Student Growth

Learning unfolds in a vibrant and vigorous environment where student growth is cultivated and regularly nurtured, not standardized and repeatedly measured.

Today many schools are eliminating vigorous extracurricular experiences that help students discover the ways they are “smart”, so they can devote more time to preparing students for rigorous standardized tests so the state can measure and compare how “smart” they are.

Rather than rating and sorting students according to a common and narrow set of testable academic skills we should be honoring and cultivating uncommon student abilities while providing diverse opportunities for these special talents to blossom in our classrooms.

“Being a good teacher is a lot like being a good gardener. Good gardeners are optimistic and patient. They are able to see the potential in those struggling young seedlings and enjoy watching them grow, develop and bloom. They give special tender loving care to those few plants that are struggling and not thriving. 

They don’t blame the plant when it’s not performing well; they check the growing conditions. Is the soil the plant is growing in suitable or does it need amending? Does the plant need more water; does the plant need less water? Does the plant need more sunshine; does the plant need less sunshine. 

Good gardeners are good problem solvers, but realize that sometimes no matter what you do, the plant still will not grow the way you would like it to.”

~ Elona Hartjes, “Good Teachers Are Like Good Gardeners”

Teachers are like gardeners and unfortunately many education reformers would have students, parents, teachers and school administrators believe that the Common Core State Standards are just like Miracle-Gro.

The makers of Miracle-Gro understand there are numerous environmental and external factors that can impact plant growth, so their packaging includes the necessary disclaimer, “results may vary depending on rainfall and temperature.”

Soil formation and fertility is one of many influences on plant growth, and has a direct impact on the ability of a plant to thrive. There are 5 factors that contribute to soil formation including, parent material.

“Parent material affects soil fertility in many ways…Parent material is the starting point for most soil development…The type of parent material and how the soil is formed will greatly influence the properties of the soil.”

~University of Hawaii at Manoa, “Soil Formation”

Educational Testing Service (ETS) released a report more than a decade ago that identified numerous factors in and out of school that impact student achievement and growth.

According to the report, parental involvement and the home environment is just as important as what goes on in the school.

"Nothing about the impediments to learning that accumulate in a child’s environment should be a basis for lowering expectations for what can be done for them by teachers and schools, or for not making teachers and schools accountable for doing those things.

And denying the role of these outside happenings – or the impact of a student’s home circumstances – will not help to endow teachers and schools with the capacity to reduce achievement gaps.

Also, insistence that it can all be done in the school may be taken to provide excuses for public policy, ignoring what is necessary to prevent learning gaps from opening. Schools are where we institutionalize learning; they are also places where we tend to institutionalize blame."

In the classroom, it is the teacher who has the greatest impact on student achievement and learning.

The architects of the Common Core State Standards surely must understand that there are numerous factors and powerful influences outside the classroom and beyond the reach of the teacher that also directly impact student achievement and growth ... yet they do not hesitate to guarantee the effectiveness of their Standards for all students?

“The standards were created to ensure that all students graduate from high school with the skills and knowledge necessary to succeed in college, career, and life, regardless of where they live.”

Intentional or not, it is much easier to deflect any questions or concerns regarding the efficacy and quality of the standards, when standardized test scores are misused through value-added (VAM) teacher evaluation policies because the lack of students to thrive in the classroom is attributed to ineffective teachers, rather than poor quality standards.

This misguided Gold Rush for student data will often distort classroom instruction and lead to an emphasis on teaching to the test, which actually undermines the validity and reliability of standardized test scores that are as valuable for measuring individual student learning and growth as fool's gold.

“The current focus on testing has tended to make test results the goal of the system, rather than a measure. The change in goal means recognizing that a test is only measure. Using tests as the goal infringes Goodhart’s Law: when measure becomes the goal, it ceases to be an effective measure.”

~ Steve Denning, Program Director, Knowledge Management at the World Bank, “The Single Best Idea for Reforming K-12 Education”

With so many environmental, social, and emotional factors impacting a student's cognitive development from year to year, it is very difficult, if not impossible, to accurately and reliably predict future achievement based on past student performance.

Teachers understand that no two students are alike, with each possessing unique skills and abilities. Teachers also understand that learning is a self-paced and individualized process not a scheduled, synchronized or standardized one.

