So as I sit down to ‘reflect’ I am realizing that I am analyzing everything I do and read. When I left class on Wednesday I was excited with where my mind had voyaged to. Contemplating why things are the way they are at school since then has got me quite excited and personal reflections have stretched beyond the average. Average reflections amongst teachers at my school generally focus on what is wrong, whose fault it is, how others could improve it and all this is said with a few expletives. Now I find myself going beyond the micro (why we are teaching this or how do you control Student A’s behaviour) and examining the larger scale systems and ideas. I don’t want it to sound like I am tooting my own horn, I just want you to know that only one class in I feel better already about the journey and how it has made me more aware of my view on various aspects in education.
The elements in education web that we constructed in class was not only eye-opening but raised a certain fear in me. You spoke of how difficult but prevalent educational reform is and it all makes sense when examining how complex of a system it is. So how does one make positive change? A person would have to design or form a new system that was accepted by all the stakeholders (or at least enough that could control the other participants) and then somehow find the resources and means to introduce it to the group. No wonder we are stuck in an archaic system that reflects not who we are as a society currently but one of previous generations. How do we change this and create a paradigm shift? The novel ideas are out there but we are still stuck in our current system.
Your point about ‘needing numbers to assess students’ and ultimately everything has intrigued me. I don’t use numbers in my assessment of students work (save the use of the 5/3/1 scale in the 6+1 Writing Traits rubric and I know it is strictly ordinal) and it has transformed my assessment and my students approach to work. How anyone could look at an essay and arbitrarily say “it is an 86% or 87%” is ridiculous. From not yet meeting expectations to exceeding expectations is where I want my students to travel. But....why then must a final percentage be added to the report card? Is it because it is always the way it has been done? Is our reporting system falling behind our assessment system? Do we provide numbers for the students or the parents because that is waht they know and recognize? I have had long discussions with parents on why I don’t have a number next to their child’s name. Does it reflect the need for the ministry (or Fraser Institute) to assess and rank school’s performance? Or does it merely reflect the need of post-secondary institutions to screen their applicants? Are we as teachers quantifying all our learning objectives for 12 years so that a university can easily choose which applicant is likely to succeed without ever meeting them in person? I started to wonder if this is all the fault of Frederick Taylor. Taylorism is one of the only things that stuck in my head from an early economics course and I find myself analyzing everything to see how I can do it more effectively. So are the universities just trimming costs and time by screening applicants in this way? On a side note, I have seen a number of people asked to leave or removed from the STEP program during their practicum in the past years because they were not suited to the profession. However, many other student-teachers could have predicted based on their social skills, organizational skills, or work ethic. Should there be a one on one interview prior to acceptance? Has society gone too far in saving money? Do economic resources have a larger weight in the educational system web than other factors? I compare it to the game Kerplunk in that many straws (systems) can be taken out and the marbles (students education) still remain but eventually one straw is removed and the system collapses. Perhaps a complete overhaul is needed to permit education to transform into a system built for the 21st century (pardon my use of this cliché).
The topic of 21st century skills is prevalent in our school these days. Our principal was on the ‘One District – One Vision – One Goal’ committee to design the attributes of a School District No. 23 Learner for Success in the 21st and we are working hard to apply or include these 5 outcomes or objectives to our curriculum. The document (which surprisingly is not available anywhere on the School district website so I will bring you a copy) lists the attributes (Learner, Thinker, Innovator, Collaborator, Contributor) that a student should possess to succeed in our current society. Most are behavioural objectives that certainly would make specific criterion levels difficult. It definitely puts the emphasis back on the students though. Throughout the readings I see a wide spectrum of who is the focus in our quest for achieving the ‘goal of education’. Students? Teachers? A happy midpoint? Is it the students who control their progression and teachers are mere pawns to distribute resources or are students the raw materials with that are created by teachers and school boards? Bobbitt and his followers seem to argue that most change can be done top-down by systems and leave little room for the role of the student. Whereas, Ebel writes that, “learning is a personal activity which each student must carry on for himself.” It reminds me of my previous career in the wine industry. There were two distinct views on producing a great product. Great wine was either the result great grapes from great soil, climate and growing conditions – the terroir – or it was the result of a great winemaker who could turn any grape to greatness by controlling the fermentation process, aging, and oak influences. So what makes a great education? What roles do students, teachers and systems play in the process?
I understand my bias or lens views the system differently due to my role as a teacher but is broadened now by my concurrent role as a student and my very near future as my role as a parent. My realities are that teachers are an important variable and that every student is very different (from each other, not just different ;) and we must acknowledge this fact when teaching them. Ebel stated that “individual learning is greatly facilitated by group instruction” and I struggled with this statement. Is it greatly facilitated because a 1:1 teacher student ratio is impossible due to Taylorism or is he missing the importance of differentiated or individual instruction? Who says 30 students is a proper number for instruction? Is it determined by the overhead costs or what is best for the average students learning? Reading through The Third Teacher I saw no benefit of having large class sizes. Do we have the necessary resources to facilitate our curriculum? To this I question our use of technology.
I was my school’s technology lead teacher and was often approached by teachers who wanted to use a new software or technology in their classroom just for the sake of using it. I would ask them what their end goal was and how this new resource would aid in achieving it. There was frequently no answer as they just wanted to use it. This is reinforced by Robert Mager when he states that when clearly defined goals are not available, teachers can get lost in their instruction and resources. We need to start with the end in mind and work backwards.
At the end of it, I am still struggling with how change can be effectively implemented in our school system. Is this system so large and complex that drastic change is impossible? I believe I sit with many others in the waiting room for educational reform.
References
Despres, Blane R. (2003). Family of Related Systemic Elements (FoRSE) Matrix.
Ebel, Robert L. (1972). What are schools for? Phi Delta Kappan, 54, 1, p 3-7.
Eisner, Elliot W. (1985). The Educational Imagination on the Design and Evaluation of School Programs. New York: MacMillan Publishing Company.
How do BC schools compare? Retrieved September 18, 2011, from Fraser Institute Web site: http://www.fraserinstitute.org/report-cards/school-performance/british-columbia.aspx
Kerplunk (game). Retrieved September 18, 2011 from the Wikipedia website. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KerPlunk_(game)
79 ideas for using design to transform teaching and learning. Retrieved September 18, 2011 from The Third Teacher website: http://www.thethirdteacher.com/
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