My colleague Valerie will be blogging this week about YouthTruth -- CEP's work with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation's beneficiaries within their US Education program. She has some incredible perspective to share. I'll do some thinking aloud on indicators of school effectiveness in the comments here.
Meantime, the NY Times article today on Brockton high school and its success as a large school (4,100 students!) adds to a growing set of research and anecdata suggesting that school size by itself is no guarantor of failure or success. This directly contradicts the premise of a huge B&M Gates Fdn initiative to break up large high schools into smaller schools and to encourage charter school startups. If I can find any public Gates Fdn evaluation results from this initiative, I'll post them here as well.
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
Hello and Action Research
I am the new kid on the block.
I read all of the past material and agree with Greg that: “you need substance in our dialogue.” However, rather than presentations to each other about where you are, why not collaborate on where you are going – prospective rather than retrospective.
For example, I have been invited to give a 10-minute presentation to the USF College of Education’s Fall Diversity Forum on the “achievement gap.” I’d like feedback on my preliminary draft of what I think I they need to hear and I need to say, given my take on take on education. The text follows: is that of interest and does that make sense?
Action Research
K. Edward Renner
The research that you are most familiar with starts with a theory, is translated into an application, which you as teachers put into practice.
However, what I will talk about today is "action-research;" it reverses that direction. It is best illustrated by a story in which the principal actors can be a professor, a student, or a teacher depending on the audience.
Two students were driving across a bridge when they spotted a child being carried downstream below. No sooner had they pulled the child from the stream when they saw two more children in the water. The first student headed back into the stream, while the second climbed up the bank. The first one hollered "where are you going" while the second answered "up stream to see who is throwing them in."
Going up stream to do primary intervention is widely knowledge as the most efficient intervention, but it seldom happens. If it did, issues, such as the achievement gap, would not be the intransigent social problems they have become.
Why is that?
There is considerable social pressure not to walk away from someone in need. But if you went up stream you would find that it is your boss -- your own institution -- that is participating with related institutions to throw the children into the stream.
It is called iatrogensis. It is the process by which institutions contribute to the very problems they are responsible for solving. The most common illustration is that one third of all hospital days are the result of illnesses contracted as a result of being in the hospital. However, iatrogensis is a common affliction, as when correctional institutions increase the probability of recidivism or when schools, seen as the instruments of choice to create greater social equality, actually increase inequality.
In a city where I used to live my neighbor was principal of the local high school. As you may know, pregnant teens are often excluded from school and fail to graduate from high school. He tried to create a program where the home economics classes would take care of the children as a practical learning experience and their mothers would continue in their regular classes. Such was not to be the case. Home economics would continue to be taught through books, and pregnant teens were to be left to their own devices to take care of their children and to pursue a GED for their education.
In a university where I used to teach, a professor offered a class in which his university students ran an after school program in the largely poor and ethnic minority district. The program turned vacant lots into community vegetable gardens. In addition to food, there were other outcomes: parental involvement, home-school interaction, the creation of a community organization, a community newsletter and an interest in a food related additions to the curriculum. But, of course there were other push-back effects: One absentee landlord rejected this appropriated use of his land and attracted negative media attention when picketed. The city first agreed and then withdrew from citing absentee owners of overgrown lots with a code violation and offering a plea bargain of a monthly payment to the program equivalent to what a lawn service agency would charge for routine maintenance. The absentee landowner had a conversation with the University President at the country club about withdrawing his support as a booster of the football program, and a financial officer of University questioned the appropriateness of the department owning a tractor. You see, University presidents expect Dean's to protect them from such external intrusions, and Dean's expect the same from department chairs, who in turn want the same from their faculty. The Dean spoke to the chairperson who reminded the faculty member that such activity is not scholarship and would not contribute to obtaining tenure. In the end, the faculty member was not retained, the tractor sold, and the university classroom returned to theoretical teaching on how the lack of parental involvement, home-school interaction, and a stable community contribute to the minority achievement gap.
If you you go upstream to put together the "systemic" pieces you will be reminded to go back down stream and take care of the individual cases. The “real” cause, as the explanation goes, is that higher education cannot solve the achievement gap because of the failure of the public school system. The public school system cannot solve the problem because the poor children from dysfunctional families and neighborhoods are not properly prepared for school. So, until poor ethnic mothers heading dysfunctional families living in dysfunctional neighborhoods stop having babies there's not anything that can be done.
