Why you should be against the Common Core...............

IN this article from Psychology Today, one of the developers of the Common Core standards articulates what teachers have been saying all along... except for a very few extremely gifted students, the Common Core standards are totally inappropriate.

Child Development Central

Practical, evidence-based information for parents and professionals.

by Mark Bertin, MD

When Will We Ever Learn

Dissecting The Common Core State Standards with Dr. Louisa Moats

Published on January 21, 2014 by Mark Bertin, M.D. in Child Development Central

Dr. Louisa Moats, the nationally-renowned teacher, psychologist, researcher and author, was one of the contributing writers of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS). The CCSS initiative is an attempt to deal with inconsistent academic expectations from state-to-state and an increasing number of inadequately prepared high school graduates by setting high, consistent standards for grades K-12 in English language arts and math. To date, forty-five states have adopted the standards. I recently had the opportunity to discuss the implementation of the CCSS with Dr. Moats.
Dr. Bertin:   What was your involvement in the development of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS)?
Dr. Moats:   Marilyn Adams and I were the team of writers, recruited in 2009 by David Coleman and Sue Pimentel, who drafted the Foundational Reading Skills section of the CCSS and closely reviewed the whole ELA (English Language Arts) section for K-5. We drafted sections on Language and Writing Foundations that were not incorporated into the document as originally drafted. I am the author of the Reading Foundational Skills section of Appendix A.

       

Dr. Bertin:   What did you see as potential benefits of establishing the CCSS when you first became involved?
Dr. Moats:  I saw the confusing inconsistencies among states’ standards, the lowering of standards overall, and the poor results for our high school kids in international comparisons. I also believed that the solid consensus in reading intervention research could be reflected in standards and that we could use the CCSS to promote better instruction for kids at risk.
Dr. Bertin:  What has actually happened in its implementation?
Dr. Moats:  I never imagined when we were drafting standards in 2010 that major financial support would be funneled immediately into the development of standards-related tests. How naïve I was. The CCSS represent lofty aspirational goals for students aiming for four year, highly selective colleges. Realistically, at least half, if not the majority, of students are not going to meet those standards as written, although the students deserve to be well prepared for career and work through meaningful and rigorous education.
Our lofty standards are appropriate for the most academically able, but what are we going to do for the huge numbers of kids that are going to “fail” the PARCC (Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers) test?  We need to create a wide range of educational choices and pathways to high school graduation, employment, and citizenship. The Europeans got this right a long time ago.
If I could take all the money going to the testing companies and reinvest it, I’d focus on the teaching profession – recruitment, pay, work conditions, rigorous and on-going training. Many of our teachers are not qualified or prepared to teach the standards we have written. It doesn’t make sense to ask kids to achieve standards that their teachers have not achieved!
Dr. Bertin:   What differences might there be for younger students versus older students encountering it for the first time?
Dr. Moats:   What is good for older students (e.g., the emphasis on text complexity, comprehension of difficult text, written composition, use of internet resources) is not necessarily good for younger students who need to acquire the basic skills of reading, writing, listening, and speaking. Novice readers (typically through grade 3) need a stronger emphasis on the foundational skills of reading, language, and writing than on the “higher level” academic activities that depend on those foundations, until they are fluent readers.
Our CCSS guidelines, conferences, publishers’ materials, and books have turned away from critical, research-based methodologies on how to develop the basic underlying skills of literacy. Systematic, cumulative skill development and code-emphasis instruction is getting short shrift all around, even though we have consensus reports from the 1920’s onward that show it is more effective than comprehension-focused instruction.
I’m listening, but I don’t hear the words “research based” as often as I did a decade ago – and when CCSS proponents use the words, they’re usually referring to the research showing that high school kids who can’t read complex text don’t do as well in college. Basic findings of reading and literacy research, information about individual differences in reading and language ability, and explicit teaching procedures are really being lost in this shuffle.
Dr. Bertin:  What benefits have you seen or heard about so far as the CCSS has been put in place, and what difficulties?
Dr. Moats:   The standards may drive the adoption or use of more challenging and complex texts for kids to read and a wider sampling of genres. If handled right, there could be a resurgence of meaty curriculum of the “core knowledge” variety. There may be more emphasis on purposeful, teacher-directed writing. But we were making great inroads into beginning reading assessment and instruction practices between 2000-2008 that now are being cast aside in favor of “reading aloud from complex text” – which is not the same as teaching kids how to read on their own, accurately and fluently.
Dr.  Bertin:  What has the impact been on classroom teachers?
Dr. Moats:  Classroom teachers are confused, lacking in training and skills to implement the standards, overstressed, and the victims of misinformed directives from administrators who are not well grounded in reading research.  I’m beginning to get messages from very frustrated educators who threw out what was working in favor of a new “CCSS aligned” program, and now find that they don’t have the tools to teach kids how to read and write. Teachers are told to use “grade level” texts, for example; if half the kids are below grade level by definition, what does the teacher do? She has to decide whether to teach “the standard” or teach the kids.
Dr. Bertin:  You’ve raised concerns elsewhere that CCSS represents a compromise that does not emphasize educational research.  How do the CCSS reflect, or fail to reflect, research in reading instruction?
Dr.  Moats:   The standards obscure the critical causal relationships among components, chiefly the foundational skills and the higher level skills of comprehension that depend on fluent, accurate reading.  Foundations should be first!  The categories of the standards obscure the interdependence of decoding, spelling, and knowledge of language. The standards contain no explicit information about foundational writing skills, which are hidden in sections other than “writing”, but which are critical for competence in composition.
The standards treat the foundational language, reading, and writing skills as if they should take minimal time to teach and as if they are relatively easy to teach and to learn. They are not. The standards call for raising the difficulty of text, but many students cannot read at or above grade level, and therefore may not receive enough practice at levels that will build their fluency gradually over time.
Dr. Bertin:  How about recommendations for writing?
Dr. Moats:   We need a foundational writing skills section in the CCSS, with a much more detailed progression. We should not be requiring 3^rd graders to compose on the computer. Writing in response to reading is a valuable activity, but teachers need a lot of assistance knowing what to assign, how to support writing, and how to give corrective feedback that is constructive.  Very few know how to teach kids to write a sentence, for example.
Dr. Bertin:   In an article for the International Dyslexia Association, you wrote “raising standards and expectations, without sufficient attention to known cause and remedies for reading and academic failure, and without a substantial influx of new resources to educate and support teachers, is not likely to benefit students with mild, moderate, or severe learning difficulties.”   You also mention that 34% of the population as a whole is behind academically in fourth grade, and in high poverty areas 70-80% of students are at risk for reading failure.
How does the CCSS impact children who turn out to need additional academic supports for learning disabilities, ADHD or other educational concerns?
Dr. Moats:   I have not yet seen a well-informed policy directive that addresses the needs of these populations. There are absurd directives about “universal design for learning” and endless accommodations, like reading a test aloud, to kids with learning disabilities. Why would we want to do that? The test itself is inappropriate for many kids.
Dr. Bertin:   How does it relate to concerns you have about teacher training in general?
Dr. Moats:   What little time there is for professional development is being taken up by poorly designed workshops on teaching comprehension of difficult text or getting kids to compose arguments and essays. This will not be good for the kids who need a systematic, explicit form of instruction to reach basic levels of academic competence.
I’ve been around a long time, and this feels like 1987 all over again, with different words attached to the same problems. When will we ever learn?
*             *             *
In addition to the LETRS professional development series, Dr. Moats’ books include Speech to Print: Language Essentials for Teachers (Brookes Publishing); Spelling: Development, Disability, and Instruction (Pro-Ed); Straight Talk About Reading (with Susan Hall, Contemporary Books), and Basic Facts about Dyslexia.  Dr. Moats’ awards include the prestigious Samuel T. and June L. Orton award, in 2013, from the International Dyslexia Association, for outstanding contributions to the field.

