Education Readings
By Allan Alach
I welcome suggested articles, so if you come across a gem, email it to me at allanalach@inspire.net.nz
This week’s homework!
What Started Treehorn?
This article by former Queensland Director of Primary Education Phil Cullen should be a must read for all primary teachers all over.
“Justice for kids is not on anyone’s agenda. “We ‘Care For Kids’” is expressed more often with tongue in cheek. Expressions about children’s learning has been replaced by plenty of talk about about test results; and it hurts as you wonder if the kind of former great people who once ran our schools, have been replaced by others, who, wonderful people though they are, seem to have lost the plot and now work hard for a sad purpose. It hurts because one believes in the enormous dignity and importance of primary schooling and there are now too many operatives who don’t seem to care.”
Over-focus on exams causing mental health problems and self-harm among pupils, study findsContributed by Phil Cullen:
‘“Parents confide that the children cry at the thought of coming to school and are often exhausted due to the stress of learning,” one anonymous primary school teacher who took part in a survey said.’
Why Math?“Why math? Why math class? Because math class can be the place where students discuss the most important and thought-provoking questions that face us as a species.”
Discursive or recursive? The fractal nature of education
Thought provoking article by Steve Wheeler:
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| What do you know about fractals? |
National curriculum is damaging children's creative writing, say authors
This is an inevitable outcome of teaching by standards; equating to paint by numbers “art.”
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| How is writing assessed? |
Are primary schools teaching un-creative writing?
On the same theme:
“The very essence of writing is that it is an expressive and personal outlet, so should we really be limiting it at all? Some argue that a child’s creativity is stimulated by the exploration of advanced vocabulary, but there really is a difference in being allowed to delve into the world of fancy words, and being forced to use them.”
The Trouble with Rubrics
Alfie Kohn:
“My growing doubts about rubrics in particular were prompted by the assumptions on which this technique rested and also the criteria by which they (and assessment itself) were typically judged. These doubts were stoked not only by murmurs of dissent I heard from thoughtful educators but by the case made for this technique by its enthusiastic proponents. For example, I read in one article that “rubrics make assessing student work quick and efficient, and they help teachers to justify to parents and others the grades that they assign to students.” To which the only appropriate response is: Uh-oh.”Lessons that Matter: What should we learn from Asia’s school systems?
Yong Zhao:
“The lessons from Asian education systems do not relate to what helped them achieve their high scores on international comparative tests, but to the efforts they have engaged in over the past few decades to transform their educational practices. These efforts are often mistaken for policies and practices designed to produce the high academic performances indicated by international tests, while in reality they are intended to create a different kind of education, an education deemed necessary for cultivating citizens in the twenty-first century.”This week’s contributions from Bruce Hammonds:
Old school or new? Math teachers debate best methods as Canadian scores fall
Old way or new way?If maths scores are falling what's the answer?“Don’t get math teachers started on best teaching practices.The discussions are emotional, heated and they don’t agree on much – except that Canadian kids are falling behind their peers in other countries, and there’s no clear solution.There are generally two camps: those in favour of the old-school method to lecture kids with a “drill-and-kill” format that preaches practice, and another, ever-growing group that believes a more creative approach is needed to engage students.”
Which approach develops positive attitudes towards maths?
The Stereotypes That Distort How Americans Teach and Learn Math
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| Jo Boaler |
“I have spent years conducting research on students who study mathematics through different teaching approaches—in England and in the U.S. All of my research studies have shown that when mathematics is opened up and broader math is taught—math that includes problem solving, reasoning, representing ideas in multiple forms, and question asking—students perform at higher levels.”
100 Percent Is Overrated
Making mistakes in maths in style – growth mindsets count! More from Jo Boaler.“Boaler notes that at least a small part of the forebrain called the thalamus can appreciably grow after periods of the sort of cognitive stimulation involved in mistake-making. What matters for improving performance is that a person is challenged, which requires a mindset that is receptive to being challenged—if not actively seeking out challenge and failure. And that may be the most important thing a teacher can impart.”
What Do We Do When Students Don’t Like School“How do we respond to students who don’t want to come to school? I’ve seen many different responses to such a question. “It’s the parents’ fault,” “The child just doesn’t want to learn,” “There is a personality conflict with the teacher,” “Kids in the class are mean”. Excuses don’t help the child want to come back to school. In fact, it makes it harder. Instead we should think of what we are currently doing that is not working.”
From Bruce’s ‘goldie oldies’ file:
Putting the heart back into teaching“Learning is about relationships. Relationships with content and with people who help us acquire it. It is about having mind changing experiences that tap into our desire to make meaning and express what we know.To be attracted to an area of learning relates to what attracts our attention and whether or not we want to put in the energy in to learn more. Curiosity is at the basis of all learning.”
Learning styles
A common sense approach:
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| Four styles |
The killing of creativity by the technocrats.
The killing of creativity by John Hattie and similar educational technocrats and accountants.
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| Anti creativity ? |
Time for some heresy?
A need for some heretical thoughts in education
“If we want to develop 21st C education systems then we will have no choice but to re-imagine education dramatically.We need to implement some heretical alternative thoughts to transform
current systems with their genesis in an industrial age an age well past its use by date. Strangely enough none of the idea being considered are new it is just that few school have put them all together. School are inherently conservative and some schools seem impervious to change. Those that transform themselves will be leading the way; the others will remain, like dinosaurs, relics of past thinking. Increasingly students, with access to powerful information technology will simply bi-pass schools that do not have the capability to transform themselves.”
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| It's not easy being a heretic |
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