This past week I tried something completely different. It was an extra-short week due to the Thanksgiving Holiday but since my students and I had two days to learn Spanish, I decided to test their auditory skills by screening a video. The idea came to me when I was watching one of my favorite holiday specials on DVD. My girlfriend and I have been watching the Garfield Holiday specials for the past few years and while we were watching the Thanksgiving Special the other day, I thought to myself, why not show this video to my class in Spanish?
The students certainly enjoyed a change of pace and it's been my own personal experience that anyone in school always enjoys a video. At first, I was going to show the video with only the Spanish dubbed over the voices, but my first eighth grade class convinced me that it would be better for them if I included the English subtitles as well. After all, they would've picked up bits and pieces here and there but without the subtitles, some would've had trouble getting the concepts presented in the video.
As the video played, I started to wonder how many of my students actually knew who Garfield was. People my age are certainly familiar with the corpulent feline but since the Thanksgiving Special aired 20 years ago, odds are some students didn't know him at all. I looked around the room during the video and noticed that most of the students were paying attention and some were even laughing at the jokes. Word got around to my other seventh and eighth graders and many were excited to be watching a video in Spanish.
After the video in a few of my classes, I asked the students to tell me about anything they had learned. One girl noticed that in the movie, the Grandma called Garfield "gatito" instead of "gato" and I explained to her that the "-ito" suffix implies an affectionate term. Instead of calling Garfield a "cat," the Grandma was calling him a "kitty." I was hoping that my classes picked up the food vocabulary from a video centered around Thanksgiving and perhaps they did, but I plan to introduce the topic of food more in depth in the coming weeks. All in all, Garfield was a success.
This week, my eighth grade students are on a week long retreat with other Catholic school students so I will be free to offer my services to the other Spanish teacher who teaches the K-6 students. I'm excited to split up the duties and teach different groups of students because I believe that two teachers can be better than one, especially when it comes to learning a foreign language. I've had a few encounters with the younger students and let's just say, I'll have to bring extra energy to keep up. I'm always ready for a challenge.
I've been meaning to post for weeks now, but the confluence of launching Tutorpedia Southland (we now have tutors in Los Angeles, Long Beach, and Orange County) and getting the Tutorpedia Foundation off the ground has put my blogging on the back-burner. Through all of this travel and work, in countless meetings, lunches, and coffees, I have continued to laud what makes Tutorpedia different, how our programs can have a disruptive force on education: By giving students a "Class of 1."
How do kids learn with 30 students in a class? Or 20? Even the small classes that benefit most private schools rarely get below 15. So you have two dozen students (or twice that in public schools) in a room, all learning at different paces, all learning in different styles, all learning with different levels of awareness, ability, and aptitude. How is a teacher - even the most skilled, trained, and patient - to reach every child? There is just no way. And that's why we need a Class of 1: Personalized tutoring brings a Class of 1 to every student.
How is this scalable, you may wonder, with 6 million students in California alone? Well, first of all, not every student needs his or her tutoring subsidized (ie. many parents can, and do, pay top-dollar for 1-1 tutoring). So let's say that 50% of parents can afford the roughly $100/hour that most competitive tutoring companies or individuals charge. That leaves us with 3 million students who can't pay out-of-pocket. If we then focus on the lowest-performing 10% say, that's 300,000 students whose personalized education could and should be paid for by outside resources. In our calculations (at just under $30/hour, including program and administrative costs), we can provide 35 hours of 1-1 tutoring to an underserved student for $1000/year. To bring a Class of 1 to the most underserved students in the state, that would cost about $300 million. True, this a lot of money, but considering that Arne Duncan's Race To The Top fund provides more than $4 billion to innovate initiatives in education, that's a drop in the bucket (less than 8%), and California schools are a great place to start.
Let's use these same calculations with the San Francisco Bay Area, home to about 1 million K-12 students. If 50% can afford tutoring, that's 500,000 students who can't, so providing for the lowest-performing 10%, that's 50,000 students who would benefit most from 1-1 tutoring. At $1000 per student per year, that's investing $50 million in our future. The numbers are roughly the same for Los Angeles Unified School District.
What's the alternative? Increased Achievement Gap, more high school drop-outs, more students without a college degree. That's more undereducated students on the streets, and statistics show more youth in jail and prison. The cost of our prison industrial complex will soon exceed that of our education system. According to an article in the San Francisco Chronicle, "by the 2012-2013 fiscal year, $15.4 billion will be spent on incarcerating Californians, as compared with $15.3 billion spent on educating them."
So why all these numbers and dollar amounts? Because the answer to fixing our broken education system is not that complicated after all. Yes we need better pay, better training, and better professional development for teachers. Yes we need more computers and adaptive technology for our students. But what we need most of all is more personal attention. We need to build trust, confidence, and relationships. Research shows that academic tutoring improves social interactions, classroom attention, and positive teacher attention. In order to close the Achievement Gap, graduate more students from high school, and prepare them for college, a more personalized model is needed. Another research article shows that students engaging in 1-1 tutoring show significant gains versus those engaged in conventional (30-1) teaching models. And this study shows the improvement of academic performance and attitudes of students receiving tutoring. There are countless other studies and research done on 1-1 tutoring, and it all points in the same direction: improved academic and social performance.
We all grew up with The 3 R's: Reading, 'Riting, and 'Rithmatic. Now we need to focus on the New 3 R's: We need to make education more Real, Relevant, and Rigorous. And all of these foci need to be built on personal Relationships. The best relationships are formed in a Class of 1.
This first trimester is finally over. I had my first successful grading period as I managed to collect all missing assignments and deal with the first round of grade discussions with students. I'm fairly sure that once the actual report cards are distributed, many of these discussions will continue. After what has seemed like an eternity, our students had their first full week of class. Since it was the end of the trimester and I had other things going on, I decided to take it easy on my students and only introduce a few new concepts while having them complete worksheets in class. At the end of the week, I found this method of having them complete their assignment in class and then correct it could pay dividends.
Some of the new concepts I introduced were stem-changing verbs. Most of my eighth graders knew the correct verb conjugation patterns of the different types of Spanish verbs but had not learned many verbs that change when conjugated. For the sake of saving space and not going into an entire grammar lesson, let me just say that we went over a few of the essential verbs to know such as "dormir," "empezar" and "volver." I had my students copy every verb chart that I drew on the board into their notes so they could refer to it later. One of the things I'm trying to teach them is to take good notes so they'll be able to study them later.
My other method was to test their recall of the material by having them work together to complete worksheets where they would apply the verbs and vocabulary we had learned. One of my classes got a little farther than the other, but then again, both classes still have a lot to review when we go back for the short two days before Thanksgiving. While my students were working, I walked around to each group that had formed to make sure they were understanding the material. That's when the "A-ha!" moment came. As I went over to him, one of my students who always pays attention but has had a hard time in the past looked up and said the three words every teacher loves to hear: "Mr. Erickson, I get it!" I could've hugged him. Due to his good note-taking, he was able to comprehend which verb to use in which worksheet.
I firmly believe that if I'm only able to inspire one person to take Spanish seriously and continue learning the language as their education progresses, I've done my job as a teacher. This is most likely true for any teacher of any subject, but it's important to me because as a first year teacher I don't often know if I'm making any impact on my students. When I heard my student tell me that, I felt like jumping for joy. I let him know how much it meant to me and then went about helping the other students. Satisfaction is something that we all strive for in everything that we do and now that I've had a taste in the teaching world, its provided me with more motivation to continue.
