Readings for creative teachers tired of the standardization agenda Ideas from Art Costa, Grant Wiggens and John Holt et all

By Allan Alach

I welcome suggested articles, so if you come across a gem, email it to me at allanalach@inspire.net.nz

All this week’s contributions are from Bruce Hammonds:

Providing Space for Wonder: Fostering Children's Natural Sense of Inquiry

“Why is the sky blue? Who invented the toilet? Why do zebras have stripes? As any parent of a preschool- or elementary school–age child can attest, children are born with a natural sense of curiosity. It is this innate sense of wonder that will lead and support our students' lifelong journeys of discovery and learning. As educators, we have a moral obligation to not only allow for our students' inquisitiveness, but to also foster and support this powerful, often untapped potential.”

http://bit.ly/1EZePLd

See maths ecerywhere

How to get children to want to do maths outside the classroom

How to get children to want to do maths – try some maths walks

“Ask adults about maths and they’ll often say: “I was never very good at maths at school”. How can we stop young children growing up today saying the same thing. One way to develop ownership is to take children on a “maths walk”, opening their eyes up to the world around them. It’s like a treasure hunt, with the treasures hidden all around us waiting to be observed.”

http://bit.ly/1Y5UpGs

Three Lessons For Teachers From Grant Wiggins

This advice is offered so that each student can continue to benefit from Wiggins' teachings and wisdom.

“While Grant is no longer with us, his spirit and ideas live on. Indeed, we can honor and celebrate his life’s work by acting on the sage advice that he offered to teachers over the years. As we prepare to meet our new students, let us consider three of Grant’s sensible and salient lessons for teachers.”

http://bit.ly/1icCBZn

Five Strategies for Questioning with Intention

The art of questioning by Art Costa and Bella Kallick

Bella and Art

“One of a teacher's most important practices is designing and posing questions. Knowing that questions are the gateway into students' thinking, masterful teachers don't just ask a lot of questions; they purposefully design and pose questions that are appropriate for each learning goal—questions that will bring about the specific kinds of student learning they are aiming for.”

http://bit.ly/1OSg3YA

The Neuroscience Behind Stress and Learning

The real oil about brain friendly learning.

“The realities of standardized tests and increasingly structured, if not synchronized, curriculum

continue to build classroom stress levels. Neuroimaging research reveals the disturbances in the brain's learning circuits and neurotransmitters that accompany stressful learning environments. The neuroscientific research about learning has revealed the negative impact of stress and anxiety and the qualitative improvement of the brain circuitry involved in memory and executive function that accompanies positive motivation and engagement.”

http://bit.ly/1p5plSG

Beyond the Factory Model

Blended learning – many schools are moving into personalised blended learning to move out of a factory one size fits all model.

“A foundation-funded experiment is testing whether“blended learning” can personalize instruction in eight Oakland schools. Blended learning combines brick-and-mortar schooling with online education “with some element of student control over time, place, path, and/or pace” of learning, according to the Clayton Christensen Institute definition of the term.”

http://bit.ly/1QdQHEK

Classrooms Flooded with Devices.

Remember B.F. Skinner’s teaching machine? Are similar claims being made for today’s technology?

“By repeatedly rotating a little wheel on the machine’s side, each child was presented with a question and its answer, then another question and its answer and so on. The feedback was instant. Each child could move at their own pace. Learning was fun instead of hard work. It was obvious to Skinner that this technology was going to change the face of education forever. Except it didn’t.”

http://bit.ly/1Kc5E91

Nine of the Best Ways to Boost Creative Thinking

“When it comes to creativity, one of our biggest concerns is usually how we can be more creative, or how to come up with better ideas. Research in this area is all over the place, but I’ve gathered some of the most practical studies out there to help you utilize specific techniques that can boost your creativity.

All of these studies are useful for everyday creativity in daily life, so try a few out for yourself and see which ones work best for you.”

http://bit.ly/1J91t9Z

Don’t Assume I'm Smarter Than My Contractor: Why Schooling Helps Us Devalue the Nonacademic

It is not only what school think is worth knowing – shame teachers don’t understand this

“Whether we mean to or not, we constantly reinforce the message that only the stuff kids are taught in school counts as serious learning. Extracurriculars are fine, but what really counts is in their textbooks and homework.We send them to school precisely because we believe that’s where they’ll be taught the most important subjects. We grade them on those things, and in many ways we measure their worth (at least while they’re in school) by how well they do on tests and school assignments.”

http://bit.ly/1LvbVdL

From Bruce’s ‘goldie oldies’ file:

New Literacies for a New Millennium

Reading has shaped our brains!

