Cycle 5 Post: What Does a Good School Look Like?

     This week's topic is one that is near impossible for educators, community members, as well as legislators to agree upon. How different we all see things was illustrated in a comedic way with the Louie CK clip. I laughed so hard at that clip thinking of how different we all are and how coming to a consensus on something so major, like how a school should be structured, seems beyond reach.

     One of the articles that I really identified with was the Meier article. I really liked the part about the Habits of Mind, 5 critical questions at the heart of each curriculum. As a middle school educator who uses teaming in our building, I believe that the importance of having multiple teachers in a building be on the same page and be using the same guiding questions is very powerful. I also struggle, as a history teacher, of constantly reinforcing to my students why history is relevant to them today and why it matters. It is also my goal for them to not just memorize historical facts and content, but to become critical and analytical thinkers. These are skills that they can use beyond the classroom for the rest of their lives.

     I agree with Meier in her discussion of the often adversarial relationship between the school and parents. Meier talks about how parents need to know that teachers are not undermining their authority, values, and standards. I also feel as an educator that parents are not supporting me at home and instead are looking for ways to find all the things they think I am doing wrong. I did disagree with Meier on her thoughts about parent-teacher conferences. She talked about how some parents do not want to come to school for conferences because we will only tell them their child is bad and make them feel guilty or inadequate. I am not sure of any educator who would actually do that and I myself, have never used a conference to talk about how "bad" a student is. It should be a meeting to discuss strategies for accomplishing goals, both in the classroom and at home with a students' academics. I also think that one contributing factor to the breakdown of parent-teacher conference attendance is online grading. Everything is put online and so you don't need to meet the teacher to find out what you already know if you are monitoring your students' progress online. At my conferences I often find that the parents I need to see the most never show, which only validates that the students are probably not getting adequate academic support at home, and the parents of my "A" students always come so that I can tell them how great their child is. It's beyond frustrating.

Egger's Wish Upon a School video made a lot of sense to me. I have always felt that the schools do not take advantage of the community resources available for education and training. The biggest reason for that, of course, is the increasing number of rigorous state standards and testing that is required of educators which leaves us all in a race to the finish line. Educators often feel like we have to forgo the extras and cut out the fluff in order to meet all of our standards. The problem is that the fluff and the extras are usually the fun stuff. When you cut out the fun, then schools, in the words of Louie, "suck".

Related Websites:
http://www.nw-service.k12.mn.us/cms/lib02/MN01000650/Centricity/Domain/24/Why_some_parents_don_t_come_to_school.pdf
This website talks about some of the little known reasons for why parent-teacher conference attendance is so low and why some parents don't come to school.

http://www.dvorak.org/blog/2013/03/02/a-teacher-explains-why-schools-suck/
This is a powerful video by an educator on why he is resigning and why schools "suck"

Cycle 4: How Should Curriculum be Created?

This week’s topic is a tricky one as it lends itself to multiple interpretations of what should be the required objectives that students learn in schools.  Throughout American history, curriculum and educational objectives have been selected with a variety of factors in mind, including educational philosophies of the time period as well as social and political happenings of the time.  The problem is that as ideologies change over time, the instructional objectives need to change along with them and making those decisions thickens the plot.

Russell Shorto’s article “How Christian Were the Founders?” discusses the recent social studies curriculum debate in Texas and the science debate they have had in the past.  This article is the classic example of how getting individuals to agree on what should be taught in schools seems like an impossible task.  Educators, community members, and state school board members are discussing various topics that they all have differing opinions on and coming to a consensus seems impossible.  Do you know who was not mentioned in the article and who probably did not even attend these meetings? Kids. Actual students who could probably sort through huge adult egos and petty arguments with something that makes sense were probably not even there. In Ralph Tyler’s article “Basic Principles of Curriculum and Instruction”, he argues that we need to look at the learners themselves when developing good curriculum as well as the subject specialists and educational philosophy of the time. 

