The power of productive friction | Nicole Dyson | TEDxBrisbane — Transcript

Full transcript

1. 0:01[applause and music]
2. 0:05[applause]
3. 0:11>> If we want young people to go far, we
4. 0:13need them to be more than just
5. 0:14resilient. We need them to be agile.
6. 0:17This is something I've learned after two
7. 0:18decades in education, working with more
8. 0:20than 130,000 students and teachers,
9. 0:23schools and systems,
10. 0:25designing learning experiences that
11. 0:26engineer productive friction,
12. 0:29deliberately placing young people inside
13. 0:30moments of stretch and uncertainty. Now,
14. 0:34friction is the force that opposes
15. 0:35motion, but productive friction, that
16. 0:38lives in the space between I can and I
17. 0:40can't. Productive friction is the
18. 0:42perfect playground for potential to be
19. 0:44realized,
20. 0:46because potential isn't realized doing
21. 0:47something easy.
22. 0:49And whilst the idea I want to share with
23. 0:50you today is grounded in research,
24. 0:53it didn't start there.
25. 0:54It started in all boys year nine English
26. 0:58class.
27. 1:01Yes.
28. 1:03My head of department told me that
29. 1:05volunteering for this project would be
30. 1:08good experience, uh which I'm sure was
31. 1:10code for nobody else wants the class.
32. 1:13It was no coincidence that this class
33. 1:15was an eclectic mix of the more
34. 1:18interesting boys in the cohort. It was
35. 1:21thought at the time that by bringing
36. 1:22these
37. 1:24characters into a single English class,
38. 1:27we, and by we I mean me, could provide
39. 1:30these boys with the targeted support
40. 1:31that they would need to
41. 1:33re-engage back in education. What could
42. 1:36possibly go wrong?
43. 1:39As a teacher, I only ever had two rules
44. 1:40in the classroom. The first rule was we
45. 1:42stop learning when we stop listening.
46. 1:45In a world where notifications flash on
47. 1:47our phones and our watches and
48. 1:48everything in between, sometimes the
49. 1:50greatest gift we can give others
50. 1:52is our attention.
51. 1:54The second rule was if you waste time,
52. 1:55you pay it back. And as a chronic
53. 1:57procrastinator, I live the consequences
54. 1:59of that rule almost every day.
55. 2:01So, it was no surprise that when two
56. 2:03boys took a bathroom break that took
57. 2:05them via the water bubbler on the other
58. 2:08side of the school, they found
59. 2:10themselves repaying back that time in
60. 2:12their lunch break.
61. 2:14With only moments left of our shared
62. 2:16incarceration, one of the boys looked up
63. 2:18at me and said,
64. 2:21"I don't mean to be rude, miss,
65. 2:24but"
66. 2:26Now, we all know nothing good happens at
67. 2:28the end of that sentence. So, on the
68. 2:30outside, I put my best teacher face on.
69. 2:32You know the one, like everything moves
70. 2:33in slow mo. You lean forward, your eyes
71. 2:36narrow, and then at the end, you just
72. 2:37lift your eyes slightly, daring the
73. 2:40student to finish the sentence.
74. 2:42On the inside, I cringed, "Please, don't
75. 2:43do it."
76. 2:45"I don't mean to be rude, miss, but
77. 2:47why are we doing this?"
78. 2:50Now, here was a question I'd heard
79. 2:51before. No seasoned teacher survives
80. 2:53without developing an arsenal of
81. 2:55responses to this one. Like, "It's
82. 2:57important to learn how to learn.
83. 3:01You don't know when you'll need this in
84. 3:03your future." Or my personal favorite,
85. 3:05"This is a building block of knowledge
86. 3:07that will unlock other, more fun
87. 3:09learning later."
88. 3:12At the time, the boys, like all of you
89. 3:14nine, were being asked to read a novel
90. 3:15and then write an analytical essay on
91. 3:17one of the themes. It was pretty stock
92. 3:18standard English fair.
93. 3:20The reality, they were never going to
94. 3:21read the book. Most had a reading age of
95. 3:24year four or year five, far below the
96. 3:26literacy level required, and some
97. 3:27couldn't spell analytical essay, let
98. 3:29alone write one.
99. 3:31So, as I opened my mouth to autopilot a
100. 3:33reply, I found myself instead saying,
101. 3:39"Because we have to.
102. 3:41And I'm sorry."
103. 3:44This random moment of radical honesty
104. 3:47has stayed with me ever since.
105. 3:49Did we have to?
