SCHOOL FOR THOUGHT

The Key To Raising Good Kids

Just when you were starting to feel good about self esteem, along comes a psychologist named John Rosemond who says that children who have high self esteem are less likely to grow up to be adults of good character. Combined with the insights of a professor named Roy Baumeister - who teaches that most violent criminals have extraordinarily high self esteem - it would seem that parents and teachers should be focusing on their children’s self CONTROL, as opposed to their self ESTEEM. Read more here.

Sunday at the Movies (Schooling the World)

This is the trailer for a movie called Schooling the World: The White Man’s Last Burden. The movie “examines the hidden assumption of cultural superiority behind education aid projects, which overtly aim to help children ‘escape to a better life’....and it looks at the failure of institutional education to deliver on its promise of a way out of poverty”. If you’re sufficiently interested, it is possible to view the whole film starting here, but it takes quite a while to download. HT to Stephen Hurley.

To me, it seems premature to write off the ability of formal education to help kids achieve a better life. While it may be true that kids in developing countries would be better off without the existing efforts at intervention, it’s like saying that we should stop urging kids to eat breakfast because the breakfast they’re eating consists of Twinkies and Coke. Let’s give them a porridge, yogurt and fruit, and then see what happens.

What’s Wrong With Our Schools Follow-up

Zwaagstra featured in National Post

When Michael Zwaagstra was in Toronto to speak at the SQE AGM on December 4th, he was interviewed by the National Post's Kenyon Wallace.  Read the full article here. If you didn't have a chance to attend his talk, the intereview picks up on most of his point that our schools (including the schools that train teachers) need lots of fixing and that choice is the way to go. 

Dalton McGuinty’s Signature Folly - All-Day Junior Kindergarten

Probably the most ridiculous aspect of the Ontario government's all-day kindergarten scheme was its insistence that school boards provide before- and after-school care programs for four- and five-year-olds. In the face of massive lobbying from school boards and existing daycare providers, the government has backed down on this issue.

However, there are still several worrisome aspects to the premier's "grand ambition to have the province's school boards deliver a mandatory single program of child-care and full-day learning to four- and five-year-olds". Many of these problems are enumerated here, and they're all so significant that it's hard to say what the second-most-ridiculous problem is. Is it the staggering expense? The fact that it isn't serving kids adequately? The lack of evidence that it's going to result in better student learning? Or the monolithic nature of the program? Your opinion is solicited.

Cracks in the Education School Ivory Tower

As most parents know intuitively, a good teacher can make all the difference. Recent research tells us that the difference between a good teacher and a bad teacher can be a full year of achievement in a single year. 

That is why this report from the Tennessee State Board of Education is important. It compares the state's teacher training institutions in terms of how likely they are to produce good teachers (based on value-added student performance data). The results are quite striking. Of the 42 programs examined, a non-conventional teaching recruitment program named Teach for America was the only one to consistently produce teachers who are highly effective in teaching reading, science, and social studies. Vanderbilt University was the only education school to produce highly effective teachers in any subject, and that only in math. 

There is no reason to think that a similar analysis of Canadian teacher training institutions would produce different results - except, of course, that alternative teacher training programs like Teach for America are not allowed in Canada. Perhaps they should be!

Tips for Parents

Yesterday, I came across this article about a new book for parents written by two former teachers.  Meet the Teacher: How to Help Your Child Navigate School is billed as a guide book for parents.  From what I can gather from the article it is full of do's and don'ts for parental behavior when it comes to interacting with your child's school. Most of them seem to be common sense courtesies that apply when dealing with just about anybody.  No one could disagree with them and I suggest that parents do take them to heart.  Some examples:

• Talk with the teacher early in the year. Share information that will help them get to know your child, including their interests and learning style. Always let them know about an illness, new baby or other changes affecting a student.
• Feel free to suggest strategies, such as having an overactive child take attendance to the office or ensuring they get daily physical activity (DPA).
• Don't criticize the teacher in front of your child.
• Ask about school policy on email correspondence. Some schools, boards and unions discourage it and want communication only through written notes, telephone or in person.
• Attend parent-teacher interviews even if your child is doing well. This sends the message that school is important and establishes a rapport with the teacher.
• If you have major concerns, don't wait until the 10-minute teacher interview to raise them.
• Don't call a teacher at home or show up unannounced and angry at 8:30 a.m. expecting a meeting.
• Consult the teacher when problems may be brewing rather than waiting for them to explode. Be involved in planning a solution.
• Take up concerns with the teacher first, before going above his or her head to a vice-principal or board superintendent.
• Before interfering with class placement, find out whether the school invites parental input, and keep in mind many factors go into the decisions

The book also has information on how to deal with bullying and peer pressure, different ways that children learn, reading to your child, interpreting report cards, and legal, medical and special education issues.

