Teach Effectively!

Over on Teach and Learn, Michael Lach has a good note about the misdirection that passes as educational reform. He commented about an editorial in the New York Times, but it’s his phrasing here that caught my attention: “It seems that the reform trend these days is increasingly focused on structures and governanace, and less on what actually happens between teachers and students and content in the classroom.” Ain’t that the truth? It’s nice to know that there is at least one other person who understands that messing with time schedules, the array of seats in rooms, and so forth will likely have far less impact on students’ outcomes than bulking up the teaching that happens there. Sure, it’s sad that some schools have lots of resources and others have few, but the critical element, as Mr. Lach noted, is “what actually happens between teachers and students.”