An NEA Identity Crisis, thank you very much.

The NEA has been conspicuously absent from most of the news that I follow, and OEA seems more interested in providing discount tickets to sporting events than addressing real issues. What can I say? Curmudgucation: read it.

CURMUDGUCATION

A grumpy old teacher trying to keep up the good classroom fight in the new age of reformy stuff.

 

 

Saturday, June 14, 2014

Van Roekel Gets Feisty-ish

It has been a noisy week for NEA president Dennis van Roekel. In the face of a great deal of anti-teacher rhetoric (some if it coming from a sitting judge in a major court case), DVR has decided that it's time to finally speak up on behalf of teachers.

First, he opened up in HuffPo, declaring that our accountability system is flunking. He wrote, in part:

The idea that everything will be better if we test students and just "hold teachers accountable" for results is unfair to our students and insulting to those of us who devote our lives to educating kids.

This is right on point, and even though he's at least a year late, at least he finally said it. But like Randi Weingarten and Linda Darling-Hammond, whose lead he appears to be following here, he writes about the high stakes testing as if it is occurring in some sort of vacuum and not as a linked and logically predictable outcome of the Common Core Gates Standards.

He compares the current system to applying for a bank loan and--wait! what? Literally thousands of metaphors have been put out there for this process, but DVR has chosen a terrible one. Our evaluations are like loans given to us by banks? Teaching is like asking someone to give you money that isn't really yours and that you have to prove you deserve?Which you have to pay back with interest?

And he calls for full-system accountability, accountability for politicians and bureaucrats. Accountability that "emphasizes improving professional practice and advancing student learning." Put that together with an earlier quote from the piece: "There are ways that do improve student success, and they involve better preparation for teachers, better support in the classroom, and ensuring that all students have access to qualified teachers and great schools." Oh, look! DVR is testifying for the Vergara plaintiffs!

I get that it's a clever technique to appropriate the language of your opponents. Hell, the reformsters have been kicking our collective ass using that technique. But you have to make clear, at least to your own people, how it means something different when you say it. When DVR says he favors measures of "advancing student learning," I don't know if he means "we need meaningful measures of student growth" or "let's have more VAM!" Ultimately, he doesn't say anything, call for anything specific (like, say, actual teacher involvement) that would cause Arne Duncan or That Woman the slightest disagreement.

Then later in the week, DVR stepped up and actually addressed his members. Specifically, he was addressing the full page USA Today attack ad (everything you need to know about the ad is covered here by Mercedes Schneider, other than saying that this is the sort of thing that leads teachers to conclude that a "mutual cease-fire" is a silly thing to discuss).

DVR opens with a compelling juxtaposition-- an ad comparing students and teachers to garbage coming to his attention while he was dedicating a memorial to teachers who died trying to protect their students. He tells us he's angry-- angry about a system that is misfocused and dominated by corporate interests. And then he addresses the reformsters directly. And this part is good. Really good:

I have a message for those people who would seek to reduce children to a test score and teaching to a technological transaction. 
You are mistaken if you think we will see your attacks and get discouraged, that we will read the headlines and give up.
You may put students in the name of your campaigns but that doesn’t mean you really care about the millions of children in our public schools.
If you did truly care, you would look at the more than half of public-school children who live in poverty and wage your crusades against the inequity in our economy.
If you truly cared, you would look at the deteriorating conditions in schools across this country and aim your fire at politicians who have starved our schools of the resources to succeed and then punished them for their failures.

Sadly, DVR does not stick the landing for the whole speech:


I will continue to fight for them, and for the educators across this country who dedicate themselves to fulfilling the promise of another generation of students.

This would be more compelling if-- well, you cannot "continue" doing something that you have not to date actually done. And while I'm being critical, I recommend you read the text and not watch the video. DVR's "I'm very angry" looks a lot like "I should have not eaten the rest of that garlic hummus."

Look, I'm still pissed at him. I'll admit it. I have not forgiven him for last summer's "Well, if you don't like CCSS, then what do you want to do instead." It was a horrible thing for the head of the NEA to say, embracing the assumption that America's teachers suck and need to be guided out of the vast swamp of suck in which they've gotten lost. Or his prolonged silence-- remember when he criticized the rollout of CCSS, then took it back immediately, then shut up about it entirely until now? So while I appreciate his defense of us now, I'm having a hard time getting past "Where the hell have you been, Dennis?"

But beyond that, DVR still doesn't grasp how complicit in the reformster mess he is, how his support of the Core has fueled much of what he now rails against. When they say we stink, they are saying the proof is that our students do poorly on the high stakes tests that are set up to prove we're teaching the Core. It is hard for DVR to convincingly protest the measuring when he's one of the people who promoted the ruler in the first place.