I feel like adults should spend less time sitting around worried about what we think students should be learning and be more practical.  I can tell you that personally, as a social studies teacher, I have never used an algebraic equation in my adult life. Yet, somewhere along the way, someone determined that was an important educational objective that all 8^th graders had to learn. Now, I know that algebraic equations are needed for some adult professions, but not mine. Do you know what would have been valuable for me to learn? I wish I would have been taught how to convert measurements such as how many teaspoons are in a cup. I can’t tell you how many times I have actually needed something like that. I was not taught that, however, because it wasn’t on my list of state mandated math standards.

Reading about developing curriculum is frustrating.  Frustrating to me as an educator who is constantly asked to teach more in less time, frustrated for my students who have to learn so many things they care nothing about, and frustrated because I don’t have all the answers of how to make it better. I totally agree with Tyler’s thoughts that when developing curriculum you need an end goal in mind that is specific and measurable and not a vague blanket statement like “to create well-rounded citizens”, but getting individuals to agree on such a goal seems like an improbable mission.

Related Websites:

http://www.ccebos.org/pdf/Curriculum.pdf

Very informative and helpful PDF guide to curriculum development in the middle school setting.

www.ascd.org/.../Who_Creates_Curriculum¢_New_Roles_for_Teachers.aspx

 An article on curriculum inquiry and how it can help districts and teachers to decide which decisions to make and which to leave to personal choice.

Cycle 3: Should the Curriculum Address Controversial Issues?

In going through this week’s readings I was not only torn in different directions as an educator and as a mother but also frustrated with my profession and our modern American culture.  While I agree that there needs to be anti-bullying education in schools and that tolerance needs to be integrated into the curriculum, I also can see how the topic of homosexuality is an extremely political and controversial topic to cover in classroom curriculum. 

Almost all adults remember a time in middle school when they were picked on for something by their peers.  I teach in a middle school, it’s a rough time in kids’ growth and development and a tough age.  Everything is all about how you appear to your peers and how you are perceived by them.  As much as we all know this is part of growing up, bullying is an increasing problem in our schools and is increasingly dangerous as teen suicides rates are staggering.  Some of those numbers can be seen here: http://www.bullyingstatistics.org/content/bullying-and-suicide.html.

Students who are either gay or are perceived as their peers as gay make up a large number of those suicides but are not the only reason adolescents consider killing themselves.  I believe that we have to be careful about picking out specific causes of bullying and teaching them as we could not possibly have the time to fit everything into the curriculum along with the state mandates.  Instead, I think it is probably better to teach tolerance of diversity period, regardless of whether it is body type, sexuality, or something different.

In the Joel Burns video that we saw this week, he states that “bullying and harassment in our schools must stop and our schools must be safe places to learn and to grow”.  I couldn't agree more.  As a nation, most educators agree that we have a problem that requires a solution.

The resolution that the Helena, Montana school district came up with in their quest to address bullying seems fair.  They changed the language of their bullying curriculum to be vaguer and more open ended about acceptance of others, rather than addressing homosexuality explicitly. I think this was a good move.  With so many cultural differences in today’s society, it makes sense to address the issue of bullying and acceptance while causing minimal conflict with the community and parents of your students.  Covering the topic in entirety rather than being specific also ensures that you don’t open the portal to teach about every single thing that kids are bullied over; which could not possibly all be covered individually within the existing academic curriculum.

The most frustrating part to me in this week’s topic is the thought that as an educator I am teaching academics (math, science, social studies, and language arts), as well as life skills and values (common courtesy, caring for others, anti-bullying, accepting diversity, etc.)  If we are teaching them everything in school, what are they learning at home?  I feel that as educators we are constantly being told to do more; to be parents as well as teachers.  Many of the things we are being asked to teach, such as kindness to others, I would consider common sense and ideas that should be ingrained in a child from birth in your home structure.  These lessons taught from home are then reinforced at school and in life.  The problem is that kids are not getting these lessons at home because the United States culture has seen a complete breakdown in the family structure.  The majority of families are no longer teaching life lessons, skills, and values, we are asking our schools to do that instead.  Schools have to teach these things all while also covering an increasing list of state mandated standards and when we can’t do it all, we are failures; frustrating to say the least!

