A Study of Lesson Study, or, One More Thing We Aren't Doing to Support Teachers

They are doing this program on WBEZ by American Radio Works, Teaching Teachers, about teacher prep programs and teacher practices in the US versus other places. These kinds of things are difficult for me to listen to, because of both the state of things now and the old, rusty feelings from when I was teaching (and when I quit). But the radio just stayed on through the program, so here I am accidentally listening to it and accidentally writing about it.

And it is indeed hard to listen to. Just now, a former math teacher just articulated exactly the pattern of events that led to me quitting all those years ago: 1) He'd identify an issue in his teaching he wanted to solve; 2) He'd go to a training or professional development on it and get great ideas; 3) He'd come back and implement it in his classroom, but he or the kids would have questions he didn't have answers for; 4) At the end of the day he'd sit down at his desk under a towering pile of student work needing review, discouraged because lessons didn't go well, and with no one to talk through his ideas and efforts, no way to see anyone demo new ideas, no way to practice methods, and no time to process anything except--on his own time--that paperwork. He felt alone, exhausted, and without any way to learn and get better, so he quit.

In the US, teachers are expected to "just figure it out," "just make it work." That's not the practice anywhere in the world with an effective education system; and even more challenging, even the most individual, solo learners do not have any time to learn and grow. Many countries have "lesson study" (Japanese method) or similar practices, where teachers in schools have plenty of time to get together and work on a specific teaching problem by sharing ideas--and that puts the focus on better teaching through practice and professional collaboration, not "better teachers." This is a mid-century American method that many countries adopted from the US but that is pretty absent in the US now. This is among the various topics the program addressed.

There are Lesson Study groups anew in the US, thanks in part to Tom McDougal, the guy whose story I summarized above--here's his organization. In the US it's mostly in math classes but in some others, too--there's one in Chicago for learning how to teaching using the Common Core framework. But teachers in the US mostly need to find a way to do it on their own time, if they are interested.

A couple things to think about from _Catalyst Chicago_

Catalyst Chicago had some food for thought recently--as it often does. 

Waukegan teachers and district are at an impasse in regards to pay and benefits, and have been for almost a month. (Update: They have reached an agreement and the hope is that school will start on Monday.)

Teachers need better pay and resources and to be treated like adults; legislators' policies and local/state funding priorities persist in not acknowledging this. It's maddening that we have not adjusted as a culture to a healthier education ecosystem.

However, kids have been out of school almost a month. The strike has been a big strain on libraries and other already strapped community resources, and on working parents. And think about the consequences for students, not only for learning, but in many cases for nutrition and safety.

Catalyst quoted an area principal that pretty much sums up not only the current consequences of the strike but the whole tragic frustrating mess of a dysfunctional education-policy/funding system. “It doesn’t matter whose side you’re on, it’s really obvious who’s getting hurt.” 

The other story that caught my eye goes in the Who Could Have Expected Anything Different file. Catalyst reports that enrollment in teacher-prep programs has declined. Poor working conditions, policies based on mistrust and micromanagement, unearned blame, low pay, little support, never-ending conflict...well, of course many young people don't wish to enter the profession. 

And also this: one person opted out of teaching because, while still in his teacher-prep program, he felt (quoting Catalyst here) “in the middle of an ideological war that surfaced in everything from state-level education policy on down to his course textbook, which had a distinct anti-standardized-testing bent.”

This really hit me, because...ugh. Because war, even ideological war, claims many unintended innocents.

Let's hope we emerge from this time of ideological conflict with a better, stronger, set of solutions for K-12 education.

HEAR Chicago Talk heard and talked about; or, A Mad Attempt to Transform a Moth Into a Caterpillar

HEAR Chicago Talk 1.1 went off, pretty much without a hitch.

Here's the room where we had it.

Photo courtesy of Schubas

We had four presentations, starting and ending with questions. Mine was about the possibility of experiential learning in the local outdoors.


Yoli Maya Yeh, who teaches yoga in CPS schools, spoke about reducing violence among Chicago youth through yoga, meditation, and peace activities.

