Skip to main content

Ineffective Practices

I've been reading Mike Schmoker's Results Now the past few days. It's been a great reminder for the start of this year about the urgent, important work that classroom teachers undertake daily and also a reality check that the smallest changes can bring about big results. And when I say "smallest changes," I really do mean that. He doesn't argue for anything radical in this book, unless you consider making sure success criteria is clear to students by showing strong examples of what they ultimately are expected to do, giving descriptive and specific feedback, or having kids actually read and write in school.

Throughout the book, Schmoker calls for a "coherent curriculum" and the opening of our classrooms to scrutiny and feedback. It's this quote that really has had me thinking for days:

'To put the need in perspective: we would be properly outraged if administrators routinely failed to show up for appointments with parents, or if most teachers frequently arrived at class 10 or 15 minutes late. But we tolerate practices that are at least as irrational--and egregious--when we fail to monitor or ensure effective instruction or a coherent curriculum that includes plenty of purposeful reading, writing, and critical thinking. ... We don't tolerate doctors who fail to wash their hands before surgery. It is time for the education professions to develop a healthy amount of what Roland Barth calls "moral outrage at ineffective practices" (2002, p. 10)' (137)

I'm the type of person that tries to avoid conflict with anyone. I'd much rather pose questions rather than point out flaws. But at the same time, don't I have an obligation -- as do my colleagues to me -- to point out things that really are an injustice to students in classroom practice?

Our students get one chance at a free education. One. I know that teaching practice, much like medicine, really is a system of trials and errors. But there are things that we fundamentally know are not okay. And if we wouldn't be okay with a doctor not washing his hands, then why do we sometimes make excuses for others?

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Handwritten Cue Cards in the 21st Century

I just stumbled upon this behind-the-scenes clip of Saturday Night Live's cue card process. This is intense writing. This is writing that is dependent upon trust and checks and balances. Over a short period of time, skits are written, drafted on cards, revised, and the cards revised over and over again. I also really love that SNL continues to use cue cards and not a teleprompter. Like Wally points out, technology can fail. Handwritten cue cards ensure the show goes on. Comedy is hard work. Writing is hard work. Changes are made up until the last minute to get things just right. This is a form of real-world writing.

Six Things to Keep in Mind When Your Class is NaNo-ing

Students recently drafted their reflections about National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), so I wrote beside them about the lessons that I had learned. Here they are: Limit the other work you give . While you may feel the pressure to have copious assignments in your grade book (there tends to be a sort of teacher shaming if you don't have many assignments in, as if there is a magical number), you have to recognize what is valuable and what is not, especially during the 30-day writing frenzy that NaNoWriMo is. I tried to make every assignment relevant for the month and their novels. Students encountered "daily challenges" (these quickly turned into every-other-day challenges) that focused on many of the necessary elements to good novels: dialogue, story world development, character creation, subplots, etc. Everything was designed so that students could use their work in their novels, and it allowed me to have short glimpses of the types of things they were writing abo

Past Secretaries of Education

After last night's hearing with nominee DeVos, I decided to research past education secretaries. Senator Alexander talked a lot about "precedent" when it came to procedures regarding the HELP Committee. Let us remember that the first education secretary was appointed in 1979. That's the same year that Congress created the department under Jimmy Carter. This is also the same department that Ronald Reagan promised to abolish. Even the first education secretary had experience in government. Shirley M. Hufstedler was both a federal and state appeals court judge. I'm going to say that because of that experience, she's probably familiar with law and how laws work. As we saw last night, when Betsy DeVos was redirected a question because her answer implied that states could choose to implement federal law or not, she might need a refresher. Then we had Terrel Bell, who was a high school teacher, bus driver, and served in the Marines. Again, a long list of public