In this student's case, learning came with simple note-taking and memorization. For other students, learning comes with visual aids. For still others it helps them to hear the language before they understand it. Little by little, they're settling into a learning rhythm just as I find my footing as a teacher and it's staring to feel worth it.
All teachers want their students to listen to them. The whole enterprise of teaching really doesn't work unless students are listening to their teachers, and teachers have developed varied methods of capturing students' attention. It's no easy task; there is a lot of competition for a young person's attention these days. In my years of teaching, I found myself competing with my students' peers, students in the hall, magazines stuck inside the covers of their books, students' cell phones covertly hidden in folds of clothing, and so on. But of all the things that I competed with for students' attention, nothing was more difficult to overcome than students' iPods.
I could be upset with America's youth for putting on a set of earphones and tuning out the universe. During my tenure in the classroom I fought against Kanye, Beyonce, and 50 for my students' attention and often lost, despite a no iPod policy at school, but I can't help but reflect that I do similarly. It goes without saying that there is an appropriate time and place for listening to music privately - and a classroom is most definitely not that appropriate place - but it still is worth noting that music has captured the attention of humanity, for better or worse. Were things any different when students' attention was held by Nirvana and A Tribe Called Quest? Talking Heads and Bruce Springsteen? Led Zeppelin and Parliament Funkadelic? John, Paul, George, and Ringo? Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong? Each of these musicians was popular with the student-aged demographic and frowned-upon by the teacher-aged demographic during their heyday. And furthermore, it has only been when those teenagers aged to the point of adulthood that the music they loved carried a bit more social currency.
Here, then, is a radical proposition: instead of competing with the things that capture our students' attention, why don't we figure out how to use those things to teach them? Instead of telling students repeatedly to turn off their music, why don't we use music to educate?
We can all point to music that has influenced our lives and the times in which we live. Songs such as the Beatles' "All You Need Is Love", Marvin Gaye's "What's Going On", or Bob Dylan's "The Times They Are a'Changin'" are said to have defined an era or a movement. Even though their music is probably different (and even though some of us might not like it as much), the principle remains with the younger generation. The message might be diluted or convoluted in today's music, but the messengers are still just as effective. So instead of resisting the medium of transmission that has captured so many us outside the classroom, we should try to embrace it, and use it to carry our message inside the classroom.
Case in point: the slightly kooky band They Might Be Giants has released a series of educational albums, the latest titled "Here Comes Science." All the songs on the album highlight certain scientific principles, ranging from Speed and Velocity to The Periodic Table of Elements. Their content is accurate, and probably much more memorable than most things classroom teachers could whip up. The science teacher in me couldn't be happier, and the music lover in me is also left quite pleased. This represents a highly innovative way to find and capture students' attention, and to teach something of academic substance.
The principle is not limited to music, of course. Anything that effectively captures a young person's attention can be used as an academic tool. Social networks on the internet can be potent educational tools. Magazine style writing might be a more effective way to compose textbooks than more traditional ways. Computer-based learning is part of this movement. And we can even look to the success of Sesame Street for an example of how to reach young minds through channels they're already investigating. Thought about in this light, one has to wonder why teachers are working so hard in order to earn students' attention with dated media and methods. So instead of telling kids to turn off their music, let's try to find ways to make the music they're listening to more educational.
I've written before about the tedious task of grading and as the first trimester comes to an end, I wish the whole process could just magically complete itself. Sadly, that is not the case so I have been spending the past few weeks just trying to get everything in order so that I can actually enter the grades into the online program. It's especially difficult for a specialty teacher like me to organize assignments of more than 140 students from four different classes, grade their performances and then submit the reports to their homeroom teachers on time before the trimester ends this Friday. However, I knew it would be difficult when I signed up so I keep charging ahead.
For the last two weeks I've decided to keep the homework light in my four classes so that I have ample time to accept any late work and then grade it on time. This has worked in some cases but in others, it's proven somewhat troublesome. For example, both of my eighth grade classes had finished their Spanish Family Tree projects and only had to turn in one more homework assignment before the end of the trimester. I had them create a mock Family Tree of celebrities, musicians and athletes, write sentences about each of their "family members" in Spanish and then present the finished product to the class. I was impressed and amazed by their creativity and even felt a little old myself at the amount of pop stars I don't seem to recognize. All of them managed to turn the projects in on time and most have turned in the last homework assignment.
Seventh grade is a slightly different story. Since I only see those students twice a week, it's understandable that sometimes they may forget to turn in the assignments that are due. However, I'm trying to teach them that that's no excuse for not turning in assignments. This is especially true after I've given them more in-class time to finish their homework for an opportunity to get full credit. We still have a few more days to sort everything out and I pray that they all turn their work in on time. I keep stressing that as long as they do their work, check it at least twice and turn it in on time, they will likely get an "A" in the class.
I'm still getting used to my duties at school. Between teaching, helping out at carpool and playing a key role as a facilitator in the inaugural year of our intramural program, there doesn't seem to be a lot of time to grade. However, I have been meticulously collecting and entering homework and test scores into our program as I receive it. I even figured out how to enter scores from home, as I do not yet have adequate wi-fi access for my laptop.
This week will test my students in something non-Spanish related. Instead of conjugating verbs or using new vocabulary, they will be expected to know to turn in their assignments and in turn receive a good grade. Repetition works well when learning anything, especially a foreign language. It will also work well for when I remind my students when grades are due.
Last Friday was the second of three curriculum development meetings among teachers at Catholic Schools in the Oakland Diocese. Our first meeting had been in late September. The meetings were divided by grade level, so as a junior high Spanish teacher, I attended the gathering of 6-8 teachers at St. Patrick's School in Rodeo, CA. The last meeting saw a group of very confused foreign language teachers sitting around a table discussing a non-existent Diocesan curriculum. Oh sure, there were national and state standards for foreign language curriculum but our schools had never taken the time to create our own. So while language arts and math teachers were running over their standards with a fine-tooth comb to see which ones were "essential," "important" and "worthy," us foreign language teachers were wishing we had any sort of standards.
On Friday, thankfully, that changed. All of the foreign language teachers (most of us teach Spanish) met in the Kindergarten room of St. Patrick's where our mission was to start writing our own curriculum. We broke into groups based on grade level where our assignment was to either write what we wanted to teach students about Spanish or what we expect them to have mastered by the time they graduate eighth grade.
I joined the junior high group and we got to work. We were able to divide our standards into different vocabulary and grammar that we expect our students to know by the time eighth grade is over. Part of this process was realizing that we are tasked to do the best we can with what little we have. For example, one of the teachers in my group told us that his students don't learn a word of Spanish before the sixth grade, so he only has three years to try and teach them what they would learn in a regular Spanish 1 class in high school. Many of us were in similar boats. When we talked about teaching culture and prayer, we were careful to assume that not every one of our students would be attending a Catholic high school in the future and thus would not need to learn prayer. We finally settled on traditions and celebrations standards.
At the end of the day, the junior high teachers had come up with a pretty impressive list of our goals. Among the vocabulary we expected our students to have mastered were: 1. Days and seasons 2. Food/Clothing 3. Family/House 4. Greetings and many more
Among the grammar standards were: 1. Stem changing verbs 2. Preterite tense 3. Present tense of regular verbs 4. Some irregular verbs, etc.
I can't wait until we finally have all of these standards written up so we can submit them to the Diocese. The best part of the day for me was sitting down with actual Spanish teachers and comparing styles, textbooks and notes. In some cases, we commiserated over our lack of time in the school schedule, but after this process we just might be able to see our students more.
