Louisville's experiment: Can teaching empathy boost math scores?
| Louisville, Ky.
At Cane Run Elementary School, ringing bells mark more than the start of the school day.
For teachers Meghann Clem and Christine 鈥淪hay鈥� Johnson, the sound of a chime begins another 50-minute lesson to teach students compassion, empathy, mindfulness, and resilience. These so-called soft skills, research suggests and educators believe, will translate into success inside and outside of school.
It鈥檚 all part of the (CSP), an ambitious $11 million, six-year experiment in social and emotional learning in Kentucky's Jefferson County Public Schools.
鈥淲e鈥檙e going to really try to keep our brains focused on the sound of the bell,鈥� says Ms. Clem to a room of kindergartners sitting cross-legged on mats. 鈥淎nd when you can鈥檛 hear the bell anymore, I want you to look up and show me those beautiful smiles.鈥�
Clem strikes a small wooden mallet against a metal chime and waits. Seconds pass in silence as, one by one, students look up, grinning.
Except for Jeremiah, whose forehead was touching the floor. He was fast asleep.
Clem guided his classmates to the next exercise 鈥� stomping around the room as if they were climbing up a mountain 鈥� and then stopped by Jeremiah鈥檚 mat.
She jostled his shoulder gently. Did he want to climb the mountain? He shook his head. Clem steered him to a mat in the corner, where he slept soundly for the rest of the class.
鈥淣ormally, I would be like, 鈥榊ou need to wake up, you need to sit up, and you need to listen to me,鈥� says Clem, who has taught elementary school for 12 years. 鈥淚nstead, I鈥檓 like, he needs to rest.聽In that moment, that鈥檚 compassion for Jeremiah. He didn鈥檛 need to walk around and do the mountain. He needed to rest.鈥�
It鈥檚 too soon to say whether this compassion curriculum will translate into academic gains or fewer behavior problems. However, philanthropists were impressed enough by classroom visits to donate an additional $4.4 million to the project this week, boosting the total amount raised to date to $6.5 million. District and CSP officials announced the gifts in a press conference Wednesday morning.
Dr. Patrick Tolan, who directs the University of Virginia's, which oversees CSP, says the time that elapses between a good idea and progressively larger rounds of testing to prove the idea works is usually 15 to 17 years. That鈥檚 almost an entire generation.
The way to shrink the time from 鈥渂ench to bedside,鈥� he says, is with a strictly implemented and evaluated program in a real-world setting.
Jefferson County Public Schools was a good fit, researchers found, with its racially and economically diverse student body, and mix of suburban and urban schools in and around Louisville. JCPS Superintendent Donna Hargens was an enthusiastic supporter, and so were city leaders.聽The CSP experiment comes four years after Louisville Mayor Greg Fisher signed a resolution to add the city to an international coalition of 鈥渃ompassionate鈥� cities committed to the values of selflessness, equity, justice, and respect.
The compassion curriculum, which aligns with state curriculum standards, will replace traditional physical education and practical living courses at 25 schools, while 25 other elementary schools will serve as comparison schools. Tolan hopes to see the same sort of positive outcomes found in other social and emotional learning (SEL) programs.
CSP officials point to a of 180 school-based SEL programs, which which showed an 11 to 17 percent increase in students鈥� academic performance and had better problem solving and conflict resolution skills.
A published in the American Journal of Public Health found a positive correlation between 鈥渒indergarten social competence and future wellness.鈥� In other words, kindergartners who are empathetic and who can regulate their emotions were more likely to graduate from high school on time and less likely to use drugs.
'Compassionate Shay Project'
At Cane Run, which was one of three elementary schools that were part of the pilot program, Clem was CSP鈥檚 first teacher. This year, she was joined by Ms. Johnson, who initially wasn鈥檛 interested. She was a veteran third-grade teacher and says that initially, she hadn't wanted to switch to what had, on the surface, sounded more like physical education. But after five days of intensive training, two of which were focused solely on the teacher's mental outlook and welfare, she was sold.
Before, Johnson had five minutes in the morning to check in with students. Now, each CSP class, which students take two or three times a week, begins with deep, calming breaths and the focusing exercise of listening to the bell.
Johnson recalled a recent class in which she gave her usual instructions to students: close your eyes, rest your bodies, and give compassion to your bodies through rest.
She heard a boy whimpering. 鈥淚 go over and check in on him and he tells us, 鈥楳y dad's going to jail tomorrow,鈥櫬犫�� she says. 鈥淗e was able to tune into what he was feeling right there at the moment.鈥� Johnson moved to comfort the boy.
Johnson left a third-grade class that was 鈥渘on-stop curriculum鈥� for a project she thinks was custom made for her. She calls it the 鈥淐ompassionate Shay Project.鈥澛燡ohnson, who has been diagnosed with a chronic condition, finds her own health has improved 鈥� a result she says of the soothing music and lower lights in her classroom.
The CSP borrows some language and poses familiar to those who practice yoga, but it avoids that word. Yoga implies a spiritual practice that would be inappropriate in a secular setting, says Alexis Harris, CSP鈥檚 on-the-ground project director and a research assistant professor at UVA.
What they do, Dr. Harris says, is mindful movement. It can get noisy.
