Reflections
Removing Obstacles to Learning
Why should educators be concerned with health?
What is the problem?
We are living in an age of childhood chronic illness. According to a 2007 national survey, 54% of U.S. children suffer from at least one chronic health condition, including developmental disorders, autism, ADD/ADHD, allergies, asthma, autoimmune diseases, obesity, cancer, anxiety, and depression. A 2010 national study found that from 1994 to 2006, the prevalence in American children of four types of chronic conditions (obesity, asthma, behavior/learning problems and “other” physical conditions) doubled, increasing from 12.8% to 26.6%. At the same time, academic proficiency is declining. The National Assessment of Educational Progress has reported a gradual decrease in reading and mathematics performance scores since 2012, with more significant declines since 2020. As educators, we have observed that a large percentage of our students present with difficulty focusing, processing information, and communicating using both written and oral language. We can no longer ignore the fact that the poor state of students’ health is interfering with their learning.
Diagnostic labels indicating learning differences may provide useful information, but they do not in themselves address the need for a healthful learning environment and effective study practices. Lowering academic standards is not the solution. Introducing digital technologies into the classroom does not improve the situation, but rather exacerbates the problem. To us, the first step in a renaissance of education requires identifying and removing obstacles to learning.
Educators are introduced to psychologist Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs pyramid that underlies human functioning and behavior. The foundational levels of this hierarchy comprise physiological and safety needs. These primary needs must first be met before the higher needs of love and belonging, esteem, and self-actualization can be fulfilled. Therefore, the primary needs are prerequisites to learning.
Primary needs include:
Anything that interferes with these primary needs constitutes an obstacle to learning.
While it is easy to identify many factors that influence our primary needs, life in the 21st century offers hidden and overlooked environmental factors that prevent us from meeting our primary needs and therefore impair our ability to learn. It follows, then, that in order for learning to take place, we must first remove these environmental obstacles to learning.
To learn more about environmental obstacles to learning, read our “Removing Obstacles to Learning" information and resource sheet below (the button will open a pdf document in a new tab), or contact us.
What is the problem?
We are living in an age of childhood chronic illness. According to a 2007 national survey, 54% of U.S. children suffer from at least one chronic health condition, including developmental disorders, autism, ADD/ADHD, allergies, asthma, autoimmune diseases, obesity, cancer, anxiety, and depression. A 2010 national study found that from 1994 to 2006, the prevalence in American children of four types of chronic conditions (obesity, asthma, behavior/learning problems and “other” physical conditions) doubled, increasing from 12.8% to 26.6%. At the same time, academic proficiency is declining. The National Assessment of Educational Progress has reported a gradual decrease in reading and mathematics performance scores since 2012, with more significant declines since 2020. As educators, we have observed that a large percentage of our students present with difficulty focusing, processing information, and communicating using both written and oral language. We can no longer ignore the fact that the poor state of students’ health is interfering with their learning.
Diagnostic labels indicating learning differences may provide useful information, but they do not in themselves address the need for a healthful learning environment and effective study practices. Lowering academic standards is not the solution. Introducing digital technologies into the classroom does not improve the situation, but rather exacerbates the problem. To us, the first step in a renaissance of education requires identifying and removing obstacles to learning.
Educators are introduced to psychologist Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs pyramid that underlies human functioning and behavior. The foundational levels of this hierarchy comprise physiological and safety needs. These primary needs must first be met before the higher needs of love and belonging, esteem, and self-actualization can be fulfilled. Therefore, the primary needs are prerequisites to learning.
Primary needs include:
- Need for food, water, clean air, and shelter
- Need for sleep
- Need for physical comfort (ambient temperature, body position)
- Need for safety
- Need for physical, emotional, and mental health
Anything that interferes with these primary needs constitutes an obstacle to learning.
While it is easy to identify many factors that influence our primary needs, life in the 21st century offers hidden and overlooked environmental factors that prevent us from meeting our primary needs and therefore impair our ability to learn. It follows, then, that in order for learning to take place, we must first remove these environmental obstacles to learning.
To learn more about environmental obstacles to learning, read our “Removing Obstacles to Learning" information and resource sheet below (the button will open a pdf document in a new tab), or contact us.