In This Issue:

  1. Charlotte Danielson on shifting from teacher evaluation to development

  2. Culture shock for U.S. military veterans who become teachers

  3. A compendium of key teaching principles from cognitive science

  4. Building ownership by giving students some choices

  5. Teaching evolution without violating students’ religious beliefs

  6. What happens when we reassure students that anxiety is normal

  7. Using Twitter in a middle-school classroom

  8. Weaving financial literacy into the math curriculum

  9. Defining “maker space”

10. Short items: (a) An app to form student groups; (b) A free school climate survey tool;

      (c) Information graphics and your brain; (d) An interview

 

Quotes of the Week

“Being a well-educated person and passionate about learning isn’t just about reading and computing well… Music and art; world languages; physics, chemistry, and biology; social studies, civics, geography, and government; physical education and health; coding and computer science – these aren’t luxuries that are nice to have. They’re what it means to be ready for today’s world.”

            John King, U.S. Secretary of Education, in a Nevada speech April 14, 2015,

            http://1.usa.gov/1NsV6Yh

 

“What is the larger culture that allows teachers and students to feel safe? That we’re out for your development. We’re not here to sort you into who can succeed and who can’t.”

            Carol Dweck, quoted in “New Online Tool Expands Access to School Climate

Measurements” by Evie Blad in Education Week, April 20, 2016 (Vol. 35, #28, p. 1,

11), www.edweek.org; see also item 10a.

 

“I’m deeply troubled by the transformation of teaching from a complex profession requiring nuanced judgment to the performance of certain behaviors that can be ticked off on a checklist.”

            Charlotte Danielson (see item #1)

 

“In the last several years, there has been a lot of evidence, both from academic work and from companies that approach recruitment analytically, that traditional job interviews aren’t particularly good tools for identifying the best employees. One conclusion: It’s a bad idea to hire someone primarily based on a job interview, or on a manager’s gut instinct. Some people perform better when being interviewed, but that seems to be a self-contained skill.”

            Neil Irwin in “Campaigns Are Long and Chaotic. Maybe That’s Good” in The New

York Times, April 19, 2016, http://nyti.ms/1YPZRvr

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1. Charlotte Danielson on Shifting from Teacher Evaluation to Development

            In this article in Education Week, teacher-evaluation guru Charlotte Danielson says, “Every superintendent, or state commissioner, must be able to say, with confidence, ‘Everyone who teaches here is good. Here’s how we know. We have a system.’” So why, asks Danielson, has it been so difficult to ensure good teaching in every classroom?

One reason, she believes, is that school-based administrators “don’t always have the skill to differentiate great teaching from that which is merely good, or perhaps even mediocre.” Another problem is the lack of consensus on how we should define “good teaching.” Is it improved test scores? That idea has run into a number of methodological problems, says Danielson. Is it rubric scores based on classroom observations? She worries that when administrators assign a score after watching a lesson, “teaching is distilled to numbers, ratings, and rankings, conveying a reductive nature to educators’ professional worth and undermining their overall confidence in the system.”

“I’m deeply troubled,” says Danielson, “by the transformation of teaching from a complex profession requiring nuanced judgment to the performance of certain behaviors that can be ticked off on a checklist.”

Only about six percent of teachers are ineffective, she continues. For the remaining 94 percent, the emphasis should shift from ratings to learning. And what do we know about professional learning? That it requires:

• Active intellectual engagement – That is, self-assessment, reflection on practice, and on-going conversations;

• Trust – “Fear shuts people down,” says Danielson. “Learning, after all, entails vulnerability. The culture of the school and of the district must be one that encourages risk-taking.”

• Challenge – “The culture must include an expectation that every teacher will engage in a career-long process of learning,” she says, “one that is never ‘finished.’ Teaching is simply too complex for anyone to believe that there is no more to learn.”

• Teacher collaboration – PD and supervisory suggestions rarely drive classroom improvements, says Danielson. “Overwhelmingly, most teachers report that they learn more from their colleagues than from an ‘expert’ in a workshop… or being directed by a supervisor to read a certain book or take a particular course.” Most often, classroom improvement comes from working with colleagues analyzing student work and planning curriculum.