“It is hard to imagine that such an innocent act as reading could limit our thinking. After all what could be more innocuous than reading a book?

http://bit.ly/1Lv8JPg

Creativity: process or product?

Quote by Goethe

What’s often missing in many classrooms are the ‘voices’ and personal creativity of the students.

The point of the creative process is for each student to produce a piece of work (research, poetry, art or dance) that represents the best a learner can do; a piece of work or performance to be proud of. We are what we create to a degree.To many teachers do not understand that to develop student creativity they  need to do 'fewer things well' to allow their students to 'dig deeply' into any experience and then to express what they discover with individual creativity.

http://bit.ly/1VZ9Tdb

See nothing, hear nothing, don't talk to anyone!

Time for the elites to listen to voices of the people.

The only way we will get a real change in the basic script of our society is for central government to start listening to the voices of the wider community and, in education in particular, to the voices of teachers, students and their parents.

http://bit.ly/1KbukMJ

Unlocking the treasure within

Unlocking the treasure within with regard to Maori students.

“Perhaps there is no way for schools to develop their Maori students learning unless they dramatically change their style of teaching – and if they did all this students would benefit.”

http://bit.ly/1icBLf0

Observation and imagination

“Students who are taught to observe the intimate world of their immediate environment not only see more, and have more to wonder and talk about but, in the process, develop a wider vocabulary and ask more questions. From this wealth of sensory experiences arises the source for talking, drawing and early writing.”

http://bit.ly/1Y5WJNx

Time to re-read John Holt

John Holt quotes on learning - more pertinent than ever

Along with John Holt I now have to admit that, after decades of encouraging school transformation, I have also come to Holt's view about the impossibility of really transforming our antiquated education system.

http://bit.ly/1NA7pAS

New Zealand Education is at risk - it is time to make a stand!!

Please share posting this with other teachers!

It is time for New Zealand teachers to stand up and speak out about where the Government is taking them before it is too late!!

September 2015

The September New Zealand Principal’s Magazine reporting on the 2015 NZPF Conference couldn’t have made the disastrous issues facing New Zealand education any clearer.

But who is listening to the ‘frightening messages’ – or more importantly taking action?

My interactions with local principals seem to indicate that, even though they may be aware of the situation, it is all too hard; so much to do just to keep up with compliance requirements.

Elwyn Richardson

Reminds me of a favourite saying of my old friend Elwyn Richardson who said, ‘When you are up to your backside in alligators it is hard to remember you came to drain the swamp’.

Sadly Elwyn is no longer with us but he still remains as the ultimate example of what  creative education is all about – his book, ‘In The Early World,’ recently republishedby the NZCER  is testament to the kind ofeducation that we were once heading towards.  His classroom was a community of young artists and scientists exploring and expressing their ideas about issues that concerned them.

And it is not that the ‘frightening messages’ are new as anyone who  reads the posting of ex senior inspector of schools Kelvin Smythe will know. Kelvin warned us in the 1980s of the consequences of  ‘Tomorrows Schools’ reforms of  self-managing, competitive schools, but no one listened ,including myself, at the time! A man before his time but at least he hasn’t given up the fight. He is now more relevant than ever.

Visit Kelvin's site

A recent comment to one of his posting, said in respect to the NZEI succumbing to the Government’s wishes over Community of Schools (a good idea abused by the Governments’ standardisation ideology):

‘Don’t comply. Stand firm…..resolution from our leaders will not happen while teachers remain apathetic and only think in the short term about their back pocket rather than the long term about the NZ education system, their profession and what is truly best for our students’.

Our ‘so-called’ self-managing schools are suffering from what one writer calls ‘a corrosion of character’.  They were promised the opportunity to develop flexible schools but find that their success depends on the approval of the Education Review Office.  This dilemma, to gain approval by ERO and to stay true to their educational beliefs, is made worse because ERO approval is a shifting target. Only those with real character (and courage) can stay true. And then there is the problem of their school’s reputation and destructive interschool competition; far easier to comply – to go along to get along.

Denise Torrey

Back to the NZPPF Magazine’s warnings.

From the ‘President’s pen page’ it couldn’t be clearer. Denise Torrey summed up the messages from the internationally respected keynote speakers.

‘Professor Meg Maguire (UK) demonstrated the harsh reality of the global education reforms (GERM) which in a nutshell, she said,’ can be summed up as the decimation of the public education system in the UK’.

