There have been a variety of proposals for the next ‘man on the moon’ project since JFK first inspired us. This includes going to Mars, infrastructure revitalization, and more. And I’m sympathetic to them. I’d like us to commit to manufacturing and installing solar panels over all parking lots, both to stimulate jobs and the economy, and transform our energy infrastructure, for instance. However, with my focus on learning and technology, there’s another ‘man on the moon’ project I’d like to see.
I’d like to see an entire K12 curriculum online (in English, but open, so that anyone can translate it). However, there are nuances here. I’m not oblivious to the fact that there are folks pushing in this direction. I don’t know them all, but I certainly have some reservations. So let me document three important criteria that I think are critical to make this work (queue my claim “only two things wrong with education in this country, the curriculum and the pedagogy, other than that it’s fine”).
First, as presaged, it can’t be the existing curriculum. Common Core isn’t evil, but it’s still focused on a set of elements that are out of touch. As an example, I’ll channel Roger Schank on the quadratic equation: everyone’s learned (and forgotten) it, almost no one actually uses it. Why? Making every kid learn it is just silly. Our curriculum is a holdover from what was stipulated at the founding of this country. Let’s get a curriculum that’s looking forward, not back. Let’s include the ability to balance a bankbook, to project manage, to critically evaluate claims, to communicate visually, and the like.
Second, as suggested, it can’t be the existing pedagogy. Lecture and test don’t lead to retaining and transferring the ability to do. Instead, learning science tells us that we need to be given challenging problems, and resources and guidance to solve them. Quite simply, we need to practice as we want to be able to perform. Instruction is designed action and guided reflection. Ideally, we’d layer on learning on top of learner interests. Which leads to the third component.
We need to develop teachers who can facilitate learning in this new pedagogy. We can’t assume teachers can do this. There are many dedicated teachers, but the system is aligned against effective outcomes. (Just look at the lack of success of educational reform initiatives.) David Preston, with his Open Source Learning has a wonderful idea, but it takes a different sort of teacher. We also can’t assume learners sitting at computers. So, having a teacher support component along with every element is important.
Are there initiatives that are working on all this? I have yet to see any one that’s gotten it all right. The ones I’ve seen lack on one or another element. I’m happy to be wrong!
I also recognize that agreeing on all the elements, each of which is controversial, is problematic. (What’s the right curricula? Direct instruction or constructivist? How do we value teachers in society?) We’d have major challenges in assembling folks to address any of these, let alone all and achieving convergence.
However, think of the upside. What could we accomplish if we had an effective education system preparing youth for the success of our future? What is the best investment in our future? I realize it’s a big dream; and I’m not in a position to make it happen. Yet I did want to drop the spark, and see if it fire any imaginations. I’m happy to help. So, this is my ‘man on the moon’ project; what am I missing?
This is magnificent. You may want to look at providers like Saxxon Learn, Time4Learning, and Florida Virtual. These do have established programs (some better than others) at these grade levels to do some research into what works, what doesn’t, etc…
We did homeschool our kids for a few years (First through 7 grade curriculum was covered between both kids) and they have returned to public school and continue to be very good students. For us, Time and FL Virtual worked well. Saxxon worked well for kid 1 but not kid 2.
Most of these are primarily existing pedagogy. Also, your comments on Common Core are accurate. Did I find value in my kids (and me and my wife) learning “new math”? Certainly. It likely works well for some, and it does break down the concepts behind the numbers (which I could intuit, but when learning multiplication as a kid, it was brute memorization- nothing else). I was glad my kids learned it, but we all saw places where it was objectively stupid to be forced to use new math when the learner could apply the standard math more readily to get to same answer (and isn’t that what personalized learning is about? One destination, but many potential roads to get there).
This sounds like a great and worthwhile cause- especially seeing how the world was unexpectedly moved to online curriculum without deep resources to deliver this education (my kids could take classes online through their school or FLVS- and it was easy to see where the more experienced FLVS instructors delivered better online learning experiences on average… that is not a slight on the classroom teachers who were shoved into an impossible scenario).
Great moonshot, Clark. Eager to see what you accomplish.
I largely agree that this is a good idea, and is something that I too have dreamed about. In other ways, there are assumptions made that are not necessarily accurate. For example, while I’m not going to say that “lecture and test” is dead in the K-12 environment, it is by no means the primary method of instruction and there are plenty of teachers who don’t use it at all.