However, at a cost of $20 (plus tax!) for the book, you just might want to save your money.  A logical follow-up to "Meet the Teacher" is Malkin Dare's updated, How To Get the Right Education For Your Child.  It is a realistic guide for parents who have done all those "right" things listed above and whose kids are still not getting the education they need. It's free and can be downloaded from our website.  SQE will even send you a free copy upon request.  Now that's a good tip.

Coping With Students Who Are No Longer Passive Receptacles to Learning

This is a guest editorial by Stacey Burnard. Ms Burnard is an educational consultant with 13 years' experience in Ontario, BC, Yukon, and the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs. She holds an MA in clinical psychology, and her professional work has focused on the areas of at-risk emotional children, learning including social cognitive challenges, and building meaningful 21st-century classrooms.

I believe that we need to form connections with our students before they will take direction from us. Due to a diminishing natural attachment to adults and a propensity to attach to peers, students will no longer be passive receptacles to learning. Those days are gone.

A necessary mental paradigm shift must take place in order to reach students today. Old-school or traditional teaching styles which principally relied upon our role as a conduit of knowledge are simply outmoded and do not respond to our children's needs. Recognition that there is a need to expand the role beyond academic educator to emotional supporter must take place. The primary focus of this role must be on relationship building. That is, unless the emotional needs of our students are met, it will be impossible for teachers to convey the academic goals. Children have to feel emotionally supportive before engaging in academic pursuits that reflect their potential. This does not negate the need for basic skill development but rather purports that a number of our learners must feel connected to their teacher prior to becoming engaged in leraning to learn.

Kids are motivated to learn and begin to inquire only when they see an enthusiastic passionate teacher. As the concept of innate desire to learn does not exist in most learners, we must instill the desire to learn by our own passion for the topic and our reaching out to connect with students.

Will Humpty Dumpty Have a Great Fall?

Canada is one of only a handful of countries that still forces workers in its unionized companies to pay union dues, even if the workers choose not to join the union. This means that Canadian unions enjoy huge and guaranteed revenue streams. As a result, many unions are arrogant and greedy - and, of course, the teachers' unions are no exception.

Now a group of employees at Alberta's Old Dutch Foods (they make Humpty Dumpty potato chips) is challenging the law, as this Canadian Constitution Foundation article explains. If the employees win, there is the potential that other Canadian unions would lose their monopolies. 

We all know that monopolies are inflexible and unresponsive. Imagine if the teachers' unions had to persuade teachers to join them - as opposed to joining a different union or even no union. For one thing, the unions might decide to reduce their dues (in the neighbourhood of $1000 a year, at present). They might stop supporting a bunch of left-wing causes, like fighting against free trade, that many of their members agree with. They might even offer to give teachers professional development in good teaching methods and materials. Wouldn't that be something!

Sunday at the Movies (A Call to Action)

You have to watch this, even though it's 53 minutes long. This is a speech given by the governor of New Jersey about the state's educational problems and what needs to be done. Although the problems in New Jersey are worse than they are in Ontario, it's only a matter of degree, and this speech just lays it all out. An inspiring, dazzling, and moving performance.

She’s Not Done

At first I was very discouraged when I learned that Michelle Rhee had been forced out of office by the electoral defeat of her mayor, due largely to the strenuous efforts of the education establishment - especially the teachers’ unions. Ms Rhee had been the take-no-prisoners chancellor of the Washington, DC school system and, as her Wikipedia page relates, she closed bad schools, fired bad principals and teachers, and took many other actions on behalf of the students. 

However, it turns out that Ms Rhee is not done. Turning down many attractive offers, she has founded a student advocacy organization: Students First. This organization will eschew the polite op-eds, conferences, and scholarly studies approach taken by all of us education reform think tanks. Instead, Students First will play hardball: it will make cash contributions to suitable political campaigns and engage in professional lobbying and public relations activities.

Michelle Rhee has identified the only access point to excellence in education - namely political leadership - and she is going full tilt in that direction. Go Michelle!