Ten obvious truths that we shouldn't be ignoring.

Recently Alfie Kohn wrote “Ten obvious truths that we shouldn’t be ignoring”  He asks

If we all agree that a given principle is true, then why in the world do our schools still function as if it weren’t?

Here are the 10 truths, with a little blurb about the meaning of the truth.

1)      Much of the material students are required to memorize is soon forgotten.

The more closely we inspect this model of teaching and testing, the more problematic it reveals itself to be. First, there’s the question of what students are made to learn, which often is more oriented to factual material than to a deep understanding of ideas. (See item 2, below.) Second, there’s the question of how students are taught, with a focus on passive absorption: listening to lectures, reading summaries in textbooks, and rehearsing material immediately before being required to cough it back up. Third, there’s the question of why a student has learned something: Knowledge is less likely to be retained if it has been acquired so that one will perform well on a test, as opposed to learning in the context of pursuing projects and solving problems that are personally meaningful.

2)      Just knowing a lot of facts doesn’t mean you’re smart!

Even students who do manage to remember some of the material they were taught are not necessarily able to make sense of those bits of knowledge, to understand connections among them, or to apply them in inventive and persuasive ways to real-life problems.

3)      Students are more likely to learn what they find interesting.

A group of researchers found that children’s level of interest in a passage they were reading was 30 times more useful than its difficulty level for predicting how much of it they would later remember.

4)      Students are less interested in whatever they’re forced to do and more enthusiastic when they have some say.

If choice is related to interest, and interest is related to achievement, then it’s not much of a stretch to suggest that the learning environments in which kids get to make decisions about what they’re doing are likely to be the most effective, all else being equal.

5)      Just because doing x raises standardized test scores doesn’t mean x should be done.

If a test result can’t be convincingly shown to be both valid and meaningful, then whatever we did to achieve that result -- say, a new curriculum or instructional strategy -- may well have no merit whatsoever. It may even prove to be destructive when assessed by better criteria. Indeed, a school or district might be getting worse even as its test scores rise.

6)      Students are more likely to succeed in a place where they feel known and cared about.

As one group of researchers put it, “In order to promote students’ academic performance in the classroom, educators should also promote their social and emotional adjustment.” And yet, broadly speaking, we don’t. Teachers and schools are evaluated almost exclusively on academic achievement measures (which, to make matters worse, mostly consist of standardized test scores).

7)      We want children to develop in many ways, not just academically.

If we acknowledge that academics is just one facet of a good education, why do so few conversations about improving our schools deal with -- and why are so few resources devoted to -- non-academic issues? And why do we assign children still more academic tasks after the school day is over, even when those tasks cut into the time children have to pursue interests that will help them develop in other ways?

8)      Just because a lesson (or book, or class, or text) is harder doesn’t mean it’s better.

If it’s pointless to give students things to do that are too easy, it’s also counterproductive to give them things that they experience as too hard.

9)      Kids aren’t short adults.

More generally, premature exposure to sit-still-and-listen instruction, homework, grades, tests, and competition -- practices that are clearly a bad match for younger children and of questionable value at any age -- is rationalized by invoking a notion I’ve called BGUTI: Better Get Used To It. The logic here is that we have to prepare you for the bad things that are going to be done to you later . . . by doing them to you now. When articulated explicitly, that principle sounds exactly as ridiculous as it is. Nevertheless, it’s the engine that continues to drive an awful lot of nonsense

10)   Substance matters more than labels.

A skunk cabbage by any other name would smell just as putrid. But in education, as in other domains, we’re often seduced by appealing names when we should be demanding to know exactly what lies behind them. Most of us, for example, favor a sense of community, prefer that a job be done by professionals, and want to promote learning. So should we sign on to the work being done in the name of “Professional Learning Communities”? Not if it turns out that PLCs have less to do with helping children to think deeply about questions that matter than with boosting standardized test scores.

Video compiling ideas about motivation

Here is the video I started my intrinsic motivation presentation with. 

Info about Standardized exams, focused on PAT in Alberta

Here is some information on the standardized exams in Alberta for grades 3, 6 and 9. 

