Baltimore teacher speaks the truth

[Larry T Spider]

This will have to be my last post until Sunday but I have enjoyed the discussion as always. We have noticed a recent trend in charter schools kicking out low academic kids and labeling them as behavior problems. We get them and start to piece together that they just didn't have the resources to help the kids and are sending them packing. There is a snapshot window of when a kid's test scores count for that particular school. We get a lot of the low kids right before that snapshot and they keep the ones that can pass, thus inflating their numbers. Then the charter school cheerleaders come along and tell everybody about how much better their school is. There are a lot of horrendous charter schools popping up that are much worse than any public school I have ever seen. They are going into low income churches and pimping their schools which are just an old Denny's and some teacher that couldn't cut it in public school.

I am all for the good charter schools existing, and there are many. I would work at some that I know of. But, the state needs to get it together and look into some of these "schools". I'm afraid they won't because it will look bad for the current agenda of pushing charter schools.

 

[Crockett]

Spider is onto something with pushing literacy tasks to ages before the child is ready. My daughter was obviously very bright. My mother-in-law, elemenary teacher and reading recovery expert told me not to teach her to read, sound out words, etc. Basically, the idea was to allow her to learn with the rest of her class. My daughter caught on fine and was ahead of the "early" readers before she was out of first grade. What the politicos gain by elbowing aside curriculum experts to speed up early learning is lost before the kids get out of sixth grade. Teaching kids when they are developmentally ready is a lot easier, not to mention a lot more fun for the teachers and students.

In a semi-related story, I was trying unsuccessfully to help my son with Pre-AP high school chemistry, but given I hadn't studied chemistry since 1979, I was no help at all. "Your sister made 100s in high school Chemistry, let's call her for help," I said. My daughter had 10 years to forget Chemistry, but her significant other is a genius engineer. He pulled out his Chemistry text from Ohio State. He told me later that the issues my son was having problems with were in the last chapter of his college text.

 

[Horn6721]

To Crock's point
"I think one great advantage charter, private and religious schools have is they can tell incorrigible kids to get lost."
Exactly.
It is interesting to remember that there are usually waiting lists and lotteries for charter and some private schools which shows there are parents who care and who know their kids will be held accountable.
It used to be that way in public schools.
Now especially in urban schools the inmates run it and teachers just hope to get through the day without getting beat up.
Even in many suburb schools in Texas teachers are little more than day care workers. I can't imagine how frustrating that is.
It is a vicious cycle that doesn't seem to have a link that can be broken in today's world.

I agree with Larry T that more oversight of charter schools is needed. There are really bad charter schools. I always wonder at parents who work so hard to get their child into a charter school but don't work as hard to get them out of a bad one.

 

[zork]

Good stuff Crockett.

 

[theiioftx]

It starts and ends there. Lots of things inbetween, but if people do not take care of what they breed, it never ends.

 

[Vol Horn 4 Life]

I think one great advantage charter, private and religious schools have is they can tell incorrigible kids to get lost.

I agree that in a school with one goal of preparing kids for college is that the parents expect a good learning environment. If there is a disruptive child he is gone unless the parents can get through to him/her quickly. Parents dont pay lots of money to allow some kid to cause their child to not be ready for the next level.

Let's not confuse this with kids who have a hard time adapting to the incredibly high level of private school accountability. The staff will do anything to help a motivated kid catch up and stay in that school. After school tutoring, summer school, etc.

My son is not an exceptional student but tries hard and is ranked in the middle of his small 30 student class in all pre AP and AP course load. My expectations are high and I feel disappointed he isnt ranked higher. However, I feel better knowing this years senior class of 28 students have garnered $3.8 million in scholarships so far to every kind of school from military academy to Ivy League to all other levels as well. Makes me feel better knowing that him being in the middle of his class he still has a decent shot of getting a full ride somewhere, but hopefully one of his choice.

Thats why those incorrigible ones are dispatched quickly. Private schools are a tool for advancement not babysitting trouble makers like many public schools. Trust me, there are plenty of wealthy trouble makers who get tossed regularly. On the flip side, it's interesting to see the high percentage of lower income scholarship students who are so successful. I think their parents are harder on them because they know the opportunity they are getting.

Notice the theme of parental involvement. It's critically important.

