👋 Hey {{first name | reader!}}
In this edition of ⚗️DistillED, we're kicking off a brand new series: Poor Proxies for Learning — a deep dive into the six classroom behaviours we often mistake for evidence of learning, but which don't guarantee it has occurred.
This series is inspired by the work of Professor Rob Coe, whose influential idea of poor proxies has challenged the way teachers interpret what's really happening in their classrooms. Each edition focuses on one proxy in depth — unpacking the research, and giving you practical strategies to move beyond it.
We're starting with Proxy 1: Students are busy — lots of work is done (especially written work).
This one is the most common illusion of all. Full pages, ticked tasks, and humming classrooms feel like success. But completion isn't learning — and in this edition, we're going to explore exactly why. Let's jump in!
In this edition
📊 Do Now: Quick Poll!
Which of these do you rely on most to know your students are learning?
What is the Busy Trap?
The Busy Trap is what happens when we mistake activity for learning. It's the assumption that because students are working — heads down, pens moving, pages filling — something meaningful is being stored in long-term memory.
But busyness and learning are not the same thing.
This idea sits at the heart of Professor Rob Coe's framework of poor proxies for learning, first introduced in his 2013 inaugural lecture at Durham University and later brought to a wider audience through the landmark Sutton Trust report What Makes Great Teaching? (2014). Poor proxies are the visible classroom behaviours we often trust as signs of learning — but which don't guarantee it has occurred. Students are busy is the most seductive proxy of all.
The problem isn't that students are working. The problem is what they're working on — and how much thinking that work actually requires. As the diagram below shows, it's effortful thinking in working memory that drives the transfer of knowledge into long-term memory, where it connects with existing schema and becomes something durable and retrievable. A task that requires no real thinking might keep students occupied — but it won't move the needle on what they actually learn and remember.
As cognitive scientist Robert Bjork reminds us, the conditions that produce fast, fluent performance during a task are often the very conditions that produce the least durable learning. Copying notes feels smooth. Completing a structured worksheet feels productive. Colouring or labelling a diagram feels focused. But if the task doesn't require students to retrieve, connect, or construct meaning — it's probably not generating real learning.
Here's a quick look at what The Busy Trap IS and IS NOT:
👎 The Busy Trap is:
Lots of Written Output → Pages filled, tasks ticked, but little cognitive effort required
Structured Without Challenge → Worksheets that guide students so closely there's nothing left to think about
Completion as the Goal → Lessons designed around finishing tasks rather than building understanding
Performance Masquerading as Learning → Students appear to know something in the moment, but it fades quickly
👍 Real Learning is
Effortful Retrieval → Students working to pull information from memory, not copy it from the board
Productive Struggle → Tasks that require students to connect, explain, or apply ideas
Desirable Difficulty → Challenges that slow down performance but accelerate long-term retention
Thinking as the Product → The goal is what students understand, not what they produce
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Why Does The Busy Trap Matter?
The Busy Trap matters because it creates the illusion of progress — for teachers, students, and observers alike. When lessons look productive, it's tempting to move on. But looking productive and being productive are very different things.
Robert Bjork's research on desirable difficulties is essential here. Bjork found that the conditions which make learning feel easy and fluent in the moment — re-reading notes, completing guided tasks, copying worked examples — tend to produce weak, fragile memories. Conversely, the conditions that feel harder — retrieving from memory, spacing practice, interleaving topics — feel less comfortable but produce far stronger long-term retention.
"Conditions that make performance improve during practice are not necessarily the conditions that lead to long-term learning and transfer."
This is why busyness is such a convincing trap. A student completing a detailed worksheet looks like they're learning. And in the short term, their performance might suggest they are. But if that task didn't require them to think hard — to retrieve, connect, or construct — the information is unlikely to stick. Take a look at this diagram from Ebbinghaus (1885/1913) — without effortful retrieval, retention follows that steep downward curve, and what felt learned in the lesson is quietly forgotten by the next day.
This is why the key question in lesson design isn't "What will I get students do?" — it's "What will students have to think about?" As Daniel Willingham puts it simply:
"Students remember what they think about."
If students are busy but not thinking, they are not learning. The activity is consuming time, not building knowledge.
How Do I Avoid The Busy Trap?
Escaping the Busy Trap isn't about making lessons harder for the sake of it — it's more about deliberately designing tasks that require students to think hard, not just do. The goal is cognitive effort in service of long-term memory.
In typical ⚗️DistillED fashion, here are five practical strategies to help:
Strategy | Explanation | Example |
|---|---|---|
Strategy 1: Replace Copying with Retrieval
| Copying transfers words from a surface to a page — retrieval forces the brain to reconstruct knowledge from memory, which is where the learning happens. Instead of copying notes from the board, ask students to close their books and write everything they can recall about the topic first. | Students close their books and write everything they can recall about today's topic. Then they open their notes, check, and correct. |
Strategy 2: Use Self-Explanation Tasks
| Self-explanation asks students to reason through a process or concept in their own words, rather than simply record it. This forces elaboration — connecting new ideas to what they already know — which significantly strengthens retention. | After a worked example: "Explain each step in your own words. Why did we do it that way — not just what did we do?" |
Strategy 3: Design for Productive Struggle
| Productive struggle sits in the sweet spot between too easy (no thinking required) and too hard (cognitive overload). Removing some scaffolding from familiar tasks nudges students into genuine thinking without leaving them lost. | Ask students to complete the next example without the step-by-step guide they used last time. Offer support only if genuinely stuck. |
Strategy 4: Ask "What Are They Thinking About?"
| This is a simple but powerful design question. Many tasks that look rigorous can be completed on autopilot — filling gaps, following instructions, copying structures. If a student can complete the task without really understanding the content, it needs redesigning. | Before setting any task, ask: "Could a student complete this without understanding the content?" If yes — redesign it. |
Strategy 5: Make Thinking the Deliverable
| When completion is the goal, students optimise for finishing. When understanding is the goal, students have to construct, explain, and justify. Reframing the task changes what students pay attention to — and what they remember. | Replace "Fill in the worksheet" with "Explain this concept to a partner without your notes — then write a one-sentence summary in your own words." |
Busy classrooms can feel like thriving classrooms. But the real question is always: what are students having to think about? Design for thinking, and the learning will follow.
Until next week!
— Jamie
If you want more:
👉 Read the original DistillED edition on Poor Proxies for Learning
👉 Explore the DistillED edition on Retrieval Practice
👉 Explore the The Attention and Hard Thinking one-page guides
👉 Get the DistillED Playbooks for practical, evidence-informed classroom practices
📥 Free One-Page Guide
Poor Proxies for Learning One-Page Guide
This edition is part of the Poor Proxies for Learning series. To help you see the full picture, download the original free one-page guide — a practical overview of all five proxies, what they look like in the classroom, and what to do instead.
⚗️DistillED+ Exclusive Content
This week, ⚗️DistillED+ members get access to The Busy Trap CPD PowerPoint, Strategy Checklist, and One-Page Guide — breaking down how to audit tasks for real thinking demand, design retrieval and self-explanation activities, and shift the goal of lessons from completion to genuine, durable learning.
