Mr. Owens

An article in the New York Times refers to discussions under way regarding evaluating teachers by test scores, predicting test scores of teachers, comparing teachers of similar experience levels, and maybe even a little more.

Not really sure how this is going to do much more than stress out teachers who are already overworked and make the job even more unpleasant and unfeasible for those could actually do it well.

Perhaps they should try and put these resources into training and supporting teachers, students, and families, and improving the quality of the assessments.

NY Times, “Measuring Teachers by Test Scores“

NY Times January 4th, 2008, excerpt from
School Commentations Come with a Critique

It was supposed to be a day to celebrate the city’s best schools. The schools chancellor, Joel I. Klein, trekked to Public School 46 in Bayside, Queens, to announce that the schools that had received the highest marks on the city’s new school report card were to receive a windfall of extra money.

But when he invited Assemblyman Mark Weprin to the microphone, Mr. Weprin, a Queens Democrat, seized nearly five minutes of the news conference to lambaste the grading system and the Bloomberg administration’s focus on standardized testing to measure achievement.

“Our schools have turned — I know the chancellor is standing here, but — to Stanley Kaplan courses in a lot of ways,” Mr. Weprin said, referring to a large test preparation company.

Lacing his comments with apologies for being “impolite,” Mr. Weprin said, “Too much focus is trying to get the right answers on tests and not enough focus on, in my opinion, on learning. And a good teacher doesn’t just teach how to get the right answers, a good teacher inspires, and a lot of that is being lost in our schools.”

Mr. Klein looked down with a bit of grimace, particularly as parents and teachers who were gathered in the back of the room burst into applause.

“Well, as you can imagine,” Mr. Klein said when he returned to the microphone, “I don’t believe that is an accurate view of what is going on.” He added, “I think learning knowledge is a key part, coupled with challenging our children to think, to be creative and to be imaginative.”

Then, with his voice rising, he added: “And yes, to test them on it, so that you know what they know and what they don’t know. If we don’t do that, we aren’t educating our kids.”

Standardized testing is hardly an exact science or perfect measure as there is much much debate even with articulated state standards about what is to be taught, how it is taught, how it should be measured/demonstrated, and the role of education in the life of a child and society. This whole keeping America competitive in the global economy, while perhaps somewhat of a reality, isn’t really the best foundation.

Inherent in all the standardized testing seems to be an assumption that teachers and administrators are unable to make decisions like these ourselves … which probably comes from lots of social promotion … which comes from school systems being overwhelmed by needs that students bring to the classroom. If social promotion ended tomorrow many school systems would come to a grinding halt overnight.

Sometimes it feels like standardized testing is the cousin of the prison industrial complex. Lots of people making money while not actually accomplishing the proposed goals of benefiting the individual and society.

A topic which has come up a lot recently is effort. A recent post I read summarizing part of Martin Haberman’s “Star Teachers of Children in Poverty” said that Haberman’s Stars focus on student effort over student grades (if I understood correctly). One of the situations referenced would be that of students who arrive woefully unprepared for your class and hopelessly out of range for attaining skill mastery. That would account for about 20% of my students this year. Grading them on mastery is doomed to failure as it is highly unlikely that they will make up four years of material in their one year with you. Still, is there some bottom line for skill mastery? Get a “2″ on the state exam and make it clear to me that you did your best, however we are able to measure that, and on you go?  I am not very pleased with my current grading system, but have yet to come up with a better one.

The second article, “How Not to Talk to Your Kids“, references research by Carol Dweck on the effect of praising children for being “intelligent” vs “working hard.” Apparently praising children for being “smart” can mess them up a little bit because it causes them to develop this image which they try to maintain, which can cause them to be confused or scared when things don’t come easily and even cheat to maintain the successful image. Although as I am writing I suppose the conclusions sounds sort of like an extension to praising, or admonishing, specific behavior instead of the child.

