Society for Quality Education

Volume 18, Number 3. September 2009. ISSN-1201-215

FROM THE PRESIDENT

The Society for Quality Education is dedicated to arming parents and teachers with information about good teaching methods and materials and new education discoveries. As always, this newsletter contains a great deal of useful information and lots of teaching tips. If you have a question about something in this issue or if you would like information about a particular topic to appear in a future newsletter, click here.

The Society for Quality Education is one of the few Canadian groups that speak on behalf of people like you. If you find our information helpful, please consider a donation. We are not a government organization. We do not receive any public funding. Instead, we rely on the voluntary support of people who want to help us help others.

If you think that one of the articles in this issue would be of interest to someone you know, you can forward the newsletter by clicking here.

Regards, Malkin Dare

PS Of interest only to those who asked for information about Frolicking with Phonics: The company that holds FWP would like to solicit your feedback on the program. We would have to let them know your e-mail address. If you would prefer not to be contacted by e-mail, click here.

MAIL BAG

Ontario High School Graduation Statistics

In Ontario, it has become firm policy, via such means as credit recovery, that failing students should be required to do the absolute minimum to regain a lost credit. For example, a program termed "Over the Top Co-op" allows students who are short a few credits to get a paying job, use it for a co-op placement, and get paid with credits as well as their wages until they graduate from high school. You didn't think we'd get the provincial graduation rate up to 85% without a drop in quality, did you? Bowmanville, ON

Assistive Technology

In your last newsletter, Aunt Malkin advised against the use of assistive technology for students who struggle in school. The reality is that technology is already a very big part of our children's lives and is already "surgically attached" to just about every pre-teen and teenager at my daughter's high school. While technology doesn't teach these kids the core literacy and numeracy skills they need to be successful, it does provide a bridge that allows them to access the curriculum. Without the use of technology to bypass their deficits, many kids get stuck on the mechanics of things like note-taking or number crunching - and then miss the lesson being delivered. For many kids, technology levels the playing field and, in the best-case scenario, gives them the time they need to catch up on their skills. In the worst-case scenario, it at least allows them to get through our flawed school system with some dignity and self-esteem. Please don't discount the amazing things technology is doing for the many kids who desperately need it. It is a tool with the potential to tear down barriers to successful learning. Burlington, ON

Weak Graphomotor Skills

Further to the question in your last newsletter about weak graphomotor skills, wouldn't it be beneficial to find out why the student is at the 5th percentile? I'm supportive of your hard work/purposeful practice advice, as it's obviously superior to the laissez-faire approach used in most schools. However, assuming there is substance to the "fixed ability" point of view, how do we know when someone has "peaked out"? Toronto, ON

Special Education

In Ontario, school boards receive their special education funding strictly on the basis of enrolment, and not on the basis of students with identified special needs. Furthermore, the special education money is not tied to specific students, but rather just goes into general revenues. As a result, there is no financial incentive for educators to identify students as having special needs and no incentive to provide appropriate specialized instruction. Even if a student is "identified" through the IPRC process, often he or she receives nothing different in the way of services. Radical inclusion, that is including everyone in the regular class based on chronological age, is the norm. Hamilton, ON

Nature/Nurture

In your last newsletter, you printed an excerpt from Dan Willingham's book (which should indeed be on the desk of every school teacher in the world) which states that working memory is a crucial component of intelligence and that it can't be changed by practice. In another chapter, Willingham all but denies that genetic heritage influences IQ, citing the Flynn effect, even though this effect is not understood at all. No sensible person would deny that there are lots of brilliant people who never amount to much and whose brainpower is largely wasted. Furthermore, everyone - irrespective of IQ - has to work hard to make his or her mark. But the question is: what kind of a mark? You don't have to be a genius to make a lot of money or become a celebrity. But to pretend that we can all become Richard Feynmans if we work hard enough is just plain nonsense. Back in the days when most parents had several children, the nurture argument carried a lot less force. When your own children display radically-varying mental abilities - despite your best efforts to treat them impartially - you begin to understand how much is hard-wired in at conception. England

ASK AUNT MALKIN

A veteran of the school wars herself, with the scars to prove it, Malkin Dare always has lots of advice to offer. If you want some been-there-done-that advice from Aunt Malkin, call her at 519-884-3166 or e-mail her.

