My concern is that a high stakes exam that focuses only on biology narrows the curriculum to the detriment of chemistry, physics, and earth science. The problem?
Change in the Fast Lane
Based on recent posts we have all been involved in a great deal of professional development over the summer. All much needed in light of the myriad changes coming down the pike between Common Core Standards,New Teacher Evaluation, and in some cases, like my building, piloting Standards Based Grading and Reporting. I am excited about each of these new "initiatives" (for lack of a better catch-all word). Each holds tremendous potential improving the depth and outcome of student learning, actionable professional growth and development for teachers, and clear communication with families about student learning and achievement. I am also terrified. Taking on all three in a single year feels like drinking from a fire hose. Each one asks us to reconsider and re-evaluate what we do each day in classrooms: how we impart skill and content knowledge to students, how we communicate their journey to mastery, how we assess our own performance. Not terribly unlike going through National Boards. Yet it seems so much more rides on how we adapt to implement these changes. Not just becuase it is an election year, but because we are reaching the tipping point were the industrial revolution model of educating people is no longer serving us. It is time to change.
Building Trust
These last few days I've been immersed in a professional experience that has shifted my direction as a teacher: how to use video as a means for facilitating my own and my colleagues' professional growth.
To use video observation successfully, one key is to look objectively at a video of classroom practice and identify critical teacher actions and student actions that are observable–and to note or record these observable actions without evaluation or judgment. Instead of watching teachers and thinking "I like how they did that" or "that is not a good assignment," my attention shifted to noticing the actions without judgment: "The teacher waited while the student revised his own incorrect verbal answer" or "The student recorded her thoughts on a continuum to self-assess."
Judgment is not forbidden, it just isn't first. By identifying the "observables"–the objective concrete details of teaching and learning–I can build a better foundation for evaluating what I can use to improve my own practice and what specific actions can do this. This all got me thinking.
Maren Johnson
I teach biology and chemistry at a high school on the Olympic Peninsula. After school, I like to run. My main trail? Straight from my classroom to a place called Big Rock several times a week. The running is a buffer between my time in school and my time at home with my kids. I also use this time, and this place in the woods, to think, and I write some of those thoughts here on this blog. I’m a lifelong Washingtonian and I am committed to improving education in this state. Follow on Twitter: @maren_johnson.
A few of my posts:
- 1080 Instructional Hours? New state mandates on instructional hours and collaboration time.
- Speed Dating and Student Work: Teacher Collaboration Time and a Senate Bill. How might proposed changes to instructional time affect teachers working together?
- Student Growth Percentiles and Teacher Evaluation: More Questions than Answers What are Student Growth Percentiles? How do they relate to teacher
evaluation and state test scores? - Ambitious Teaching = Rigor + Equity Equity and access in the Next Generation Science Standards.
- Washington State Teacher Evaluation: At High Risk? Taking a look at the US Department of Education’s high risk warning letter regarding teacher evaluation.
- Just a Tweak? Educator Effectiveness and the Evergreen Effect A D.C. think tank policy analyst issued a critical report on Washington state teacher evaluation, “The Evergreen Effect.” Here’s my response. Is our new evaluation system really just a tweak?
- Let’s Hijack that Spaceship: The Next Generation Science Standards So what about these new science standards? What will implementation look like in our state?
- Teacher Talk: West Africa and New England Thinking about schools in West Africa, New England, and even here in at home: Why those of us in public schools need to advocate for school funding and education!
- Accountability at What Cost? The Biology End-of-Course Exam What are the implications of a high stakes biology end of course exam in Washington state? What are some possible solutions?
- Looking Back, Looking Forward: Legislative Advocacy for National Board Certification! National Board Advocacy in a legislative district.
- The ‘People’s Plan’ for Washington Education Looking at the Excellent Schools Now coalition “People’s Plan” for education in Washington state. This coalition’s plan has been revised and is now called “A+ Washington.”
Reality Check
What do you say when someone tells you they want to be a teacher?
