The Blob - it eats schools alive!
“The Blob” is a 1958 film starring Steve McQueen in his first leading role.?Click here to watch the trailer!
Note:?this article is a bit of a rant expressing my observations and frustrations over the continuing, and to me, inane, practices plaguing education since the inception of NCLB.?The purpose of this article is not to denigrate educators, although I realize it sounds like that sometimes.?I can say that the classroom teachers are not responsible for these practices; they were forced upon them.
For several years now I have been equating a film, in which a monster called "The Blob" threatens to destroy all life on Earth, to the ongoing standardized testing mania that has been spreading, growing and destroying education.?It began in the United States, in Texas to be exact (where I live), and this monster which I have named Standardized Testing Mania has spread virtually all over the planet - like the Blob or a pandemic.
“The definition of genius is taking the complex and making it simple."?
Albert Einstein
Apparently the designers of the products and services being marketed so intensively to educators to help them prepare their students for standardized testing success did NOT get that memo from Einstein.?In fact, it seems that many of these "experts" go out of their way to make teaching complicated and confusing.
More testing, "unpacking" the standards, more slicing and dicing techniques offered by various programs, publishers and consultants, and the constant barrage of "8 things teachers?. . . ., "10 Roles . . .",?"7 Keys . . .", and "89 components with 447 smaller elements clustered into 15 domains".
And let's not forget the "guaranteed and viable" curriculum.?Supposedly this means that students have the “opportunity to learn and the time”.?When did that bit of plain old common sense reach the status of profundity??And why are school districts all over the country bragging that they now offer a "guaranteed and viable" curriculum??Isn’t that what they should have been doing all along?
How is it possible to guarantee the opportunity and time to learn when students are changing class 7 or 8 times per day (some students change class 11 times per day!) for 45-minute class periods??Deeper learning cannot happen in class periods that short, especially when the curriculum is fragmented and no two classes or courses are connected in any way.
It seems like education has gone spinning off into the Twilight Zone – just crazier and crazier!?There are new practices growing in popularity in elementary education, including kindergarten, which are outrageous -?Platooning and Student Data Walls.
Platooning - A recent article highlighted a practice growing in popularity known as “platooning” which is being implemented as early as kindergarten!?Now these little children get to march – literally - and change classes for different subjects.?Out the window goes all the research on learning theory, the whole child, the benefits and academic gains resulting from practices such as “looping” (staying with the same teacher for 2 or more years).?Writer for the Washington Post, Valerie Strauss, aptly describes this practice as "elementary boot camps".?
These images, from the iCAN charter schools, sum it up.?How is it possible for anyone to actually be proud of this practice??Does this look like a place where children can experience the joy of learning??Does it look like the type of practice that demonstrates respect and caring for children??Is this how children develop 21st century skills and literacies??Or does it look like a prison?
Look closely and consider:?what happened to student-centered, personalized learning??How do these students become more creative, innovative, entrepreneurial, self-directed, independent and interdependent??How do they develop critical thinking, problem-solving, leadership, collaboration, imagination and curiosity?
Where is the joy of learning?
Why is platooning a growing practice??The CCSS and testing!?Now superintendents think that they need super subject area specialists to teach math, science, language arts and social studies in order to obtain higher standardized test scores in content areas.
Student Data Walls - what better way is there to humiliate and damage children??I fully agree with the comment here from Jason Endacott, Ph.D. and Christian Goering, Ph.D., at the University of Arkansas in their blog post entitled, "Coming to a School Near You - DATA WALLS!"
“If protecting the hearts and feelings of a little kid isn’t enough to get you to stand up and do something about the direction that education reformers are taking us, then I don’t know what is."
Also see this article, "Massachusetts data walls shame students with low test scores".?Education editor, Eric Owens, says it best:?"At least one psychopathically cruel person involved in the Holyoke, Mass. public school system thinks it is a good idea to use “data walls” to motivate students."
The factory model paradigm is firmly in place.?This paradigm instructs us that the only way to organize school and learning is through the “cells and bells” approach.?
Many schools are locked into a district-mandated curriculum that dictates exactly what content teachers will teach (or, actually, that should be stated as what teachers will?cover) in each grading period.?Some districts actually dictate what lesson will be taught each day – for example, every student in the fifth grade in that district will be on exactly the same page, same lesson, in the textbook on a given day!?This practice flies in the face of everything that is known about how people learn!?Yet it is being implemented – demanded – by so-called educators!
All of these desperate attempts to “try anything” to get the test scores up indicate an absence of reflection and the ignoring of what we know about how children learn as well as totally ignoring what is working – very well – in many schools today.?Because these high quality schools seem to be so different, their successes are ignored and rejected.?The traditional educators who cling to the factory model almost always dig in their heels and say, “We can’t do that.”?Then come all the excuses and blaming.
