Why Great Teachers Quit: And How We Might Stop the Exodus

January 20th, 2011 by teacherken 1 comment »

If teachers, parents, school boards, administrators, community members, and lawmakers can listen to each other and work on this problem together, we can lessen the tide of teacher attrition, ultimately improving the learning and working environment in schools for everyone. (p. 156)

Those are the final words of this new book by Katy Farber. Depending on what statistics you use, we lose up to 30% of new teachers in the first three years, up to 50% in the first five. Some clearly should not have been teachers in the first place. But others bring the passion, knowledge and, at least potentially, the skill we need for all of our students. Some of those we lose early in their career are already great teachers, others are potentially so. The reasons that cost us these teachers also cost us those later in their careers, who all recognize are great.

This book can help us begin to address the problem.

Katy Farber was mentoring another teacher at her school in Vermont when that teacher quit after only two years. She was stunned. Her mentee was enthusiastic, creative, and the kids loved her. Farber decided to study the issue of teacher attrition, why we lose so many so early, and in the process began hearing consistent messages from teachers across the country. This was also at a point in her own professional career that potentially represented a cross-roads for her:

A perfect storm of difficult parents, a new principal, and a new teaching partner brought many of these issues to the forefront for me (p. xiii)

This book is something you can choose to sit down and read through, but the design makes it clear that there are other approaches you can take. After the various introductory materials, there are eight chapters, followed by a brief set of Final Thoughts by the author, a list of references, and an index. Each of the eight chapters focuses on a specific area that is a source of tension and possible disillusionment for teachers. In order, these are

1. Standardized Testing
2. Working Conditions in Today’s Schools
3. Ever-Higher Expectations
4. Bureaucracy
5. Respect and Compensation
6. Parents
7. Administrators
8. School Boards

Each chapter presents a real-life scenario, drawn from Farber’s contacts with teachers through conversations, posts on blogs, emails, and other forms of communication. The scenarios are followed by discussions containing thoughts from additional teachers, as well as a list of suggestions Farber describes as “practicable, applicable recommendations for administrators and teacher leaders” (p. xvi).

It is fair to say that while there is no one single reason causing teachers to leave the profession, a large number of the reasons that influence them, and which Farber explores in this book, could be generally classified as experiencing a lack of respect. That lack of respect applies to skill, knowledge, work conditions, salary, treatment by administrators, and treatment by parents.

Let’s focus on working conditions for a moment. Teachers have far less flexibility for things like bodily functions and meals than do most menial workers. There are also issues with unhealthy buildings, use of toxic substances to clean. There are real issues of safety. Imagine you have a college degree. Now imagine you may have to go three hours without being able to take a bathroom break, or that you may have a lunch period as short as 15-20 minutes to yourself. That is the real world of conditions for many teachers.

Or consider this. A significant proportion of teachers, particularly at the elementary level, are female. If they are starting families, and wish to breast feed an infant, is there any provision for a teacher to express milk during the school day? Or is our solution going to be that we are going to exclude nursing mothers from being in the classroom, even though we might thereby diminish the pool of highly qualified and effective teachers?

Farber offers thoughtful comments from teachers on all the topics she covers. Because the impact of testing is perhaps the most covered of these, I will not explore the valuable material she offers on that topic. But we should not avoid exploring the related topic of ever-higher expectations. Even without the imposition of such higher expectations, responsible teachers already feel crushed by the demands on the time they have. Increasingly, the demands “are not directly related to teaching students” which as Farber notes, is often the main motivation for teachers to be in the classroom. She also writes:

This state of affairs is exhausting and dispiriting. Many teachers shared that they simply don’t have enough time to do everything that they feel they should be doing. And it is eroding their personal and professional lives. (p. 44)

The advice offered by veteran teachers is to set limits, as one experience suggests to no more than 9 hours of school-related work daily. Yet this can create conflicts for those really dedicated to their students. If, for example, I were to limit my workday to 9 hours, of which 7.5 were in school, how could I conceivably read and correct papers from the vast majority of my 192 students in order for those corrections to be part of a meaningful learning experience? Do I limit the amount of work I assign in order to keep up with it? Do I shortchange the feedback to which my students are entitled? Do I allow the responsibilities of effective teaching to consume time that should be available for things outside of my school responsibilities? None of the three choices is truly acceptable, yet in reality for many teachers such are the options from which they can choose. Choices like this are just one example of the pressures that many good teachers experience, and that can help drive them from the profession.

Hopefully by now you have a sense that that book will connect you with the real experience of real teachers. The structure provides not merely their reactions, but a context from which those reactions flow, as well as material that can help ameliorate some of the problems that are contributing to our losing some of the teachers we really want to keep.

Just that justifies purchasing the book as a valuable reference tool. But that is not all one gets from this book. The final four pages of text, 153-156, are under the title of “Afterward: Final Thoughts” and these pages bring together final conclusions from the wealth of material Farber has provided. There are three sections, titled respectively, Why Teachers Teach,: To Educational Leaders, Policy Makers and Politicians; and To Teachers. In the first, Farber tells that most teachers look beyond the challenges discussed in the book.

They tend to be idealists. They strive constantly to improve their teaching, public education, and the lives of their students. It is our responsibility as citizens, educational leaders, parents, and politicians to support them in doing so. (p. 153)

In the 2nd, directed to those who are not teachers but have a great influence on education, Farber offers 4 points, the last of which is this:

Elevate the dialogue about public education by infusing your comments, thoughts, and ideas about education with respect for the hard work that teachers are doing in America. As you may have noticed from this book and several others like it, teaching is no easy task. Before making broad and sweeping pronouncements about education, think how your comments will forward the goals of educating children and supporting teachers. (p. 155)

Speaking as a teacher, were the public dialogue about education more respectful about teachers, we would likely be less resentful of others who do not understand the task of teaching and seek to impose “solutions” without regard to the real welfare of the students who are our primary concern.

Farber concludes with words directed towards teachers. You have already read, at the very beginning of this review, her final words. In this final portion of the book she refers to words by Jonathan Kozol about making the classroom “a better and more joyful place than when [the students] entered it” (from his Letters to a Young Teacher). Kozol also reminds us that we cannot let our concern for professional decorum overwhelm and suppress our very human need to reach out to and comfort our students. Farber concludes her quoting of Kozol with words from p. 208 of that book directed to teachers: “A battle is beginning for the soul of education, and they must be its ultimate defenders.”

Farber wants teachers to remember why we got into education, to reconnect with our beliefs, use those to fuel our energy. Or as she puts in the final sentence of her penultimate paragraph on p. 156: “Remember your core beliefs about life, learning, and teaching, and then let them guide and refresh you.”

