Teacher World

This is the last in my series on Diane Ravitch. I have been blogging about her recent article from the August/September issue of neatoday magazine. In her article, “Stop the Madness”, she explains why she no longer supports NCLB, and she ends her article discussing how we can improve our schools.

According to Ms. Ravitch, “We must first of all have a vision of what good education is.” We should be asking what constitutes a well-educated person, what we want students to learn before they graduate, what we want them to accomplish, and why we educate students. In other words, we need to agree on what education is, what it looks like, and why we want to be a part of it as teachers.

Second, she says we need to look beyond reading and mathematics and decide what other qualities are synonymous with a well-educated, well-rounded student. We want to turn out students who are able to think for themselves, have good character, are able to make good decisions, have courage and humor, and who treat others with compassion and fairness. And we need to teach students to be responsible citizens who make educated decisions by rationally studying different points of view.

Finally, she states that we need to send out academically well-rounded students who are able to use both math and science to understand and solve real problems in their communities and in their world and who can also appreciate and participate in their artistic and cultural heritage. In other words, we need students who participate in  significant ways, who enjoy the world around them, and who are willing and able to work to improve it. We need to teach them about the world in which they live and help them to find their niche within it.

What kind of test could ever adequately measure these truly important things? There is no such test because the true test of these qualities is life and the purposeful living of it. As Diane Ravitch states, “If these are our goals, the current narrow, utilitarian focus of our national testing regime is not sufficient to reach any of them. Indeed, to the extent that we make the testing regime our master, we may see our true goals recede farther and farther into the distance.” She concludes by stating that, if we continue on this current path, we are likely to produce a generation who equate learning with the drudgery of “worksheets, test preparation, and test-taking”.

In her final plea to turn the current tide by doing away with NCLB in the hopes of saving our public schools, Ms. Ravitch wraps up with this eloquent, heart-felt statement: “As we seek to reform our schools, we must take care to do no harm. In fact, we must take care to make our public schools once again the pride of our nation. To the extent that we strengthen them, we strengthen our democracy.”

(Diane Ravitch’s article was based on her book entitled The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice Are Undermining Education,)

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I have been blogging about Diane Ravitch’s article in the August/September issue of neatoday magazine, entitled “Stop the Madness”. If you have read my previous blogs, you know that Ms. Ravitch has held a number of prestigious positions in the education field and was a staunch supporter of Bush’s NCLB until she began to study the results of these policies and what it has done to public education. Because she is so knowledgeable and makes such valid points, I have been spending intensive time discussing some of her most critical points. So here goes my third blog on what this remarkable woman has to say about NCLB.

One of Ms. Ravitch’s strongest arguments against NCLB states, “NCLB assumed that shaming schools that were unable to lift test scores every year-and the people who work in them-would lead to higher scores. It assumed that low scores are caused by lazy teachers and lazy principals. Perhaps, most naively, it assumed that higher test scores on standardized tests of basic skills are synonymous with good education. Its assumptions were wrong.”

I love this statement because it resonates with truth. Public educators and principals are being shamed to improve test scores. Our results are publically displayed every year and compared to other districts’ scores. Even within school systems, individual schools are compared to each other, and those schools that did not produce excellent scores are made to feel inferior in comparison with those who did. In reality, those differences probably had more to do with the difference in the neighborhoods surrounding these schools, which make up each school’s population, than differences in the effectiveness or ineffectiveness of the schools’ staffs. I have seen it in my own district. For three years in a row now, my elementary school has gotten higher test scores than our sister elementary school. The competition and fear that this has created between our two principals has been extremely unhealthy for both staffs. This is only one sad example of the result of “shaming” schools into achieving higher test scores. Anyone who believes that creating this level of competition and frustration is an educationally sound practice needs to spend some time in schools that are panicked over raising test scores.

I applaud Diane Ravitch for admitting that the policy she initially supported whole-heartedly is flawed and is not “synonymous with good education”. When I look back over my years of teaching, and this will be my 31st, I feel such sadness for young people just starting out in the teaching profession who think that what we are being asked to do is excellent teaching. Somewhere along the way, teachers have metamorphosed from well-rounded, creative lovers-of-passing-on-the-excitement-for-knowledge to test-taking trainers. And while I still love working with kids, and I love being involved in co-teaching and the strategies of co-teaching, I have lost some of the wonder of teaching. As we fast approach 2014, and the ridiculous expectation to achieve 100% passage of state achievement tests, I dread the panic that is going to become synonymous with “good education”.

