Reforming Our Schools: Students Aren’t Widgets, Part II
Yesterday I mentioned that one lesson I took from Monday’s Day of Blogging for Real Education Reform is that educators are concerned that neither our current educational system nor the reforms we tend to pursue address the fact that students are not identical. But as Ira Socol said, “kids are humans, not interchangeable parts of Eli Whitney’s or Henry Ford’s assembly lines.”
And we, as a system, do not do enough to recognize the individual strengths, weaknesses and interests of each student. Consider what Paula White said: “So many times we simply don’t allow students to show us their brilliance.”
The education reforms we tend to pursue perpetuate the notion that you can take one child—any child—and put him into a classroom with a strong curriculum and a teacher who has shown his students improve on standardized tests, and you will get success.
It is not that simple. A student needs to be engaged before she can truly learn. That engagement could take the form of an active interest in subject matter. It could take the form of a personal relationship with a teacher, and the knowledge that someone truly cares whether she succeeds or fails. So many posts I saw Monday either directly or indirectly mentioned the "engagement" element as critical in efforts to improve our public schools.
Consider some of these comments:
Tyler Rice, a high school science teacher from Washington. “There is one key to reforming education … INQUIRY! …Inquiry means students are deeply engaged in learning…”
Michael Kaechele, a middle school technology teacher from Michigan. “Students need relationships to grow and learn. Schools should be more like families than factories. … Students need to be given choice in what to learn and how to do it.”
Adam Fletcher. “The single problem plaguing all students in all schools everywhere is the crisis of disconnection. … Meaningful Student Involvement happens when the roles of students are actively re-aligned from being the passive recipients of schools to becoming active partners throughout the educational process.” (Adam also offers six hallmarks of what meaningful student involvement looks like.)
Kevin. “We need to let students become more of the leaders in our classroom when it comes to exploration of learning. ... Our perception of the teacher in front of a room of rows of students, writing down notes of what we say, must begin to become transformed into us, the educators, listening more to our students. Let their voices ring out. ... We need to find more ways to engage our students in their learning."
Given that so many educators recognize this as a key concern in our education system, why don’t we do more to promote reforms that recognize and help foster the relationships we know are necessary for students to succeed in school? Or reforms that guide us towards a more student-centered approach to learning?
At the national level, our discussions rarely include this type of language. In fact, they rarely acknowledge the student at all--other than as that "passive recipient" of efforts to improve our schools. Why? Because to implement these types of reforms, we have to develop—and trust—our educators, not just fire them? Because these reforms are not dependent on a governance model? And because that means that they are, quite frankly, much harder than most of the reform efforts being proposed today?
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Sounds like run of the mill
Sounds like run of the mill progressive reform that's taught to teachers in education schools since Dewey. Or am I missing something?
All of these suggestions are
All of these suggestions are sound and important. However, even a really engaging teacher who stimulates the students' curiosity and gets them involved in inquiry-based learning, may still fail to hook all students and, many of those who are hooked, will still fail academically. This is because of socioeconomic factors that prevail outside of school.
First, school is a middle class institution run by people with middle class norms and values. Middle class kids come to school with the cultural capital to succeed in this environment and thus have a leg up on other kids. They are more likely to understand the expectations and discipline. They are more likely to know how to study. They are more likely to have good perseverance and the courage to ask questions during class or to meet with teachers for extra help.
Poor and working class kids often come to class already defeated, having had many years of failure and low expectations. They often come reading far below grade level, without good study skills or self-efficacy and are very passive in class. These things don't suddenly change just because a teacher is highly engaging
I am with you 100%. But
I am with you 100%. But isn't this far more positive than rote driven teaching to the test techniques?
Watching videos is probably
Watching videos is probably better than rote teaching to the test (assuming they're good videos). My point is that we need to invest in families and fight for a more equitable society to really see gains in student achievement. The tests are a sham that not only cannot produce better schools or learning outcomes, they are a huge give away to private educational profiteers.
Your remark about schools
Your remark about schools being middle class institutions is incisive.
I fear Anne does not fully realize how nearly-impossible it is to bring those lower-class kids up to par. In a world of infinite resources could it happen? Yes. In a world of infinite resources we could teach Afghanis to like and practice clean democracy too.
I hate the "engaging lessons" mantra. You are right: there is a class of kids for whom all the engaging lessons in the world won't do a damn. What's the solution? I simply don't know. But I bristle at false solutions. "Engaging lessons" is a false one.
One more thing: "engaging
One more thing: "engaging lessons" e.g. role plays and whatnot, can be the worst thing for lower class kids unless the teacher has a superhuman ability to contain disorder. Class turns into mayhem. It may well be that structured lectures followed by quizzes might in fact yield MORE real learning for kids who don't fit the middle-class norm.
Active students, engaged
Active students, engaged students, in other words students that use their brains! It seems that a lot could be done in terms of reform if the dialogue was informed by what we know about how kids' brain work and learn. What do you think?
Here at SharpBrains blog we're increasingly covering Learning & the Brain topics, in case you may want to share some recent posts with your readers. For example, renowned educator and brain expert Dr. Robert Sylwester prepared this list of recommended books: The Top Brain Book Collection for Educators and Learners.
Hope you enjoy!
http://www.sharpbrains.com/blog/2010/11/22/the-top-brain-book-collection...
Simple is as simple does.
Simple is as simple does. There is no counter-hypothesis to "students are not alike." Put another way this is a trivial observation. We have not yet come to grips with the providing the equivalent of the most basic human needs in Education the equivalents of food, exercise and a safe environment. Teacher Education and especially “Professional Development” are wholly inadequate. There is no common core curriculum of Best Instructional Practices despite claims of such. Despite "common standards" the seminal content of courses addressing these issues can be entirely different from one professor to another. All methods are not created equal, some are counter-productive, some perfunctory, some have modest incremental value and some are superbly generative. These are not distinctions without significant differences in outcomes. An industry that does not even attempt to properly identify, let alone apply these common applications cannot hold teachers accountable for student progress; it is illogical, if not irrational. The appearance given is that there are no answers to instructional challenges, except "loving kids" and hawking but not addressing diversity. There is no other profession with this void, not surgery or hairdressing could get away with such ineptitude.
You might wish to look in on our efforts to correct this oversight and thereby advance Instructional Science, Teacher Preparation and respect for the teaching profession… we have been at it for many years: http://teacherprofessoraccountability.ning.com/main/invitation/new?xg_so... . And… http://www.bestmethodsofinstruction.com/ and, http://anthony-manzo.blogspot.com/2010/05/race-to-top-accountability-lea... and our newest site experimenting with inviting students to get on board; something of a Student Crusade for Rational Educational Reform http://www.facebook.com/pages/Bye-Bye-SenselessHomework/166057496746368?ref=ts&v=page_getting_started#!/pages/Bye-Bye-Senseless-Homework/166057496746368?v=page_getting_started
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