First off, the definition of a standardized exam:

A standardized test is a test that is administered and scored in a consistent, or "standard", manner. Standardized tests are designed in such a way that the questions, conditions for administering, scoring procedures, and interpretations are consistent and are administered and scored in a predetermined, standard manner.

I urge all parents to read and make an informed decision on whether or not their child participates in the exams in grades 3, 6, or 9.  As a parent you actually have the choice to whether or not your child participates in these exams.  For dates and times of these exams, you are to ask your child’s teacher or principal.  If you choose to not have your child participate you can withdraw your child, by sending a letter to your child’s principal.  No consequence, through marks or other tactics, can be taken against your child.  Taken off the Alberta Education’s website:

If a parent withdraws a student from participation, the school is obligated to mark the student “absent” not “excused” on the List of Students. A copy of the parent’s letter indicating that the

child will not be participating should be attached to the Principal’s Statement.

From the Alberta government’s website, the reasons of the exam are:

·         determine if students are learning what they are expected to learn.

·         report to Albertans how well students have achieved provincial standards at given points in their schooling.

·         assist schools, authorities, and the province in monitoring and improving student learning.

Also, further in the document states,

“Careful examination and interpretation of the Achievement Testing Program results can help reveal areas of relative strength and weakness in student achievement. Teachers and administrators can use this information in planning and delivering relevant and effective instruction in relation to learning outcomes in the Programs of Study.”

Now, in the document, it also states:

“Achievement tests can assess only part of what is to be learned. In addition, many factors contribute to student achievement. Personnel at the authority and school levels are in the best position to appropriately interpret, use, and communicate school authority and school results in the local context.”

Reading these two statements states that the PATs can help find areas of strength and weakness in a child’s achievement, but the people who are best to know what a child actually has learned are the teachers of that child.  Click here for more on Achievement VS Learning

I have done some research around these exams and also wanted to include what I read elsewhere.

First we should be aware of the costs.  In 2003, the PAT and diplomas cost the government $12 million, while they only spent $4 million on curriculum.

An informal "count me out" movement against excessive testing is gathering momentum around the globe. Hundreds of teachers in Britain have recently voted to boycott the tests. Hundreds of parents in Alberta have requested that their children be exempted from the tests. A U.S. group is even suggesting that all politicians take all the tests.  

Currently, the Alberta Teachers Association is trying to abolish the grade 3 PAT entirely, due to the fact of the age of the students.  Virtually all specialists condemn the practice of giving standardized tests to children younger than 8 or 9 years old. I say "virtually" to cover myself here, but, in fact, I have yet to find a single reputable scholar in the field of early-childhood education who endorses such testing for young children.

Also, I have read research stating that standardized exams test more on socioeconomic status then actual learning.  For decades, critics have complained that many standardized tests are unfair because the questions require a set of knowledge and skills more likely to be possessed by children from a privileged background. The discriminatory effect is particularly pronounced with norm-referenced tests, where the imperative to spread out the scores often produces questions that tap knowledge gained outside of school. This, as W. James Popham argues, provides a powerful advantage to students whose parents are affluent and well-educated. It's more than a little ironic to rely on biased tests to "close the gap" between rich and poor.

Data from the USA standardized exam, the SAT:

Family Income	Average SAT Score
$30 - $40K	885
$50 - $60K	929
$70K +	1000

The test makers call their multiple-choice tests 'objective' and would have us regard objectivity as a virtue. But the term 'objective', when applied to the tests, is really a misnomer. The objectivity resides not in the tests as a whole but merely in the fact that no subjective element enters the grading process once the key has been decided upon. Yet the choice of questions to ask, topics to cover, and the choice of format, that is, multiple-choice as opposed to essay-answer, are all subjective decisions. All 'objective' means, in the narrow technical sense, is that the same mark will be received no matter who grades the test. The chosen answer is simply judged as 'correct' or 'incorrect' in accordance with the key, no argument or rationale is permitted, and the grading can be done by computer. In this sense, all multiple-choice tests are "objective."