For public education to properly serve our students and our society, we must focus on quality teachers. They are the most important in-school factor. We certainly do not want to discourage the best of them, to continue to see them leave the profession out of frustration.

This is a book by a teacher, with words of teachers, about teachers, and about the challenges they face. It can remind those of us who do teach why we do so, not only to reconnect us with our core beliefs, but also to motivate us to speak up beyond our individual classrooms on behalf of the well-being of our students and the ultimate success of public schools.

The book is also something that others concerned with education should read with care, if for no other reason that no meaningful improvement in public education can occur without a solid and continuing cadre of dedicated and committed and highly skilled teachers. Insofar as politicians, policy makers and others ignore that, they will undermine the possibilities of any meaningful reform.

We can no longer continue the ongoing loss of skilled teachers. It costs too much financially. It costs even more in lost learning and benefits to our society.

I highly recommend that anyone concerned about the future of public education read and absorb this book. That would be a good start towards turning our discussions about educational policy in directions less destructive of the core of skilled teachers we have but we are losing.

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Civil Discourse: It’s Common Sense

January 9th, 2011 by Pam Moran No comments »

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

U.S. Declaration of Independence

Events occur, as did the mass shooting in Arizona this past weekend, that remind us a culture of civility does not come without explicit teaching in the home, our schools, and every community in this nation. While we don’t know all the facts or motivating factors, serious discourse among citizens from all walks of life has led many to reflect this weekend upon the vitriol that dominates the political rhetoric of our nation.  We know that this rhetoric influences and cues a culture of disrespect.

However, parents, educators, and leaders from all sectors of a community possess the potential to form a powerful teaching team to help young people learn the art of civil discourse, especially when holding a dissenting opinion or when confronted by others who hold different beliefs or perspectives. The hallmark of this great nation has been our inalienable right to a liberty that includes being able to speak our piece without fear of imprisonment, retribution from our government, or loss of life or liberty at the hands of those who may not agree with us.

“ Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

1st Amendment, Bill of Rights Ratified June 21, 1788

Our nation’s powerful words, the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, define a set of beliefs in us: the American people. We believe ourselves to be models for freedom throughout the world. We believe ourselves to be a people who will defend the rights of others, even when we disagree with them. In protecting that right for some, we protect that right for all of us.

I believe the vast majority of Americans value civil discourse because the language of respect helps us weave together the fabric of America’s communities. Civil discourse is the hallmark of adults who care enough to state their opinions publicly and boldly- but with respect. Civil discourse represents the best of communities of responsibility, whether in the real world or in a virtual network. In responsible communities, people care enough to speak up. They also understand their behavior determines the community’s culture that will be created and honed over time.

We are a nation facing critical issues politically, socially, and economically. Such times create emotions of fear, anger, and frustration. Those emotions spill over into our communities and tear at the fabric of responsibility that’s essential for its members to feel safe. We have become used to hearing and reading daily attacks both publicly and anonymously at the national, state, and local levels. These attacks have lowered the bar for any standard of civil discourse representative of opinions on both sides of political and social aisles.

However, we are a nation that’s grounded in hope and perhaps we can get back there if we can see our way to work together. There’s a bipartisan movement afoot in Utah to establish a cultural shift towards civility. For several months, my friend and colleague Dave Doty,(@canyonsdave) superintendent of Canyons District in Utah, and I’ve been discussing a need for more positive models of civil discourse in every area of society. It appears that he lives in one state that has leaders willing to do something about it.

We, who have responsibility for raising and teaching children, must consciously and consistently model a language of respect even when we disagree with each other. We need to teach our children that dissent and respect can occur in the same sentence. But, civility isn’t solely an issue of public schooling. We educators are part of the solution, but we aren’t the only solution. Civility begins in the home. It’s modeled in the community. And, it must be supported by everyone; religious leaders, political leaders, and arts and entertainment leaders. Media personalities need to step up to the plate and take responsibility for shifting the culture, too. If we don’t all do our part, then shame on us for talking the talk of civility for a few days without walking the walk for the long haul.

Do we want a nation where people can confidently speak up and share different opinions? Do we want schools where children can confidently engage in discourse about different perspectives from their peers and others? Do we want communities where people confidently consider a diversity of perspectives from other citizens? If so, we all need to start leading from in front for civility. Everywhere. All the time.

Thank you, Utah, for setting a tone that leads the way.

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Using Groups Effectively: 10 Principles

January 4th, 2011 by Kevin Washburn 3 comments »

Confession: as a student, I usually hate group work. I know, I know. Having students work in groups reaps a bounty of benefits, including boosting students’ social skills and upping the number of “happy campers” in the classroom. Such findings filter through my thinking when I’m preparing to teach, so I do use group interaction, hoping that the promises from its advocates will be realized. Occasionally they are; often they are not.

I recently attended a conference session featuring Keith Sawyer. In addition to being a jazz pianist (a musical collaborator), Sawyer is an expert on the effectiveness of group efforts. His presentation focused on what has been and potentially can be accomplished through collaboration, but he hinted that just getting people into groups is not the answer.

This piqued my curiosity, so I bought his book Group Genius. In it I’ve begun to find some answers to my questions: When are groups effective as means of learning? What tasks are better accomplished collaboratively than individually? How do you structure groups for optimal effectiveness and results?

Though his focus is on creativity, I think Sawyer’s insights apply to our use of groups to foster learning. Here are ten principles I’ve picked up:

  1. Flow matters. Flow is a term used to describe a state of high engagement in which thoughts run freely and progress occurs, often without group members being conscious of it. However, flow is like intrinsic motivation; it can’t be created on demand. The best we can do as teachers is provide a classroom environment that fosters flow.
  2. Conversation is key. Sawyer succinctly explains this principle: “Conversation leads to flow, and flow leads to creativity.” When having students work in groups, consider what will spark rich conversation. The original researcher on flow, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, found that rich conversation precedes and ignites flow more than any other activity.1 Tasks that require (or force) interaction lead to richer collaborative conceptualization.
  3. Set a clear but open-ended goal. Groups produce the richest ideas when they have a goal that will focus their interaction but also has fluid enough boundaries to allow for creativity. This is a challenge we often overlook. As teachers, we often have an idea of what a group’s final product should look like (or sound like, or…). If we put students into groups to produce a predetermined outcome, we prevent creative thinking from finding an entry point.
  4. Try not announcing time limits. As teachers we often use a time limit as a “motivator” that we hope will keep group work focused. In reality, this may be a major detractor from quality group work. Deadlines, according to Sawyer, tend to impede flow and produce lower quality results. Groups produce their best work in low-pressure situations. Without a need to “keep one eye on the clock,” the group’s focus can be fully given to the task.
  5. Do not appoint a group “leader.” In research studies, supervisors, or group leaders, tend to subvert flow unless they participate as an equal, listening and allowing the group’s thoughts and decisions to guide the interaction.
  6. Keep it small. Groups with the minimum number of members that are needed to accomplish a task are more efficient and effective.
  7. Consider weaving together individual and group work. For additive tasks—tasks in whicha group is expectedtoproduce a list, adding one idea to another—research suggests that better results develop when individual thinking precedes the pooling of ideas in a group setting. Researchers also suggest that alternating between individual and group work helps keep the work focused but not fixated—i.e., not limited to one aspect or detail of an idea or issue. (By the way, this weaving of individual and group interaction may be reason why technological or “electronic brainstorming” is often effective.)
  8. “Divide and conquer” ≠ collaboration. When groups assign members to specificresponsibilities for completing a task they undermine the thinking that collaboration can produce. Sawyer talks about creativity via collaboration as being “exponential,” meaning that it is constructed via conversation. One individual’s thought may inspire another group member’s insight, which in turn sparks new concepts for another. It is this emergent thinking that enables collaboration to accomplish what individual effort cannot.
  9. Think threefold. Group tasks that produce the best results often have three defining characteristics: 1) they are novel, something students have not done before, 2) they feature a visual component, something that can be represented in nonverbal forms, and 3) they are relational, meaning they require the combining of ideas or components to be accomplished.
  10. Be complementary. The best groups are composed of members who have enough familiarity with one another to be comfortable but who possess varied backgrounds and experiences. Again, because of how we typically use groups in classrooms, we tend to form groups around ability—if there is at least one “good student” in the group, we think something will get done. However, Sawyer suggests ability should be less of a consideration than diversity in experience. This can be challenging to accomplish but it’s worth considering when groupingstudents for collaborative tasks.

These insights have me rethinking groups, not whether or not to use them, but when and how to use them effectively. As with every aspect of teaching, using groups effectively requires mindful

planning and attention to more than who works with whom. As Sawyer summarizes, “Putting people into groups isn’t a magical dust that makes everyone more creative. It has to be the right kind of group, and the group has to match the task.”2

References

  1. Sawyer, K., Group Genius: The Creative Power of Collaboration (New York: Basic Books, 2008), 43.
  2. Ibid., 73.

Images

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Elementary Education Is “Waiting For Any Man”

November 7th, 2010 by Rob Jacobs 3 comments »

Last week my school had a baby shower…I didn’t go.

It’s not that I have anything against baby showers. I just didn’t want to be the only man in the room.

I have been thinking about that a lot lately. Being the only man in the room is starting to wear on me a bit. The people I work with are incredible. They are the sorts of teachers we all hope and wish for. I just wish I wasn’t the only man.

But I am usually the only man.

I have been thinking about my near decade in education. I have worked at 3 different schools. I have worked for and with 6 different principals 5 of who were women. I have worked with nearly 100 different teachers over my time in education. Of those 100 teachers only 9 others were men.

At some I just got used to the fact that when I would attend at meeting at the district office, or a staff development session somewhere, or served on a school site council, etc. I was going to be the only man in the room.

I love everyone I have had the chance to work with during my time in education. I just wish that there were some more men to work with, bond with, and share the male experience with. I don’t think it is healthy to always be void of that connection that comes with being men. (And vice-versa for women) To go day after day without a “Hey brother, did you catch the game?” or handshake, or some just some general guy commiseration, bonding, friendship, and perspective.

While the rest of the nation debates Waiting for Superman, I have been silently been debating the impact on education and myself from having so few men in elementary education.

I don’t need superman. I am waiting for any man.

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Student Grades, Test Scores, and Rankings

November 4th, 2010 by teacherken 3 comments »

originally posted at Huffington Post

Some want to tie teacher evaluation to student performance on external tests. They may advocate a value-added methodology, which in theory should allow us to rank teachers by how much their students improve. While there are methodological issues about whether we can truly isolate what the teachers have actually contributed to the student performance, I found myself asking, if the way some propose to evaluate teachers is by how much the students improve, why are we not similarly evaluating students? Why do we insist upon artificial levels of performance, determined by percentage scores and weights, as if in converting things to a 100 point number scale, we therefore communicate something meaningful about that student — s/he performed at an A level, or got a 93 percent overall. Is that really meaningful? Who has done more, the student who begins at a very low performance and then achieves at what we would classify as a C level, or the student who begins with a high A and stays there?

Here, I think of a class many moons ago. There were 27 students in a “Talented and Gifted” class, all 9th graders. 23 finished with final grades of A. Consider several students from that class whose names have been changed to protect their identity.

Natalie was early on getting 94s on my tests and written assignments when no one else was over a 90. I pulled her aside and told her that if she did not improve what she was doing, she would be wasting both my time and hers. She raised one eyebrow, then dedicated herself to her work. Her final overall average would have been around 98 — and I am not considered an easy grader (an issue to which I will return).

Natalie finished her high school career as our salutatorian, never having a quarter grade other than A. She took 13 Advanced Placement Courses, which gave additional points for the difficulty of the course. She scored 5 (the top possible score) on all 13 AP exams.

Her high school record was “perfect.” She was not valedictorian because someone else completed 14 Advanced Placement courses, and thus had a marginally higher Grade Point Average because of the additional weighted grade.

Both students were outstanding. Why do we have to distinguish between them?

We have since had twins finish first and second twice. We ranked one over the other. What is gained thereby?

That long-ago class had some incredibly gifted kids. The one whose performance I most admire was one of the four NOT finishing with an A. John was somewhat outmatched. He was not especially verbal, and his writing was atrocious. His first quarter grade was a D — an “average” in the 60s. His final grade was a B. But for the second-half of the year, he had done A work, averaging over 90 percent for quarters three and four. His record of D-C-A-A averaged out to a final B.

That is not a fair reflection of what he had accomplished. For half-the-year, he performed at an A level, often higher than students whose final grades were A, but because of his early struggles, the grade on his transcript was that final B, and his overall GPA was affected accordingly. Did we punish him because he took on a more challenging course, and even though he rose to the expectations of the course, saw his grade affected by his early struggles. Does that send a message not to take on courses that might stretch one because of the impact upon grades?