School reformers are very wrapped up in some important questions: how do we close the achievement gap? How do we foster the academic success of underperforming students? How do we realize each student's potential? These are indeed important questions.
School reformers at all levels have generated answers to these questions, and their answers tend towards to the highly complex. Granted, there are a lot of ins and outs to these problems, and many facets to the broken education system that need attention. School reformers analyze the situation from various levels: some think that the key lies in legislation and appropriation of money, others throw everything behind teacher professional development, while others are more concerned with standards and assessment. There is no argument that each of thees things are important, but they are enormous detours on the road to solving the central problem that schools face.
The problem, succinctly stated, is how to best increase student achievement, especially for low-performing students. Framed as such, the problem seems fairly straightforward. And as such, we at Tutorpedia would like to propose an equally straightforward answer:
Personalized Attention.
The What of the solution is not the hard part. The How, however, is. It's unrealistic to expect teachers to be able to give enough personal attention to all their students given their current workload, and it's equally unfeasible to assume that simply holding an objective measuring stick up to underperforming students will spur them to academic greatness. The right combination of rigor, standards, and the personal attention to support a student's push towards those goals, is the answer. It is our hope that the newly incorporated Tutorpedia Foundation can start to answer the How. We'd like to find a tutor for every student that wants one, regardless of their ability to afford it. With that sort of personalized attention, we really do believe that all our society's educational goals are achieveable.
Tomorrow the Tutorpedia Foundation, our new nonprofit 501(c)3 organization, hosts its inaugural Board Meeting in downtown San Francisco. Among many things to be discussed, the Board will officially approve our mission statement.
Nancy Lublin, CEO of Do Something, wrote a great article in this month's Fast Company about how to write a mission statement. Here's an exerpt:
Here are four mission statements. Two are from real organizations. Two were created by Dilbert's Automatic Mission Statement Generator. Can you guess which ones are genuine?
1. It is our job to continually foster world-class infrastructures as well as to quickly create principle-centered sources to meet our customer's needs.
2. Our challenge is to assertively network economically sound methods of empowerment so that we may continually negotiate performance-based infrastructures.
3. To improve lives by mobilizing the caring power of communities.
4. Respect, integrity, communication, and excellence.
She goes on: "Mission statements are like corporate Hallmark cards. Often written in a bland cursive font and plastered conspicuously at headquarters, these aspiring epigrams are pretty words in Air Supply -- like rhythm." Why? Well, for one, mission statements are meant to inspire. But more than inspire, they should be a call to action. James Collins and Jerry Porras, in their 1994 book Built to Last, first proposed that a mission statement should be a "big hairy audacious goal" (BHAG). They say a BHAG is "clear and compelling and serves as a unifying focal point of effort, often creating immense team spirit. It has a clear finish line, so the organization can know when it has achieved the goal .... A BHAG should not be a sure bet ... but the organization must believe 'we can do it anyway.' "
Lublin concludes with some very specific advice:
Write a mission statement with a goal that's an action, not a sentiment; that is quantifiable, not nebulous. If you're trying to sell a product, how and how many? If you're trying to change lives, how and whose? Take your wonky mission statement and rip it to shreds. Then ponder your ambitions, and write and rewrite the thing until it reflects -- in real, printable words and figures -- the difference that you want to make.
So here's the Tutorpedia Foundation's initial mission statement: To provide tutoring and other education services to low-income students. But now I'm considering making this a real BHAG: To provide every K-12 student in California with a tutor. This will surely close the achievement gap, graduate more students from high school, and prepare more students for college and beyond. Who knows, maybe the Foundation eventually brings tutoring to all 50 states, and then to countries and cities whose students didn't even know what a tutor was. That's big, hairy, and audacious.
Oh, and by the way, the mission statements above? Nos. 1 and 2 are Dilbert's. No. 3 is the mission statement of the United Way, and no. 4 belonged to Enron.
What is the most important thing that a student needs to learn?
After waiting a while for some responses from past and present teachers, here's what we all came up with:
"At the end of the day, regardless of the learning setting and goals, I feel it is essential that a student learn how to ask their own questions, have the tools to seek their answers, and then be able to evaluate the reliability of their findings based on the quality of their evidence. In short,students need to learn how to be critical thinkers, who are actively engaging in their world. This is especially crucial in our information age where knowledge is readily available and needs analysis."
-Raul Betancourt, chemistry teacher, who is presently at The Bay School, in SF, and has previously taught at the public charters; City Arts and Tech HS in SF and East Palo Alto Academy in EPA, as well as at Georgiana Bruce Kirby and Merritt Academy in Santa Cruz.
"I think the most important thing a student needs to learn is how to set appropriate learning goals, and then to take the necessary steps to meet them. An active learner is one who connects what he or she learns to everyday life, and subsequently extends that knowledge towards more abstract concepts. "
-Matt Honigman, 2nd grade teacher in Wauwatosa, Wisconsin.
"Recipe for learning: Take group of students, combine with safety and security (see: Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs) add some focus till calm. Gently fold in (previously planned) empowering and expressive activity. Whisk with sparks of interest and intrigue. Drop in pinch of intrigue to taste! Bake on high with Big Picture debrief. Serves 30."
-Nicole LaCount High School Sciences Teacher
"Depends on the grade level and student. There is no answer that fits both a first grader and a twelfth grader. But, since you want one answer: students always need to learn how to read better. That is, they ALWAYS need to improve as readers and they must know that they should always be improving."
-David Stein
There seems to be a common thread among our teachers that students need to learn about learning. I couldn't agree more. I especially like the active learning ideas as well as students learning how to ask questions. I see this daily in my Spanish classes when my students don't understand the material. Most are perceptive enough to ask questions when they need help but sometimes I worry when there aren't enough questions asked because the students may think they know all of the material. I also think that having engaging and empowering activities are key for any education.
Last week I began teaching Chapter 5 in the Spanish textbook to my eighth graders. I hadn't had any time to give them a test on Chapter 4 so I just decided to go ahead with the next chapter because the first trimester is ending a couple of weeks. I took my own advice from last week's post by creating a one page outline of Chapter 5 detailing all of the vocabulary and grammar lessons that we would learn during the course of instruction. As we went over the outline in class, I could sense my students understanding more of what was going on. Since they now knew what to expect and on what page, they seemed to be more in touch with the material. It really helps to be organized.
I was also fortunate enough to be observed during one of my classes. Our principal came in and watched during one of my lessons to an eighth grade class. I noticed her standing in the back while I was lecturing the students on Chile, which is our country of study for this chapter, but instead of becoming nervous, I was happy she was there. I saw her later in the hallway and she told me that my classroom management needed a lot of work. She then told me that it was clear that I knew the material and suggested I do some observing of my own. One of my disadvantages of not having a credential is that I haven't been required to observe other classes. I couldn't be happier that she came and observed me because I'm a firm believer in constructive criticism and the fact that she cared enough about me to come and watch.
In my seventh grade classes, I finally handed back their Chapter 1 tests and also gave them a Chapter 2 outline with vocab and grammar notes, similar to the one I gave my eighth graders. We were barely able to review the tests in one of classes due to all of my students coming in late and talking, but we got through it. I was happy to see all of my seventh graders engaged in going over all of the test answers. I even heard from some of my students who hadn't talked in class all year. This was like a dream come true for me because one, I now know their names, and two, I know they care enough to try and improve their grade.
