Sitting on the Fence

I feel as though we are becoming more and more polarized in our country, especially in education. Often we find ourselves in discussions where it is either left or right and we can’t be in the middle for fear of being looked upon as apathetic. Everyone wants to think they are right and therefore that others are wrong. The more and more discussions like these I find myself in the more I think sitting on the fence is the best way to go.

Now there are certain things that we can never sit on the fence with. Students should always be treated fairly, with respect and dignity. However, there are many things within the educational realm with extremely polarized views.

Grades:

Some teachers swear by their grade books as an integral part of their teaching. They would think it blasphemy to hear the outrages claims of those saying we need to rid out schools of grades. On the other hand there are those that see no value in grades as a means of feedback and that our classrooms would be better off without them. I would rather sit in the middle and acknowledge most traditional grading practices are archaic and should be reflected upon and revised. If we are up front about what we grade, how it is graded, why it is graded, and detailed feedback on the grading process in our class it is ok. Myself, I use standards based grading as a middle ground. I am able to clearly communicate to students and parents progress made toward a set of learning standards. There is no guess work as to how the grades are determined or what goes into the “A”.

Standardized Testing:

This is one that I may get heat for but again, there is a middle ground here. The issue as I see it is the amount of money spent creating, preparing, administering and grading these assessments. In addition, the amount of class time spent preparing and taking these tests is at a great cost to learning opportunities. Can’t we use small tests to gather the same data? How accurate is this data if so much time is spent teaching to the test? The tests themselves are a greater indication of teacher preparedness rather than student learning progress. If we instead down play their role and use them as snap shots or basic skills only, they can have little use for us. With technology we can offer more solutions with less hindrance on the classrooms themselves.

Standards and Common Core:

This is a hot topic right now with the advent of the Common Core standards and their role in the future of education in many states. On one hand there are the advocates of strict standards and increased rigor as the only means of “saving” education in our country. Conversely there are those that would advocate for more student driven learning where students guide their learning in absence of standards. Can’t we have both? Is it possible to have a loose set of overarching standards to guide our learning progress while giving students a larger role in the process? Standards are not the issue as much as our overreliance on them both as a means to drive curriculum as well as attempt to hold teachers accountable.

Instructional Procedures:

There are many ways in which a teacher can deliver content to a group of students. As with a favorite sports team, many teachers become a staunch fan of one way and nothing else. Whether you are lecturing, using PBL, Flipped Model, small groups, or any of the other numerous models, they all have value. What works one day will not work the next. What works with one student will not necessarily work with another. We need to stop looking for that silver bullet of instructional methods and realize that bullet is flexibility and evolution. The teachers who succeed are those willing to change when needed for the sake of the student.

Technology Use:

Yes, there is certainly opposing views on the value of technology in education. Many see technology as a great tool with unending potential for improving student learning. However, there are also those that see it as a distraction or shiny object flashing in the eyes of our students. I tend to think they are both right. Technology can, has, and will transform learning in our schools. However, if not used properly, it can be a distraction and a waste of resources. Stand in the middle where you use technology to further learning but not just using it to be using it.

Too often we get wrapped up in our “side” that we fail to recognize the value in the other side. It is in this moment that we are unable to learn and move forward but instead get entrenched in our viewpoints at the detriment of all. Often times sitting on the fence is viewed as the easy way out or just being lazy. However, in most situations, it is the dichotomy within issue that breeds inaction and stagnation. Most of the discussions in education have two sides and the middle ground between both is where I see the greatest potential for growth. I encourage discourse, argument, and discussion as a means of growth but we must stay in the middle to a certain degree for the sake of any change happening. 

You're Holding that Pencil Wrong!

I hesitated in writing this post as I don’t want to call anyone out or embarrass anyone. This story is true and happened to someone close to me and I felt sharing and reflecting on it. My friend’s oldest child is in kindergarten this year and recently got his son’s first report card sent home. Report cards are all different but this was a pretty standard kindergartner report card. It had a handful of skills in a column with the tried and true “S” for satisfactory or “D” for developing. One such skill was “pencil grasp” and his son received a “D” in this column.

