NCTQ's Pretty Darn Quick

A review of Elizabeth Green's "Building A Better Teacher: How Teaching Works (and How to Teach It to Everyone)"

Julie Greenberg — Thu, 18 Sep 2014 12:00:00 EDT

Along with Tom Loveless,Robert Pondiscio and David Steiner, count me among those who are less than enchanted by Elizabeth Green’s new book. The journalist -- who did such a fine job as a blogger about New York City education issues -- has definitely written an engaging book. Unfortunately, it is in the service of a weak theory that may divert us from making the right changes in how teachers are trained.

In a nutshell, Green's argument is that two teacher educators, Deborah Lowenberg Ball and Magdalene Lampert (both very prominent in teacher ed circles), have perfected the student-centered, discussion-based instructional practices that parallel those in Japan's math classrooms. By contrast, Green argues that while the "teacher moves" developed by Doug Lemov (very prominent in the world of charter schools) bring order to often chaotic urban classrooms, they stifle student interaction and thought. (A more charitable portrayal, at least, than those in teacher ed who view Lemov as promoting nothing more than a “bag of tricks.”)

Nearly two decades into their work, neither Ball nor Lampert has yet to produce any research demonstrating that teachers who employ their methods produce greater learning gains than teachers who do not, a vacuum that may have passed muster years ago, but can't be tolerated any more. Ball has laid out an impressive research agenda into the relevant questions, but -- to our knowledge -- neither she nor anyone else have set about answering those questions. Nor, apparently, did Green demand that the heroines of her story show her the proof that their methods were effective, instead drawing parallels to Japan's classrooms.

Reviews to date of Green’s book have also noted the lack of research evidence and the problems with drawing parallels between American and Japanese schooling. But they have missed another obvious weakness, which William Schmidt's studies about the self-professed teaching difficulties of our elementary teachers and the middling preparation of our middle school teachers internationally make quite clear: many of our teachers have a difficult time teaching math at even a procedural level. Whatever the pedagogical value of probing, student-centered discussions of math concepts, ignoring the fact that Japanese teachers can orchestrate such discussions because they are better-versed in math ignores a critical factor in improving the preparation of U.S. teachers. What's missing from the Green story is a simple, matter-of-fact observation: teachers can't teach what they don't know. Any discussion of the pedagogy of math instruction that doesn't explicitly address the issue of content preparation is deficient on its face.

Is NCTQ litigious?

Kate Walsh — Thu, 18 Sep 2014 12:00:00 EDT

Americans increasingly agree that the gateway into teaching ought to be a whole lot tougher. Findings released this week from Gallup/ PDK's annual education poll indicate that six in ten Americans recognize that entry standards into teacher preparation aren't rigorous enough. Fully eight in ten think teachers should have to pass some sort of bar exam. That could be read as a public endorsement of AFT's 2012 testing proposal, except that sensible idea's only purpose was to serve as the guts of a fiery Weingarten speech.

The only time you find that kind of consensus is on the subject of ice cream, or maybe bacon. The message from these latest poll numbers is crystal clear: the public thinks teacher prep needs fixing. As NCTQ has been banging this drum for a decade now (and for many of those years, as a solo act), the numbers come as very, very heartening news. It's not good news that we have a teacher prep problem, but as we all know, the first step to fixing any problem is to acknowledge its existence. Can we agree to roll up our sleeves?

Other less heartening news earlier this month came from Missouri, when we asked the Show Me state to, “Show us their course syllabi” under the state's sunshine law, and the answer was an emphatic NO. To be accurate, the University of Missouri System said no and on August 26, an appellate court agreed that course syllabi are indeed exempt from the state's sunshine laws. The oddly reasoned argument concluded that the syllabi are copyrighted and don't have to be shown to anyone. “Huh?” we asked. Copyright or not, there's this thing called the "fair use" provision of American copyright law which allows someone to study copyrighted materials as long as they don't profit from them. Bad news for NCTQ, but worse news for a free press and public transparency.

So now we'll be heading to the Missouri Supreme Court. University of Missouri professor Mike Podgursky and long-time NCTQ booster was outraged by his own institution's obfuscation and bravely said so in an op-ed (he may have tenure, but he does have to share the Mizzou sidewalks). That led to another Missouri ed professor labeling our decision a "bully" move. I know I'm biased, but it seems to me an utterly reasonable act. The issue of NCTQ having the right to review course syllabi has been settled in our favor in eight of nine states, including by a Minnesota appellate court. There's nothing unique about Missouri in this case.

In any event, I'm not in a bullying frame of mind, nor even a litigious one. The whole business (even if reasonable) is distasteful. The problem we face is not of any single institution's making, but a systematic problem that needs to be acknowledged. We can all contribute to its solution.

Taking a look at charter schools operated by schools of education

Thu, 18 Sep 2014 12:00:00 EDT

A news article some months ago about a charter school operated by the School of Education at the University of California, Davis led us to ask "How many education schools operate charter schools, and how do the students in those charter schools fare?” We were only able to identify four charter schools operated by education schools (University of Chicago, University of Dayton, Stanford and UC Davis), but if you know of more, please send their names along. While a firm conclusion can’t be drawn from our brief analysis of the student performance at these schools, it's still intriguing.