One of my homework assignments last week for all four of my classes was for my students to go the textbook website to look around and try out some of the exercises. I did this mainly to get their feedback on what they found. Many of them thought that the website was a good resource, some thought it would have more games, and some probably didn't go on at all. In the future, I'll have to learn how I can incorporate more games and resources in the classroom with the little time that I have, but for now, it's a work in progress.
An article on CNNMoney.com this week listed being a high school teacher as one of the highest-stress, lowest paying jobs. This comes at absolutely no surprise to anyone who has stood up in front of a crowd of 20-30 teenagers every day at work. This too may be believed by a section of the rest of the working world. Teachers, when asked what they do, often are met with responses along the lines of "Oh, good for you. I could never do that!" (And here's a little secret: many teachers would never want to do what you do either.) People don't say this sort of thing because of a teacher's salary; they say this sort of thing because of a teacher's job description.
There is no doubt about it, a teacher's job is high on stress and low on salary. So much so that about 50% of all teachers leave the professon after five years. A popular belief held by many is that the best way to retain teachers is to pay them more. Paying a teacher as one might pay an accountant or lawyer might be a good way to recruit high caliber potential teachers to the profession, but higher pay does nothing effective for the job stresses that come with teaching.
Teachers know that we are in a profession that will not make us rich. Money, by and large, is not as motivating as notions of seeing one's students grow up to be intelligent contributing members of society. And as such, money can only motivate a teacher so far. Even if a teacher were to be paid twice or three times more than they ever thought they were going to make, it still would not diminish their stress level. The trick to retaining teachers, then, is to make the day-to-day of the job less stressful. Here are some recommendations whose price is small when compared to its payoff:
1.Reduce the number of students a teacher has to teach at any one time. Teachers in large comprehensive high schools can't effectively keep track of the number of students they currently have. A high cost solution is to reduce class sizes. This isn't always a feasible option, though, but there are still other ways of cutting down a teacher's caseload. Using block or semesterized schedules can reduce a teacher's caseload.
2. Make a usable curriculum and requisite resources available to all teachers in all schools. Teachers that work in schools that are just starting often are forced to create their curriculum on the fly, and it's only after they've taught a class all the way through do they have a curriculum to use. In these cases, teachers often reinvent the wheel, designing a curriculum around content that already has a solid curriculum developed. In the age of the Internet, there should be no reason why every teacher does not have access to a well-designed curriculum. this does not mean that teachers should be forced to use a curriculum, but rather that they have access to lesson plans and pedagogical and content resources. Teachers will often (almost always) adapt such curricula to their own classrooms, and I have never heard of a teacher complain about having too many resources.
3. Provide training in classroom management, and ensure that schools are consistent and firm when it comes to setting and enforcing limits on behavior. No teacher likes to put time into behavior management, but no teacher can deny that behavior management is important and necessary. Anything that can be done by administrators to alleviate the burden of behavior management can give teachers more time and energy for the things that they are there to do in the first place.
Having quality teachers makes all the difference. Offering money to teachers, while welcomed, will ultimately not make the job itself less stressful. It's vitally important that we figure out what will, and work towards it.
This week, like any other, was chock full of activity. My own educational experience at St. Isidore continued as I herded students out into their cars to get picked up in the pouring rain. It seemed like we almost needed a canoe to make sure that every child could get out safely. The end of the week saw the annual disaster drill, where I was in charge of watching over the entire eighth grade class as they waited out in the parking lot to get picked up by the parents after a simulated earthquake drill.
Needless to say I didn't have a whole lot of time with my students this week. However, somewhere in the middle of it all I managed to schedule and then write my first chapter test for the seventh grade class. Since the first trimester of the school year is coming to an end of November, I thought it pertinent to access the progress of my students by way of their first test. A few students did extremely well, most were in the middle, and it was apparent that some either hadn't prepared or weren't paying attention in class. After grading all of them over the past few days, I've begun to notice a few things that I could improve upon in the future with regards to my teaching style.
First, I need to learn how to present my plans better. I'm constantly reminded of how little time I especially spend with the seventh grade class so I think it would be more appropriate if I write up an entire schedule of the upcoming chapter. This would me as much as it would help them, because on this first test, many missed points due to lack of preparedness. Part of my job is to prepare them better.
Next, I believe many would score higher if they used every resource available. I am privileged to work in a classroom that has an ACTIVboard in it but I think that my students would benefit from other activities as well. The supplemental videos I show to go along with Vocabulary and Grammar lessons I give in class are a big help. The online resources provided by the textbook might help even more. The more resources at my disposal, the better.
By this point in my teaching career at the school, I know that I'm faced with many constraints. With very limited time to accomplish what I need to accomplish, it's time to go back to the drawing board. I will use the next few weeks to make better lesson plans and tell my students about the online resources that will help them improve their grades. I've said before that a computer is no substitute for an actual teacher that can explain the material but it can't hurt in aiding the learning process. It would certainly help if any of them decide to continue learning the language in the future.
It seems to me that we've shied away from the apprenticeship model of education in schools as of late. Instead of learning the thing itself, students often settle for learning about that thing - reading books, watching videos, discussing, perhaps even doing simulations.
Thanks to budget and time constraints, schools are often unable to provide in vivo experiences in the way teachers and students would like. When I was teaching biology, I taught in classrooms that didn't even have sinks, so many of the lab experiences that typify a high school biology class had to be improvised or simulated. I did my best, but at the end of the day, most of what my students learned was referential. It wasn't the experience itself, but an activity/reading/discussion about the experience. In short, there was not the opportunity for access.
But thinking creatively about how to obtain access might yield solutions that are easier than most would believe. There are experts everywhere - especially in large urban areas (such as the Bay Area). There are parents and neighbors who go to work and are able to speak with a great deal of authority about their respective professions; how hard would it be to have them donate an hour or two of time and come in to speak to students? Or better yet, how feasible would it be to bring students to their workplace? In my experience, sometimes it only takes a request.
There are incredible examples of professionals at the highest level of their fields donating their time. Today there was an article in the Washington Post about one of the preeminent classical conductors in the world rehearsing a youth orchestra. Citizen Schools is a great innovator in the after school sector - they build their program around apprenticeships taught by "Citizen Teachers,"experts from the community who volunteer their time to teach their craft and passion to middle school youth. And Tutorpedia is starting a similar initiative: enriching project-based workshops.
Apprenticeship-modeled education is thriving in some schools, such as The Met in Providence, RI. It's also thriving in vocational education; apprenticeships are the way that electricians, carpenters, mechanics, and plumbers enter their respective professions. Vestiges of apprenticeships are even seen in medical school, and less commonly in Law school. But learning directly from practicing experts is something sorely lacking in the majority of our nation's classrooms today. Perhaps it's because teachers don't want to feel as though they are not expert, or perhaps due to the fact that teachers don't know how to access these experts, but either way, putting students into contact with practicing experts is something that benefits everyone: student, expert, teacher, school, and community.
I hope this title raises some alarm. If we think at all of education as a business, we most surely think of it as a nonprofit one. Education is a right - not a privilege - and public schools and districts are public institutions, paid for by public funds. The Boston Globe says, "Education is a public trust. For a century and a half, Americans have taken on the job of providing knowledge and skills to all the nation's children through a system of taxpayer-supported public schools."