 

[Mr. Deez]

I feel like we do a lot of character education in the way of morals and discipline in public schools.

Yes, but there's only so far you can take that. You can tell a kid what's right and wrong, but without stepping over the line and advancing a religious and cultural agenda, it's pretty difficult to make a kid truly appreciate and respect what's right and wrong.

The problem is we lack the way to back it up when the lessons are not followed by students.

From what my wife tells me, you have almost no tools in the shed, and that undermines your efforts to teach right from wrong. Without a respectful fear of consequences, I don't see how you can teach morals or impose order except by the grace of the kids choosing to obey.

The most effective way to improve public schools overnight is to let them play by rules that the private/charter schools play by. We tell parents that their kid isn't following the behavior code, they get pissed and take the kid to charter school. Guess who shows back up after getting kicked out a few weeks later..

I think you're right. And if charter schools are so great, then why not let regular public schools have the flexibility to emulate the good ones?

 

[Horn6721]

MrD
"And if charter schools are so great, then why not let regular public schools have the flexibility to emulate the good ones?"

Yes we could just go back to when the teacher had the attention if not respect of students. I have no doubt there were bad abusive teachers then and even then unions protected them.
But as a metric and a place to start this seems like one reasonable point.Of course as long as the parents can and do sue over everything that won't happen.
And as long as too many parents think gov't should be the agent that feeds houses medicates all while educating them I don't know how things can change.
Anyone remember that black educator in Chicago that did wonders with so many of the inner city kids? What happened to her? Or that real life teacher on which Stand and Deliver was based. Perhaps a REAL Sec of Education could learn from real life experiences and encourage schools to adopt what has shown to work.

 

[Mr. Deez]

Yes we could just go back to when the teacher had the attention if not respect of students. I have no doubt there were bad abusive teachers then and even then unions protected them.
But as a metric and a place to start this seems like one reasonable point.Of course as long as the parents can and do sue over everything that won't happen.

The issue is about character. Parents have had the ability to sue for abusive discipline for decades or longer in some states, and even now these cases aren't very common and difficult to win. However, in the past parents usually reinforced teachers' authority. Today, they frequently call it into question whether they've taken the step of considering a lawsuit or not, and that's where the problem lies. They think they're helping their kids by protecting them from potential unfairness, when the they're actually doing them a horrible disservice far worse than any unfair treatment within reason.

 

[ProdigalHorn]

In a semi-related story, I was trying unsuccessfully to help my son with Pre-AP high school chemistry, but given I hadn't studied chemistry since 1979, I was no help at all. "Your sister made 100s in high school Chemistry, let's call her for help," I said. My daughter had 10 years to forget Chemistry, but her significant other is a genius engineer. He pulled out his Chemistry text from Ohio State. He told me later that the issues my son was having problems with were in the last chapter of his college text.

Sounds like this is a trend, and maybe an example of how we sometimes chase a problem with an unrelated solution. So we hear that our kids are behind other kids in school performance, and our response is that we need to get them to know more by the time they leave... so we start rushing them even more to get through the basics in order to get them to an arbitrary level of understanding of more complex subjects, basically so that we can say our kids are smart because they've already done calculus in high school.

Seems like that's a symptom of not really being able to fix actual issues regarding education, and therefore finding one area that we can sort of measure (how much material have they covered) and boost that. I'm curious what the criteria is for deciding what is an appropriate level of curriculum for a "competitive" high school grad.

 

[NJlonghorn]

Sounds like this is a trend, and maybe an example of how we sometimes chase a problem with an unrelated solution. So we hear that our kids are behind other kids in school performance, and our response is that we need to get them to know more by the time they leave... so we start rushing them even more to get through the basics in order to get them to an arbitrary level of understanding of more complex subjects, basically so that we can say our kids are smart because they've already done calculus in high school.

Seems like that's a symptom of not really being able to fix actual issues regarding education, and therefore finding one area that we can sort of measure (how much material have they covered) and boost that. I'm curious what the criteria is for deciding what is an appropriate level of curriculum for a "competitive" high school grad.

What you are pointing to is a byproduct of a broader philosophy that has a substantial number of proponents in the educational community -- that the target should the same for every kid. There is no "appropriate level of curriculum" for kids as a whole, because every kid is capable of achieving very different levels.