If course that is nonsense.
We know that it is the sum of the contributions of the component systems that keep the flow of children coming. The difficulty is that the only place you, as a person, can have an influence is within your own system. But, when you go upstream to do action research -- using practice to inform policy -- you will be sent downstream to do the job you have been trained for and are paid to do. This is where cynicism and teacher burnout comes from.
Your university education should prepare you for this. You need to learn about the methodology of action research and the challenges and strategies of going upstream. You should have within the College of Education programs like the garden project, ones that your faculty contribute to on a par with standard theoretical research. You need this to prepare you for interrupting the iatrogenic habits that exist within our systems, which collectively are largely responsible for the intransigent nature of social issues such as the achievement gap.
I read all of the past material and agree with Greg that: “you need substance in our dialogue.” However, rather than presentations to each other about where you are, why not collaborate on where you are going – prospective rather than retrospective.
For example, I have been invited to give a 10-minute presentation to the USF College of Education’s Fall Diversity Forum on the “achievement gap.” I’d like feedback on my preliminary draft of what I think I they need to hear and I need to say, given my take on take on education. The text follows: is that of interest and does that make sense?
Action Research
K. Edward Renner
The research that you are most familiar with starts with a theory, is translated into an application, which you as teachers put into practice.
However, what I will talk about today is "action-research;" it reverses that direction. It is best illustrated by a story in which the principal actors can be a professor, a student, or a teacher depending on the audience.
Two students were driving across a bridge when they spotted a child being carried downstream below. No sooner had they pulled the child from the stream when they saw two more children in the water. The first student headed back into the stream, while the second climbed up the bank. The first one hollered "where are you going" while the second answered "up stream to see who is throwing them in."
Going up stream to do primary intervention is widely knowledge as the most efficient intervention, but it seldom happens. If it did, issues, such as the achievement gap, would not be the intransigent social problems they have become.
Why is that?
There is considerable social pressure not to walk away from someone in need. But if you went up stream you would find that it is your boss -- your own institution -- that is participating with related institutions to throw the children into the stream.
It is called iatrogensis. It is the process by which institutions contribute to the very problems they are responsible for solving. The most common illustration is that one third of all hospital days are the result of illnesses contracted as a result of being in the hospital. However, iatrogensis is a common affliction, as when correctional institutions increase the probability of recidivism or when schools, seen as the instruments of choice to create greater social equality, actually increase inequality.
In a city where I used to live my neighbor was principal of the local high school. As you may know, pregnant teens are often excluded from school and fail to graduate from high school. He tried to create a program where the home economics classes would take care of the children as a practical learning experience and their mothers would continue in their regular classes. Such was not to be the case. Home economics would continue to be taught through books, and pregnant teens were to be left to their own devices to take care of their children and to pursue a GED for their education.
In a university where I used to teach, a professor offered a class in which his university students ran an after school program in the largely poor and ethnic minority district. The program turned vacant lots into community vegetable gardens. In addition to food, there were other outcomes: parental involvement, home-school interaction, the creation of a community organization, a community newsletter and an interest in a food related additions to the curriculum. But, of course there were other push-back effects: One absentee landlord rejected this appropriated use of his land and attracted negative media attention when picketed. The city first agreed and then withdrew from citing absentee owners of overgrown lots with a code violation and offering a plea bargain of a monthly payment to the program equivalent to what a lawn service agency would charge for routine maintenance. The absentee landowner had a conversation with the University President at the country club about withdrawing his support as a booster of the football program, and a financial officer of University questioned the appropriateness of the department owning a tractor. You see, University presidents expect Dean's to protect them from such external intrusions, and Dean's expect the same from department chairs, who in turn want the same from their faculty. The Dean spoke to the chairperson who reminded the faculty member that such activity is not scholarship and would not contribute to obtaining tenure. In the end, the faculty member was not retained, the tractor sold, and the university classroom returned to theoretical teaching on how the lack of parental involvement, home-school interaction, and a stable community contribute to the minority achievement gap.