But what if that isn't enough? As my recent post suggests, at least in California, this is certainly not enough to maintain the high standards of school infrastructure, teacher salaries, and technology resources, not to mention paying for professional development, collaboration with other teachers and schools, and innovative curriculum and assessments. So where does business find a place - if any place - in schooling our kids?
There's a great article in the Spring 2009 issue of Rethinking Schools, Goodbye to Schools as Businesses. The editors argue that "education is education - a humane and human process." They go on:
The purposes of schooling should not be degraded into privatized preparation toward the fattest paycheck. Clearly, schools should prepare students to earn decent livelihoods... And schools should go far beyond preparing students for work. There are many non-market (perhaps even anti-market) purposes for learning: to end wars, to effect racial equality, to curb greenhouse gases, to halt domestic violence, to appreciate the arts, to play sports and exercise,... to learn to live together.
I agree. I (we) don't go into teaching to make money. Go trade on Wall Street or work for an investment bank - that will make you some money (or used to at least). Funny that so many who argue that schools should be run by CEOs because "they know how to run organizations" forget that the past two years have been destroyed, economically speaking, by those who run the top banks and insurance companies. Maybe they shouldn't be running our schools. Just because you know how to run (even) a successful business does not mean you know how to run a school. These are two completely different beasts.
Or are they?
Take out the bottom line for a minute, and think about all the parts that constitute a school - you have the principal (and other administration), you have teachers (and other faculty), and you have students. I'm not big on hierarchy either, but let's face it, most schools - and most businesses - have vertical systems in place for checks and balances on one another. Some businesses are flatter than others, and some schools are flatter than others. My point is this: to run a good school - whether you're the principal, teacher, or student - you need collaboration, you need organization, and you need roles, rules, and responsibilities.
As a former teacher, tutor, and now business owner, these qualities are still as salient as ever. I love the fact that I can run a business model based upon how I'd like to run a school - my tutors have ownership (and creative power) over their curriculum, my employees have ownership (and alignment) over their unique roles and responsibilities (what we call our Superpowers), and my students get to choose what they want to learn, how they want to learn. We plan meetings as we would plan a class, by planning backwards and asking ourselves: What should students (or tutors) know and be able to do at the end of the day? What if all businesses were run like this? What if all schools were run like this?
Lastly, a good friend of mine recently shared with me a very interesting article about why to start a nonprofit - or more accurately, about why NOT to start a nonprofit. In just a few short days, we (Tutorpedia) will officially incorporate the Tutorpedia Foundation, a nonprofit whose mission is to provide free tutoring and other educational services to low-income students. The article's main points are as follows: there are too many nonprofits out there, we are all vying for the same money, we have limited time and resources so we should be working together instead of competing. We're a bunch of do-gooders who are too caught up in doing it our way; we neglect to see the true costs of starting our own 501(c)3, instead of partnering, collaborating, volunteering, and fundraising with already established nonprofits. I wrote a response at the end of the article, saying that while all this is true (Tutorpedia already partners with other nonprofits and schools, we volunteer and provide free resources, training, and tutoring), I do see value in doing things the Tutorpedia Way.
Bottom line, I want to provide more free tutoring to students who cannot afford it, and no one's going to donate to a for-profit company, so we must incorporate a nonprofit to raise money. I have no illusions that this will be simple (okay maybe a few illusions), but with a devoted Board of Directors, and a dedicated Board of Advisors, I am not alone in my fundraising pursuit.
Tax money won't pay for all of what needs to be learned. It won't pay for those who are struggling with algebra in East Oakland, it won't pay for SAT help in East Palo Alto, and it certainly won't pay for a gardening workshop in Hunter's Point, San Francisco. With the help of those with deep pockets and a deeper concern for the health and well-being of our future, we can support those who need the extra help, the extra tutoring, and the extra education that our budget-strapped state and country sorely needs.
I was going to post this week about the challenges of trying to teach my students the words to the song "Cielito Lindo" but my most interesting educational experience of the week came at a place outside Danville. One of our Tutorpedia's tutors invited many of us to join her at the EastLake YMCA in Oakland to tutor some of the students in an after school program. Since I live in Oakland and am always up for a tutoring opportunity, I planned to go.
I arrived at the facility on 45th Ave a little after 6 pm. Still feeling a little fresh after a full day of teaching, I entered the building to find the students watching a documentary about what I think was the perception of the Latino Community in different parts of the country. I listened as one of the adults lead a discussion about what the students had just seen. Many were upset about what they'd seen and heard in the video. As the discussion came to an end, the leader introduced our founder and the other tutors who had shown up to help out. I became a little nervous about what the students would think when I told them that I taught Spanish at a private school out in the suburbs but as it turned out, none seemed to care much either way.
The other tutors and I got to work. I met a high school aged girl and began to help her with her algebra homework. She was behind in class so we spent the entire hour and a half doing the problems she hadn't yet completed. As I looked around I saw students engaged in their work. One boy was studying for what sounded like a history midterm while other students were working on poetry. Everyone seemed to be getting along and focused on the task at hand.
It was a complete eye-opener for me. While nearly all of my students are white, none of the students at this facility were. While many of my students probably take their education for granted, these students seemed to appreciate the fact that we were there. That is not to say that my junior high students aren't appreciative or that the students at the YMCA couldn't have done just fine without the tutors. It's just that the dynamic was different.
There is a great disparity among educational opportunities when you compare two communities like Oakland and Danville. My students have significantly more resources and attention but as I found out while I was working with the students at the Y, all of them were just as eager to learn. Many of my students in Danville are missing assignments just like the girl I was helping at the Y. The difference now is that she is all caught up.
I hope to go to many more of these sessions in the future. Aside from the tutoring, I hope the students at the program know how much I'm willing to form relationships with them and give them that guidance they need. If nothing else, it will give me an opportunity to see how education is practiced across communities.
I worry a lot about the direction our society is headed: the ideals that are instilled and passed down, the morals and values that are being shaped, twisted, and corroded, the actions that will eventually bring ultimate harm to humanity, the very assumptions we all make out of our own perceived infallibility as individuals and as a species. I believe that humanity is currently headed in a very dangerous direction on many levels (social, economic, ecological), but I also believe that all of this is reversible.
Education, in effect, is ‘future insurance.’ Education is the cornerstone to the transmission of cultural ideas, values, and technologies that define who we are. At the heart of our desire to invest in the education of our young people is the hope that our future will be better than our present.
Education – at its best – empowers people with the tools they will need in order to be the best citizens of Planet Earth that they can be. This sometimes means having the necessary tools to promote the secure future of our society’s structures, and at other times it means having the critical consciousness, wisdom, and power to change those structures as to be more equitable and sustainable.
We, as a society, have done quite well on the former point. Our schools have turned out exceptional individuals whose contributions to society are enjoyed by all. But on the latter point, we have faltered. Schools, in the eyes of many, perpetuate a system of inequality. As evidenced by authors such as Jonathan Kozol, there are incredible disparities between schools in affluent communities and schools in poor communities. It should not come as a shock that the well-to-do continue to enjoy certain comforts and privileges, the poor stay that way, and there is very little movement from one pole to the other. Schools, as institutions that socialize us from a very young age, are primary agents in such a phenomenon.
Last week at the Teachers For Social Justice conference in San Francisco, keynote speaker Pedro Noguera pointed to quality education in our toughest schools as being a potent weapon against social inequality. Education - which should not be equated with schooling - is a liberating agent, especially to those who have not enjoyed access to the best teachers and resources. Everyone deserves an education, but as Dr. Noguera (and many others) argues, the equitable distribution of educational resources in our schools (teachers, equipment, money) is simply not a reality. When one thinks hard about how to redistribute those resources equitably such that everyone has access to equivalent educational opportunities, one starts to conceptualize education as an act of social justice.
