Dangerously Irrelevant

I don’t get to attend the meetings between educators and policymakers when they talk about teacher ‘accountability,’ but this is how I envision the conversation often plays out…

Happy viewing! (with captions!)

Diane Ravitch says:

[The] data-driven focus [of Houston Independent School District's Apollo Program] contains the seed of its own destruction. Talking about tests all the time, doing test prep all the time, making kids take tests that they are not relevant to them and that they are not prepared for. . . .

I was not surprised by the emotional and physical reactions of these kids as staff kept trying to get them and keep them in school. The kids keep saying that the learning is irrelevant. They keep saying that school is boring. They keep saying that no one understands them and their plight. Telling them, “No Excuses!” is disrespectful.

via http://dianeravitch.net/2013/05/17/pbs-in-houston-watch-the-faces-of-the-students

Did you know that…

• Google Apps can help you ‘launch a stress-free implementation of the Common Core’s required technology components?’
• these 5 apps will help your kids meet the new Common Core standards?
• FASTT Math is ‘the only fact fluency program to extend beyond math fact fluency practice into more rigorous Common Core objectives?’
• ‘Great Books programs meet Common Core standards?’
• these student center activities are ‘aligned to the Common Core?’
• all of these Pinterest resources are ‘aligned with specific Common Core standards?’
• every one of McGraw-Hill’s ‘core math, reading, and language arts programs fully align with the Common Core?’
• you can watch video clips of ‘Common Core-aligned teaching and learning?’
• NWEA ‘has developed a set of MAP assessments aligned to the Common Core?’
• you can get access to ‘the world’s first and only on-demand, comprehensive training on the Common Core standards?’
• all of these software programs are ‘aligned to the Common Core,’ even Timez Attack?
• you can ‘become a Common Core Black Belt?’
• the new SimCity video game will ‘conform with the Common Core?’

As expected, with the advent of the Common Core we are seeing a lot of labeling and re-labeling of instructional materials, resources, and activities. Publishers are adding the Common Core designation to existing textbooks, resources, assessments, and professional development opportunities just as fast as they can. Educators are unpacking the Common Core and affirming to themselves that they’re already doing what the standards expect. Lots of Common Core hoopla. Lots of Common Core assurances. Lots of old educational wine in new Common Core bottles…

Plus, of course, lots of gratuitous Common Core labeling and hucksterism. Because if it’s not stamped ‘Common Core’ these days, hardly anyone’s going to look at it. 

We have the standards. And publishers’ criteria. And state and school district certification efforts. But we also have lots of confusion, including whether or not teachers are prepared or unprepared to implement the standards.

As we sort out that confusion – and as we work together to become better prepared for implementation of the Common Core juggernaut – we need to be critical consumers of both our own lessons and the vendor pitches that accompany the standards. Because if there’s anything that policy-level folks agree on, it’s usually that the Common Core is supposed to be different. Very different.

• If the math in a ‘Common Core aligned’ textbook looks like the math you experienced as a student, put it down.
• the traditional US mathematics curriculum must become substantially more coherent and focused
• “I’m scared of rewarding bullsh*t,” Coleman told me…. “I don’t think it’s costless at all.” By bullsh*t, Coleman means the sort of watered-down curriculum that has become the norm in many American classrooms. [statement censored by me so as to better enable passage through draconian school Internet filters]

Of course if we absorb the Common Core into what we’ve always done without substantially changing anything – and this is extremely likely given our history – then things won’t be different at all. We know from past experience that standards usually don’t change instruction much. Neither do they change the day-to-day learning experiences of most children. Implementation always trumps wishes. Regardless of the rhetoric accompanying the Common Core, our historically high rates of reform assimilation indicate that what kids do in school on a daily basis is unlikely to be very different in most places. As Richard Elmore notes,

Internal accountability precedes external accountability and is a precondition for any process of improvement.

What does it mean to you for things to be ‘Common Core aligned℠?’ [Although Common Core chief architect / circus barker David Coleman believes that "people really don't give a sh*t about what you feel or what you think", I do.] Perhaps more importantly, what are you and your fellow educators doing to avoid old wine in new bottles?

P.S. Never fear. This blog post is Common Core-aligned℠. See ELA-Literacy.CCRA.R.8.

Everyone wants children to be able to read. But unpacking that educational goal – and the political rhetoric that often surrounds it – may require a bit more digging and critical analysis. Here’s an example…

In the 2004-2005 school year, 18 4th graders took the state reading test at Charter Oak-Ute Elementary. Only 14 were deemed proficient, for an AYP percentage of 78%. That apparently sparked a 7-year quest to raise test scores.