Now, the grade was not the issue my friend initially had but rather confusion because his son holds his pencil as “normal” as anyone else. So, he waited to bring this up at his son’s parent teacher conference. At the conference he asked the teacher why his son received a “D” for his pencil grasp. Her reply, according to him was, “well, when I tested him, he held his pencil in a fist which is not correct.”

I am not here to defend the way a child holds his pencil but the fact that his grade was based on a one time “test” of pencil holding ability. Knowing this kid, I am sure he was just being a stinker at that moment of the test. In addition, I have personally witnessed this child hold and use his pencil in the “approved” manner. Yet, this teacher did not base his grade on what I would assume would be multiple days of in class observation. She had to have seen him write, color, and draw on countless occasions during the few months he had been in her class. His grade was based on a so called snapshot moment that clearly did not illustrate his abilities.

For me, there a few reasons I find this story problematic. First, I happen to know this was a first year teacher that was probably just doing what they were told. This is often the case in schools where new teachers are products of the environment rather than doing what is best for kids. Second, this is another illustrated example of why standard and district assessments are too often a snapshot and not the whole picture of a child. Yet, so much value is given to these assessments. Finally, this points to the problem with grades and how they often fail to articulate a child’s abilities. If you were an un-involved parent, you would see such a report card as my friend and assume there was a problem with your child.

In looking at lessons learned here…if you are a teacher don’t let a child’s grade be based on a snapshot. Do everything within your power to use grades and any other feedback you have to paint a clear picture of a child’s abilities. On the other side of things, if you are a parent like my friend, make sure you ask questions. Teachers can learn from parents as much as anybody and their perspectives are often underutilized. 

What Do We Measure?

Last night I found myself in a conversation on twitter with a handful of individuals in varying roles within education. Our discussion ended up essentially talking about what we measure in schools. Here is a snip of the conversation.

I reflected a great deal on this and found myself with a few questions.

What do we measure in schools?

This is the only question I felt I had a handle on. We measure student’s academic knowledge through grades, tests, and other data points. Myself, I use standards based grading where a student’s grade is solely based upon their ability to demonstrate mastery of a learning standard. I need to provide each student a grade in my classes and I choose to have those grades based completely on content knowledge. I don’t believe in inflating grades with homework or extra credit. While this may not be a perfect system, it is working for me and my students right now.

What do we teach that is not measured?

Lately, I have been focusing on having my students think outside the box and be more creative. Is creativity measured? Can it be? I am also working on building a cultural and global awareness within my students. Is that something I can have them “bubble in”? What about other life skills such as empathy and generosity as Dean suggested? None of these things are measured in schools even though they might be observed and noted. At the end of the day, there is not an “A-“ in empathy showing up on a student’s report card.

What should we be measuring?

With both of the previous questions in mind, what should we measure in schools? What is our purpose for measuring students, other than to see who grew two inches over the summer? J Is the reason for measurement to rank, sort, and track students? Is it possible that some of the most valuable life skills we teach in school are not measurable?

As with most things, I have more questions than answers. I feel as though educational culture is predisposed to measure everything and color code it on an Excel spreadsheet. What should we be measuring and what should we just observe and nurture? Are the life skills mentioned above difficult to define and therefore left out of the conversation when it comes to what we value about student learning while in schools? 

Student Driven Learning: My Journey

Many people have asked me recently about my push to make my classroom more student driven. For some, it is a large step and can be potentially scary to think about relinquishing control of your classroom to students. In an effort to help and also reflect on my journey, I provide the following phases of creating a student driven classroom. This is by no means ground breaking or the definitive answer, but simply one teacher’s journey.