Acccountability enthusiasts reveal their lack of understanding regarding the processs of learning when they make the absurd claim that value-added teacher evaluations provide a reliable and accurate measure of teacher quality based on comparing the predicted achievement and growth of "similar students".

Furthermore, education reformers want to hold teachers accountable if all their students don’t demonstrate sufficient growth and achievement on standardized tests at the end of every school year, but they also expect teachers to cultivate a growth mindset in our students so they understand that overcoming failure and making mistakes are an essential part of life and the learning process.

If cultivating a growth mindset in all our students is a goal of education than wouldn’t teachers who have students that don’t achieve the yearly growth targets on assessments be considered more effective as they are helping students to become more resilient learners and to persist in their studies despite the disappointment of a poor performance?

Many reformers appear to view education as a digitized and standardized information delivery system while the classroom functions as a well-regulated training environment where personalized products engage diverse learners ensuring a predictable amount of synchronized student growth each and every school year.

This misguided data-driven and test-centered approach to education is focused primarily on collecting student data in order to sort, rate, and compare student performance with little concern for the reliability of the data that is collected and the validity of policies and programs that are extrapolated from this data.

An interest-driven and student-centered education program is focused primarily on the learner and enabling each student to achieve his or her congitive, emotional, and social potential.

Sir William Osler clearly supported a very similar patient-centered approach when it came to the field of medicine and properly caring for patients as he explained;

"It is much more important to know what sort of a patient has a disease than what sort of a disease a patient has."

The Wikipedia biography on William Osler further explained...

“Perhaps Osler’s greatest contribution to medicine was to insist that [medical] students learned from seeing and talking to patients and the establishment of the medical residency…

He liked to say, “He who studies medicine without books sails an uncharted sea, but he who studies medicine without patients does not go to sea at all.”

His best-known saying was “Listen to your patient, he is telling you the diagnosis.”

Source: Sir William Osler and His Inspirational Words 

Good teachers are also like a coach, recognizing that too much attention on the standards and learning outcomes can be counterproductive as it may discourage some students and decrease self-confidence which will inhibit cognitive growth and development.

Education programs should focus on empowering and preparing students for lifelong learning rather than comparing and prepping students for standardized testing.

Students will be much more successful in school and life if they are confident in their ability to learn and always put forth their best effort, rather than dwelling on how far they still have to go, are they "on track" to be college and career ready, or how their ability and performance compares to other "similar students".

That is why Coach Taylor has his player Brock put on a blindfold before attempting the death crawl in this classic motivational clip, as he explained...

"I don't want you giving up at a certain point when you can go farther."

Here's hoping that in 2017 there is much less purchasing of computers, personalized software, and standardized tests to measure and compare student growth and there is much more investment in art programs, sports programs, work-based learning, trade and vocational programs, playground equipment, adult education, librarians, school nurses, counselors and other essential wraparound services that will properly nourish and sustain student growth.

Back in 2011, David T. Conley warned in his essay, “Building on the Common Core” about the potential for misuse and misapplication of standardized tests…

“Implemented correctly, the common standards and assessments can vault education over the barrier of low-level test preparation and toward the goal of world-class learning outcomes for all students. Implemented poorly, however, the standards and assessments could result in accountability on steroids, stifling meaningful school improvement nationwide.”

Students will learn more from compassionate teachers who collect hugs and care about them, than from "highly effective" teachers who are more concerned with collecting data and comparing them to others.

"One looks back with appreciation to the brilliant teachers, but with gratitude to those who touched our human feelings. The curriculum is so much necessary raw material, but warmth is the vital element for the growing plant and for the soul of the child."  ~ Carl Jung

Students most certainly acquire knowledge and skills in diverse ways and "grow" at different rates of speed, so it is foolish to expect them to demontrate mastery of these skills in a uniform, scheduled, and synchronized way.

Learning is about discovering your purpose and passion in life. Schools should provide diverse pathways and opportunities for students to explore and unleash their specialized skills and abilities…not standardize them. 

Yes, education reformers, there is an education Miracle-Gro and secret sauce for student success and growth...diverse learning opportunities that stimulate the hearts and minds of our students while allowing for student choice, and without limiting or silencing student voice.

"...I ain't gonna be just a face in the crowd

You're gonna hear my voice

When I shout it out loud

It's my life

It's now or never

I ain't gonna live forever

I just want to live while I'm alive

My heart is like an open highway

Like Frankie said

I did it my way..."