Question

After a great start at a Montessori school, my son attended a good private school for grades 1-3, but then that school disappeared in an ugly way. My husband and I managed to find another good private school for his grade 4 year, but now this school has closed as well. We have identified another small and affordable private school for grade 5, but we're nervous and want to learn about alternatives in the publicly-funded system just in case. I'm confident my son would quality as "gifted", but I'm wondering whether the gifted programs in publicly-funded schools are academically strong. I'm also worried that they might be elitist. Do you know of any publicly-funded schools in my area that have strong academic programs? Rodica, Toronto

Answer

Your best bet is to check out the alternative middle schools, like Delta, Spectrum, Horizon, and Quest, which are very academically challenging. They are not "gifted" programs because no IQ testing is required. They are billed as being for "highly-motivated students", and rightly so, because they depend a lot on students having reasonable organizational skills and ability to follow through on assignments with minimal supervision.

The gifted programs tend not to be elitist, since the criteria for admission depend primarily on the results of an IQ test. However, there are very long wait lists for children needing any kind of assessment, even in very high-needs cases. There is a two-week period in November every year set aside for screening students for the gifted program, but that depends on teacher recommendation. There is a process to follow, and it would take quite a while to get your son in the queue if he were new to the school board. A problem with the gifted programs, however, is that they tend to be very constructivist (based on the concept that children construct their own learning by reflecting on their personal experiences). Of course, there is a benefit to going to school with other bright and motivated students, since regular classes may include a number of kids who are unable to do the work, as well as kids with moderate to severe behavioural or cognitive challenges. However, the gifted program is not advanced, since the school board does not believe in an "advancement" model of gifted education but rather an "enrichment" model. The emphasis is on problem-solving and higher-level thinking skills.

There is also an elementary International Baccalaureate (IB) program at a couple of schools. These would be worth checking out. Admission to the IB program is merit-based, but admission to the other programs is by lottery. More information about the various programs is available here.

I wish I could tell you about other options - like trying to sneak a common-sense pill into educators' thermoses. Unfortunately, science has not yet found a cure for child-centred learning.

Regards, Aunt Malkin

SOCIETY ACTIVITIES

We had so many requests to post a blog on our web-site that we have decided to start one. Cleverly named School for Thought, our new blog contains up-to-the-minute education news, hot teaching tips, and punchy commentary. Be sure to add it to your favourites and tell all your friends and relations about it!

Coming soon - Sunshine on Schools - an exciting new initiative to be unveiled VERY shortly. Watch for it.

We have revamped our web-site. Besides the very popular Stairway to Reading and Stairway to Math remedial programs, our web-site contains a wealth of free information and resources for parents and teachers. Come and take a look.

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

Exorcising Learning Disabilities

For several centuries, it was widely believed - on the basis of absolutely no evidence whatsoever - that there was such a thing as a witch. The belief was so strong that it led to the agonizing deaths of thousands of innocent men and women. Nowadays, of course, we laugh at our ancestors for being so gullible.

However, it is worth thinking about why the notion of witches took hold so firmly despite its flimsy basis. What purpose did it serve? One possibility is that, in a time of superstition, witches served as convenient scapegoats. They could be blamed for all kinds of upsetting events - bad weather, crop failure, illness, and so on. As well, the fear of being accused acted as a whip to keep citizens within societal norms. The Christian churches undoubtedly had an easier time keeping their flock in line as a result.

The concept of learning disabilities is a modern-day belief system with a number of parallels to witchery. Like witchery, there is zero evidence that learning disabilities exist. The most sophisticated brain imaging has turned up no differences. There is no clear cut-off mark along the continuum of learning difficulty. There is no test that can distinguish among "learning-disabled" students and those who are struggling because they have been badly taught.

Like witchery, the concept of learning disabilities serves a purpose. It absolves educators of blame - since teachers can't possibly be expected to overcome a defective brain. It absolves parents of guilt, since their children's problems are ascribed to nature as opposed to nurture. And it even absolves the students, who might otherwise be deemed slow or lazy.

