While at ISTE last week, I had the pleasure of meeting Bob Greenberg, who interviewed me for his Brainwaves Video Anthology series. Bob seeks out "thinkers, dreamers, and innovators; some of the brightest minds in education" and seeks to record their stories to help inspire other teachers. It was an honor to be chosen by Bob to be a part of this project. Below is my 4 minute talk about the power that global service learning has had on our students at the Wallenpaupack South Elementary School.
Showing posts with label problem solving. Show all posts
Showing posts with label problem solving. Show all posts
Wednesday, July 8, 2015
Monday, October 28, 2013
"College and Career Ready" is the Wrong Goal
Anyone having anything to do with education has been bombarded lately with information about how the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) are going to fix what's wrong with American Education. This national curriculum is supposed to ensure that every student who graduates from an American high school will leave prepared for either college or a career. On the CCSS website, this idea is clearly written into the mission statement for the standards:
Let's break down that mission statement.
In December of 2012 Forbes Magazine came out with a list of the top 10 skills that 2013 employers were looking for in employees. Almost all of these qualities were not content based. They were not skills that could be neatly written into standards. These are traits like "critical thinking" and "complex problem solving" that require experience with solving real world problems.
And proponents of CCSS will tell you that those standards are designed to do just that. But they aren't. They can't do that. Because CCSS are designed to be used to judge children, schools, and teachers on standardized tests.
So, here's what's really happening instead of that experience with solving real problems. School districts are rushing to buy textbooks that are aligned to CCSS so that students can pass those tests. Teachers are being told not to stray from teaching the lessons in those textbook programs so that students pass those tests. Students are being taught how to pass those tests. Nobody ever solved a real problem in their community by working out of a textbook or workbook.
Here's the truth: Focusing and measuring what students know will always prevent you from focusing on what students can do. And they can do amazing things if we'll let them.
Instead of focusing on preparing students for "college and career", we should be preparing them for life. Heaven knows, there are plenty of people who were successful in college and/or are successful in their careers that are miserable. How many times have we heard about wildly "successful" people who, when we define success as more than "how much money you make", aren't?
We're missing the forest by focusing on the trees.
So, instead of preparing students for college and career, I propose that we prepare students for life. Teach them how to think for themselves. Teach them how to solve real problems in society. Teach them to come up with creative solutions, to make a difference, to experience the joy of being kind to others, to leave their communities better, and to advocate for the things they feel passionate about.
Instead of discussing a list of things our students need to know that was lobbied for and developed with money from large profit-driven corporations (that may or may not have our children's best interests at heart), imagine if teachers all across the country spent professional development time discussing project, inquiry, problem, and service based learning projects that allow our students to learn content while also learning the very things that will help them succeed in an unknown future. Imagine if our focus was on student learning instead of "standards implementation".
The beauty of this goal is that, along with leaving students prepared for life in ways that our increasingly narrowed curriculum cannot, it will also prepare our students for their futures in every way possible.
Teach them to think for themselves, to love learning, to problem solve, to innovate, and to connect with others, and there will be nothing they cannot accomplish.
They'll even be prepared to be successful in college or their future career.
The problem is that focusing on "college and career readiness" is the wrong goal. Worse, it's a goal that will ensure that less students are prepared for college and/or careers.The Common Core State Standards provide a consistent, clear understanding of what students are expected to learn, so teachers and parents know what they need to do to help them. The standards are designed to be robust and relevant to the real world, reflecting the knowledge and skills that our young people need for success in college and careers. With American students fully prepared for the future, our communities will be best positioned to compete successfully in the global economy.
Let's break down that mission statement.
- The Common Core State Standards provide a consistent, clear understanding of what students are expected to learn, so teachers and parents know what they need to do to help them. The standards are designed to be robust and relevant to the real world, reflecting the knowledge and skills that our young people need for success in college and careers.
In December of 2012 Forbes Magazine came out with a list of the top 10 skills that 2013 employers were looking for in employees. Almost all of these qualities were not content based. They were not skills that could be neatly written into standards. These are traits like "critical thinking" and "complex problem solving" that require experience with solving real world problems.
And proponents of CCSS will tell you that those standards are designed to do just that. But they aren't. They can't do that. Because CCSS are designed to be used to judge children, schools, and teachers on standardized tests.
So, here's what's really happening instead of that experience with solving real problems. School districts are rushing to buy textbooks that are aligned to CCSS so that students can pass those tests. Teachers are being told not to stray from teaching the lessons in those textbook programs so that students pass those tests. Students are being taught how to pass those tests. Nobody ever solved a real problem in their community by working out of a textbook or workbook.
Here's the truth: Focusing and measuring what students know will always prevent you from focusing on what students can do. And they can do amazing things if we'll let them.
