Having written previously about ways education has improved in the 40 years since I began teaching, I would like to address one change that I do not believe has been beneficial: the attempt to make “content standards” the basis for everything in education.

The standards movement, which began about 20 years ago, is an effort to improve K-12 education by creating a list of content standards for each course and grade level, telling teachers exactly what needs to be taught and measuring what students have learned using tests built around those standards. California started generating these standards about 12 years ago, and now has content standards and tests for English, Math, Science, and History. These standards list between 40 and 70 things that need to be taught in each subject, each year. With 180 days in a school year, it is clear that this allows only two to four days per standard.

These standards are based on a misconception of what education is. They assume that education is like building a brick wall. If you place every brick in just the right place — that is, if you teach each standard –you end up with the finished product you desire. However, education is not just a matter of teaching 70 bits of information or skills each year. It’s about exciting students. It’s about inspiring them. It’s about awakening their individual talents and ways of looking at things that are never exactly like anyone else’s. Excellent teachers know this, and that is why many of us resist the effort to “standardized” what we do.

In English classes, the most important outcomes are that students read well and write clearly, that they enjoy reading, and that they take pride in their ability to capture their own thoughts and feelings on paper. Those goals are not enhanced by having 70 numbered standards ranging from “1.5 Use correct punctuation and capitalization” to “2.6 Write technical documents: a. identify the sequence of activities needed to design a system, operate a tool, or explain the bylaws of an organization. b. include all the factors and variables that need to be considered. c. use formatting techniques (e.g., headings, differing fonts) to aid comprehension” (Eighth Grade California English Standards).

In math, the one subject that most of us were taught based on the building-a-brick-wall method, the leaders in the field are rejecting this approach in favor of one based on developing thinking skills. National Council of Teachers of Mathematics President Henry S. Kepner, Jr. says “Reasoning and sense-making are at the heart of mathematics from early childhood through adulthood,” and W. Gary Martin, professor of mathematics education at Auburn University adds “We keep teaching that learning to carry out complicated procedures is what math’s about; to me the real question is, can [students] do anything with it?” (Both quotes from Education Week, Oct. 7, 2009.)

In history and science the standards also now favor breadth over depth, and teachers are pushed to cover more topics, even if it means doing so superficially. Excellent teachers do just the reverse.

Look back at your own education. I doubt if the teachers who influenced you most were those that preferred covering many topics over going into depth. The teachers who had the greatest impact on me stressed a few important concepts and stayed with them until students had time to fully internalize them. My tenth grade English teacher, Ms. Gilbert, didn’t jump from one writing type to another as the standards now require (nine types are listed in the tenth grade California standards). She stuck with critical book reviews until we could write clearly about a book’s theme and style and make reasoned evaluations with adequate supporting citations. That didn’t happen on our first or second attempts. Mr. Sheilds, my eighth grade history teacher, didn’t cover every one of the 69 topics now listed in the eighth grade standards, much less the 109 sixth and seventh grade standards eighth grade teachers are now expected to review, but he did take enough time on the topics he taught to allow us to do individual research and explore the controversies of the periods, letting American history come alive for us.

I am not claiming that content standards have made good teaching impossible; that isn’t true. Teachers are adaptable and resourceful, and some can make lemonade out of even the sourest of lemons; but the standards, as they currently exist, have hurt education. They have led some excellent teachers to retire earlier than they might have because they have found the new demands irreconcilable with their deepest held beliefs. These standards have caused many bright new teachers, who might have developed into a new generation of excellent educators, to quit after two or three years because they found the “brick-laying” method of teaching joyless and non-productive. And these standards hurt student learning because, even though many teachers do a valiant job to minimize their negative effects, the standards demand too much coverage and too little meaningful instruction.

As the Obama Administration begins to focus on changes in national educational policy, I hope parents and teachers will join together in calling for an end to the type of standards which stifle creativity and encourage superficiality. We must set higher standards for our standards.