Also like witchery is the fact that learning disabilities have negative consequences. While its victims are not burnt at the stake, it is probably safe to say that many of their hopes and dreams are sacrificed on the altar of learning disabilities. Telling children that less is expected of them because they have a learning disability makes it far less likely that they will work hard to overcome their areas of weakness and achieve their goals. After all, their diagnosis makes them believe they have a built-in ceiling on what they can accomplish. Similarly, their parents and teachers lower their own expectations.

Yet virtually all students can learn virtually anything to a very high level. Every child should be encouraged to reach for the stars!

In light of the fact that, despite many years of searching, researchers have been unable to isolate any indicators of learning disabilities, then perhaps it is time educators stopped wasting their time applying labels and started spending their time trying to teach more effectively.

WHAT'S NEW?

School for Thought, our brand new blog, contains up-to-the-minute education news.

BOOKS OF INTEREST

The Beautiful Tree: A personal journal into how the world's poorest people are educating themselves - James Tooley

In this book, the author lyrically relates the story of how he discovered that the slums of cities in Africa, India, and China were overflowing with small, parent-funded schools. He learned that tens of thousands of poor parents are sending their children to these schools because their educational quality was much higher than that offered in the government's schools. Dr. Tooley realized on reflection that this phenomenon was not all that surprising, since the parent-funded schools are mostly businesses that depend on tuition fees to survive and thus are directly accountable to their parents. While the international aid agencies are counselling the poor to wait patiently while work progresses on improving the appalling public education offered by their government, the poor have taken matters into their own hands. The excerpt elaborates on the resourcefulness of poor parents and hints at the relevance of their solutions to current efforts to improve public education in developed countries.

Excerpt (pp. 268-269)

"Perhaps the evidence accumulated throughout this book suggests that their [proponents of education vouchers] more radical departure might be the more sensible approach for America, and by extension for other countries in the West too. For what we are seeing in Africa and Asia, in effect, is a grassroots privatization of education. This evidence raises the possibility that we may not be too radical but rather too cautious if we look only to state intervention through vouchers to assist the disadvantaged in the West too. The poor in Asia and Africa don't sit idly by, dispossessed and disenfranchised - adjectives used by the liberal elite to describe the disadvantaged in America - acquiescent in their government's failure until outsiders step in to improve their lot. Instead, some of the most disadvantaged people on this planet engage in 'self-help', vote with their feet, exit the public schools, and move their children to private schools set up by educational entrepreneurs from their own communities to cater to their needs, without any outside help. Could it be that the government intervention we take for granted in America and the West crowds out parallel educational enterprise that could help the poor help themselves, as they are doing in places like Kenya and India? Could it be that real privatization could emerge in the same way that it has emerged in developing countries, from the bottom up?"

What Intelligence Tests Miss: The psychology of rational thought - Keith Stanovich

The author, a professor at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE), argues that IQ tests are severely incomplete as measures of cognitive functioning, since they fail to assess such things as the ability to make decisions that further one's goals or form beliefs that correspond to reality. Rational thinking is crucial to good planning, risk and probability judgment, and effective decision-making. Importantly, there are preliminary indications that rational thinking - unlike IQ - can be taught to a significant extent. Yet our society continues to focus on IQ in preference to reasoning strategies that could transform our world. The excerpt discusses a common error in dealing with probabilities.

Excerpt (p. 148)

"An additional error in dealing with probabilities - one with implications for real-life decision making - is the inverting of conditional probabilities. The inversion error in probabilistic reasoning is thinking that the probability of A, given B, is the same as the probability of B, given A. The two are not the same, yet they are frequently treated as if they are. For example, Robyn Dawes described an article in a California newspaper that had a headline implying that a survey indicated that use of marijuana led to the use of hard drugs. The headline implied that the survey was about the probability of a student's using hard drugs, given previous smoking of marijuana, but actually, the article was about the inverse probability: the probability of having smoked marijuana, given that the student was using hard drugs. The problem is that the two probabilities are vastly different. The probability that students use hard drugs, given that they have smoked marijuana, is much, much smaller than the probability of having smoked marijuana given that students are using hard drugs. The reason is that most people who smoke marijuana do not use hard drugs, but most people who use hard drugs have tried marijuana."

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