LIAS Learning Principles: Taking Another Look

Source: Real Options for City Kids San Francisco (ROCK SF) 

By Sam Piha

Afterschool youth programs, sometimes referred to as out-of-school time or expanded learning programs, have unique advantages that perfectly position them to complement the learning that happens at school and home, and offer valuable extended learning opportunities. If afterschool programs are to achieve their full potential, they must be known as important places of learning that excite young people in the building of new skills, the discovery of new interests, and opportunities to achieve a sense of mastery. 

In 2010, Temescal Associates launched the Learning in Afterschool and Summer (LIAS) Project to address a great debate as to whether afterschool programs should be focused on academic or youth development outcomes. It was designed to unify the field of afterschool and focus the movement on promoting young people’s learning. The LIAS Learning Principles became a foundational part of the California Quality Standards for Expanded Learning Programs.

We developed research-based LIAS Learning Principle and brought together afterschool leaders from across California to review and help shape the Learning Principles. 

Source: Temescal Associates

These learning principles are strongly supported by recent brain research, afterschool research, and the growing science of learning. They are also well aligned with the 21st century learning skills and workforce skills that young people will need to succeed in the years ahead, as well as efforts to increase young people’s interest in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM). Each of the learning principles cited below support each other and provide an important framework for afterschool programming. 

“These principles, all critical, reflect what our own field experience and research suggest about the characteristics of effective learning environments. They speak to both staff practices and program content, which is important. I think that working toward mastery, which goes right to the intersection of program content and staff practices – is something we need to be more intentional about in out-of-school time (OST) settings.”- Karen Pittman, Co-Founder of the Forum for Youth Investment 

Source: Temescal Associates

We believe the learning principles are still relevant and useful today. Each of the learning principles cited below support each other and provide an important framework to guide the design, implantation and evaluation of afterschool programs. Below are the LIAS learning principles:

1. Learning must be ACTIVE


Learning and memory recall of new knowledge is strengthened through different exposures – seeing, hearing, touching, and doing. Afterschool learning should be the result of activities that involve young people in “doing” – activities that allow them to be physically active, stimulate their innate curiosity, and that are hands-on and project-based. (CA Quality Standards #2, 3, & 5)



2. Learning must be COLLABORATIVE


Afterschool and summer programs should help young people build team skills that include listening to others, supporting group learning goals, and resolving differences and conflicts.
Collaborative learning happens when learners engage in a common task where each individual depends on and is accountable to each other. (CA Quality Standards #1, 2, 3, & 8)



3. Learning must be MEANINGFUL


Learning is meaningful when youth have some ownership over the learning topic, the means to assess their own progress, and when the learning is relevant to their own interests, experiences, and the real world in which they live. Community and cultural relevance is important to all youth. (CA Quality Standards #2, 3, & 4)

 

4. Learning must SUPPORT MASTERY


If young people are to learn the importance and joy of mastery, they need the opportunity to learn and practice a full sequence of skills that will allow them to become “really good at something.” Afterschool and summer activities should be explicitly sequenced and designed to promote the layering of new skills. (CA Quality Standard #3)



“We spend so much time focused on "achievement" and so little time focused on how to motivate students to learn. The principles advocated by Learning in Afterschool strike the right balance and make sense. We want to see a more holistic approach taken to educating children, one that responds to the developmental needs of the student and focuses on fostering intellectual curiosity and a love of learning. The principles contained in Learning in Afterschool and Summer promote such an approach, and if applied with fidelity, could lead to real improvements in educational outcomes for kids.”- Pedro Noguera, Emery Stoops and Joyce King Stoops Dean of the USC Rossier School of Education. 

5. Learning must EXPANDS HORIZONS


Afterschool and summer programs should provide learning opportunities that take youth beyond their current experience and expand their horizons. They should go beyond the walls of their facilities to increase young people’s knowledge of their surrounding neighborhood and the larger global community. (CA Quality Standards #2 & 3) 

WHAT OTHER LEADERS SAY ABOUT THE LIAS LEARNING PRINCIPLES

Source: Temescal Associates 

“All five principles are critical. They collectively provide the relevance so desperately needed for students to become engaged and for learning to become alive for them. They also provide the deeper understanding and the discovery of learning that is critical for success in school and life.” - Dr. Willard Daggett, Founder and Chairman, International Center for Leadership in Education

“I used the LIAS principles because I felt they captured many of the core elements that a successful afterschool program should have.  Actually, those principles should be reflected in classrooms during the regular school day as well.” - Pedro Noguera, Emery Stoops and Joyce King Stoops Dean of the USC Rossier School of Education. 

“The five LIAS principles are perfectly aligned with a 21st century learning approach – active, meaningful, collaborative learning projects that provide opportunities to expand one’s horizons and master important knowledge and skills – this is the heart of 21st century learning.” - Bernie Trilling, Author of 21st Century Skills: Learning for Life in Our Times

 “Afterschool and out-of-school instruction needs to be constructed in a way that is consistent and sustained with high quality instruction as well. In other words, how are teachers, mentors, and facilitators trained to ensure ‘active, collaborative, meaningful, supports mastery, and expands horizons’ are actualized in afterschool programs?” - Richard Milne, Associate Professor of Education, Vanderbilt University

Click images below to view two brief videos that detail the LIAS Learning Principles and are excellent for staff training and discussion.

