After reading about some of the possibilities, I can see the greater good in revising how we "do" high school. As Marc Prensky put it in his article Shaping Tech for the Classroom, "A big effort? Absolutely. But our kids deserve no less." It isn't that there are just a lot of aspects to be considered and overhauled, it's taking a look at the entire picture of what a high school currently is and does.
As an educator, there is a fear of criticism from not only parents but also administrators. How can you "act radically" and try to begin the movement and still keep your job? For me, it is easier to make small changes withing my own classroom and speak up when the opportunity arises, than to create the "big wave", and as the articles pointed out, these small changes don't really add up over time but more or less just end up back at the start.
A couple of ideas that would be wonderful to put into place were, specialized academic plans for each student, student advisors that stayed with them all four years, and also offering an advisory period each day where students can gather. It is said that students will do better socially, emotionally and academically, when they are invested and involved. How else do we as humans become invested other than by building relationships with others and for students, that's with their peers and teachers.
From a student perspective, it would take some getting used to. Because learning so often involves memorizing a set of facts, when you ask students to be creative and respond in general to something, they have no idea where to begin. I can remember from my own high school education that there were some projects that now as a teacher I would have thought were a great way to assess the students learning. I would have been excited to implement such an assessment, but as a student who had never really experienced demonstrating learning in ways other than a "traditional" test, I did not even no where to begin.
In conclusion, I don't have one. The possibilities seem endless and yet overwhelming. Where do we even begin? How can we take the research that has been done, the opinions that abound, the wonderful ideas, the examples we have been shown, and design an educational system that truly prepares our citizens for at least today and hopefully tomorrow.
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Hi Rebekah- I agreed with you and the small change vs.big wave. Change is good but all at once can overwhelming for all. My son attends Ellsworth High School. For the last 5 or so years, they have had assigned advisors for students and have what they call a guided study with their advisors. It has been well received and great for kids. You're right... where do we begin, especially in these times with budget woes.
ReplyDeleteI wonder if the small changes would work if you remembered where you began. Or maybe each semester make one change and help spread the word of change to other teachers so eventually you are reshaping the whole school without making a "big wave" and jeopardizing you job. My school does an academic adviser group where we have the same group all four years, twice a week for 15 minutes. Although this seems to be a good idea at times it is hard because we only have them for 15 minutes and by the time students come in we have less than that and also getting things done in that amount of time is challenging. One thing that was hard for me when I started teaching I got the my group as sophomores and spent the year trying to learn about them and figuring out what I was suppose to do with my group.
ReplyDeleteMy school meets weekly (15 minutes) with students in an advisory group that we have for four years. I understand the correlation between having a positive adult relationship and students succeeding but in our current system, they happen infrequently with a population of our students. I often think that the teachers who are good at developing relationships with their students would do this without a weekly advisory period. The same could be said for teachers who don't connect particularly well with their students.
ReplyDeleteI guess what I am saying is that at times, this need for a connection with students seems forced and that the time being used for advisory could be used more effectively.
As far as how to fix this, I like the idea of a guided study with an advisory group. Also, possibly meeting more would move advisory along as well.
I liked your comment on how much work revising education is, but that our kids deserve it. Sometimes we lose sight of what we are doing (the big picture) and why. Reading "Curriculum 21" and hearing about how the whole foundation for how we teach is schools was not even developed with kids in mind is shocking. I knew we had some issues, but I didn't know how deep they went!
ReplyDeleteKeep up the good work it sounds like you're doing in your classroom. Eventually everything else will get caught up. Never forget WHY you do what you do everyday.
I like the idea of a series of small changes, because they are doable and really, after awhile, they can add up to significant differences.Heidi Hayes Jacobs seems to be in favor of making small changes on a regular basis, and I like that she calls it 'growth' . While endless references to 'school reform', can be dry and depressing, I connect with the idea of growth. I hope to continue growing, it sounds and feels healthy! Extreme and sudden change is scary and disruptive, but It is so much less intimidating to think, well, I will integrate one more aspect of technology into each unit this year, instead of thinking that each unit should be digitalized to the teeth. One change I think I will make this trimester is that I will give oral feedback via an MP4 recording to student essays. I only have 4 essays to respond to, so it makes it really doable. Might be harder for someone with 60 students! Also, I can have students submit their work electronically, which may not be a possibility for all. Anyways, I think growth at a reasonable and continuous pace is good.
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