I am a tough grader. Whatever my students can do when they arrive in my class, I expect them to be able to do far more at the end of the year. I wonder if those who had me might have felt disadvantaged because other teachers of such classes were not so rigorous in their demands? Might some attempt to “equalize” different levels of rigor by insisting upon absolutely uniformity in grading? Would that really solve the problem of adequately communicating what a student has accomplished?

I think back to that class. It challenged me as much as any I have taught in my 16 years in a public school classroom. I was prepared to let one student take over the class after two weeks. She is now, after several years of employment, a first-year student at one of the most prestigious professional schools in the nation. I know she will do well, not because of her grades, but because of her willingness to take on challenges, and the experience of rising to meet whatever confronts her. Lisa is one of my favorites, not because of her superb academic record, but because of how much she grew — and how much she challenged me — during the year I was her teacher. Similarly, Natalie and John both grew. He grew most of all because he started with less-developed skills.

His grade does not fairly represent what he accomplished. Natalie, being ranked second in her class, is at least on the surface, somewhat unfair. Even Lisa’s superb academic performance does not indicate how much she grew as a student and person in her years at our high school. I was delighted to write her recommendations for her college applications because I could thereby explain some of that. I wonder why we cannot have similar narratives for all our students as a part of their record, for each course.

If our tests are supposed to measure what a student really knows and can do, why are they heavily multiple choice? Why are they timed, thereby giving an advantage to those who can think quickly, even if no better than those who want to reflect? Do the results accurately reflect what a student can do in the real world?

Why do we insist upon comparing students to one another? Should not our challenge be to have each student rise as high as s/he can, to perform as well as s/he can?

Why do we not simply have two grades — needs improvement and meets the requirements? Why should students not be allowed to learn from their mistakes and gain credit for self-correction?

I wrestle with these issues. Our school keeps score. We rank. Do my students suffer because my standards are high?

There are many things we should rethink about our public schools. Should issues like those I raise be part of the discussion? How much does how we assess, grade, and rank our students do them a disservice?

Natalie, Lisa, and John. I can still remember them as individual students, not merely as the grades they achieved. Cannot we rethink what we are doing so that we will truly know what our students have learned and can do, and be able to describe them accurately as more than scores on tests or cumulative GPAs? Is not each child entitled to something more than that?

I hope so.

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Student Cheating and Plagiarism or Creativity and Innovation?

October 19th, 2010 by Rob Jacobs 4 comments »

During a recent conversation with my #ecosys Twitter friends, the topic turned to a recent BBC article about how Danish students were being allowed to use the Internet during exams. Danish pupils use web in exams

What followed was a thoughtful conversation about the advantages and disadvantages of allowing students access to the Internet during exams and if this amounted to cheating or plagiarism.

Phil Hart (@philhart) wrote an excellent and thoughtful piece on his blog (A techie’s view) titled “Is Using the Internet Cheating?

Phil notes that, “People now have access to levels of knowledge that was inconceivable 20 years ago. Rather than having to carry thousands of facts around in one’s head, what is needed today is an understanding of the context in which the question is being asked and being able to place the answers within that context.”

In terms of cheating during an exam Phil clearly points out that, “So when we see somebody ‘cheating’ in an exam, what are they doing? They are taking information from another source, in this case a fellow assessee. Is it legitimate to do so? Probably not, but … accessing the Internet with the correct question and being able to use the resulting answers when responding to an exam question requires an understanding of the context. In other words: “How well is the assessee able to remember the context (and everything that goes into making a context) rather than being able to merely regurgitate facts?”

I agree with Phil’s points and conclusions.

But beyond having access to the internet to answer test questions is the the larger question of taking existing ideas, research, work and “pirating” it into other “improved” or “reinvented” works.

Is if this is an actual skill that should be developed and encouraged in our students?

Is it piracy and plagiarism, or is it creativity and innovation?

Which do you suppose we should be teaching our students to do?

We live in an age where anybody can produce, mix, or re-purpose information and ideas.

When we pirate information and ideas, we may just be innovating new ideas and creating new ways of doing things.

Thomas Edison invented the phonograph and musicians viewed it as piracy. He was pirating their music, recording it, and selling it. They feared the end of live performances, instead an entire industry was born, the music industry.

MP3 players existed prior to the iPod, but the iPod pirated that technology and created it’s own phenomena. Music lovers, wanting to share music with each other without paying, created digital music sites like Napster. They were pirating their way around and outside of what the music industry existed to do. Steve Jobs figured out that to beat the pirates he had to compete with them and built iTunes. The pirates ideas had become mainstream and put old music sellers out of business. It is piracy or innovation? Is it plagiarism or creativity?

The iPod itself is just a combination of pre-existing ideas; the battery, operating system, hard drive, screen, MP3 technology, etc.

Reggae, Disco, and Hip-hop music demonstrate that we can repurpose music into something new. The pirate old songs and create new and innovative versions. These versions become so popular that they create entirely new music genres. It is piracy or creativity?

Moviemakers, not wanting to pay high fees in New York pirates their way around the system by setting up studios in California. Today we call it Hollywood.

India reverse engineers drugs for the poor pirating what they themselves could not afford to do. Drug companies, sensing the good public relations they can benefit from, begin selling their drugs at huge discounts an in some cases giving them away. They respond to the pirates by creating an entirely new approach of serving the poor of the world. Piracy or creativity?

Teachers pirate great lesson plans and instructional ideas from other teacher all the time. It helps them to be more effective and learn new ways of instructing their students.

So, is piracy and plagiarism just another way of being creative and innovative? Are they a source of new ideas, methods, and models? Are there links to each other or are they mutually exclusive?

A senior business executive needing the most current research on a company or economic trend asks his junior executive to find the best and most current information. The junior executive doesn’t start his or her own research project, rather he or she Googles the information looking for the most current research on the topic that has already been done by the most respected and knowledgeable experts. He or she copies it, rips it, digitizes it, scans it, re-purposes it, integrates it, synthesizes it, and puts into a usable document to give the senior executive. This is what we call good research.

In the classroom we call plagiarism.  So, it is plagiarism or creativity?

Most of the examples I shared, which come from Matt Mason, would be examples of plagiarism and cheating if they happened inside a classroom.

Doesn’t there seem to be a disconnect from what we do in the classroom and what the real world expects of them? I know most of you are saying it’s about the process. But if that is true, then why do we spend so much time evaluating and grading the result?

If it really is about process then Pat Dixon has an idea;

  • Give the students a question they know nothing about.
  • Give them 30 minutes to put together a 3000 word report on that question.
  • Grade for Correctness in the answer
  • Authoritativeness of sources used
  • Uniqueness of of the pieced together report.

