friends,
admittedly, i didn't tune in to the inaugural celebration, but in passing, i caught a sound clip of someone important saying that america was known for its "practicality and optimism." i would agree with that, but i would also add for its creativity. i have been fortunate to grow up in a generation that has embraced companies like google, embraced the idea that success is not only dependent on hard work, but also on thinking outside of the box, beyond boundaries... and maybe installing a slide in the middle of the office. and not wearing shoes. and bringing dogs.
and even though some might argue otherwise, i believe that we are a nation that generally embraces the arts, if we expand the definition of that word. sure, we may not be a country of opera-goers, but many of us still love music, movies, looking at beautiful things, eating really good food. at least in cleveland, i feel a little arts revolution coming on, and i like it. i like it a lot.
so it makes me wonder, then, why our education system is moving in exactly the opposite direction of our national values, curiosities, and passions. kliebard agrees: "although lags between what knowledge a society values and what knowledge gets embodied in the curriculum of its schools are not uncommon, it is hard to imagine a culture in which the knowledge deemed to be valuable for whatever reason does not find its way into what is taught deliberately to the young of that society" (7).
and i would aruge that we are not only moving in the wrong directions, friends... we aren't moving. i'm taking a stand here when i say that i think the national goals for our education system are sub-par. we are aiming too low. after doing some reading and reflecting, i think it boils down to these three issues: 1) the demonization of teachers, 2) a boring vision for our nation's curriculum, and 3) assessment that is far more static than what happens in classrooms.
let's start with issue #1. in his book what is curriculum theory?, pinar writes: "in the demonizing world of school deform, only teachers are responsible" (22). he scoffs at former d.c. chancellor, michelle rhee's idea that "'effective' teachers could 'overcome poverty' and any other 'disadvantages'" (21). this is simply untrue, and we are doing a great disservice to ourselves when we are convinced that it is. we need a way to "talk about the family" without liberals rolling their eyes at such a traditional tag line and without conservatives getting on their high horses. because we really do. we really do need to talk about the family. we need to talk about the complexities of poverty, and just how much family structure is both causal and effective of it. we need to talk about parents' obligations in their child's learning. we need to talk about parents reading to their children, checking their homework, asking good and difficult questions and listening to their child's answers, and most of all, supporting education, schools, and teachers: "no more bullshit: schools do not fail. like physicians and other professionals, teachers can and do make mistakes. but the inconvenient truth is that it is students who fail...teachers offer opportunities; it is students' responsibility to take advantage of them" (18-20).
some of the most profound things we can do in education involve teachers taking risks and, in order to take risks, they need to be supported by all of us. the first thing we need to do is change our language about education. i'm talking to the media, yes, the politicians and bureaucrats, yes, but most of all, parents. how you talk about education at home walks right in with your child in the morning. our words make a difference. and our words should reflect hope, possibility, positivity, and encouragement. saying "your teacher is stupid" does not make your child any smarter.
while we're talking about "stupid teachers," let me address my second point: in the past five years, i have three incredibly intelligent friends who have left teaching because it was too boring. did you hear that? let's take a second to reflect on what this means for our students. no, these weren't lofty intellectuals who wandered into teaching and found it was "beneath them." these were ed school-trained professionals, some of whom i worked intimately with, who left because they couldn't teach the way they knew was best for their students, and for themselves: "the truth is that disconnecting the curriculum from students' interests and teachers' intellectual passions ensures the 'failure to learn'" (18).
these teachers who left: this is what we should be worrying about. we need to listen to their stories. we need to fix what is making them leave. let's assess that.
the fact of the matter is: our curriculum is as traditional as it has ever been. in his experience and education, dewey suggests: traditional curriculum focuses on "bodies of information and of skills that have been worked out in the past; therefore, the chief business of the school is to transmit them to the new generation" (17). this was in 1938, friends. we called this traditional in 1938! let's continue to dissect dewey's admittedly-outdated "traditional" education: its main goal is to "prepare the young for future responsibilities" (18), students are expected to be obedient, receptive, and docile (18), textbooks are the chief carriers of wisdom, while teachers the organs (18), it imposes "adult standards, subject-matter, and methods upon those who are only growing slowly toward maturity" (19), and "that which is taught is thought of essentially static" (19). hmmmm, sounds a lot like "race to the top" to me!