- With American students fully prepared for the future, our communities will be best positioned to compete successfully in the global economy.
Instead of focusing on preparing students for "college and career", we should be preparing them for life. Heaven knows, there are plenty of people who were successful in college and/or are successful in their careers that are miserable. How many times have we heard about wildly "successful" people who, when we define success as more than "how much money you make", aren't?
We're missing the forest by focusing on the trees.
So, instead of preparing students for college and career, I propose that we prepare students for life. Teach them how to think for themselves. Teach them how to solve real problems in society. Teach them to come up with creative solutions, to make a difference, to experience the joy of being kind to others, to leave their communities better, and to advocate for the things they feel passionate about.
Instead of discussing a list of things our students need to know that was lobbied for and developed with money from large profit-driven corporations (that may or may not have our children's best interests at heart), imagine if teachers all across the country spent professional development time discussing project, inquiry, problem, and service based learning projects that allow our students to learn content while also learning the very things that will help them succeed in an unknown future. Imagine if our focus was on student learning instead of "standards implementation".
The beauty of this goal is that, along with leaving students prepared for life in ways that our increasingly narrowed curriculum cannot, it will also prepare our students for their futures in every way possible.
Teach them to think for themselves, to love learning, to problem solve, to innovate, and to connect with others, and there will be nothing they cannot accomplish.
They'll even be prepared to be successful in college or their future career.
Monday, March 25, 2013
Preparing our Students for the (1950's) Workforce
This morning, while getting ready for school, I was getting my daily dose of news by flipping through different stations on TV. One station shared a Forbes report of the top 10 skills you will need to find employment in 2013. They were:
We talk about graduating students who are college and career ready, yet we focus almost all of our time, energy, and resources on things for which neither colleges nor employers are looking.
Not only are we not preparing our students for the workplace of their futures, well beyond 2013 and the list above. We're still preparing them for the factory jobs of the 1950s in which compliance, basic reading and writing skills and the ability to calculate were all you needed to be successful.
The more we focus on standardized tests as the driving force in education, the more we make it impossible for our students to develop the skills they most desperately need. You cannot measure critical thinking, active listening, complex problem solving, or any of the above skills on a multiple choice test. As much as the corporate reform movement of the past 15 years has complained that schools are not properly preparing students for the workforce, nothing has forced schools to shift focus away from those skills our students most need more than the corporate reform movement.
Our students need to be able to critically think, problem solve, evaluate difficult situations, and actively listen, yet we continue to put the greatest importance on multiple choice tests, ensuring that none of those things can be a focus in schools. Our students need to learn to use computers, electronics, and to program, yet we put policies in place to prevent them from even taking the electronics they already own - the very electronics they will need to utilize in the workforce - out of their pockets.
Basically, we have turned schools into places where we prepare students for the realities of our past. While some overcome this insanity to become successful, pointing to them as a reason to continue with this broken system is like pointing to the 90 year old smoker as a reason to give our children cigarettes.
It is time to confront the realities of the 21st Century. We don't know what jobs will be available to our students in the future. Many of them don't exist yet. We do know that skills like critical thinking, problem solving, and decision making are becoming more important. That should drive what we do in schools.
Ten years ago, the world was very different than it is right now. The phone in your pocket didn't exist. No smartphone did. There was no such thing as an iPad or a digital tablet. Now, those items are ubiquitous.
My fifth grade students are 10 and 11 years old. What will the world look like when they are looking for jobs?
I don't know, but I do know it won't look like the 1950's.
So stop trying to force me to prepare them for that.
- Critical Thinking
- Complex Problem Solving
- Judgment and Decision Making
- Active Listening
- Computers and Electronics
- Mathematics
- Operations and Systems Analysis
- Monitoring
- Programming
- Sales and Marketing
Not only are we not preparing our students for the workplace of their futures, well beyond 2013 and the list above. We're still preparing them for the factory jobs of the 1950s in which compliance, basic reading and writing skills and the ability to calculate were all you needed to be successful.
The more we focus on standardized tests as the driving force in education, the more we make it impossible for our students to develop the skills they most desperately need. You cannot measure critical thinking, active listening, complex problem solving, or any of the above skills on a multiple choice test. As much as the corporate reform movement of the past 15 years has complained that schools are not properly preparing students for the workforce, nothing has forced schools to shift focus away from those skills our students most need more than the corporate reform movement.
Our students need to be able to critically think, problem solve, evaluate difficult situations, and actively listen, yet we continue to put the greatest importance on multiple choice tests, ensuring that none of those things can be a focus in schools. Our students need to learn to use computers, electronics, and to program, yet we put policies in place to prevent them from even taking the electronics they already own - the very electronics they will need to utilize in the workforce - out of their pockets.