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Let’s discuss what Diane Ravitch calls “the danger of the culture of testing” that has been created as a result of NCLB, as reported in the August/September 2010 issue of neatoday magazine. Feel free to say a few “amens” and “you’ve-got-that-right-sister” as you read her critical points.

Ms. Ravitch states that “one of the unintended consequences of NCLB” has been the “shrinkage of time available to teach anything other than reading and math”. Since these are the only test scores used to calculate a school’s adequate yearly progress, she claims that teachers feel forced to put much more time into the teaching of these subjects, leaving less time for science, social studies, and the arts. She goes on to say that many schools have even done away with recess in order to better prepare students for math and reading tests.

In our district this year, we are required to attend grade level team meetings which will meet twice a week. Guess what we are discussing and brainstorming in these meetings? We will be looking at formative assessments for (you guessed it) reading and math to identify areas of weakness and collaborate as a grade level to improve upon these skills in order to bring up test scores. What are conspicuously lacking from this list are science, social studies, and the arts. My guess is that most teachers out there would agree that they are spending more time and effort teaching reading and math than in teaching other subjects. And we all know why we are.

Diane voices legitimate concerns too that our focus as teachers has also shifted, due to the emphasis on test scores, from thorough knowledge of the subject matter to test-taking skills and strategies. She cites the use of previous tests, which are available on the Department of Education website, to prepare students and claims that “in urban schools, where there are many low-performing students, drill and practice became a significant part of the daily routine” as a result of NCLB.

Ms. Ravitch, thank you for bravely stating what every teacher out there knows. We teach differently, but we don’t teach better. We teach differently because instead of trying to educate our children, we are trying to get them to pass tests that make our schools look good. And, as a result, we are doing our children a disservice; a disservice we are forced to continue to do because our jobs are on the line. Don’t you just wish we could get back to being real teachers preparing our students for real life and real careers, to be responsible citizens and real community leaders, and to love learning simply for the sake of learning, not to pass a bubble test? Do I hear an “Amen, sister”?

Changes in Teaching, Educational Reform, No Child Left Behind, Teacher-World's Blog, state achievement tests Diane Ravitch, NCLB, standardized tests, students, teachers

Okay, I apologize but I am still not done discussing Arne Duncan’s speech to parents at the Annual National PTA Convention in June. So, like it or not, I will spend the next two blogs discussing my reaction to some of his other note-worthy points.

In his speech, Mr. Duncan stated that in his numerous visits to school districts throughout the country he found that parents and teachers shared two common concerns about public school education. According to him, “First, they feared that schools were ‘teaching to the test.’ And second, they worried that the curriculum was narrowing, as school districts placed too much emphasis on boosting test scores on fill-in-the-bubble tests in math and English.” He acknowledged the current administration’s determination to deal with “a narrowing of the curriculum, and an over-reliance on fill-in-the bubble tests.”

And yet, we continue to hear about merit pay based on test scores, cutting teachers’ salaries based on test scores, and non-renewing teachers’ contractions based on test scores. So with so much riding on test scores, is it any wonder that teachers might feel the need to teach to the test? Is it any wonder that our curriculum is narrowing as what needs to be covered prior to the administration of these tests continues to increase? And does it come as a huge surprise that with less time to cover more material, if choices have to be made about what will be taught, the information that is not critical for the test will be pushed back for a later day?

This is the world that has been created for teachers and students due to the enormous emphasis that has been placed on one set of tests. If we don’t want education to narrow then we need to stop limiting how we measure student progress. Let’s pursue educational reform that would target the mapping of yearly progress for our students throughout the year, not just at one time during the year. And let teachers get back to what they entered the teaching profession to do: to instill within each student a love for learning and a desire to succeed.

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Three more positives from Arne Duncan’s speech to the Annual National PTA Conference, and I’ll be through with the issues I agreed with. Let me emphasize some vital points he made to parents.

First, he appropriately brings up the overuse of televisions, and computer and video games in our students’ homes. He basically called parents out on the fact that many of them are not limiting the number of hours their children spend mesmerized by these forms of visual stimulation. Every Monday morning we start out by sharing what we did over the weekend. And it is always true that the majority of my students regularly reported spending most of their weekends glued to their television and/or game systems. They rarely get outside and seldom do anything physical. Parents, you need to monitor and limit the use of television and game systems in your home daily and engage in activities which will benefit your children and possibly even support their learning.