So I appreciate his jumping in now that we've had a week of severe clobbering. But I'm not going to get excited about it until A) he recognizes and apologizes for his role in creating this atmosphere in the first place and B) he repudiates the whole mess, Core and all. What a great gesture if the NEA gave back the $3.00 it collected from all of us to help promote CCSS (like buying bullets for our own executioners).  I will settle for somebody getting a clue to his most-likely already-selected successor.

What you need to know about that nasty ad in USA Today.

That Full-page Union-bashing Ad in USA Today

June 12, 2014

Remember that five-story billboard in Times Square in December 2013 and the accompanying full-page ad in the New York Times blaming American Federation of Teachers (AFT) President Randi Weingarten for 2012 US PISA scores?
Both were the work of a union-busting “nonprofit,” the deceptively-named Center for Union Facts.
Well, on June 12, 2014, the same union-busting group posted this full-page ad celebrating the teacher tenure mis-ruling in California’s Vergara trial:



The Vergara trial amounts to nothing more than well-funded privatizers attempting to strip teachers of due porcess rights. Here is a summation of the case as posted by education historian Diane Ravitch:
The plaintiffs argued that poor and minority children suffered because they had ineffective teachers who could not be fired. Lawyers for the teachers unions maintained that the causes of low performance were poverty and inadequate school funding. The plaintiffs prevailed and promised to take their cause to other states with strong teacher job protections, like New Jersey and New York.
There will be appeals, and the battle will spread to other states. As due process is removed, it seems to be replaced by evaluations of “effectiveness” based on test scores.
The long-range question is whether the “reformers’” efforts to remove all job protections from teachers will affect the number of people who choose teaching as a career and how they will affect the nature of the profession over time.
For an excellent detailing of the Vergara trial, the decision, and varied responses, follow this link to Ravitch’s blog.

Teacher tenure” is due process, not a lifetime job guarantee.
This brings us back to that full-page USA Today ad bashing unions and encouraging the public to sue “to protect kids.”
Ironically, not only were none of the plaintiffs’ teachers documented as “ineffective”; some of these plaintiffs did not even attend schools where teachers had due process at all. As Ravitch notes:
I was curious to learn whether the plaintiffs in the Vergara trial actually had “grossly ineffective teachers.” The answer is “no, they did not.”
Not only did none of them have a “grossly ineffective” teacher, but some of the plaintiffs attended schools where there are no tenured teachers. Two of the plaintiffs attend charter schools, where there is no tenure or seniority, and as you will read below, “Beatriz and Elizabeth Vergara both attend a “Pilot School” in LAUSD that is free to let teachers go at the end of the school year for any reason, including ineffectiveness.
It turns out that the lawyers for the defense checked the records of the plaintiffs’ teachers, and this is what they found (filed as a post-trial brief in the case): (See pp. 5-6).
“Plaintiffs have not established that the statutes have ever caused them any harm or are likely to do so in the future. None of the nine named Plaintiffs established that he or she was assigned to an allegedly grossly ineffective teacher, or that he or she faces any immediate risk of future harm, as a result of the challenged statutes. The record contains no evidence that Plaintiffs Elliott, Liss, Campbell or Martinez were ever assigned a grossly ineffective teacher at all. Of the remaining five Plaintiffs, most of the teachers whom they identified as “bad” or “grossly ineffective” were excellent teachers. [Emphasis added.]
Wow.
Of course, union-bashing Center for Union Facts had to kick the teaching profession when it was down by encouraging the spread of this utter absence of justice to other states.
But who is behind the so-called Center for Union Facts?
Rick Berman, and does he have a self-serving story. Here is a detailed excerpt I wrote as part of this December 2013 post:

CUF is a front for union bashing. This is what CUF does. CUF is not concerned “with” education; CUF is concerned “against” teachers unions. So, the issues it pretends to raise in its ads (not only in newspapers, but also on radio) are done in order to undermine collective bargaining.
Unions are certainly not the sole Berman target. Berman uses his front groups to attack anyone who stands in the way of his mystery funders’ profits.
Berman serves corporate America in shady fashion. Allow me to offer some Sourcewatch highlights:
Although Berman used to fly under the media radar, by now he is well-known and widely regarded as an industry shill, having been the subject of a 60 Minutespiece in 2007that dubbed him “Dr. Evil,” a public takedown on the Rachel Maddow Show, and years of research documenting his close ties to industries looking for a well paid hired gun to defend the indefensible. He has attacked respected scientists and scholars, food safety experts, and even Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD).
Despite this documented lack of credibility, Berman continues to work through a variety of research-for-hire front groups to remain relevant by creating a façade of academic respectability for extreme policies that many mainstream companies, scientists, and voters have rejected.
Berman has raised millions of dollars from companies, trade associations and individuals, but refuses to name them. According to the National Journal, the Employment Policies Institute was started “by a group of restaurant companies” that at the time (1995) got “95% of its budget from corporate sources—primarily restaurateurs and retailers.” Several years ago an unnamed former Berman employee revealed a list of Berman’s 2001-2002 corporate funders, including Coca-Cola, Cargill, Monsanto, Tyson Foods, Wendy’s, Outback Steakhouse and Applebee’s.
“We always have a knife in our teeth,” Berman has said, and his approach is “to shoot the messenger.” Restaurant industry spokespeople have praised his “outstanding work as an industry Doberman.” 60 Minutes called him “the booze and food industries’ weapon of mass destruction.”  …
Rick Berman conceived the idea of theGuest Choice Network, a front group to help advance the goals of Philip Morris‘ Accommodation Program while appearing to be more of a grass-roots-led effort. …
Berman is also counsel for the American Beverage Institute, which also fronts for the tobacco industry. …
Berman formed a group called Beverage Retailers Against Drunk Driving” (BRADD), a pro-social drinking group, in response to Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD). …
For several years, Berman has been fighting efforts by the voter registration/community organizing group ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) to raise the minimum wage at the state and federal levels. To assist with his efforts, Berman created a Web site,http://www.rottenacorn.com, slamming the group. Contact information on RottenACORN.com directs readers to theEmployment Policies Institute,^[23]a Bermanfront groupwhich shares the same address as Berman’s lobbying business, Berman & Company. ^…
As head of theCenter for Consumer Freedom(CCF), afront groupfor the restaurant, tobacco, and alcohol industries, Berman has specialized in the no-holds-barred intimidation tactics pioneered by Big Tobacco. …
In an October 9, 1989 commentary for Nation’s Restaurant News, Berman opposed the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act(“ADA”). He wrote, “The ADA in its present form will cost our industry untold millions in added construction and labor costs.”  [Emphasis added.]
So, this is the kind of ‘work” for which Berman is known.
The real story is on Berman’s nonprofit tax returns.