Today the Iowa Department of Education (DE) touted Charter Oak-Ute Elementary as one of the 5 schools (out of 1,409 in the state) that’s supposedly proving that poverty does not equal destiny. In fact, DE boldly said on its home page:

It may be well known that high-poverty schools will have lower proficiency rates than their more affluent counterparts. Sure, it’s well known. But it is wrong.*  [yes, that was our Department of Education dismissing decades of peer-reviewed research on student learning outcomes in high-poverty schools]

What did Charter Oak-Ute Elementary do to warrant DE’s publicity? Well, in 2011-2012, 19 of its 21 3rd grade students passed the reading test - for an AYP percentage of 90%** – despite 58% of its students receiving free/reduced price lunch. [for reference, the average statewide reading proficiency for 3rd graders is 76%]

From 14 of 18 students to 19 of 21 students. If Charter Oak-Ute Elementary had kept its reading proficiency percentage steady, only 16 3rd graders would have passed the state reading test last year. So it essentially moved the needle for 3 students. In seven years.***

By now many of you may be wondering, “What did this elementary school do to bump up these 3 kids’ reading scores?” Well, according to its principal:

[Teachers and students] weren’t happy with some of the things we had to drop, such as morning recess time because we really don’t need that.

That’s right. Among other interventions, the school cut recess. For 7- and 8-year-olds.

Never mind statements against cutting recess from the National Association for the Education of Young Children and the American Academy of Pediatrics. Never mind the research that shows how recess breaks maximize children’s cognitive performance or shows recess is important for children’s learning, social development, and health (“no research clearly supports not having recess”) or connects recess to good classroom behavior. Never mind children’s needs for breaks, exercise, and play. Never mind our childhood obesity epidemic, particularly for low-income kids.

And, apparently, never mind DE’s own admonitions for schools to adopt ‘evidence-based practices.’ Whether proposing 3rd grade retention or cutting recess (FYI, for both the research is heavily AGAINST them), DE is beginning to show that is willing to hold up and/or advocate for practices that are anything BUT ‘evidence-based.’

A high-poverty school that gets rid of elementary school recess to feed the always-hungry maw of ever-increasing test score goals should raise concerns for us. Because it’s yet another example of the kinds of dehumanizing microaggressions that happen all too often to children who are in poverty and/or of color. And it’s not what we in Iowa should be encouraging. Because if DE is willing to tout this recess-cutting school as doing what it needed to raise reading scores, the writing is potentially on the wall for ‘whole child’-oriented practices in larger school districts that have even greater concentrations of children in poverty. Yes, that means you, Des Moines, Waterloo, Sioux City, and Davenport (and others)…

I’m concerned that we’re becoming one of THOSE states. In Iowa we always have prided ourselves as being more enlightened than many of those states in which districts were cutting art, music, recess, physical education, foreign language, and other aspects of school necessary to provide well-rounded schooling experiences for children. We took pride in doing our best to attend to the needs of the whole child – for every child. But that commitment to children – and our recognition of decades of child development research – appears to be waning.

So put February 25, 2013 down on your calendar as the day when not only did Iowans learn that one of our own schools cut recess to improve test scores but also that our own Department of Education was willing to brag about it. Welcome to the new #edreform in Iowa.

* At least it’s ‘wrong’ for the 5 schools out of 1,409 that DE cherry-picked [please ignore the other 1,404]
** DE said it was 92%?
*** Of course this ignores ordinary year-to-year variation, differences between cohorts of students, random measurement error, etc. 

Iowa high school student Jack Hostager says:

Are you going to do what makes you look good or work for a system that does what’s best for students? Are we going to test the daylights out of me to get our bar a little bigger than everyone else’s on some national assessment data graph, or are we going to move towards a system that rewards meaningful learning and develops critical, concerned, productive citizens?

My child should not be responsible for anyone’s pay based on one test on one day. . . . I keep checking the tony private schools to see when they are going to pay their teachers based on test scores and I have yet to find one that thinks this is credible nor do any believe in this data-driven model of high stakes testing for their students.

Rosemarie Jensen via http://www.edexcellence.net/commentary/education-gadfly-daily/flypaper/2013/the-seattle-map-flap.html#comment-781024577

Too often, teachers and administrators complain that they are overly constrained by what the state government expects and cannot deviate for fear of not covering the necessary material.  This statement is somewhat true, however through authentic learning experiences i.e. content-specific authentic texts, evaluating real world issues, community service projects, labs, students can build an understanding of the world that takes them past any standard the state has set for them.  In any perpetually high-achieving school regardless of any demographic data, they do not teach to the test, they teach above the test.  Students’ experiences and knowledge take care of the rest.

Kevin ‘Doc’ Dougherty via http://educationismylife.com/curiosity-does-not-equal-chaos

notice what’s going on in the video around the 2:00 mark: a whole stageful of musicians, ranging over at least a span of 60 years of age, takes up bows and dives into the music. No one’s tracking them in an FMS (Fiddle Management System); no one’s worried about the failure to capture and embed Shareable Audio Objects. People put time and effort into becoming better at an activity they find worthwhile.

Dave Ferguson via http://www.daveswhiteboard.com/archives/5314

Hat tip: Stephen Downes, http://www.downes.ca/cgi-bin/page.cgi?post=59600

the study’s major finding states only that “the results demonstrated that overall, automated essay scoring was capable of producing scores similar to human scores for extended-response writing items.” A paragraph on p. 21 reiterates the same thing: “By and large, the scoring engines did a good [job] of replicating the mean scores for all of the data sets.” In other words, all this hoopla about a study Tom Vander Ark calls “groundbreaking” is based on a final conclusion saying only that automated essay scoring engines are able to spew out a number that “by and large” might be “similar” to what a bored, over-worked, under-paid, possibly-underqualified, temporarily-employed human scorer skimming through an essay every two minutes might also spew out. I ask you, has there ever been a lower bar?