Second, he talked about why it was so important to level the playing field from state to state by having national standards which all students in the United States would be expected to master. “For years, we have been actually lying to children and lying to ourselves by pretending that 50 different standards, in 50 different states, will make America competitive and help our children succeed in life. We have to stop pretending. We have to tell the truth. And we have to raise the bar for all children,” Mr. Duncan stated.  “When you play basketball, the basket is always ten feet high. In football, the field is always 100 yards long. A 3-pointer is worth 3 points, and a touchdown is worth six points. Yet until now, we have resisted leveling the playing field in education. I’ll put it plain and simple: When you tell students that they are ready for college and they are not, you are lying to children when they most need your candor and help.” I have advocated for some time now that the standards be aligned nationally. It has never been fair that some states have way more standards than others that students must master. Now that there are national standards, I will be curious to see how this affects standard-based report cards and formative assessments. Will they remain aligned to their state standards or need revising in order to reflect the national standards? It will be interesting to see how that all shakes out!

Finally, I was overjoyed to read this quote from Mr. Duncan’s speech: “Unlike in the past, our ESEA proposal also emphasizes measuring student growth, not just absolute test scores. I’m much more interested in growth and gain than in absolute test scores. I want to know how much individual students, schools, districts, and even whole states are improving each year.” Amen! This is so perfectly said that there is no need for me to belabor it other than to say. Well done, Mr. Duncan! And very well said!

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Okay, some of you have read my blogs all year about co-teaching and the class I had this year. If so, you know that my team teacher and I were given a large number of low-achieving Gen Ed students, and my homeroom specifically was comprised of a homogeneously low group with no real leaders. We worried and stressed over the OAA’s, and I can honestly say that we never worked harder than we did this year to prepare our students. The dreaded news arrived last week that the test results were in. As I opened my email which would disclose the dire news, it was a feeling akin to facing your executioner. I forced myself to study the numbers which flashed on my screen, in spite of the knot tightening in my stomach. And, guess what?

Our students’ scores were awesome! Unbelievable based on the difficulties we faced! Our combined classrooms had a 90% passage rate for both reading and math and 100% for science for our general education students! Amazing! And our SPED students did a wonderful job as well. The passage rate for reading was 60%, and for math and science it was 50%. This was a huge improvement over last year’s SPED results. My first reaction was total elation and a sense of pride that our hard work really paid off. There was no way, judging from last year’s test results, that we should ever have achieved such an outcome. After I came down from the ceiling, I began to ask myself what these test scores had taught me. So here goes:

1. Co-teaching works. Pure and simple! The methodology behind co-teaching sounds great, but we proved it is great. The ability to restructure a classroom in dynamic ways with the aid of an intervention specialist and a paraprofessional is hugely responsible for the results we attained.

2. Homogeneous grouping of children, especially of lower achieving children, is a huge and unnecessary stress on teachers and is unfair to students. I cannot emphasize enough what a constant struggle we faced with my students to get them to progress. Statistically, my homeroom had a lower passage rate by one student for both reading and math on the OAA. But I can hear you saying, “Hey, quit whining! That’s just part of the job you signed up for.” And to an extent, you would be right. We all know we will have students who will need extra time and help from us to be successful. But I did not sign up for a classroom where the majority of the students fell into this category. Maybe I’m wrong, but I was under the impression that we believe in the philosophy of inclusion. If it’s good for the SPED population, shouldn’t it be good for the Gen Ed population as well?

3. As much as I am celebrating our victory, I am fearful of the message it sends to others, especially our principal. You see, I am afraid that some people will look at what we achieved and say, “See, we knew they could take on this difficult task and succeed. All of the concerns they voiced last year were proven wrong, so we can load up the co-teaching classrooms in the future just like we did this past year. They will make it work!” Maybe we performed way beyond even our own expectations, and maybe we were just lucky. I would rather not be thrown back into the fire to see which it was.

4. It felt so good to see those exceptional results, but I am already dreading the stress that these tests will make me feel again next year. And that’s what’s wrong with these tests. They have become too important to teachers whose very jobs may someday ride on the outcome of random questions which, supposedly, are the criterion for determining how effective they are, not their students, but they are as teachers.

So, for now, I celebrate our students’ success, our success, and try very hard not to worry about next year’s tests. (At least for a couple of weeks…)

Changes in Teaching, Teacher-World's Blog, special education, state achievement tests co-teaching, Gen Ed students, OAA, SPED, state achievement tests, test results

Now that school is over for the year and I have more time to contemplate what to look forward to in educational reform, here it is, as promised, but with a slight twist. I was going to write about what I thought was a more positive approach to Ohio’s round two RttT application, but upon deeper reading and rereading of the first application, I am feeling  some trepidation. Let me see if I can explain myself better.

