Just Sit Down Already!
What Evolution Tells Us About Student Behavior
Any teacher can tell you that there are days you just sit and watch your class and wonder, “what in the world is going on???” As you look around you see kids are everywhere (besides their desks), they’re yelling or making silly noises, feet are in the air, and one kid is rolling head over heels across the carpet. No work is getting done and you’re at your wits’ end. You spend a good chunk of time trying to get everyone focused and back on track. Just as they get back to work, a pencil box goes flying off a desk, makes a huge bang, and crayons roll everywhere. Chaos ensues as everyone jumps up to chase them. Odds are, it isn’t even lunch yet.
Student behavior is something that every teacher deals with. Many will tell you it is one of the most challenging parts of the job. If they would just sit and listen, we could get so much done! While an evolutionary lens may not fix all our issues, it can help us understand student behavior better.
Evolutionary Mismatch
I’ve said it before and I will say it again: kids evolved to learn through mixed-age, collaborative, self-driven play. Ancestral children became successful adults by watching the adults of their nomadic tribe engage in everyday activities and by mimicking those activities through play. Children choose what they wanted to learn and when they wanted to learn it. This type of learning was the norm and really the only way education happened for most of our evolutionary history (Gray, 2009).
After the advent of agriculture roughly 10,000 years ago, life became more sedentary and folks no longer lived in hunter-gatherer bands. Even more recently than that did formal schooling come to exist and become compulsory. I’m talking just a few hundred years or less. As a result, our brains have not kept up. In terms of education, our brains expect to be able to learn in the self-directed, play-based manner that was typical for nearly all of our ancestors (Bjorklund, 2021). Brains are good at that! It is a lot harder for brains to learn in the novel ways schools and education exist today. This discrepancy between evolved and current conditions is referred to as evolutionary mismatch (see Geher, 2014).
Mismatch and Behavior
So then, what does this all mean for student behavior? Think about what it would have been like to learn as a hunter gatherer versus what learning is like for modern students.
As a hunter-gatherer child:
You could move around whenever you wanted, you were not stuck at a desk or sitting on a carpet.
You spent the whole day outdoors, not in a classroom.
You spent all day talking and engaging, not listening.
You followed your own schedule, it was not dictated for you by someone else.
You interacted primarily with other children, not adults.
You collaborated and shared with other children, you were not in competition with or measured against them.
You chose your activity or game, it was not given to you or mandated.
You worked at your own pace, you didn’t have assessments or deadlines.
All of your work was hands-on with real tools and materials, not with pencil and paper or the computer.
This list could go on and on, but the takeaway is that much of schooling is unnatural and counter to how children have evolved to learn best. We have taken the play and choice out of learning. Considering this, it should come as no surprise to us that school is hard for many kids! Their brains expect to be learning and experiencing childhood in one condition, but they find themselves in something completely different. Some of this change is necessary to learn the modern skills kids need, but at the end of the day, kids did not evolve to learn best through sitting and listening. They evolved to be active and in-charge. This discrepancy explains much of their “bad” behavior.
A Caveat Before The Takeaways
I want to make it clear that I am not dismissing kids’ bad behaviors as natural or acceptable. Evolutionary mismatch is present in many areas of our lives and make those things more difficult. Food is more readily available and more heavily processed than it was for our ancestors, it is difficult to eat healthy. Many of us have sedentary desk jobs, it is difficult to stay active and exercise. We live in large groups or cities, staying in touch with close relatives is difficult.
The truth of it is that the majority of kids exist in a school system that, despite being evolutionarily unnatural, is what they must navigate. Kids in the 21st century must learn to behave, follow directions, etc. to be able to learn the skills needed for success. Evolutionary reasoning helps understand why behavior is such a challenge. It provides some tools teachers can use to address behavior. But, it does not excuse behaviors.
Takeaways
It is difficult to have a clear takeaway here because there is limited ways that teachers can adjust for this big of an evolutionary mismatch within the constraints of a public school setting. Behavior will always be a challenge because at a certain point, the structure of school is unchangeable. There are not big changes that can be made that are in the control of individual teachers. So in this case, I am providing some small takeaways for teachers to lessen the impacts of evolutionary mismatch. I am also sharing takeaways for administrators on what they can do to support teachers.
Teachers:
Allow for flexibility in working spaces. Not all kids learn best in chairs at all times. It can be as simple as allowing kids to sit, stand, or work on the floor. It can also be as complex as investing in flexible furniture.
Allow student choice and voice in learning and work when possible. While we have to follow a given curriculum, look for opportunities for choice such as in projects or books.
Spend time outside for academics or play. I promise, they’ll still be learning.
Let kids work together. Kids can work with peers in their classroom or kids of other ages.
Administrators:
Allow for flexibility in scheduling. Teachers need the freedom to take a class outside or explore a topic of interest with their students. Some of the most meaningful work occurs in these moments, but teachers must have the opportunity and time for it.
Budget funds for furniture that meets the needs of students.
Prioritize ample time for work and play to develop children’s social-emotional skills. These skills are just as important as the academics, but are often ignored because they are not tested. Kids who are able to self-regulate, understand their feelings and needs, and work together will be more ready and willing to learn despite the evolutionary mismatch inherent in schools.
None of this will solve behavior issues completely, but I am of the philosophy that every little bit helps. We are asking kids to work and learn in an environment that is hugely different from how they evolved to learn best. This type of work is difficult for adults, let alone children, and we see the adverse outcomes in student behaviors. We cannot and should not excuse all behavior issues in schools, but understanding them is important and an evolutionary lens helps.
References
Bjorkund, D. (2021). How children invented humanity. New York: Oxford University Press.
Geher, G. (2014). Evolutionary Psychology 101. New York: Springer.
Gray, P. (2009). Play as a foundation for hunter– gatherer social existence. Champaign, IL: University of Illinois