Lead from the Start

The Learning Studio

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2009-11-09T18:28:00-08:00

When I walk into a classroom these days I feel like I am walking into a dance studio. I am the only one who isn't moving, learning, expressing, struggling or stretching and as a result, find myself sticking out like a sore thumb. For one, my clothes are too clean. And generally, a clipboard and pen now accompany me. I stand by the door observing, trying not to reflect on how much I'm interrupting by simply doing nothing.

I am enjoying my new job as a Child Development Specialist for Head Start, and some days I feel like I am really making a difference. Like last week, I was able to show a novice teacher how to negotiate the power struggle with a boy who kept pushing. I told her, "He wants to be told no. He wants you to love him by saying no. He wants to know that you won't let him float away." A little modeling on how to connect, some reflection, some follow-up the next day and she was teaching again with a new friend.

I get the feeling that teachers want me to see perfection when I enter their classroom. But there's no such thing as a perfect pre-k class. When I was teaching everyday, my classroom felt a lot like a studio. What happened there was imperfect, unfinished, and always a work in progress. I worked with an instructional assistant so I always had a "partner" to bounce ideas off of, to make sure I wasn't too far off the mark. Now I am by myself when I am "working."

I walk into other teacher's studios. I know they can't be sure how to interact with me. I am a supervisor and I am also too familiar with the imperfections of the classroom. Working in a preschool classroom is one of the most primal experiences you can have in education. I am talking body fluid primal. I am talking pure joy, pure rage, pure uncertainty, cultures clashing, towers smashing, tricycles crashing.

The children shed crocodile tears, Daddy arrested tears, and give me back my doll tears all in a couple minutes. Who am I to judge this chaos but, it's my job.

I could always tell how comfortable a visitor was with this primal experience by how far they came into my classroom. Another pre-k teacher might make it all the way back to the dramatic play area. Most, especially principals and school board members, never made it past the line-up line. The energy, chaos, joy, and terror, stopped them like a moat of tears. It was shallow, but who would want to get their feet wet in "real" teaching when they could just as easily not muddy the waters of their ideals with the human drama and primal experience of real pre-k kids.

I am trying to negotiate this role of supervisor. I wear the micro-politics of my role as a supervisor like a sports coat that is too small. I can see how tight it is, how it doesn't quite fit, and I wonder, does the teacher I am talking to think it doesn't fit either?

image: http://www.metmuseum.org/works_of_art/collection_database/european_paintings/the_dance_class_edgar_degas/objectview.aspx?collID=11&OID=110003530

image: http://www.buzzle.com/img/articleImages/294252-3328-5.jpg

Chattering Classes Meet The Psychometric Qualities of Performance Pay

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2009-11-03T14:56:00-08:00

I just read an excellent post on Bridging Differences about using test scores for teacher evaluation. My favorite part was this...

"And then there is the fundamental problem, as all psychometricians warn us, that tests should be used for the purpose for which they were intended, and not for other purposes. In other words, a test of fifth grade reading tests whether students in the fifth grade are able to read material appropriate for children their age. It cannot then be used to determine whether their teacher was good or bad."

Hallelujah
Testing validity depends on the test actually being used to measure what it was designed to assess.
I keep coming back to the idea that teachers don't go into education for the paycheck so why do, as Diane describes them, "the Chattering Classes" keep thinking that giving a mediocre teacher a couple extra bucks is going to make them a better teacher?

Tying student test scores to teacher pay is meant to increase teacher "performance" but what we are trying to do is increase student learning. If we had similar accountability to the banking industry we could still teach whatever wanted as long as we demonstrated the goal has been achieved ie "learning". But, we are more concerned about the test score than the learning that is meant to be demonstrated by the test. As an NBCT, I am totally for accountability and high levels of learning and teaching but until we develop a support structure for accomplished teaching from teacher prep to master teacher whatever we put in place will really evaluate how we support teachers not their effectiveness. Besides, there are plenty of economists who have studied how money is not an effective motivator in any profession and actually distracts from the goals of a profession. This approach focuses us on the gaming the system ala Enron and Bernie Madoff and not the goals the test scores are supposed to represent. Student Learning.

Maybe if the student test scores reflected actual learning instead of students ability to pass a test, teachers would be behind this type of reform. In the meantime, if we want to evaluate teaching lets start with evaluating their practice instead of how well their students can pass a test.

Teachers are Disheartened When they Work in Tough Schools or for Bad Principals

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2009-10-20T10:54:00-07:00

Joanne Jacobs just covered Teaching for a Living, a Public Agenda and Learning Point Associates study.

Jacobs wrote

"Most of the disheartened teach in low-income schools. They’re frustrated with unsupportive administrators, disorder in the classroom and testing. Contented teachers typically teach in middle-income or affluent areas where they say their schools are “orderly, safe, and respectful” and their administrators are satisfactory. Idealists are younger and often teach in elementary schools."

We expect miracles in hard to staff schools but don’t make choices that even come close to making miracles a reality. Good teachers won’t work for bad principals and lots of times the bad principals are only bad in high needs schools. They would be fine in a middle income school, just like most teachers. Teachers and principals are being pushed into the same boat more and more by pundits and the press. Maybe this is a good thing. I don’t think these statistics are particularly enlightening. Check out this data from the society for human resource management.

Research indicates that employees who are satisfied
with their jobs are more likely to stay with their employers.
According to this survey, 86% of employees indicated overall satisfaction with their current position, with 41% of employees reporting they were very satisfied. ((((Sounds like the teacher data)))))
What’s more, majority of employees (58%)reported that the current economic climate has not made any difference in their level of satisfaction—and this is good news for employers, especially during the economically challenging time.

Why would we expect teachers to be any more satisfied than any other profession?

Micro-politics of Cell Phones

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2009-10-18T10:02:00-07:00

Having moved from the classroom to an office I have been re-exposed to the intricacies of coworker micro-politics. I gained a pretty thorough understanding of micro-politics in my young adult life working for a grocery store. My father also worked for the company so I was in a unique position because employees would confess to me things and ask me not to tell my father. This type of information manipulation caused me to understand what was open information and what was sub-information. I because fairly adept at understanding when I was hearing information for my benefit and when I was hearing "gossip" meant to secure my allegiance.

