Expert Teachers, the #1 Reason Kids Succeed

Recently I've been reading some research that pertains to the effects on student achievement of pre-packaged programs and curriculum designs that are being sold to schools across the world. Program A claims to raise student achievement higher and faster than ever before, while Program B makes the same claims. Sometimes these programs do make positive gains on achievement (usually measured by standardized and/or norm referenced tests).

The first few years of my doctoral studies have been focused on looking deeper at the negative aspects of business models in schools, of pre-packaged programs (Success For All and DNG to name a few), and of what actually has the most profound impact on student learning in the long term. It's a hard thing to study, because as a teacher-researcher I've decried standardized testing as inherently unequal and inaccurate. Of course the current studies, some of the best I've ever read, agree with this, but go a few steps further.

To put it quite simply, these articles, that I won't name here yet, because that's not the point of my discussion here, claim that the single biggest factor on student learning is quality teaching. Of course, quality teaching is almost impossible to define because it means different things to different students.

This is something I've tried to keep in mind every day when I enter the classroom. There's 28 young kids in my classroom, and what works for him may not work for her and so on. In the current era of test reform, rigorous political factors, and money being put at a higher level of importance than kids, it's hard for teachers to ever reach the level of teaching students, they're so focused on teaching content and teaching tests that they are afraid that actually *gasp* teaching to their students needs will be seen as subversive. I can confirm this, in my short five-year career, I've focused on teaching students and have been considered quite the rebel because of this.

I hope to continue looking at and pegging down indicators of great teaching, and hopefully researching it more in depth some day. If we can define it, if we can prove that it serves the best interests of children and scores them proficient on those ridiculous standardized tests, there might be a compromise out there that actually hands the reins of education to teachers while keeping the politicians at bay.

No Child Left Behind, in the Words of Other Professionals

No Child Left Behind continues to loom over public education here in the United States. I think about the law a lot, I have written numerous (unpublished) papers on the topic, and am definitely an advocate against it. I have talked with President Obama's Administration twice on the matter (not that they really listened to me), once at a conference and once through an e-mail exchange. As a parent, I think No Child Left Behind hurts because it means that my son has to sit in the classroom and have the pressure of the law put on his shoulders. As a teacher, it puts the wrong focus on my job and forces me to do things that do not teach students, they teach them to test.

I've discussed this many times, so today, for those of you who are interested in hearing a little more, I'm going to throw a Youtube video titled "No Child Left Behind: Truths and Consequences." It's around 9 minutes long, but has some interesting information that I think most teachers could agree with. So here it is:

When A Problem Comes Along, You Must FIX IT

It's hard to argue against the fact that education is failing in the United States. This is a muli-dimensional argument that can run the from school funding to high stakes testing to curriculum choices to the attitudes of students and teachers, among many others. In the face of failure, many have started focusing in different directions, wanting school to be fun or kids to feel good about themselves. The reality is, we should take responsibility for the out dated system we have, stop making excuses and pointing fingers, and fix the problems in front of us. Why can't kids feel good about themselves because they achieved something, and why can't teachers expect more regardless of where they work and the population of their students?

Well, these issues are not easy to resolve, because it does matter what population of students you work with. But saying "if they come every day, my job is done," should be reason for a teacher to lose their job. You are there to teach, you're not a baby sitter, do your job. There, that's about as up front as I can say it. People put their children in private schools (which, in my opinion, are actually no better than public school, they just have a more involved population of parents and a higher socio-economic population as well), and home school their children, because they look at public education and say "I don't want my child there."

Now, we can either sit back and blame those people for leaving the system, or we can fix the system. Are private schools and home schools better than public schools? The answer is yes and no, but this post isn't about them, it's about public schools.

Teachers, first of all, are the professionals in the field of education, they're the ones who actually do the job. Forget the superintendents, leave them to their budgets, forget the "specialists" who have never spent a second with classroom teachers, and forget everything you learned from Dr. Wong's books, it's time for teachers to refocus themselves.

Good teaching comes from having a deep understanding of how to teach and why to teach it, which come from being taught in theory and method. Teachers should never dive into something because it's there. Are textbooks the best choice? How do you know? If you've never experienced anything else, how can you be sure? Why did you choose that book? Is there a better one? Are you sure your students enjoyed it or learned from it? How are you sure?

That's just a few questions teachers should be asking. Because after all, we can't worry about the attitudes of students if we don't take care of our business first and know our stuff. We can't worry about the parents who pull their kids out of our schools for whatever reason, because we've already failed them (or they just want to home school or pay for a school that is better for their child, which is every parents right, and no teacher should ever take that personally).

This post was mostly just speculation on this topic. I hope to post more in depth on this soon, including possible pathways to fix it.

Persespolis: A Graphic Novel Review

Persepolis, by Marjane Satrapi, is one of the great graphic novels of recent years. I was drawn to it after reading Art Spiegelman's Maus, the biography of his father's experiences as a Jewish Holocaust survivor. When I picked up Persepolis, I was first captivated by the simple yet effective graphics in the book itself, as well as the topic. This series, originally published in two parts, but now available as one book, is the autobiography of Satrapi, growing up in the Islamic Republic of Iran in the '70s and '80s, and living in Europe to escape the tyranny of the extremist government.