Catalytic Questions:

In what ways could you re-purpose your research report assignments to develop real world skills that focus on the process, the correctness, the authoritativeness, and uniqueness of synthesis?

What might that look like in your classroom or school?

How does your current understanding of technology, business, and innovation impact your thoughts?

How might your students be better served with the assignments they work on?

In what ways have you been successful in the past in adjusting assignments to meet the changing needs of the students and the world they live in? How might you draw upon that experience?

In what ways does the discussion of plagiarism and pirating vs. creativity and innovation force you to think in new ways?

What are the underlying principles at work in this discussion and how does it/they impact your approach to education?

What if you were to reverse the process and have students examine existing reports and determine how well they meet the criteria for a good research report?

Which assignments could you substitute with these new ideas?

Recommended Reading:

Plagiarism and Pirates

Plagiarism Is A Good Thing?

Where’s the Respect? A 21st Century Learning Question

The Dangers and Benefits of Piracy and The Pirate’s Dilemma

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Posted in 21st century skills, assessment, Authentic learning, Creativity, Grading, Innovation, Rob Jacobs

Smart MOVES

October 18th, 2010 by Kevin Washburn 1 comment »

I’m convinced: our schools need to give fitness a place in the curriculum.

Let me clarify one thing. By an emphasis on fitness, I’m not recommending more or longer recess periods (though they may help), nor more or longer physical education classes (though, again, they may help). I fear some schools may reach these conclusions and implement changes without additional thought. Such an approach would be a mistake as schedule changes are only part of a good response to the growing body of research.

An emphasis on fitness is different from merely increasing unstructured play time or adding more days of dodgeball into the schedule. (Forgive me, PE Teachers. I know that many of you do not consider dodgeball to be a beneficial way to spend a physical education class. I’m speaking to the erroneous perception, not your work!)

Dr. John Ratey, who literally wrote the book on this subject, uses a school in Naperville, IL to illustrate an emphasis on fitness. During one physical education session Ratey observed, students ran a mile while wearing heart rate monitors. In addition to completing the distance, students focused on reaching a target heart rate and on improving their times recorded in earlier previous sessions. Ratey then explains this focus:

The essence…is teaching fitness instead of sports. The underlying philosophy is that if physical education class can be used to instruct kids how to monitor and maintain their own health and fitness, then the lessons they learn will serve them for life. And probably a longer and happier life at that. What’s being taught, really, is a lifestyle. The students are developing healthy habits, skills, and a sense of fun, along with knowledge of how their bodies work…[The] effects [of this emphasis] have shown up in some unexpected places—namely, the classroom.1

Sure, I’m concerned about the childhood obesity rate (estimates put the number around 23 million children in the US—more than thirty times the number during my youth). Being overweight influences movement, both physical AND cognitive, and it’s this latter impact that interests me.

Consider these recent findings:

Fit children possess more of the neural geography used in learning and thinking. For example, in-shape children have “significantly larger basal ganglia, a key part of the brain that aids in maintaining attention and ‘executive control,’ or the ability to coordinate actions and thoughts crisply.”2 (Executive function is “an umbrella term for the complex cognitive processes that serve ongoing, goal-directed behaviors,” including goal setting, planning, organizing and initiating behavior over time, flexibility, attention, working memory capacity, and self-regulation. It comprises abilities to plan for the future, control impulses, and make sense of incoming data.3) In a similar study, fit children possessed larger hippocampi—more than 10% larger— and scored significantly higher on tests of associated memory than their less fit peers. (The hippocampus is a brain structure associated with memory, both encoding and retrieval.) The researchers concluded that “interventions to increase childhood physical activity could have an important effect on brain development.” 4 In short, fitter children develop brains with the potential for better learning and thinking.

Childhood fitness also affects capacities that uphold and empower learning. For example, children engaged in regular fitness activity score higher on tests of self-regulation, an executive function that provides critical support for learning. Self-regulation is the ability to consciously suppress or delay responses in order to work for a higher goal. It predicts academic success better than IQ. It also better predicts GPA, standardized test achievement, homework completion, the potential for GPA gains during the course of a year, and even SAT scores. Self-regulation is like the support struts of a bridge; it is not the roadway to learning, but without it, an individual lacks the emotional and cognitive control that optimize learning.

Researchers have also discovered relationships of fitness and academic achievement. A recent study focused on students representing four different categories: 1) children who possessed high physical fitness levels in fifth grade and maintained those levels in seventh grade, 2) students who were fit in fifth grade but lost their fitness by seventh grade, 3) students who were not fit in fifth grade but were physically fit by seventh grade, and (sadly) 4) students who were not physically fit in fifth grade and remained not fit in seventh grade. In reading, math, science and social studies, the fit in fifth, fit in seventh group outscored their peers. The students who gained fitness between fifth and seventh grades had the second best scores. The students who lost fitness from fifth to seventh grades had the next to lowest scores, with the never fit group scoring the lowest. Researchers conclude that physical fitness actually shows up in academic performance.5 Schools minimizing physical education classes to spend more time on academic subjects may actually dampen the academic performance of their students.

However, not all types of fitness show similar results. Teenage boys with higher cardiovascular fitness outperformed their peers in intelligence, education, and even income as adults. The researchers from this study stress the importance of cardiovascular fitness: “In every measure of cognitive functioning they analyzed—from verbal ability to logical performance to geometric perception to mechanical skills—average test scores increased according to aerobic fitness.”6 Weight training alone did not provide the same effect.

What do we do with such convincing evidence—evidence that suggests the best tool to improving learning may be a pair of running shoes for each child? What do we need to change besides perceptions and schedules? Since physical movement seems to improve cognitive “movement,” how do we help our students get smarter by moving more?

I’m going to ponder these questions as I head out for a run. Anyone care to join either the run or conversation? Looking forward to your comments! For now, I’ll give John Ratey the last word:

The notion that [fitness can influence learning] is supported by emerging research showing that physical activity sparks biological changes that encourage brain cells to bind to one another. For the brain to learn, these connections must be made; they reflect the brain’s fundamental ability to adapt to challenges. The more neuroscientists discover about this process, the clearer it becomes that exercise provides an unparalleled stimulus, creating an environment in which the brain is ready, willing, and able to learn…”7.