Under the "No Child Left Behind" mentality, targets are set for each age group. Students who meet the target are deemed a success, and those who fall short are deemed a failure. Thus, a not-so-smart kid who works his butt off and learns everything he is capable of, but falls short of the target, is deemed a failure when in realty he is a success. And a brilliant kid who makes the target but should have done much better is deemed a success when the system actually failed him.

To use the chemistry example, many kids are ready for a college-level chemistry class by 11th or 12th grade. Schools are right to offer that class, and to push some kids to take them. Those kids will end up as the scientists, engineers, and doctors that cure diseases, increase productivity, etc., and we owe it to them (and to ourselves) to help them get there. The problem is when you start to push all kids to take the harder class, even when the easier one is all that they are prepared for at this point in their development.

I often hear that it is "elitist" to offer a "better education" to some kids than to others. This boils my blood. We live in a meritocracy. Those who are more capable, or work harder, should get ahead. Our society depends on it.

The harder question, and the one for which there is no easy answer, is what to do about kids who fall behind not because they are less capable, and not so much because they don't work as hard, but because they are in a harder circumstance than others, though little or no fault of their own. We as a society owe a duty to the individual kid, not to his family or community. Even if the largest part of the fault lies with the kids' parents, we can't count on the parents to provide the solution.

 

[Dobeyville]

The buzzword of the educational world is "rigor". No one can define it for the teachers. Excellent points on this topic from many of you. European education has it right in several regards by splitting the students off at a certain point in the process according to their abilities. We refuse to do that because of the aforementioned "elitist" education that some would receive. Everyone has to be treated the same, it is sickening.

 

[Dionysus]

Some of the educational research I’ve seen introduced something new to me, which is the idea of “scaffolding” among mixed-age kids — an example is when kids of the same age, say seven years old, are trying to learn a new skill and can’t quite get there alone, but if they begin playing with a kid a few years older — say ten to twelve years — with the developed skill, the younger ones are often able to get it, just from the exposure to the older ones.

The more experienced kid “scaffolds” the younger one up in a way that an adult might not be able to. Kids are far more interested in other kids (especially older ones) than they are in adults, and tend to be very receptive to what they can show them. So the younger child benefits by working/playing with the slightly more experienced ones. The benefit for the older kids is they learn to mentor, to feel a sense of their relative skill and maturity, to demonstrate empathy, etc.

I really like this idea. It makes sense to me and it speaks to at least one positive aspect of having mixed-age interaction in a learning environment.

 

[Larry T Spider]

Some of the educational research I’ve seen introduced something new to me, which is the idea of “scaffolding” among mixed-age kids — an example is when kids of the same age, say seven years old, are trying to learn a new skill and can’t quite get there alone, but if they begin playing with a kid a few years older — say ten to twelve years — with the developed skill, the younger ones are often able to get it, just from the exposure to the older ones.

The more experienced kid “scaffolds” the younger one up in a way that an adult might not be able to. Kids are far more interested in other kids (especially older ones) than they are in adults, and tend to be very receptive to what they can show them. So the younger child benefits by working/playing with the slightly more experienced ones. The benefit for the older kids is they learn to mentor, to feel a sense of their relative skill and maturity, to demonstrate empathy, etc.

I really like this idea. It makes sense to me and it speaks to at least one positive aspect of having mixed-age interaction in a learning environment.

I have worked in a mixed age setting such as this before when I was working on my masters. Scaffolding is a broad term for when a child is working in their zone of proximal development (from Vygotsky), or the area where they can do the task with help but not on their own. In reality, this is where most learning takes place and is the ideal place where a teacher wants to be with a child. All is well so far because just about everybody can agree with this. So, the educational community, but not many teachers, have come up with the idea of "differentiation". This is when the teacher is in the ZPD of each child all at the same time, no matter how far apart their levels are. I'll be honest, I have my masters, have been teacher of the year, and have other awards related to teaching and I don't really think I do a good job of this. As part of my duties, I visit other classrooms and don't think anybody does a good job of this. I think its an absurd expectation for anybody that has 20 plus students in a room with one teacher. HOWEVER, in a mixed age setting, you have lots of little teachers running around that can help with this. The lower (sometimes younger, sometimes not) get the individual attention they need. The higher (but not necessarily older) students get the benefit of learning through teaching with time added in for their own work. There are other benefits such as being able to retain a child without the social impacts. It also allows high achieving younger students to move ahead without going through an entire administrative process. They simply start doing the harder work. There are also fewer behavior problems in this setting. This is old time one room schoolhouse type of stuff but it can work amazingly well with the right teacher.