On a recent Tuesday, Johnson leads students in a chant as they march around their mats. 鈥淲e鈥檙e walking around our mountain and we鈥檙e looking for our friends!鈥�
鈥淚 see cobras,鈥� Johnson says, as the children fall to the floor in cobra pose, their legs and bellies against the floor as they press their upper body up using their arms. Then, they slither and hiss like snakes before jumping up and marching again. 鈥淲e鈥檙e walking around our mountain and we鈥檙e looking for our friends!鈥�
Johnson sees a butterfly and they all sit down, the soles of their feet touching. She tells them to move their knees up and down, as if they were bees en route to a nearby flower.
With a room full of six-year-olds, there鈥檚 bound to be some silliness. 鈥淚 broke my back,鈥� one says. 鈥淚 broke my leg,鈥� says another.
Then Johnson passes out hand mirrors. One of the curriculum鈥檚 objectives is for students to recognize the seven universal emotions and to accurately interpret others鈥� facial expressions.
What if, Johnson wonders out loud, your parents told you鈥檙e having pizza and ice cream for dinner?聽The children squeal and smile (happiness and surprise) as boys in the back of the room open wide, as if they鈥檙e preparing to swallow an entire pizza whole.聽
'Life happens big time to our babies'
Another universal emotion is sadness, which CSP teacher Debbie Hutchinson at Semple Elementary unwittingly tapped into when she asked second-graders to draw their heroes.
鈥淢ost of them, either [their heroes] had passed or they were in prison or they don鈥檛 see them a lot,鈥� she says.
The exercise turned into a cry session, says Ms. Hutchinson, whose brother-in-law died less than two months ago. The curriculum, she confesses, 鈥渋s helping me, too.鈥�
This school year alone, eight parents of JCPS students have died at a single school. Accidents and a bad bunch of heroin, Harris explains. 鈥淟ife happens big time to our babies,鈥� Johnson says.
The day before, Johnson says, at a park about two miles away from Cane Run, a shooting broke out during a youth football practice. Kids hit the ground and no one was injured, but the trauma from that exposure to violence follows the children to school.
It鈥檚 no wonder some kids are distracted during class, but before CSP, Clem says, students didn鈥檛 always get the help they needed.
鈥淗ow many times as a teacher have I said, 鈥楽it up and focus,鈥� when I鈥檝e never once given you the definition of what focus means?鈥� Clem says.
Now, she鈥檚 showing them what it feels like to focus. Even misbehaving students give their classmates a chance to practice what they鈥檝e learned.
She points to that morning, when one most of the class was sitting obediently, but "I had a kid, during the bell, running across these chairs,鈥� Clem says, pointing to a row of blue chairs lined up against the wall.聽鈥淏ut,鈥� she says proudly, 鈥淚 had 22 kids who were able to sit here and tune him out. Now imagine that in a testing situation.
鈥淭hey need to be able to stay focused even through major distractions. Everything about this curriculum teaches them how to do that.鈥�
The pause place
Compassion in the classroom bears little resemblance to the hyper-disciplined environment found in many charter schools or the demerits system in some JCPS classrooms.
In compassion classrooms, there鈥檚 no time-out chair, only a small mat labeled 鈥淧ause Place,鈥� where students are encouraged to go when they are upset or having trouble staying on track, so they can self-regulate their emotions and behavior.
The compassion curriculum makes the same frequently quoted point as Austrian psychiatrist and Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl: Between stimulus and response, there is a space, or as CSP calls it, a pause.
The goal, Harris says, is to take that pause before they react with some behavior that may or may not be appropriate.
The calming breaths, the mirror exercise, learning to de-escalate conflict and ignore distractions 聽鈥� it鈥檚 all a pause.
And that speaks to another universal emotion: fear.
Clem theorizes that many teachers treat students more harshly than needed because they鈥檙e afraid. Afraid of what students鈥� poor performance on high-stakes testing might mean for educators鈥� jobs. Afraid that the principal will pop into class just when a disruptive student is upending a carefully planned lesson. Or afraid of losing a tight grip on the class, a grip they may maintain through decidedly uncompassionate behavior.
Indeed, in a hallway at Cane Run, a student can be heard screaming at a teacher and the teacher yells right back.聽
That鈥檚 reality, Clem and Johnson acknowledge, and to them, it proves that the compassion curriculum is overdue.
That day in Clem鈥檚 class, one boy had the toughest time staying on his mat.
鈥淭hat would have really bothered me and I would have really zoned in on that, but what I鈥檝e learned through all of this training is to stop scanning for the negative,鈥� she says.聽Instead of immediately disciplining that boy, she says, 鈥淚 can find that pause and I can sit in that pause a little longer.鈥�
What might the country look like, the teachers muse, if that pause became routine practice in all schools, communities, politics, and even policing, which has come under intense scrutiny in recent years following dozens of high-profile shootings of black citizens?
鈥淪ome day, one of them might be a police officer and one of them might be on the other end of that,鈥� Clem says.
Take the Tulsa, Okla., police officer who shot an unarmed black man last month, Harris says.
鈥淪he said she was scared for her life and that鈥檚 why she pulled the trigger, but if you can find that pause, that can be life-changing.鈥�
