are just given something to mindlessly do.

I've always wondered if these sorts of environments also correlated to athletic teams. For (what might be a terrible and uninformed) example, would a coach at a lower school forgo a system such as the Run & Shoot or Split Veer for a Power-I (maybe the Air Raid is a better example), thinking his kids didn't have the brains to make the reads in the R&S or Option? I'm not arguing one offense over another here, just thinking about what a coach might see in his kids.

brophy said...


Which would illustrate how the methodology (rote memorization) is failing the LI group.

The *study* would suggest the polar opposite preferred teaching method for both groups.

Kevin said...

I just watched a "High School Rivalry" bit on the NFL network that showed Muskegon, MI which has a very low SES and they are famous for the "Ske Gun" as I am sure most of you know. The coach was criticized at first because people said the kids could not pull it off. I have watched them in the Michigan finals a few times..