You’ve probably had this conversation: some starry-eyed young college graduate starts to tell you about how he’s going to become a teacher so he can inspire his students and help the parents and do all these great projects and…
I remember when I was that young teacher how deflating it was to hear veteran teachers grumble about how things have changed and all the joy has been taken out of teaching. As a novice teacher, I vowed to never get all bitter and grumbly.
And now?
Who Are The Real Reformers?
By Tom
Last winter, Nick Hanauer famously called Washington State “an education reform backwater.” It’s a curious insult. Strictly speaking, a backwater is a stretch of river that moves slowly, due to a dam or other obstruction. It’s water that’s “backed up.” Washington’s geography, of course, is dominated by the Columbia River, which winds its way slowly from the Canadian border to the Pacific, through 11 hydroelectric dams, which render it, for all intents and purposes, a 745-mile “backwater,” a label that belies the fact that it provides power and irrigation for most of the northwest.
But that’s not what Hanauer had in mind with his insult. He was complaining that education reform tends to move slowly here in Washington State, due mostly to the obstruction of the Washington Education Association. If only he could have seen what I saw this summer.
Realigning to Common Core
By Mark
This summer, I've been participating in a book study about challenges in implementing Common Core State Standards in English Language Arts. In that spirit, I sat down today to look at my scope and sequence for the classes I teach (Freshman English Lit and Comp). All along I've been saying to myself and others that this whole Common Core Standards shifting is no big deal: we're already doing that work, it's just a matter of identifying in those standards all the things we already do–we won't really have to do much that is "new."
As it turns out, this whole process really made me rethink what I teach and how I teach. I found that there were many standards which were addressed, reinforced, and assessed in basically every single unit of the sequence. I also found a few standards which never appeared more than once, buried as a footnote in some broader unit. More concerning: some of the projects and assessments that I and my students enjoy the most were supported by only tenuous connections (at best) to the standards.
This coming school year, I anticipate that many of my posts will reflect my process with the Common Core. Interestingly, when I try to characterize my feelings, the first word that pops into my head (however irrational this may be) is the word mourning. Some of those projects that kids seem to connect with so well lack strong connection to Common Core, even if they are the tasks that former students still recall to me ten years later. No matter how much I, or they, love the experience, these are the things I really need to examine and honestly assess whether they belong in my classroom under my new expectations.
As I try to help other teachers make this transition to the new standards, I need to remember that word that popped into my head. As I encounter resistance, I need to remember that isn't just about being "opposed to change." I need to remember that the first reaction when you are told to do something new might not actually be a reaction to that which is new, but rather a quick and confusing pang of loss for something deeply enjoyed that no longer seems to fit.
Teaching And Dentistry
By Tom
Last summer I was part of a panel discussion with several other teachers. As it was winding down, the moderator asked us one final question. “What would you say is the most important factor impacting student learning?” Each panelist said something about class size, funding, standards, blah, blah, blah.
I got to go last. “The most important factor, as far as I’m concerned,” I said, “Is the extent to which we as teachers are able to work effectively with our students’ families.”
I still think that’s true.
Standards Based Grading
By Kristin
My school, a middle school, has been implementing standards-based grading. It's a big deal for us, but elementary schools have been doing this for years. That means that when parents see an A on the report card, they can assume their child has met and is exceeding grade-level standards in that content area, even if he was the most disruptive child in the class and one who rarely did homework. The standards we're using are the Common Core standards, and we've moved to consistency within grade level content areas.
This transition means we've had to move away from things like marking down for late work, averaging a quiz's grade with a retake, or offering extra credit.
There has been much respectful compromising.
“Higher” Standards Are Not The Answer
By Mark
It is wonderful when businesses offer ways to support effective teaching. People can speculate about the advancement of agendas, but anything that can offer opportunities to help teachers hone their craft and thus increase student achievment is a good thing.
I'm sure you've seen these commercials from Exxon Mobil about supporting science and math education:
Let's solve this: I like that. However, one piece of rhetoric is more troubling: "Let's raise academic standards across the nation" (00:15).