An Absurdity – and an embarrassment to the field of education – “Unpacking the Standards”
Who in the world came up with the idea that teachers were so devoid of intellectual capacity that they had to be told how to "unpack the standards"??Instructing teachers to go through a particular process - taking a standard, circling the nouns, underlining the verbs, etc. is ludicrous.?This particular fad has turned what had been intelligent professionals into unthinking parrots, supposedly "teaching" their teachers how to understand a standard.?
YouTube has literally thousands of videos on "how to unpack the standards".?I came across one, for example, made by a school district superintendent.?She used the following standard as an example of how to "unpack" the standards.?What is so difficult to understand about this 7th grade standard for English Language Arts??And, if a standard was difficult to understand, how would highlighting the nouns, verbs and adjectives – color coded! - really help??In her demonstration she selected/highlighted three nouns as shown below.?
"Engage in a wide range of?nonfiction?and real-life reading?experiences?to solve?problems, judge the quality of ideas or complete daily tasks."
Teachers do not have to interpret, translate, dissect, or be psychic to understand this standard to determine how to teach it.?Each standard on that web site was further delineated by a number of examples and activities which the state standards documents provide to support the standard.?Nevertheless, this superintendent feels that she has to go through the document highlighting every noun, verb and adjective. . . .?By the way, she missed, overlooked, forgot or failed to recognize/identify some of the nouns in the standard such as?–?“quality”,?“ideas”?and?“tasks”.?Hey, if you're going to "unpack" the standard by identifying every noun, you need to get them all!
Do you believe that taking teachers through a process of identifying and highlighting the nouns, verbs and adjectives in this standard is a useful activity? This is what the Superintendent for Curriculum and Instruction for this district did, and published it online for the world to see.?If there is any teacher in a district that has to go through such a process in order to figure out what the standard is and how to teach it, they need to be removed from the classroom, because they are hopeless.?How could a person even graduate from college if their intellect and education were that inferior?
Why in the world would a district SUPERINTENDENT actually put together an activity like this and present it??Could this person be unaware of the absence of intellect and creativity, not to mention the just plain stupidity, they are putting on display??How is it possible that a person demonstrating this lack of critical thinking and intellectual rigor is?a school district superintendent?!??Unfortunately there are superintendents, principals and curriculum directors all over the country doing the same thing.
What set me off today, you ask??
This has actually been simmering for a long time, but today I visited a district web site, went to the Curriculum and Instruction Department, to Elementary Education . . . and there I found district level "Curriculum Snapshots".?These dictate, for each grade level, exactly which content and skills will be taught during each of the six, 6-week grading periods for the school year.?
This kind of dictate virtually eliminates any possibilities for teachers to develop and implement a rigorous, relevant,?exciting?educational experience for their students.?It also makes planning interdisciplinary, project-based curriculum impossible.
If your teachers cannot be trusted, or are unable, to plan and teach a certain set of content standards and skills during a single school year, then you have a hiring problem.?I find this practice to be demeaning to teachers, and destructive to good quality curriculum and instruction. And then there is the negative impact on the students!
How in the world did educators buy into this??Never did I dream that something like NCLB, followed by RTTT and the CCSS, would cause so much damage to so many people.?We do not have schools any more; we have test prep centers. Why teachers across the nation have not walked out en masse, standing up to this insanity, is beyond me.?Teachers do have a voice; they do have power; and if they aren't confident enough to stage a walkout, then they can certainly make their voices heard through voting and writing letters to their representatives.
Who really pays the price - the ultimate price??Our children, our students and this nation.
It is 2016, and we have new teachers who have just graduated from college; all they have ever known about school, teaching and learning has been under the NCLB.?They grew up in it!?
When are educators going to realize that?the emperor has no clothes!??
领英推荐
“ Learning is Serious, but that doesn't mean it has to be Grim"
What should we be doing in schools, then, instead of drilling, skilling and testing students to death?
You can create and implement a very high level, rigorous, relevant, real world curriculum experience that surpasses "meeting the standards", teaches valuable 21st century skills and the multiple literacies for the 21st century by designing project-based, interdisciplinary curriculum based upon themes such as (some of the links below are password protected, but you can request the free password here):
Cowboy Culture???*???Frog Jumping Day????*????The Zombie Apocalypse??*
?Be a Millionaire Day??*?????Food and Culture??*??Civil Rights ???*??
*????Constitution Day??*?????Kingdom Animalia??*??
The possibilities are?virtually unending!?So why stick to worksheets and drills??Do you teach World History, 4th grade, Algebra I, English Literature, French . . . Home Economics, AP Government, Health??You can create excellent curriculum for your students, and bring back the joy to teaching and learning! And blow the top off your standardized test scores.
7,000 students drop out of school every day in the United States.?Why??They are bored, and they do not find school relevant to their lives.?Instead of educators scrutinizing students and asking, “What could be wrong with this student?”, or making excuses and placing blame, why don't we simply offer an educational experience that is Relevant, Rigorous and Real World? Those are my 3 R's!
Learning Theory
Let's get “back to the basics” of what we know about learning - Learning Theory.