Phase One:

As with any journey worth taking, the first step is often the most difficult to take. For me it was realizing that I was no longer the keeper of the knowledge and that I didn’t need to be “teaching” as much as I was. I needed to believe that my students could take more ownership and that I could guide more and instruct less. In order for a teacher to push more student driven learning, they first must be able to resign from teaching and trust they don’t need to be in front of the class at all times.

Phase Two:

Once I made the decision to resign and begin putting more the learning in my student’s hands I started with giving them more choices. This is a really simple and easy step to start, especially for younger kids. For me, I started with giving choices on simple things like projects and daily in class activities. If my goal was to see if students comprehended a concept, why does format matter? Let the students choose what works best for them.

Phase Three:

For me, the next step was no longer dictating the learning steps a student took in order to master a learning standard. Yes, I realize that the very presence of learning standards is counterintuitive to student driven learning, but it is also a reality of my job. I did this in a number of ways. First, I modeled with students how to turn a standard into a learning question. The students then decided how best to answer that question…what resources to use, what method of information gathering, and what format to share or present their learning. I created a series of organizers to help students go through this process and they became quite good at doing it.  

Phase Four:

The next phase is to turn all of the work completely over to the students. I did this last spring when I gave my Language Arts students a list of the learning standards for the entire trimester. They choose what learning activities to do, what order to do them in, and how to show evidence of their learning. I had a calendar and students filled in meeting times with me for mini lessons, small group discussions, and any other assistance they needed. They owned every aspect of their learning with the exception of the standards themselves. I shared many of these posts and experiences during my Reform Symposium presentation. 

Phase Five:

This is the best and most pure form of student driven learning and I experienced this on one occasion last year. For me, stage five is when students not only choose their activities and evidence, but also the content of their learning. They are not driven towards a predetermined standard but rather choose what to learn based on their passions and learning needs. My example of this was last year during our Innovation Day where students worked towards their own learning goals in whatever method best suited them.

As I move into this new school year, I am planning on continuing to evolve my process and always look for more opportunities to help students take more ownership of their learning. One example that I am looking to pursue is to have more days in phase five where students can create more long term and sustainable learning projects based on individual interest and passion. I am bound by certain learning standards within my class, but I will continue to nurture student driven learning as I firmly believe that is a huge step to creating lifelong learners. 

Celebrate the Small Things

Simple post with a simple idea…celebrate the small things in life and in school. Below is a video of my youngest son demonstrating how he can now zip his coat on his own. They make a big deal about this at his preschool as kids join the official “Zipper Club” after being able to zip their own coats. While this may seem like an insignificant pursuit to most of us, you can certainly see the pride on my son’s face when he gets it done.

How often are we celebrating the small things in our classrooms? Are we taking time to give a student a pat on the pack and tell them we are proud of their work or some seemingly insignificant action? I am not asking for handing out awards but simply celebrating and acknowledging good things kids are doing. 

Standardized Testing

I think there are a handful of issues related to public education such as funding, unions, merit based pay, and standardized testing. Many of these issues are hot topics and are being debated from the teacher’s lounge to the halls of Washington DC. For me, the issue I see having the greatest impact on my students and my classroom is the over emphasis on standardized testing. I am a believer in student driven and individualized learning for all students. Standardized testing flies in the face of this belief or at least appears to do so as it is currently being used.

For me, I see the reason we have standardized testing is more about holding teachers accountable rather than measuring student learning. We want to be able to say that all our teachers are teaching the same content and we are all on the same page either as a school district or a state. The reason it is being used in such a way is that it is easy to use simple test questions and pull data to evaluate and make decisions from. We use these to make decisions on teacher effectiveness and student learning because they are easily scored and measured.

The problem with such an approach to teacher evaluation and student measurement is that it is not the whole picture but often is treated as such. Standardized tests largely require low level thinking skills and ask students to simply recall and regurgitate facts and procedural items. They do not reflect a student’s ability to creatively solve problems, work collaboratively with peers, or use creative problem solving. If we think in terms of life skills and 21st Century Skills, standardize tests are not able to adequately assessing these skills. With that in mind, educators know the value of such skills and yet they are not being considered when a student is evaluated in terms of a standardized test score.