In general, as someone who has straddled the K-12 and corporate L&D line, I have seen a lot of misunderstanding of each side from the other. I heard a presenter once who described some valid techniques for in-person training, all the while decrying how we teach people in school, but these techniques were essentially grown-up versions of things I read about in educator Harry Wong’s excellent book “The First Days of School.”
Otherwise, figuring out how to defeat the education lobby is difficult. The companies that make the annual achievement tests have a vested financial interest in maintaining the status quo. They make the tests, they make the prep materials, and the like. They work hard to keep this up. It’s not as much money as other lobbies, but that’s actually ok for them – because that power is mostly with the states now, and state-level elections are smaller dollar in comparison to national campaigns.
All of that said, I do think there needs to be a sea change in how we as a society teach people of all ages. A great start would be removing politics from the equation. I think that education must be free and public, but initiatives that live and die as parties change governorship or legislative majority are the reforms that fail and waste money. I also question the position of school boards, who have a great deal of power in terms of how their districts are run but have no requirement for educational expertise.
It’s a big task. At least one key step is moving the infrastructure out of political side of government. Setting education policy needs to be a wholly apolitical and independent process, sort of like the FDA.
David, thanks for the feedback. Dave, agree largely, but when it comes to ‘lecture and test’, I’ve seen too often (including in my own kids’ schooling) that the end-of-year tests of knowledge lead to teachers scrambling to teach to the test. Which wouldn’t be a problem if the ‘tests’ were assessment of meaningful skills. I do see plenty of other things, but not all are good. For instance, most of the assignments creating ‘posters’ is pretty much to make the room pretty for open house, and has little learning benefit.
I agree, those tests are useless and no teacher wants to teach to them. But the problem is that they’re used punitively. If the school doesn’t meet certain metrics, funding gets cut. It’s a systemic issue, not a classroom issue.
Great idea! Even doing this discipline by discipline would be a worthwhile effort – like mapping the various schema required to do advanced math and then layering the concepts into a “recommended†flow?
I could not agree more with Mr. Quinn’s and everyone’s commentary and “suggestions.”
So here is my take, in case anyone cares:
At the core of teaching-to-the-test are two elements: (1) Scaled assessment for a large body of students; (2) Money and politics; (3) Accountability for teachers, schools, and districts.
It is the latter topic that I will address here.
The problem is that standardized tests, as currently designed and written, do not actually measure learning transfer and application but instead are based on the ability to remember and memorize. There is no accountability for the degree for deep learning.
Perhaps, if still operating with multiple-choice questions, s.t. could be based on short scenarios designed as “select the best solution for John Doe’s dilemma [the character in the scenario] or the next action John Doe should take or what is the next step in solving this equation and so on.
I am still dumbfounded that the government(s) keeps throwing $ at “solving” the problems, but after, at least, decades of increased funding for various initiatives, programs, raises, and otherwise, nothing has improved or changed for the better.
On another note, I live in TX (actually I am a native Texan), and anyone with a bachelor’s degree can teach. All one needs to do is take some online courses, complete a student teaching apprenticeship, and pass the certification test.
Yet this initiative, in general, does not attract individuals “originally” interested in teaching: most seem to either hate their current corporate jobs, so they switch to teaching and/or they are stuck in lower-paying job and want more income. Actually there is a 3rd group: those want government benefits (insurance, retirement, stability, etc.).
Disclaimer: I present the following example only because it is serves an illustrative purpose…it does not serve as a or the basis on which I came to my opinions as outlined here.
So here we go!
My best friend and her husband each have a bachelor’s degree, one in public relations and one in political science. They both detested the respective fields and the overall corporate environment, so they completed the necessary steps to become certified and both obviously became teachers.
The wife loves it (but husband quit after 2 yrs.).
Kelly, interesting story. I’ll add one issue; I suspect that the ‘powers that be’ aren’t actually much interested in creating independent thinkers, but instead want good little corporate cogs. When we truly recognize that the future of society will come from our best-educated youth, and that it happens not with the tests you rightly point out are designed to test memorization, we may create more important curricula, pedagogy, and assessment. At least that’s my hope.
You’re not wrong about wanting “good corporate cogs”. Just look at the ways that companies have diminished training, and then turned around and groused because they couldn’t find employees who were ready-made to work for them. Of course, they rarely found ready-made employees, they just stopped wanting to train new hires, so this whole propaganda discussion about the skills gap opens and ultimately the burden got pushed to schools.