Kids gain valuable character, skills, and techniques from Peace Within YOUth

Ari Frede, founder of arts charter the Orange School, spoke about pedagogical underpinnings and everyday examples of giving children authentic choices in the classroom.
 

Christine Krumsee reminded us that the importance of reaching people through meaningful activities does not stop at age 18. She spoke about her work with Helping Hospitalized Veterans, an organization that brings crafts kits to veterans as a sort of informal art therapy. 

Photo from VA Maryland Health Care System

After each presentation, the audience had one minute to ask questions. As we got into the third and fourth presentations, audience questions started focusing more on connections among them, especially Yoli's and Christine's. That was unexpected and perfect.

The one-minute-question part is just questions, no answers. That way, questioners feel freer to ask wide, deep, or speculative questions--ones that can't be answered right away, but can be thought about--and presenters get more to chew on without the pressure of having all the answers. After the structured part of the evening was through, folks had plenty of time and opportunity to find each other and discuss the questions if they wished.

Following Christine's presentation was a brief open mic portion where audience members could chew for one minute on their own edu-questions; and then, people settled in for drinks and chats.

So--I think it worked! People ate and drank. Technical equipment operated. The presentations provoked thought and interest. People introduced themselves to others and traded contact information. I hope that with regular installments, HEAR Chicago Talk becomes a go-to place for educators and other communicators to reflect on their practices, articulate their goals, and trade and test ideas with others. The next one is September 18, y'all! Mark your calendars and contact me here or here if you're interested in presenting.

A reporter from Medill (Northwestern University) was there and wrote this cool little article (which content makes it clear to me that I must immediately work on articulate and pithy pitches about the format, the goal, and the reason for the not-Q-&-A part. Dear god).

True to the format of the evening I'm going to end with a question (well, several). Ironically, or something, really nothing presented was new by a longshot--rather the opposite. Learning through experience in the outdoors dates to the dawn of humans; yoga has been around for thousands of years; Dewey's work on student choice was done at the turn of the last century (as was Maria Montessori's); and Helping Hospitalized Vets was founded in 1971. What's happening here? Is the "innovation" actually the stuff that's not working: forcing kids to sit in seats all day, thoroughly separating out subjects, testing to the point that teaching and learning are punishing instead of transcendent activities?

Hey--what IS innovation when it comes to a timeless practice integral to every human society, anyway? And is wanting to transform it to be authentic, relevant, enjoyable, and equitable as naive as wanting to transform a moth back into a caterpillar?

On PBS's article, "The Battle Over Education Reform"

This past Tuesday, PBS's Azmat Khan wrote about K–12 education reform as part of the Frontline series, The Education of Michelle Rhee. I have not yet watched the series, so perhaps some of the things I talk about below are addressed there. But the article, anyway, at once summarizes the divisions in ed reform and illuminates why this frustrating debate is going nowhere.

One of the most contentious movements in ed reform now is the charter school movement. Charter schools started as grass-roots, small-scale alternatives in communities important to the individual founders. This was its state when I taught in San Francisco at the turn of the millennium. Nowadays, many charter schools are run by large networks with a central office resembling something between a business and a school district. These networks are often backed by wealthy foundations and, with some notable exceptions, the teachers are not unionized.

And therein lies the hullabaloo. Where some see innovation and opportunity, others see privatization and carpetbaggery. In the public discourse, at least, there are pro-charter reformy types and anti-charter teacherly types, and never the twain shall meet. Of course, there is a multitude of nuanced opinions one may have, but those are not given much breathing space.

So back to the article. Khan describes charter schools' structure, their financing, and their promise as well as their pitfalls, and then summarizes the carrying on in the edusphere about whether charters yield better results than traditional public schools.  Pro-charter folks say the data favors charters;  anti-charter folks say the (same) data doesn't. This horse-race calling is never ending. It's  also an empty proxy for philosophical differences and territorial disputes. Isn't this data based on test results? Test results are a tiny component of what makes a high-functioning school. Educators all know this, whether they are charter school supporters or detractors (though charter school funders and policy-makers don't seem able or willing to understand this, and that unfortunate ignorance has railroaded  education policy for the past twelve years). What about student safety? What about teacher safety, for that matter? What about study and work conditions? What about facilities condition and management? What about orderliness, clarity of function and purpose, a caring tone combined with an expectation of excellence? Children's needs, and schools' success along a multitude of vectors, are poorly represented through test scores, to say the least. Test scores being equal, one school might still be vastly preferable to another.