Todd Farley via http://www.joebower.org/2012/11/ravitch-should-computers-grade-essays.html.

Today the Iowa Department of Education (DE) released a report on achievement levels in Iowa compared to other states. The report also focuses heavily on closing the significant achievement gaps that exist in our state. Here are some very quick reactions that I have to the report…

1. The emphasis on better meeting the learning needs of traditionally-underserved student populations is absolutely necessary. Educationally and otherwise, we often have neglected students of color, students in poverty, students who are English language learners, and students with disabilities.
2. It’s hard to argue with proposed educational solutions that are focused on instruction, proven effective, and scalable, but I think that there is an accompanying, unstated concern: How should we think about educational initiatives that need to occur but don’t have ‘significant bodies of evidence’ behind them yet? For example, we live in a digital world and we know that students need to be fluent with the technologically-transformed information spaces of our time. And yet the peer-reviewed research to support this move isn’t there yet. It’s just sort of common sense: all we have to do is look around and realize that this is a need. Given the lack of ‘research,’ however, does that mean we don’t do it?
3. I wish that the report’s initial framing of the issues focused on the substantial changes that are occurring in the ways that we learn, citizenship needs in an increasingly-complex democracy, and other concerns related to life success beyond just economy/workforce issues. The latter are definitely important, but preparing future employees is not schools’ primary societal function.
4. If we’re going to work on raising scores and closing achievement gaps, let’s do our best to focus on assessments that matter. Right now we seem to be concerned mostly about average scores on assessments of primarily lower-level thinking. It’s also worth noting that our own National Research Council has found that decades of test-based incentives have done nothing to improve student learning outcomes. In fact, high school exit exams as configured in many states actually decrease graduation rates without concurrent increases in achievement.
5. Despite the sturm und drang around Iowa’s NAEP scores, we must recognize that there are no objective criteria and/or research-based evidence behind the cut scores for the different NAEP proficiency levels. The cut scores are set by committee and thus are inherently political. The NAEP benchmarks have been vociferously criticized by the National Academy of Sciences, the Government Accounting Office, the National Academy of Education, and many, many others. The designers of NAEP freely admit that the cut scores and levels are arbitrary.
6. Is our concern merely about raising Iowa students’ academic performance levels or is it necessary that we also BEAT OTHER STATES AND NATIONS? The rhetoric that’s flying around about Iowa ‘slipping to the middle of the pack’ seems very concerned about the latter. It’s also worth noting that most of the countries to which we negatively compare Iowa also wouldn’t do very well on NAEP.
7. ‘Rapid iteration,’ ‘living in perpetual beta,’ and other ideas related to quickly trying things, getting feedback to see if they worked, and adjusting course accordingly are all extremely important, particularly in a rapidly-changing world. As such, Response to Intervention (RTI) is a great process, particularly if feedback loops are short in time. But the RTI process also traditionally has been deeply rooted in notions of low-level cognitive work. Terms like ‘progress monitoring’ and ‘data-based decision-making’ are typically employed by educators in service of factual recall and procedural knowledge regurgitation. Turning those ideas toward higher-order thinking outcomes is going to be a lot of work in most school systems.
8. We need to be careful that we don’t turn ‘fidelity of implementation’ and ‘best practices’ into cookie-cutter instructional recipes and/or scripted lessons (as has occurred in many districts across the country). The report says that we need to ‘eliminate variability in instruction.’ I understand the sentiment behind that phrase but we need to be very wary of simplistic, stupid solutions to this issue.
9. The underlying premise of the report (and its accompanying policy proposals that we’ll see in the near future) is that education is a system amenable to fairly mechanistic solutions: put in place the right inputs, processes, and feedback loops and we’ll get the desired outcomes. Classic systems theory stuff. Learning and teaching are inherently messy domains, however, that often defeat externally-imposed procedures and expectations. As other nations show, we can improve student learning outcomes with thoughtful, purposeful changes, but we should be prepared for a lot of messiness along the way.
10. There’s a difference between ‘differentiation’ (as proposed in the report’s description of RTI) and ‘personalization’: see McClaskey & Bray’s chart on this. Differentiation is good, but a move away from primarily teacher-directed learning environments also is needed.

Final thoughts

Will teacher quality initiatives, the Iowa Core, and better deployment of RTI improve student learning outcomes in Iowa? Probably, at least somewhat. Are we going to see massive shifts in student learning outcomes in Iowa as a result of these? Probably not. These are school-focused interventions promulgated by the state department of education, and they’re all likely to have some positive impact. But they’re not enough. The research is very clear that roughly 80% of student learning outcomes is a result of NON-school factors. If we’re truly concerned as Iowa citizens and policymakers about improving student learning outcomes and closing achievement gaps, we’ll pay attention to the 80%, not just the 20%, just as most other ‘higher-performing’ nations have done. That means looking beyond the Department of Education for solutions.

Take some time to read over the report. What are your reactions?