If you you go upstream to put together the "systemic" pieces you will be reminded to go back down stream and take care of the individual cases. The “real” cause, as the explanation goes, is that higher education cannot solve the achievement gap because of the failure of the public school system. The public school system cannot solve the problem because the poor children from dysfunctional families and neighborhoods are not properly prepared for school. So, until poor ethnic mothers heading dysfunctional families living in dysfunctional neighborhoods stop having babies there's not anything that can be done.
If course that is nonsense.
We know that it is the sum of the contributions of the component systems that keep the flow of children coming. The difficulty is that the only place you, as a person, can have an influence is within your own system. But, when you go upstream to do action research -- using practice to inform policy -- you will be sent downstream to do the job you have been trained for and are paid to do. This is where cynicism and teacher burnout comes from.
Your university education should prepare you for this. You need to learn about the methodology of action research and the challenges and strategies of going upstream. You should have within the College of Education programs like the garden project, ones that your faculty contribute to on a par with standard theoretical research. You need this to prepare you for interrupting the iatrogenic habits that exist within our systems, which collectively are largely responsible for the intransigent nature of social issues such as the achievement gap.
The alternative is a Millennial Generation dutifully volunteering down stream as the product of a complicit educational system helping to provide a steady supply of children who need to be rescued. All of this while the “systemic” educational system passively watches a consuming life style, in a deregulated economy thriving on a money driven political process having created a Millennial Generation dutifully volunteering down stream…
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
Quo Vadimus
We've been talking about schools, education, founding principles, and pedagogy within a framework of "education salon" for about two months now. Others among us have been talking about about these things for years.
We have salons in the form of video conference, we have this blog, we have the wave. All these tools. All this intent. What are we doing with them?
I ask this because I think there are different purposes at work here. Phil wants to physically found a school: paperwork, boarding school, everything down to picking the plaid of of the school uniform (Are there uniforms? I want to know.) Jess's vision of the school isn't necessarily the same - there are different founding principles and methods used by other schools, and Dewey (engaging though he is) doesn't hold the only golden corner on teaching the children. For my own part, I just like sitting in my study and listening to the ideas pour out of our brains and challenging myself to think about what really is best and what is broken in education.
So we don't really know what we're doing together in this thing, and perhaps what we need is a bit more focus. Salons are much fun - seeing all the people I love and gabbering back and forth about the best way to beat knowledge into the brains of tiny people is wonderful. But it's usually not very directed. One of the reasons that I like this blog is it encourages an author to string together multiple thoughts together into a coherent thread, build an idea into something that can stick to the wall when you throw it there. The Wave and Facebook chattering are fun, but not substantial.
We need substance in our dialogues too. So I propose a little change: let us revise the format of Salons - one of us will give a short presentation (15 to 30 minutes or so) followed by conversation about the topic of the presentation.
I can talk about math education, and share some of my experiences teaching above-average college kids. Jess has many years of experience teaching middle and high school students, and has researched a lot of institutions while thinking about the education of Jackson. Phil is nearing completion of his dissertation - perhaps he could talk to us for a half hour about Dewey and the functional operation of education philosophy. Rachel need only dip into any one of the sub-topics that she talks to me about in the evenings. Tessie must be bubbling over with ideas at the beginning of her grad school program. And these are only the people I've directly been in Salon with - I know there are more interested parties out there too.
What do you think? Have we been down this path before with the Society for Pragmatism?
Talk to me.
We have salons in the form of video conference, we have this blog, we have the wave. All these tools. All this intent. What are we doing with them?
I ask this because I think there are different purposes at work here. Phil wants to physically found a school: paperwork, boarding school, everything down to picking the plaid of of the school uniform (Are there uniforms? I want to know.) Jess's vision of the school isn't necessarily the same - there are different founding principles and methods used by other schools, and Dewey (engaging though he is) doesn't hold the only golden corner on teaching the children. For my own part, I just like sitting in my study and listening to the ideas pour out of our brains and challenging myself to think about what really is best and what is broken in education.
So we don't really know what we're doing together in this thing, and perhaps what we need is a bit more focus. Salons are much fun - seeing all the people I love and gabbering back and forth about the best way to beat knowledge into the brains of tiny people is wonderful. But it's usually not very directed. One of the reasons that I like this blog is it encourages an author to string together multiple thoughts together into a coherent thread, build an idea into something that can stick to the wall when you throw it there. The Wave and Facebook chattering are fun, but not substantial.
