Ergas 2016

Source:   RESEARCH ARTICLE

APA Citation:

Ergas, O. (2016). Attention please: Positioning attention at the center of curriculum and pedagogy. Journal of Curricular Theorizing, 31(2), 66-81.

Author bio:

Oren Ergas is a senior lecturer at the Faculty of Education, Beit Berl College and a teaching fellow at the School of Education, Hebrew University. Oren's research focuses on contemplative education and mind-brain and education, explored from philosophical, psychological and sociological perspectives.

Notes:

This paper proposes that the quality of experience depends on the human faculty of attention 66

We mostly find a struggle with inattention featuring Attention Deficit (hyperactivity) Disorder (ADD) that has been grouped into the two domains of ‘inattention’ and hyperactivity/impulsivity’ … inattention as ‘poor attending to details, sustaining attention, listening, organizing, and finishing tasks, exerting mental effort…” and impulsivity as ‘blurting out answers, cannot wait, interrupting others’ (Swanson et al, 2007). 66-67

Inattention and mindfulness are a pervasive human condition; in light of the central role of attention in our lives and its formative role in the educational experience, it would make sense to consider ways of fostering attention positively as part of the curriculum rather than focusing solely on combating inattention 67

We tend to conceive of attention as a means and not as an end in itself and findings from neuroscience and psychological research suggest that our minds are wanderers by default; applications of ‘attentional training’ demonstrate that the above two premises may be incorrect 67

Teacher education programs thus may be rightly concerned with divers forms of teacher knowledge that inform ways in which teaching becomes interesting and effective; however, no amount of teacher education will ensure our success in sustaining students’ attention since attention is not completely in the teachers’ hands 68

I suggest that we have dedicated ourselves far more to the side of the teachers as interest-ers, and not enough to the side of the students as those that are to be interest-ed. Such an approach seems to ignore the bi-directional nature of attention, and results as limiting the scope of the public curriculum 68

My focus is on the beliefs that have been guiding our teaching practice in ways that have undermined the possibility of educating students in becoming more responsible for their faculty of attention, a faculty that substantially shapes their lives and their educational experience 70

Ellen Langer – mindful learning; “a mindful approach to any activity has three characteristics: the continuous creation of new categories; openness to new information; and an implicit awareness of more than one perspective” (p. 4) 70; sustained voluntary attention cannot be cultivated – need to reconceptualize what it means to ‘pay attention’ given the nature of our mind as a ‘wanderer’ 70; instead of fixing our attention on the object, the teacher is to follow the natural tendency of the student’s mind to wander, by constantly repositioning the subject matter and re-packaging it as a bait that lures the students’ interest and attracts attention 71

William James – distinguished between active and passive attention. Passive attention does not require voluntary effort on behalf of the attender. The attender’s mind takes complete interest in the subject matter at hand, and thus no effort on his or her behalf is required to sustain attention. Active attention is the voluntary directing of attention to an object in which the mind loses interest (sustained voluntary attention). He stated that “there is no such thing as voluntary attention sustained for more than a few seconds at a time” (James, 1962, p. 234).

Reference Killingsworth study – a wandering mind is an unhappy mind. (2010)

Both James’ and Langer’s concept of teaching depicts the ideal classroom as one that is ruled by James’ view of passive attention. That is, a state of which the students need not make any effort to sustain their attention on their own behalf 71

I am rather claiming that if we embrace this model alone, then we are missing the dramatic educational potential that emerges from the possibility of developing what James thought to be impossible – sustained voluntary attention 71

The mind is indeed a ‘wanderer’ by default, but contemporary research that examines the impact of mindfulness and other contemplative practices on diverse human traits proposes that this default is not a fixed state that we must ‘work around’ as in James’ and Langer’s case … this default can be viewed as more of a habit, and though old habits die hard, with perseverance they can be rectified. It is more about cultivating our ability to choose what we attend to, and how we attend to it – this is what determines the quality of our lives 72

Attentional training carried an educational impact beyond a narrow understanding of simply being able to attend to an object for longer periods of time; attentional training makes way for what may be referred to as a balancing curricular orientation in which attention is viewed as an end served by the subject matter and not merely as a means 74

We thus tend to think of attention as a precondition, or a vehicle toward the acquisition of something other than attention. A student attends so that she learns Algebra, etc. From the teacher’s or the school’s point of view, once the students attends, this precondition for learning is out of the way and the lesson can now advance to the ‘real business’ of studying Algebra (or whatever). Attention thus serves the learning of the subject matter. 75

Should not then education in attention precede the disciplines, given that it is the precondition for undergoing any educational experience? Ought it not become the meta-subject matter of our education; one that might even bear precedence over the famous three Rs none of which can be acquired without? Out it not be elevated from being considered as a means to becoming an end in itself? 75

Educating students to know attention and be attentive means attuning them with the common denominator underlying all their interactions with themselves and the world. 75

Out attentional skills may be something that if studied at school, would be constantly put to practice in our daily lives enriching students long after school years have ended 76

The implications of not attending to attention as a subject matter in an of itself, are limiting our curriculum in the following ways

1.      There is an inherent imbalance in holding the teacher alone responsible for ensuring students’ passive attention. With such approach, not enough responsibility is laid on the student so that they become the agent of attention acknowledging its life-transforming power

2.      In treating attention solely as a precondition to be gotten out of the way we frame it as a means to achieve the subject matter. This confines schooling to a limited perception of life 76

I am claiming that at the moment curriculum is unbalanced for attention is constantly placed at its background 76

We thus need to skillfully learn to shift our attention from a curricular subject (out there) to our attention (in here) (ref. Ergas 2015). The study of attention can be based on incorporating mindfulness and other contemplative practices into the curriculum, but it can also be based on integrating it with curricular subject matter 77

Contemplative pedagogies – pedagogies that rely on active attention, placing it at the foreground, which inevitably pushes the conventional course subject matter to the background (ref. Barbezat & Bush, 2014; Gunnlaugson et al, 2014; Lin et al, 2013) 77

Some of the subject matter clearly requires frontal lecturing, yet diverse contemplative practices are applied to enhance students’ intimate engagement with the subject matter based on active attention. This engagement yields a far more rewarding and meaningful educational experience, such that many students seek when turning to higher education 77

Active attention can be developed, and that mobilizing attention to the foreground holds a transformative educational potential. Such shift entrusts the responsibility over attention, not only in the teachers’ hands, but also in the students’ hands, and by so doing, it initiates students into the understanding of attention as a life-determining quality 78

Teachers need to become highly familiar with contemplative pedagogical approaches … which implies modifications of approaches to teacher education 78