Entries Tagged 'Teacher Reads' ↓

At a recent school board meeting Asheville parents and students expressed concern about student safety at the city middle school. The principal summarized their concerns this way:

We are a public school, not a private school, and I think there are some people who are looking for a private school experience in a public school.  (AC-T, 5/13/2012)

That is true. Continue reading →

I challenge school board members, superintendents, and principals to think philosophically, instead of social scientifically, about school improvement.  Start with the six-virtue definition of the educated person.  It costs nothing.  If you and your teachers model and teach those virtues, you won’t need to invest in:

(1)  data-driven instruction,

(2)  instructional differentiation,

(3)  problem-based learning,

(4)  learning styles,

(5)  higher order thinking skills,

(6)  common core,

(7)  Khan Academy,

(8)  multiple intelligences,

(9)  high expectations,

(10) character education,

(11) core knowledge,

(12) benchmarking,

(13) brain-based teaching,

(14) cooperative learning,

(15) professional learning communities,

(16) heterogeneous or homogeneous grouping,

(17) standards-based instruction,

(18) 21st century learning.

It is simple.  Policymakers who are understanding, imaginative, strong, courageous, humble and generous should hold teachers accountable for modeling and teaching the same virtues.  It’s all about your definition of the educated person?  What is yours?  Contact me if you need help with this.

My challenge is that you get to bring your education ideas, techniques, materials, and research findings to any school you want.  I get to bring the six-virtue definition of “educated” to any school you choose for me.  At the end of the year, my school will be improved more than yours — and you get to choose the improvement measures.

Take this challenge, if you promote:

(1)   data-driven instruction,

(2)  instructional differentiation,

(3)  problem-based learning,

(4)  learning styles,

(5)  higher order thinking skills,

(6)  common core,

(7)  Khan Academy,

(8)  multiple intelligences,

(9)  high expectations,

(10) character education,

(11) core knowledge,

(12) benchmarking,

(13) brain-based teaching,

(14) cooperative learning,

(15) professional learning communities,

(16) heterogeneous or homogeneous grouping,

(17) standards-based instruction,

(18) 21st century learning.

None of these professionals will accept this challenge.  They know that modeling and teaching the six virtues will get better results than any of these 18 proposals.

So, why do psychologists, educational consultants and social science researchers ignore the six virtues of the educated person? There is one universal, simple way to improve American public education, but it won’t be tried because:

1. It requires philosophical thinking from educators have been brain-washed to believe in the social science improvement paradigm.

2.  Nobody can make money on it. Everybody knows we are born uneducated (ignorant, unimaginative, weak, fearful of truth, proud and selfish); and we have the potential to become educated (understanding, imaginative, strong, courageous, humble and generous). No professional development is needed.  No books or technologies need to be bought.  No consulting fees need to be paid.

We are in a Catch-22.  We could choose a philosophical paradigm for improving education, but that would require philosophical thinking from the public school teachers, administrators, and policy makers who were taught that philosophy is useless and social science is useful. That is why aphilosophical administrators and policy makers pay for “research-based” professional development, books, technologies, and consultants. It makes them feel as though they are doing something that has been “proven” to improve schools.

Yes–they are doing something that might improve schools in the shallowest way possible. How is that working in your school? How much is your school improving?  How many more standardized test questions did students answer right this year? How is that improving the education of our young people?

The social science improvement paradigm is nonsense.  Educators, however, have been taught to believe in it, just like Americans have been taught to believe public education must be governed politically. Neither is true.  To understand why, you have to read the book.  It will show you how easy and useful it is to think philosophically.

