Connect with Daniel Pink
Twitter: @danielpink | Website: www.danpink.com | Book: When: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing
Links & Show Notes
- Daniel Pink Intro (00:46)
..* Drive (01:19) - Autonomy, Mastery, & Purpose - Prime your brain (2:50)
..* “Timing isn’t the main thing, it’s the only thing.” - Miles Davis (3:50) Biological clocks in every cell of our body - Time of day & standardized testing - Denmark study (5:21)
- School start time for high schoolers (6:21)
..* Chronobiology / Chronotypes
..* American Academy of Pediatrics Report (don’t start school before 8:30)
..* Teen depression, teen obesity, lower test scores, more car accidents
..* Adults saying ‘don’t be lazy’ - remember how detrimental that can be from our discussion with Glenn Whitman!
..* We don’t take timing seriously (8:43) - Phases of the day based on chronotype (9:53)
..* 15% are larks
..* 20% are owls
..* The rest of us are ‘third birds’
..* Pattern of the day (Twitter, Daniel Kahneman)
..* Peak → Trough → Recovery - “Our cognitive abilities don’t stay the same throughout the day.” (11:20)
..* Peak: Analytic work - most vigilant at this time
..* Trough: increase in medical errors, decrease in handwashing in hospitals, more car accidents: Administrative work - not a lot of brainpower
..* Recovery: High mood but less vigilant - time for Creative Work - Scheduling (14:45) - Not just a logistical issue, it’s a pedagogical issue and a strategic issue
..* Only criterion we use is availability (rooms & people) when we schedule anything - we should give more weight to the ‘when’
..* Time of day alone represents about 20% of variance in how someone performs on the job (15:50)
..* We’re intentional about the ‘what’ - the curriculum, the ‘who’ - who’s in the room, the ‘how’ - the pedagogy, but the ‘when’ takes a back seat, which is a big mistake.
..* Study of 2 million students in LAUSD - student performance in math in the morning vs. math in the afternoon
..* Corporate earnings calls - NYU study (19:07) - even led to temporary stock mispricing
..* Communicate important messages earlier in the day - Taking breaks (22:02)
..* Breaks are undervalued
..* Something is better than nothing - even if 1 to 2 minutes, better than nothing; breaks should be social, even for introverts; moving is better than stationary; outside is better than inside; fully detached is better than semi-detached
..* We look at recess as a concession - recess is part of what we need to learn!
..* Denmark - 20 to 30 min break before those standardized tests, scores went back up - Temporal Landmarks (24:48) - trigger an interesting form of mental accounting
..* Try using fresh start dates or temporal landmarks for when you want students to try something new - Suggestions for School: (27:20)
..* More breaks for teachers and students alike, analytical classes (literacy & numeracy) in the morning, move art / music to later in the day, pay more attention to how well things are working and adjust accordingly - test and reiterate
..* Increase our chances of being successful; not guarantees - Premortems - Gary Klein (30:53)
..* Make mistakes in your head and come up with solutions before you make those mistakes, e.g. ask students: AP test is in 6 months, you get a 1, what went wrong? - Group Synchronization (34:46) Oxford research on prosocial effects of synchronous play with children (boosts our mood, increased collaboration, more open to playing with kids who don’t look like them, open minded, generous, etc.)
- Motivation (37:57)
..* Autonomy, Mastery, & Purpose - Genius Hour & self-directed projects, student-led conferences, solve problems in their local community - Homework from Daniel Pink (40:56)
..* Be a better observer of your own behavior - how are you doing at different times of day? Observe and act accordingly
..* Beginnings, middles & ends - importance of the end of the year - Danpink.com / danielpink.com / email newsletter
- Takeaways (43:52)
..* Quiz on Daniel’s website to learn your own chronotype
..* Make the end of year powerful!
