Friday, June 12, 2015

Ten obvious truths about educating kids that keep getting ignored


The following piece appears in full on the Washington Post.
Cathy

Ten obvious truths about educating kids that keep getting ignored



There is no end to the debate about school reform, but there are certain things about education that seem like no-brainers. The problem is that they continue to be ignored by policymakers and in schools. Alfie Kohn lists 10 of them in the following post, which he first published in the American School Board Journal in 2011, but which holds as true today as it did then. Kohn (www.alfiekohn.org), who gave me permission to republish this piece, is the author of 13 books, the most recent titled “The Myth of the Spoiled Child: Challenging the Conventional Wisdom About Children and Parenting.”

By Alfie Kohn
The field of education bubbles over with controversies. It’s not unusual for intelligent people of good will to disagree passionately about what should happen in schools. But there are certain precepts that aren’t debatable, that just about anyone would have to acknowledge are true.

While many such statements are banal, some are worth noticing because in our school practices and policies we tend to ignore the implications that follow from them. It’s both intellectually interesting and practically important to explore such contradictions: If we all agree that a given principle is true, then why in the world do our schools still function as if it weren’t?
Here are 10 examples.

1. Much of the material students are required to memorize is soon forgotten

The truth of this statement will be conceded (either willingly or reluctantly) by just about everyone who has spent time in school — in other words, all of us. A few months, or sometimes even just a few days, after having committed a list of facts, dates, or definitions to memory, we couldn’t recall most of them if our lives depended on it. Everyone knows this, yet a substantial part of schooling – particularly in the most traditional schools – continues to consist of stuffing facts into students’ short-term memories.

The more closely we inspect this model of teaching and testing, the more problematic it reveals itself to be. First, there’s the question of what students are made to learn, which often is more oriented to factual material than to a deep understanding of ideas. (See item 2, below.) Second, there’s the question of how students are taught, with a focus on passive absorption: listening to lectures, reading summaries in textbooks, and rehearsing material immediately before being required to cough it back up. Third, there’s the question of why a student has learned something: Knowledge is less likely to be retained if it has been acquired so that one will perform well on a test, as opposed to learning in the context of pursuing projects and solving problems that are personally meaningful.

Even without these layers of deficiencies with the status quo, and even if we grant that remembering some things can be useful, the fundamental question echoes like a shout down an endless school corridor: Why are kids still being forced to memorize so much stuff that we know they won’t remember?

Corollary 1A: Since this appears to be true for adults, too, why do most professional development events for teachers resemble the least impressive classrooms, with experts disgorging facts about how to educate?

2. Just knowing a lot of facts doesn’t mean you’re smart

Even students who do manage to remember some of the material they were taught are not necessarily able to make sense of those bits of knowledge, to understand connections among them, or to apply them in inventive and persuasive ways to real-life problems.

In fact, the cognitive scientist Lauren Resnick goes even further: It’s not just that knowing (or having been taught) facts doesn’t in itself make you smart. A mostly fact-oriented education may actually interfere with your becoming smart. “Thinking skills tend to be driven out of the curriculum by ever-growing demands for teaching larger and larger bodies of knowledge,” she writes. Yet schools continue to treat students as empty glasses into which information can be poured — and public officials continue to judge schools on the basis of how efficiently and determinedly they pour.

3. Students are more likely to learn what they find interesting

There’s no shortage of evidence for this claim if you really need it.One of many examples: A group of researchers found that children’s level of interest in a passage they were reading was 30 times more useful than its difficulty level for predicting how much of it they would later remember. But this should be obvious, if only because of what we know about ourselves. It’s the tasks that intrigue us, that tap our curiosity and connect to the things we care about, that we tend to keep doing — and get better at doing. So, too, for kids.

Conversely, students are less likely to benefit from doing what they hate. Psychology has come a long way from the days when theorists tried to reduce everything to simple stimulus-response pairings. We know now that people aren’t machines, such that an input (listening to a lecture, reading a textbook, filling out a worksheet) will reliably yield an output (learning). What matters is how people experience what they do, what meaning they ascribe to it, what their attitudes and goals are.
Thus, if students find an academic task stressful or boring, they’re far less likely to understand, or even remember, the content. And if they’re uninterested in a whole category of academic tasks — say, those they’re assigned to do when they get home after having just spent a whole day at school — then they aren’t likely to benefit much from doing them. No wonder research finds little, if any, advantage to assigning homework, particularly in elementary or middle school.

4. Students are less interested in whatever they’re forced to do and more enthusiastic when they have some say

Once again, studies confirm what we already know from experience. The nearly universal negative reaction to compulsion, like the positive response to choice, is a function of our psychological makeup.

