Research Supporting ABC Bootcamp
As you might know (or maybe you don’t know…) my classroom operates a bit differently! In a lot of ways…but today I’m gonna focus on ABC Bootcamp and no tables and desks!
I want to share some research that supports ABC BOOTCAMP which is learning a letter a day for 26 days. I did bootcamp last year and the results were amazing. My students mastered all of their letters and sounds their reading levels. I am doing bootcamp again this year with my ‘staches and I keep promising to share some research about letter a day and ABC Bootcamp….so here ya go!
This research is from the International Reading Association Pre-Institute on Early Literacy. Their findings found that students who did letter a day scored higher on DIBELS testing than students who did letter a week.
In their research they talk about The Law of 10-20 for Memory Sets. It basically says the optimal review cycle for something you want your students to remember is 10-20% of the time you want the students to remember the items. (Please tell me that is just as confusing to you as it is to me!)
So here it is in plain English.
You want your kids to know all 26 letters and sounds and remember them for about 6 months. That’s 182.5 days. 10-20 percent of 182.5 is 18-37. So this is the optimal review cycle for learning letters. 18-37 days is scientifically, research based as the most effective number of days to learn letters.
What number is in the middle of 18-37?? 26. 26 days. 26 letters.
What do we teach? We explicitly teach the uppercase and lowercase letter (That’s part of bootcamp.). We teach the sound (Yep, bootcamp). We teach writing the upper and lowercase letter (Again, bootcamp.
SO……What does this mean????
Research says ABC BOOTCAMP is optimal!
Learn more about ABC Bootcamp:
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Research Supporting Flexible Seating
Here’s some research and links for supporting not using tables and desks in your classroom!
This article from Herman Miller on Rethinking Classroom Design talks about classroom design and it’s impact on motivating and engaging students! We want our students DOING so we need to design our spaces to encourage and motivate our kiddos to DO IT!
The article discusses how comfortable classrooms are good for the mind and body of our students! This is so important to me! I want my ‘staches to be comfortable. Sitting in chairs and desks all day long is not comfortable. But being able to lay down or sit or stand and do our work is engaging, comfortable and very motivating!
This article from Edtech Magazine talks about the demise of the cold hard school desk! If we want our students ready for the 21st century, we need classrooms that engage, motivate and inspire our students. Cold hard desks ain’t doin that!
This article from KQED Mind/Shift features an interview with Erin Klein who inspired me to go deskless! I love her quote that “the desks get in the way” of our learning and out ability to collaborate!
Also check out Erin’s boards on Brain Friendly Learning and Classroom Design for more research into classroom design!
Here is a great blog post from another classroom teacher on the benefits of ditching the desk!
Check out Teaching The Teacher!
Click above to read about how to start “no tables and desks!”
Handwriting with No Tables No Desks – Research:
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9 comments
Thanks for the research. It really puts everything in perspective. This research about teaching the alphabet is going to be very useful as I am planning my phonemic awareness instruction before school starts.
Thanks for sharing the articles. I really want to go without tables as I will have 22 kiddos in a small room, but many of our teachers are “old school” as is the principal (even though he's young), and they are questioning me. Also our phonics program with handwriting teaches that they must sit up straight in writing position to write. I have to do this to teach with fidelity. 🙁
I teach first and I love your boot camp! How do your TRC levels look at the end of the year and do you attribute those to starting off with boot camp? Also like the idea of no desk–I got rid of my teachers desk years ago.
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Thanks Greg! This was a helpful post. I enjoyed reading the articles you linked as well. Who would have thought our society would go from desks nailed to the floor to no desks at all!
I love the idea of going deskless (or tableless) in theory but I also teach a handwriting program that demands correct writing posture. I have not read the research links but I wonder what your thoughts are on this. Last year I had a student with minimal core strength whose fine motor skills were shaky. I asked the OT in our building if lying down to write would work for him, and she suggested taping his work up vertically and having him stand. Doing this, I did see improvement. So while I do allow student to work in various areas of the room I am struggling overall.
I love the idea of going deskless (or tableless) in theory but I also teach a handwriting program that demands correct writing posture. I have not read the research links but I wonder what your thoughts are on this. Last year I had a student with minimal core strength whose fine motor skills were shaky. I asked the OT in our building if lying down to write would work for him, and she suggested taping his work up vertically and having him stand. Doing this, I did see improvement. So while I do allow student to work in various areas of the room I am struggling overall.
Hello Gregg. I see that you mention the DIBELS results as support for this strategy. I was wondering how much you rely on DIBELS for fluency assessment? I am just curious. 🙂
I am designing a classroom that will have a mix of traditional and modern classroom setups. I am planning to have tables but since the size of our room is on a larger side, I am implementing the flexible seating concept. We will have a “meadow” which is a 9×12 green carpet space and a “pond” in our library (5×8 blue/gray carpet) as well as 36″ storage units next to the tables. They will have the option to work on the floor in the “meadow” or “pond” with a clipboard, sit at the “stumps” (tables), or stand next to the 36″ storage units. I am feeling positive about these options and hoping for the absolute success with it.
Allison 🙂
First Year Kindergarten Teacher 2016-2017