When our school system was in the decision-making stage for round two trying to determine whether we wanted to jump on board, our union sent us a list of reasons to support or oppose the participation of local schools in round two. When I read the first statement of support, I was initially enthusiastic. Here it is: “Each participating LEA will develop its own (teacher) evaluation model. Districts, in partnership with their local unions, will develop evaluation systems that meet the criteria outlined in the preliminary scope of work. The Educator Standards Board is developing a model evaluation framework that districts may choose to use…(RTTT - Phase II Information and Clarifying Points, 2010)”

Yes, I thought! They are going to let local school systems work with their unions to come up with a fair way to evaluate teachers. Then I read a little closer, and got snagged on these tiny little words: “that meet the criteria outlined in the preliminary scope of work”. Hum…What does that mean? So I went back to the original RttT summary, and then I got really concerned. Here is what I read: “ODE will collaborate with LEAs and teachers unions to develop a teacher evaluation model that includes annual evaluations, provides timely and constructive feedback, includes student growth as a significant factor-”. And that’s where I stop. Now, let me be clear. I totally agree that we should be responsible as teachers to show student growth, that is, after all, why we are there, but if that growth is going to be solely or even partially measured by state achievement tests, I have a problem with RttT.

Don’t get me wrong! Measure student progress, by all means! That should be part of a teacher’s evaluation. But do it in a variety of ways. Make common formative assessments which can be administered regularly. Use these to chart student progress, and use these results for grade level collaboration, mentoring, and planning. Establish grade level teams where teachers work together to study those assessment results in order to better facilitate student progress, and let teachers’ willingness to work together on these teams be another important aspect of teacher evaluation. And there are so many other worthy factors in determining teacher effectiveness. But never, never base my effectiveness as a teacher on one test for which students have no ownership. And without the new summary for Ohio’s RttT round two in front of me, I have no idea what criterion will be proposed to determine student progress. Hence, I have legitimate misgivings and concerns.

So I appreciate the OEA who clearly stated: “Although student outcomes can be considered as one of several criteria for assessing the practice of teachers and principals, OEA believes as most researchers do that the use of student outcomes as the primary indicator of success is inappropriate to achieve the desired result of a valid, fair and robust educator evaluation system.” Now this is language I can agree with! What about you?

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It’s that time of year again; that busy time spent packing up and wrapping up another school year. This time of year, I think teachers everywhere spend some time counting their successes and targeting areas that still need improvement. This is a necessary exercise as it shapes our next year and helps us to make critical decisions about the future. So, here goes! Here are some of my triumphs and some of my works in progress.

* I am grateful that I was able to receive training for co-teaching and have had the opportunity to practice all of the teaching strategies. My goal next year is to start the year out right. No “my class/your class”. And a good balance of tried and true approaches to presenting curriculum. My co-teacher and I had time to sit down and tentatively map out our hopes and dreams for next year, and I am so excited that I wish I could jump in right away! I am grateful, however, for the summer and the time to make our plans more concrete so we will be well-prepared for next year.

* I am encouraged that my voice was heard regarding the need to establish a classroom which has a better heterogeneous mixture for next year. I am confident that we will be more successful as a result. This year’s homogeneous grouping of students stifled many of our attempts to raise the bar academically, but we have higher hopes for next year’s students.

* We successfully addressed the issue of bullying this year. I worked hand-in-hand with our guidance counselor to introduce anti-bullying curriculum, and incidents involving bullying were dealt with quickly and effectively. This is an on-going goal which will require time and effort every year.

* It has been an awesome reprieve for me to only have to prepare students for the reading OAA test, since the social studies test has been removed for this year and next. But, I realize how difficult a task it will be for me (since I will be teaching a self-contained fifth grade class) to cover all that I am required to cover to prepare students for three tests next year and all four the following years. Yikes! It comes as no surprise to you, if you have been following my blogs, that this is the least favorite part of my job. But I take the OAA seriously; therefore, I realize I have my work cut out for me.

* I have learned how to share my space this year, and actually enjoy having another adult in my classroom. I have even learned to give up the reins more frequently and rely on my co-teacher to share my job. This is a work in progress for me, as it is not natural for me to give up control in my classroom. Luckily, we get along very well, and I trust her judgment. We also agree philosophically on what is best for our students. I look forward to making decisions mutually and truly sharing every aspect of the classroom.

All in all, this has been a great year. I have grown professionally and have been challenged, which keeps teaching from growing stale. Next year the challenges will be even greater. I can’t wait! And I hope you will follow my continued journey throughout the summer and into a new year. Good luck to all of you teachers out there as you close out your year. God bless you for the job you do.