Any newbie from the area’s public or private schools is invited to partake in the oohing, aahing and gifting that will take place at the College Avenue Presbyterian Church, 5951 College Avenue, Oakland, according to the e-mail notice I received. Veteran teachers and local office supply stores have donated books and other classroom materials for the occasion.

Questions? E-mail Bob Houghteling, director of the institute, at bob@ba-tii.org.

photo from WonderMike’s photostream at flickr.com/creativecommons

photo of Glenview Elementary School students by D. Ross Cameron/Staff.

A story in tomorrow’s Tribune looks at grassroots efforts to give every child access to fresh produce and a healthy meal, as well as the Oakland school district’s progress on that front. What are your ideas?

Researchers surveyed and conducted focus groups of teachers from around the country who were born between 1977 and 1995 (Do people start student-teaching at 18 and 19?). The teachers considered parental involvement, class size, learning opportunities and salary raises across the board to be more important factors than performance pay, according the report.

Another nuanced finding? That these young teachers value their unions’ preservation of tenure protections, but that they think the unions protect ineffective teachers.

To the many Gen Y-ers in Oakland and the East Bay: How do your views mesh with these findings? Do you agree with the corresponding policy recommendations?

How about Boomers? Gen X-ers?

photo from Oakland Technical High School’s Web site

Last Wednesday I attended the Oakland Technical High School open house. This was unusual, as I normally find it taxing to come out to any extraneous school events and have missed my share of Halloween parades and school performances. What is even more significant is that my oldest child will not start high school until the year after next, and I generally consider myself to be a pretty low key parent. But I was not alone. I ran into half a dozen other seventh-grade families I know, checking out this Oakland public high school early. 

The Oakland Tech building is architecturally striking, with huge columns and a white marble foyer, but what really struck me was the number of people swarming through the doors. We were directed to an auditorium that looked to hold about 500 people and was nearly packed!

The evening consisted of a series of six short periods in which you visit classrooms and learn about the various academic programs. Apparently, everyone had heard about the successes of Paideia and the Engineering Academy as there was a monumental rush to get into these classrooms. My daughter and I were turned away from the Paideia classroom twice, and when we finally got in, it was standing room only. I know of one family that attempted to get in three times, and never did. This is not to say that there was not significant interest in other academies and programs. Rooms were full with people standing around the back of every classroom I visited, including Health Academy and World Languages.

I noticed several other things as well. First, the people who attended the event appeared to be mostly Caucasian. Granted, this is only my impression of the identity of the crowd, but this was surprising given that the demographics of the school is listed at only 10 percent white on the Great Schools Web site. 

Second, I personally recognized families from Hillcrest and Redwood Day, and overheard parents chatting about tours they had scheduled at College Preparatory School and Bishop O’Dowd. In my mind this places the crowd as solidly middle class or above. While the downturn in the economy may be driving some people to check out their public options, it was not clear to me that economics was the motivating factor for the turn out at Tech.  

Third, and the point that requires the most of my processing powers, was the way I felt throughout the evening. Over and over, I had the mildly anxious sensation of having to compete. Sure there were moments of relief as I realized that kids could enjoy a rigorous, quality education all the way through high school in our public school system, but this was attenuated by that whispered assumption, and niggling worry that this opportunity was severely limited.  
 
The most concrete way in which it is limited is space. Many families, including mine, live outside the Tech High boundaries and would have to rely on the lottery or Options program to gain admission.  With all the popularity of this school, that may be challenging.

There is yet another way that this opportunity is limited. In 10th grade, each student must be recommended and/or apply for entrance to the elite academies or programs. On the surface that sounds reasonable enough, but this is the point where I stop operating on reason and sink into that heart-racing, gut-twisting realm of emotion. 