We need substance in our dialogues too. So I propose a little change: let us revise the format of Salons - one of us will give a short presentation (15 to 30 minutes or so) followed by conversation about the topic of the presentation.
I can talk about math education, and share some of my experiences teaching above-average college kids. Jess has many years of experience teaching middle and high school students, and has researched a lot of institutions while thinking about the education of Jackson. Phil is nearing completion of his dissertation - perhaps he could talk to us for a half hour about Dewey and the functional operation of education philosophy. Rachel need only dip into any one of the sub-topics that she talks to me about in the evenings. Tessie must be bubbling over with ideas at the beginning of her grad school program. And these are only the people I've directly been in Salon with - I know there are more interested parties out there too.
What do you think? Have we been down this path before with the Society for Pragmatism?
Talk to me.
Sunday, September 12, 2010
Charlotte Mason
I was just reading up on the Charlotte Mason method of education and came across this little tidbit:
"Education should deal with character issues, not just acquiring a certain amount of knowledge."
I believe this to be a true statement. While I'm not keen on the religious aspect infused into the Charlotte Mason method, I do appreciate the main points I've been reading about on it:
"Education is an Atmosphere, a Discipline, a Life"
Atmosphere in this case is the environment, both immediate and macroscopically. This can mean the home environment, the school environment, the world at large, etc. It can include the emotional overtones of the student's surroundings or the state of cleanliness or cluttered-ness thereof, for example.
The Discipline aspect seems to tie back into what a lot of people now refer to as Self-Regulation or Executive Function. It all boils down to instilling an internal discipline in the student. The student learns good habits, self-motivation, self-restraint, and logical decision-making skills.
The Life part is a bit harder to put to words. The examples I've read describe, for example, a liveliness of character. The books the student experiences in the learning process are not dry and dull but written by someone who has an interest and a passion for the subject of study. The concepts are "living ideas" and, moreover, are considered in the Charlotte Mason method to be only 1/3 of the scope of education.
The information for this was culled primarily from this site: http://simplycharlottemason.com/
Friday, September 10, 2010
Prototype schools
A short list of folks we can contact at Dewey-oriented schools in the US:
1: John Dewey Learning Academy in Leecompton, KS, was founded nine years ago as an alternative high school.
Based in Kansas, but we might want to reach out by phone and email to get a sense of how these folks got started and what they are accomplishing.
"The mission of the John Dewey Learning Academy is to provide an authentic, nurturing, and academically challenging learning environment for high school level students that is connected to the world outside of school, is meaningful for students, and promotes their positive sense of community and enthusiasm for learning."
2: John Dewey High School in Brooklyn, NY, opened in September 1969. They list some interesting core principles:
* Students should learn by doing
* Students should learn at their own pace
* A student's education should be validated by his/her experience
* Grades inhibit learning and promote unwanted competition
* A classroom should be conducted by many teachers and many learners, not by one teacher and many learners
* If you give students responsibility, they will be responsible
* Students must be active participants in their education
3: The John Dewey Academy in Great Barrington, MA, just down the highway from Rachel and Greg in the Berkshires.
This one is a boarding high school for students ages 15-21. Their mission:
"We provide an individualized and comprehensive education for bright, troubled adolescents with a history of self-defeating or self-destructive choices. Our peer-based approach leads our students to high levels of achievement and inspires them to develop in ways that promote self-respect, maturity, and respect for others."
I found their FAQs helpful as a reality check as we continue to consider student needs when dealing with students with less privileged or less stable histories. Clinicians on board.
1: John Dewey Learning Academy in Leecompton, KS, was founded nine years ago as an alternative high school.
Based in Kansas, but we might want to reach out by phone and email to get a sense of how these folks got started and what they are accomplishing.
"The mission of the John Dewey Learning Academy is to provide an authentic, nurturing, and academically challenging learning environment for high school level students that is connected to the world outside of school, is meaningful for students, and promotes their positive sense of community and enthusiasm for learning."
2: John Dewey High School in Brooklyn, NY, opened in September 1969. They list some interesting core principles:
* Students should learn by doing
* Students should learn at their own pace
* A student's education should be validated by his/her experience
* Grades inhibit learning and promote unwanted competition
* A classroom should be conducted by many teachers and many learners, not by one teacher and many learners
* If you give students responsibility, they will be responsible
* Students must be active participants in their education
3: The John Dewey Academy in Great Barrington, MA, just down the highway from Rachel and Greg in the Berkshires.