The question then becomes: how? Dr. Noguera argues that it's not just a matter of throwing money into poor school systems. Supplying adequate funding to school is part of the solution, but there needs to be more. There needs to be a certain type of education in schools - one that is not biased towards those in power, and one that is culturally inclusive and accepting of differences. For the affluent, education needs to include an awareness of social power dynamics and of the inequalities that do exist here and now. For the poor, there needs to be a concentration of efforts to level the playing field. At this point in the game, that most likely means that equitable distribution will most likely not be equal distribution.
Tutorpedia believes very strongly in giving all students access to educational resources. We have worked with public school districts for two years, supplying tutoring to underprivileged students at no cost to them. We are offering scholarships for one free year of tutoring to deserving students. And this month, we are incorporating the Tutorpedia Foundation, a nonprofit entity whose mission is to provide tutoring and other educational services to low-income students. In these ways, our work becomes more than supporting individual learners as they grow towards college and adulthood, it becomes nothing short of an act of social justice. And that makes me worry a little bit less about all of our futures.
It seems like there is never enough time to teach. Between planning lessons and worrying about issuing progress reports to over one hundred combined seventh and eighth graders, I had little time to do anything else last week. On top of the traditional letter grades, I was also expected to grade the eighth graders on their conduct and effort in my class. The students are graded on a scale from 1 to 4 with 1 being the best based on how they behave in a specific class. Most of the students at my school have never received anything less than a 1 on these grades. That was about to change.
Although I was under a strict deadline to issue conduct and effort grades, I was able to quickly go down my list of students and enter in a score based on what I had seen and perhaps more importantly, heard during my short time as a teacher. Out of two classes full of eighth graders, none of my students would get higher than a 2 in conduct. Very few received a 1 in effort. Most hovered somewhere in the 3 range.
When I returned to the eighth grade classes on Wednesday, I took time out of my lesson to talk with my students about the conduct and effort scores. As soon as they'd gotten wind of what their scores would be, some had started to panic. I even received a few e-mails from parents asking if their kids were acting up in class and assuming the worst. Instead of explaining why each student got the score they did, I decided to ask the class as a whole why they thought they got their respective scores, starting with conduct.
"Why do you think I gave you the score I did?" I asked. "Because we don't pay attention in class," said one student. "Because we're always talking," said another. We came up with a few more reasons, such as not turning in homework on time and not participating. I clearly told them that I expect everyone to participate in my class. When learning a language, participating is not a choice. It's an obligation. I then explained that the student who receives a 1 in my class will always come in on time, have their book out and be ready to work, and always make an effort. More than three weeks in and some were still struggling to take our their books.
This past week was also cut short by two days due to parent-teacher conferences at which the students were also expected to attend. A few parents wanted to meet with me so I showed up to talk about their students' performance. Most parents were worried about the conduct and effort scores. I assured them that no one got great scores this time and that since this was only a progress report, their kids had a lot of time to improve.
In many ways, the conferences benefited me as well as the students and parents. For example, I made allies with parents by finally meeting them and setting goals with them and their kids. I also made it clear to my students that they need to step it up if they want me to notice them. I told one of my students, Peter, that he needs to find a way to stand out among the other 100 students if he wants to ensure future 1s in both conduct and effort.
I'm glad that I could teach my students that nothing is certain. You can never assume that your conduct and effort will be perfect. You may think you're perfect until the teacher says otherwise. The more important lesson I hope they take away is that life is unpredictable. It will only get more difficult as they go on to high school, college and especially the real world. I don't foresee any problems for these students as far as staying in school, but it always helps to know the worst case scenario.
California schools comprise a large and diverse system. According to Ed Source, CA currently has more than 6.2 million students learning in about 9,800 schools across 977 districts. Our school districts range from the tiny (less than 10 students) to the unwieldy (LAUSD has 700,000 students), and charter schools are increasing rapidly (there are more than 700 CA charter schools, and Secretary of Education Arne Duncan's Race to the Top initiative hopes to continue that growth). We have a million more students than Florida and New York combined (1/8 of all US students are in CA), yet the highest proportion of children with a parent without a high school diploma. Almost half of our students qualify for free or reduced price lunch, and 1/4 of our students are English Language Learners.
In California, 1/3 of our education budget comes from local revenues, while 2/3 comes from the state (in most states this is reversed). Education makes up 40% of our state budget, so when our budget is squeezed, our schools are one of the first to feel its effects. State leaders decide annually how much money should be allocated to education. Districts then decide how to spend the funds. Proposition 98 (1988) set a minimum guarantee for K-14 funding (at least 39% of state budget, which adjust for inflation and growth in normal years, and suffer along with the rest of the budget in bad years).
So how does California compare to other states in terms of resources?
CA spent $614 less per pupil than the national average in 2005-06
CA teacher salaries are high, even after adjusting for cost of living
CA has 48 teachers (national average is 64) and 2.2 principals/assistants (national average is 3.5) in a school of 1,000 students
CA has put more than $70 billion into facilities since 1988 from passing local bonds
California's education budget was about $70 billion in 2008-09. How is that carved up?
the state controls more than 80% of these funds (mostly from state General Fund and local property taxes)
the federal government contributes about 10% (primarily to low-income and special education)
the lottery provides less than 2%
the remaining 8% comes from "local miscellaneous" sources (a combination of bonds, private donations, and parcel taxes)
How did we get here? Prior to 1970, school district funds came primarily from local property taxes. In a landmark court decision, Serrano v. Priest (1971-1976) used "equal protection" to challenge the inequities caused by differences in property wealth and set revenue limits for districts. Then came Proposition 13 (1978), which set a statewide property tax rate of 1% and capped increases at 2%. This cut local property taxes in half, took control of property tax distribution and school funding, and essentially took revenue-raising ability away from local schools.
So how do we increase funding and support to our public schools? I believe through a stronger local option. This would provide:
More direct connection between taxpayers and their schools (and therefore greater willingness to support schools)
More revenues for schools without affecting other state programs
Less dependence on volatile state revenues
Greater accountability between local districts and the communities they serve
Schools are the largest single item in the state budget, and with our current fiscal crisis there appears to be no capacity or political will for providing more funds statewide. Local communities have shown a willingness to commit more resources to their schools, and local revenue options should at least be a topic - if not the central topic - in the budget reform debate.
They came dressed in bright green shirts and long flowing dresses. The whole school watched as they sang and danced in the courtyard. Each dance told a story. During the last dance, one of the students got into a make-shift bull costume and ran around the others as they chased him with red cloths and yelled "ole!" At the end of the number, the ninos went around and shook hands with all of the students at my school and prepared for their respective classroom visits. Our guests had finally arrived.
On Friday a group of sixteen students from the Nuestros Pequenos Hermanos center in El Salvador came to St. Isidore School in Danville to share in each others' cultures. This particular group of students is part of the Father Frank's Kids Organization, which dedicates itself to providing housing and education for abandoned children in countries like Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and El Salvador. Out of around 500 students in the center in El Salvador, only these sixteen had been chosen to come to the United Sates to showcase their culture and abilities. One of the kids, Mario, informed a class of 8th graders that their selection was based on grades, singing and dancing abilities and overall standing in the center.