Policy leaders, concludes Danielson, should undertake a comprehensive redesign of personnel policies. Here are her preliminary thoughts on what a new system should include:

-   An emphasis on professional learning in a culture of trust and inquiry;

-   A career ladder from probationary to continuing status after about three years; from that point on, the main emphasis becomes professional learning;

-   Differentiation in the evaluation system, with novice teachers getting support from a mentor and being evaluated every year;

-   Career teachers assessed periodically to ensure continuing quality;

-   Teacher leadership positions (mentor, instructional coach, team leader) for which experienced teachers in good standing are eligible to apply; these come with training and support, extra compensation, or released time during the regular school day;

-   The ability to identify seriously underperforming teachers, support their improvement, and if sufficient progress isn’t made, deny them tenure or continuing employment.

 

“It’s Time to Rethink Teacher Evaluation” by Charlotte Danielson in Education Week, April 20, 2016 (Vol. 35, #28, p. 24, 20), www.edweek.org

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2. Culture Shock for U.S. Military Veterans Who Become Teachers

            In this Kappan article, Janis Newby Parham (a Texas-based consultant) and Stephen Gordon (Texas State University/San Marcos) note that public schools have hired more than 17,000 veterans under the Troops to Teachers program. Veterans can bring significant advantages to the classroom, including: experience working with people from different cultures to achieve a common mission, knowing how to adapt to changing conditions, and resilience. They are also more likely than other applicants to be people of color, to teach in high-need areas like math, science, and special education, and to stay in education for the long haul. “Former service members tend to be committed to their students and tenacious in their efforts to improve,” say Parham and Gordon. Some early studies suggest that over time, veterans are stronger in classroom management, instructional practices, and student results.

            But they also enter teaching with some unique needs, and many encounter the following problems in their first year of teaching:

-   Beliefs about PTSD – Some educators believe many veterans suffer from psychological disorders that might be a problem for students and colleagues. In fact, most veterans don’t have these issues, and those who do can usually be successful educators with the proper treatment and support.

-   Adjusting to an environment that is much less hierarchical, results-oriented, and loyalty-bound than the military – “Former service members can be bewildered by teachers who aren’t willing to share successful lesson plans or instructional materials and by the cliquishness and rivalry among faculty subgroups sometimes present in schools,” say Parham and Gordon. Veterans who have had life-and-death combat experiences “tend to have low tolerance for petty politics in schools or for initiatives that seem unrelated to educating students. Former service members may sometimes seem overly assertive in discussions with colleagues.”

-   Adjusting to not being a trained expert in charge of others – Veterans entering the classroom may feel like novices and have to adjust to their students not snapping to attention when given an order.

-   Failing with students – “As veterans new to teaching begin to realize their students are not learning as anticipated,” say Parham and Gordon, “feelings of frustration and powerlessness are common.”

-   Isolation – The close-my-classroom-door norm of privacy in many schools can make veterans feel they have been parachuted onto an island and left to make it on their own.

-   Figuring out hidden norms – Veterans who are used to explicit operating procedures have to decode the unspoken expectations on how to relate to colleagues, handle student discipline, deal with parent concerns, get supplies, and get help.

“Most former service persons survive their first year and go on to become effective teachers,” say Parham and Gordon. “However, veterans and their students endure a rocky journey during that first year, which could be made much smoother if they were provided appropriate entry-year support.” Here are the authors’ suggestions:

            • Appropriate information for colleagues – Ideally, an experienced educator who’s been in the military briefs the faculty on the unique challenges faced by veterans. The more communication there is, the better, say Parham and Gordon: “Discussions of shared experiences, shared values, and shared goals can help veterans and other teachers begin to build relationships.”

            • Levels of structured support – This might consist of a well-chosen mentor (similar to their “battle buddy” in the military), a support team (perhaps a grade-level or subject team that meets regularly), and a support network with other veterans in the school or district.

            • General assistance – Veterans need an especially thorough briefing as they enter a new setting, including policies, procedures (copying machines, grading, and more), formal and informal rules, and a map of the school.