Meg Maquire spoke about how assessment and so called ‘performance’ are the all-consuming focuses in the UK.  ‘Children’ she said, ‘face more of the same, year after year: assessment preparations, then assessment, then repeat’.  School leadership is a statistical exercise in crunching data and preparing children for the next test. And, she said, ‘if schools are underperforming they are closed down by the equivalence of ERO (OFSTED) and replaced by private academies’ (charter schools).

No wonder such principals suffer from ‘a corrosion of character!’

This brings up what Denise calls ‘the sinister topic ofprivatising of education.

Diane Ravitch

She now sees such ‘reforms’ as all about ‘eliminating publiceducation.

Keynote speaker  American educator Diane Ravitch outlined the steps politicians use to introduce their agenda- ones that will be recognised by New Zealand educators.

 First they manufacture the ‘crisis’ ‘in New Zealand the ‘one in five failing’ and  ...’students are leaving school and can’t read, write or do maths’. Once the crisis gets public support then in comes the political solution.

1 in 5 failing = 1 in 5 in poverty! Any connection?

 The ‘crisis’  is framed as teachers not doing their job properly, teachers unions protecting them, not being accountable and not having proper standards. Then in come the standards in literacy and numeracy and suddenly we have a standardised measure of a schools ‘performance’.

Next in line, warns Denise, are privatised charter schools to solve the problem – and to make a profit. Denise brought up the issue of the TTPA (Trans Pacific Partnership Agreement) which she says would allow foreign corporations to establish charter schools and, if so, to override the decisions of democratically elected Governments.

In this scenario schools are to blame – no mention of poverty being an issue.

Totally compliant

And to make things worse schools have not expressed a creative teaching alternative to such developments. Too busy complying to fight for educationally inspired Communities of Schools and   the NZEI, it seems, has lost an opportunity toshare the creative ideas of teachers and instead has opened the way for greater compliance and standardisation; a sell out with dire consequences.

Denise asked those attending, ‘What is the purpose of education?’ 

Seems like a good question and too important to leave to

ideologically driven politicians. She continued, ‘there seems to be an absence of a shared vision for education in New Zealand.’ A vision’, she said, ‘that might include the ‘empowerment of children to manage their own learning’ and todevelop ‘creativity, problem solving and critical thinking’.  She asked,  ‘where would policies like NationalStandards  in reading , writing and mathsand the Progress and Consistency Tool fit into today’s personalised education?’

 Denise informed the meeting that a business world survey found that the top five skills required for job hunters are: problem solving, team work, communication, critical thinking and creativity.

And Denise reminded attendees there are the views of theimportance of a creative education by such educational experts as Sir KenRobinson. ‘Unless we reach an agreed sense of the purpose of education’, Denise concluded, ‘we will continue to be overwhelmed and bewildered by myriad policy initiatives none of which emanate from a common purpose.

Time to stand up and speak out! There is an alternative.

 A good start would be to put the focus back on the vision of the all

but side-lined 2007 New ZealandCurriculum; a curriculum one speaker, Cathy Wylie,   said ‘is the jewel in the crown’ of a positive future oriented education.

 Steve Maharey,the Vice Chancellor of Massey University, continued the theme of the importanceof a personalised education system where, ‘students would become activeparticipants in constructing their own learning by making their own decisionsabout why, how and what they learn’.  And he commented the New Zealand Curriculum, introduced when he was Minister

Steve Maharey

ofEducation, was ‘a document to be proud of’.  He concluded by saying that in a rapidly changing world only the flexible, creative and innovative will succeed’. He could’ve also be referring to schools themselves!

 The message was loud and clear; creativity or compliance.

 Liz Hawes the editor of the NZPPF magazine (who summarised all

Liz Hawes

the various speakers) that 'resist1 resist! resist! was the clarion call from the lead keynote speakers’ all of who ‘described the reforms as having crushed the quality education systems in both countries (the UK and theUS, leaving barely mediocre private academies and charter schools in theirwake’.

And it is no better in the test dominated school system ofAustralia. Read what Phil Cullen, an ex-Director of Primary EducationQueensland (another old warrior who hasn’t given up), has to say aboutdestructive Australian testing (NAPLAN) system.

Meg Maquire

Professor Meg Maquire (Kings College London) continued the message with frightening clarity 'mirroring the concerns], that Liz Hawes writes, ‘ that New Zealand teachers have expressed since the introduction of national standards, public achievement information and league tables; fears that these will lead to obsession with assessment data, threats of school closure for under performance and chains of charter schools’.

In England Meg said, ‘we haven’t got a system left. Teachers are the objects of policy, not the agents. These are deforms not reforms’, resulting in ‘intolerable stress levels’.

