Almost Like Being in Love

I just finished reading Teacher Proof, and I gotta say.......

....wow..... just wow.

It has been a long time since I've had that much fun reading a book, paper, article about education.  A long, long time.  Not since Mr. Teachbad's heyday, have I felt as much kinship with an education author.

Tom Bennett is snarky and witty.  (He's also English, which I think helps in the creative insult and sarcasm departments)  His bullshit detector is finely tuned; he has a brain in his head and is not afraid to use it, and he accepts nothing at face value.

What I have to admire most is Bennett's ability to translate the tortured language used in educational research writing to readable prose.  I've tried many a time to read music education studies.  Either I end up falling asleep or daydreaming about the surfeit awful writers and fatuous research topics.  Bennett has done the legwork to disprove some of education's most entrenched fallacies: learning styles, group work, multiple intelligences, flipped classrooms, and emotional intelligence.  If I had been blessed with a better memory, I would memorize large chunks of his book and recite them chapter and verse at staff meetings.

But nothing is perfect; Teacher Proof is not without flaws.  The first is its title.  This may be a function of the differences between American and British English.  To your average American, the title sounds like something an administrator would read in order to figure out how to keep his serfs teachers from screwing up his latest master plan for educational domination.  The second problem is the book's cost.  $26 for the e-book, and $30 for the paperback.  Zounds, that's expense!  Worth every penny, but if Bennett's publisher brought the price down to $10, he would make a killing.

Along with Dan Willingham's books, Teacher Proof sits on my shelf as a must-read for every pragmatic teacher in the English-speaking world.

What's Wrong with American Education - Reason #3450695

Like they say over at the KTM blog: "It's always worse than you think."

Today, in what I thought was a decent first grade, I nearly stopped teaching, so gobsmacked was I by the poster hanging there above the whiteboard.  I desperately wish that I could have taken a picture of it to post here, but alas, I was never alone in the room.  It would have been highly impolitic for me to say, "I'd like to photograph your poster so I can post it on my blog as a prime example of American educational stupidity."

Thankfully, it was all text, and easy to memorize:

3 Ways to Read a Book
   1) Read the pictures
   2) Read the words
   3) Retell the story

You don't need to pinch yourself, you are indeed awake.  This is what passes for reading instruction in suburban first grade.

For those of you slow on the uptake and those progressives who wandered in by mistake (The door is over there, you can show yourselves out at any time.), I'll break down why this poster is the most fatuous thing I've seen this year.

First, let's define the word "read."  Webster's defines it as, "look at and comprehend the meaning of (written or printed matter) by mentally interpreting the characters or symbols of which it is composed."

Now using that definition as a foundation, let's return to the poster:

3 Ways to Read a Book
   1) Read the pictures - by definition, pictures are not composed of characters or symbols, and thus cannot be read. 
   2) Read the words - words are in fact made up of characters or symbols (called "letters") and can be read.
   3) Retell the story - assumes that you have already done #1 or #2 and does not involve, by definition, reading

As you can see, there are NOT, in fact, 3 ways to read a book.  There is only one.  The entire poster is both a waste of paper and a source of boundless confusion for poor, impressionable six year-olds.

Here endeth the lesson.
 

Stupid Educational Quote of the Week

"Perhaps these kids really believe they are not worth teaching."

This was written in reply to a gentleman who is at the end of his rope dealing with a class of reprobates.

Bullshit!  These kids think nothing of the kind.  Too many teachers believe that acting out is some kind of reverse psychology.  That kids take every opportunity to do as they please because they feel bad about themselves.

Let me tell you a secret.  These kids (who I've taught by the score) do not lack in self-esteem.  In fact, they truly believe they are God's gift.  Why?  Because every single adult has catered to their every whim, given in at every temper tantrum, and bent over backwards to make them happy/keep them quiet.

These kids know that they can do whatever they like, whenever they like, and no one will stop them.  Sure adults will threaten all kinds of horrible things, but those consequences never actually happen.  Its all just empty words.  So why should they care?