For those of you interested in the more academic side of education that doesn't exist in our schools, read up on some Vygotsky. I try to make my classroom look as much like his philosophy as possible and I get great academic results even though we play a lot of the day. His theories on play and learning are by far the most important thing that I have read. Every freshman education major has to read some of his stuff, but the really good stuff only the graduates get assigned. They also have enough time working with kids to get the context of it. If I ever work up the nerve to work on my doctorate, I want my research to make connections between Vygotsky's ZPD and the benefit of involved parents that know what their kid can do with their assistance and naturally scaffold them without even thinking about it. I see this as the main difference between kids that show up at school ready for what they will face and the ones that show up already a year or more behind. I also want to see how effectively parents can be taught this skill. It is much harder than teaching from a standard curriculum because the child's abilities are always changing and you have to have some knowledge of what skills are prerequisite to get the child to the next level. Its a very hard thing that many parents do without even really thinking about it.

 

[Dionysus]

read up on some Vygotsky. I try to make my classroom look as much like his philosophy as possible and I get great academic results even though we play a lot of the day. His theories on play and learning are by far the most important thing that I have read.

Great stuff Larry, something else to read up on, thanks. I have no formal background or training in education, just some limited exposure to a few new ideas through my wife’s homeschooling/unschooling group. We recently heard Peter Gray talk about Karl Groos’ theory of play. IIRC he started with animals but much of what was observed there applies as well to human learning. Are you familiar with Groos? Wondering what you think about him and how he compares to Vygotsky, if at all.

 

[Larry T Spider]

Man, maybe I should publish some stuff if groos is making a comeback. Haven't heard that name in a while although I generally agree with his two main arguments.
1. Play helps teach survival skills.
2. Kids play helps them survive in the world that they exist in.
We have created a complicated social world for children to make sense of an they do that through their play. When something eventful happens, we see children literally play with what happened, trying out different solutions and generally trying to make sense of it. So, I think he's right about learning survival skills but more in a social way in modern society. He talks about how kids in more primitive societies play with survival skills in a more literal way and that is true for animals and humans alike. I don't know a lot about the specifics of his writing but it appears to be very much in line with vygotsky. So much so that I wonder why his two books would be emphasized over vygotskys more numerous and detailed work. I'll look more into that. I do know that one difference is that vygotsky viewed the human way of play as uniquely human.

This is a quick three minute read that hits briefly on most of his major theories. Obviously you can get really in-depth on any one item such as play teaching self-regulation, etc. http://www.childdevelopmentmedia.com/articles/play-the-work-of-lev-vygotsky/

One interesting thing about vygotsky is that he felt he could more accurately predict the future academic level of children by how deep and detailed their play was than by their current academic level. It is one of many reasons that I insist on keeping play in my classroom and other pre-k classrooms. It give them a chance to make sense of what they are learning about, practice using the language, and develop other skills such as self regulation. You wouldn't believe the number of parents that just want them to memorize **** all day.

 

[zork]

reference:

http://www.edarticle.com/

 

[Dionysus]

It is one of many reasons that I insist on keeping play in my classroom and other pre-k classrooms. [...] You wouldn't believe the number of parents that just want them to memorize **** all day.

My wife and I were talking about this last night. Most of us I think were raised in top-down hierarchical models (parents, public schools) where there was strict control, and then went on to the same as adults in the workforce -- so it's the only frame of reference we have for how to structure things. That's a tough pattern to break but I think it is one we have to rethink if our institutions are going to successfully evolve.

I think that most kids don't need to be controlled or told what to learn or do, they just need the time and freedom and resources to pursue what's interesting to them and they will find their own way. They do this through free play. That's what I am seeing anyway.

 

[NJlonghorn]

I think that most kids don't need to be controlled or told what to learn or do, they just need the time and freedom and resources to pursue what's interesting to them and they will find their own way. They do this through free play. That's what I am seeing anyway.