The effects of such overdependence on standardized tests score often have significant consequences in a number of areas of education. For one, curriculum is often driven by these tests. The order of units and chapters are put in place to align with these tests rather than a logical sequence based on best practice or what is best for the cognitive development of students. Scope and sequence for tested curricular areas are being decided by testing schedules rather than by what is best for student’s learning. 

Another effect is the potential implications for teachers whose students underperform on such tests. In some cases teachers are being held accountable for low tests scores or unjustly receiving accolades for high scores. Often these scores are the results of student affluence rather than teaching ability or inability and yet teachers are being held accountable for them. In addition to teachers, whole schools and districts are being blamed for poor test scores. Schools are being put on watch lists and in some cases being reconstituted or closed based on these scores.

In my opinion, the most profound impact is being felt by the students themselves. For many, this is the key indicator or their success or failure within the academic realm. They are sorted, ranked, and placed in classes solely based on a standardized test score. Intelligent students who test poorly are unjustly hurt by these tests as well as students who struggle within the confines of the format of such tests. Too often a student’s academic value is being decided by a one size fits all test. Students are individuals that learn, grow, and demonstrate their learning in unique and different ways. Standardized tests do not allow for this to happen.

In terms of a solution, there are a few things that can be done to help this issue. First, the test themselves are actually not bad if used in a specific way. If they are used simply to determine a student’s ability to recall facts, dates, and definitions, then they are adequate. However, they should not be the sum of all a student’s academic parts. In addition, they cannot be the focus of weeks and months of preparation nor should budget line items be in place for “test prep”. Too much learning time is being wasted in an effort to teach to the test. In addition, they should not be the sole tool used to measure a student which they often are. Yes, it would be nice to not have any tests and trust students and teachers to be constantly learning and making progress. However, that is idealistic and not practical in all cases. Therefore, we need to make sure in addition to tests of rote memorization if required, that we have performance assessments, observational data, critical thinking tasks, and other tools aimed at evaluating the whole student. Students are unique individuals and our assessment of them, when necessary, should reflect that.

My Message

Many of you are probably aware that I was recently named Illinois Teacher of the Year. As a result of that honor, I am a nominee for National Teacher of the Year. Part of the process was a packet of paperwork that I recently submitted to "nationals" last week. Among the many questions and topics was one that asked what my message would be about our profession to fellow teachers and the general public. Below is an excerpt from my answer...

My message would be a simple one; it is all about the kids. Regardless if you are a teacher, parent, administrator, school board member or politician, every single decision you make must come down the kids in the seats. We as educators and those that have any hand in education must be held accountable to the students first and foremost. If we cannot walk up to a child and explain to them why we made the decision we did, then we shouldn’t be doing it.

Students are what this entire profession is about and we often lose our focus in the midst of budgets, meetings, trainings, politics, and indecision. Bottom line we need to be in tune to what the needs of the students are and use all of our individual and collective resources to meet those needs. This has to go beyond words but must be reinforced with actions.

I would ask parents to use all their available resources to help their child be successful at home and trust teachers to do what is best for them. In addition, I would ask parents to respectfully advocate for their child and be as involved as possible in their child’s education.

I would ask teachers to remain focused on the kids in the classroom and do whatever they can to meet the needs of each of them individually. I would also ask them to never be content and always find ways to hone their craft to be better for their students.

I would ask administrators both at the building and district levels to stay in touch and grounded in the work being done in the classroom. They need to be present in classrooms to put student’s faces and names behind the decisions they will be called upon to make.

I would ask politicians and corporate reformers to defer to the experts in education before making decisions. If decisions are being made about education, then I would ask educators to be at the table as well as those being educated.

Lastly, I would say that we are stronger and better together and need to stop competing, hiding and being afraid of the collaboration that will benefit us all and in turn benefit students.