Working in a school, the school day was so structured that the information exchanges were also fairly structured. I became adept at "not" overtly describing people and places so as not to be considered a gossip even though that was exactly what I was doing. This type of gossip is likely not exclusive to education but I think it holds a unique place in the school culture. I just finished reading a study of this type of gossip titled: Gossip at Work: Unsanctioned Evaluative Talk in Formal School Meetings. Gossip holds a special place in the hearts of teachers because "we" have always been the least powerful stakeholders in education besides students (another gossipy group). Gossip to me seems to be primarily concerned with power. When individuals feel dis-empowered they gossip to gain feelings of power and solidarity against an "oppressor". This can be the boss, parents, or other teachers.

This week I also learned that it happens outside the school too. One of my coworkers has been engaged in a power struggle with our supervisor for a long time. During a recent meeting she came 45 minutes late and then answered a phone call after she had been there for 10 minutes. She went in the hall to talk. Then, 8 minutes later, while the supervisor was talking, she answered her phone again. This time, instead of going in the hall, she started talking in the meeting. When she was ignored she finally hung up with a loud, "OK. OK, then. Talk to you soon!" Her voice rising so loud she was almost shouting.
This is when the politics came in. My supervisor did not address the interruption. I don't know the back story but I know that her decision was likely made as the most strategic decision. I thought to my self I would definitely have addressed the interruption. It seemed to me that by not acknowledging the power struggle she actually gave it more power than if she had.
What do you think? What would you do?

Get On the Bus! Or, not

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2009-10-12T21:04:00-07:00

I just read about the political battle that raged recently in Wake County, one of the most highly acclaimed school systems in the country. I can't believe I am writing this but it is about busing. The county has a "diversity policy" that attempts to balance socioeconomic diversity among schools. Wake County has some full year schools. My friend Bill Ferriter teaches in one of them and he loves it. Opponents of the Diversity Policy are hoping to block efforts to require some students to attend full year schools involuntarily.

From WRAL news:

Wake aims to have no more than 40 percent of students any school receiving free or reduced-price lunches. The school system reassigns students every year to maintain that level of socioeconomic diversity, as well as to fill new schools and relieve overcrowding.

Diversity supporters said they fear area schools will become segregated if the policy is abandoned.

"If you have all low-income kids in a school, they have no power. They have no voice," Goodmon said. "We know exactly what will happen to those schools."

The policy has became a referendum in the local school board elections polarizing the constituency. Check out this video...What do you think?

Having taught in a school system that began busing (poorly) and ended busing (poorly) I have seen how neighborhood schools can support segregation. I have also seen concerted efforts by parents and the community can make a school diverse. It is not easy and I am not sure that we are really post-racial enough yet to let go of these types of policies that protect the underserved. However, I also believe choice is one of the most powerful engines of school reform. I am not talking about charter schools but choices like community over opportunity. Wake County is one of the best school systems in the country with the second highest number of National Board Certified Teachers in the country. So I guess if there is anywhere that could do it, let go of the supports of policies that address desegregation, then Wake County might be the place. Will Wake County take a step forward or a step back? Would doing away with the policy lead us into the post-racial era or trip us up in our progress toward a worthwhile goal? Maybe if the push to end the diversity policy were actually driven by a lack of its relevance I might be less cynical but I am afraid we will see the county make a slow shift back to what is comfortable instead of what is right.
3 of the 4 seats went to neighborhood school candidates. All of the contested seats went to candidates against the diversity policy.
There will be a run off for the District 2 seat next month between two neighborhood schools candidates.

Image: Courtesy Valentine Richmond History Center Virginia students oppose busing in the 1960s.

Raise the Bar or Build Thier Own Course

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2009-10-02T19:22:00-07:00

A former state superintendent will be coming to my Politics of Education class next week. I feel like I have gotten to know her well enough to know that she will ask more than one tough question. I think I know one she will ask.

Virginia was a leader early in the standards based education reform movement. It's infrastructure for developing and administering effective accountability measures is strong. Currently our third grade reading pass rate is hovering in the 80% range through out the state. The advanced pass rate, students who answered more than 31 out of 35 questions correctly, has been steadily since 2005 from 18.8% to 38.9% in 2008.

I can just hear it now. Dr. Demary will ask us, "So, almost everybody is passing. Isn't it a good time to raise the bar?"

Every fiber of my teacher being wants to say no, but all of my learning in educational leadership says yes. I am torn. I believe in high standards but, I am not convinced that raising the bar is the best way to get teachers, and more importantly kids, to jump higher.

I think the reason for this is internal struggle is that I am not sure that bar jumping is what we should be teaching kids to do. I think we need them to build their own obstacle courses, not just master hoop jumping. As it stands now, on reading tests kids are asked to identify characters, setting, conflict, etc. They are required to read for comprehension, all worthy goals. We are not asking them to write their own stories, to tell the story where they are the main character. It is as if they are the actors in someone else's play.

If we buy into the post-modern perspective, that there is no single over arching story, then the reasons for assessment change a little. Our nation is a teaming tangle of stories. Maybe this is why fame has become such a fascination for our young people. The goal is not to help move the plot of the greater human story along but to be famous enough to be featured in the individual stories of the nation.

So what would I do? If it were my decision I would start evaluating beyond basic skills in areas closer to 21st century skills. Maybe it is a voluntary assessment for an additional ribbon on a degree. Maybe it is the certification movement pushed down into high school. Maybe a kid runs track, is in the debate club and earns a social media certification in order to make himself more competitive in college.

When Dr. Demary, (one of my education heroes) asks what do we do now that most of our students are passing the SOL tests, this is what I will say. "When students in your class pass a test you have prepared them for you don't give them the same test but raise the number of correct answers needed to pass. You teach new content, you expand on their solid foundation evidenced by their test scores. You start teaching them something new, something that might be even more important than what they mastered already, like critical thinking, creativity, and team work. There is only one problem though, it is hard to test those kinds of skills. Maybe the tests have outlived their usefulness? Maybe the kids could help build their own obstacle course to test their learning."

