SCHOOL FOR THOUGHT

Reform School

As the world waits breathlessly to hear whether the Ontario government is really going to insist on zero pay increases for its teachers, it’s worth taking a look at what is going on in Colorado’s Harrison School District. If you click here, you can read a little bit about the district’s pay-for-performance plan and watch a short clip about how the superintendent thinks it important to align teacher compensation with quality instruction, professional development, student achievement, the evaluation process and so on. A detailed report on the Harrison plan can be downloaded, but the Reader’s Digest version is that teachers are paid for performance, and the grid has been abolished. It’s early days, but so far the students appear to be doing well: The district’s most recent average ACT scores were up one full point over the previous year, and one elementary school’s third grade scored 100% proficient on Colorado’s state reading test.

What’s Bugging Me Today

Guest Blog by Nancy Wagner, SQE Treasurer

Last Friday, I went to see The Hunger Games with my daughter and daughter-in-law. I didn’t know much about it, but a movie always sounds good to me. For those living on another planet like me, this is the movie version of the first book in a hugely-popular series aimed at teens. 

Briefly, the story concerns 24 children, ages 12-18, who have to compete to the death as penance for a long-ago uprising against the government. Only one child is to be left alive, and is then showered with riches. I have to say I thought the movie was well done and well acted, but not for the faint of heart.

As we were leaving for the 1 pm show, my daughter mentioned that her friend’s son was going to see this movie with his class. He is 12, in grade 7. She thought he was a little young to be seeing this particular flick. When we got to the theatre, there were four yellow elementary school buses pulling away. After viewing this show, I cannot begin to figure how this movie could have benefitted this age group. Watching 12-18 year-olds hunt down and kill each other doesn’t seem to have a tie-in with the curriculum as far as I can see!

The next morning, over coffee with friends, several of whom are teachers, I was told that for several schools, grades 5-7 attended this movie. I pointed out that the rating is PG-13 and was told that written permission was obtained (this is true for all field trips anyway). We talked about what possible lessons could be learned from the story and one teacher suggested that it could prompt a good discussion around bullying. However, since many of the children in the movie were enjoying their “hunt” I don’t see how this would be possible. Besides, the story is not about bullying, it is about killing. Another teacher noted that even though year after year there is more and more discussion around bullying, the bullying situation, in her opinion, has only gotten worse.

So why were so many students given half a Friday off for this? They certainly didn’t need a break from school - they had just returned after a 10-day holiday.

Sunday at the Movies (US Round-Up)

Here’s a short clip featuring our old friend Bob Bowdon, who gives a quick overview of educational action in the US and then highlights two important stories. The first concerns a Seattle study which found that African-born black students were doing significantly better than American-born black students, suggesting that the roots of the black/white achievement gap are cultural, not racial. The second concerns an attack on charter schools in New York, which was jointly launched by one of the teachers’ unions and the NAACP. This would seen somewhat incongruous on the face of it, since the NAACP is supposed to be working for the benefit of black Americans - yet the charter schools in question were serving (and serving well) mostly disadvantaged black kids. It then was learned that the NAACP was on the payroll of the teachers’ union, suggesting that the NAACP cares more about money than it does about the welfare of the black students in the charter schools. YouTube link.  H/T A/S

Cui bono?

A recent comment to Math, Math, and More Math got me thinking. Mr. Wainscotting challenges us to try to figure out who has the most to gain from the bad math programs used in schools - the unions? the school boards? the faculties of education? the publishers? It’s a really good question, and I don’t have the answer.

Of course, there’s always the possibility that the bad math programs persist because of inertia, but I doubt this - because none of the usual suspects is a shrinking violet and so they would surely be speaking up if they didn’t like having bad math programs. So, I think we can conclude that all four suspects like the programs and benefit from them in some way.

Same thing goes for ideological conviction, by the way - there aren’t a whole lot of people who will follow their ideological convictions even though it means sacrificing their personal well-being.