LIAS RESOURCES

Check out the LIAS Website to find additional materials, tools and resources.

Global Competency, Part 2: Resources for Expanded Learning Programs

By Sam Piha

Sam Piha

If young people are going to be prepared for work and citizenship in our global community, it is important that they develop global competency. 

Below is part 2 of our interview with Heather Loewecke, Senior Program Manager of Afterschool and Youth Leadership Initiatives at Asia Society. It is important to note that the effort to promote global competency is not a "pile on" to the California Quality Standards for Expanded Learning Programs. Instead, global learning and global competency are intertwined with the existing standards for quality programs.

In Heather's response to our question about resources, she listed a great list with links. We urge any program leader who wants to explore global competency further, to check out these resources. To view her PowerPoint presentation that she offered at our recent How Kids Learn VI conference in Los Angeles, click here. 

Q: What would be examples of how an afterschool program might

Heather Loewecke

promote global competence? 
A: Here are several ways programs can start integrating global content into programs:

Create a Culturally Sensitive Environment
Staff and youth can work together to create a set of group guidelines that outline expected behaviors. Include strategies for asking respectful questions about people, cultures, or ideas that are unfamiliar. Introduce youth to new countries and cultures, including those of students in your program and of people in the community at large. Present balanced viewpoints during learning activities and remind participants that everyone’s ideas are valid. If possible, include decorations and snacks from different cultures around the world and set up space to promote collaboration.

Make Community Connections
Take stock of existing partners and stakeholders or conduct a community assessment to identify additional potential assets and partners in the community. Invite partners to events and festivals or to be guest speakers in the program to share their global connections and resources. Take youth on field trips to museums, nearby neighborhoods, and local businesses to enhance and deepen learning. Coordinate with local schools or nonprofit organizations to set up service learning efforts that promote youth’s civic participation to address local issues while increasing their leadership skills. Develop partnerships with programs in other cities or countries to provide participants with virtual exchange opportunities with peers. 

Photo Credit: Asia Society

Integrate Global Learning into Existing Activities
Go beyond flags, food, and festivals. It’s not necessary to overhaul all activities or create new programming to get started doing global learning in afterschool, but it is important to provide sustained and regular global learning activities in order to develop youth's global competencies. Start by focusing on one programming component or learning unit:

• Is there an example or a piece of content in an activity that could be replaced with one from another country or culture?
• Could an activity be augmented through the addition of a globally oriented extension project or field trip?
• Or, perhaps an activity could be transformed by aligning an existing goal or outcome with one of the global competencies listed above.

For example, read folktales and poems from other countries during literacy time. Or, include games from other cultures in your health and fitness component. During cooking club, teach students to prepare healthy foods from other cultures.

Design Thematic and Project-Based Learning Units
Once staff are comfortable infusing global content into existing activities, they can go deeper by using globally significant topics when planning new activities. Topics such as water access, human rights, health care, and education are relevant both globally and locally and increase youth’s academic knowledge and social-emotional skills such as empathy and compassion. Teaching about these issues across program areas helps young people to become informed, global citizens through integrated and interdisciplinary study.

Develop these topics further into project-based learning units that begin with an essential question or problem that interests participants and guides them through research toward an action project.

Photo Credit: Asia Society

Q: Does Asia Society have any resources on global learning for the expanded learning community?
A: Yes! Here are a few resources to support the suggestions noted above:

• Global leadership performance outcomes and rubrics benchmarked at grades 3, 5, 8, 10, and 12. Use these when planning learning units and giving feedback to youth on their projects.
• Global learning “quick sheets”: One‐page examples of developmentally appropriate unit plan outlines in typical afterschool content areas. Each activity in the unit builds upon the last, connects across the four domains of global competence, and leads to sample program outcomes. We developed these with the support of the Statewide Afterschool Networks, and we are creating more. 
• “Global Learning in Afterschool Self‐Assessment Tool”: Programs can use this tool to reflect upon their practice and guide the development of quality improvement measures. It can be used in conjunction with other quality improvement processes and self‐assessment tools.
• Expanding Horizons: Building Global Literacy in Afterschool Programs: This guidebook lists strategies and resources for the afterschool field on how to integrate international knowledge, skills, and experiences into its program activities.

Take a look at our global learning blog on national newspaper Education Week, follow us on Twitter, and join in to our weekly Twitter chat (#globaledchat) Thursdays at 8pm ET / 5pm PT for more ideas from practitioners and education leaders. If you have any questions, feel free to contact me at HLoewecke@asiasociety.org.

