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Education
Related: About this forumDaily inspiring text messages fail to inspire US students to perform better
Source: The Guardian
Daily inspiring text messages fail to inspire US students to perform better
Richard Adams, education editor
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 11 June 2013 01.07 BST
A groundbreaking experiment that bombarded US high school students with inspiring text messages was found to be a success on all counts except one: it made no difference to how the students performed in school.
Roland Fryer, an economist at Harvard University, helped establish the experiment involving nearly 2,000 pupils at state schools in Oklahoma City.
The students were given free mobile phones in return for receiving daily texts written by a trend-setting advertising agency, encouraging them to stay in school and study for exams.
Many of the students correctly answered quiz questions showing they had paid attention to the messages but the nine-month-long randomised field study failed to find any improvement in the students' academic results or attendance.
[font size=1]-snip-[/font]
Richard Adams, education editor
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 11 June 2013 01.07 BST
A groundbreaking experiment that bombarded US high school students with inspiring text messages was found to be a success on all counts except one: it made no difference to how the students performed in school.
Roland Fryer, an economist at Harvard University, helped establish the experiment involving nearly 2,000 pupils at state schools in Oklahoma City.
The students were given free mobile phones in return for receiving daily texts written by a trend-setting advertising agency, encouraging them to stay in school and study for exams.
Many of the students correctly answered quiz questions showing they had paid attention to the messages but the nine-month-long randomised field study failed to find any improvement in the students' academic results or attendance.
[font size=1]-snip-[/font]
Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2013/jun/11/text-messages-us-high-school-students
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Daily inspiring text messages fail to inspire US students to perform better (Original Post)
Eugene
Jun 2013
OP
mbperrin
(7,672 posts)1. Attaboys failed to increase performance??!!
Whattashock!
I'm always amazed at what these frat boys dream up....
femmocrat
(28,394 posts)2. Quelle surprise!
It's like "character education". All those words of the week don't actually improve behavior. And Red Ribbon Week doesn't really prevent future drug use. But we keep on trying, don't we!
LWolf
(46,179 posts)3. Make it a great day, or not...the choice is yours. nt
AnneD
(15,774 posts)4. So Big Brother....
isn't working.
I'm shocked, shocked to find there is gambling here.
savebigbird
(417 posts)5. Let me get this straight...
They're offering kids free phones in exchange for reading text messages and then taking quizzes on them? So by giving students more tests (the text message quizzes), they're expecting the kids to improve performance on tests given in school? Hmmm...