Three Years; 200 postings; 50,000 views

       Three years ago today I began this blog with the modest words below.  It has been a learning and a reflective experience to write about education in America.   I've considered some controversial topics and I've praised the many excellent people that work within the walls of our schools everyday. And I've receive great feedback from my readers; their stories and ideas.

       Thank you follow joining me in this journey.  There is always so much to do; so much to say.  And together we can do it all.

First Post from October 3, 2013

It's 6:30am; "No time like the present." (Right?)  So here is my first post; really my introduction to this blog.  This blog that I have said to myself for years (and to others) that I should write.  So here is the beginning.

The blog is called, What's So Good About about Education?.  The purpose (the vision) is to highlight the good things that occur in American education every single day.  There are lots of sources out there that talk about the bad things in education.  This would make the average person think that there is nothing good about education in America.  Well that's just not true.

In truth, I may talk about the good and the bad, but I want to stress that there is lots and lots of "Good" going on.  We need to acknowledge the hard work of teachers and the many, many successes of our students. 

I hope to  be able to do that.

Have a great school day America.  I know you will.

Five Steps to Effective Schools

       I should have titled this post, Five Humongous Mountains to Traverse that Lead to Effective Schools.  But anyone who has ever worked within our public school system already knows that the best results only ever come from hard work and massive efforts.

       As I think about what is necessary for any school or school system to be truly effective, I keep coming down to these five propositions:

1. The purpose of school is learning.
2. Teachers facilitate learning.
3. #2 (above) requires a great understanding of how students learn.
4. Teachers plan lessons that include strategies that are effective in helping students to learn based on the students' learning styles.  (That is, based on #3 above.)
5. Students learn.

The Purpose of School is Learning

       Some people might have trouble accepting this first proposition.  The time and effort we put into sports and activities (and worrying about grades) may certainly lead some to believe that schools have other purposes or (at least) competing purposes.  

       These other purposes are wonderful and they help to make "school" a welcoming place.  They give our students a sense of being part of the community and they teach our students that the world is full of opportunities.  Still, I believe that the true purpose of school is learning.  It's not grades, it's not sports, it's not standing-in-lines and doing-what-you're-told and putting-your-name-in-the-upper-right-hand-corner-of-the-page.  The purpose of school is learning.

Teachers Facilitate Learning

       Some teachers feel that their job is to teach and their students' jobs are to learn.  I believe that teachers' main job is to facilitate learning.  If students aren't learning, then what's the point--what are we doing day in and day out?  Teaching is (of course) a big part of the job, but if we believe that the purpose of school is learning (see #1 above), then we must believe that student learning is a crucial part of every teacher's responsibility.

       The difficulty in traversing this mountain is nestled in the fact that we can't force anybody to do anything.  If we have a student (or many students) who  refuse to accept the opportunity for learning we (as teachers) are limited in our ability to make this happen.  Yet, I would ask, What does a good parent do when her child refuses to go to sleep at bedtime?  Does she give up?  Does she allow the child to do that which she knows is not in his best interests?  No.  She reads on to my next proposition [!] .

Understanding How Students Learn

       Let's face it...the first two mountains were molehills relative to mountain #3.  In fact, I would guess that 90% of teachers are in full agreement with the first two propositions.  It is this third proposition in which our journey across toward effective schools really begins to get difficult.  Indeed, we have some great teachers who have been teaching for over ten and 20 years who still struggle with this question: How Do Students Learn?

       From my point of view, I believe that a full understanding of how students learn requires formal training (or professional development) and experience.  No new teacher is fully prepared for the job of teaching, because a new teacher cannot fully understand how students learn without having the experience of interacting with students and making instructional decisions based on those interactions.

       Resources on the science of learning are plentiful.  An excellent list of fairly recent breakthroughs in our understanding of learning can be found here.  Edutopia compiled an excellent list of brain-based learning resources recently.  Here is an excellent blog on the Science of Learning.  If you want to dive deep into this subject, the National Academies Press put out a full volume on How People Learn.  Teachers can take courses about how students learn and learning theory, and teachers can seek out information from these and other sources to build their knowledge about how students learn.  

       If teachers are to succeed in facilitating learning, they must have a working knowledge of how students learn.  Hence, my third proposition is likely to be the biggest barrier to effective schools.  It is hard for individual teachers to gain the volume of knowledge needed to be very successful on this front; and it takes to time and experience for teachers to use and to fine tune this knowledge.  I believe that most of our good teachers are perpetually improving their skills at understanding how students learn.  Teacher that do not view this skill as necessary will forever be only marginally effective and will prevent our public schools from achieving their primary objective: Learning.

Use Knowledge of How Students Learn to Plan Effective Lessons with Effective Strategies

       This step goes hand-in-hand with #3 (above).  In practice, teachers gain an understanding of their students, search for strategies and activities that they feel would be engaging for their students, and then plan their lessons to incorporate their strategies and activities.  After teaching the lesson, the teacher evaluates its effectiveness and (perhaps) makes some adjustments for the next time that this lesson is taught.