Basically, we have turned schools into places where we prepare students for the realities of our past. While some overcome this insanity to become successful, pointing to them as a reason to continue with this broken system is like pointing to the 90 year old smoker as a reason to give our children cigarettes.
It is time to confront the realities of the 21st Century. We don't know what jobs will be available to our students in the future. Many of them don't exist yet. We do know that skills like critical thinking, problem solving, and decision making are becoming more important. That should drive what we do in schools.
Ten years ago, the world was very different than it is right now. The phone in your pocket didn't exist. No smartphone did. There was no such thing as an iPad or a digital tablet. Now, those items are ubiquitous.
My fifth grade students are 10 and 11 years old. What will the world look like when they are looking for jobs?
I don't know, but I do know it won't look like the 1950's.
So stop trying to force me to prepare them for that.
Friday, January 18, 2013
Allow Teachers the Chance to Be Excellent
Everybody wants excellent teachers. Parents want their kids to have the best teachers, politicians claim to want teachers to be excellent, communities want their schools to have excellent teachers, and teachers themselves want to be excellent at what they do. Regardless of how we feel about how to reach this goal, the desire for excellent teachers seems to be a universal desire.
Every teacher certification program spends time teaching us Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. (I used the term 'teacher certification program' and not 'teacher preparation program' because I'm not familiar with what gets cut when 4 year college programs get squeezed into crash-course 5-week teacher prep programs like those offered by Teach For America.) It's widely accepted that people cannot reach the higher levels of the Hierarchy without having their needs met at the lower levels. We're taught this so that we can help our students learn. Students who are hungry, sleep-deprived, unhealthy, etc. cannot learn until those needs are met.
Yesterday I was reminded of Maslow and his Hierarchy of Needs by this Tweet from R. Turner:
The answer is obvious. Teachers, just like any other people, cannot be effective at anything without having their basic needs met. I got thinking about Maslow, his Hierarchy and how it relates to teachers in today's education culture.
When we look at the Hierarchy, the qualities we find in excellent teachers like creativity, problem-solving, and lack of prejudice (objectivity) are all found at the top. In order to reach that top teachers must have the needs below them met.
As we look at the needs below the top, we start to see some of the things that the reform movement of the last decade has targeted: teacher job security, respect of the teaching profession, resources available to teachers in schools. It's clear that teachers are incapable of reaching their full potential without these necessities.
The question we've got to ask then is, "What is the purpose of this reform movement?" Either those pushing for these reforms believe that excellent teaching does not include objectivity, problem-solving, and creativity, or there is a motive other than excellent teaching behind their policies.
Either way, we need to look in a different direction if we are to provide our students with the excellent education they deserve.
Every teacher certification program spends time teaching us Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. (I used the term 'teacher certification program' and not 'teacher preparation program' because I'm not familiar with what gets cut when 4 year college programs get squeezed into crash-course 5-week teacher prep programs like those offered by Teach For America.) It's widely accepted that people cannot reach the higher levels of the Hierarchy without having their needs met at the lower levels. We're taught this so that we can help our students learn. Students who are hungry, sleep-deprived, unhealthy, etc. cannot learn until those needs are met.
The answer is obvious. Teachers, just like any other people, cannot be effective at anything without having their basic needs met. I got thinking about Maslow, his Hierarchy and how it relates to teachers in today's education culture.
When we look at the Hierarchy, the qualities we find in excellent teachers like creativity, problem-solving, and lack of prejudice (objectivity) are all found at the top. In order to reach that top teachers must have the needs below them met.
 |
As we look at the needs below the top, we start to see some of the things that the reform movement of the last decade has targeted: teacher job security, respect of the teaching profession, resources available to teachers in schools. It's clear that teachers are incapable of reaching their full potential without these necessities.
The question we've got to ask then is, "What is the purpose of this reform movement?" Either those pushing for these reforms believe that excellent teaching does not include objectivity, problem-solving, and creativity, or there is a motive other than excellent teaching behind their policies.
Either way, we need to look in a different direction if we are to provide our students with the excellent education they deserve.
Friday, July 22, 2011
Friday's Five - How to Talk About Math
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Friday's Five is a feature every week where I pick a new topic and list five items that I think fit best. Then I ask you, my readers, to share your thoughts in the comment section. For an archive of past topics, check the Friday's Five Page. If you'd like to make suggestions about future topics or discuss topics I bring up on the blog with others, make sure you click the "like" button on the right hand side of the page to join A Teacher's Life for Me on Facebook. Don't be shy about sharing the blog and Facebook Page with others. Each post has a "Tweet" button on top and buttons on the bottom that allow you to share in several ways, including e-mail, Facebook, and Twitter.