Image: http://www.japanwindow.com/images/20051012002715_051008_undoukai_041.jpg
Image: http://vaperforms.virginia.gov/indicators/education/3rdGradeReading.php

Raise the Bar or Build Thier Own Course

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2009-10-02T18:56:00-07:00

I can just hear it now. Dr. Demary will ask us, "So, almost everybody is passing. Isn't it a good time to raise the bar?"

The Micropolitics of Parents and Teachers

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2009-10-02T17:57:00-07:00

National Standards: No Thank You Please

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2009-09-27T18:14:00-07:00

Do you know what it is like to work for the federal government? I do, and if it weren't for strong leadership in my local Head Start program for over 45 years, we would not be able to help as many kids as we have.

Education has always been under the jurisdiction of the states for a reason. Historically the reason for this is well documented but it comes down to this -- at the continental congress when the founding fathers where crafting the constitution the founding fathers decided not to address it. They knew, as we know now after trying to reauthorize the closest bill we have ever had to a federal school system, that coming to grips with the multiple reasons for and approaches to education across this nation would be a roadblock to progress. In the 1700s it was the ratification of the Constitution, now it is NCLB. This isn't to say there weren't attempts to create national educational system.
Thomas Jefferson spoke of the importance of public education in a letter to John Tyler in 1810, "I have indeed two great measures at heart, without which no republic can maintain itself in strength: 1. That of general education, to enable every man to judge for himself what will secure or endanger his freedom. 2. To divide every county into hundreds, of such size that all the children of each will be within reach of a central school in it." --Thomas Jefferson to John Tyler, 1810. ME 12:393

In the 1800s that vision may have been viable but now, I can't imagine a federal educational system that would work for every student, every where. As a Head Start employee I have seen what it is like to have Congress as your school board. It is not pretty. Large structural gaps that should be fixed by reform are missed because they are too hard to agree on while small meaningless measures are continually added onto the Head Start regulations. These additional federal regulations don't necessarily impact child outcomes are run rampant through the performance standards. I thoroughly believe in Head Start, at the local level, but systematically I really think it needs a make-over.

Now we are considering National Standards and I am still saying, no, please, no.If our country had a National school system in which states were truly accountable to the federal government, national standards would have been a forgone conclusion a long time ago. But, we are nation based on a balance of federal and states’ rights. States are responsible for the education of its citizens. It seems that NCLB’s over-reaching in terms of accountability has started to make National standards seem like the only way to clean up the mess. This policy would seem reactive instead of proactive.
Besides, in order for national standards to have any meaning the country would need to change its constitution. As it stands the national standards that have been set by various professional organizations have served as a guide to states when they craft their own standards. Scoring well on the NAEP has actually acted as a carrot for states to create high standards because scoring poorly brings public outcry but no real measures of governance reforms by the federal government on states school systems. The NAEP as an accountability tool is a reform without teeth.

As Virginia has learned from its own standards based accountability system, if you test at high standards students will perform at high standards. At the same time, if there isn’t any stakes for the student in the system, then the system may not get a very clear picture of what students know and are able to do in the content areas.

All of this discussion of states rights doesn’t really address the reason that some call for national standards. Some students, when they move from one place to another, experience an expectations culture shock when they go to a school with lower, or higher standards than they have experienced. One of the good aspects of NCLB is that it provided funds for tutoring to those who are not able to meet challenging standards. How about a similar reform for states? Then we can start talking about national standards. Until then it would be another version of the same problem, high standards that are appropriate for some, too high for others, and not enough for a few.

It's Not a Race (Thing)

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2009-09-23T14:06:00-07:00

nm"We know that, historically, African American and Hispanic students do not score as well on the NAEP (National Assessment of Educational Progress) as their white and Asian peers."

What do preschool teachers know about race and poverty that educational researchers don't? How many times have we heard a statement like this as educators? For some reason - even though it may be true statistically - it doesn't seem to make sense because the statement itself obscures the real issues. It doesn't necessarily matter that many African American students score lower on these types of tests because not all of them do.

These types of statements contribute to bias against African American students because they connect the problem -poor achievement- to the descriptor instead of the cause. If a researcher said, "We know that, historically African American and Hispanic students do not score as well on the ______ test as their white and Asian peers because of the inherent racial bias of the _____ test," only then should a child's race be an important part of the discussion.

Often We have these types of discussions in my doctoral classes. This semester, I am taking a measurement in educational research course. It is meant to prepare us, the budding researchers, for our dissertation and future life as an educational "expert" ie Ph.D. This week the issue of race came up. Specifically, the professor mentioned the "achievement gap" in order to push the conversation into uncomfortable territory. I put "achievement gap" in quotes intentionally because it doesn't seem worth talking about outside of the context of test validity and reliability. Usually after a statement about testing and race someone will say, "That is is because tests are biased." Then another researcher might say, "But, there is more of a correlation between socio-economic status and test scores." Even though the statement is true, it doesn't contribute to a deeper understanding of the issue. It uses descriptors in an almost causal relationship to data. The "achievement gap" assumes that the tests are valid and the scores are reliable indicators of student achievement. In actuality, they may only be valid for students from the dominate white culture. By switching the argument to money you just change the context of the discrimination. By saying, "Well actually its about money not race." researchers are able to wash their hands of the issue because there is no way that schools can impact how rich or poor a kid is, when they know there is no reason a child's race should affect a test score either.

Many preschool teachers know that the only thing that matters in a child's educational trajectory is the frequency and types of language interactions and experiences children have in their early years. Hart & Risley pointed this out in Meaningful Differences. They found the strongest influence on a student's vocabulary was the types of talk children engaged in as an infant, toddler, and preschooler. The number of words that children knew at age 3 was found to be predictive of achievement at age 9. However, some children of professional parents, who didn't spend much time talking with their kids had similar average minutes of interaction as some welfare and working class families. Across the board the researchers found race was not found to influence the vocabulary of children at all. Hart & Risley "saw quality added to interactions when we saw parents talking to their children beyond what was necessary to manage or provide care." So yes, poverty is a factor in the development of children's vocabulary because the essence of poverty is a struggle to survive. Poverty requires parents to focus on the day-to-day survival of their family.