Berman Nonprofits Paying Berman

 In the last several months, I have read at least 100 nonprofit tax returns. Nothing I have seen equals what I am about to write for its obviousness in corporate profits being funneled through nonprofits.
This is the 2011 990 for Berman’s CUF. Berman is listed as CUF’s president and executive director.
In 2011, CUF’s total revenue was $3.24 million.
In 2011, CUF’s highest paid “independent contractor” was Richard Berman and Company, Inc., to the tune of $870,182.
This is the 2011 990 for Berman’s American Beverage Institute (ABI). Berman is listed as president and general counsel-director.
In 2011, ABI’s total revenue was $1.76 million.
In 2011, ABI’s only “independent contractor” was Richard Berman and Company, Inc., to the tune of $1.35 million.
This is the 2011 990 for the Center for Consumer Freedom (CCF). Berman is listed as president and executive director.
In 2011, CCF’s total revenue was $1.4 million.
In 2011, CCF’s highest paid “independent contractor” was Richard Berman and Company, Inc., to the tune of $1.3 million.
This is the 2011 990 for Berman’s Employment Policies Institute Foundation (EPIF). Berman is listed as president and executive director.
In 2011, EPIF’s total revenue was $1.6 million.
In 2011, EPIF’s highest paid “independent contractor” was Richard Berman and Company, Inc., to the tune of $1.1 million.
There is a fifth nonprofit that Berman runs, the Enterprise Freedom Action Committee (aka the Employment Freedom Action Committee) (EFAC). It is listed as the co-sponsor with CUF of the Labor Pains blog used to blast both Weingarten and now Ravitch (in defense of Weingarten).
EFAC’s 990 notes that EFAC “advocate[s] on behalf of employee choice in the workplace, in particular related to issues of union organizing, job growth and health care options.”
EFAC was quiet in 2011. According to its 2011 990, it produced only $322 in revenue. However, EFAC’s total revenue for 2008, 2009, and 2010 combined was $20.3 million, with most of it ($16 million) paid to Orion Precision Marketing Research (CT) for “media brokerage.”
Despite its virtually nonexistent revenue in 2011, Berman still managed to use EFAC to transfer nonprofit funds into his for-profit.
As the Charity Navigator notes,
During our analysis of this charity’s FYE 2011 Form 990, the document revealed that more than half of Enterprise Freedom Action Committee’s functional expenses were paid to its CEO Richard Berman’s for-profit management company, Berman and Company.  The document revealed that, out of total expenses of $136,000, $82,000 were paid to Berman and Company. See relevant pages from the organization’s 2011 Form 990 filing via PDF files “EFACpage10” and “EFACscheduleLpage2” for  more information. 
We find the practice of a charity contracting for management services with a business owned by that charity’s CEO atypical as compared to how other charities operate and have therefore issued this Donor Advisory.
Affiliated nonprofits also have Donor Advisories including: Center for Consumer Freedom, American Beverage Institute, Employment Policies Institute Foundation and the Center for Union Facts.  [Emphasis added.]
If Berman (aka CUF, ABI, CCF, EPIF and EFAC) thinks that his accusing Weingarten and, in turn, Ravitch absolves him of his own “elephant,” he either has had a partial lobotamy or believes that the American public has had one.
Berman is hooking for corporate. Evidently it pays quite well.

Berman does not care for children. He serves himself by way of the corporate interests who pay him.
For Berman and the misnamed Center for Union Facts, the Vergara verdict is a convenience to be used. And buying full-page ads is nothing new for him.
_______________________________________________________________

Like my writing? Read my newly-released ed “reform” whistle blower, A Chronicle of Echoes: Who’s Who in the Implosion of American Public Education

NOW AVAILABLE ON KINDLE.

Governor Kasich is really beginning to piss me off! Actually, it's been that way for quite a long time, but it's becoming really egregious lately, and here's the latest piece of excrement...... as reported by Plunderbund.

New Kasich School Board Appointee Thinks Kids Should Be Taught Creationism

By Joseph On June 13, 2014 · Leave a Comment

Governor John Kasich appointed Republican Cathye Smith Flory from Hocking County to the State School Board yesterday, filling the seat left open when Darryl Mehaffie resigned last week.
Flory previously served 12 years  on the Logan-Hocking Board of Education.
In a 2005 Meet the Candidates Night, Flory was one of two Logan-Hocking school board candidates who wanted Creationism should be taught alongside actual science in public schools.
According to an article on LoganDaily.com, Flory and another candidate agreed that “children should be taught the various theories and decide for themselves what is right for them.”   
Today, class, we will be watching another episode of Cosmos and discussing the Earth’s place in the Universe.  Tomorrow we will discuss the possibility that the Earth is only 6,000 years old.   And remember, Friday is the last day to bring in your dioramas of humans riding on dinosaurs.

The Tormenting of Teachers for Profit

This from Debra Testa Fedyna about sums it all up....and if you haven't joined Ohio Bats yet, you should. The struggle is on.................

