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SCHOOL FOR THOUGHT
Canada’s Lost Quartile
GUEST BLOG BY TOM BEREND, SQE DIRECTOR
The OECD recently ran their Survey of Adult Skills (PIAAC), and Canada did fine. We finished second overall in 'Education and Skills', behind only to Finland among 16 developed countries. We had the second-highest high-school completion rate (after the US). There was some concern that we scored near the bottom on Innovation, but overall it was a triumph. http://www.conferenceboard.ca/hcp/default.aspx
But that's not the interesting story. The average Canadian may be a world-beater (or at least slightly better than the OECD average), but you can drown in a river that is only a foot deep on average. The interesting story is how many Canadians are drowning.
The CBC broke down the statistics here: http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/oecd-study-reveals-canada-s-polarized-workforce-1.1930222 Below is a quote from their report:
"Among Canadians surveyed, 37 per cent scored at the top two levels of competency, which was more than the OECD average of 34 per cent. Both Ontario and Alberta had a higher than average number of adults with strong computer literacy skills.
"At the same time, 15 per cent of Canadians were at or below the lowest level of competency, three percentage points higher than the OECD average. These individuals had the basic information and communication technology skills to take the test but had difficulty solving problems.
"Facility with numbers was also wanting, with 23 per cent of Canadians performing at the lowest level, compared to 19 per cent for the OECD.
"So, while Canada is generally on a par with the OECD nations for literacy and slightly below for numeracy skills, there is still a large group of adults who don’t have the basic tools for coping in an information-saturated world."
So the real story is that almost a quarter of Canadians are neither literate or numerate. They can't read how to manage their health, they can't figure out their taxes, they can't fill in a job application form, they can't benefit from training programs. They get cheated by financing tricks that the rest of us know to avoid. They fill our jails and strain our social net.
SCHOOL FOR THOUGHT
A Little education proposal
Frequent commenter Doug Little has laid out what he describes as a moderate progressive agenda for education on his home page. This agenda includes such things as total implementation of full-day junior and senior kindergarten, free first year of university, free services for poor kids (for example, dental and vision care, breakfast and lunch), a halt to school closures, continuing reduction of class sizes, elimination of EQAO tests, and the possible elimination of streaming and special programs like IB and French immersion.
Given that Ontario is apparently planning to increase its deficit (here) again next year, Mr. Little's very expensive proposals would appear to be a non-starter. But I would be interested in your reaction to Mr. Little's proposals (please note #6 regarding JUMP math). H/T JE
SCHOOL FOR THOUGHT
Your morning smile
Today's post is not, strictly speaking, educational, although some of the puns do knead readers to no how to spell. H/T LL
SCHOOL FOR THOUGHT
Sunday at the Movies (Charter Schools)
Today, SQE's own video on Alberta charter schools. This is Part 1 of three parts, totalling 27 minutes in all - very watchable, if I do say so myself.
SCHOOL FOR THOUGHT
There are eight million stories in the naked city - here are six of them
Here are some of my accumulated reader tips.
An column on the impact of bad teaching methods on family harmony H/T TA
A tweet about grade inflation from an Ontario high school teacher H/T JD
An article on the philanthropic efforts of the Walton Family Foundation H/T TB
A study summarizing the state of school choice in Canada H/T GN
A column on why we shouldn't lose faith in religious schools H/T JC
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Today, a good news story
GUEST BLOG BY TOM BEREND, SQE DIRECTOR
A wonderful, happy, amazing story. Over 15 years, a group of schools in Tower Hamlets (a suburb of London) has gone from 'worst in the UK' to 'best in the world', demonstrating that poverty is no excuse for a substandard education.
These are not charter schools ('Academies', 'Independent', or 'Free' schools in UK parlance), this is the old doddering public school board. But back in 1999 they faced a clear challenge - Academies and Free Schools were slated to open in the borough, and the status quo was about to blow up.
So these horrible, failing public schools abandoned old, comfortable, in-bred ways, fired almost all their principals, traded out the low-performing teachers, and rebooted their procedures. They focused on academics,and set high expectations They reached out to the community.And the results are stunning.
Research shows that a few charter schools can lift the performance of all schools. Sometimes,all it takes is the threat of charter schools to raise the bar.
SCHOOL FOR THOUGHT
It’s nice of Manitoba to show us the way
We have always favoured competition in education, because of course everyone tries harder when they are competing with someone else, but I don't think we ever envisaged inter-provincial competition as a healthy stimulus - until now. This article reports that the Manitoba Minister of Education boasted in the legislature about the reforms to his province's math curriculum, saying that Manitoba has brought back an emphasis on basic skills and that "other provinces, some to the west, some to the east, continue to utilize methods and curriculums which we have found to be not as successful.”
High fives and kicking ass - I guess that's politics - but even though it feels icky, we'll hold our noses while we cheer. After all, the result is that the kids will be better off.
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The Drive to 25 Campaign
SQE has some exciting news!
A philanthropic organization, recognizing the importance of our work, is willing to offer SQE a $25,000 grant. BUT there is a catch because for the SQE to receive that $25,000 grant we MUST raise the matching $25,000 from among our supporters.
We're calling this our Drive to 25 Campaign.
We need your help.
Many of you have already generously responded to meet the challenge and we thank you. As a result, we are just over one-third of the way to our goal, but we can still use your help.
Can we count on you to help us reach that $25,000 pledge goal? Please consider a generous (and tax deductible) donation to SQE today.
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This is not rocket science
Here I am in Las Vegas, only to find this article in the local paper. It seems that the local school board, the fifth-largest school board in the US by the way, is getting poor literacy results - with about a third of grade 3 students and 61% of grade 8 students behind in reading. The new superintendent, according to the article, apparently thinks it's because a) they're not spending enough on teaching reading and b) the teachers are not trying hard enough. Faithful readers of these pages will probably not be surprised to learn that Balanced Literacy is the teaching method used in Clark County.
You know, if a Martian were to visit Clark County and try to find out what to do about the board's poor literacy results, it would probably take the Martian about an hour to learn that additional spending and trying harder haven't worked elsewhere, while abolishing Balanced Literacy and instituting systematic phonics has worked elsewhere. One has to wonder why these truths elude the new superintendent of the Clark County School District.
SCHOOL FOR THOUGHT
Read My Lips: Whole-word methods aren’t working
We have devoted several postings to the parental revolt out west, with lots of media appearances petitions and rallies and delegations. And while in Ontario and Quebec parents are still pretty silent, now eastern parents are also starting to speak up. more Unlike in the west where the protests revolve around math, however, the eastern unrest is more focused on poor literacy results.
This article features an expert on learning disabilities who says that none of the various reading interventions, even though they are very expensive, is going to do the job.
"Jamie Metsala, a professor of education and the Jarislowsky Chair in Learning Disabilities at Mount Saint Vincent University, says schools aren’t following a rigorous, systematic way of teaching kids how to read. 'We’re not targeting the component skills of reading,' she says. 'We’re neither targeting the alphabetic code-related skills, which cripple many children when they’re beginning to read. … We’re also not targeting in a strong enough manner meaning-related skills.' Children need to be taught systematically and explicitly, going from the easiest steps to the hardest, with enough review and practice for kids to master the skills, Metsala says."
It is amazing how education leaders are twisting themselves into pretzels in an effort to avoid research-based methods of teaching kids to read. They apparently believe so fervently in their whole-word approaches that they reject research evidence, expert advice, poor results, common sense, and public dissatisfaction.