If we were to reframe the achievement as a "language development" gap we we might get closer to the "truth" about why some kids score higher and lower on standards based tests. Yesterday I heard a woman in a supermarket tell her 9 month old that her cookie looked "scrumptious". Does it matter what race the woman was? Of course not, I know that her child will likely hear many words like "scrumptious" in her early life. A more correct way of describing the achievement gap might be to discriminate between students with few language experiences (FLE), substantial language experiences (SLE), and many language experiences (MLE). Is this practical? No, but at least it would be true. By continuing to attach race and class to achievement we support the assertion that they are predictive when they aren't, they are just an easy way to sort data.

Much Too Bright: At Peace with the Struggle and Moving On

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2009-08-14T16:08:00-07:00

I recently spent my week in "paradise" at Nimrod Arts Program. The week long retreat has been my moment to be my "truest" self during the doctoral work I have been doing in educational leadership and the teaching I do during the school year. The past two years have been explosions of creativity, iced with lots of insights and back slaps for the work I did. This year wasn't the same. I had been feeling a little restless. Like maybe I wasn't learning as much as I could with my paintings.

I decided before going this year to experiment in some way on every painting I did.

This can be a really difficult way to approach your "art" whether it is art or teaching. By trying to get outside of the box on every painting I wasn't able to be "really" happy with much of the work. I questioned my personal vision, "What should I do next?" and my vision said, "Ummm, I don't know." I feel like I made strong paintings but they don't live fully in the world I envision for them. I struggled, all the way through. Then, when I tried an approach I was comfortable with, I felt like I let myself down. It was a tough summer.

I have felt like this with my teaching before. Actually, I have felt this way a lot. Especially in the past year. I was tring to grow this past year but much of what I tried failed. Then when I tried what I knew would work, I was surrounded with criticism from myself and others involved in my classroom. I felt like I wasn't learning.

So I have decided that I need to try something new this year. I am going to leave the classroom. I have decided to take a job as Childhood Development Specialist with the my Head Start program. I will supervise about 12 teachers and 12 assistants. I have been pursuing my doctorate in educational leadership. Now I will get a chance to see if I am really a transformative leader like I have been trying to learn to be in work and school. I will work with the leadership team to support teachers through professional development, team work, and relationships. Oh, and to try out some 21st Century skills with teachers.

It should be an interesting year. Now for the art. I wonder what will happen.

The painting above is titled: On the Edge

Much Too Bright: Fear and the Unknown

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2009-07-08T04:03:00-07:00

On Friday I posted on my Facebook status, "John is getting up the gumption to paint again. It is scary like 7 year old thunder storm scary." The hardest part is getting started again especially when the painting sitting unfinished on my easel is not working the way I hoped.

When I was a kid my Grandmother (the creative one) had themes that she would repeat to me. Only when I got older did I understand what they met. One theme was: Go West Young Man. When I got in my teenage and college years I understood, she was saying, "follow your dreams." or something close. Another theme was the nursery rhyme, "Little Boy Blue, come blow your horn, the sheep's in the meadow, the cow's in the corn. Where is the boy who looks after the sheep? Under the haystack fast asleep." Was it just a nursery rhyme? Yes but, it was also along the same theme as Go west! Don't let life slip by.

Whenever I face possibility of picking up the brush again I feel a fear that is just enough to push painting out of my mind while school, or grad school, or life is happening, the fear of the un-built canvas. If I don't have any canvases built it is like a paralyzing feeling because I can't reach down, pick up the next painting and rush head long into it without thinking about the unknown. Deciding that I have to build them and committing to doing it is like another of my grandmother's theme's, The Flying Trapeze. She would sing the song and later I would think about how the amazing thing about the trapeze is the letting go of what you have and reaching out and grabbing for what you have to have faith will be there.

Going out to build those canvases is like reaching for that trapeze. I know the bar will be there, I know the paintings will come but I have to let go first and trust in the unknown future.

Much Too Bright: Much Too Bright

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2009-07-05T05:05:00-07:00

In an effort to more fully integrate my personhood I have decided to start posting my art on this blog. I was inspired by my good friend Jose Vilson, an artist, writer, teacher, thinker, poet, and all around brilliant person. Jose has always posted all of his content on one blog. He may have a post about teaching computation of the rise of an inclined plane, a post about teacher leadership, his latest poem, and a post about Tupac Shakur's birthday all within a week.
I decided that I like that because as I arranged all of these magazine clippings in my mind I began to make sense of Jose, teaching, creativity, and life in a new way. I learned, which I love. So here is my first post: Much Too Bright. This is my title image from my art blog. As I post about my art I may try to use Much Too Bright as the title then the post as the subtitle. We will see how this goes.

Now I will be able to talk about art more in education and learning more in my art, hopefully integrating my self more as I do it.

Creativity: Four Apples = ?

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2009-05-17T07:45:00-07:00

Sometimes I think of the teaching I do as training creative Jedi. Just think of me as Yoda for the pre-k set. From 3- 5 years old children experience a burst of creativity. Children are able to move from their imaginations to the real world seamlessly. It is the last outpost for the imagination. When kids get in kindergarten they start to hear adults first, and then their friends say, "I can't draw." "I'm not creative." "I can't sing." Then they doubt, "Can I sing? Am I creative? I want to fit in with my freinds, and none of them are creative, I should probably not be creative either. Piaget may have accidentally set this up by describing the preoperational stage of development as hierarchically lower than the concrete operational stage. It is as if a child who sees the world for what it is, (4 apples is 4 apples no matter what shape they are in) should not see the world for what it could be, (4 apples cut in to is 8 pieces and boiled can be applesauce).

Why isn't creativity important in our schools? The easy answer... it is hard to test. Concrete understanding of the world is easy to test. If you don't know that 4 apples is 4 apples then you don't get it.

There are some rubrics that attempt to judge creativity but in general, much of our appreciation for creativity, like her sister beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. In a recent discussion about creativity with someone on the decision making side of the education game I asked why creativity isn't considered a school readiness indicator. The response was, "It is the only indicator of school readiness that was deemed unreliable in several states." It was also said that many teachers are not creative enough to recognize creativity even if it bit them in the patootie. Well that isn't what was said but it is close enough. Why don't we expect teachers to be creative? Why don't we epect children to be creative?

