Don Hirsch published an editorial in Education Week that tells it true. We need, he argues, to place a greater emphasis on what and how we teach during children’s early school years. Of course, he champions his recommendation for adopting a clear curriculum during the early years, too. But, the big idea is that the primary and elementary grades are very important if students are to be able to excel in high school and college.
The elementary grades are much more important than is apparently credited by philanthropies like the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which has recently been giving many millions to high school reform—with negligible results per dollar. For many years, the philanthropic and policy worlds have placed a lot of emphasis on the two ends of precollegiate education—high school and preschool. They are right about preschool—but not about high school. The general knowledge and vocabulary required for effective learning at the high school level are the fruits of a long process. The way to reform high school is to prepare students effectively in the elementary years to thrive there. If, in recent decades, high school has become a place where students are offered a smorgasbord of watered-down subjects, that is because watered-down subjects are all that our ill-educated students are now prepared to understand.
Link to Professor Hirsch’s editorial (note that a subscription may be required to read the entire piece, but you can get one for free).
Over on d-edreckoning, Ken De Rosa has a wonderful post explaining how some widely discussed educational constructs fail to have the impact that teaching effectively has. He’s constructed normal curves showing the relative effects of class size and socio-economic status on the average achievement when low-level achievement is the base.
Link to Mr. De Rosa’s entry, which has the delightful title, “Your Pet Reform is Suckier than You Think.” In back-channel communication, Mr. De Rosa reminded me of the pages that I have in the old U.Va. “office of special education” on relative effects of different educational methods. I’m sure I’ve referred to them previously in these entries, but let me drop that link one more time: effective methods.
The Division for Research of the Council for Exceptional Children (DR-CEC) awarded Michael Coyne, of the University of Connecticut, its 2008 award for distinguished achievement in research about special education. This prestigious award recognizes Professor Coyne’s substantial contribution to understanding individuals with disabilities and the provision of services to those individuals. According DR-CEC,
The Division for Research recognizes the critical role of research to both current practice in and the future of the field of Special Education through its Distinguished Early Career Research Award. This annual award recognizes individuals who have made outstanding scientific contributions in special education, in basic and/or applied research, within the first 10 years following receipt of the doctoral degree. For the 2008 award, candidates must have received their doctoral degree in 1998 or later. Nominations are sought across all areas of Special Education as well as all forms of research methodology.
Continue reading ‘Coyne receives early career award’
Well, folks, I closed the poll about bogus reasons for not teaching effectively. It was a close contest:
- That kind of instruction may be good for some students, but it just doesn’t fit my teaching style. (35%, 34 Votes)
- Students will learn it when they’re ready. (33%, 32 Votes)
Now it’s time to start a new poll. This time we’ll examine bogus reasons for failing to test whether students actually learn what educators say they “teach.”
Continue reading ‘Bogus Bowl III’
Former “reading czar” G. Reid Lyon has responded to questions posed by Michael F. Shaughnessy about the U.S. Reading First program. As those who have been paying attention know, the federal foray into guiding schools to use scientifically based reading instruction ran into rocky allegations of malfeasance, allegations that at least one reporter has questioned strongly. Mr. Lyon describes his disagreement with some of those allegations, and you can read why he does.
- An On-going conversation with Reid Lyon: About Reading First [Part 1]
- An On-Going Interview with Reid Lyon: About Reading First [Part 2]
- An On-going conversation with Reid Lyon: About Reading First [Part 3]
Use the marvelous search mechanism available at the top right to search for more about Reading First; you don’t even have to press “go” for it to work.
Please remember that I am a member of the Reading First federal advisory committee. I am not, however, speaking for the committee, my fellow panelists, nor the US Department of Education here.
Writing for the Boston (MA, US) Globe under the headline “Seeking a kinder word for failure: Schools’ morale front and center,” Tracy Jan reported that Massachusetts school officials have debated what words to use to describe schools were too many students fail. Check this lead:
To soothe the bruised egos of educators and children in lackluster schools, Massachusetts officials are now pushing for kinder, gentler euphemisms for failure.
Instead of calling these schools “underperforming,” the Board of Education is considering labeling them as “Commonwealth priority,” to avoid poisoning teacher and student morale.
Schools in the direst straits, now known as “chronically underperforming,” would get the more urgent but still vague label of “priority one.”
The board has spent parts of more than three meetings in recent months debating the linguistic merits and tone set by the terms after a handful of superintendents from across the state complained that the label underperforming unfairly casts blame on educators, hinders the recruitment of talented teachers, and erodes students’ self-esteem.
Pretty amazing. Pretty misguided. Pretty sad. Actually, not pretty.
Fortunately, the student member of the board sees through this. Zachary Tsetsos said, “I don’t want to tiptoe around the issue. I’m not concerned about what title we give these schools. Let’s work on fixing them.” Mr. Tsetsos deserves an award for seeing things clearly. Success would breed good morale.
Mayhaps we should have a Bogus Bowl for the euphemisms?
Link to the article.
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