SCHOOL FOR THOUGHT

Competition in Education—The Last Sacred Cow

The National Post kindly printed my letter in response to this article which reports on the mediocre Ontario provincial test results. The article quotes Peter Cowley of the Fraser Institute’s famous school comparison reports. 

Cowley calls on schools to be run more like businesses:

“‘Competition’ is a word you never use when talking about education because once you use the word competition, people stop listening to you—which is odd since one of the first things you see when you walk into a school is the trophy case,“ said Mr. Cowley, author of the education handbook” The Parent’s Guide”.

Mr. Cowley advised educators to seek out successful school models and replicate them in the same way successful businesses replicate themselves.

“In some areas, the replication of a successful school is exactly like the replication of a successful coffee shop: You figure out what works.“

A Bottomless Pit

So the Ontario premier finds it “unacceptable” that Ontario parents are having to fundraise so that their children’s schools can buy essential supplies such as textbooks. (As an aside, it’s quite amazing that he made this announcement solely in reaction to a report from his pals at People for Education. We wish we had that kind of influence when we ask for things like the use of proven teaching methods and good standardized tests.) 

And if you are wondering why the schools don’t have enough money to buy essential supplies, given the fact that the province has increased their total funding from $16,257,066,889 in 2003 to $20,790,348,435 in 2009 (an increase of almost 28%), then we refer you to this CBC news story about how the Toronto District School Board just spent $125,000 on a “conference” at the Air Canada Centre where their employees enjoyed performances by, among others, teenage jazz singer Nikki Yanofsky and the Canadian Tenors. That $125,000 would have bought an awful lot of textbooks!

The Golden Mean

Here’s an interesting video from the 40’s that explains the thinking behind “progressive” education trends. Of course, it’s impossible to tell from the little bit shown, but it looks as if schooling in the 40’s probably struck the right balance between traditional methods and progressive methods. No one could have predicted, however, that educators would have gone to such extremes as they have today. One gets the feeling that the main proponent of progressive methods, John Dewey, would have been appalled if he could have foreseen where his ideas would lead.

If Taught Properly

Further to yesterday’s posting, Ontario’s premier is now saying that Ontario set the bar too high and that it is unreasonable to expect 75% of the province’s students to be able to master the curriculum for their grade. 

Here’s what the ever-popular George Bush had to say on this topic. “Some say it is unfair to hold disadvantaged children to rigorous standards. I say it is discrimination to require anything less - the soft bigotry of low expectations. Some say that schools can’t be expected to teach, because there are too many broken families, too many immigrants, too much diversity. I say that pigment and poverty need not determine performance. That myth is disproved by good schools every day. Excuse-making must end before learning can begin.“

As a reading tutor, I know that virtually every child can learn to read at grade level, if taught properly. John Mighton over at JUMP says the same thing about math. Three very important words.

Something Is Fishy in the State of Denmark (Apologies to Mr. Shakespeare)

Today, Ontario’s Education Quality and Accountability Office released the results of the 2010 Grade 3, 6, and 9 testing. In general, a higher percentage of students is meeting the provincial standard, but the pattern is kind of strange. The students were tested in reading, writing, and math in grades 3 and 6, and in math in grade 9. Improvement was shown over a five-year period in every category except grade 3 reading and grade 6 math. Does anyone have an explanation as to how, for example, grade 3 students can get better at math, grade 6 students get worse, and then grade 9 students get better? This isn’t the way things normally work!

Kids Say The Darnedest Things!

Here’s a little joke for you. Or is it?

The little boy was getting poor marks in school. One day he said to his teacher, “I don’t want to scare you, but my daddy says that if I don’t start learning more, somebody is going to get a spanking.“ 

Only the Shadow Knows For Sure

Here’s an interesting report on what’s happening to class sizes in the US. In a nutshell, a few years back it was fashionable to mandate smaller class sizes. Sadly, student achievement has not improved as a result but the reduced class sizes have been continued because they are very popular with parents/voters. Now, however, the huge and continuing expense of smaller classes is starting to bite, and many jurisdictions are no longer able to afford to maintain their class size reductions. It will be very interesting to see what happens as a result. Will student achievement fall? Will parents/voters express their displeasure at the ballot box? Will Ontario abandon its own class reduction initiative? Stay tuned for the next exciting episode.

A Conversion on the Road to Damascus?

This new policy paper from the Ontario Ministry of Education means that the province’s teachers are now allowed to penalize students who hand in their assignments late or not at all. This is a definite reversal of the Ministry’s trend towards ever more “progressive” policies. Is it possible that it signals a change in overall direction? We live in hope!

Eat Sleep Work Move

In today’s fast-paced world, kids seldom get enough sleep - and there are serious consequences, according to this article: depression, obesity, car accidents, and low grades to name a few. So perhaps bus pick-up times of 7:00 am are not such a good idea.

Another interesting article outlines some sensible things that can be done to improve student performance, above and beyond good teaching and curriculum. They are:

• Cultivation of the attitude that brain function can be improved by determination and hard work
• At least eight or nine hours of sleep every night (a theme may be emerging here)
• A high-protein breakfast
• Daily exercise

Basically, kids should just listen to their moms. But we already knew that…...

Spelling It Out

Do spelling and punctuation errors get you down? Then maybe you should join the Typo Eradication Advancement League. But beware! The intrepid members of this organization have been warned to "keep walking or they would make sure we didn't walk again". They have also been fined $3,000 and banned from speaking publicly about fixing typos. It seems that pointing out spelling and punctuation errors can be bad for your health and your pocketbook!

Since apostrophes seem particularly prone to abuse, here's a link to an excellent site called "The Care and Feeding of Apostrophes". And when it comes to spelling, we have a number of excellent articles in our newsletter archives (scroll down to Spelling).