This one is a boarding high school for students ages 15-21. Their mission:
"We provide an individualized and comprehensive education for bright, troubled adolescents with a history of self-defeating or self-destructive choices. Our peer-based approach leads our students to high levels of achievement and inspires them to develop in ways that promote self-respect, maturity, and respect for others."
I found their FAQs helpful as a reality check as we continue to consider student needs when dealing with students with less privileged or less stable histories. Clinicians on board.
John Dewey Director of the Urban Education Institute
Someone to interview:
Dr. Timothy Knowles serves as John Dewey director of the University of Chicago Urban Education Institute (UEI). UEI is dedicated to addressing the question, how can we reliably produce excellent schooling for children growing up in urban America? UEI addresses this question in four ways: by undertaking rigorous applied research lead by the Consortium on Chicago School Research; developing urban teachers and leaders; operating and supporting PreK-12th grade schools; and designing scalable tools and ideas to improve teaching, learning and leadership.
During his tenure at the University of Chicago, UEI has initiated the creation of 20 new schools across Chicago’s south side, four of which are designed and operated directly by the University of Chicago. This portfolio of schools is designed to serve as an existence proof that poor children can learn at high levels. The schools also serve as a locus for developing new methodologies for training aspiring, new and veteran teachers and school leaders.
Prior to coming to Chicago, Knowles served as deputy superintendent for Teaching and Learning at the Boston Public Schools. While in Boston he created two organizations devoted to building the pipeline of high quality teachers and school leaders for Boston Public Schools and served as co-director of the Boston Annenberg Challenge, a nationally recognized effort to improve literacy instruction.
Prior to his work in Boston he founded and directed a full-service K-8 school in Bedford-Stuyvesant, New York City. He also served as the founding director of Teach for America in New York City, and a teacher of African History in Botswana.
He has written and spoken extensively on the topics of school leadership, teacher quality, school reform, and accountability in public schools.
He received his B.A. in anthropology and African history from Oberlin College and an M.A. and doctorate from the Harvard Graduate School of Education.
Contact info at the link above. I wonder if anyone at the Boston Foundation might put us in touch? I'm going to reach out today and see what happens.
Dr. Timothy Knowles serves as John Dewey director of the University of Chicago Urban Education Institute (UEI). UEI is dedicated to addressing the question, how can we reliably produce excellent schooling for children growing up in urban America? UEI addresses this question in four ways: by undertaking rigorous applied research lead by the Consortium on Chicago School Research; developing urban teachers and leaders; operating and supporting PreK-12th grade schools; and designing scalable tools and ideas to improve teaching, learning and leadership.
During his tenure at the University of Chicago, UEI has initiated the creation of 20 new schools across Chicago’s south side, four of which are designed and operated directly by the University of Chicago. This portfolio of schools is designed to serve as an existence proof that poor children can learn at high levels. The schools also serve as a locus for developing new methodologies for training aspiring, new and veteran teachers and school leaders.
Prior to coming to Chicago, Knowles served as deputy superintendent for Teaching and Learning at the Boston Public Schools. While in Boston he created two organizations devoted to building the pipeline of high quality teachers and school leaders for Boston Public Schools and served as co-director of the Boston Annenberg Challenge, a nationally recognized effort to improve literacy instruction.
Prior to his work in Boston he founded and directed a full-service K-8 school in Bedford-Stuyvesant, New York City. He also served as the founding director of Teach for America in New York City, and a teacher of African History in Botswana.
He has written and spoken extensively on the topics of school leadership, teacher quality, school reform, and accountability in public schools.
He received his B.A. in anthropology and African history from Oberlin College and an M.A. and doctorate from the Harvard Graduate School of Education.
Contact info at the link above. I wonder if anyone at the Boston Foundation might put us in touch? I'm going to reach out today and see what happens.