On the dinner table of school, creativity is often considered the frosting on the cake. However, in life outside of school, it is often the difference between a home cooked meal and fast food. In "real" life, ie. life outside of the socially constructed definition of school, creativity is what makes things happen from finding cures for diseases to selling everything we know. We can't test the future ability to find a cure for cancer. To borrow a metaphor from my wife, in schools we only test if kids know the recipe not if they can cook.

Here is my question... Why?

Why aren't some teachers able to recognize creativity when they see it? Why isn't creatvity taught as a skill?
Any art teacher can tell you that much of making art has more to do with experimentation with and mastery of materials than with innate talent. We expect this in language arts, why not life? If we can teach kids the creative writing process, why can't we teach them the creative living process? If we are going to survive the "unknown" future we are going to need new ways of looking at problems to meet those challenges. If everybody knows the recipe but nobody knows how to cook, how are we going to live much less live well?

Image from: http://api.ning.com/files/vT0cCRtGT-WQgiNdKtNlO0lz6hW7GFWHp*nzcmE9zAIwGK4m4S6eUef8gY1KvKemdqqzhzkcxpQ0DsshcmVDrhwXw*xDLTwu/fingerpaint.jpg

Toys Dinosaurs and Sir Kenneth Robinson

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2009-03-24T18:23:00-07:00

My son has a lucky dinosaur. He keeps it in his sock drawer and pulls it out when we play board games. His mother says that when she found it she "knew it was his lucky dinosaur." We have started to move him towards considering that maybe HE is lucky. I think he is starting to believe us.

I hope he starts to internalize this idea because it may help him find his bliss. I say this because being "lucky" is one of those ephemeral traits that seem to surround successful people. I just finished reading The Element by Sir Kenneth Robinson and turns out that being "lucky" is one of the traits that can help you find and inhabit your "element." Luck is the ability to be open to opportunities, to act on opportunities, and to turn misfortune into opportunity.

When we start to describe luck this way it becomes much less about superstition and much more of a creative skill. It is this type of thinking that Sir Ken Robinson is known for exploring.

Reading The Element is like reading a transcript of the conversation between your heart, your head, and your education. Only this time, your heart wins the argument. Ken Robinson tells us all the things that we told ourselves before we were "tracked" or Myers-Briggs'ed into groups for easier classification. This time though, your heart has some heavy-duty research behind its case.

In The Element, Robinson argues that schooling, as a system, is like a machine that dehumanizes kids by trying to stuff them into boxes instead of helping them to find their potential as human beings. He says schooling is all about society and not about the kids. Through stories of many exceptional people, Robinson describes what might have happened if famous and successful people had listened to their parents, or their teachers, or their Myers-Briggs for that matter.

If so-and-so had listened to the teacher who said, "You’re good at ____ so you should become a ____," they never would have become the creator of The Simpsons or the author of The Alchemist or the winner of the 1970 Nobel Prize for Economics. The key is that these individuals discovered their true passion, realized their aptitude, and stuck to it, sometimes in the face of their education and in spite of a community or a society that didn't buy it.

The trouble with schooling, according to The Element, is that schools do not ask the right questions. Schools today are built on the question, "How smart are you?" Robinson says we should be asking, "How are you smart?"

If schools were organized around identifying and supporting students' finding their "element," teaching and learning would look much different than it does now. "The Element is the meeting point of natural aptitude and personal passion," he concludes.

I have to say I can relate to this book. There is this feeling I get when I am painting and sometimes when I am teaching. Actually, it is not so much a feeling as place I feel like I inhabit. This feeling of being in flow. It seems to be a state that almost all people are able to reach. But in society there is a meta-story that seems false to me about what creativity is and means. Many times creativity is seen as a gift from a higher power, something out of the ordinary.

In Robinson's view, creativity is what happens when aptitude and passion find each other. It is what students will need to tap into in order to be successful in the unknown future. Robinson says "it would be wise" to support students in identifying and pursuing their element, rather than a particular career or a set of marketable skills, because the only thing we can be sure of is that the future will be different than the world we live in today.

Burning Down the House

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2009-02-21T19:05:00-08:00

On TLN and on my friend Bill's blog there has been a heated discussion of the role of creativity in schools. In a strange turn of events, I will support the opposite position for a minute. In our discussion of creativity it is important that we acknowledge the normative function of schooling. I am all for starting all over, burning down the house, and starting again by redefining the purpose and hence the accountability necessary for our schools. However, I think that some of the aspects of schooling that we might change might not be the parts that need to change. Creativity needs to be brought into our expectations, not basics pushed out. There have been numerous researchers who have found that the most effective way to teach at risk kids is to teach the basics and higher level thinking at the same time. Otherwise kids will not be ready to use either by the time they are adults.

I am sort of like the hammer that sees nails all over the place. I see creativity in many places where others don't.

Creativity sometimes substitutes for the word expression. I can see how teachers are fed up with the lack of expression of their humanity in their practice. In many cases it is not why we got into this gig. But, creativity and expression are not the same thing. Creativity is figuring how to get that test answer out of that kid as much as it is helping kids see past that test question.

Creativity is a big word with different meanings for a lot of people, sort of like schooling is different from learning. If all kids had to do was learn then they wouldn't need us, it is the schooling that makes teachers necessary. It is also why our creative expression is sometimes compromised for the sake of the an accountability tool that does not measure creativity. If the purpose of schooling moved past (but included) the basics standards we would probably have plenty of time for creativity, in fact we might be required to teach it 3 hours a day. Then what would we have to complain about?

The big issue seems to me to be that there is a conflict between what schools need to be about, and what they are held accountable for creating. These expectations are almost polar opposites now which can cause a great deal of stress for the people responsible for meeting conflicting expectations. We have a hunch about what kids will need in the future but right now, that doesn't matter. Right now what matters is the test. So we have to teach to both sides of the brain at the same time with out compromising either. It can be done, in fact it has been done in poor schools for years.