____________
Heather began her career as an English teacher at a high school in New York City where she implemented interdisciplinary curricula utilizing a workshop format for developing students’ literacy skills. Then she managed capacity building projects and coached educators in various topics such as conflict resolution, lesson planning, social-emotional learning, behavior management, among others. Heather was a member of the Children’s Studies faculty at Brooklyn College and taught an undergraduate course called Perspectives on Childhood. She joined Asia Society in 2012. 

The Coming Together of School and Afterschool Practices

By Sam Piha

Sam Piha

With the large increase in public funding of afterschool programs in the early 2000’s, people argued that if afterschool was to remain relevant, we would have to close the gap between afterschool and the school day. To many this meant afterschool should, among other things:

• Mimic the school day,
• Reinforce the school day’s core academics, and
• Raise the school’s standardized test scores.

But, while afterschool programs worked to support the learning in school, successful classrooms began to employ strategies that looked more like afterschool programs. These changes in teaching and learning strategies was supported by the research and literature on the new science of learning, the brain and learning, the importance of social emotional (non-academic) skills and character building, the importance of summer learning, and the skills needed for success in school, work and life. The result was a change in how we think about children, not as students, but as learners.

For example, the Figures below represent a study of how teachers use their time when they structure their learning in a whole class/lecture format (Figure 1) versus serving as a learning facilitator using small groups (Figure 2). (CNYD Youth Development Guide, Chapter 5)

Figure 1 - CNYD Youth Development Guide, Chapter 5

Figure 2 - CNYD Youth Development Guide, Chapter 5

In the past, the worlds of education (schools) and youth development (afterschool/expanded learning) seemed so far apart. Today, they are sharing a focus on young people's learning. This is well illustrated by the similarities between the California Quality Standards for Expanded Learning Programs and the California Standards for the Teaching Profession.

The LIAS Principles and the CA Quality Standards for Expanded Learning Programs

By Sam Piha

Sam Piha

In 2010, the Learning in Afterschool & Summer (LIAS) project was launched to offer five research based principles that serves as a guide for programs wishing to increase the engagement, motivation, and learning of their young participants. 

Four years later, the California Department of Education (CDE)/After School Division released the California Quality Standards for Expanded Learning Programs (CA Quality Standards). LIAS staff served on all three phases of the development of these standards to ensure that the LIAS principles were embedded. These standards focused on points of direct service with youth (#1-6) and standards that are intended to guide program managers (#7-12). 

Many afterschool and summer leaders asked how the LIAS learning principles correspond to the CA Quality Standards. To address this question, we issued a “crosswalk” paper, which correlated the LIAS learning principles with the CA Quality Standards for points of service with young people. This “crosswalk” paper can be found on the LIAS website here.

Below we offer a summary of this crosswalk. 

Learning that is Active: 
Learning and memory recall of new knowledge is strengthened through different exposures – seeing, hearing, touching, and doing. Afterschool and summer learning should be the result of activities that involve young people in “doing” – activities that allow them to be physically active, stimulate their innate curiosity, and that are hands-on and project-based. 

Learning that is Collaborative: 
Afterschool and summer programs should help young people build team skills that include listening to others, supporting group-learning goals, and resolving differences and conflicts. Collaborative learning happens when learners engage in a common task where each individual depends on and is accountable to each other.

Learning that is Meaningful: 
Learning is meaningful when youth have some ownership over the learning topic, the means to assess their own progress, and when the learning is relevant to their own interests, experiences, and the real world in which they live. Community and cultural relevance is important to all youth. 

Learning that Supports Mastery: 
If young people are to learn the importance and joy of mastery, they need the opportunity to learn and practice a full sequence of skills that will allow them to become “really good at something.” Afterschool and summer activities should be explicitly sequenced and designed to promote the layering of new skills. 

Learning that Expands Horizons: 
Afterschool and summer programs should provide learning opportunities that take youth beyond their current experience and expand their horizons. They should go beyond the walls of their facilities to increase young people’s knowledge of their surrounding neighborhood and the larger global community. 

•••

You can read other blogs by the LIAS project by going to: 

• Expanded Learning 360°/365 Project website 
• LIAS Blog Written for the California Afterschool Network

The New Quality Standards for Expanded Learning

By Sam Piha

Sam Piha

I was honored to join a group of afterschool leaders to develop a set of quality standards for expanded learning on behalf of the CDE After School Division. This group was selected through a competitive application process and met several times over the past year to complete its recommendations. After the quality standards were reviewed by stakeholders across the state, they were submitted to the After School Division in June 2013. 

CDE approved the recommendations for the 12 Quality Standards for Expanded Learning and have released them in a full report. 

The Learning in Afterschool & Summer learning principles (below in bold) are fully reflected in the following standards: 

- Active and engaged learning 

Program design and activities reflect active, meaningful and engaging learning methods that promote collaboration and expand student horizons.

- Skill building 

The program maintains high expectations for all students, intentionally links program goals and curricula with 21st-century skills and provides activities to help students achieve mastery.

There are 12 standards in all. You can view a full copy of the report here. A second quality committee is being formed to consider the terms that require further definition, the need for a self-reflection tool, and other tools to help field leaders make good use of the California Quality Standards for Expanded Learning.