What Does Our Discomfort with Fidget Spinners Say About Education?
As educators, we have all encountered colleagues bemoaning the rise of fidget spinners, whether in-person, on blogs, or on social media.
For some perspective, consider how people outside education view fidget spinners. WatchThe Young Turks enjoy playing with them. Forbes magazine calls them the “must-have office toy for 2017.” The sheer delight of staffers playing with fidget spinners at AJ+ bears this out. Most poignantly, YouTuber BunnyMeyer says, “I find…I’ve been struggling with depression and anxiety…and these things [fidget spinners] calm me down.”Quick aside:How awesome would it be if we cultivated creativity in our students that resulted in them having eight million YouTube subscribers like Bunny Meyer does?
These positive takes are not surprising when you consider Nerdist’s piece about how physics explains why fidget spinners are so fun. Non-educators think of fidget spinners as fun and comforting, so…
What does our discomfort with Fidget Spinners say about education?
My best guess is that some educators are uncomfortable with fidget spinners because they distract from a traditional, teacher-centered, industrial model of education that relies on learners paying attention and distractions kept to an absolute minimum. Fidget spinners are a problem when we expect students to be audience members in their classrooms. A simple solution – don’t expect students to be audience members in their classrooms.
If the concern is that fidget spinnerstake students off-task, consider the gainfullyemployed people in the examples above. Further, if we areworried about fidget-spinners taking learners “off-task,”how dedicated are we to moving away from our industrial model of education?Second quick aside: Can we please eradicate the child-hostile terms “off-task” and “on-task” from education?
One last question to consider: if our kids care about or arefascinated by something, and it is safe, doesn’t it belong in their classrooms as a hook to engage them?
The Good News
Fortunately, not all educators are uncomfortable with fidget spinners. Some are using them to engage and teach. Have a look at these great examples from Education Week, Denis Sheeran, and Meagan Kelly. You have all summer to contemplate this issue. In 2017-18 will you ban fidget spinners or use them to engage students?
Thank you for reading. I am curious tohear from you about this issue. Please comment below or tweet me at@TomEMullaney.
Thank you,Canva, the tool I used to make theimagefor this post. This is the chalkboard in the image. This is the fidget spinner.
FULL DISCLOSURE: I HAVE NOT RECEIVED COMPENSATION OF ANY KIND FOR MENTIONING THE PRODUCTS OR SERVICES IN THIS POST. I WAS NOT SOLICITED TO WRITE THIS POST AND I HAVE NO RELATIONSHIP WITHANY OF THE COMPANIES MENTIONED.
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