The second storyline, from Downton Abbey, is about a kitchen maid who has an opportunity to run a small farm. She's worried that she doesn't have the book-keeping skills she would need, so she sends away for workbooks to learn basic arithmetic. Then she's frustrated because she can't make sense of the workbooks. The cook hires a teacher to teach the kitchen maid arithmetic, and the kitchen maid is thrilled to finally understand it.
In both these stories, an adult needs to learn a particular skill, and the characters trust a teacher to impart that skill.
For me, this is what teaching should look like, especially when it comes to basic skills like reading and arithmetic. We know what the desired outcome is and we should find the most solid, expedient and painless way to get there.
Needless to say, this is not what goes on in American schools. In American schools, various interests make money by taking what used to be a simple goal (e.g., get the kids reading) and mucking it up with a lot of high-falutin' nonsense ("teach deep comprehension!") The resulting shambles has no reliable effect besides making kids hate the subject.
If doctors take as their maxim "First, do no harm", I think teachers should take as their maxim, "First, don't cause the student to hate the subject." As I said somewhere on this blog, what's the point of teaching a child to correctly analyze a novel if they never willingly pick up a book again?
Through Chris' blog, I've learned about "close reading", which is apparently being promoted by the Common Core. Here's a horrifying example, where a kindergarten teacher beats "The Hungry Caterpillar" to death:
Boys and girls, can you say "developmentally inappropriate"?
Overachiever's footnote: the teacher says, incorrectly, that "chrysalis" is a synonym for "cocoon". A cocoon is the structure a caterpillar builds around itself; a chrysalis is the pupa of a butterfly or moth.
In both of your fictional examples, the student wanted to learn the subject. I think most of the "high-falutin' nonsense" (and I totally agree with the characterization) results from the compulsory nature of K-12 education. When someone really wants to learn something, teaching is relatively easy. When you have to make someone learn something -- someone who may have no interest whatsoever in the subject, at least at that particular moment -- it's much harder.
ReplyDeleteMaybe K-12 education will always be compulsory, but it's another thing for it to completely give up on cultivating intrinsic motivation, as it seems to be doing. It can, for example, give the student a greater role in choosing what to study or what to read, and can be more open to working at the student's own pace rather than squeezing everyone into cookie-cutter "standards." With reading instruction, it would certainly make sense to ensure that the inherently enjoyable aspects of reading are always front and center, so teachers won't win the battle (i.e., squeeze a few more standardized testing points out of the students) while losing the war (making kids loathe reading).
A "first, do no harm" approach would be a great foundation for K-12 education, but it would require education policy-makers to give up their dream that they can accomplish their goals simply by fiat, rather than by grappling with the students as actual people with ideas and desires of their own.
Children are born wanting to learn. When it comes to basic skills like reading and arithmetic, in my experience kids are already motivated. Both of my (very different) daughters were eager to learn these skills. It takes truly appalling teaching to wreck that motivation, although it can be done.
ReplyDeleteA "first, do no harm" approach would be a great foundation for K-12 education, but it would require education policy-makers to give up their dream that they can accomplish their goals simply by fiat, rather than by grappling with the students as actual people with ideas and desires of their own.
ReplyDeleteBingo.
Who develops these programs that teachers are then expected to use? Is that known? Some suit who has never spent a day teaching I'm guessing . Just these names ( deep comprehension, Core ) are horrifying. Is Whole Brain still going strong? ( That name makes me think of a brain in a jar)
As I often say, most of our intuitions are a shambles right now and for the same reason...no one is home. The system, whether public or private ,does not want to have to deal with individuals , or their ideas or desires.
It's across the board, school being one of the more glaring places
PS
ReplyDeleteI believe Common Core's point and why it's mandatory, is to create a better cannon fodder...that's not a joke