The story itself chronicles the downward spiral of hope for Iranian citizens at this time as the fundamentalist government came into power and persecuted them. This book is a clear representation of what happens when religion is allowed to rule theocratically, and isn't just a political statement, but a personal account of what DID happen, not what CAN happen.

As far as its relevance in the classroom, this book could consider adults its main audience. BUT, I do see relevance in the high school literature/composition classroom, but nothing with student much younger than 16 or 17 years old. The book does openly talk about executions, sex, and the personal journey of a teenager. Now, I'm not one for censorship, so I personally think it's great that this book touches on these things, and think it's appropriate for the 16 and up age set, because these are issues that are alive in their minds, and the political issues are things they need to know about.

Now, I'm going to step away from the book to end this and make a personal statement of opinion. As I said in the previous paragraph, I do have major issues with censorship. I don't think it should be up to the moral majority to decide what is censored. It should be up to parents to decide what is appropriate for their children, not ALL children. Also, teachers need to be aware of age appropriateness, and not just pull a book off the shelf and have the class start reading it without either reading it or researching it themselves.

By the age of 16, students should be exposed to more of the realities of the world. If we expect teenagers to be able to vote at the age of 18, they need to understand the intricacies of the world, and the difference that exist out there. I have met some narrow minded people in my life, and most of them are sticklers on the issue of censorship (they're all for it, and seek to censor those around them). We don't live in 1925, we can't think locally, and about only ourselves anymore in this world. Persepolis is a great book, because it puts a real human face on the citizens of Iran, who have been persecuted for a long time, and demonized in the eyes of many Americans.

When You've Got To Slow Down

Here we are, late April, finally. The end is near, here in New Mexico, it's now less than four weeks away. That means a few things. First of all, it means that we're running out of time, but it also probably means that students are having a little difficulty staying focused, most teachers are starting to drag a little bit, and administration is still breathing down everyone's neck, does that sound about right?

Well, if your state is anything like New Mexico, you might have some lag time between your standardized testing and the end of the year. We take it to extremes here, taking the test over 10 school weeks before the end of the year, yes 10. That means that the pressure is in full gear up until the last week of February. The testing then takes place for two weeks, and the last 10 weeks, most of March (with Spring Break mixed in there), April, and May coming after the storm.

For me, this is a golden opportunity to do some actual teaching and let my kids actually learn (let's stop it with all this essential learning, back to basics nonsense, I'm talking about those 'nice to know' things that all teachers wish they had time to teach).

In terms of literacy, this means more self selection, more multimedia tie ins, more long discussions, and more chances to take risks on some new and untested books.

We've lost touch with our students so much that it sickens me. School has been reduced to numbers, students nothing but test scores and labels of advanced, proficient, nearing proficient, or beginning step. It's ridiculous, we need to stop patting ourselves on the back every time a kid goes up two percentage points on the test, and start patting ourselves on the back when a kid pulls a book off the shelf for fun or because they're interested, that's what it's all about, everything else is nonsense.

How To Get Rich While Making School Lame

OK, so this isn't a 'get rich quick' post with a how-to, the title was just a ruse to suck you in, and now you're here, so you should probably just read this post, because it probably will make sense to you.

Most school districts are alike, and as a rule, the bigger the district (student and city population wise that is), the more banal some of the ideas that come out of the leadership can be, that's just the way it is. I've seen so many programs come in and out of my school district that I can't remember all of them, and the crazy thing is, this is only my third year as a teacher. I'm not exaggerating, I've seen a lot in that short period of time, since 2005.

I've seen reading programs, writing programs, math programs, science programs, social studies programs, and even different approaches to Title I programs. Some of the programs come from the big textbook companies, you know, the Scott Foresman, Houghton Mifflin bunch, but I've also gone through programs invented by one person.

I've seen Math Investigations, Nancy Fetzer, Response to Intervention, Developmental Reading Assessment (DRA), Baldridge, New Science Science Kits, and the Scott Foresman basal reading series, just to name a few. Now sure, most of the examples I gave are companies, but there are those programs that come from individual people.

Of course, they're not all bad, and most are crafted by someone who really believes in their program, and they bring it out there for the world to see, and possibly bank a few million dollars while they're at it selling it to big and small districts alike.

The problem I have is that when schools jump so hard and deep in to a program for every single subject, meant to take up every single minute of the day, they're all but assuming that teachers, the professionals in this great field of education, those on the front line, are incompetent and incapable of doing the work themselves.

I don't mind having math textbooks, they actually make my job a little easier, but I don't want to have to teach, day by day, out of a scripted program. Sure, the reading basal may have a nice story here or there, but by no means do students need to have a literacy experience, for years at a time, that are almost solely based around textbooks, this just isn't' right.

If I wanted to get rich quick, I'd think up of a new way to bring test scores up, and sell it off. I would go around the country doing trainings, peddling my materials, and then sit back and drive a Bentley around while students continue to push further and further away from education and teachers continue to leave the field in droves because they feel insulted, but who cares, I'd be rich.

As this blog evolves (or if you read my other blog, The Buss), you will see that I'm definitely a teacher to the core. I support teachers, I support them as professionals, as the leaders and innovators in the field, and as the trailblazers that will actually save education. It's not about some innovator with that great idea, I'm sure it worked for them, but I need to have the right, as a teacher, to pick and choose what works and doesn't work for my students. Anything else is idiotic.