How do you get a trip approved fast? My friend had a simple technique:
I find out when Frank (assistant head in charge of health and safety) is teaching, pop into his lesson and tell him I just need a signature. Then I ask Maria (the head) as she’s going down to lunch duty.”
While he had a good record running trips, his approach illustrates that when we ask can be as important as what. Take wearing seatbelts: researchers reminded people either: a) as they entered their cars, b) five minutes before they entered their cars or c) not at all (Austin, Sigurdsson and Rubin, 2006). Among those receiving:
- An immediate reminder – 80% wore seatbelts
- A reminder then a delay – 58% wore seatbelts
- No reminder – 55% wore seatbelts
A delayed reminder had almost as little influence as no reminder at all: timing mattered more than content. Picking the right moment can determine how people respond: other studies highlight times to target and avoid.
1) Time of day
Most people’s energy and attentiveness peaks in the morning, dips (with their mood) towards lunchtime, and recovers partially in the afternoon (Pink, 2018). (A quarter of people are owls, for whom the sequence is reversed: recovery, trough, peak). Most people perform better on analytical tasks requiring close attention in the morning and on tasks requiring creativity and insight in the afternoons (for owls, it’s the other way around). What are we good for in the middle of the day? Naps, breaks and lunch – or, if we must keep going, checklists to ensure we don’t miss something critical (Pink, 2018). Lunchtime may also be a good time for less demanding tasks: people were more likely to respond to tenant satisfaction survey if they received it at 11.55am than if they received it at 8.55am (SBST, 2015). So perhaps we can tailor tasks to the time of day.
2) Day
Days of the week affect our enthusiasm and effort too. One study tested weekly deadlines with financial rewards to motivate university students to study (Burger, Charness and Lynham, 2011). The deadlines didn’t work, but the team did show study patterns vary by day: students did most on Mondays, then less each day until studying picked up slightly on Sundays. We’ve all felt the Friday dip: we might ask students to start tasks at the start of the week.
3) Breaks in routine
Breaks in routine, such as going to university, having children and moving house, disrupt our habits. When we move house, we change our shopping, commuting and leisure activities: councils have tested encouraging new residents to walk, cycle or use public transport, with some success – particularly if this fits their existing values (Thompson et al., 2011). Likewise, American troops moving to a new base are prompted to begin saving for a pension: this has doubled pension savings rates (SBST, 2015). Breaks in students’ routines may offer similar opportunities.
4) Temporal landmarks
We need not wait for breaks in routine however: temporal landmarks have similar effects. People reflect on their goals and make fresh commitments at collective landmarks – like the new year – and individual ones – like birthdays (Dai, Milkman and Riis, 2014). More people search online for diets on Mondays, in January, on the first day of each month, and after public holidays. Gym attendance is higher on the same dates, and after individuals’ birthdays (except their twenty-first, on which Americans gain the right to drink). Temporal landmarks offer fresh starts, separating us from past imperfections and allowing us to focus on our goals: students may be prompted to make a fresh start each term, or each Monday.
How can we use this in practice?
We could match tasks to students’ attention and energy, picking times when students can best work analytically, think creatively, or need short, snappy tasks. Primary teachers and timetablers can exploit this, but knowing that students are most attentive at 9am on Monday is little consolation if we teach Year 9 on Friday afternoon. More usefully, therefore, we might:
1) Plan times for students to act
We can help students plan to act at conducive times. For example, we could:
- Encourage students to complete homework earlier in the week, setting deadlines (or implementation intentions – the subject of a future post) accordingly.
- Encourage students to plan revision so that they practise questions and review answers in the morning, take a decent break at lunchtime, and do something more creative in the afternoon, like making revision mind maps.
Any time we want students to do something, we can ask ourselves, and them, the best time to act.
2) Promote fresh starts at key moments
We can use breaks in routine and temporal landmarks to encourage students to review past successes, current goals and make future commitments.
- Teachers often emphasise classroom expectations in September, but we can exploit other landmarks, brightening the lines (Lemov, 2015) between units, topics, weeks and months, to help students recognise their progress and commit to improvements.
- We can use moments of change in individuals’ lives to encourage fresh commitments: when students move set, class or school, or at birthdays, we can ask them:
- “What are you most proud of from the last unit/month/term?”
- “How do you want the new week/term/class to be different?”
- “What one thing will you commit to doing in order to achieve this?”
Any break of routine or landmark allows a fresh start; or, if students need a fresh start, we can create landmarks (Heath and Heath, 2017), such as the tenth book read this year, fifth essay completed, thousandth right answer.
3) Nudge at key moments
We can also try to influence students when they are most susceptible. One trial sought to maintain attendance at further education colleges (Chande et al., 2017). Students received text messages encouraging planning, such as:
- Hi [Student’s name] it never hurts to plan ahead. Decide when you will practice and mark next week’s class in your diary. [College’s name]
And promoting motivation and social connectedness, such as:
- [Student’s name], well done, you’ve reached the mid‐term break! Take time to practice what you’ve learnt & stay connected: [Class Facebook link; College’s name]
Although the study didn’t test timings, the messages were carefully timed: they began during the October half-term – when a break in routine leads to a spike in dropouts, and were sent on Sunday evenings. Attendance among students who received the messages was 7.3% higher; the pass rate was 8.7% higher. Any time we intend to influence students’ behaviour, it may be worth choosing the most conducive moment to act.
Conclusion
We experience many of these phenomena in our own lives: we do crucial work when we feel fresh, we reflect at temporal landmarks. It may help to apply the same logic to students’ too, and – before asking them to act – asking ourselves:
- When’s the best time?
- What’s the best day?
- Is there a break in routine or temporal landmark?
- If not, can I create a landmark?
Eliciting commitments from students is just one step however: students may promise future action, then find their commitment wanes. People are more likely to agree to an action which feels further away (next month rather than this, for example), but less likely to act (Tu and Soman, 2014). So, having picked our moment and gained students’ commitment, we need to identify ways to prompt action – I discuss these here.
This is a draft excerpt from Habits of Success: getting every student learning.
If you found this interesting, you might like…
Helping students choose wisely by making it seem like a good idea at the time
How can we get students started on a task? Behavioural psychology and practical tips.
References
Austin, J. Sigurdsson, S., Rubin, Y. (2006). An Examination of the Effects of Delayed Versus Immediate Prompts on Safety Belt Use. Environment and Behavior, 38(1), pp.140-149.
Burger, N., Charness, G. and Lynham, J. (2011). Field and online experiments on self-control. Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization 77, pp.393–404.
Lemov, D. (2015). Teach like a champion 2.0. 1st ed. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Pink, D. (2018). When: The scientific secrets of perfect timing. Edinburgh, Canongate.
Social and Behavioral Sciences Team. (2015). Annual Report. Office of Science and Technology Policy.
Thanks Harry, really interesting.
A lot of it feels like common sense but is so easily to forget these things.
Thanks for reminding me!
Will reflect on my homework deadlines.