Combine that with a culture that punishes interest in intellectual pursuits and the short-sightedness of children in general, and what you get is a toxic disease the poor original poster has to deal with every day.

Until parents actually roll up their sleeves and do the hard work of parenting (setting boundaries, following through with threats when necessary, and placing a high value on school work) then nothing will change.  Feeling sorry for all the poor delinquents certainly won't help any of them -- or us.

 

Bog Standard, Part 2

I dare you to find someone, anyone, working in education today who can clearly define the words "standards" and "curriculum."  I double dog dare you to find anyone who can clearly differentiate between the two, present company included.  But let's give it the ol' college try shall we?  Success not guaranteed, and, no, you can't get your money back. 

Language
Standards are written in the vaguest language conceivable.  To say they are general is to say water is wet.  Bureaucratic vocabulary and sentence structure is the order of the day.  Standards are also heavy with jargon.  Education schools instruct prospective teachers on how to "unpack" standards.  I guess that means standards are like a suitcase full of ugly clothes you wished your sister had never given you in the first place.

Curriculum can use opaque language and jargon, but it is not a requirement.  The more mainstream the curriculum, the more likely it is to contain both.  Curriculum will contain definite, descriptive language.  Hopefully, you won't have to hunt for it.  Going back to the clothes metaphor, curriculum is having attractive well-fitting clothes hanging in your closet ready to wear.  (Yes, I thought up this metaphor in ed school; I was really that bored.)


Authorship
Standards are written by committees.  Typically, standards come from state boards of education or educational professional organizations.  Sometimes they come from a consortia of groups, as in the Common Core standards. 

Curriculum can be written by committee, as evidenced by the offerings by the major publishing houses.  Alternatively, and more frequently, it is written by one or two people. The best curricula are written by brilliant teachers, like Michael Clay Thompson (someone you should know if you teach English)


Content
Standards are general.  They deal almost entirely with skills in only the broadest of terms.  Although the language is so opaque that it is often quite difficult to determine what, if anything at all, is being described.  Any indications of what, or how, or quality, or quantity are conspicuously absent. 

Curriculum is specific.  Knowledge to be learned is included along with skills to be acquired.  Skills are described in detail.  Ideas to be discussed, books to be read, time periods to be studied, types of writing to be assigned can all be found in a curriculum.


Audience
Standards are the province of the public school system.  After all, most of them are written by state bureaucrats who try very hard to disavow all non-public forms of education.  Supposedly for everyone, the real audience for standards are educators, education policy wonks and politicians.  Debating the worth of standards gives them excuse to pull a paycheck.  Ed schools torture indoctrinate educate prospective teachers with never ending assignments about standards.

Curriculum is theoretically territory for all schools (home, private, charter, public).  In reality, home schools, private schools and charter schools are the ones who really spend a lot of time and effort on curriculum.  Public schools wish curriculum would vanish off the face of the earth, as it tends to generate a lot of complaints and letters to the editor because someone's pet cause is left out.  Ed schools succeed in making curriculum vanish by denying it exists in the first place.


Purpose
Standards are a political document.  Elected officials and bureaucrats can hold up a set of standards and claim, "This is what we are teaching your children."  (Whether that's true or not is the another post.)

Curriculum is a practical document.  Teachers use a curriculum to plan lessons and projects for their students.  When trying to figure out what to do next month, good teachers always reach for curriculum, not for standards. 


Usage
Standards are not used by good teachers.  They will never say this on the record, on campus, or within earshot of anyone remotely connected to education.  But if you corner a good teacher at the bar on Friday afternoon and ply her with margaritas, she'll readily fess up.  The only reason standards are put on lesson plans and posted on the board is to placate and/or brown nose administrators.

Curriculum is used by teachers.  Frequently.  Good teachers think about curriculum constantly.  Great ones have written their own (and, like Michael Clay Thompson, published it). They use it to write lesson plans, set up projects, and select books for their classes.  Curriculum is literally half of education. 


Okay, it's time to call it a day before my head explodes.  In Round 3, I'll either take on the tenuous relationship between standards and curriculum or blood will shoot out my ears.  Haven't decided which yet.