‘Don’t go down this path,’ she concluded.

Professor Alma Harris (Head of Educational Leadership, London) asked attendees to rethink what high performance means and to ‘press the pause on the Programme for International Student Achievement (PISA), which is distorting education’. Sir Ken Robinson calls then as reliable as the

The leaning tower of PISA

Eurovision Song contest is for defining singing quality! What is wrong is that PISA testing takes no account for context and that the real problem with PISA is when the measures become the target’. And they only measure what they measure! ‘The trouble with targets’, one business philosopher wrote,’ that it is not the ones you hit that count it is the ones you miss because you weren’t looking.

Alma’s final message was to ‘unite against thestandardisation and privatisation of our excellent education system with itsworld class curriculum’. ‘Resist! Resist! Resist!

This was a message  further pushed home by Professor Diane Ravitch of New York University.  ‘You must avoid being infected by GERM (Global Education Reform Movement). It is not aboutreform it’s about privatisation and eliminating public education’. 

 ‘What drags down performance in the United States is poverty, more than any other factor. But politicians and power brokers don’t want to talk about poverty they want to talk about reform.’

  A further belief is that ‘if you standardise testing, and the curriculum and everyone has common testing them all children will be successful and all poverty will disappear And, with regard to charter schools, ‘you have no unions, no tenure and no security’. ‘This is education for profit based on ideas

that teachers are motivated by incentives such as performance pay’. Education in the US is becoming more corporatized  and computers are being seen as a replacement for teachers  which, says Ravitch, ‘is the ultimate in eliminating human relationships from education’  it  is all about schools calculating the ‘value add’ score based on literacy and numeracy tests scores. And those who resist such reforms are labelled resisters who just want to protect the status quo.  Sound familiar?

‘Resist! Resist! Resist!’ Ravich insisted,‘public schools are vital to a democracy’

Liz Hawes concludes her summary by writing, ‘It is timely that we continue to take on board the strong warning from the speakers from both the UK and the USA that global reforms are dangerous and destructive and should be resisted’.

Time it seems for educators to remember ‘they came to drain the swamp’ and to set their sights on an educational vision that focuses

on thedevelopment of the talents and skills of all New Zealanders rather - a visionthat we can all get behind.

This is something worth fighting for but so far I don’tsense much action.

It will take character courage, imagination and working together to avoid the current ‘corrosion of character’ but what is thealternative?

Actually it will take a change of Government.

Education Readings - fighting for creative education in the face of politically imposed standardisation.

By Allan Alach

I welcome suggested articles, so if you come across a gem, email it to me at allanalach@inspire.net.nz

 Why America’s obsession with STEM education is dangerous

 Steve Jobs: Technology alone is not enough

Other countries who are being sucked into STEM need to take note.

“A broad general education helps foster critical thinking and creativity. Exposure to a variety of fields produces synergy and cross fertilization. Yes, science and technology are crucial components of this education, but so are English and philosophy. When unveiling a new edition of the iPad, Steve Jobs explained that “it’s in Apple’s DNA that technology alone is not enough — that it’s technology married with liberal arts, married with the humanities, that yields us the result that makes our hearts sing.”’

http://wapo.st/1Ei8rIT

Weapons of maths destruction: are calculators killing our ability to work it out in our head?

It’s not the calculators that is the problem…

“Sadly, the potential for calculators to transform school mathematics and enhance our facility with mental arithmetic is not being achieved. We are not being provided with opportunities to solve real and interesting mathematical problems in the most effective ways”

http://bit.ly/1TbUBE0

How The Ballpoint Pen Killed Cursive

Interesting.

“Sassoon’s analysis of how we’re taught to hold pens makes a much stronger case for the role of the ballpoint in the decline of cursive. She explains that the type of pen grip taught in contemporary grade school is the same grip that’s been used for generations, long before everyone wrote with ballpoints. However, writing with ballpoints and other modern pens requires that they be placed at a greater, more upright angle to the paper—a position that’s generally uncomfortable with a traditional pen hold.”

http://theatln.tc/1MUTKSO

A New Kind of Social Anxiety in the Classroom

“Kids who constantly use phones and computers tend to be more nervous in face-to-face conversations. What can teachers do to help?”

http://theatln.tc/1JDSYIR

Making and the Reggio Emilia Approach: Making the Connection

“The Reggio Emilia approach to early childhood education places among the children an atelierista with two primary responsibilities: to conduct deep observation of the patterns in each child’s growth and use these observations to lead children into the process of the artist. Atelieristas often refer to this process as the “aesthetic dimension,” full of desire for meaning, curiosity and wonder.”

