Proof in the Pudding

I saw this invigorating, inspiring post today from The Libertarian Homeschooler:

Some Things I Wish I Had Understood When I Started Homeschooling

1. Lessons do not equal learning.

2. Curriculum does not trump real work.

3. My expectations about "who our children will be and what our children will do" need to sit down and shut up.

4. Most veteran homeschoolers don't do sit-down lessons until the child is six or older.

5. Some veteran homeschoolers don't do parent-initiated lessons.

6. Some children don't read until they're 10. Others, 13. And then they pick up and are reading at the same level as their been-reading-since-kindergarten peers. Without intervention.

7. The years we did book learning like mad, our son tested really well. The years we did no book learning at all, our son tested better. Don't put much stock in book learning or testing.

8. No lesson, no video, no book, no class can substitute for a curious parent who is with her child and asking questions, exploring, reading aloud, making messes, making mistakes, facilitating, doing intellectual match-making, and explaining stuff. There's no substitute.

9. You must spend a lot of time with your child every day, intentionally, and open-heartedly.

10. If you focus on understanding the child's needs and capacities everything else will fall into place. Until you understand the child you have in front of you, nothing will fall into place and you'll keep going from thing to thing to thing. 

To Each Their Own Interests

One of the things I struggled with as a teacher was what material to teach. Probably many secondary (middle and high school) teachers struggle with this issue.

I imagine it would be even more difficult to determine what students should learn, especially millions of students. My classes were a mere 20-30 students and there was incredible variation in interests and personalities among them.

The reason I struggled so much with what to teach is because research proves (and I strongly believe) that learning happens best when kids are interested and engaged. It is highly unlikely that any single book will be interesting and engaging to all students in a classroom, even if there are only 20. So how can a rigid set of standards apply to millions of unique individuals who happen to be the same age?

How is it that someone with an advanced degree can determine exactly what millions of children should know at any given point in time? I believe that a second grader interested in dinosaurs should be able to pursue that. And a fourth grader interested in ecosystems should be able to explore that. But with standardization, students aren't allowed to explore their own interests in the name of "college and career readiness."

How Many People Does it Take?

How many people should be responsible for writing the standards that millions of children will be expected to learn? What kinds of credentials should they have?

A mere TWO people wrote the language arts standards of the new Common Core. There was a third person that was consulted. The content that millions of teachers are now required to teach and that even more students are required to learn rests on two (and a half) individuals. But it's ok, because those two individuals are probably highly qualified, right?

David Coleman is perhaps the more notorious creator of the Common Core language arts standards. After graduating from Yale, he studied English literature at Oxford University and classical philosophy at Cambridge University. Not too shabby. Then, he applied for a high school teaching position in New York.... and was turned down. Instead, he began work with a large consulting firm, advising urban school districts. He has never been a teacher and has no educational training whatsoever. But wait, advising urban schools must count for something, right? Sure, but that is the business/administration side of schools and has little to do with instruction.

Anyone writing an educational standard should have some sort of education training and/or experience. Understanding how kids learn is important to creating standards. Incidentally, I left public education due to my interest in neuroscience. We have made leaps and bounds in brain research in the last 30 years but this amazing stuff has been ignored by public education. It is so incredibly frustrating to see schools doing the opposite of what research proves to be effective. Perhaps if the people who wrote the standards had some knowledge of teaching and how kids learn, their standards wouldn't ignore proven research.

Happy Birthday to William Kamkwamba

One of my favorite books and stories is the autobiographic novel The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind. It is the story of a 14-year-old kid who built a windmill literally from trash, thereby bringing electricity to his African village for the first time. The author and innovative windmill builder is William Kamkwamba. The book is also available as a children's book. Here is the website for more information.

I love William's story for many reasons, one of which I'll focus on here. I like to see people succeed. As a teacher, helping others succeed is what I strove to do, even though schools make failure more possible. Shouldn't success outside of school translate to success in school and vice versa? The intention of public education, after all, is to prepare kids for life outside of school.