I introduced myself to some of the visitors and then watched quietly as my two eighth grade classes asked them questions (through a translator) about their favorite sports, movies, television shows and other aspects of their lives. I was proud to see some of my students take out their notes and ask the questions in Spanish. Our hard work crafting the questions had paid off, I thought to myself.
Later, after the ninos had changed out of the dancing outfits, they met both of the eighth grade classes at the soccer field. At first, I noticed that my students were a little uncomfortable in approaching our visitors but as the games continued, they became more confident in playing together. My students passed the ball to the ninos and vice versa. Since soccer is probably the most universal of sports, it wasn't hard to see why it was easy for all of the kids to get along and play together.
Our last event of the day was Spanish Bingo. I was asked by my principal to facilitate. As soon as we had all of the students settled at the tables eating their lunches, I proceeded to call out the letters and numbers on the Bingo Balls in Spanish. Some of my students were having trouble knowing what I was saying so I urged them to pay better attention. Playing Spanish Bingo is a good example of using our Spanish letters and numbers in real life and my own students soon caught on. We were only able to play 3 games because of a hurried schedule.
After my students said their goodbyes and took one last picture with our friends, I went on an outing with the ninos. We went to a local grocery store that had donated a bunch of socks to the NPH center in El Salvador. The ninos got a tour of the store from a native Spanish-speaking employee and I could see them smiling as they ate the complimentary meat and fruit given to them by the store. Our last stop was the Yogurt Shack, where the ninos got free frozen yogurt.
I enjoyed the day immensely. My favorite part was being able to speak Spanish all day with our visitors and then seeing the joy on their faces as they interacted with all of my students. I was happy to have my students ask me when they didn't know how to say something in Spanish and then see them turn around and ask our visitors so that they could better understand them.
After researching the web for more information about NPH and Father Frank's Kids, I've come to understand how special these organizations are. I came across this letter written by Father Ron Frank, who was present on Friday, detailing how simple donations like chairs, books and toiletries will make all the difference in the world to these ninos. I am impressed with the way our two cultures interacted and am very happy for the ninos who can benefit from the NPH center in El Salvador.
There seems to be a very distinct line drawn in the sand: either a topic is academic, or it isn't. Either it is worthy of serious scholarship, or it isn't. Knowing a lot about the Civil War is academic; knowing a lot about professional football is not. Being able to recite Shakespeare is academic; being able to recite 2Pac is not. Schools, in maintaining the traditional content areas (and distribution requirements) of English/Language Arts, Social Studies/History, Math, and Science, perpetuate this division. Some things, schools say, are worth knowing, and some things just aren't worth knowing.
Any one of us could make the argument that there are some things that are objectively not worth knowing. Generally speaking, though, each of us would make a case for something different that is not worth knowing. Some sorts of topics may be devoid of all relevance and meaning to my life (the life cycle and history of termites in Madagascar, for example), but that does not mean that everyone finds these topics so dry (Malagasi home builders and foragers). And conversely, some things that I know a lot about (vintage Fender guitar amplifiers) may be completely useless knowledge to the next person (my deaf 90-year-old neighbor). What school does, in effect, is tell us what is worth knowing and what isn't.
This world needs experts in all subjects. We who have never taken apart our car engine or bathroom sink understand this when they break down. But even car engines and indoor plumbing would be hard-pressed to find a home within traditional academics. These are the topics for shop class, an anachronistic fringe elective that has traditionally been there for those who have not done so well with their "academics."
One interesting thing to note is that this dichotomy of "academic" and "non-academic" quickly falls apart when we move past high school. In college, one quickly realizes, you can study anything. One friend of mine wrote about people that trade Grateful Dead tapes for his Master's Thesis, and another friend studied the reproductive habits of teenagers (she is now a Ph.D., who consults with the WHO about HIV prevention). Studying the reproductive habits of teenagers is a bit more...informal when you are in high school, but can become one's life's work. We even see respected scholars like Cornel West and Tricia Rose researching hip hop, which may make us think twice about just how academic 2Pac really is.
The truth is that anything is worth knowing if it brings meaning and understanding into our lives. At Tutorpedia, we ask: what have you ever wanted to learn? We expect that the answers will vary wildly, and we're preparing accordingly. Our tutors are experts in helping students better understand math, English, history, and science, but they are also in the process of putting together project-based learning experiences that will extend what is possible to learn beyond the borders of traditional academics. Soon, Tutorpedia workshops will allow students to polish their fiction writing skills, grow edible plants in an organic garden, find focus through meditation, perform live in a rock band, gain extra confidence and practice for the SAT or SSAT, explore the latest innovations in biotechnology, compose a photo essay, choreograph their own hip-hop dance routines, and more.
It's important to pass on knowledge, and much of the knowledge that we pass on in school is important. But let's not limit ourselves to just the "academics." Topics that nobody would suggest be studied in school can be just as legitimite and meaningful.
Each month, we at Tutorpedia come up with an education related question to pose to a group of tutors, teachers, school administrators, or counselors. We call it a "Roundtable Question." This is the first of many monthly installments of the Tutor Roundtable.
I sent out an e-mail with our first question:
What is the most important thing a student needs to learn in school?
Here is an interesting response:
"I taught in an inner city school for 2 years so my answer is more specific to this group of students. I think that looking back, one of the most important things for me to teach my students was morals/values. Although it is equally important to teach them basic skills so that they can succeed in the future, I found out through my experience that these lessons on skills were useless if students did not learn to value them. The parents of most of my students were hardly ever home to spend time with their children, thus I had to take on a parenting role as well as a teacher role. " -Romina Kim
It's worth noting that this response focus on something other than just having students memorize facts, dates and other protocol. The most important part of an education to me is teaching my kids how to be better learners. At my school, we often stress that we want students to be "life-long learners." I try to accomplish this daily by making sure they complete the little things like copying important information on the board to help improve their note-taking skills. If they start to make connections between learning and real life, learning becomes easier and easier.
We've all heard the old joke: a concertgoer is lost in Midtown Manhattan, and stops to ask someone on the street how to get to Carnegie Hall. Their response: "Practice."
Practice is the key to refining any craft. Practice isn't always fun; indeed it's often tedious. But if any of us are interested in becoming masters of our craft, practice is the only way. As Rafe Esquith has quipped: There Are No Shortcuts. Musicians practice their scales for hours on end, not because their recitals or concerts will involve playing those simple progressions, but because they know that they are developing a foundation for greater things. Even Miles Davis and John Coltrane, incredible musicians remembered for improvisation, practiced scales for up to 12 hours every day.
Coltrane, Esquith, and the Karate Kid all understand the value of long hours spent practicing the basics. Most of us do not have the discipline (and the ear) of Coltrane, or the obsessed passion of Esquith, but we can learn from them. Our success in school is often no different from Daniel-san whitewashing the fence or Coltrane practicing his scales - in fact, we need to spend concerted amounts of time plowing through algebra problem sets if we are to master the distributive property or thinking and rethinking all angles of a historical event if we are to fully appreciate it. Put simply, there is no substitute for practice.
Yet, our culture is filled with those who promise a short and easy way to the top. Fad diets, get-rich-quick schemes, and test preparation services that guarantee a boosted score with minimal preparation are rife. Many test prep companies focus on the structure and setup of standardized tests rather than the content of the tests, and then imbue students with a set of test-taking strategies and tricks. These have their place - it is absolutely crucial to understand the beast you are to do battle with - but equally important is time spent acutally learning the content and skills that will serve you on these tests. And that involves practice.