            • Classroom-based assistance – Mentors and support teams have an especially important job bringing these veterans up to speed on teaching priorities, curriculum breadth versus depth, dealing with student differences, lesson planning, instructional materials, and, of course, discipline. Veterans “tend to be able to achieve student compliance,” say Parham and Gordon, “but may have difficulty developing the kinds of relationships that promote student self-discipline.”

            • Differentiating instruction – “I think the hardest adjustment for me was that I had a range of academic ability in the classroom,” said one veteran. “I had some kids who, everything was really quick, and then I had some who would really struggle.” Support for this common challenge can come from peer coaching, observing expert teachers, workshops, articles and books, and seminars. The good news is that veterans have experience taking on new challenges and are almost always eager learners.

“Military Veterans Bring Many Positives – and Some Needs – Into Teaching” by Janis Newby Parham and Stephen Gordon in Phi Delta Kappan, April 2016 (Vol. 97, #7, p. 43-47), www.kappanmagazine.org; Gordon can be reached at [email protected].

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3. A Compendium of Key Teaching Principles from Cognitive Science

            In this article in Kappan, Benjamin Riley reports on a paper recently published by the Deans for Impact (a group of education-school leaders) summarizing cognitive science principles essential to effective teaching and learning. The ideas, developed with Daniel Willingham (University of Virginia) and Paul Bruno (a former middle-school teacher), are organized around six essential questions, with practical implications for the classroom:

A. How do students understand new ideas?

• Students learn new ideas by linking them to what they already know. This means it’s essential for teachers to develop and refer to prior knowledge. Teachers should also make frequent use of analogies, elaborate on them, and help students see how prior knowledge connects to what is to be learned.

• Students must transfer information from working memory to long-term memory. Because working memory has limited capacity, students can be overwhelmed if too much information is presented at once. Effective teachers make content explicit through carefully paced explanation, modeling, and examples; present new information through multiple modalities; and make good use of worked problems.

• Learning doesn’t progress through a fixed sequence of age-related stages. Rather, the mastery of new concepts happens in fits and starts. “Content should not be kept from students because it is ‘developmentally inappropriate,’” says the report. “To answer the question ‘is the student ready?’ it’s best to consider ‘has the student mastered the prerequisites?’”

B. How do students learn and retain new information?

            • Information is often withdrawn from memory just as it went in. For students to remember what information means and why it is important, we need to get them thinking about meaning when they encounter to-be-remembered material. Effective teachers assign tasks that require explanation or require students to organize material in meaningful ways. Stories and mnemonics are also helpful in getting students to impose meaning on hard-to-remember content.

            • Practice is essential to learning new facts, but not all practice is equally effective. For long-term mastery, it’s best to space practice over time and interleave questions from different content areas. Frequent quizzes with low stakes, and students testing themselves, help establish long-term retention through the “retrieval effect.” At a metacognitive level, it’s good for students to understand this principle of long-term memory.

C. How do students solve problems?

            • Each subject has basic facts that support higher-level learning by freeing working memory and illuminating applications. In reading, these include phonics and letter-sound pairings; in math, they include basic facts such as the multiplication tables.

            • Effective feedback is often essential to acquiring new knowledge and skills. Good feedback is specific and clear, focused on the task rather than the student, explanatory, and directed toward improvement rather than merely verifying performance.

D. How does learning transfer to new situations in or outside the classroom?

            • To transfer learning to a novel problem, students need to know the problem’s context and its underlying structure. It’s important for students to have sufficient background knowledge to appreciate a problem’s context.

            • Examples are helpful to learning new ideas, but it’s often hard to see the link to other examples. Having learned to find the area of a table top, a student might not see how this applies to finding the area of a soccer field. Explicitly comparing the examples helps students remember the underlying similarities. With multi-step procedures, students need to identify and label the sub-steps so they can apply them to similar problems. It’s also helpful to alternate concrete examples and abstract representations.

E. What motivates students to learn?

            • Beliefs about intelligence are important predictors of student behavior in school. Motivation is improved if students believe that intelligence and ability can be improved through hard work, and if adults respond to successful work by praising effective effort rather than innate ability. It’s also helpful for teachers to set learning goals (e.g., mastering specific material) rather than performance goals (competing with others or vying for approval).

