“Are we doing anything fun today?” might be the phrase that makes my heart rate spike more than anything else before the bell even rings, only surpassed by, “Did we do anything yesterday?’ Both of these questions from students are fairly benign and usually meant without any malice or negativity, but as a teacher what I hear is, “How are you planning to entertain me today?” I spent many, many hours in the early years of my career trying to create activities that would do just that, entertain them, dazzle them, engage them. As I became more experienced, I started to wonder—how much critical thinking was happening during my elaborate activities? Did my hours of work creating games, cutting and sorting, and setting up simulations relate to them deeply engaging in the content or was it just fun?
Where I teach, these fun activities without much deep or critical thinking are called “Barbies,” named after a now retired, elaborate activity mummifying Barbie dolls as part of an Ancient Egypt unit. The students were absolutely having fun that day, “locked in” for 90 minutes, but what did they actually learn? Maybe how toilet paper shreds easily, how to wrap toy body parts, or that mummification is time-consuming. None of those learning outcomes were part of the curriculum.
This story isn’t meant to call out or embarrass anyone. I had plenty of “Barbies” in my own classroom over the years. But as my teaching experience grew, my pedagogy strengthened, and my instructional tool belt expanded, I became more comfortable with an uncomfortable truth: Fun, while nice, is not the goal. Learning is hard work. Sometimes it’s fun, sometimes it’s frustrating, and sometimes it’s both. Instead of worrying about fun, I needed to focus on developing meaningful activities that engaged students’ interests and their thinking skills.
In an effort to find the “Barbies” in my own classroom and increase their rigor without sacrificing the joy they often bring, I determined a few criteria to evaluate an activity’s level of fun versus its effectiveness. These criteria are based on the article written by Jennifer Gonzalez and published in Cult of Pedagogy titled, “Is your lesson a Grecian Urn” (Gonzalez, 2016), which I self-labeled as “Sins of Fun.” These “Sins of Fun” are not non-starters, but rather yellow flags to force myself to think through each activity’s purpose and my end goal. Should an activity never include arts and crafts supplies, of course not, but if the arts and crafts are the focus and psychology takes a back seat, I need to rethink my plan. Is new technology always a bad idea? No, but if it does not enhance their thinking and is just “flashy”, I need to consider other options. Most importantly, I need to stay focused on the learning objective. Does my lesson help my students meet the learning objective, and more specifically, does it help them accomplish the type of thinking the objective requires? If my objective is asking students to evaluate information, my learning task should lead them to that cognitive skill. While evaluating my lessons, I created a flow chartopens in new window to help me think through these various “sins” and make sure I stayed on track when planning. Additionally, TOPSS created an excellent vetting rubric resource (PDF, 80KB)opens in new window to help psychology teachers vet activities and resources they are interested in using during class.
While some of the “Barbie” lessons ended up retired like the mummification activity, I did not want to throw all the “Barbies” out with the bath water. Rather, I wanted to focus on increasing the rigor and engagement of activities I felt were leaning into “Barbie” territory. I knew it was possible to keep the fun and make it meaningful. One tool I utilize to increase a lesson’s rigor and effectiveness without sacrificing joy is the engagement CUBE by John Antonetti. It asks teachers to focus on three big ideas: high yield strategies, levels of thinking, and qualities of engaging work. Lessons that contain only the qualities of engaging work, such as choice or novelty without deep thinking or high yield strategies are likely to become a “Barbie”. However, using the engagement CUBE as a tool to incorporate instructional strategies and critical thinking, it is possible to take classroom activities that are just fun and shape them into joyful, engaging, and effective lessons (Antonetti, 2016).
As a final thought, I’m not anti-fun. There are plenty of appropriate reasons why a teacher might do a fun activity. The question I ask myself is, “Is this activity a good use of my instructional time?” And if the answer is no, then I cut it. There is almost always a more relevant, effective demonstration or activity I can find and, in most cases, any activity or lesson that started like a “Barbie” is able to be molded into a more rigorous activity with a few strategic adjustments. Every once in a while, I will find a demonstration or activity I believe students will love but does not fit into my objective for the day. In this case, I use the 5-minute rule. If I can do the activity in less than 5 minutes and I believe it will hook students, then I use it. Because when students ask, “Are we doing anything fun today?”, the answer should be, “Yes, because learning is fun.”
About the author
Melissa Schaefer Adams is a veteran educator at Mundelein High School, where she has taught psychology and AP psychology since 2008. A recognized leader in the field, she received a 2022 APA TOPSS Charles T. Blair-Broeker Excellence in Teaching Award. Melissa is deeply committed to pedagogical innovation and professional service. She served as an AP psychology reader for the College Board from 2014–2020, and has been a frequent presenter at various psychology focused conferences, including the APA National Conference, the Social Studies National Conference, and the CHI-TOPSS Conference. In addition to her work in the social studies department, Melissa serves as the AVID district director, where she fosters college readiness and a culture of belonging for all students. She holds a master’s in counseling and a master’s in educational leadership from Northeastern Illinois University.
