The Marshmallow Test

I immediately liked this article because I read the word marshmallow. But in a closer reading I learned that the article wasn't in fact about making smores or incorporating treats into the classroom (I know it's bad but I can't help but make my famous brownies when there is an occasion). I digress, the article is really about concentration.

A group of four-year-olds were told if they waited fifteen minutes before they ate a presented marshmallow, they would get two marshmallows in return. Shockingly, "fewer then one in three children passed the so-called 'marshmallow test'" (Sparks 20). The follow up on this research proved that the children who were able to withhold on eating the treat "were more likely to do well in school, avoid substance abuse, maintain a healthy weight (probably because they can look at a marshmallow and not eat it), and even perform better on the SAT then peers who couldn't resist temptation" (20).

Interestingly, the same students were tested years later as an adult. Rather then testing the adults with treats, which may not hold as much gratification to an adult, the testers were tested with images of of happy, fearful and neutral faces. In response to a happy face, the tester is told to press a button. When the objective changes and the tester is asked not to press a button at all, the students who ate the marshmallow as a child were more frequently the one's who were pressing the gratifying button. What does this all mean? "Sensitivity to environmental cues influences individual's ability to suppress thoughts and actions, such that control systems may be 'hi-jacked' by primitive limbic system, rendering control systems unable to appropriately modulate behavior"(20). Now say that ten times, fast. What I gather from the quote is that students who have a low threshold for restraint tend to have less self control in the classroom, looking for the next pleasurable stimuli. A possible solution to this self control issue is giving students definite social cues. An example given would be to give children a picture of an ear when they need to be listening or a picture of a mouth when they are asked to speak.

This reminds me of the first time I tried to teach debate in my classroom. Can you imagine a group of eight graders learning to debate for the first time? It was quiet a debacle. What I learned was that the students needed tangible guild lines as well as something tangible to display who was speaking. When the students understood that each debate group had to take turns in making their argument, it was easy to incorporate a spokesperson with a 'microphone' to speak. If another member from the other party spoke without the microphone, a point will be taken off from the whole team. Another go at the debate and the class learned to speak in turn and listen respectfully in order to articulate their next debate move.

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