The Tormenting of Teachers for Profit
Teacher bashing has become a national pastime in this country.
I have been watching this escalate throughout my 35 years of teaching. When I began teaching in 1977, I was viewed as a professional who knew what was best for the young children I taught. My opinion mattered and was respected by parents and administration.
Slowly, year after year my profession began to be analyzed, scrutinized and vilified by the press, legislators and infamous education reformers. It began with the Nation at Risk report on the state of public education in the 80’s which planted the seeds of doubt in the minds of the public.
I knew when NCLB came into the picture that things would only get worse. Teaching to the test became the norm and the needs of children were pushed aside. If you protested the testing it was perceived as you were trying to protect yourself, not the children. The corporate world began to see education as a lucrative business opportunity and teacher unions became the roadblock that needed to be removed. All the while teachers were caught in the middle. Wrestling with what was best for students and trying to uphold their professional rights. We have been the underdogs in this entire process. Often underpaid, overworked and over scrutinized by the communities they served.
I was mystified by the notion of Teach for America being accepted by the public. How could parents want unlicensed, non-education majors teaching their children? How could someone with a pre law degree be better qualified to teach kindergarten after 5 weeks of summer training than a teacher with a 4 year degree, in class experience and a teaching license?? Then I realized that this was the first step in erasing teaching as a profession. TFA implies that anyone with a degree in anything can teach as well or better than a licensed teacher. I was appalled that the public did not demand that this be stopped. But TFA recruits are cheaper to hire than experienced teachers and they have one hell of a PR program. TFA insists that there is a teacher shortage in inner city and rural schools and they fill that void. Now licensed teachers are being fired to bring in TFA recruits in Chicago, Cleveland and many other cities.
So the assault on teachers continued. Education reform groups popped up like dandelions in the years that followed. Students First, Education Matters, Students Matter, Every Child Matters, Center for Education Reform and the list goes on and on. All groups had catchy names, wealthy backers and the ability to influence legislation and financially support Ed Reform candidates. The war against teachers was reaching its peak. I have watched in horror as legislators across the country are enacting laws that reduce teacher retirements, reduce collective bargaining, eliminate tenure, increase testing and tie 30%-50% of teacher evaluations to student test scores.
The focus of all of this educational reform seems to be based on proving teacher ineffectiveness, not improving the learning conditions for students. The catch phrase “Every child deserves a quality teacher” implies that the present teachers are ineffective. This is about controlling the teaching profession so profits are increased. What better way to increase profits then to control the biggest expense, the teachers. If you control that expense, profits soar. When you also control the curriculum, the textbooks, the test prep materials and the testing, you can make a fortune off of the backs of children!
Charter Schools, Virtual Schools and Voucher programs drain funding and take spaces from our public schools. The CEO’s who run these schools are making huge salaries and the track record of most of these charters is questionable at best. Yet they are touted as the answer to all educational issues.
When will the public wake up and realize what is going on? What will it take for them to see that their children are being used for profits? When will they realize that it is the teachers who are fighting to reduce the pressure of over testing, reduce the ill effects of the Common Core and eliminate constant test prep?
I am begging all teachers to continue to fight the onslaught of their profession. Inform your friends, family and colleagues of what is going on. If we don’t stand up for ourselves, no one else is going to save us.

Research, shmeesearch...who needs it?

As the reform movement sweeps through education like a wave of toxic sludge, more and more of its components are being shown to have no foundation in any research, with many of them hurting both teachers and students. The need to stand up to these changes is essential if we are to save the soul of public education from these misguided reformers, and time is of the essence. They have the money, but we have the numbers. We all need to make our voices heard.

Published Online: May 20, 2014

Published in Print: May 21, 2014, as Retention May Cause More Problems Than It Solves

Commentary

Holding Kids Back Doesn't Help Them

By Deborah Stipek and Michael Lombardo  

This spring, 3rd graders in several states are taking tests that could change their lives. Based on how youngsters in Arizona, Florida, Indiana, and Ohio score on their 3rd grade reading assessments, they will either move on to 4th grade or be required by law to repeat 3rd grade. (Oklahoma lawmakers recently postponed by a year enactment of a similar policy.)
Retaining children who are behind grade level is not a new practice. But, until recently, the decision has typically been made at the local level, often between teachers and parents. Increasingly, though, state laws are requiring that students be held back automatically based on their performance on 3rd grade reading assessments—regardless of what teachers and parents think is best.
State-mandated retention statutes are being enacted at a dizzying pace by legislatures across the country. In 2012, 13 states adopted laws targeting early reading achievement, many of which require schools to hold back elementary school students based on reading assessments. At least 10 other states have considered or are considering similar laws.
The model most frequently cited as the basis for state-mandated retention is a Florida statute enacted in 2002, part of a comprehensive package of reforms, beginning in 1999, that also included A-F grading of schools and an investment in academic interventions, pre-K, and summer programs. The overall results appeared to be significant: Fourth grade reading proficiency, as measured by the National Assessment of Educational Progress, increased from 22 percent of students in 2002 to 30 percent in 2013, a greater increase than seen in national 4th grade proficiency rates, which grew from 29 percent to 34 percent.
The gains may have had little to do with the retention policy, however. Research cannot determine which of the Florida strategies, if any, was responsible for generating these gains. The only formal evaluation of Florida's state-mandated retention policy, a 2007 study by the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville, was not able to disentangle the impact of retention from that of Florida's other reforms. The study also acknowledged that prior research comparing different strategies had found retention to have no effect on reading achievement after two years.

—iStockphoto.com

In addition to the absence of evidence on the effect of state-mandated retention in Florida, an examination of the best research conducted on the effects of retention demonstrates that the policy is most likely counterproductive.
A majority of peer-reviewed studies over the past 30 years have demonstrated that holding students back yields little or no long-term academic benefits and can actually be harmful to students. When improvements in achievement are linked to retention, they are not usually sustained beyond a few years, and there is some evidence for negative effects on self-esteem and emotional well-being.
Moreover, there is compelling evidence that retention can reduce the probability of high school graduation. According to a 2005 review of decades of studies by Nailing Xia and Elizabeth Glennie: "Research has consistently found that retained students are at a higher risk of leaving school earlier, even after controlling for academic performance and other factors such as race and ethnicity, gender, socioeconomic status, family background, etc."
The authors went on to note that retention's effect on dropout rates was also "associated with decreased lifetime earnings and poorer employment outcomes in the long run."
Even the Florida experience is consistent with evidence that state-mandated retention may, at best, have only short-term benefits. While 4th grade reading proficiency in Florida increased by 8 percentage points from 2002 to 2013, 8th grade proficiency increased by only 3 percentage points. And, as of 2013, Florida still rated below the national average for 8th grade reading proficiency.

“When a strategy fails to work, the solution is not to do it again; it is to change the strategy.”