            • Intrinsic motivation leads to better long-term outcomes than extrinsic motivation. Teachers need to keep their eye on whether a task is one that students are already motivated to perform; whether a reward is verbal or tangible; whether a reward is expected or unexpected; whether praise is for effort, completion, or quality; and whether praise or a reward occurs immediately or after a delay.

            • It’s difficult to gauge one’s own learning and understanding. That’s why students need to learn how to monitor their own learning through assessments, self-testing, and explanation.

            • Students will be more motivated and successful when they believe they belong and are accepted. Teachers should reassure students that it’s natural to have doubts about belonging – but those feelings will diminish over time. Teachers can also encourage students to see critical feedback as a sign that others believe in their ability to meet high standards.

F. What are common misconceptions about how students think and learn?

            • Teachers need to recognize and dispel a set of incorrect beliefs about teaching and learning:

-   Misconception #1: Students have different “learning styles.”

-   Misconception #2: Humans use only 10 percent of their brains.

-   Misconception #3: People are preferentially “right-brained” or “left-brained” in how they think.

-   Misconception #4: Novices and experts think in all the same ways.

-   Misconception #5: Cognitive development progresses in age-related stages.

“The Value of Knowing How Students Learn” by Benjamin Riley in Phi Delta Kappan, April 2015 (Vol. 97, #7, p. 35-38), www.kappanmagazine.org; the full Deans for Impact report, The Science of Learning, is at http://www.deansforimpact.org/the_science_of_learning.html

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4. Building Ownership by Allowing Students Some Choice

            In this Chronicle of Higher Education article, James Lang (Assumption College) suggests three ways to give students a degree of choice without sacrificing control over essential curriculum direction:

            • Student-generated test questions – “Traditional exams in a course represent one of those moments in which students seem to lose all control,” says Lang. To counteract that, he suggests having students work in groups for 30-45 minutes coming up with test questions that might be used (or reworded) in the actual exam. This is a two-fer, says Lang: it not only gives students a sense of control over their learning but also serves as an effective review session.

            • Open assessments – This involves leaving 10 percent of the syllabus for an assignment that students create with the instructor. The default is a paper, but students are free to come up with a more creative and interesting assignment.

            • Class constitutions – Having students collectively come up with ground rules for a course gives them a collegial sense of working together toward a shared purpose. This could include the use of cell phones, tablets, and laptops in class, how late work is handled, and other items that aren’t on the instructor’s list of non-negotiables.

            “Ceding control over any aspect of teaching can be scary,” says Lang, “which may be why my own progress in this area has been so gradual. But if you find the prospect intriguing – if these ideas resonate with your own experience as a teacher or learner – see if you can offer students one new choice next semester, either in how they demonstrate their learning to you or in how your class forms its community rules. In doing so, you just might nudge them one step closer to the goal we have for every student: taking ownership of their own education.”

 

“Small Changes in Teaching: Giving Them a Say” by James Lang in The Chronicle of Higher Education, April 22, 2016 (Vol. LXII, #32, p. A34-A35), http://bit.ly/1SFhMn5; Lang is the author of Small Teaching: Everyday Lessons from the Science of Learning (Jossey-Bass, 2016)

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5. Teaching Evolution Without Violating Students’ Religious Beliefs

            In this Education Week commentary, Adam Laats (Binghamton University/SUNY) and Harvey Siegel (University of Miami) say that creationists aren’t correct when they say:

-   The world is only 6,000 years old;

-   Our species descended from two ancestors in the Garden of Eden;

-   Studying evolution in school forces an anti-Christian religion on students;

-   We need to modify the science curriculum by teaching intelligent design.

“Evolutionary theory is a building block of our understanding of life,” say Laats and Siegel. “As the best existing scientific explanation of the way our species came to be, how evolution works is vital for all students to understand. Students should not have a right to opt out of learning about a central tenet of contemporary science.”

However, the authors continue, creationists are correct in protesting any attempt by public schools to impose religious beliefs on students.