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Ohio’s application for the phase 1 portion of Race to the Top was soundly rejected and may be again in phase 2 unless the writers are able to make some major changes to the application. Ohio teachers are probably wondering why it was rejected, and what kind of changes need to be made. Well, let me tell you what I have been able to learn.

First of all, each portion of the application received points, which when totaled, determined which states would be the recipients of RttT resources. According to my research, the area in which Ohio scored lowest (second to the lowest of the 16 finalist states) was in the area called “Great Teachers and Leaders”. Apparently, Ohio’s application was too wimpy due to “the state’s inability to ensure equitable distribution of teachers in hard-to-staff subjects, specialty areas, or in high-poverty or high-minority schools”, according to The Ohio Education Gadfly. Reviewers felt that the process it would take to remove ineffective educators was not clearly provided. There was also criticism due to the fact that only half of the local schools who participated in the phase 1 application process agreed to link teacher evaluations to their compensation and promotion. Some of the other areas of concern were its failure to adequately detail how it would close achievement gaps between poor students and wealthier students, and how it would turnaround the lowest-performing schools.

Now what does this mean for Phase 2? Well, first of all, if Ohio has any hope of being considered, it will need to develop stronger guidelines regarding merit pay, tenure, and dismissal of teachers. And you can rest assured that all of these will be linked to a large degree on achievement test scores. One source I read stated that RttT approved heartily of states like Florida, where the legislature approved teacher salaries being tied directly to test scores, and teachers would be offered one year salaries only. (Although, as I have previously blogged, this was later overturned by Florida’s governor.) Clearly, this is indicative of what the judges are looking for.

Secondly, Ohio will have to state more clearly how teachers would be evenly redistributed so as to level the playing field between low income and higher income school districts in order to turnaround lowest-performing schools. In other words, they are looking for stronger language regarding how highly effective teachers could be moved.

Additionally, Ohio’s application lacked teeth when it came to teachers unions. From what I have been able to glean, RttT reviewers are looking for a firm commitment by unions to be willing to make pretty radical changes to teacher salary, licensure, evaluation, tenure, and termination.

These are some of the salient reasons why Ohio’s application was rejected. I will continue to keep you informed and, of course, give my opinions about upcoming information as it becomes available. In the meantime, I hope you take the time to comment about what you have heard or read, and how you feel about Race to the Top, no matter which state you are from.

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Well, it finally happened! What I have feared since the first moment I heard the words “merit pay for teachers”: the linking of merit pay to student test scores. Now that the cat is out of the bag, don’t think we have heard the last of it. Let’s look at what happened in Florida over the past two weeks.

First, the bitter: the Florida legislature voted for merit pay for their teachers. Now that may not seem so bitter until you listen to what they approved, which was that half of a teacher’s salary in Florida (according to news coverage) would be based on their students’ test scores. And if this wasn’t bad enough, teachers would only be offered one-year contracts. This would obviously allow teachers to be non-renewed if their students do not perform as expected. And forget about tenure which teachers earned by putting in years of faithful service to their profession and taking classes. Wow! I could go on for hours and bore you to death as I repeat all of the reasons why this is just crazy, but I won’t because, if you know anything about teaching, you understand a teacher’s inability to control all of the outside factors that can interfere with good test scores.

Now, the sweet: Governor Charlie Crist, Florida’s republican governor, turned his back on political prudence, and voted down the legislation after spending significant time listening to teachers express their outrage and their legitimate concerns over the ramifications of such a proposal for both teachers and students. Apparently, one of the deciding factors for him was a conversation he had with a friend from St. Petersburg who called him to ask how such a bill would impact his special needs child and his child’s teacher. And that is a huge consideration, because if this had become a law, who would want to risk their salary and possibly their career by taking on a co-teaching classroom or work with the special education population? And that is only one of the many huge reasons why merit pay linked solely to test scores is dead wrong! So, thank you Governor Crist, for bringing sanity to this highly charged issue.

Finally, the bitter again: Don’t think this is over! Now that this ugly topic has been breached, don’t think we won’t hear it again. Even though we have heard the countless assurances that merit pay would be based on a myriad of factors, politicians will continue to advocate and push for linking merit pay solely to test scores, and eventually, it will pass somewhere. When that day comes, we should all hang our heads in sorrow that what was once considered an honorable profession has been corrupted by politicians who have little to no understanding of the real issues teachers face in classrooms today, and who think they can impose business-like regulations on a profession that should never operate like a business.

Hats off to the teachers in Florida who forcefully raised their voices for teachers everywhere! We all need to take a lesson from them and start speaking up now before it is too late!

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