Now combine this point with the preceding one: If choice is related to interest, and interest is related to achievement, then it’s not much of a stretch to suggest that the learning environments in which kids get to make decisions about what they’re doing are likely to be the most effective, all else being equal. Yet such learning environments continue to be vastly outnumbered by those where kids spend most of their time just following directions.

5. Just because doing x raises standardized test scores doesn’t mean x should be done

At the very least, we would need evidence that the test in question is a source of useful information about whether our teaching and learning goals are being met. Many educators have argued that the tests being used in our schools are unsatisfactory for several reasons.

First, there are numerous limitations with specific tests. Second, most tests share certain problematic features, such as being timed (which places more of a premium on speed than on thoughtfulness), norm-referenced (which means the tests are designed to tell us who’s beating whom, not how well students have learned or teachers have taught), and consisting largely of multiple-choice questions (which don’t permit students to generate or even explain their answers).

The third reason is the problems inherent to all tests that are standardized and created by people far away from the classroom — as opposed to assessing the actual learning taking place there on an on-going basis.

This is not the place to explain in detail why standardized tests measure what matters least. Here, I want only to make the simpler — and, once again, I think, indisputable — point that anyone who regards high or rising test scores as good news has an obligation to show that the tests themselves are good. If a test result can’t be convincingly shown to be both valid and meaningful, then whatever we did to achieve that result — say, a new curriculum or instructional strategy — may well have no merit whatsoever. It may even prove to be destructive when assessed by better criteria. Indeed, a school or district might be getting worse even as its test scores rise.

So how is it that articles in newspapers and education journals, as well as pronouncements by public officials and think tanks, seem to accept on faith that better scores on any test necessarily constitute good news, and that whatever produced those scores can be described as “effective”? Parents should be encouraged to ask, “How much time was sacrificed from real learning just so our kids could get better at taking the [name of test]?

6. Students are more likely to succeed in a place where they feel known and cared about

I realize there are people whose impulse is to sneer when talk turns to how kids feel, and who dismiss as “soft” or “faddish” anything other than old-fashioned instruction of academic skills. But even these hard-liners, when pressed, are unable to deny the relationship between feeling and thinking, between a child’s comfort level and his or her capacity to learn.

Here, too, there are loads of supporting data. As one group of researchers put it, “In order to promote students’ academic performance in the classroom, educators should also promote their social and emotional adjustment.” And yet, broadly speaking, we don’t. Teachers and schools are evaluated almost exclusively on academic achievement measures (which, to make matters worse, mostly consist of standardized test scores).

If we took seriously the need for kids to feel known and cared about, our discussions about the distinguishing features of a “good school” would sound very different. Likewise, our view of discipline and classroom management would be turned inside-out, seeing as how the primary goals of most such strategies are obedience and order, often with the result that kids feel less cared about — or even bullied — by adults.

7. We want children to develop in many ways, not just academically

Even mainstream education groups have embraced the idea of teaching the “whole child.” It’s a safe position, really, because just about every parent or educator will tell you that we should be supporting children’s physical, emotional, social, moral, and artistic growth as well as their intellectual growth. Moreover, it’s obvious to most people that the schools can and should play a key role in promoting many different forms of development.

If we acknowledge that academics is just one facet of a good education, why do so few conversations about improving our schools deal with — and why are so few resources devoted to — non-academic issues? And why do we assign children still more academic tasks after the school day is over, even when those tasks cut into the time children have to pursue interests that will help them develop in other ways?

Corollary 7a: Students “learn best when they are happy,” as educator Nel Noddings reminded us, but that doesn’t mean they’re especially likely to be happy (or psychologically healthy) just because they’re academically successful. And millions aren’t. Imagine how high schools would have to be changed if we were to take this realization seriously.

8. Just because a lesson (or book, or class, or test) is harder doesn’t mean it’s better

First, if it’s pointless to give students things to do that are too easy, it’s also counterproductive to give them things that they experience as too hard. Second, and more important, this criterion overlooks a variety of considerations other than difficulty level by which educational quality might be evaluated.
We know this, yet we continue to worship at the altar of “rigor.” I’ve seen lessons that aren’t unduly challenging yet are deeply engaging and intellectually valuable. Conversely, I’ve seen courses — and whole schools — that are indisputably rigorous . . . and appallingly bad.

9. Kids aren’t just short adults

Over the past hundred years, developmental psychologists have labored to describe what makes children distinctive and what they can understand at certain ages. There are limits, after all, to what even a precocious younger child can grasp (e.g., the way metaphors function, the significance of making a promise) or do (e.g., keep still for an extended period).