State-mandated retention seems like a common-sense strategy to ensure that students' reading achievement is on grade level. The alternative typically posed in political circles is social promotion, and who can argue for passing children on grade after grade regardless of whether they are ready for the material they will be expected to learn in the next grade?
But retention does not help most children who have fallen behind, primarily because they are exposed to the same material in the same way that didn't work for them the first time around. When a strategy fails to work, the solution is not to do it again; it is to change the strategy.
Happily, there are more effective and less expensive alternatives. The cost of having a student repeat 3rd grade is several times greater than alternatives such as tutoring or small-group interventions, summer school, or high-quality pre-K. These approaches don't have the negative side effects associated with retention.
Instead of giving children the same treatment that failed them the first time, alternative strategies provide different kinds of learning opportunities.
Interventions should also begin long before 3rd grade. Research has provided compelling evidence that investments in preschool can reduce retention and have positive long-term payoff for individuals and society, in contrast to the negative long-term effects of holding a student back later.

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Many tutoring and summer programs in the first few grades of school have demonstrated effectiveness in helping students improve reading. Investing in improving the quality of the teaching children receive in the early grades is another less expensive alternative to retention, and it would benefit all students, not just those who are falling behind grade level.
Given what decades of research has told us, decisions to retain individual children should be made only when there is compelling evidence that it is likely to benefit the child. Until there is a body of rigorous research linking mandatory retention to long-term benefits for children, we do not recommend that states require students be held back against the wishes of parents and over the objections of educators.
Policymakers in Florida and across the country should be commended for acknowledging the importance of early reading and taking actions intended to improve achievement.
Research tells us that mastering reading (as well as math) by 4th grade is a critical factor in determining a child's later success, both in school and in life. Let's harness this legislative momentum and focus on implementing strategies that have been proven to be effective and offer the best chance of preparing children to be successful, confident students.

Deborah Stipek is the dean of Stanford University's graduate school of education and is the Judy Koch professor of education there. Michael Lombardo is the chief executive officer of Reading Partners, an Oakland, Calif.-based nonprofit organization that promotes early-childhood reading. He is also a social-entrepreneur-in-residence at Stanford.

Vol. 33, Issue 32, Pages 22-23

Making the best of a bad deal and turning crap into gold......Edualchemy 101

 http://www.plunderbund.com/2014/06/08/how-educators-can-seize-control-of-the-ohio-teacher-evaluation-system/

How Educators Can Seize Control Of The Ohio Teacher Evaluation System

By Greg On June 8, 2014 · Leave a Comment

When the Ohio General Assembly finally adopted changes to the Ohio Teacher Evaluation System (OTES) through House Bill 362 last week, there was one positive remnant left from the original Senate Bill 229 introduced in late 2013 that does offer school districts some relief from the time-intensive process.  With the majority of teachers in in the state being expected to receive a rating of skilled or accomplished, and with those ratings being aligned with teachers who are effectively doing their jobs by demonstrating desired classroom practices and expected student growth (according to the legislators and Ohio Department of Education), schools will not be required by law to fully evaluate these teachers each and every year.
The new law reads as follows [emphasis added]:

Ohio Revised Code Section 3319.111

…

(2)(a) The board may evaluate each teacher who received a rating of accomplished on the teacher’s most recent evaluation conducted under this section once every three school years, so long as the teacher’s student academic growth measure, for the most recent school year for which data is available, is average or higher, as determined by the department of education.

(b) The board may evaluate each teacher who received a rating of skilled on the teacher’s most recent evaluation conducted under this section once every two years, so long as the teacher’s student academic growth measure, for the most recent school year for which data is available, is average or higher, as determined by the department of education.

…

(3) In any year that a teacher is not formally evaluated pursuant to division (C) of this section as a result of receiving a rating of accomplished or skilled on the teacher’s most recent evaluation, an individual qualified to evaluate a teacher under division (D) of this section shall conduct at least one observation of the teacher and hold at least one conference with the teacher.

If the school chooses to opt for this provision, instead of conducting multiple observations, walkthroughs, and conferences, the evaluator must still conduct at least one observation and hold at least one conference with the teacher.  The premise here is that those teachers should still be held accountable for maintaining their good teaching practices and monitoring them with an evaluator is the only way to do so.

I’ll put a positive spin on this and say that this type of interaction between a principal (evaluator) and teacher is the type of sound professional practice that good principals already engage in when they are given the freedom to act as the school’s instructional leader.  When you have a high-quality principal in a school who works collaboratively with teachers by engaging in professional dialogue about the best practices that are contained within the OTES rubric, teachers can receive constructive feedback and principals can identify areas in which they need to provide improved support for the teachers under their care.

Additionally, by removing the mandate to evaluate these high-quality educators each and every year, principals now have some added freedom to work more intensively with teachers who may be struggling in one or more areas.  The key to this entire process is how the individuals involved react to this opportunity.  Principals must utilize the information gathered from the observations and conferences to help connect teachers with resources, especially the human capital within their buildings, in order to promote and encourage professional growth and improvement.  Again, this is what high-quality principals have been doing for years and OTES can be a model to guide schools and principals to function in this improvement model.

From a pessimistic, and in many cases a realistic, viewpoint, the OTES system is being used as a way to label teachers with the goal of ousting those who may struggle in their current assignment.  Not only is this goal lazy on its face, but very concept of firing these teachers outright contradicts the entire foundations of our educational system.

Think about it — how do we react when students are struggling with mastering skills or concepts?  We often go above and beyond to provide additional support for those children, frequently capitalizing on the strengths of other students to provide peer support, but most often identifying additional services and interventions to guide the students toward mastery.  Nothing is more evident of this than Ohio’s Third Grade Reading Guarantee law.  While we have lambasted the law’s mandatory retention component as exacerbating the long-term success of these students, the other pieces of the law distinctly try to focus on catching struggling students early on in and providing increased interventions and support.  We don’t simply identify a student who is “below grade level” in reading in first grade, label them as unsuccessful, then kick them out, do we?  Of course not, we seek to help them improve!

In this same manner, principals and teachers need to be allowed to use the OTES, still in its infancy, to help one another improve their professional practices.  Let’s be clear — OTES is not simply a means of directly improving teachers’ practices, it is also a tool that principals need to embrace as a way to improve their role as instructional leaders.  Too many people simply assume that gaining the title of principal automatically makes that individual master of all in their domain.  However, those in the field of education know that nothing could be further from the truth.