It seems to me two things have to happen: first, policy-makers, legislators, and the wealthy people and institutions who invest in schools these days need to develop a better understanding of the uses, and especially the limitations, of testing; and secondly, as the article mentions, folks on all sides need to get serious about culling the stuff that works at charter schools and applying it to the traditional public school system without either side starting a spitting contest. Until then, charter-lovers will use incomplete, interpretable data points to make the claims that benefit the beliefs they already have, and charter-haters will do exactly the same, with the same data, and nothing will change.

Next up: teacher reforms. The article outlines the discussions around teacher tenure and tools for evaluating teacher quality. I'm not going to get into how flawed evaluating teachers on children's test scores is--that's been discussed enough elsewhere, and the Khan article doesn't dwell on it either. It spends more time talking about attempts to improve teacher training programs, which I'm glad to see, but there's another big piece here that is missing and that just doesn't come up much in the discourse.  There is little acknowledgement that the last century's working conditions are not conducive to this century's expectations, and that last century's attitudes about teachers and teaching are disrespectful and out-of-touch in the lens of this century. Yes, let's ensure smart people well-suited to teaching enter the profession--but let's also be honest about the disconnect between what America expects of its teachers and what America thinks of them and provides for them.

Those are the two most controversial items, and the ones for which the debate simply must be reframed lest we hurt ourselves with all the gnashing of teeth and cracking of knuckles and hitting of heads against walls. The article also touches on character education programs and the search for the best way to instill values such as curiosity, self-control, and grit (note to funders and pols: not testing!), and on the strategy of improving schooling through deep investment in whole communities, such as with the Harlem Children's Zone.

Khan notes that some question whether investment in a community's health, nutrition, and safety is "the practical way forward." I was dumbfounded by this--what could the argument against healthy kids growing into adulthood in an environment relatively free of violence, uncertainty, and fear possibly be?--so I looked at the Brookings Institute report Khan cites and...I'm still processing it. I guess that is a blog for another time.

Three Takes on Branding

There's been a lot of talk lately related to issues of branding and marketing K–12 education, though the term is used differently in different contexts and readers or listeners are expected to take away entirely different messages.

At a recent City Club of Chicago lunch (and elsewhere) Karen Lewis decried the ed reform policies  championed by Arne Duncan and Rahm Emanuel and supported by large funders such as the Gates Foundation as empty marketing schemes that hide the truth, hinder effective and fair solutions, and cede control to privateers. (Here's a summary, though its tone implies a great deal less warmth of reception than I witnessed, and here's some paraphrasing along with a clip to the video of her speech.  I also live-tweeted the speech here.)

Meanwhile, some folks writing for Co.Exist (I can't figure out the writers' relationship to the site; they're not listed as contributors or editors) argue that K–12 education would actually benefit from some re-branding. Their argument is that education should be far, far higher on the American public's list of Interesting and Urgent Things To Engage With. "If we could devise a provocative and ongoing message--" they say-- "a relevant pitch that appeals to people's immediate lives and illuminates the possibilities rather than the problems in education--we could unify businesses, teachers, communities, and political leaders around a single goal."

And I recently heard a piece on Marketplace about the dramatic difference a Cincinatti school's renovation has made in student engagement. Certainly, much of that is related to physical comfort, access to conditions needed to focus, and resources such as new science-lab equipment. But there is also an enormous psychological element. Says a Kansas State prof in the story, "A poor building imparts a poor attitude, and it has an effect on learning;" a school building with well-lighted hallways,  clean floors, upgraded plumbing, and temperature control is a place "where children feel valued, where teachers feel valued, and where the environment and the surroundings don't get in the way." That's a pretty important sort of branding.

By the way, Marketplace has done several heart-warming pieces on this particular school's  smart, caring, and systematic approach to revitalizing itself and its community, which you can access here. I am very curious about the renovation's funding sources. There are so many school buildings in terrible physical shape! I emailed Marketplace with the question but have not heard back.