More from Haberman published in Education Leadership:

Characteristics of “Star Teachers”

• persistent
• physical and emotional stamina
• caring relationships with students
• commitment to acknowledging and appreciating student effort
• willing to admit mistakes
• commitment to inclusion
• good organizational skills

“Star Teacher” Ideology

• Stars tend to be nonjudgmental. As they interact with students and adults in school settings, star teachers try to understand the motivation behind a given behavior rather than judge the behavior.
• Stars are not moralistic. Star teachers know that preaching and lecturing do not equate to teaching and that those approaches neither influence behavior nor increase students’ desire to learn.
• Stars respond as professionals and are not easily shocked. Horrific events occur in urban schools with some regularity. Star teachers ask themselves, “What can I do about this?” If they can help, they take action. If not, they get on with their work and their lives. They respond to emotionally charged situations as thoughtful professionals.
• Stars hear what students and adults say to them. Star teachers listen and understand. They have exceedingly sensitive communication skills. They regard everyone in the school community as a potential source of useful information.
• Stars recognize and compensate for their weaknesses. Star teachers are aware of their weaknesses in terms of a lack of knowledge or skills or in terms of their own biases and prejudices. They strive to overcome them.
• Stars do not see themselves as saviors. Star teachers have not come to rescue the system. Actually, they do not expect much from the system—except for the likelihood that it may worsen. They focus on making their students successful in spite of the system.
• Stars do not work in isolation. Star teachers know that burnout can affect everyone. They network and create their own support groups.
• Stars view themselves as successful professionals rescuing students. Star teachers see themselves as “winning” even though they know that their total influence on their students is likely to be less than that of the society, neighborhood, or even gang. They take pride in turning students on to learning and making them educationally successful in the midst of failed urban school systems.
• Stars derive energy and well-being from their interactions with students. Star teachers so enjoy being with students that they are even willing to put up with the irrational demands of the system. Rather than always feeling exhausted, they often feel vitalized and energized from a day at work.
• Stars see themselves as teachers of children as well as of content. Star teachers want to encourage their students to become better people, not just higher achievers.
• Stars are learners. Star teachers are models of learning for students because they are vitally interested in some subject matter or avocation that keeps them continually learning.
• Stars have no need for power. Star teachers derive their satisfaction from effectively teaching diverse low-income students.
• Stars recognize the imperative of student success. Star teachers see the need for diverse low-income students to succeed in school as a matter of life and death for the students and for the survival of society.

This was recently on the math-learn list (you can go there to see the author’s name as I’m not sure if proper netiquette would have me include or exclude his name):

When students have a misconception, it can be deeply rooted, so that telling them or grading them has no effect. Remember that once brain connections are established they do not go away or unconnect. So it is not a matter of just refusal, but rather often a misconception.

The students have to buy into the ideas by discussing it. Written answers explaining why and how you do things can also be useful. If you can get them to explore concrete situations where adding negative numbers is involved, they can in a sense be hit in the face with the fact that their answer does not predict the actual outcome. Experiencing a physical situation involving the math is a much more powerful stimulus than just being graded with a red pencil.

But when doing physical examples, the students must always predict the answer before it is revealed by the experiment or demonstration. Otherwise they can not be faced with the fact that their thought process is not in line with reality.

Getting students to use a method is really a matter of convincing them that it works better than an alternative. So they have to be put into situations repeatedly where the wrong result is predicted by the method they are currently using. But again, grading is usually a poor reward for motivation. It is more effective if it is instantaneous, and extremely ineffective when delayed. When students get their papers back the next day they do not reflect on that they were thinking about to get the wrong answer, but rather on what is the right answer. The result is that the wrong method often lies dormant and is not affected by the grade.

One technique that has been shown to be effective is having students vote on answers, and then if enough get it right discuss the problem and convince each other. Notice that it provides immediate feedback.

I don’t really know much about the author except that most of his posts make a lot of sense to me and he seems to really like the work of Shayer & Adey, Feuerstein, and Lawson. From what I gather some of their research is about teaching students how to think and/or reflect on their own teaching.

I know for myself that this one of the my biggest struggles. Trying to setup class in such a way that student errors are caught early, the student has a chance to figure out how/why they made a mistake, someone leads the student to the correct answer (directly or indirectly), and then the student has the chance to practice and have their work monitored over an extended period of time.  Meaning the next couple days or weeks.

If anyone has the answer as to how to do this with easily distracted middle school students … (actually maybe a set of clickers from Holt, Rhinehart, Winston or some similar technology that provides instant feedback and then break the students up into groups!!)