Likewise, there are certain things children require for optimal development, including opportunities to play and explore, alone and with others. Research fills in — and keeps fine-tuning — the details, but the fundamental implication isn’t hard to grasp: How we educate kids should follow from what defines them as kids.

Somehow, though, developmentally inappropriate education has become the norm, as kindergarten (literally, the “children’s garden”) now tends to resemble a first- or second-grade classroom — in fact, a bad first- or second-grade classroom, where discovery, creativity, and social interaction are replaced by a repetitive regimen focused on narrowly defined academic skills.

More generally, premature exposure to sit-still-and-listen instruction, homework, grades, tests, and competition — practices that are clearly a bad match for younger children and of questionable value at any age — is rationalized by invoking a notion I’ve called BGUTI: Better Get Used To It. The logic here is that we have to prepare you for the bad things that are going to be done to you later . . . by doing them to you now. When articulated explicitly, that principle sounds exactly as ridiculous as it is. Nevertheless, it’s the engine that continues to drive an awful lot of nonsense.

The obvious premise that we should respect what makes children children can be amended to include a related principle that is less obvious to some people: Learning something earlier isn’t necessarily better. Deborah Meier, whose experience as a celebrated educator ranges from kindergarten to high school, put it bluntly: “The earlier [that schools try] to inculcate so-called ‘academic’ skills, the deeper the damage and the more permanent the ‘achievement’ gap.” That is exactly what a passel of ambitious research projects has found: A traditional skills-based approach to teaching young children — particularly those from low-income families — not only offers no lasting benefits but appears to be harmful.

Corollary 9A: Kids aren’t just future adults. They are that, of course, but they aren’t only that, because children’s needs and perspectives are worth attending to in their own right. We violate this precept — and do a disservice to children — whenever we talk about schooling in economic terms, treating students mostly as future employees.

10. Substance matters more than labels

A skunk cabbage by any other name would smell just as putrid. But in education, as in other domains, we’re often seduced by appealing names when we should be demanding to know exactly what lies behind them. Most of us, for example, favor a sense of community, prefer that a job be done by professionals, and want to promote learning. So should we sign on to the work being done in the name of “Professional Learning Communities”? Not if it turns out that PLCs have less to do with helping children to think deeply about questions that matter than with boosting standardized test scores.

The same caution is appropriate when it comes to “Positive Behavior Support,” a jaunty moniker for a program of crude Skinnerian manipulation in which students are essentially bribed to do whatever they’re told. More broadly, even the label “school reform” doesn’t necessarily signify improvement; these days, it’s more likely to mean “something that skillful and caring teachers wouldn’t be inclined to do unless coerced,” as educational psychologist Bruce Marlowe put it.

In fact, the corporate-style version of “school reform” that’s uncritically endorsed these days by politicians, journalists, and billionaires consists of a series of debatable tactics — many of them amounting to bribes and threats to force educators to jack up test scores. Just as worrisome, though, is that these reformers often overlook, or simply violate, a number of propositions that aren’t debatable, including many of those listed here.
_________________________________________
This essay is an abridged version of the introduction to Feel-Bad Education…And Other Contrarian Essays on Children and Schooling (Beacon Press, 2011)

Education Materials?

The “Youth Risk Behavior Survey” is a test given out to students across America.  It is not an opt in test, and most parents do not have the ability to opt out of the test.  With math and reading scores so low across New Hampshire why are we even giving this test to students?  Is it all about the money?  It would be nice if educators and administrators focused more on education and less on getting as much money for their schools no matter the costs to the students.   Schools have been hijacked by those with political agendas and a jobs program for unions to keep their buddies in place.

The following information was shared from Mass Resistance.org.  Some parents may find this information useful, but is the information even shared with the parents.  This is something parents should be discussing with their children if they choose.  The state aka the government has no business knowing most of this information. 