http://stanford.io/1LEEiZv

Alfie Kohn

Four Reasons to Worry About “Personalized Learning”

Alfie Kohn deconstructing the corporate view of “Personalized Learning”:

“Certain forms of technology can be used to support progressive education, but meaningful (and truly personal) learning never requires technology. Therefore, if an idea like personalization is presented from the start as entailing software or a screen, we ought to be extremely skeptical about who really benefits”

http://bit.ly/1KvV3sQ

This week’s contributions from Bruce Hammonds:

Putting the Passion in Project-Based Learning

“How do we as teachers get our students to define their own driving questions? One way is by pairing design thinking with project-based learning. If you want students to develop leadership, confidence, and solid core content knowledge, then this is a strategy that works “learning miracles.”Students crave assignments that are relevant to them. That’s why project-based learning is the best way to get students to take control of their learning. Here are some keys to getting the most out of project-based learning.”

http://bit.ly/1V5CvBk

Most Likely to Succeed,’ by Tony Wagner and Ted Dintersmith

New York Times review of Tony Wagner’s excellent book  is well worth a read

Tony Wagner

‘“Most Likely to Succeed: Preparing Our Kids for the Innovation Era,” by Tony Wagner and Ted Dintersmith — argues that the only way to ensure any kind of future security for our children is to totally upend the education system and rethink what school is for.Many of the disruptions the authors suggest — an interdisciplinary approach; hands-on, project-based learning; student-directed curriculums — are already in place in some of the country’s best schools. Less convincing is the assumption that undergirds this whole tract: that every person can — or should — be molded into an entrepreneur.’

http://nyti.ms/1JR1kPk

Why Ed Tech Is Not Transforming How Teachers Teach

“A mountain of evidence indicates that teachers have been painfully slow to transform the ways they teach, despite that massive influx of new technology into their classrooms. The student-centered, hands-on, personalized instruction envisioned by ed-tech proponents remains the exception to the rule.”

http://bit.ly/1MSwtTa

Golden Rules for Engaging Students in Learning Activities

“Research suggests that considering the following interrelated elements when designing and implementing learning activities can increase student engagement behaviourally, emotionally, and cognitively, thereby positively affecting academic achievement.”

http://bit.ly/1htKauQ

Igniting Student Engagement: A Roadmap for Learning

More good advice on engaging students.

“Here are three practices that, when incorporated by teachers, offer entry points for students to invest in their learning.”

http://bit.ly/1PCvl4j

Know that you have it: Keys to self-driven, self-loving, self-supporting education

“In life and learning, sometimes it isn’t what we know, but knowing that we have it that makes the difference. How can we cultivate an education system that values both how we feel and behave, as much as what we “know?” Imagine if you went into school every day and learned, along side your core studies, how to listen, communicate, and collaborate; how to honor each other; how to see the best in each other. The possibilities are endless.”

http://bit.ly/1UQWc30

From Bruce’s ‘goldie oldies’ file:

Negotiating the Curriculum

“In the Australian book 'Negotiating the Curriculum, edited by Garth Boomer,  four steps are suggested to negotiate a study with students applicable for any level of schooling. Essentially it is an inquiry model that emphasizes valuing the 'voice' of students in the their own learning. It is very much in line with the 'co- constructivist' teaching philosophy.The four steps outlined below are premised that the study has not yet been widely accepted by the students. In this situation the teacher and the learners should ask four questions and together negotiate the answers. This is essentially about power sharing leaving the agency for learning in the hands of the students.”

http://bit.ly/1Kc8Kd3

And further ideas:

How to engage students - advice from the experts!

“Engaging students at the year 7 to 10 year age groups seems to be a growing challenge worldwide as non 'academic' students are finding their learning boring or irrelevant. The obvious answer would seem to be to ask the experts themselves - the students!

This is what was done by the innovative Australian project 'Negotiating the Curriculum' of the early 80s edited by Garth Boomer.”

http://bit.ly/1KmYPmk

Transform schools or exclude students

Either we transform schools or exclude disengaged students.

“On Sunday night TV One a play, 'Ahead of the Class', based on the true story of how Lady Marie

A scene from the play

Stubbs turned around a notorious school in South London was shown; this school, no doubt, had more than it's fair share of suspended students; the previous principal had been murdered by a pupil! The play faced up to the challenge of ‘turned off’ learners that face too many of our secondary schools. And it also faced up to a staff who had accepted that the problem lay with the students.”

http://bit.ly/1KPzEeo