The vast majority of criticisms of schools these days are targeted at teachers and teaching practices, and the legislative talking points about OTES are centered on identifying “bad” teachers and getting them out of our schools.  But a “funny” thing has happened along the way – OTES has exposed the fact that principals aren’t infallible either, and many don’t know how to identify good teaching practices or how to provide solid instructional support that promotes professional growth by their teachers.

So again, capitalizing on this rare moment of optimism that I’m having, and looking for a way for educators to regain control of our profession, I must encourage principals and teachers to “modernize” their professional practices and forget the traditional view of schools where the principal is “the boss” and teachers are silent followers of the boss’s rules.  Instead, for the sake of our collective profession, principals and teachers must be willing to let down their guard and take a deeper look at the research-based OTES rubric that is at the heart of the observation/conference process.  Principals need to be willing to admit that they don’t know everything, let go of personal opinions about what always worked for them “when I was a teacher”, and truly follow the evidence-based rubric to drive their evaluation process.  In the same way, teachers need to understand that principals aren’t omnipotent.  Teachers must also be willing to advocate for themselves and their classroom practices, speak to principals about what support is needed, and be willing to accept help from not only the principal, but their peer teachers.

In the end, education is a profession that has strong communication and strong relationships at its foundation.  From a union standpoint, we’ve often been focused on an “us vs. them” mentality when describing the relationship between teachers and administrators.  Now, with the implementation of OTES, both principals and teachers have been unwillingly thrown into this process together and both sides need to understand and accept that we are not perfect.  Maybe, just maybe, by working together, principals and teachers can work to change the stereotypical adversarial relationship between them and focus on using this law that has been imposed upon us for our collective benefit.

Legislators wanted to use this law to fire educators.  What if we hijacked it and actually used it to our benefit?  We can only do so if principals and teachers are willing to engage in professional dialogue and begin to see themselves as co-educators and not as bosses and employees.

Can we do it?  Can we — districts, schools, principals, and teachers — take over OTES and take back control of our profession?

*Here's a quote from Plunderbund (Greg Mild) from a discussion on the OHIO BATs Facebook page explaining further his thoughts on the post above. It puts some responsibility on teachers to make sure that the evaluation system is used to its best advantage, even while we work to eliminate it. The idea of teachers and administrators working together for their common good is really appealing.

"Obviously my post describes an idealist view as it ultimately requires that principals and teachers both act in an appropriate way. In conversations about the process this year, my greatest suggestion is that teachers actually "help" principals in the evaluation process. The ultimate key is really digging into the OTES rubric and the descriptive elements within all the categories. Principals truly only get to see a small fraction of a teacher's practices in the limited observations and walkthroughs, so teachers need to advocate and share evidence to fill in the blanks for the principal during the conferences (which SHOULD literally be two-way conversations, not a one-sided report). This practice is CLEARLY spelled out in the state's OTES training that all credentialed evaluators attend. In addition, teachers need to be willing and able to identify areas in the rubric that they might be able to improve on and advocate for assistance in those specific areas, not some general professional development that is just blindly targeted for every teacher. In the same way that we're always being told to differentiate instruction for children, so should PD be differentiated for teachers. Lastly, teachers and principals need to be GIVEN TIME to have meaningful conversations and practice effective communication skills in a non-adversarial environment. Within our schools, it is a high-quality principal who has the advantageous position of using the observation data to connect teachers within a building who would benefit from collaborating and sharing their individual strengths with each other. A skilled principal could set up this type of environment so that teachers aren't threatened, but actually would benefit from working together (without having to continually complete meaningless paperwork about the process above and beyond the OTES). In the absence of such a skilled principal, teachers are left to build their own community in which they would discuss their own personal observations of their practices and collaborate among themselves. Ultimately, for the system to work best, it requires teachers and principals all working together in a highly collaborative and cooperative environment. From a higher administration standpoint, principals also need to be mentored and held accountable for creating a successful school climate -- something that doesn't seem to happen enough in schools everywhere. It always seems to be assumed that attaining the title of "principal" grants complete knowledge and autonomy to run a successful school building without help from anyone else."

Realizing that an Orwellian future is actually happening now is a sobering thought.

Another great post from Curmudgucation that lays out the dark underbelly of standardization. The one overriding message: It's all about money. Call me a dreamer, but there is more to living a fulfilling life than how much money you have. And kids need to learn more than just how to make it.

Sunday, June 8, 2014

CCSS: Schooling for Wretched People in a Miserable World

The Council of the Great City Schools (yet another group apparently set up to make money by shilling for the Core) has created a marvelous promotional video for the Core. Done in the style of those high-speed marker-drawing videos that the interwebs love, and narrated by a possible-non-caucasian lady narrator, it does a fabulous job of distilling the world view embedded in the Common Core complex.

I'm not going to break it down second by second. Instead, lets look at some of the assumptions built right into the program

Education Is A Single Staircase

The central image of the video is the stairway. The stairway is a single path, always heading upward. It should be exactly the same for everyone-- in fact, every "problem" that the video brings up is visualized as ways in which two separate sets of steps aren't exactly the same. Differences are bad. We feel so strongly about this that we even lie about how the new CCSS staircase is just like the international staircase, because Same is Good.

It's a Dog Eat Dog World

"Like it or not," says the video grimly, the world is all about measuring and competition. We see athletic winners blocks with big piles of money going to the top spot. The world is all about competition. Here is a cartoon American competing with cartoon grads from Shanghai and look-- the Shanghai grads are getting all the money.

So it's clear that not only is life all about competition, but there is only one way of keeping score-- and that's with money.

But, Plateaus

The video highlights one of the oddly self-negating qualities of the Core Complex. Our students need to compete, but we've also got plateaus on the steps where we will gather all the students and make sure they're all on the same step. So it's like a race-- but a race where at the end of every lap, everyone has to sit and wait until all the runners have caught up.

Measures Are For the Fatherland, Not the Child

The video makes it clear that one of our big problems is that the different staircases, different tests and different measures make it hard for the Supervisory Other to see what's going on. I actually appreciate the honesty in this point of view-- it certainly beats the usual line that students and their teachers are somehow too boneheaded to know how the student is doing.

But here it's clear. They don't need to know. It's the bosses, the overlords, the fatherland, the high potentates of business and government-- these are the people who need a good, solid dependable report on how well the education system is doing and what kind of product it's churning out.


