Isabel Sawhill and Jon Baron published an editorial in Education Week calling for a new approach to the venerable Head Start program, one founded on evidence about effectiveness. They argue that in the wake of the discouraging Head Start Impact Study reported by US Department of Health & Human Services, it’s time to bring research into the nation’s play pre-schools.
A new approach is needed. One that has been suggested—defunding these programs—would amount to giving up the fight against major social problems such as educational failure and poverty that damage millions of American lives. A far better alternative is to use rigorous evidence about “what works” to evolve Head Start and other federal efforts into truly effective programs over time, and to use sophisticated models to trace their longer-term effects on children’s life prospects.
Continue reading ‘Evidence-based education in Head Start?’
Over on Zig Site, Siegfried Engelmann has a new series of articles in which Socrates questions fictitious educators about educational concepts. In the first, Socrates engages one Dr. Gibbs, a “prominent professor of education.” Here’s an excerpt:
Dr. Gibbs: Learning is extremely complicated and influenced by a host of factors, including motivation and parental attitudes. The point I try to make to my students is that every child is an individual who learns according to his or her time table, and in his or her unique way.
Socrates: You give us a lot to think about. But is there some fact or rule that describes all learning?
Dr. Gibbs. Of course not. The learner is what the learner does and what the learner has inherited. Learning is not some kind of cut-and-dried process. The most specific thing one could confidently say about all learning is that it occurs in a series of predictable stages, which have been described by Piaget and others.
Just imagine the hash that Socrates makes of such bologna!
In another, Socrates and Dr. Baram Rosenthal, an “educational guru,” discuss reading instruction. Catch ‘em at Zig Site. Look in the left rail.
Teach Effectively pal Dan Willingham has another treatment of the learning-styles myth at the Washington Post. In a guest entry for Valerie Strauss’ “The Answer Sheet,” Professor Willingham mentions the recent scientific review of research that debunked the myth (yet again) and provides responses to some of the pro-myth arguments that he’s encountered. Here’s a link to “Willingham: No evidence exists for learning style theories.”
Writing in the Chronicle of Higher Education under the headline “Matching Teaching Style to Learning Style May Not Help Students,” David Glenn describes the hook of a forth-coming paper the examines the popular, but unsupported, notion that instruction must be differentiated according to personal characteristics of the learners.
If you’ve ever sat through a teaching seminar, you’ve probably heard a lecture about “learning styles.” Perhaps you were told that some students are visual learners, some are auditory learners, and others are kinesthetic learners. Or maybe you were given one of the dozens of other learning-style taxonomies that scholars and consultants have developed.
Almost certainly, you were told that your instruction should match your students’ styles. For example, kinesthetic learners—students who learn best through hands-on activities—are said to do better in classes that feature plenty of experiments, while verbal learners are said to do worse.
Continue reading ‘Learning styles gets academic attention’
Over on Kitchen Table Math the contributor who identifies himself as SteveH has a delightful post about some new test results. Here’s the lead:
Recent testing has shown improvement in shoe tying by fourth and eighth graders over the past two years, although the growth has been stagnant in some districts. Urban school activists, however, can be encouraged by the statistical improvement in areas with populations of 250,000 or more. This continues an upward trend that started 6 years ago when this testing began.
Jump over to Testing Shows Improvement in Shoe Tying.
Bob Dixon, an instructional designer who can run circles around just every other instructional designer whom I know, has initiated a service to which I want to refer readers: instructionalsolutions.blogspot.com. Here’s his explanation:
I’ve been reading posts about dyslexia, reading disabilities, learning disabilities, autism, and such. Many courageous people are fighting battles on large fronts on behalf of students so labeled. Here and there in these discussions, however, I see a relatively specific question about a specific problem a real student is having right now with some specific task. Such questions often get responses that are far too general to address the specific question identified. That seems to me like a small gap in the discussions that could possibly be closed. I’m going to give that a shot, using a blog in a sort of “backward” fashion. I’m hoping that parents, teachers—anyone, really—will post very specific, concrete problems on the blog. If a student is having a severe spelling problem, for example, list what the words should be and what the student wrote. If a students appears to be “dyslexic,” give a sentence and tell exactly what the student says when reading that sentence. If a student doesn’t have a clue about the first step in a simple geometric proof, post the proof and say the student writes absolutely nothing for the first or second step. If the student can’t remember a list of anything, provide the list and describe how the student studies it and what happens. You try the offered solutions and report back on their relative success.
An editorial in the Des Moines (IA, US) Register makes the case that students’ learning outcomes should be employed in the evaluation of teachers’ effectiveness. The focus of the editorial is (of course) local to the state of Iowa, but the implications are relevant for many other geographic regions and governmental entities.
When West Des Moines teachers are evaluated, their students’ progress on standardized tests doesn’t affect their ratings. It may be part of the conversation, but that’s about it. “It’s not something commonly done in Iowa,” said Superintendent Tom Narak.
But the Iowa Legislature should require it.
Today’s students have to be able to compete in a global economy. The role of teachers in the 21st century matters more than ever before. Schools should identify those who improve student achievement, and those who don’
Link to “ Use student achievement to measure teachers.” The editorial writer refers to the McKinsey report on education.
Over on Children of the Code David Boulton published a transcript of an interview with Siegfried Engelmann, the primary force behind the development of the Direct Instruction methods. In “Instructional Design 101: Learn from the Learners!,” which provides only part of the material that CoC will publish, Mr. Boulton asked Mr. Engelmann a wide range of questions and recorded his answers.
Engelmann recounts how he entered education, how he came to develop scripts, and lots more. Also, there are insightful anecdotes. For example, in one segment Mr. Engelmann recounts a story about the development of the Corrective Reading Program.
Continue reading ‘Engelmann interview on instructional design’
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