An article on the breakdown of the American family structure can be seen here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-w-whitehead/the-breakdown-of-the-trad_b_675444.html, and an interesting article on teachers as parents can be seen here:  http://www.cnn.com/2011/09/08/living/ron-clark-reactions.

Cycle 2 Resources

http://shine.yahoo.com/parenting/24-life-lessons-to-teach-your-children-2480134.html

This site has some of those life lessons that I was talking about in my post that I often feel my students need to know but are not learning at home.  Since teachers are being asked to parent more and more at school, maybe we should be responsible for teaching them?

Begun, R.W. (1996). Ready-to-Use Social Skills Lessons and Activities for Grades 4-6. San Francisco, CA. Jossey-Bass.

This book gives teachers lesson guides to use in the classroom to teach life lessons and important social skills.  You can preview the book at amazon.com here: http://www.amazon.com/Ready-Social-Skills-Lessons-Activities/dp/0876284748/ref=pd_bxgy_b_img_z

McCall, J. (2011). Gaming the Past: Using Video Games to Teach Secondary History. New York, NY. Routledge.

This book is written all about using progressive education such as video games to connect and engage students in learning history, much like the Quest to Learn schools. You can preview the book here: http://www.amazon.com/Ready-Social-Skills-Lessons-Activities/dp/0876284748/ref=pd_bxgy_b_img_z

Cycle Two: What Should Schools Teach?

           As I saw the topic for this cycle and read through the material, it really resonated with me.  The funny thing about this topic is that I was just telling my student teacher, that I should to quit teaching American History and teach a class titled “Life Lessons/Personal Etiquette”.  In this class, students would learn important idioms to live by and proper social etiquette they need for life such as “when things get hard, try your best”, “you are in control of your own destiny”, and when someone gives you a compliment, you acknowledge them and thank them politely.  Although these items may seem common sense to you and I, today’s generation is lacking them.  I feel that most students are not being taught important lessons for life the way that they should be.   As a parent myself, it makes me feel like these important skills and lessons for life should take precedence over the history content.  Of course, this is fiction and I cannot totally dismiss the history content, so instead I must find a way to integrate them together.  An example of this integration would be teaching the life lesson “try your best” while using examples of famous people in history who made important decisions for our country while “trying their best” to solve major problems.

            In the New York Time’s article about the Quest to Learn school, you can see the importance of student-centered and student-directed learning.  In this type of environment, you find a balance between traditional content and required standards with modern unconventional styles of learning and student engagement. I agree with the fact that you need to find a balance between traditional and progressive education, as well as do whatever it takes to get students involved and excited about their learning. If moving students beyond textbooks and into the world of gaming gets it done, I am for whatever it takes.

            Geoff Mulgan’s talk on Studio Schools in England follows this same idea of practical, hands-on knowledge rather than traditional education that most students find boring.  It is no secret that most people, not just students, learn by doing, and so it comes as no surprise that students would like schools and environments that would give them more opportunities to do real world things.  Personally, I like this type of school better than the Quest to Learn schools as they seem to focus more on career training and less on video gaming; which seems more practical.

            The Hirsch Jr. piece was confusing to me.  On one hand I agree with him that we need more progressive education and not just educationally accepted norms that are not working. On the other hand, he talks about how there is not enough uniformity in education about what is being taught and uses American history as an example.  In that area I disagree with him because if a teacher is covering their state standards as they should be, we should all be covering the same topics/ time periods in our history class. I know that is not always the case, but if you are doing your job properly as an educator it should be.

            With the standards based, high stakes testing world that we live in, I do believe that it would be extremely difficult to carry-out and measure these new out-of-the-box schools and progressive ways of teaching, but I don’t think that means we shouldn't do them.  If these Quest to Learn schools and Studio Schools are what will work for kids in education then let’s make it happen.  I think that education is not a one-size-fits-all item and that is why having all students tested on the same material is so hard, and why having state mandated curriculum is so difficult.  Like anything else in life, we need to find a balance and the truth lies somewhere in the middle. I think that in the world of education, it is unfair to say that we have been doing everything wrong, but we can definitely do more right.