References

  1. Ratey, J., SPARK: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain (New York: Little, Brown & Co., 2008), 12.
  2. Parker-Pope, T., Phys Ed: Can Exercise Make Kids Smarter? http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/15/phys-ed-can-exercise-make-kids-smarter/?emc=eta1
  3. Meltzer, L., Executive Function in Education: From Theory to Practice (New York: Guilford Press, 2007), 1.
  4. ScienceDaily., Children’s Brain Development Is Linked to Physical Fitness, Research Finds. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/09/100915171536.htm.
  5. ScienceDaily., Students’ Physical Fitness Associated With Academic Achievement; Organized Physical Activity. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/03/100302185522.htm.
  6. ScienceDaily., Fit Teenage Boys Are Smarter—But Muscle Strength Isn’t the Secret, Study Shows. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/12/091207143351.htm.
  7. Ratey, 10.

Images

  • ‘Running Shoes’ http://www.flickr.com/photos/64015205@N00/46324600
  • ‘Morro Bay, CA High School Physical Education+class+-+teen+girls+run+up+and+down+the+Morro+Strand+State+Beach’ http://www.flickr.com/photos/72825507@N00/3253894179

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Our Only Charter Should Be Radical Invention

October 16th, 2010 by Pam Moran 5 comments »

Seth Godin writes about the power of the tribe “just waiting to turn into a movement.” We educators who write on October 17 have the potential to become a tribal movement to form, not “reform”, a positive learning future for our young people. To become a movement, we’ve hard work to do. We have to stop acting like a crowd without leadership. We must invest ourselves in forward motion towards DARPA-like radical invention of education’s future learning spaces rather than incremental change in reaction to our past. The past is over. America’s factories have all moved elsewhere. It’s time for our school factories to disappear as well.

We, who write today, know we face significant challenges to realize Godin’s view of a viable movement. Nevertheless, we step forward to “tell our stories about who we are and the future we’re trying to build.” Tomorrow, we must build on the connections we make today to become a different kind of tribe- one from which grassroots leadership, rather than a singular leader, emerges. Then, we must create momentum within our tribe so our writing transcends this one event.

Over the last two decades at the expense of our workforce, politicians and corporate heads blew up our old manufacturing factory economy by outsourcing America’s work anywhere in the world where they could realize increased profits. They sent 2.3 million jobs to just China alone between 2001 and 2008. However, they seem to have forgotten a key step- building a new economy to replace the old one.

It’s now apparent to just about everyone that our country can’t survive these profit-making decisions unless we hyper-change into a “new economy” workforce that’s both “knowledge- and creativity-able”, regardless of the job or sector. Now, some of the same politicians and corporate heads that outsourced our workforce want to do the same with public education. I propose we invest differently in our economic future, national security, and our democratic way of life. My dream strategies speak to the need for changes in the very marrow of what we consider as public education:

  1. In-source educational invention to our educators and set them loose on a DARPA-like mission in which “their only charter is radical invention.”
  2. Close down our factory schools and simultaneously form new learning spaces for America’s children.
  3. Implement the National Educational Technology Plan as a model 21st century learning blueprint for ESEA reauthorization. It’s the best work ever from the USDOE.

New learning spaces demand a quality of teaching never before experienced in our schools; contemporary teaching that intersects pedagogical, technological, and knowledge expertise so that learning is accelerated, not remediated, for all young people. This new learning world must provide every student with the tools they need to access the most in-depth, creative and critical knowledge work possible. This world represents implementation of the innovative National Educational Technology Plan. This world looks like DARPA for education with an end in mind as wildly out of the box as the inventions of the Internet, GPS, and speech translation. This world looks like schools that are as different from what we call classrooms today as the telephone is from the Internet.

So, we tell our stories today in a symphony of voices; passionate educators who chose this profession for reasons that are incomprehensible to many professional peers in other fields. We aren’t here for fame or fortune. We are here for one simple reason- to provide young people with the best we have to offer. That’s why we’re educators. We teach America’s future.

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This teacher reacts to seeing “Waiting for Superman”

October 15th, 2010 by teacherken 6 comments »

crossposted from Daily Kos for which it was first written

Friday schools across Maryland were closed, so I went to the first show at Noon.

On the way home I thought long and hard about what I would say.

No matter how I parse it, my reaction has two key points.

1. Davis Guggenheim feels guilty about not sending his kids to public schools, and the result is a film which basically trashes public schools, public school teachers, teachers unions, while unjustly glorifying Geoffrey Canada, Michelle Rhee, charters, Kipp, and union busting.

2. The film is intellectually dishonest, so much so it is laughable.

I will explain my reactions.

Guggenheim admits his sense of guilt. He talks about his admiration for teachers. He reminds us of his 1999 film “First Year” about dedicated teachers. He shows us video of driving past four public schools to take his child to a PRIVATE school (note, NOT a charter school). But we never are given any specifics. We are not even told if any of those is the public school his child would have attended. He uses his skill with films to have us infer that none of the four does a decent job of instructing kids, and that his child would have to attend one of them. But we are given NO data to support such an inference.

The film focuses on children trying to get into charter schools via lotteries. Yet at the end, in the text after all the emotion has been wrung out of the viewing audience, Guggenheim is at least honest enough to tell us that lotteries are not the answer. If they are not, why not show us schools that are? Why is not a single successful public school shown? Might that undermine the propaganda that is being put out to manipulate the viewer in a particular direction? Might that make the viewer less likely to text in support of the agenda that Guggenheim puts forth?

I said the film is intellectually dishonest. I will not go through all the examples I could cite: I do come to this “review” late, and many others have dissected the various problems with the film.

Let me cite several. Jay Mathews advocates for KIPP on the basis of the raise in the percentiles on reading scores. Yet that ignores a chunk of data. First, those being tested do not include all those who entered KIPP schools – at least a portion of KIPP schools have an unfortunate tendency to “counsel out” students who would not score well. Second, it is not yet clear that the gains in test scores that are reported persist further up the educational ladder when the students leave KIPP. Finally, the independent study (by Mathematica) that Kipp likes to cite says only 10% of KIPP schools perform better than the public schools from which they draw. That is actually a worse percentage than charter schools as a whole, as was seen in the CREDO study, where 17% of charter schools performed better but 37% performed worse.

From Canada we constantly heard that the system was broken, and on the whole we were intended to draw the conclusion that public schools are not working. Yet even Eric Hanushek is quoted in the film as saying something quite different: that if we could replace the worst performing 5 to 10 % of teachers, our schools would be performing at the same level as Finland, the highest scoring nation in the world. Finland, however, has a far lower rate of children in poverty than does the US, and that difference accounts for much of the difference in performance. But Finland also has a 100% unionized teaching force, which seems relevant to mention if Finland is supposed to be the standard by which we judge our performance, especially when we are constantly bombarded with “facts” about how unions are the problem.