This question is the headline for a Bridging Differences blog.   Diane Ravitch discusses two social science studies of what teachers want.  According to her, the MetLife Survey of the American Teacher “showed that teachers across the nation are demoralized and that their job satisfaction has dropped precipitously since 2009.”  She asked,

What has happened in the past two years? Let’s see: Race to the Top promoted the idea that teachers should be evaluated by the test scores of their students; “Waiting for ‘Superman’” portrayed teachers as the singular cause of low student test scores; many states, including Wisconsin, Florida, Louisiana, Michigan, Indiana, and Ohio have passed anti-teacher legislation, reducing or eliminating teachers’ rights to due process and their right to bargain collectively; the Obama administration insists that schools can be “turned around” by firing some or all of the staff. These events have combined to produce a rising tide of public hostility to educators, as well as the unfounded beliefs that schools alone can end poverty and can produce 100 percent proficiency and 100 percent graduation rates if only “failing schools” are closed, “bad” educators are dismissed, and “effective” teachers get bonuses.

Is it any wonder that teachers and principals are demoralized?

Another survey, released about the same time, has not gotten the attention it deserves. This one conducted by Scholastic and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is called Primary Sources: 2012. It contains valuable information about what teachers think.

You can read the studies, or bemoan low teacher morale; but skip the commentaries at the end of these blogs.  Even though commenters want to improve education as much as I do; they wage war on each other, instead of bridging differences.  (I love the irony.)  These “Comments” illustrate what we get when we believe pride is a virtue and humility a vice.  We can’t even  talk with each other because we are so damn proud of ourselves.

To hear what teachers want, go to my video interviews with teachers.  There you will experience the beauty of humility, instead of the ugliness of pride.

Psychologese Crap

News flash for teachers and parents:

Students learn when they are engaged in their lesson!  You can watch the two-minute video yourself.

Students learn when they are engaged?  I am glad a psychologist revealed that (sarcasm).

Cut the Crap

In common language, students learn when they put their mind to it.  They learn when they bring understanding, imagination, and strong character to the lesson.

We can pretend psychologists offer insight, or we can keep it simple: Just model and teach the six virtues!

Some teachers disagree with what I write. Although I am sympathetic to their situation, they disagree with me because I look at their situations from the opposite perspective.

For example, they look at the need for education reform, and they immediately want administrators, school board members, and state legislators to lead the way. I look at education reform by first looking at the history of public education. Then I conclude that governing elites will be the last people to lead reform.  They have benefited from our current system — they are administrators, school board members, and state legislators. Continue reading →

Why do legislators, school board members, district administrators, professors of education, and parents define “educated” as scoring high on standardized tests?  In TSVOTEP I argued that the standards and accountability movement is the cause.  If we go deeper, we can see a simpler, more concrete reason. Continue reading →

Ancient and Medieval philosophers did not have to debate this question because they didn’t have to contend with economists.  Libertarians and capitalists think self-interest is a virtue because it is the human drive that makes societies prosper.  According to them, self-interest creates so much good that it is a virtue, not a vice. Continue reading →

Richard Tabor Greene identified 48 capabilities of the educated person.  Does his research answer my question about what it means to be educated?  Or is it another list of desired qualities that is neither useful nor inspiring?

Cut the Crap

I tried to read the explanation; but it’s an example of why philosophers get a bad name — discussing esoteric topics in tortured language.  Greene conducted social scientific research to answer a philosophical question.  He provides charts and arrows to illustrate what he found.

Continue reading →

Concerning ways to help students succeed in school, Benedict Carey, (NY Times, 9/6/2010) wrote:

Advice is cheap and all too familiar: Clear a quiet work space. Stick to a homework schedule. Set goals. Set boundaries. . .

And check out the classroom. Does Junior’s learning style match the new teacher’s approach? Or the school’s philosophy? . . .

Such theories have developed in part because of sketchy education research that doesn’t offer clear guidance. Student traits and teaching styles surely interact; so do personalities and at-home rules. The trouble is, no one can predict how.

The last sentence applies to all psychological and educational research.  If, unlike natural science findings, social science findings can’t predict how people will behave, how helpful are they?

Cut the Crap

Concerning how we learn academic material, Carey put it this way: “The more mental sweat it takes to dig it out, the more securely it will be subsequently anchored.”

It is simple — just model and teach the six virtues, the third of which is strong character — the topic of this article.  Those who know the six virtues of the educated person don’t need to read it.