The reason William was able to build the windmill was because his parents couldn't afford his school fees and so instead of school, he went to the library and checked out books related to his interest in science and mechanics. Often times, kids do their best work outside of school, or in spite of school. A particular thing that comes to mind is coding/programming games. I would love to see schools who enable kids to follow their passions and build their own metaphorical windmills.

Places of Learning?

If schools are truly places of learning, then a child shouldn't be "good at" or "bad at" school. Every child has the capacity to learn and usually the eagerness, too, until school takes it away. The very idea that one can be "bad at" school means there is something going on besides learning. Being inherently "bad" at learning is impossible. Sure, we all learn at different paces and in different ways. But the fact remains that we can all learn, and we all do learn, one way or another. 

Perhaps public school only caters to certain types of learning, or only allows certain types of learning. This is especially true with NCLB and now Common Core, which have all but done away with hands-on learning of any kind. Hands-on education is less testable, or at least less directly testable. It's much easier to shove a story in front of a kid and have him answer the questions that go with it. Cheaper, too. 

To Each Their Own Pace

"A child who is miserable with a curriculum is not 'learning' a whole lot. As for what they're 'supposed to' learn and when they're 'supposed to' learn it, I think they pull this stuff out of a hat and call it good. It has nothing to do with how children learn and what will serve each individual the best. It's about pushing the meat through the grinder. A numbers game. We find that we do better without adhering to a standard scope and sequence because we're tailoring the education to the individual."

~The Libertarian Homeschooler


Standards, by definition, are NOT individualized. Teachers are encouraged to differentiate instruction to meet all children's needs, but in a classroom of 30 or more, that is utterly impossible. 

A standard suggests that there is a specific concept that a child should have mastered at a specific point in time. But why? Why is it so important that a child master any given concept at a particular age? If you have children, think about this. At what age did each child learn to walk and talk? Probably it was different for each kid. So then, why can't each kid master concepts and skills at his own pace throughout his school days? Why must we have deadlines for mastery?

I've heard a story of an unschooled kid who was slow to begin reading. Suddenly, at age nine, he blossomed and couldn't stop reading. By public school standards, he would have been labeled with any variety of (often negative) terms used for kids who have not achieved mastery by an arbitrary set date. He likely would have been placed in remedial reading classes under the Special Education umbrella, where kids who enter rarely leave. 

Strict and arbitrary standards are not healthy for kids. I say let kids learn what they want when they want, because, why not? 

A Letter to Students

Dear Students of Public Education,

I’m sorry. I’m sorry for all of the problems that you have to endure thanks to NCLB on steroids. I’m sorry that your generation is being cheated out of a quality education.

I’m sorry that you are looked at as a number and treated as a test score by the powers that be. Please know that your teacher does not see you that way. 

I’m sorry that our Congress members seem to think it’s necessary to spend more on prisoners than on you. Know that this is part of a larger systemic problem that has nothing to do with you. Unfortunately, you still get left with schools operating on shoestring budgets. But hey, at least it’s better than third world countries, right?

I’m terribly sorry if you’ve ever been made to feel stupid at school. This thought brings tears to my eyes. Test scores can only tell us a fraction of how smart you are. Know that many people are simply not good test takers and this in no way means you are dumb. Grades, too, are a poor indicator of intelligence. Some of the smartest folks did poorly in school and went on to become very successful adults. 

Most of all, I’m sorry that school has been stripped of excitement and passion for you. Some of you are lucky enough to have veteran teachers with a few tricks up their sleeves and I am so grateful for them. Please, please, please understand that learning CAN and SHOULD be more fun than you’ve experienced.  Don’t base your opinion of an entire subject or field on just what you learned about that particular subject in school. There is so much more to each subject than what you can learn from a textbook or worksheet. 

There are other ways to learn besides school. Find a way that you enjoy and learn the way you like!

Sincerely,

A Former Teacher