106. 3:51Cuz the truth of the answer is a lot of
107. 3:53what we ask young people to do in school
108. 3:56is designed to help them to succeed in
109. 3:59school, but not necessarily to succeed
110. 4:01in life.
111. 4:03And if I had to sum up the problem in a
112. 4:05line, it would be this.
113. 4:07As students get older, school gets more
114. 4:09predictable, right as life gets less
115. 4:12predictable.
116. 4:14As students move through our education
117. 4:16system, learning tends to narrow. Tasks
118. 4:19become more structured, outcomes become
119. 4:21more defined, and success, well, that
120. 4:23becomes about getting the right answer
121. 4:25in the right way.
122. 4:26But this narrowing occurs precisely as
123. 4:29young people's cognitive capacity
124. 4:31actually expands. Their abstract
125. 4:33reasoning increases, their executive
126. 4:34function strengthens, their cognitive
127. 4:36flexibility, well, that improves.
128. 4:39What changes though
129. 4:41is their experience of failure.
130. 4:44In adolescence,
131. 4:45fear shifts.
132. 4:47It becomes less about physical risk and
133. 4:50more about social risk.
134. 4:52Failure stops being about falling over
135. 4:54and starts being about being seen
136. 4:57falling over.
137. 4:58Judged.
138. 5:00Embarrassed.
139. 5:02Labeled.
140. 5:04But here's the paradox.
141. 5:06Right at the developmental moment when
142. 5:08young people need to practice navigating
143. 5:10uncertainty most,
144. 5:12we scaffold away the struggle, quietly
145. 5:15teaching the opposite.
146. 5:17Which brings us to here.
147. 5:18We're training young people to succeed
148. 5:20in certainty and then judging them for
149. 5:23struggling in uncertainty.
150. 5:25Now, when we notice this gap, the usual
151. 5:26response is to talk about resilience,
152. 5:28and resilience does matter.
153. 5:30But the way we've taught resilience
154. 5:32often misses the practical application
155. 5:34that young people need most.
156. 5:36Resilience is often theoretical,
157. 5:38explaining how to recover after a
158. 5:40hypothetical fall. But you can't fully
159. 5:43learn how to handle discomfort just by
160. 5:45talking about it.
161. 5:47Resilience is also often taught in
162. 5:49really heavy contexts,
163. 5:51which is not exactly a safe place to
164. 5:53practice.
165. 5:54So, we find ourselves here.
166. 5:56We've built an education system that
167. 5:58minimizes young people's exposure to
168. 6:00failure,
169. 6:01and then act surprised when they fear
170. 6:03it.
171. 6:05Now, firstly, we need to get more
172. 6:07precise about the capability we're
173. 6:08trying to develop. Resilience is how you
174. 6:11recover after the fall, but agility
175. 6:15Agility is the action you can take
176. 6:18whilst you're still in motion.
177. 6:20Agility is persisting when things feel
178. 6:23uncertain, adapting when things don't
179. 6:25work, and staying calm under pressure.
180. 6:29In a world defined by uncertainty,
181. 6:31unpredictability, and friction, this
182. 6:33distinction matters.
183. 6:35Agility is the capability this changing
184. 6:38world demands, and yet
185. 6:40many young people have never been taught
186. 6:41how to do it.
187. 6:43The solution is surprisingly simple. We
188. 6:46build agility like we build anything,
189. 6:48with fast, frequent, and fun practice.
190. 6:51In classrooms, this looks like 10 to
191. 6:5315-minute challenges once a week
192. 6:55embedded within existing curriculum. And
193. 6:58there's a simple recipe to these
194. 7:00challenges.
195. 7:01The first ingredient is friction.
196. 7:04Not random difficulty, but calibrated
197. 7:08stretch. Too little stretch and there's
198. 7:10no growth. Too much and the brain's
199. 7:11threat response takes over.
200. 7:14Psychologists call this the
201. 7:15Yerkes-Dodson curve. Performance
202. 7:18actually peaks with a moderate level of
203. 7:20challenge. Now, this peak lives inside
204. 7:24productive friction. Our job is to find
205. 7:26that productive friction zone, and then
206. 7:28slowly inch the peak forward through
207. 7:33action.
208. 7:34Agility is not a theory, it's an action.
209. 7:37The challenge design must provide the
210. 7:39conditions for students to persist,
211. 7:41adapt, and experience pressure
212. 7:43in real time. Now, this is consistent
213. 7:46with what we know from performance
214. 7:47psychology. Capability develops with
215. 7:49deliberate practice at the edge of
216. 7:52current ability, not passive exposure.
217. 7:55The third ingredient, reflection.