Image from: http://www.centralfpd.com/Portals/0/Clip%20Art/House%20on%20Fire02.GIF

Obama's Top Ten Pre-K Promises

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2009-01-21T14:24:00-08:00

As the students in my classroom watched the inauguration, my assistant cried. (Just a little bit.) It was an amazing thing to see history in the making. It affected everyone in our economically challenged urban elementary school. Yesterday, as I listened to the post-party coverage and people talking on their cell phones in the grocery store, I was struck by how many people are concerned about President Obama moving left or right of where they think he stood on issues. This morning I heard a radio comment that now is the time for everyone to make their opinions known and that they should remind our president of where he has come from. So here is my "don't forget the pre-k" post-it note for President Obama.

We seem to be on the right track. The House economic stimulus package in Congress already has 2.1 billion for Head Start in it as described in this Wall Street Journal article about the loads of promises the president made on the campaign trail.

President Obama has mentioned funding early childhood education many times since 2007. So in the spirit of David Letterman, I give you President Barack Obama's Top 10 quotes on early childhood education as found on the website On the Issues. and Youtube.

10 Obama supports increasing funding for the Head Start program for preschool children. Obama has called on states to replicate the Illinois model of Preschool for All.

Campaign website, BarackObama.com, "Resource Flyers" Aug 26, 2007

9 We can start by investing $10 billion to guarantee access to quality, affordable, early childhood education for every child in America. Every dollar that we spend on these programs puts our children on a path to success, while saving us as much as $10 in reduced health care costs, crime, and welfare later on.
Source: Speech in Flint, MI, in Change We Can Believe In, p.249 Jun 15, 2008

Put billions of dollars into early childhood education
8 Latinos have such a high dropout rate. What you see consistently are children at a very early age are starting school already behind. That’s why I’ve said that I’m going to put billions of dollars into early childhood education that makes sure that our African-American youth, Latino youth, poor youth of every race, are getting the kind of help that they need so that they know their numbers, their colors, their letters. Every dollar that we spend in early childhood education, we get $10 back in reduced dropout rates, improved reading scores. That’s the kind of commitment we have to make early on.
Source: 2008 Democratic debate in Las Vegas Jan 15, 2008

7 Teachers don’t go in to education to get rich. They don’t go in to education because they don’t believe in their children. They want their children to succeed, but we’ve got to give them the tools. Invest in early childhood education. Invest in our teachers and our children will succeed.
Source: Take Back America 2007 Conference Jun 19, 2007

6 If you’re a progressive, you’ve got to be worried about how the federal government is spending its revenue, because we don’t have enough money to spend on things like early childhood education that are so important.
Source: 2008 Politico pre-Potomac Primary interview Feb 11, 2008

5 Children’s First Agenda: zero to five early education

High-Quality Zero to Five Early Education: Obama will launch a Children’s First Agenda that provides care, learning and support to families with children from birth up to five years old.
Source: Campaign booklet, “Blueprint for Change”, p. 20-23 Feb 2, 2008

4 We’ve got to have early childhood education.
Source: 2007 NAACP Presidential Primary Forum Jul 12, 2007

3 We’ll invest in early childhood education programs so that our kids don’t begin the race of life behind the starting line and offer a $4,000 tax credit to make college affordable for anyone who wants to go. Because as the NAACP knows better than anyone, the fight for social justice and economic justice begins in the classroom.
Source: McCain-Obama speeches at 99th NAACP Convention Jul 12, 2008

2 Michelle and I are here only because we were given a chance at an education. I will not settle for an America where some kids don’t have that chance. I’ll invest in early childhood education.
Source: Speech at 2008 Democratic National Convention Aug 27, 2008

1 This clip really seems to show where his heart is on the issue of voluntary Pre-K. Hopefully, he won't forget.

Supervision vs. Observation

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2009-01-19T08:53:00-08:00

I was asked recently about my experience of supervision in my first year. I am thinking back 12 years now. I was not observed formally more than three times my first year. I was observed informally numerous times. This year however, I have experienced a new type of observation from my supervisor. My current principal stops in almost every morning for about 30 seconds. He doesn't ask questions or interrupt. He just watches, smiles, and leaves.

As I have gained experience my perspective on this has changed. In the beginning I thought I was being "cheated" the necessary guidance I thought I needed. Over time I have discovered that some aspects of my practice are observed informally and frequently (lesson planning, management, and student rapport) while formal observations were almost incidental. I always tell new teachers that they are judged by how they walk their students down the hall and it is true. I have never received more than cursory feedback from formal observation although I have asked and even pressed administrators for feedback.

Recently, after reading Malcolm Gladwell's "Blink" which describes how experts and people in general can "thin slice" experiences and make the same or better qualitative judgments as scientifically based observations I decided that a principal can probably see "what a teacher actually does" as well or better in an informal 30 second observation as in a formal observation.

After having done some observation of student teachers, I have come to see the process of observation as much more fluid. The coaching or formal observation process can be extremely helpful to inexperienced teachers but I am not sure that it is the best use of administrators' expertise. I have always believed what my father said about management, that "It is easy to make someone do their job but hard to make them want to do their job." The observation/accountability process can intrude on this aspect of the administrator/teacher relationship.

I do think that observation is changing in the field but it has not happened in my school system yet. I think that observation for coaching is one area where teacher leadership can make a significant impact if the structure of schools is changed to allow for this type of leadership. Peer coaching may be more effective than supervision in supporting novice and struggling teachers. The evaluative aspect of administrator observations can actually distract from the goal of coaching. When a young teacher is observed for evaluation they are doing "their best" while, when they are observed for coaching it is understood that they are trying to improve and so may may show what is actually closer to their practice. Reflection on video is an excellent tool in this situation.

I have been trained as a coach using the Santa Cruz "New Teacher Center" protocols. They use a criterion referenced observational system that focuses on reflection as the primary tool for improving teaching practice.

If a supervisor is necessary to provoke reflective thought in a teacher maybe that teacher shouldn't be practicing or at least should still be in an apprentice position.

Gerald Bracey Buries The LDH Hatchet

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2009-01-06T17:21:00-08:00

Gerald Bracey wrote an excellent post on the Huffington Post about what the heck happened with the Secretary of Ed nomination. He describes how the "frame game" was played and the people who have the most expereince with actual kids (teachers and teachers unions) got labeled as anti-reform or for those not familiar with right wing edu-speak as not caring about kids and the quality of their education.