Cathy

How old are you?
A.  12 years old or younger
B.  13 years old
C.  14 years old
D.  15 years old
E.  16 years old
F.  17 years old
G.  18 years old or older
=== Sexual Behavior ===
Which of the following best describes you?
A.  Heterosexual (straight)
B.  Gay or lesbian
C.  Bisexual
D.  Not sure
A transgender person is someone whose biological sex at birth does not match the way they think or feel about themselves. Are you transgender?
A.  No, I am not transgender
B.  Yes, I am transgender and I think of myself as really a boy or man
C.  Yes, I am transgender and I think of myself as really a girl or woman
D.  Yes, I am transgender and I think of myself in some other way
E.  I do not know if I am transgender
F.  I do not know what this question is asking
Have you ever had sexual intercourse (oral, anal, vaginal)?
A.  Yes
B.  No
How old were you when you had sexual intercourse (oral, anal, vaginal) for the first time?
A.  I have never had sexual intercourse
B.  11 years old or younger
C.  12 years old
D.  13 years old
E.  14 years old
F.  15 years old
G.  16 years old
H.  17 years old or older
During your life, with how many people have you had sexual intercourse (oral, anal, vaginal)?
A.  I have never had sexual intercourse
B.  1 person
C.  2 people
D.  3 people
E.  4 people
F.  5 people
G.  6 or more people
During the past 3 months, with how many people did you have sexual intercourse (oral, anal, vaginal)?
A.  I have never had sexual intercourse
B.  I have had sexual intercourse, but not during the past 3 months
C.  1 person
D.  2 people
E.  3 people
F.  4 people
G.  5 people
H.  6 or more people
Did you drink alcohol or use drugs before you had sexual intercourse (oral, anal, vaginal) the last time?
A.  I have never had sexual intercourse
B.  Yes
C.  No
The last time you had sexual intercourse (oral, anal, vaginal), did you or your partner use a condom?
A.  I have never had sexual intercourse
B.  Yes
C.  No
During your life, with whom have you had sexual contact?
A.  I have never had sexual contact
B.  Females
C.  Males
D.  Females and males
How many times have you been pregnant or gotten someone pregnant?
A.  0 times
B.  1 time
C.  2 or more times
D.  Not sure   
Have you ever been tested for HIV, the virus that causes AIDS? (Do not count tests done if you donated blood.)
A.  Yes
B.  No
C.  Not sure
Have you ever been tested for other sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) such as genital herpes, chlamydia, syphilis, or genital warts?
A.  Yes
B.  No
C.  Not sure
=== Family and personal life ===
How often does your parent/guardian(s) wear a seat belt when driving or riding in a car?
A.  Never
B.  Rarely
C.  Sometimes
D.  Most of the time
E.  Always
Do your parents text, e-mail or use any other form of social media while driving a car or other vehicle?
A.  Yes
B.  No
Can you talk with at least one of your parents or other adult family members about things that are
important to you?
A.  Yes
B.  No
My parent/guardian(s) talk to me about the dangers of alcohol and drugs?
A.  Yes
B.  No
Is there at least one teacher or other adult in this school that you can talk to if you have a problem?
A.  Yes
B.  No
During the past 12 months, how  often did you talk with your parents  or other adults in your family about  sexuality or ways to prevent HIV  infection, other sexually transmitted  diseases (STDs), or pregnancy?
A.  Not at all during the past 12  months
B.  About once during the past  12 months
C.  About once every few  months
D.  About once a month
E.  More than once a month
How long have you lived in the United States?
A.  Less than 1 year
B.  1 to 3 years
C.  4 to 6 years
D.  More than 6 years but not my whole life
E.  I have always lived in the United States
Where do you typically sleep at night?
A.  At home with my parents or guardians
B.  At a friend's or relative's home with my parents or  guardians
C.  At a friend's or relative's home without my parents or  guardians
D.  In a supervised shelter with  my parents or guardians
E.  In a supervised shelter  without my parents or  guardians
F.  In a hotel or motel, car, park, campground, or other public  place with my parents or  guardians
G.  In a hotel or motel, car, park, campground, or other public  place without my parents or guardians
H.  Somewhere else
=== Weapons ===
During the past 30 days, on how many days did you carry a weapon such as a gun, knife, or club?
A.  0 days
B.  1 day
C.  2 or 3 days
D.  4 or 5 days
E.  6 or more days
During the past 30 days, on how many days did you carry a gun?
A.  0 days
B.  1 day
C.  2 or 3 days
D.  4 or 5 days
E.  6 or more days
=== Suicide ===
During the past 12 months, did you ever seriously consider attempting suicide?
A.  Yes
B.  No
During the past 12 months, did you make a plan about how you would attempt suicide?
A.  Yes
B.  No
During the past 12 months, how many times did you actually attempt suicide?
A.  0 times
B.  1 time
C.  2 or 3 times
D.  4 or 5 times
E.  6 or more times
=== Tobacco, alcohol, drugs ===
How old were you when you smoked a whole cigarette or other tobacco/nicotine product for the first
time?
A.  I have never smoked a whole cigarette
B.  8 years old or younger
C.  9 years old
D.  10 years old
E.  11 years old
F.  12 years old
G.  13 years old or older
During the past 30 days, how did you usually get your own cigarettes, or other tobacco/nicotine product?
 (Select all that apply)
A.  I did not smoke cigarettes during the past 30 days
B.  I bought them in a store such as a convenience store, supermarket, discount store, or gas station
C.  I got them on the Internet
D.  I bought them at a public event such as a concert or sporting event
E.  I gave someone else money to buy them for me
F.  A person 18 years old or older gave them to me
G.  I took them from a store
H.  I took them from a family member
I.  I took them from someone else’s home
J.  I got them some other way
During the past 30 days, what is the largest number of alcoholic drinks you had in a 4 hour period?
A.  I did not drink alcohol during the past 30 days
B.  1 or 2 drinks
C.  3 drinks
D.  4 drinks
E.  5 drinks
F.  6 or 7 drinks
G.  8 or 9 drinks
H.  10 or more drinks
During the past 30 days, how many  times did you drive a car or other vehicle when you had been  drinking alcohol?
A.  I did not drive a car or other vehicle during the past 30 days
B.  0 times
C.  1 time
D.  2 or 3 times
E.  4 or 5 times
F.  6 or more times
During the past 30 days, how many times did you use marijuana?
A.  0 times
B.  1 or 2 times
C.  3 to 9 times
D.  10 to 19 times
E.  20 to 39 times
F.  40 or more times
During your life, how many times have you used any form of cocaine, including powder, crack, or freebase?
A.  0 times
B.  1 or 2 times
C.  3 to 9 times
D.  10 to 19 times
E.  20 to 39 times
F.  40 or more times
During your life, how many times have you used heroin (also called smack, junk, or China White)?
A.  0 times
B.  1 or 2 times
C.  3 to 9 times
D.  10 to 19 times
E.  20 to 39 times
F.  40 or more times
During your life, how many times have you taken a prescription drug (such as OxyContin, Percocet, Vicodin, codeine, Adderall, Ritalin, or Xanax) without a doctor's prescription?
A.  0 times
B.  1 or 2 times
C.  3 to 9 times
D.  10 to 19 times
E.  20 to 39 times
F.  40 or more times