So, back to Mr. Wainscotting’s question. I propose that we start a conversation and together try to tease out the truth here. Let’s take the four suspects one by one.

The unions:  Bad math programs generate more special education students requiring smaller classes = more union members

The school boards:  Bad math programs generate more special education students requiring smaller classes = more and bigger hierarchies

The faculties of education:  Bad math programs generate more special education students requiring more specially trained teachers = more professional development opportunities

The publishers:  Bad math programs generate parental discontent = need to constantly publish new teaching materials

Which of these has the most to gain? What have I forgotten? Let’s think this through together.

Walk the walk, not talk the talk

Parents for Learning is offering this webinar designed to help parents and teachers understand which kinds of parental involvement matter most and what they can do to promote important parental involvement.

This is all very fine, but the problem is that most public education systems have a number of very powerful built-in factors that militate against parental involvement - and these factors figure to swamp any well-meaning efforts such as the one attempted by Parents for Learning. Here’s an old School for Thought blog that lays out this problem. 

And here’s an article from our newsletter archives that shows what schools could be doing if they were really serious about fostering parental involvement.

Math, Math, and More Math

Seems that the math problems plaguing our schools are not going away anytime soon. WISE Math and the Macleans article that Malkin previously posted on have turned a few heads in the media. 

The Fraser Report Card on Secondary Schools will be released in the next few weeks. Surprise. Math doesn’t get any better in high school. The reason? Well, SQE thinks it is the poor foundation that is laid in elementary school.

At the risk of sounding like the broken record, I dug out some gems from our newsletter archives on why the problems persist and what needs to happen. In A Bogus Dichotomy a math professor argues that basic skills go hand in hand with conceptual understanding and you can’t have the latter without the former.  Long time SQE supporters will recognize Charles Ledgers’ Spirit of Math drills that we wrote about decades ago along with JUMP math, another useful program to instill fundamental skills.

In the meantime, don’t forget our free Stairway to Math worksheets. Practice makes perfect.

As usual, the footsoldiers feel the pain, while the officers go unscathed

According to this Toronto Star story, the Toronto District School Board is facing an $85 million dollar deficit. As a result, board staff are recommending that 803 positions be cut - 430 educational assistants, 200 high school teachers, 134 school secretaries, and 39 vice-principals. Does anyone other than me find it strange that not one consultant or board administrator is on the list?

Here’s an idea! Toronto might take a look at Edmonton which moved the responsibility for administrative services down to the schools and let them decide what they needed. Here’s an article from our archives that explains how it works.

It all adds up to the wrong answer

We have previously mentioned the math problems arising from the new programs that emphasize understanding over skill. Here’s a recent article in the Toronto Sun on this topic (quoting Doretta), and there has been a lot of other coverage, including a cover story in Maclean’s Magazine. 

An alert reader in Oakville sent us this link. You have to hand it to the Hamilton-Wentworth Catholic District School Board - they are listening! In response to parental frustration with their new math programs, the board is offering SuccessMaker: an adaptive online math program for parents - so they can learn the new math programs themselves and then support their own children. The course will take a minimum of eight weeks, 20 minutes four times a day. 

An alternative, of course, would be to offer math programs that are effective and accessible to parents, but that would probably break Ontario laws. At a minimum, the use of such programs would handicap its students on the provincial tests. H/T HH

Keep your eye on Louisiana

Unrelated to today’s blog, but of interest nevertheless - School for Thought has just gone over the 2,000,000 hits mark. Thanks for reading.

Today’s video is an impassioned plea from the governor of Louisiana last week to a legislative committee considering three landmark education reform bills. It’s worth watching, because it reminds us (if we had forgotten) how high the stakes are. The bills in question are progressing rapidly through the Louisiana legislature, and it looks as if they will all be successful. More here, including information about the inevitable teacher union opposition. YouTube link

Sunday at the Movies (A remarkable teacher)

If you click here, you’ll access a heart-warming antidote to Friday’s video. H/T LDA