Classroom Decorations Distracts Students, Says New Study

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Classrooms have long been considered a crucial part of education. Thus it is no surprise that most classrooms in schools worldwide are designed in a way to offer an enhanced learning experience to the students. You can find various educational and decorative items inside your classroom like smiley paper flowers, number charts, alphabets, world map, welcoming posters, banners and perhaps even a hamster in a cage. But does all this decoration inside the classroom distract our students from actually learning? Let’s find out... 

Are Decorated Classrooms A Good Idea?

 

According to a recent survey, less is more in the classroom, at least for kindergartners. The Psychological Science study, published in May 2014, aimed to explore the influence of classroom decorations on learning. The report revealed that highly decorated classrooms made students more distracted. As a result they scored lower than students who studied in classrooms with bare walls. 

The study by researchers at Carnegie Mellon University surveyed 24 kindergartners. In the first stage, children learned in a room that was decorated with artworks, maps, science posters and presidential photos. The students were seated on the floor in front of their teacher for a science lesson which lasted for 5-7 minutes. It was followed by a multiple-choice picture test. During the lesson, all activity of the children was videotaped to observe their focusing abilities. 

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Do Children Get Distracted By Classroom Decoration?

 

It was found that learners in bare classrooms got distracted, but only by themselves and fellow student. However, in decorated classrooms, learners were much less focused and were more distracted by the decorative pieces. Associate psychology professor and lead author of the study, Anna V. Fisher, believes classroom environment may create a negative impact on the student’s ability to learn. She thinks that the research was not systematic enough and was rather small, to provide comprehensive results and further study is required on this topic. 

According to Gillian McNamee, Director of Teacher Education at Erikson Institute (Chicago), most experienced teachers had already known that excessive visual stimulation can create a negative impact on children’s concentration. Lori Baker, an elementary teacher from Illinois, says “My personal approach is you don’t put anything up if the children have not made some sort of prior connection to it.” 

Are Sparse Classrooms The Solution?

 

However, psychology professor Daniel Willingham of University of Virginia, thinks there are aspects in the findings of the study which we need to focus on. Firstly the study claims that the students will eventually get familiarised with the decorations within almost 2 weeks from introduction to the decorated room. Thus it is likely that the children will gradually return to the standard distraction-level pretty soon. Secondly, there might be some negative aspects in not having a decorated, cheerful and welcoming classroom. He suggests the best alternative is to have an inviting environment a vase of flowers and calm paint colours, instead of over-stimulating it. 

Alfie Kohn, author of books about parenting, education and human behaviour, says “While we’re at it, maybe we should just design classrooms without windows. And, hey, I’ll bet kids would really perform better if they spent their days in isolation.” 

Creating The Right Learning Environment

 

Anna V. Fisher said in an interview that she is not asking educators to tear wall decorations from their classroom. She is simply telling teachers to give some more thought to creating the right classroom setting. She adds “Improving education outcomes for children is such a complex and complicated issue. There are so many parts to this problem…there are so many things, and some things are not easy to change for educators. Classroom visual environment is just one of those things that’s malleable, it’s something that is under the control of the teacher.” 

What do you think? Can excessive classroom decoration distract children? Are bare classrooms better? Feel free to share your views and opinions with us.