In a New Role, Teachers Move to Run Schools
With the gradual shift from "Principal Teacher" (19th century) to "Principal Administrator" (20th century), teachers are finally discovering what Waldorf has known for such a long time. Teachers must be leaders and, ideally, have control over the environment in which they teach. That means being responsible for the curriculum, the facilities, and the schedule. I cannot reinforce enough the role of appropriate leadership in the school system. Administrators are currently measured on their ability to enforce standards from above. Leadership and significant participation from below is neither cultivated nor appreciated. Is it any wonder teacher attrition rates are so high? I think not.
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
The Child-Driven Education: Sugata Mitra
Sugata Mitra's computer-in-a-wall experiment has shown some phenomenal results. His work is giving us a broader way to think about technology in classrooms, the way we expect students to learn individually and in groups, best uses of current information as curriculum material, and what it means to teach.
Monday, September 6, 2010
Thoughts on a Dewey school: student background edition
An "aha" moment getting at the thing I've been trying to pin down during our conversations -- what has us talking about disadvantaged/underprivileged students and boarding schools? Where is the emphasis on environmental factors coming from? What is it we're feeling the need to control for and/or eliminate entirely from students' lives 24/7?
In Experience and Education, John Dewey writes:
Dewey goes on to say that neither the traditional "battle of wills" method of bringing non-participating students into participation, nor the straight out exclusion of these students from the school, are solutions to these kinds of student situations. He also goes on to discuss the need for sufficiently thoughtful planning on the part of the school, so as to make room for and have resources to deal with such students.
But the assumption I'm hearing is that students start out wanting ever so much to learn and participate democratically and prepare ahead and strike the optimal balance of respect for authority and confidence in their individual positions. This I tend to agree with, but only within the context of students' developmental levels. There is likelihood of student disengagement, rebelliousness, passivity, and poor previous experience no matter where students come from in the socioeconomic spectrum. These things are part human variant, part developmental stage (like separation from authority in high school or devotion to black & white thinking and social group definition in middle school), and part -- not all - environment.
In our next conversation, or one of the next anyway, I'd like to chat more with the group about how, if at all, we would like to continue exploring the implications of targeting specifically disadvantaged student populations for any school endeavor. Ditto the boarding school. There's quite a bit students lose when they are removed from their home environment into one created by, and consisting solely of, their school environment. The kind of students we start talking about when we talk about the benefits of a boarding school will need much more infrastructural support than just a caring set of teachers and a dorm dad.
(Just having an anti-Stand and Deliver backlash moment, and wondering if we can talk about who we want to be as educators without creating straw orphans to save by the sheer power of our great teaching and school administration in the process.)
Have at it with me in the comments?
In Experience and Education, John Dewey writes:
"I am not romantic enough about the young to suppose that every pupil will respond or that any child of normally strong impulses will respond on every occasion. There are likely to be some who, when they come to school, are already victims of injurious conditions outside of the school and who have become so passive and unduly docile that they fail to contribute. There will be others who, because of previous experience, are bumptious and unruly and perhaps downright rebellious."
Dewey goes on to say that neither the traditional "battle of wills" method of bringing non-participating students into participation, nor the straight out exclusion of these students from the school, are solutions to these kinds of student situations. He also goes on to discuss the need for sufficiently thoughtful planning on the part of the school, so as to make room for and have resources to deal with such students.
But the assumption I'm hearing is that students start out wanting ever so much to learn and participate democratically and prepare ahead and strike the optimal balance of respect for authority and confidence in their individual positions. This I tend to agree with, but only within the context of students' developmental levels. There is likelihood of student disengagement, rebelliousness, passivity, and poor previous experience no matter where students come from in the socioeconomic spectrum. These things are part human variant, part developmental stage (like separation from authority in high school or devotion to black & white thinking and social group definition in middle school), and part -- not all - environment.
In our next conversation, or one of the next anyway, I'd like to chat more with the group about how, if at all, we would like to continue exploring the implications of targeting specifically disadvantaged student populations for any school endeavor. Ditto the boarding school. There's quite a bit students lose when they are removed from their home environment into one created by, and consisting solely of, their school environment. The kind of students we start talking about when we talk about the benefits of a boarding school will need much more infrastructural support than just a caring set of teachers and a dorm dad.
(Just having an anti-Stand and Deliver backlash moment, and wondering if we can talk about who we want to be as educators without creating straw orphans to save by the sheer power of our great teaching and school administration in the process.)
Have at it with me in the comments?
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