and if we're doing all of this complaining about our kids being "stupider than ever before" and "unable to compete with kids from china" (which should never be our goal, anyway), perhaps we should attempt to grow and enrich our curriculum instead of assessing it simply to prove failure, as if to say: "see, i told you so!" how is this productive?
if i had national control over our curriculum, it would look like this: a lot of discussion and dialogue and perspective-sharing, a lot of writing, a lot of critical thinking and annotated reading and project-based learning. and maybe without our shoes on. and maybe a slide in the cafeteria.
we also would never instruct teachers that a best practice is to "write the objective on the board so kids can see what they're learning." here's a heads-up: kids don't care what they're learning! adults don't even care what they're learning! humans learn when it feels applicable to them, when it feels exciting and motivating and inspiring. humans learn when it matters to the present moment, not in the past, not in this ever-present "future" we dangle over our students like a dreary carrot nobody wants. dewey writes: "how shall the young become acquainted with the past in such a way that the acquaintance is a potent agent in appreciation of the living present?" (23) dewey knew it. why don't we?
i know why, and it's my third point: because deep learning is more difficult to assess. listen, it is important to keep teachers accountable. not because teachers are lazy, lying, unprofessional babysitters, but because accountability keeps all of us humble. the least humble among us, i would argue, are those kept least accountable, by shortcut of money or power. and it's true: assessment tells a story, but not the whole story. measuring a year's worth of classroom learning - plus what's going on at home, plus a student's history with and perception of schooling, plus the teacher's whole self and the other two to three dozens whole selves in the classroom and how all of those hormonal, struggling, starving, confused, or sad selves interact on a minute-to-minute basis (i mean, we're really talking about endless variables here) - cannot be measured with a standardized test, not even a really good standardized test. a classroom is not a vacuum. our assessment needs to be complex. and let me clarify: linking test scores to teacher accountability does not make anything more complex. is that what we thought we were doing?
recently, a group of teachers in seattle stood in solidarity against MAP testing, a boxed-assessment package a district may purchase, which, in theory, links student learning gaps to the curriculum, and in seattle, also links student test scores to teacher evaluation. teacher evaluation is not a bad thing. i believe the way we produce effective teachers is not simply to pay them according to how long they've been teaching, so the ones who are most rewarded are the ones who "hung on." but basing a teacher's livelihood off of a purchased assessment package isn't the answer either. plus, i've used the MAP system. it's time-consuming, confusing, and provides exorbitant amounts of information which leaves teachers overwhelmed, not inspired. it also assesses on its own set of standards, not those by which teachers are teaching. please reread that last sentence again, and now let me ask: hel-lo, do we even have a basic definition of what assessment is, and its purpose? if we are not assessing precisely what students are being taught, what are we doing?!?! wasting time and money and producing anxiety in mass quantities, that's what.
my final word is this: teachers need to be able to take risks in the classroom, and they need to be bravely supported by their administrators who are working beside them as colleagues and their communities who are encouraging schools' successes against all odds. instead of spending money on MAP testing, let's spend money on professional development which will fire teachers up to teach better, deeper, and more thoughtfully than ever before (which means to say: far above the standards). then, let's figure out a better way to assess the work that teachers are doing in the classroom and that just might mean going inside the classroom to see how its real live humans are interacting, learning, and sharing. quality control -- if we're going to insist on comparing schools to businesses -- involves a much more intricate approach than standardized testing, and even, i would argue, a standardized test and a single teacher observation.
but we're getting there. we've been doing a lot of "national soul-searching" (kliebard 4) as a country, and we're in process. in process is a messy, complex, organically-evolved, dynamic, exciting place to be. the best place to be.
ask a teacher.
respectfully,
coreen
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