Thursday, June 11, 2015

Public Education As An Act of Fraud

Public Education As An Act of Fraud

State of EducationIf the average Public school was a non-profit organization asking you for your money to attend to some perceived public ‘good” you’d probably refuse to give them any. You might even ask the “authorities” to investigate them for fraud after seeing their balance sheet.
Why?

When 70% or more of all “donations” go to staff salaries and benefits, there isn’t much left for the business for which the institution claims to exist. And that is exactly what most Public school budgets look like.

They are no longer, if they ever were, a system by which a public body invests in securing the knowledge base in future generations for the common good. They are a scam whereby a protected partisan political class extorts salaries and benefits in exchange for a virtual monopoly on institutionalized day-car services disguised as education.

Wednesday, June 10, 2015

Free SAT Prep at Khan Academy

Khan Academy is offering free SAT prep.  Khan Academy is also a great online source for mathematics information.

Cathy

Croydon Needs OPT in for Testing and Surveys

Croydon needs opt-in, it is what is best for the children.   The following is from the website,  Ms (sic) Chang's Art Classes. Be sure to click on the link to read the rest of the story and view more pictures.

Cathy


"Drawing and Painting students in grades 10-12 were asked to create art about how they FEEL about standardized tests. I gave the students some old scantron sheets and offered drawing and painting materials. This is the art that was created:"

Sunday, June 7, 2015

A Message from a Black Conservative Friend

Sharing with permission.

"I love it when an educated liberal challenges me to share the message of the TEA Party! Our policies are about liberty. Liberal policies are about life long dependency on Big Gov from cradle to grave for the poor. They tell black people they can't pull themselves up by their bootstraps because they don't have boots or straps. That's a lie too that many believe!
My reply: Encourage everyone to take advantage of all the USA has to offer. Don't rely on crumbs from the Democrat table of freebies. It's a trap to keep you mentally and physically on their plantation. TEA Party message is one of school choice because Democrat run schools in urban areas are not educating children. TEA Party message is your limitations are dictated by you not by racist America. Our story is one of triumph not defeat. I tell people to "Vote Your Values! Value Your Vote!". Stop voting for Dems who don't reflect your core beliefs. After 50+ years of religiously voting (D) what do we have to show for it? Three things: Shantytown conditions, failing schools and shooting gallery neighborhoods!" ~ My very politically correct, articulate sister from a different Mister and Mrs. Stephanie W. Trussell