The history of the Ed Sec position has seen only two ED Secs with actual experience in education. Only one, Terrel Bell, was a K-12 teacher. What did Terrel Bell do? He changed the future of education in America through bringing together countless stakeholders to create the National Commission on Excellence in Education, and publish a Nation at Risk. And he accomplished this while Ronald Reagan was trying to dissolve the USED and cut funding for all of its programs.

We could only have been so lucky as to have a "non-reformer" like LDH in the position. Teachers don't mess around with reform because it is a code word for privatizing education these days. Why hire somebody to fix education when everyone you need to do it is in a classroom. Hire a teacher for the job and then you have buy-in from the most important group, the people actually doing the teaching. Bracey did an excellent job explaining what happened this fall. The real reformers (people who care about kids) got beat by the fake reformers (arm chair quarterbacks) with no experience actually playing the game on the field. Who do you want to coach your team, someone who has played the game or someone who has watched it from the stands.

image from:http://www.objetsobjects.com/id1.html

Thanks to Thompson @ This Week in Education

If I Were a Muppet

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2008-12-31T06:54:00-08:00

This is going to be a short and sweet post. Sometimes I feel like the male character in this classic bit from Sesame Street. I am really into education, teaching, the power of children, the amazing vision that children have and their ability to make us see the world different than we do. But, I get so into this whole teaching thing sometimes I forget where I am, I start passionately preaching to the choir until they remind me, I am not singing the same song anymore. So for all of you teacher leader freaks out there who absolutely just love education, this one's for you. With out us the profession may never start singing but, lets not get too far ahead of the parade that people don't know you are in it.

Dear Mr. Obama, Re: LDH

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2008-12-14T09:31:00-08:00

Dear Mr. President-Elect Obama,

I wanted to ask you to consider the rare opportunity you have to select Linda Darling-Hammond as Secretary of Education.
You see, the ED Sec position has always been a political decision, based on repaying the service of select individuals who have worked hard for a new president's campaign.

Here is a brief history of Secretaries of Education. It is from wikipedia so possibly incorrect, but it shows who held the position previously.

Carter: Shirley Hufstedler had a distinguished career at the highest levels of legal and public service.
Reagan: Terrel Bell, the impetus for a Nation at Risk, had a doctorate in education and had been a high school teacher as well as a superintendent.
Reagan: William Bennet was an American neoconservative pundit, politician, and political theorist. He went on to become the "drug czar" for Bush 1.
Reagan/Bush: Lauro Cavazos was the first Hispanic to serve in a cabinet post. He held B.A. and M.A. degrees in zoology from Texas Tech University, and a Ph.D. in physiology from Iowa State University. He was forced to resign as Education Secretary, amid an investigation into improper use of frequent flyer miles.
Bush: Andrew Lamar Alexander (born July 3, 1940) is the senior United States Senator from Tennessee and Conference Chair of the Republican Party. He was previously the 45th Governor of Tennessee from 1979 to 1987.
Clinton: Richard Riley Riley was elected governor of South Carolina in 1978. Riley made a huge impact by bringing the voices of teachers into the policy arena through teacher in residence program and supporting the establishment of the the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards.
Bush II: Rod Paige began his career in college athletics. Later, as ED Sec Paige criticized the National Education Association (NEA) for obstructing "No Child Left Behind's historic education reforms," calling the NEA a "terrorist organization." He later said it "was an inappropriate choice of words" and apologized later the same day, but maintained that the NEA uses "obstructionist scare tactics" in opposing the law.
Bush II: Margaret Spellings was the political director for Bush's first gubernatorial campaign in 1994, and later became a senior advisor to Bush during his term as Governor of Texas from 1995 to 2000.

The history of the position has seen only two ED Secs with actual experience in education. Only one, Terrel Bell, was a K-12 teacher. What did Terrel Bell do? He changed the future of education in America through bringing together countless stakeholders to create the National Commission on Excellence in Education, and publish a Nation at Risk. And he accomplished this while Ronald Reagan was trying to dissolve the USED and cut funding for all of its programs.

Darling-Hammond is a real threat to efforts to privatize education. She is a friend of unions because she believes in teachers, one the most leftist ideals you can maintain these days. One can hardly imagine what our school systems would be like if teachers were empowered to be the good guys. Mr. President give it a try and watch the inherent heroism of impassioned teachers transform out schools. Let a teacher lead us.

Please.

Malcolm Gladwell the Airmchair Quarterback

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2008-12-13T04:20:00-08:00

Yesterday Eduwonkette responded to Malcolm Gladwell's article on hiring teachers in the New Yorker. In It Gladwell uses the first bad metaphor I have ever seen him write. I am a big fan of Gladwell's work but it seems like he hasn't talked to as many teachers as researchers before writing this article. In it he compares teaching to being a professional football player. I am sure that all of the women I work with will appreciate being compared to a 6 foot 2" football player but the part that is really bad is in portraying the circumstances. Gladwell compares watching players in college to watching teachers in student teaching. He then compares playing pro ball to becoming a real teacher. One way the metaphor breaks down is that even though many players can't transition to the big leagues is that the game changes. It becomes more complex and harder in the pros.

Teaching isn't hierarchical in its demands and schools are not organized so that the same type of practice is needed to be successful in each. The truth of the situation is that in some schools you can teach like a high school quarterback and be fine and in others you have to teach like professional quarterback to be successful. The real difference is that you get paid better in professional football if you are successful whereas in teaching the high school quarterbacks and the professional quarterbacks all get paid the same.

Over on Wonkette's site there is a hearty discussion about what makes good teachers. In it there is discussion about the art and science of teaching. John Thompson suggests that the profession is most like a craft. I tend to agree. Nancy Flanagan has written an excellent response to Wonkette's article as well.

Nancy and I have discussed art and science numerous times in the past. I want to point out that when Nancy says "science" and wonks and researchers say "science" they are not talking about the same thing. When wonks say science they are often proposing a word problem something like this: Teaching Practice A yields student success 88% of the time. Teaching Practice B yields student success 64% of the time. Which practice should you choose?