This video is worth watching because it captures just how small and meager and bleak is the world envisioned by the reformsters. Our students are to all toil away on exactly the same path, with exactly the same steps, to exactly the same destination, where the only measure of their success or worth in this upward rat race will be how much money they get. And that education, as flat and uninspiring as it is, is not being provided for the benefit of the students, but to benefit the uberclass that runs the schools and the factories and the government, the same uberclass to whom the students and the schools are accountable.

What a miserable joyless de-humanizing version of education. What a sad model of a pointless life for wretched people in a miserable world.

Every discipline has its mythology...even education.

How many of these myths do you subscribe to?

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8 Myths That Undermine Educational Effectiveness

May 29, 2014 | Mark Phillips

Image credit: Thinkstock

Certain widely-shared myths and lies about education are destructive for all of us as educators, and destructive for our educational institutions. This is the subject of 50 Myths & Lies That Threaten America’s Public Schools: The Real Crisis in Education (1), a new book by David Berliner and Gene Glass, two of the country’s most highly respected educational researchers. Although the book deserves to be read in its entirety, I want to focus on eight of the myths that I think are relevant to most teachers, administrators, and parents.

Myth #1: Teachers are the Most Important Influence on a Child’s Education

Of course teachers are extremely important. Good teachers make a significant difference in achievement. But research indicates that less than 30 percent of a student's academic success is attributable to schools and teachers. The most significant variable is socioeconomic status, followed by the neighborhood, the psychological quality of the home environment, and the support of physical health provided. There are others, but the bottom line is that teachers have far less power to improve student achievement than do varied outside factors.

Myth #2: Homework Boosts Achievement

There is no evidence that this is true. In Finland, students have higher achievement with little or no homework and shorter school hours. The more important factor is what students experience during the school day. Project-based learning, as one example, places the emphasis on what is done during the day. If students choose to do more after hours, that's their choice. There also may sometimes be other good reasons to assign homework, but there should be no illusion that homework will help increase student achievement.

Myth #3: Class Size Does Not Matter

In an average high school, one teacher is responsible for 100-150 students on any given day. Students inevitably get lost in the shuffle. Research evidence strongly indicates that a decrease in the number of students has a qualitative pedagogical impact. When reductions occur in elementary classrooms, evidence has shown that the extra individualized attention and instruction appear to make it more likely for these students to graduate at higher rates from high school. Affluent families more frequently opt for districts or for private schools with smaller classes. It should come as no surprise that larger class sizes may disproportionally impact the children of the poor. Therefore, reducing class sizes will in fact result in more learning.

Myth #4: A Successful Program Works Everywhere

There is significant evidence against the idea that a program successful in one school or district should be imported elsewhere and expected to work well. Context is the key variable. Programs must be related to the makeup of the school district and/or the specific school. Approaches to education that are marketed for nationwide use may be excellent yet totally inappropriate for some districts. A program has to fit the specific needs of the schools and classrooms in the district, and a careful needs assessment coupled with a thorough examination should determine whether to adopt a program, not the success of the program elsewhere.

Myth #5: Zero-Tolerance Policies are Making Schools Safer

This strikes me as one of the most colossally wrong-headed and destructive of the myths. Berliner and Glass describe numerous examples of this policy being implemented destructively, including one in which two students were suspended because one shared her inhaler with a friend who was having an asthma attack. Most importantly, there is no evidence that zero tolerance policies decrease school violence. To the contrary, the authors note that "suspensions and expulsions have far-reaching implications for a student's academics and can set them up for failure in their personal lives." Zero tolerance policies have resulted in school officials routing record numbers of students through the juvenile justice system, students who are then more likely to also end up in an adult prison later on. And, not surprisingly, all of the unintended effects associated with zero-tolerance policies in schools are multiplied for non-whites.
The authors also give examples of some schools that are learning from this research. As one example, after the tragic events at Sandy Hook Elementary School, teachers, parents, and administrators are focused on crisis preparedness and the politics of the gun debate, not on stricter policing of students.

Myth #6: Money Doesn’t Matter

It's a popular argument that, while we're spending more money than ever, test scores remain stagnant. This is a destructive myth widely shared by those who oppose better funding of our schools. Yet the research is clear. When school districts with sufficient resources are compared with those without, achievement outcomes are definitively higher in the wealthier districts. The authors note that it makes a significant difference in terms of student achievement when higher salaries are used to attract more experienced and better-educated teachers. Schools that serve the poor are more likely to retain well-paid teachers, despite the challenging circumstances they deal with each day. Since class size does matter, as we’ve seen, adequate funding makes it possible to hire more teachers and reduce class sizes. All of these assertions are strongly supported by research. Additionally, the authors cite Linda Darling-Hammond (2)'s report on new research from Finland, Singapore, and other countries that provides "striking evidence that spending more, and targeting that spending at students who come to school with the fewest resources, can have a dramatic positive impact on a nation's overall educational outcomes."
Of course, it is also possible that the school districts spending more money are located in communities in which socioeconomic factors and neighborhood quality play an important role.

Myth #7: College Admissions are Based on Academic Achievement and Test Scores

Berliner and Glass' findings are disturbing. Many colleges and universities practice admissions by category. One example is athletics. The most significant variable at 30 of the most selective universities was discovered to be legacy (whether a family member previously attended the university). Wealthy parents who contribute development funds further increase the likelihood of admission. This doesn't mean that universities don’t pay attention to student achievement in their admissions process. It does mean that there is preferential treatment in admissions that relegates academic accomplishments to a lower priority.

Myth #8: Merit Pay for Teachers Improves Student Performance

The full argument is that merit pay is a good way to increase teacher performance, because teachers should be evaluated on the basis of student performance, and rewarding or punishing schools for student performance will improve our nation's schools. However, evidence suggests that competition between teachers is counterproductive and interferes with collaboration. Measuring teacher effectiveness is very difficult, and no simple measures effectively do this. There is no evidence that merit pay correlates with improved student achievement, but there is strong evidence that basing teacher salaries on student performance is counterproductive and ethically wrong -- it frequently punishes teachers and schools for socioeconomic factors over which they have no control.
Every educator, especially administrators and policymakers, should read 50 Myths & Lies. Based on hard research evidence, this book makes it very clear that we need to do a better job of differentiating myth from reality when we make our educational decisions. All too often, decisions are based on myths and what are essentially lies, not on research evidence.

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