Sitting in the Paideia classroom, I was actually quite daunted by the incredibly high academic level at which the children must work. When the staff dropped a few choice names like ‘Machiavelli’ and mentioned the ‘Socratic method’ my smile tightened. I had immediate questions of whether my bright child was really bright enough to perform at that level, and a certainty that I could not have done it at that age. My mind whirled with crazed plans for my child to start reading novels in a foreign language, and assigning reading in The New York Times so she could learn the names of the politicos taught in history class. 

It has taken a few days for me to add these plans to the long list of things that I have considered meritorious, but will probably never do, and have resumed my ‘good enough mother’ and ‘good enough child’ attitude. In this time, I have reflected back on the unpredictable and circuitous route that I traveled in my own education and personal development. I come away from this experience with the knowledge that there are great opportunities out there, including some extraordinary programs at Oakland Tech, but also with the realization that our children will make their own opportunities in their own due time.

Well, it’s Nov. 2, and Kakishiba hasn’t left. He says he is respecting the requests he has received from other board members and his constituents to see if a “legal remedy” could be reached that would let him serve on the board within certain parameters.

“I’m prepared to resign, but not one single person has said, `Get the hell out of here,’” Kakishiba told me today.

At 6 p.m. Nov. 12, the school board will hold a special meeting on the subject. Kakishiba said his colleagues don’t know the legal basis for Minor’s opinion — in part, because Kakishiba, himself, doesn’t even have a copy of the document – and that they are concerned about the broader policy implications of the ruling. (Kakishiba says he doesn’t plan to weigh in on the discussion, and that he might not even attend the special meeting. “I don’t really have an opinion about it,” he said.)

“We want to get it all out in the public,” said board member Gary Yee.

Yee also said he hoped the board would find a way to keep Kakishiba on the board, legally. “I think most people who are aware of the situation know that this is not the best time to go looking for a replacement,” he said.

Do you agree?

You can find the U.S.  Department of Education report here. The California-specific breakout, which shows – very generally — where the money was spent, starts on Page 20.

file photo by John Green/Bay Area News Group

Lillian Mongeau and Becky Palstrom from Oakland North, a UC Berkeley School of Journalism blog, captured a quintessential slice of high school life in an audio slideshow about the Oakland Technical High School homecoming game (and the basic rules of football). Mongeau took the photos, and Palstrom interviewed the students and collected the audio.

I was highly entertained. You can find the slideshow here.

Benjamin Schmookler, principal of Media Academy – a small school on East Oakland’s Fremont Federation campus — agreed to be dunked today during a celebration of the school’s improved test scores. Media Academy’s state test scores went up by 79 points to 600 (on a scale of 200 to 1,000), the biggest gain seen in all of the district’s high schools this year.

At an Oakland school board meeting last night, while Jody London spoke of the need to strengthen ties with the city, it was announced that the new schools chief, Tony Smith, would join the city’s even newer police chief, Anthony Batts, and Mayor Dellums at a town hall meeting Monday night at Prescott school in West Oakland.

Given the number of shootings — fatal and non-fatal — that Oakland public schoolchildren have suffered since August, and the tragic death of 11-year-old Alana Williams, who was struck by a car Oct. 16 while she was in a crosswalk right by her school, it seemed like a good start.

Smith speaks often about the need for everyone to come together to solve Oakland’s seemingly intractable problems, including the perils facing children and families in some neighborhoods. So who better to work with — at least, outside of the district — than Batts?

Maybe that will eventually come to pass. I understand that Smith plans to attend the 6:30 p.m. town hall meeting at PLACE at Prescott (920 Campbell St.), but I’m not sure what his role will be, exactly. He’s not mentioned in the promotional flier put out by the mayor’s office about Chief Batts’ introduction to the community.

In any case, maybe I’ll see you at the meeting. There’s another one Nov. 9 at the Cesar Chavez Educational Complex, if you can’t make it on Monday.

In what ways do you think the city and school system can better work together, especially around public safety issues? Do you sense a divide?