But it is important to realise that saying a test is "objective" does not mean that the questions are relevant or unambiguous; nor does it mean that the required answers are correct or even "the best." Even more important, calling the tests "objective" does not mean that the tests are not biased. As discussed above, standardized tests may discriminate against many of the best candidates. It is more generally accepted that these tests are biased against women, minorities, and the poor.

Bias can take many different forms. With women, test scores underpredict grades. Although women tend to score lower on standardized tests, they tend to earn higher grades in college.  At least one study has found the scores also under predict grades for Hispanic students.  Bias against black students takes a different form. Although there is no clear evidence that test scores consistently under predict the grades of black students, it seems that test scores are far less reliable predictors for black students. Or in other words, even more errors in prediction will be made for black than for black students. This form of bias is known as differential validity.

Finally, tests cause stress and depression. Teachers our on edge all year with regards to how to prepare children for the tests. Children become nervous and depressed worrying about how well they are going to do on the test day. I'll bet that doesn't help them to do better. To think that a child being tired, hungry, or nervous during a test can totally effect their results in and of itself says a lot about the fallacy of any test, least of all a government test.

Children, human beings that is, are turned into numbers. A high number or a low number. Instead of making changes in thinking of the thoughts, feelings, emotions, curiosity, of real people, our children, the powers that be see only numbers. Numbers that represent living breathing children.

If you require more info, you can refer to the websites below.

References:

http://www.alfiekohn.org/teaching/edweek/staiv.htm

"Large scale educational assessment: the new face of testing" in Passing the Test: The False Promises of Standardized Testing.

Hampton, Wayne. "Challenging the testing regime in Alberta."

www.education.gov.ab.ca

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standardized_test

http://testcritic.homestead.com/files/standardized_tests.html

http://www.brighthub.com/education/k-12/articles/3239.aspx

AMP first, marks second.

Why do we give exams?

After asking many teachers the top three answers that have been given are:

1)      “To assess, and find out actually what the students know”

2)      “If we don’t test it, the students won’t want to learn it”

3)      “Hold teachers accountable for their teaching”

After many hours of thought, I have decided to post my rebuttal to these three reasons, over the next three blogs:

1)      To argue this I would like to start by quoting Einstein “Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts”.  I believe that discrete statistical data, derived from tests, actually devalue the professional judgement of a teacher.  Teachers should be able to rely on the personal interaction with their students that they have on a day-to-day basis and not the mark received on an exam. 

To further illustrate this, before a student even writes an exam, he/she could explain to the teacher what his/her mark will be on the evaluation.  Furthermore, I would even go as far saying that most teachers know what mark the student will receive on the exam as well.  If both the teacher and the student know what mark is going to be achieved, why waste valuable class time giving an examination?

Tests are also discouraging to any student achieving a mark that is not sufficient.  A student, in this category, will walk into your class KNOWING they will not achieve an adequate mark, and then write the exam.  When you hand back the exam, marked, their knowledge will be confirmed with the poor mark.  We are beating their confidence down with their own knowledge.

Alfie Kohn, would say:

“Most assessment systems are based on an out-dated behaviourist model that assumes nearly everything can -- and should -- be quantified.  But the more educators allow themselves to be turned into accountants, the more trivial their teaching becomes and the more their assessments miss.”

Some would then argue; give more exams.  The more chances a student has to demonstrate their learning, the better the picture the teacher has of what the student knows.  Psychologists Martin Maehr and Carol Midgly would say “an overemphasis on assessment can actually undermine the pursuit of excellence”. 

It has been shown, many times, that the more a student is told to focus on their marks, the less engaged they become about the learning.  Classrooms should have less of an emphasis on achievement and marks, and more emphasis on autonomy, mastery, and purpose.

student learning environment first, teacher's work enviornment second.

Below is a chart from "What to look for in a classroom".  After reading this article, I realized that I have some remodelling to do.  When I first started my teaching career, I used to organize my classes with the mindset "What is best for me to teach in".  Lately, I have came to the conclusion that I must actually be thinking "What is best for students to learn in".