Whether we choose to excel at standardized tests, music, the martial arts, or anything else in this world, we need to practice. Psychologists put the amount of time one needs in order to achieve expertise at 10,000 hours (that's about 4 1/2 years of full-time work!). Whatever the number may be, the point is that in order to achieve our goals, and achieve them well, there is no shortcut. We must put our time in and practice the basics. Only then will we be able to find our ways to the respective Carnegie Halls in our lives.
So much going on now that school is back in session... There are potential walk-outs at UC campuses across the state due to budget cuts and tuition hikes. Todd Gallagher, a 33-year old author and former ESPN writer, is writing a new book about going back to high school - by going back to high school. And as I try to keep my eyes open writing this, I am reminded of the early start time to school (and work!) that has serious effects on students, teachers, and schools in general.
None of these stories, however, get me more riled up than standardized testing. Deborah Meier and Diane Ravitch, two of today's most influential educators, share a common passion for improving schools, yet are often at odds about how to do so. In a recent post to their blog on Ed Week, "Bridging Differences", Ravitch wrote a letter to Meier about her beliefs on testing, what she calls the NCLB Paradox. She reprimanded NCLB's misguided approach to high-stakes testing, and talked about the harmful results that come from punitive discipline (closing down schools instead of reforming them) to unfair rewards (NYC teachers received $33 million in bonuses after they reported allegedly phony test scores).
Educators have argued about standards and standardized tests for years. Teachers constantly debate the value of learning "hard content" vs. "soft skills". How do we measure what students learn? And more importantly, what should students learn? When studying history, is it more important to learn specific facts (when World War II broke out, where the major battles took place, etc.), or is more important to understand general ideas (what led to WWII, what effect the war had on technology, education, politics, etc.)? When studying science, is it more important to learn how to balance chemical equations (photosynthesis: 6H2O + 6CO2 + sunlight = C6H12O6 + 6O2, for those currently in chemistry class), or is it more important to understand the general idea that if we feed plants water, carbon dioxide, and light, they'll give us glucose (sugar) and oxygen in return? How should we measure literacy (language, science, math, and history)? Just like everything, probably a little from column A, a little from column B...
We need to set high standards for all students, not just those in low-performing public schools, and not just those in high-performing private schools - ALL STUDENTS. This is an assumption that is lost among proponents of standardized testing - just because I don't like standardized tests does not mean I don't like standards. We just need to have different ways of measuring standards, and bubbling in a multiple-choice test in a timed situation is not the best way, and it certainly is not the only way. Not only have many studies shown the biases of such tests, but these tests can also be so ineffective that they result in conflicting conclusions. The stress and anxiety that comes from a timed, multiple-choice, pencil-and-paper exam (see the SAT, CAHSEE, and STAR assessments, just to name a few) do not show what students know and are able to do. The best educators - teachers, tutors, and parents - know that we all learn differently, so we must measure this learning differently - through authentic assessments. This can be in the form of narratives (using standard rubrics designed by teachers), exhibitions (public presentations of student work), and performance assessments (testing know-how, along with know-what). These are all ways to assess students according to their individual learning styles, be they audio, visual, or kinesthetic.
Combine these assessments with computer-based learning and student-centric technology, and we will have successfully disrupted class. Until we figure out a better way to measure student achievement, we will continue to waste millions of dollars on failed schools, failed tests, and failed policies that do more harm than good. Sure, authentic assessments - based upon high standards - will cost more money and take more time than sticking a piece of paper and pencil in front of a student, but consider the alternative: students held back, schools shuttered, and an entire generation of kids who think they're dumb because a dumb test says so.
Adaptability is probably the most important skill I've had to employ in my first month as a teacher. As I said in an earlier post, I do not see my students nearly enough to make a huge impact on their knowledge of Spanish language and culture. This week will be no exception because both my seventh and eighth graders will be hard at work on the ITBS standardized tests all next week and unfortunately, I will get to see them even less.
The three days I will have with students this week will be of the utmost importance because along with the eighth graders completing a quiz, all my students will be asked to prepare for the visit from Father Frank's Kids. Father Frank's Kids are a group of students from Latin American countries that come to the school each year and meet our students. This year they will perform a dance and I am expected to lead a Spanish bingo game with the kids and my eighth graders.
The visitors arrive in two weeks. So far, my students and I have discussed different questions to ask them, such as "Te gusta futbol?" and "Cual es tu comida preferida?" but the real test will come when my students are forced to interact with the visitors. I will see firsthand how my own students will adapt to the task of serving as ambassadors by communicating with confidence in a language other than their own.
It's difficult to plan lessons when classes are cut short and I don't see my students as much as I'd like. However, during my first month, I've made it clear to my students that though I may have a rapid teaching style in the short time I spend with them, I'm always available to give extra help. I've given them extra time to study the "Expresate" Textbook for tomorrow's quiz. Just as I have adapted to their style of learning, they will be expected to adapt to my style of teaching.
Of all the hoops students are made to jump through on their road to college, few are as disliked as the SAT. The test stands apart from content learned in school, and is rarely - if ever - thought of as having any amount of intrinsic value, but it nevertheless weighs heavy in the minds of countless college-bound students. To many, the four hours spent sitting this standardized test is a make-or-break when it comes to college admissions.
It's unfortunate that one's SAT score can be the pivotal deciding factor for admissions counselors. Students' grades, accumulated over four years of work and study, seem to be a much more valid and reliable indicator of ability and performance than one number generated on one Saturday morning. Yet, colleges still rely on the SAT to tell them something about their applicants. Why? What does the SAT tell you, exactly?
According to Edward Carroll, whose job it is to take the SAT over and over again, the infamous test tells you nothing except how good you are at taking the SAT. He elaborates in this Washington Post article:
The SAT, more than anything else, shows how well you take the SAT. It is NOT a measure of a student's raw math or verbal ability. The College Board itself does not claim that the SAT predicts subject skills, but rather that it is a predictor of performance in college (along with the rest of a student's application).
Personally, I think it also filters out students who can't perform quickly. The test is rigidly and tightly timed. It is very, very difficult to finish each section and the [College Board] knows it. They design it that way so that they can assure a nice range of scores to the colleges for comparison.
In this light, the SAT seems like cruel and unusual punishment. To many students it may feel that way. And they might be correct. But just knowing these simple facts - that the SAT is not a measure of one's academic ability and that it's designed to be very hard to finish in the allotted time - might put some people's minds at ease. The SAT, more than almost any other part of a young person's school experience, is about learning how to abide by the rules put in front of them, and play by those rules as well as they can. Many other test prep companies make money (A LOT of money) teaching students tips and strategies on how to play by those rules as craftily as possible, and this does result in improved scores. Knowing the rules and how to work in and out of them is an important skill, but at some point there must also be a recognition that this is simply a game that is being played, a hoop that students are being made to jump through.
Tutorpedia offers SAT prep both for individuals and as a small group workshop. Tutorpedia's directors are also available to give free speaking engagements about the SAT to students, families, or school. We do examine the context - the structure - of the test, but we prefer to focus on the content, the actual substance of what is being tested. In this way, SAT success is directly tied to generalizable skills and habits of mind that students can use in school and in life. And in this way, the SAT becomes a little more meaningful.
Some colleges have de-emphasized the SAT in their applications, and some have gone "test-optional," that is, they have stopped requiring the test altogether. The list of forward thinking schools like this is growing. We at Tutorpedia applaud this stance, and hope to see more critical analysis of tests like the SAT from institutions of higher learning.
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