Nancy is talking about approaching teaching with a scientific mindset. She might choose Teaching Practice A but she might also choose Teaching Practice B at another time just to reach that 12% of kids Practice A doesn't work for.
I keep coming back to the story in Teacher Man where a kid throws a sandwich across the room. In that moment, how does McCourt react? There is no science in that moment but there is something else. There are goals, increasing student engagement and building relationships. Two goals that support and lead to student success although there is no academic element to the situation. What does McCourt do? He eats the sandwich. This is where creativity comes in, in how we react and promote learning "around" the academic content.

One point not mentioned in the discussion so far is the role of Bob Pianta's work in Gladwell's article. I have been a fan of Pianta's work for years. I know that he would not say that teaching should be open to anyone with a pulse but he would agree that the traits of successful teachers can be found in anyone. In the article Pianta highlights what the preschool teacher does that is good teaching, allowing students to show engagement through movement, he also points out what she could have done that would have supported more learning. This is where the profession can be taught, how to maximize learning situations. The teacher does maximize the learning by responding "creatively" to the situation as in she creates more learning using what is out of her control instead of shutting it down.

How Many Presidents Does it Take to Turn-On a Light Bulb?

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2008-11-19T17:34:00-08:00

My buddy Bill "The Tempered Radical" Ferriter posted about the above visual on his blog. He had this to say...

"Because we're working on identifying main idea in our reading classes, I asked my students a simple question: "What point do you think the artist was trying to make with this image?" My students' answer:

"Well, that's pretty obvious, Mr. Ferriter. He's trying to say that the United States has never had a woman president."

Amazing, huh?
That's got me feeling pretty good about the future of our country. Sure, there are people who will always look at other individuals through the lens of skin-color. While racism is abhorrent, it's also a sad truth of the human condition.

But as more and more children grow up in an increasingly tolerant world with successful role models of every shape and color, our country---like my kids---becomes increasingly color-blind...and that' just plan cool."

I found Bill's post interesting but perhaps a little naive. I never thought I would say that about a post that Bill wrote but our cultural circumstances are so entirely different I thought that I should leave a comment. Here it is.

I think that you may be on to something but, I am not sure that racism is a condition of the human race or that being color blind is a good thing.

What does color blindness in ed policy lead to? What does it lead to in our classrooms?

As you may know I am the minority, a white man, in my school. The more I talk about, and joke about race the less of an issue it becomes for my colleagues and myself. I am also taking all these doctoral classes and let me tell you that race blind researchers are the last thing we need. Sometimes researchers forget that race is not the cause of the poor performance it is the name for the poor performance. It is a descriptor for a group of students who historically have been under served by education.

It is in naming the unnamed so that it loses power that we create a color "full" America. Maybe Bill's students were afraid to name the unnamed and address race head on. Maybe it was the safe route to talk about something they were all obviously comfortable with, gender equality.

Some thoughts from an embedded reporter. What are yours?

Image from: Patrick Moberg's Illustration Blog:

Disrupting Education

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2008-11-19T10:16:00-08:00

I have been reading Clayton Christensen's Disrupting Class.In it he proposes that education, like all industries of a certain vintage, is ripe for disruptive innovation. He proposes that this will come about because technology provides unique opportunities for individualization in untapped markets like early childhood education, boutique classes offered online, and home schooling. I think he misses the mark with his application of his theories about innovation to education.

I agree that education is ripe for disruption but I don't think it will come about because of technology.

I have come to the conclusion that education is an entirely human endeavor and not necessarily adaptable to the laws of commerce that so many business models encourage us to adopt. I think the future disruption that Christensen proposes will come about.... but only from and by the hand of teachers.

Teachers taking more and more leadership in the process of education would constitute a true innovation. Changes to education in the past have come from influences outside of education like technology. As teachers embrace their creative capacity as professionals they will push education past its current state to become another entity and that technology will only be the tool for that disruption.

Teachers are currently creating disruptions in areas like:

how schools are created, run, and funded with models like Avalon Schools
how curriculum is developed and distributed with services like We Are Teachers
how instruction is delivered using Web 2.0 tools

Dr. Christensen, you have made some excellent points in your book but I think that perhaps you might have committed the classic academic researcher's mistake by seeing what you were looking for and not necessarily the reality of the situation. Education will change but, it is the people who will change it, not the tools.

Image from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wright_brothers

Hart & Risley Turned Inside-Out

noreply@blogger.com (j m holland) — 2008-11-12T11:18:00-08:00

In Clayton Christensen's book, "Disrupting Class: How Disruptive Innovation Will Transform Education." I have finally come to the dreaded chapter on early childhood. In chapter six Christensen says flat out that America shouldn't invest in voluntary preschool because it won't work. He then uses one of the most important studies of early language learning, Hart and Risley's "Meaningful Differences in the Everyday Experiences of Young American Children", to argue that pre-k is too little too late to help kids' language development. The only supportive evidence he sites is this study. I doubt Hart and Risley would agree that preschool should not be funded because kids make the most gains in language development from 0-3 years old.
Christensen states:

"Rather than funding programs that hire people to substitute for parents who aren't succeeding at preschool talk, quite possibly we might have a greater impact if we taught children how to b e parents before they become parents."

I actually agree with the above statement that some prevention, especially parenting courses at the middle school level in health classes, would help prevent some language delays in all children. But, the reality is that Hart and Risley's study, published in 1995, did not account for the current economic environment. It was also completed before welfare reforms which required poor parents to work. At the time, teaching poor parents how to talk to their children may have been the only intervention needed but now, that would not be enough. What Hart and Risley do not say, and what Chirstensen takes for granted is that it is too late for a child who is 3 or 4 years old to gain language at a rapid pace.
This is why Head Start has, for approximately 15 years, included parent involvement and parent literacy training in its comprehensive services offered and required of parents. In fact, our program recently received an Early Reading First grant through VCU to implement, as part of a holistic literacy program, family literacy strategies based on Hart and Risley's work. To say that children learn most from 0-3 is not the same as saying kids don't learn from 3-5. Shouldn't poor kids have the chance to catch-up even if they do start out behind?