The graphic below summarizes academic results, with short blurbs on each school following the graphic.

University of Chicago Charter Schools
University of Chicago
Urban Education Institute
Founder: Unclear

The four campuses of this network of charter schools are all successful academically, with the only evidence of poor student performance found in the 2013 reading and math results for the Grade 6-12 secondary school:

The North Kenwood/Oakland Campus (Pre-K -Grade 5) was founded in 1998. Every year since 2001, NKO students have outperformed Chicago Public Schools students.
In 2008, Carter G. Woodson (Grades 6-8) opened its doors. In the past two years, the proportion of students meeting or exceeding state standards in reading and math increased from 70 to 83 percent.
In 2005, Donoghue (Pre-K- Grade 5) opened. Since 2006, the proportion of the school’s students meeting or exceeding state standards in literacy, math, and science grew from 52 to 70 percent.
In 2006, Woodlawn (Grades 6-12) opened its doors. In 2010, 100 percent of its graduating class was accepted to college. However, Woodlawn students scored below state averages in reading and math in 2013.

Dayton Early College Academy
University of Dayton
Department of Teacher Education
Founder: Dr. Thomas Lasley, Chair [1]

The two campuses of the University of Dayton’s charter school are both successful academically:

Dayton Early College Academy (Grades 9-12) was established in 2007, with grades 7-8 added in 2008. In 2013 its students outperformed the state average in all subjects of the Ohio Graduation Test. It has received a bronze medal from U.S. News & World Report as one of “America’s Best High Schools.”
In 2012, DECA Prep (K- grade 6) was established. It is rated as “Excellent” by the Ohio Department of Education.

Stanford New School
Stanford University
Graduate School of Education
Founder: Dr. Linda Darling-Hammond, Professor

The Stanford New School opened its doors in 2001. It closed its doors in 2010 after being consistently rated as one of the state’s lowest performing schools.

West Sacramento Early College Prep
University of California, Davis
School of Education
Founder: Dr. Harold Levine, Dean

West Sacramento Early College Prep Charter School opened its doors in 2007. In 2011, the California Charter Schools Association recommended non-renewal of the school's charter because it failed to meet any of the renewal criteria. (Only 1 percent of charter schools operating in California failed to meet standards that year.) Despite this recommendation for non-renewal, the school remains open. In 2013, the average scores on California's achievement tests were 56 percent in reading and 51 percent in math; students attending West Sacramento Early College Prep scored an average of 21 percent in reading and 7 percent in math, placing the school in the bottom 10 percent of schools statewide.

[1] Dr. Lasley is on the Board of Directors at NCTQ.

Zooming in on classroom management in The Teacher Prep Review

Katie Moyer — Mon, 30 Jun 2014 12:00:00 EDT

No matter how well a teacher knows her stuff, if she doesn't know how to bring order to a classroom and manage student behavior little actual learning may occur. The results from the Classroom Management Standard in this year's Teacher Prep Review show just how little training many new teachers receive.

The Classroom Management Standard this year is new and improved, with the addition of a new indicator focusing on specific praise. Given the strength of research supporting classroom management techniques focused on reinforcing appropriate behavior through specific praise and/or recognition, we were disappointed to find that only one out of four programs provide their teacher candidates with feedback on this essential skill.

University of Washington - Seattle’s graduate special education program provided a bright spot: in addition to providing its candidates with feedback on using positive reinforcement, it also provides feedback on whether candidates use more positive than negative statements--including explicit guidance on that ratio (4:1). While no specific ratio is explicitly supported by research, research does indicate there should be more positive than negative feedback.

Also of note is the distribution of programs that submitted new data for analysis in 2014: compared to programs which did not submit new data, a higher proportion of programs that submitted new data nearly meet and meet the Classroom Management Standard.

The following example from Murray State (KY) illustrates how simple changes to language in an observation or evaluation form can provide much more specific and helpful feedback to candidates: “Uses methods of respectful classroom discipline” is replaced by “Uses proximity and other non-verbal communication to redirect off-task behavior. […] Consistently applies consequences when a student misbehaves. […] Uses effective classroom management to reinforce standards of behavior through praise, rules, routines and/or procedures.”

Time to STEM the tide

Graham Drake — Fri, 27 Jun 2014 12:00:00 EDT

You can’t teach what you don’t know -- that’s what makes teacher prep critical. Yet when it comes to science and mathematics (STEM), very few elementary teacher candidates are required to complete coursework ensuring they are knowledgeable.

The findings from the Elementary Mathematics and Elementary Content standards in Teacher Prep Review 2014 paint a grim picture of STEM prep. The table below identifies program results based on our analysis of elementary programs requirements with regards to both basic science and elementary math coursework:

Only three out of 907 programs (0.3 percent) require teacher candidates to complete basic science courses (including labs) in biology, chemistry, and physics, and also require a sufficient amount of elementary mathematics content coursework.

Nearly 50 percent of programs require little to no basic STEM coursework, no doubt a contributing factor to the conditions that are leading the US to fall further behind internationally in STEM.