            The thing is, they argue, “Teaching evolutionary theory is not in and of itself religious indoctrination.” That’s because evolution is not a religion. “How could a religion have no beliefs about the supernatural? No rituals? No moral commandments?”

            But the theory of evolution definitely has religious implications for the followers of some religions. “Evolution forces a profound rethinking of traditional faith,” says Jason Rosenhouse of James Madison University. Creationists are correct to object if their children are asked by teachers to believe something that’s contrary to their religious upbringing.

            The responsible middle ground, say Laats and Siegel, is to ask students to learn about evolution without insisting that they believe it. In other words, we shouldn’t push skeptical students to say, “Natural selection is one of the most important ways species came to be differentiated.” Better for them to say, “Most scientists think natural selection is one of the best explanations.”

And indeed, preliminary research indicates that this approach – separating what is believed from what is not believed – can work. Researchers in Arizona found that high-school students can understand evolution without giving up their deep skepticism about the theory.

 

“Teaching Evolution Is Not About Changing Beliefs” by Adam Laats and Harvey Siegel in Education Week, April 20, 2016 (Vol. 35, #28, p. 18), www.edweek.org

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6. What Happens When We Reassure Students That Anxiety Is Normal

            In this Education Week article, Sarah Sparks and Debra Viadero report on research about students’ emotional reactions to school transitions. In one study in Madison, Wisconsin, 1,190 sixth graders were randomly assigned to take part in an experiment. As they entered middle school, the students were asked to read several pages of quotes from a survey that students like them took at the end of the previous school year. The quotes conveyed the idea that anxiety was typical and transitory – for example, “I felt like I had a knot in my stomach the first four months,” but that the teachers “were there to help you” and the negative feelings dissipated. The students in the experimental group were then asked to write their reactions to the quotes.

            When the researchers followed up with the incoming sixth graders the following spring, they found striking differences between those in the experimental and control groups:

-   Students in the experimental group had higher ratings in social belonging, school trust, and school identification and lower ratings of evaluation anxiety.

-   They had higher GPAs and fewer Ds and Fs.

-   They had been absent one day less.

-   They had fewer behavior referrals.

“It turns out children are better able to cope if they understand what they’re going through is normal, that it affects everyone, and that it will pass,” comments Adam Gamoran of the William T. Grant Foundation. “How we think about a stressful situation influences how we feel and how we perform.” Studies like this, he says, “show how deeply intertwined are cognition and emotion.”

 

“Studies Affirm Role of Emotions in Students’ Transitions” by Sarah Sparks and Debra Viadero in Education Week, April 20, 2016 (Vol. 35, #28), www.edweek.org

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7. Using Twitter in a Middle-School Classroom

            In this article in Middle School Journal, Ryan Becker (Woodstock, Vermont teacher) and Penny Bishop (University of Vermont/Burlington) describe Becker’s use of Twitter in his middle-school science classroom. He has incorporated Twitter in the following ways:

• Personalized and relevant curriculum – Connecting students to reputable, relevant scientific people and organizations in real time – Neil de Grasse Tyson, Bill Nye, PBS’s Nova, Discovery Channel’s MythBusters, NPR’s Science Friday, and more.

• Twitter as formative assessment – Becker’s classes have mini-discussions using tweets, he can display responses on his interactive whiteboard, and he uses Twtpoll to check for understanding and immediately discuss errors and misconceptions.

• Twitter as authentic audience – Students constantly tweet ideas, assignments, projects, suggestions, and photographs to each other, broadening the reach of their thinking.

• Twitter as embedded literacy – Students get plenty of practice with succinct writing as they share analyses and observations.

“Like any new initiative, especially one involving technology, the path to implementing Twitter in a middle school is not without challenges,” say Becker and Bishop. After three years with this experiment, they reflect on the biggest ones:

-   Students setting up their Twitter accounts – It turned out that significant guidance was necessary to overcome technical glitches.

-   Finding time within classes to guide students in how to use Twitter – This included setting norms and expectations on personal conduct, overcoming technical problems, and gathering feedback on how it was going.