I spent a lot of time thinking about teaching math this week. Our district is struggling to develop an action plan for transitioning to the Common Core Curriculum from the current Pennsylvania Standards, and I've been reading a few books on elementary math teaching. While some of those thoughts are fresh in my mind, I wanted to focus this week on ways teachers (especially elementary teachers) can promote mathematical discussion in their classrooms.
Too many times our classrooms resemble ping-pong tables. We ask a question. (Ping) A student gives and answer. (Pong) We tell them whether they are correct or not. (Ping) Then we repeat the cycle over and over again. There's a lack of in-depth discussion about math.
After all, math is not about numbers or right answers. We've got calculators and computers for that. Math is about thinking and solving problems.
The books I've been reading are from a company called Math Solutions (Full disclosure - Math Solutions sent me these materials for free, but I do not currently have, nor have had in the past any kind of financial agreement with them.) Their mission is to help K-8 teachers teach math in a way that promotes understanding rather than focusing on using procedures to get a correct answer. I really like what I've learned about them so far and the fact that they aren't a textbook company or a program that's being touted as the answer to your standardized test score problems. Some of five suggestions below were influenced by what I've read.
Friday's Five is a feature every week where I pick a new topic and list five items that I think fit best. Then I ask you, my readers, to share your thoughts in the comment section. For an archive of past topics, check the Friday's Five Page. If you'd like to make suggestions about future topics or discuss topics I bring up on the blog with others, make sure you click the "like" button on the right hand side of the page to join A Teacher's Life for Me on Facebook. Don't be shy about sharing the blog and Facebook Page with others. Each post has a "Tweet" button on top and buttons on the bottom that allow you to share in several ways, including e-mail, Facebook, and Twitter.
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| Duke TIP/ Flickr |
Too many times our classrooms resemble ping-pong tables. We ask a question. (Ping) A student gives and answer. (Pong) We tell them whether they are correct or not. (Ping) Then we repeat the cycle over and over again. There's a lack of in-depth discussion about math.
After all, math is not about numbers or right answers. We've got calculators and computers for that. Math is about thinking and solving problems.
The books I've been reading are from a company called Math Solutions (Full disclosure - Math Solutions sent me these materials for free, but I do not currently have, nor have had in the past any kind of financial agreement with them.) Their mission is to help K-8 teachers teach math in a way that promotes understanding rather than focusing on using procedures to get a correct answer. I really like what I've learned about them so far and the fact that they aren't a textbook company or a program that's being touted as the answer to your standardized test score problems. Some of five suggestions below were influenced by what I've read.
- Stop being scared of math. - The biggest thing we can do to promote mathematical discussion and understanding in our classrooms is to stop treating math as if it's something hard to understand and difficult for most adults. It's not if it's taught correctly. Why is it acceptable for an elementary teacher to say that they couldn't possibly pass an 8th grade math test, but not acceptable for that same teacher to claim that they can't read on an 8th grade level? They are both unacceptable.
- Focus on the meaning, not on the procedure. - For example, when teaching division, stop trying to get kids to memorize that they should divide, multiply, subtract and bring down. They're going to forget it anyway (ask any 3rd, 4th, 5th, or 6th grade teacher and they'll back me up on this). Instead focus on what it means to divide. Explain that you are putting things into groups. Ask them to come up with a story that fits the division problem. Those discussions will promote your students' understanding infinitely more than a cute story about how Dead Monkeys Smell Bad, or any other memorization of procedure you push upon them.
- Give students problems that don't have a simple answer. - "What's the healthiest vegetable?" is a much better problem than "Carrots have x calories per serving. How many calories are there in 8 servings?" The first problem promotes a lot more thinking, discussion, research, and debate. It also will lead to a whole heck of a lot more math, and it's a lot more interesting. You won't find questions like that in a textbook, which brings me to #4.
- Get away from your textbook. - Textbooks are often a crutch that holds us back in elementary schools. There are a plethora of real problems out there in the world that both require math and have relevance to our students. Work towards solutions to those problems. Discuss them and demand that your students discuss, debate, and research them. Your students will gain skills they'll need in life, motivation, and a sense of purpose in addition to learning math.
- Make the question "why?" the one you ask all the time. - I wrote a whole post on this, so I'll keep it brief here. Students must know that they will have to understand math well enough to explain their thinking to others and not just spit back a correct answer. When our classroom expectations rise to this level, students will rise to meet them. There is no more important question to ask.
Now it's your turn. How do you promote math discussion in your classroom? There are certainly more ways than the five I listed. What barriers do you see in implementing the ideas I'm suggesting? Why do elementary teachers seem to view math so negatively? How can we get them to change that view? Please let me know your thoughts in the comment section below, and pass the post on to others who feel strongly about math. I'd love to hear their thoughts as well.
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