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This article is the third of a six part series on successful school-based strategies to optimize attention and enhance learning ability, and follows the Zone’in Child Development Series December 2009 newsletter advocating for school implementation of the School Operating Safely (SOS) – Child Behavior Management Policy and Procedures. This policy has recently been forwarded to all provincial Education Ministers, as well as members of the Council of Ministers of Education.

Schools of the New Millennium – Drugs and Seclusion, or Movement and Green Space?

Managing child behavior in school settings poses potential injury risk, to both staff and students, resulting in increased use of questionable practices.  In the past decade, schools have witnessed an unprecedented rise in the use of various forms of restraint to control child behavior: medication of children, use of seclusion rooms, and physical restraint.  To protect children with behavior problems and their staff, it is imperative that schools take proactive measures by establishing effective child behavior interventions and policies in an effort to avoid use of restraints.  This article profiles the increasing incidence of schools to diagnose and medicate child behavior, and use seclusion rooms and/or restraints, and contrasts the high risk and cost of this behavior management method to the low risk and cost of improved access to green space and movement.  A less discussed, but increasingly used type of restraint in school settings, is that of technology.  While many educators are under the assumption that children need unlimited access to computers to perform their school work, many of these children are actually spending the majority of their time involved in entertainment or social networking tasks – not academic-type work.  Technology used for the purpose of giving either teachers or students a “break”, is really a form of restraint, and should be prohibited.  When we know that adequate access to movement and green space is attention restorative and enhances learning, (as well as healthy!), there really is no reason for the use of any type of restraint.

15% of elementary aged children have been diagnosed with a mental illness (C. Waddell 2007) at a time when medical experts are actively debating whether these children really just have “bad behavior” (F. Baughman 2006).  15% of these children are on some form of psychotropic medication, prescribed for toddlers as young as age two (J. Zito 2002), and prescribed for foster children and children of low income families at significantly higher rates.  Almost half of the referrals for ADHD diagnosis are from teachers (L. Sax 2003) who now consider themselves as “disease spotters” (C. Phillips 2006).

While the incidence of seclusion rooms and use of physical restraints to manage child behaviour in school-based settings are increasing(M. Irwin 2009), evidence shows they are not only detrimental to child mental and physical health, but also result in an INCREASE in the behavior (S. Magee 2001).  Numerous studies point to the associated problems between seclusion and restraints, with lack of education; poor development of policy, guidelines, and regulations; and staff inconsistency, www.pent.ca.gov/beh/rst/restraintresources.pdf and www.pent.ca.gov/beh/rst/alternativestorestraint.pps.  Endemic problems with seclusion and restraints have prompted pediatric researcher and medical school professor Dr. Martin Irwin to actively advocate for the widespread elimination of their use in both child psychiatric and school-based settings.

Two of the ten healthy alternatives to use of seclusion and restraints listed in the Schools Operating Safely – Child Behavior Management Policy are daily access to “green space” and movement.  Schools planning student daily access to “green space” would effectively counteract the “overload” effects of technology use, promoting focused attention and learning.  Green space is defined as nature-based and alive, including plants, shrub, trees, grass, and flowers, and can be created either indoors, or accessed outdoors, and is further discussed in excerpted section from Zone’in February 2010 newsletter below.  Movement is defined as either cardiovascular or resistive/isometric, and should comprise approximately 3-4 hours of a child’s day, and is further discussed in excerpted section from Zone’in January 2010 newsletter below.

Excerpt from Schools of the New Millennium – Part 2 (February 2010 Zone’in Newsletter)

Indoor green space is already accessible to classrooms with a view of nature, which a number of studies have now shown to procure students with lower behavior problems and higher academic performance.  Fresh air breaks, either through opening the window or door to the outside, can prove to be essential techniques for afternoon sleepy and zoned out students.  Indoor green space can also be designed and achieved through use of greenhouse-type environments such as arboretums, conservatories and biospheres that contain aspects of nature e.g. plants, small trees, ponds with waterfall, patch of grass.  Funds might be accessed for creation of indoor green space through local community groups and organizations, or alternatively, through application to technology production corporations. One of the goals of the future Children of the New Millennium Foundation will be to promote the channeling of donations from technology production corporations to schools to reverse the negative effects of technology overuse on development and learning, through increasing access to green space.

Outdoor green space can be accessed during recess and lunch breaks, with strict adherence given to the policy of no technology use during these designated time periods.  Accessing outdoor space for a short time prior to tests or more difficult subjects such as math, can prove to be an effective strategy to ensure optimal learning. Starting a school gardening project with daily access to shoveling a bit of dirt would not only provide green space access, but also provide necessary proprioceptive input for calming an aggressive or anxious child.  Weekly field trips to a local park, woods, farm or beach, and/or yearly classroom or school camping trips would provide children with a more significant experience of the soothing aspects of nature.  Accessing Mother Nature feeds not only the body and mind, but also the soul, and is truly the best remedy for problems associated with technology overuse.

Excerpt from Schools of the New Millennium – Part 1 (January 2010 Zone’in Newsletter)

Dr. John Ratey, child psychiatrist and author of Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain discovered that 45 min. of sustained aerobic activity at heart rate 65-75% of maximum sufficient to gain one grade level in only 4 months!  Dr. Ratey goes on to report the following correlations between exercise and learning, impulsivity and mental health.

Exercise and Learning

• Improved cognition: exercise enhances memory and learning through improved neurogenesis in hippocampus and frontal cortex.
• Decreases ADHD: increases dopamine transmitter, which improves focus and attention.
• Increases attention:  releases nerve growth factor to inhibit impulsivity, promoting focus.

Exercise and Impulsivity

• Impulsivity control is located in the frontal lobes.
• Overuse of technology “short circuits” access to frontal lobes.
• Exercise increases blood flow to frontal lobes, thereby decreasing damage caused by technology overuse.
• Exercise decreases impulsivity and increases attention.

Exercise and Mental Health

• Reduces anxiety: rewires response pathways.
• Decreases stress: improves blood flow to brain to enhance neural connections.
• Decreases depression: elevates endorphins and dopamine, regulates serotonin.
• Decreases addiction tendency: increases dopamine, enhances the brain’s own ability to satiate.

The following is a CBC film on the work of Dr. John Ratey.

http://www.cbc.ca/thenational/indepthanalysis/story/2009/10/06/national-braingains.html

In moving our children toward sustainable futures, and creating healthy environments that support attention and learning, it is imperative that schools embrace increased access to nature and movement based strategies. Children who act out are simply craving love and attention, and the only way they know how to get it is to be extreme in their behavior. Reaching out with a kind word and deep pressure touch techniques can not only calm an anxious child, but enable that child to pay attention and learn. Employing attention restorative strategies of access to nature and movement, will successfully take schools into the new millennium, creating sustainable futures for all children.