-   Managing students’ encounters with objectionable material from the outside world, including occasional use of profanity and sexually suggestive follower requests.

Despite these challenges, say Becker and Bishop, “the benefits of Twitter outweigh the drawbacks. In an age where media is constantly competing for students’ attention, and where messages in popular media are often at odds with in-school norms and expectations, opportunities to model, discuss, and practice the appropriate use of Web 2.0 technologies are critical.”

 

“‘Think Bigger About Science’: Using Twitter for Learning in the Middle Grades” by Ryan Becker and Penny Bishop in Middle School Journal, April 2016 (Vol. 47, #3, p 4-16),

available for purchase at http://bit.ly/1WQwPxe; the authors can be reached at

[email protected] and [email protected].

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8. Weaving Financial Literacy into the Math Curriculum

            In this article in Kappa Delta Pi Record, Heather Glynn Crawford-Ferre, Lynda Wiest, and Stephanie Vega (University of Nevada/Reno) suggest ways to use financial literacy as part of the middle-school mathematics curriculum – for example:

-   Comparing services – Proportional reasoning, equations, creating and analyzing graphs, and number sense;

-   Planning a budget – Organizing and representing information and number sense;

-   Determining the costs and payoffs of higher education – Percentages, compound interest, and rates;

-   Playing the Stock Market Game – Ratios, proportional reasoning, reading and analyzing reports and graphs, and algebraic thinking (e.g., gains and losses).

The authors recommend the following resources:

-   Games about investing: http://www.richdad.com/apps-games/apps-games-landing

-   Curriculum, games, etc.: http://dfi.wa.gov/financial-education#.VRcpASROZcM

-   Financial FAQs, scenarios, forum: http://mathforum.org/fe/finance-topics

-   Activities and lesson plans: http://www.usmint.gov/kids/teachers/financialLiteracy

-   Girls and finance: http://www.girlscouts.org/research/publications/financial_literacy

-   Young Entrepreneurs/Big Ideas: http://www.kidpreneurs.org

-   Games: http://www.nerdwallet.com/blog/2013/learn-online-financial-literacy-games

-   Stock Market Game: www.smgww.org

 

“Teaching Middle-Grades Mathematics Through Financial Literacy” by Heather Glynn Crawford-Ferre, Lynda Wiest, and Stephanie Vega in Kappa Delta Pi Record, April-June 2016 (Vol. 52, #2, p. 79-82), available for purchase at http://bit.ly/21cPjZ7; the authors can be reached at [email protected], [email protected], and [email protected].

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9. Defining “Maker Space”

            In this Education Week article, Benjamin Herold defines Maker Education: “The term generally refers to using a wide variety of hands-on activities (such as building, computer programming, and even sewing) to support academic learning and the development of a mindset that values playfulness and experimentation, growth and iteration, and collaboration and community. Typically, ‘making’ involves attempting to solve a particular problem, creating a physical or digital artifact, and sharing that product with a larger audience. Often, such work is guided by the notion that process is more important than results.”

 

“Researchers Probe Equity, Design Principles in Maker Ed.” by Benjamin Herold in Education Week, April 20, 2016 (Vol. 35, #28, p. 8-9), www.edweek.org

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10. Short Items:

            a. An app to form student groups – The CATME website http://info.catme.org has a tool for instantly forming different configurations of classroom groups.

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            b. School climate survey tool – The U.S. Department of Education has just released a free climate survey https://safesupportivelearning.ed.gov/edscls including tools to generate school- and district-level reports.

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            c. Information graphics and your brain – In this article in ProPublica, Lena Groeger explores visual displays of information – and how graphics can trick our brains. One startling graph displays the results of a study showing that judges were much more lenient in sentencing right after eating a meal. Groeger’s article contains numerous graphics and a list of no fewer than 98 cognitive biases.

 

“How Information Graphics Reveal Your Brain’s Blind Spots” by Lena Groeger in ProPublica, April 20, 2016, http://bit.ly/1WQadNq

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d. An interview – Jay Willis of Educators Lead interviewed me last week about teacher supervision and evaluation and my path from the classroom to school leadership: http://www.educatorslead.com/kimmarshall/

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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