Consider – we are given comparative statistics for lifting of licenses for doctors and lawyers versus only 1 in 2,500 Illinois teachers losing their teaching certificates. But that totally ignores the large number of teachers who leave before they get tenure, many of whom are low performers. Why go to the expense of legally lifting a certificate when the person is no longer teaching? We lose almost half of teachers in the first 5 years. If only 1/2 of those are substandard teachers, then the rate of substandard teachers leaving is higher than the 5-10% Hanushek says is necessary to replace, and not only 1 in 2,500. And by the way, Hanushek never gives any evidence that the replacements would be any better.

That raises another interesting point. By his own admission in the film, Geoffrey Canada was NOT even a satisfactory teacher his first two years. He said he didn’t begin to hit his stride until his 3rd year. Elsewhere, but not in the film, Michelle Rhee has acknowledged that she was a horrible teacher her first year and half. She came out of Teach for America. Both of these people, offered as models for what we should be doing about education, demonstrate something very well known – that as a nation we do a poor job of preparing our teachers and inducting them – bringing them into the classroom. Finland does so over several years with decreasing amounts of supervision and increasing levels of individual responsibility for the new teachers. Finland offers a model which works. Teach for America, by the words of Rhee and Canada, is not what we should depend upon. And if we were to summarily fire 5-10% of teachers only to replace them with additional novices, there is no evidence this will improve student performance.

Let me also note what I consider the most disturbing image in the film. It is used as a set-up to bash teachers. We see a teacher peeling back skulls and pouring knowledge into the heads of students. Later, as the words we hear are bashing unions and union rules, we again see the teacher pouring, only this time she – and it is a she – is pouring her “knowledge” onto the floor, somehow missing the open minds of the students.

This is a horrible model of education. It may work for drill and kill to raise test scores. It does not result in meaningful long-term learning or the development of an ability to continue learning independently. It may not be intellectually dishonest, but it is a distorted understanding of teaching and learning.

What is intellectually dishonest is what the film says about tenure. The film somewhat misrepresents the development of tenure in post-secondary institutions. It is totally wrong when it describes tenure for public school teachers as a life-time guarantee of a job. All tenure does is require due process according to contract rules mutually agreed to by unions and school boards. Note the two parts to this: due process, and mutually agreed to. The portion of the film with Jason Kamrad is used to imply that it is almost impossible to dismiss a tenured teacher. In fact it is not, rubber rooms not withstanding, if administrators follow the rules and document. This is no more difficult that convicting criminal wrongdoers in the justice system when the police and the prosecution follow the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Petty dictators and inexperienced leaders might not like following the rules. Michelle Rhee dismissed a batch of teachers ostensibly because the city could not afford them, but replaced some with people from Teach for America. When she got caught she talked about a handful who rightfully should have been dismissed (although that could easily have been done under proper procedures) while implying that all of the dismissed teachers had similar problems. That was not honest.

Her track record also is not as rosy as the film portrays, although on this I would refrain from accusing that portion of intellectual dishonesty, because the inconsistency of score performance became publicly apparent only after the film was in editing. Still, questions had been raised about the performance at the time Mayor Fenty and Chancellor Rhee were touting the scores as proof that their approach was working.

Perhaps the most intellectually dishonest portion of the film is the presentation of Geoffrey Canada. Let me be clear: I believe Canada is absolutely correct in providing what are known as wrap-around services, including medical and tutoring and family support. What the film implies is that Canada is obtaining better results applying the same or similar resources, and somehow if others would take his approach, which includes his insistence on no union and the ability to fire any teacher, all would be well.

Let’s try the reality. As it happens, on this the New York Times has a recent piece that is quite appropriate, about which many have now commented. Titled Lauded Harlem Schools Have Their Own Problems, the piece appeared on October 12. In it we learn that the schools in Harlem Children’s Village have per pupil expenditures of $16,000 in the classroom and thousands more outside the classroom. The average class size in the Promise Academy High school is about 15, with two licensed teachers per class. Stop right there, and think about the image of most urban schools: how often do you see as few as 20 students per class? How rarely are there two adults to deal with what is often 30 or more students?

Despite that, Canada’s track record is spotty. In the film we hear about the commitment he makes to the parents, which in the Times piece is framed as “We start with children from birth and stay with them until they graduate.” Perhaps we should read about the first cohort of Promise Academy I, which opened in 2004:

The school, which opened in 2004 in a gleaming new building on 125th Street, should have had a senior class by now, but the batch of students that started then, as sixth graders, was dismissed by the board en masse before reaching the ninth grade after it judged the students’ performance too weak to found a high school on. Mr. Canada called the dismissal “a tragedy.”

Somehow dismissing an entire cohort does not bespeak a model that I would want to emulate. Nor does it demonstrate that Mr. Canada is the sparkling example the movie would have you believe. Allow me to quote what Walt Gardner posted about Promise Academy I in this blog at Education Week:

Even now, most of its seventh graders are still behind. Only 15 percent passed the state’s English test. Their failure to perform resulted in the firing of several teachers and the reassignment of others. Although 38 percent of children in third through sixth grade passed the English test under the state’s new guidelines, their performance placed them in the lower half of charter schools in the city and below the city’s overall passing rate of 42 percent.

As a piece of propaganda pushing a flawed vision of education, “Waiting for Superman” is brilliant – it manipulates emotions, it takes facts out of context, it misrepresents much of the data it uses and is less than accurate in its portrayal of key figures, most especially in its portrayal of Canada.

I have not yet cited the biggest example of its intellectual dishonesty. That would be what is NOT in the film. There is not a single example of a successful traditional public school, whether in troubled neighborhoods – and they do exist – or in places like suburbs where many of our schools perform at levels as high as in any place in the world. Instead it allows Canada to paint with a broad brush, saying “the system is broken” and implying that ALL of American education is failing.

It is not. Even by the flawed measure of test scores, the current administration wants to target 5% of American schools. Not all schools are dropout factories.

Too many are. They are for the reasons they have often been – they teach other people;’s children, the children of the poor, those of color, those who do not speak English at home.

It does not have to be this way.

The film is wrong when it wants you to believe this is a new phenomenon. There was no idyllic time in inner city schools, certainly not in the 1970s, which is again an impression the films wants to give you. After all, it was because children of the poor were being systematically deprived of the right to an education that Lyndon Johnson pushed for and signed the first version of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act in the mid 1960s. That had not magically changed things within the next five to ten years.