Then, let's apply that learning theory to what education should be in the 21st century.?Go back to your educational psychology or learning theory courses at the university - Constructivism?(Jerome Bruner),?Experiential Learning?(Carl Rogers), Social Development Theory, remember the ZPD – Zone of Proximal Development? (Lev Vygotsky),?Lateral Thinking?– I teach my students to use many of DeBono’s “thinking tools” (Edward DeBono),?Multiple Intelligences?(Howard Gardner) and Brain-Based Learning?(Eric Jensen).?None of these theories of learning support rote learning only, memorizing as many facts as possible, as quickly as possible.?Rushing students through a list of content standards and discrete skills for the purpose of taking a standardized test will not, indeed,?cannot?result in authentic learning.
In a testing situation students are feeling high levels of stress.?As Sugata Mitra tells us in his wonderful TED Talk,?Build a School in the Cloud:
“The reptilian part of our brain, which sits in the center of our brain,?when it's threatened, it shuts down everything else,?it shuts down the prefrontal cortex, the parts which learn,?it shuts all of that down.?Punishment and examinations are seen as threats.?We take our children, we make them shut their brains down,?and then we say, "Perform."
Solutions
Obviously, high stakes standardized testing must be stopped.?In the meantime, here is what we CAN do .?.?.First, we must intentionally design the?learning environment.?This includes the physical environment, the emotional environment and the academic environment.?
In terms of curriculum and instruction, then, creating?a supporting context?for learning the content and skills will result in learning.?Teachers who design and implement project-based learning are providing their students with an appropriate context in which the content and skills have meaning.?Preferably, this PBL21 curriculum is interdisciplinary and integrated.?The more connections you offer, the greater the learning.?This increases understanding, retention, motivation and test scores.
Actually, designing and implementing a rigorous, real world and relevant curriculum that?engages?students, teaches content knowledge?deeply?and helps students to develop their?21st century skills?and?multiple literacies?is not only easy but enjoyable for both students and teachers.?Within such a curriculum it is easy to ensure that every student not only meets the minimal expectations, but exceeds the standards.
7 Survival Skills for the 21st Century
Let's consider the "7 Survival Skills for the 21st Century"?as articulated by Dr. Tony Wagner of Harvard University.?Please read his wonderful book,?The Global Achievement Gap - Why Even Our Best Schools Don't Teach the New Survival Skills Our Children Need - and What We Can Do About It.??
?According to Wagner, the?7 Survival Skills for the 21st Century?are . . .
What learning theories, if any, support "teaching to the test" as a way for students to develop these 21st century skills??Which learning theories support "teaching to the test" as preparation for life and living in the 21st century??None.
Many school districts have lofty mission and vision statements, and all claim to be "21st century".?Unfortunately, in most cases those mission statements are nothing more than meaningless platitudes.?If they actually want to prepare their students for success - on tests and in life - then they have to?actually change?what they are doing.?
Many school districts, as well as most curriculum designers, publishers and professional development programs for educators claim to be "21st century".?Actually, all they are doing is slapping a few buzzwords related to the 21st century education paradigm and 21st century skills, onto what they have always done.?That's not 21st century education - that's marketing.?It's business as usual while they stuff their pockets with your limited district funds.
For many years I have worked with educators, not only from all over the United States but also from a number of other countries.?In some cases they came to us in the United States, and in others we went to them overseas.?There are some excellent schools out there making enormous strides into the 21st century and that demonstrate excellent results - from standardized test scores to attendance, graduation rates and college admissions.?
However, what we have found, by and large, is educators?saying?that they want to move into the 21st century but simultaneously?refusing to take the steps required to make that happen.?Most try to take bits and pieces of what they perceive to be 21st century educational paradigm and practices, and then try to force fit them into what they are already doing.?It will not work.
Change requires?actual change!
Now the questions for schools become:?
?The answers:?
You will need to develop a deep understanding of what 21st century education is and is not.??You will need to analyze your school using a set of criteria to determine where you stand on the spectrum between factory model, traditional education and 21st century education.?Here’s one place to begin:?20th vs 21st Century Classrooms
You will need to consider everything from your facilities and grounds to your curriculum, your school schedules, professional development, and school/district level policies and procedures.
Your journey into becoming a 21st century school can be guided by these?3 compasses. These must be?embedded within?an intentionally designed Learning Environment - the physical environment, the emotional environment and the academic environment.
This journey will not be easy, but it?will be exhilarating and rewarding.?In some ways, it is similar to?launching a rocket?to the moon - in that you must have enough initial thrust to ensure successfully escaping the gravitational pull of the traditional, factory model paradigm.
Future posts will outline each of the 3 Compasses for 21st Century Education as well as the three components of the 21st Century Learning Environment.
In the meantime, you may wish to consider bringing the professional development experience,?PBL21 - Designing the 21st Century Classroom,?to your school, district or other organization – anywhere in the world!?
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Educator at Government of St. Kitts and Nevis
6 年Thank you for posting this. There is really a need for change in our education system.
CEO Learning Counsel News Media & Research; Knowstory Founder
8 年Cool.