218. 7:58Because experience alone can't create
219. 8:00learning. Metacognition, the ability to
220. 8:03think about your thinking, is one of the
221. 8:04strongest predictors of transfer.
222. 8:07After each challenge, students must have
223. 8:09the space to ask what went well,
224. 8:12what didn't,
225. 8:13what would I do differently next time,
226. 8:15and why does that matter?
227. 8:18Friction,
228. 8:19action,
229. 8:21reflection.
230. 8:22That's FAR.
231. 8:24It's not a theory, it's developmental
232. 8:26science applied deliberately. But, let's
233. 8:28look at FAR in action. One example is a
234. 8:31challenge we like to call the Festival
235. 8:33of a random object.
236. 8:36Students are placed in random teams,
237. 8:37often with people they don't normally
238. 8:39work with, and as a team are given 10
239. 8:42minutes to design an entire festival
240. 8:44experience that heroes a random object
241. 8:47of the group's choice. Now, this could
242. 8:49be the potato
243. 8:51or
244. 8:52the bidet. That's happened.
245. 8:56A second example of these challenges is
246. 8:58something we like to call Silent Sleuth.
247. 9:01Students walk into a silent classroom.
248. 9:03On each desk is a different unseen
249. 9:05challenge. On the board is a timer
250. 9:08that's already started ticking down.
251. 9:10Now, in one, we have the chaos of
252. 9:12collaboration. In another, the stress of
253. 9:14silence. In both, we have no single
254. 9:17right answer to the challenge and the
255. 9:20pressure of time.
256. 9:22Some students enjoy this, but most find
257. 9:25the conditions uncomfortable, but that's
258. 9:27deliberate. We're engineering productive
259. 9:30friction. At the end, we don't ask who
260. 9:32won.
261. 9:33We ask,
262. 9:35"What did you do when you got
263. 9:37uncomfortable?
264. 9:39Did you step back?
265. 9:41Did you step up?
266. 9:43Did you get frustrated? Or did you
267. 9:45decide the task was stupid and just tap
268. 9:47out entirely?
269. 9:49Because it's in these moments, not the
270. 9:51outcome, where agility is revealed and
271. 9:55built. And we know this works.
272. 9:58We've tracked changes in more than 2,000
273. 10:00students across 40 schools. When
274. 10:02teachers embed agility across a 10-week
275. 10:05term, students' confidence in their own
276. 10:08agility grows by 10 percentage points.
277. 10:10That's one percentage point a week. But
278. 10:13maybe the piece that surprised us the
279. 10:14most is that some of our most
280. 10:16under-resourced schools, government,
281. 10:18regional, remote, showed the most
282. 10:21significant shift.
283. 10:25Now, despite cosmetic upgrades,
284. 10:27smartboards, iPads, BookTok,
285. 10:33the fundamentals of education of
286. 10:34teaching and its relationship to
287. 10:36learning haven't shifted significantly.
288. 10:39In most classrooms, success is still
289. 10:42measured by assessment tasks that
290. 10:44privilege the learner who can
291. 10:45regurgitate the facts back the fastest
292. 10:47and in the right order.
293. 10:50But here's the thing we don't often like
294. 10:51to admit.
295. 10:53Sometimes we protect young people from
296. 10:55friction
297. 10:57because friction makes us uncomfortable.
298. 11:01And in this way, a young person's
299. 11:03comfort zones begin to mirror the
300. 11:06comfort zone of the adults closest to
301. 11:08them.
302. 11:09It's often easier for us just to teach
303. 11:12the content, easier for us to control
304. 11:14the outcome,
305. 11:15easier for us to avoid the mess.
306. 11:19But what's easier for adults is not
307. 11:21always what's best for young people.
308. 11:24Because when we remove the opportunity
309. 11:26for productive friction,
310. 11:28we don't remove discomfort from our
311. 11:30young people's lives.
312. 11:33We just delay it.
313. 11:35What if each week young people practice
314. 11:38navigating uncertainty and friction
315. 11:41the way we practice literacy and
316. 11:42numeracy?
317. 11:44They wouldn't be resilient eventually.
318. 11:47They'd be agile now.
319. 11:50And that's what the world they're
320. 11:51entering actually demands.
321. 11:53Because the safest place for a young
322. 11:56person to fail is not out there.
323. 11:59It's in here.
324. 12:01With a teacher who's brave enough to
325. 12:03step back
326. 12:05and let their students step up.
327. 12:09Thank you.
328. 12:10>> [applause]
329. 12:14[applause]
330. 12:19[applause]