At the end of the film the text that appears on the screen says we know what to do, then offers the usual bromides of so-called reformers of more accountability, more assessment, higher standards, and the like. This has been the pattern at least since the Reagan administration. If this were the correct path, why a quarter century after A Nation At Risk are we hearing the same things, only more so?

Let’s be clear. Raising the bar of ‘standards’ will do nothing to improve the educational performance of a child not achieving the current, apparently too-low standards. It may in fact merely increase the number of drop-outs.

If Geoffrey Canada can, with foundation money, provide all those wonderful trips for his students, plus teacher-student ratios in the classroom of better than 1-8, perhaps we might consider what we need to do to provide for the students in our regular public schools, who are often at a classroom ratio of better than 30-1, who do not have foundation and hedge-funds paying for their field trips. Canada has a spanking new building, modern, fully equipped. Many of our young people are in buildings more than half a century old, with leaking roofs, with no doors on bathroom stalls, sometimes with no toilet paper unless they bring it themselves. Just the difference in externals like this delivers a powerful message about which kids we really care about, and they know it.

If you knew nothing about American education except what you gleaned from watching “Waiting for Superman,” you would have a totally distorted understanding both of the status of American public education and of what really makes a difference for young people. That inevitably distorts the public discourse on this important national issue. Of course, the intent of propaganda is to drive discussion in a pre-decided direction, whether or not that direction is either necessary or justified by the real facts on the ground.

The film is intellectually dishonest. Most of those who know about education, especially those who know the reality of what has worked and can be scaled up, have increasingly been speaking out and writing against the glorification of the film, and the vision it pushes, and those it attempts to lionize.

And Davis Guggenheim? He admits his sense of guilt. On that he is at least partially honest. What he has done in this film should not, however, allow him to feel as if he has expiated his sense of guilt, for this film has done real damage to the public discourse over education, and made it harder to get to the kinds of real reform necessary so that none of our children are left in failing schools. I long for such a day that all experience fully the right, the opportunity to learn. That will not happen by busting unions, propagating charters, all the while we ignore the increasing economic disparity, and the unfortunate reappearance of racism. Couple this with the attitude of some of an unwillingness to pay for public services for which they do not personally benefit and you will see an increase in the number of students who are not well served by our public schools – we will damage many that are currently working.

As bad as it may be now, things like “Waiting for Superman” merely make it harder to move towards the changes we truly need. I fear that will be its legacy, and that would truly be tragic.

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What Administrators Need: Part I (Pam Moran and Matt Haas)

October 8th, 2010 by Pam Moran 2 comments »

Cross-posted from Dangerously Irrelevant

Dear Scott,

I haven’t really answered your question, “What do administrators need from teachers?” Instead, I’ve deferred to a colleague who has a most unique perspective. I’d like to share some background about him- before you read his story and response to your question. By the way, I’ve always liked to color outside the lines of work so you are getting something you didn’t ask for- two blogs in one day!

Dr. Matt Haas currently serves as secondary director for Albemarle County Public Schools. Until two years ago, he led a high school of around 1700 students. This past spring Matt came into my office, sat down at my stained and worn country-kitchen worktable. Looking me in the eye, he said, “I need to ask you something.”

He looked a bit nervous, not a usual state for Matt, and my thoughts immediately turned to a concern that perhaps something was really not going well for him. Instead, the question he asked shocked me, compelled me, and indeed moved me.

I was forced to sit, silent for a moment, to contemplate a response to a question I had never been asked by a central office instructional leader. “May I teach a class in a high school next year?”

My first thought, I confess, was how would Matt ever be able to do his job as an administrator. Then, words floated back to me from my first administrative mentor, “Pam, if teachers come into your office with a new idea they want to try out, give them a chance. Even if you believe it won’t work, do NOT say no. Figure out how to make it work. As soon as you start saying no, you will close down the potential for growth and creativity forever more in your school.”

I took a deep breath, pushed away the list of Matt “to dos” for the next year, and said, “yes.” Then, I asked him, “why?” His response came without hesitation, “The last time I taught a class was in the 20th century.  I think I need to experience teaching in the 21st.”

This year, Matt holds down his day job as Secondary Director and teaches a heterogeneous group of 30 ninth grade English/Language Arts learners.  These two jobs now often keep him up after midnight. He writes in his journal about his experiences and I hope he’ll eventually blog for the education world. He’s tried out Poll Everywhere as a personal response system and found that almost all his students have cell phones. He’s using Edmodo with the class.

Tech learning curve? It’s been a bit of a problem, but he says his kids can teach him just about anything he wants to do with tech apps. He’s asked for a document camera so he can share printed work more easily to facilitate group conversations. He’s also shared his frustrations with me about the same tech challenges faced by colleagues in the classrooms around him- time to learn new skills, infrastructure, tech access, etc.

Most importantly, Matt’s found out what happens to kids in his class who don’t have dictionaries in their home- let alone tech devices and proximity to Internet access. Despite their learning struggles, he worries every day about these learners because he sees such potential in them. He shared that they take to tech-accelerated work like “ducks to water” and he knows he’s opening critical learning pathways for them.

He’s figuring out how to support them with extra access options at school and is securing devices they can check out for home use. However, he also experiences angst because these learners without Internet access can’t get 24/7 chances to collaborate and network with peers who have home devices. He worries about every one of his learners, but he’s especially concerned about those who are blocked from participating in the full range of learning options available to kids who simply are born into middle class homes with college-educated parents.  So, when he uses Poll Everywhere, he’s figured out how kids without cell phones can log responses from his phone. He shared with me recently that one such student took her own iPhoto and turned it into his phone wallpaper. He laughed about that. Then, our conversation turned poignant about this student who doesn’t have a cell phone and the constraints upon her learning.

I originally thought that Matt and I would co-write this piece drawing upon his experiences this year as he puts his feet simultaneously in the two worlds of teaching and administration. Then, when he sent me his initial draft, I felt I could add nothing to what he wrote- no questions, no pithy insights, no perspectives. I think he nailed it.  I’m learning from his experiences this year and believe I will be a better superintendent for saying “yes” to him. I’m learning what it means to be a lifelong learner from Matt. He looks for and finds learners’ strengths rather than dwelling on their deficits. He’s willing to do whatever it takes to make a difference.

My answer to you, Scott, is simple. What I need are more educators who commit, feel, care, think and problem-solve like Matt. Give our children schools full of “Matts” and I believe we can change the industrial hierarchical model of teaching, learning and administration.

Regards,

Pam

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