                 

Cycle 1 Resources

http://pakphilosophy.blogspot.com/2008/08/comparison-of-idealism-and-realism-in.html

This site goes with the idea in my first blog post about my conflict as an educator between an idealist and a realist.  It explains both philosophies of idealism and realism and how they relate to education.  I was interested to read the differences in the actual definitions of each philosophy and I think most people would be surprised by what they think idealism and realism are and what they actually are.

http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational_leadership/dec94/vol52/num04/Can_Inclusion_Work%C2%A2_A_Conversation_with_Jim_Kauffman_and_Mara_Sapon-Shevin.aspx

This online article from Educational Leadership discusses inclusion and whether or not in can actually work in public education.

Cycle 1: What is Curriculum? What is its Purpose?

       As I read and watched the material for this first lesson, I was keeping in mind the main questions of what is curriculum and what is its purpose.  As a definite "Type A" personality I love structure, tradition, and curriculum, but despite my traditionalist viewpoint I am also an advocate of modern instruction and classroom teaching that goes beyond the textbook.  I often find that these aspects of my normal personality and the teacher I strive to be are in constant conflict.  But is it the field of education itself that is the conflict or is it me?  If asked to list characteristics that describe who I am as a person you would find the words traditionalist and realist.  These large pieces of who I am often come into conflict with my profession as an educator where the words idealism and theory run rampant.  I often wonder if I am alone in this constant tug of war because of my own personality traits or is it the profession itself that can’t make up its mind.

       In the Otterman article, the question of the purpose of curriculum was brought up with the issue of severely cognitively impaired students, inclusion, and curriculum.  Again, I have conflicting views of this issue.  The educator side of my brain says that inclusion is an educational method that provides all children equal opportunities to learn and grow in an educational setting.  In theory, ideally, a severely cognitively impaired student in a general education classroom could still gain valuable social and functional skills for life beyond school.  At the same time, the practical and realist side of me believes that time may be better spent for a child such as Donovan from the article in teaching them more functional daily life skills rather than the causes of the Civil War.  Evidence that Donovan’s inclusion is not working is seen in the fact that the young man has learned virtually nothing in the 15 years through the public education system; a fact that is both upsetting but yet not shocking.

       The Ken Robinson video brought up the topic of creativity in schools and in curriculum.  This topic, while it seems like a no-brainer, is also full of conflicting viewpoints.  While most educators understand the importance of creativity in the classroom and the value of exploration in the arts in theory, there are real world factors to consider.  State mandated curriculum, lack of resources, as well as a need for structure in the school setting can sometimes stifle creative freedoms.  As a teacher who values moving beyond the textbook, I know that I have spent countless hours putting together creative lesson plans, only to have them fail miserably in actual practice.  There is a need for creative thinking and exploring while at the same time, teachers are held accountable for student test scores on curriculum content.

            John Dewey’s writing brought up a lot about how education is full of theory and that we can often find a great deal of things that are wrong with institutions such as education, but being able to figure out how to fix them is the problem.  No one has all the answers and most of educational ideas are theory.  This is the hard part for me in education.  Educators are constantly being asked to tackle new and exciting theories/ideas about how we should teach in our classrooms and run our buildings, yet the theories change from year to year.  Nothing has time to get put into place or become solid structures before we are changing their shape.  As a traditionalist I have trouble with implementing a new idea that will become “the wrong way to do things” merely five minutes after I try it out.

            The final Schubert article made perfect sense with the entire idea of my blog post.  He asked the question of do we, as educators, have to choose one side of the argument or the other; progressive education versus traditional education?  This is exactly my dilemma.  John Dewey said not to choose a side and to continue on without a direct path, but this strategy goes directly against my Type “A” personality where I must have a path to follow.  Floating along between paths causes great internal conflict.  That is where I am as a professional.  I am part progressive educator and part traditional educator, and I am not sure that it is only me that is conflicted; I think it may just be the profession itself and although it sometimes frustrates me personally because I consider education today so unstable, having such a malleable profession is a large part of what keeps me intrigued, on my toes, and prevents me from getting bored each day.