This is fabulous as a model for kindergarten and first grade, and as a component in higher grades. But as you go further up the chain, it becomes increasingly critical to introduce more structured learning. Curiosity is a great thing to encourage and exploit, but it will only take most kids so far.

 

[Dionysus]

But as you go further up the chain, it becomes increasingly critical to introduce more structured learning.

Do we know this to be true? Maybe it is, but I am questioning all of the old models. Certainly there is a benefit to a structured approach for specialized skills and professional tracks, but I am thinking in just broader terms of learning.

 

[Larry T Spider]

I can write more later, but I believe that in some cases the skills need to be taught more directly but that the topics can be chosen by the student. In other cases, the topics are set but the student should be able to show their own way of demonstrating mastery. The most I ever learned from a class was my graduate course that afforded me the most freedom in what type of project I could work on (topic). But I still had a prof up my butt, pushing me in many other ways. The second most I ever learned from a course was then the topic was set because the material that needed to be covered was non-negotiable, but the way that I demonstrated mastery involved some choice. Some things that kids need to know, such as algebra, aren't just going to come about naturally for most kids and the ways to demonstrate mastery are limited. In those scenarios, I believe in as much real world application to the problems as possible.

My main push is really for kids pk-2nd grade to still have a lot of freedom and choice in their learning with play incorporated into the day. They should be learning from experiences more than anything else. When they get older, they will have the context to make more typical class work relevant. If you look at the 5th grade science test scores, its not the direct science questions that the kids are missing. Its the ones that involve a scenario with things in it that they have not experienced. You would be amazed by how many 10 year old children have never really been anywhere or done anything. They have never spent any time in the woods, ever. When we get on a bus and pass downtown Austin, they act like we just passed the moon. It is very hard to make sense of broad academic concepts without the context that they exist within. It quickly become memorizing meaningless facts as a way to get by.

 

[Dobeyville]

I teach in a small town and it is not only the younger kids who have never spent anytime in the woods. I have taken students on 16 educational tours to Europe to help them see what is on the other side of the world. It is very enlightening. It has opened up avenues they never would have been exposed to had they not traveled. Some have studied abroad, others have taken jobs with international companies. It is satisfying to see them go beyond their own little world. Keep them playing Larry T! We chose the same type of education with our own children, natural curiosity is great stuff.

 

[Crockett]

In Isreal, a country with a manpower shortage so every young person is important, they have an industrial track for kids who aren't making satisfactory progress on an academic track. The military takes over the training, I'm told by a leading industrial psychologist who visited Israel. Most of the problem students are male and their teachers are not what I would have guessed. ( I would have expected someone with the personality of Gunnery Sergeant Hartman from Full Metal Jacket). Their teachers are female soldiers age 20-22. The youngsters who complete this track have terrific job prospects and work performance., the psychologist told me. He thinks the key is that there is a lot of evaluation of aptitude and preferences. Everybody is good at something and when they are following their abilities, they tend to be successful. He's saddened that most aptitude testing done by schools is on paper ... thus inability to read and handle abstract thought is misinterpreted as lack of intelligence and ability. His speciality was coming up with ways to test abilities of those previously thought untestable.

 

[Mr. Deez]

I teach in a small town and it is not only the younger kids who have never spent anytime in the woods. I have taken students on 16 educational tours to Europe to help them see what is on the other side of the world. It is very enlightening. It has opened up avenues they never would have been exposed to had they not traveled. Some have studied abroad, others have taken jobs with international companies. It is satisfying to see them go beyond their own little world. Keep them playing Larry T! We chose the same type of education with our own children, natural curiosity is great stuff.

That is a superb idea. Even in the age of the web, your average American kid is pretty isolated. Seeing how people live in Europe would be extremely eye-opening not only for kids but also for adults.

 

[Dobeyville]

If only our esteemed legislators had a clue about education things could be fixed for the better. I have a kid in class that wants to be a taxidermist. He can read, write and do simple mathematics. I'm not sure why he needs to complete all the other core courses for his world, but we force him to. I am all for the split tracks according to aptitude and wish it would happen here in Texas. It goes back to the "find a job that you will be happy in and you'll most likely be a happy person".

 

[BevoBeef]

Some of the educational research I’ve seen introduced something new to me, which is the idea of “scaffolding” among mixed-age kids — an example is when kids of the same age, say seven years old, are trying to learn a new skill and can’t quite get there alone, but if they begin playing with a kid a few years older — say ten to twelve years — with the developed skill, the younger ones are often able to get it, just from the exposure to the older ones.

The more experienced kid “scaffolds” the younger one up in a way that an adult might not be able to. Kids are far more interested in other kids (especially older ones) than they are in adults, and tend to be very receptive to what they can show them. So the younger child benefits by working/playing with the slightly more experienced ones. The benefit for the older kids is they learn to mentor, to feel a sense of their relative skill and maturity, to demonstrate empathy, etc

Larry T said:

I generally agree with his two main arguments.
1. Play helps teach survival skills.
2. Kids play helps them survive in the world that they exist in.
We have created a complicated social world for children to make sense of an they do that through their play. When something eventful happens, we see children literally play with what happened, trying out different solutions and generally trying to make sense of it. So, I think he's right about learning survival skills but more in a social way in modern society.

I firmly believe in these concepts because I have had personal experiences with three grandsons (who are 3-4 years apart) and have seen the effects of mixed-age children learning and playing together. My daughter had experience teaching with elementary age children and has home schooled her 3 children from day one. Not only that but also my son-in-law is a director of an NFL sponsored flag football program and basketball program that exists all year round. I have been an assistant coach for a team where one grandson would practice constantly on a team with a group of kids that are as much as 4 years older than him. The improvements in the skill level of the two younger brothers are quite dramatic. The youngest, who is not quite 10 years old, has had major problems with his fine motor skills and emotional problems with playing failures and losing games. He has turned into quite a good passing quarterback and a very good hands receiver with quite an improved attitude and a healthy perspective when he loses. This has come from how the three boys play and encourage each other in structured sports and classroom activity while working on their educational projects. It is quite interesting to see how they coax each other and have formed a tightly knit working relationship that is much better than I had with my own two sibling relationships.

Njhorn said :

This is fabulous as a model for kindergarten and first grade, and as a component in higher grades. But as you go further up the chain, it becomes increasingly critical to introduce more structured learning. Curiosity is a great thing to encourage and exploit, but it will only take most kids so far.

The example that I have given has happened in a structured environment in both the classroom and sports field environment. However, my observations are that, if the mixed-age children have a strong bond together, then they find ways in an unstructured environment to teach each other by themselves. It comes as a part of a social interaction that naturally occurs when friends work and play together on a constant basis. It happens both at an early elementary age and also as they grow into teenagers.

 

[zork]

Creativity study interesting info from a Stanford study:
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2015-05/sumc-srt052115.php

Relax when you want to be creative I guess?

 

[Seattle Husker]

Was blessed this week to attend my daughter's high school awards ceremony. This public high school produces 15 plus national merit scholars each year and is the equivalent size of a 3A high school in Texas.

The principal discussed success in the school as a direct result of parent and community involvement. For graduating seniors, he asked that parents continue to visit the school, come to games and support the school as long as they were in the community. Money is not the answer - parenting is.

"Good parenting" cannot be measured. The best statistical correlation to school success is median household income of the students. It's not whether they have a high divorce rate or any other typical measurement of parent quality. Money, not in the school but of whether the students have it or not is strongest predictor of a schools success rate.

Now, you can say that higher income families have a lower divorce rate or have some other "parenting" quality and I'd love to see the data to back that up. Still, without knowing where or what school the above poster is referencing it clearly has a demographic of students in an upper middle class or high income bracket.

 

[theiioftx]

Actually, good parenting can be measured, but isn't. Just count the percentage of both parents that show up for parent teacher night at one school versus the other.

I get your premise though. However, income is primarily a function of work ethic and decision making. People with those attributes will generally try to pass it on to their kids.

 

[Larry T Spider]

Parenting has attempted to be measured in decades upon decades of research. Just about every possible scenario such as income, divorce, adoption, gay/straight parents, religion, and every parenting style imaginable has been subject to longitudinal research. Whether or not it reaches any definitive conclusion is subject for debate but the stuff is out there.