       Matching effective strategies to the learning abilities of the students is difficult, complex work.  Indeed, this is the hard part of teaching and a major stumbling block in our efforts to be as effective as we can be.  This is where the "science" of teaching appears to become much more of an "art".  It is where individual teachers interact with individual students.  This complex work (in my opinion) requires teachers to work in groups and in Professional Learning Communities (PLCs) to gain the knowledge and experiences from many professionals in order to build on each teacher's knowledge and experience.

Students Learn

       The end result successfully completing steps 1 through 4 is student learning.  For some schools, this finish line far from view and much work is needed to begin to see this end result.  For others, this goal is well within view and is getting closer each school year.

       The first step to any problem is identifying the problem and then to identify a path to solving the problem.  These five steps will definitely lead to effective schools.  Achieving these five steps requires significant effort.  We have to be a team of teachers and administrators and researchers and parents and community.  All of our schools can be effective schools.

       Our students deserve nothing less than our collective best.

The Pros and Cons of Standardized Testing

Warning:  If you are 100% against standardized testing or 100% in favor of standardized testing, you shouldn't read this blog post.  I'm going to some things that you will agree with, but you will be so blinded in anger over the things I say that you disagree with that you will never see the agreement parts.  Besides, you have already determined your thinking on this matter so there is no point for you to hear the opinions of others.

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       Alright, maybe that warning was a little harsh.  I apologize.  In truth, I'd like to believe that the people who are on the extreme sides of this issue are a very small minority.  Most people have their views regarding standardized testing, and I would guess that most people fall somewhere in the middle of the issue.  I'm one of those people.

       In an ideal world, the students will come to school and do their best everyday to learn--and testing wouldn't be necessary.  The reason it wouldn't be necessary (in this ideal world) is because teachers would constantly gain an understanding of each student's level of learning through formative assessment practices; and students would ask questions about the things they didn't understand and keep working on these things until they got it.  The motivation would be the attainment of knowledge.

       To be fair, some students and teachers and whole schools work hard to (at least) approach this ideal world of education; but for the rest of us, we are still somewhere on our journey toward this world.  We are striving to emphasize learning over "getting-a-grade"; but we still need effective ways to measure learning--and testing is part of this process; and standardized testing is part of this process.

Some Pros of Standardized Testing

       In my view the "standardized" part of standardized testing is a pro.  Every student takes the same test regardless of the factors that influenced their learning (such as their teacher, the curriculum, the standards, the state they live in, etc.).  Think about the SAT test: colleges know that every student is taking the same test, so SAT scores can be compared to each other regardless of where in the country the test was taken.

       Also, the next generation of standardized tests (think PARCC and Smarter Balanced tests) are written to determine a measure of learning based on understanding content more than based on memorizing formulas and procedures.   This means that it will be harder for students to guess the right answers on these tests.  It also means that results will be based on true learning and understanding rather than on a student's ability to take a test.

Some Cons of Standardized Testing

       It may be a challenge to teach all of the content that is covered in a standardized test prior to the administration of the test.  Standardized tests typically have specific testing windows or a specific testing date on which to give the test.  Since different school districts start and end on different dates during the year and have different days off due to holidays and other reasons, it might be hard to structure a course outline that completely covers all of the material that will be assessed on a standardized test.  This occurs (sometimes) for Advanced Placement tests.  These AP tests usually have a particular May date for their administration and many school districts finish their school years in June.

       Some might argue that a "con" to standardized testing is that it might assess something that we don't teach or don't want to teach in the course.    I believe that there is general agreement of what needs to be taught in each grade and that this is less of an issue than some would have you believe.

       To me the biggest down side to standardize testing is that it gives the message to students (and parents) that the goal of school is getting a good grade on a (standardized) test rather than having the goal of learning.  Sometimes standardized test results are treated with great importance with newspaper articles and school-wide celebrations.  And sometimes these results are given too much importance when making course selection decisions for the next couple of school years.  As I said before, schools should emphasize learning and should de-emphasize "getting a grade".  A standardized test score should be just one piece of data that is used in conjunction with many other data points to make big decisions about a student's ability.

Parents Like Their Children's Schools More Than They Like Education in America--Huh???

Question #1:  How satisfied are you with the quality of education of our your oldest child?
Question #2:  How satisfied are you with the quality of K-12 education that students receive in the United States today?

       How would you answer these two questions?  Gallup has asked these questions to Americans for years and the answers are always the same; paradoxical, but the same:

Answer #1: I like my child's school.  I think he/she is getting a good education.
Answer #2: I don't like education in America as much as I like the education in my child's school.

       What???  How can this be?  How is it that most parents are satisfied with their child's education, but not (generally) satisfied with the nation's schools?

       One possible reason is that parents live in the community that their child's school is located and they like their community.  Another reason could be that parents know their child's teachers; they've met them, talked to them, maybe are neighbors with them.  Their child's school is a place that they've visited many times and that they know pretty well.

       On the other hand, the quality of our nation's schools is heavily influenced by newspaper and media reports--which is generally negative.  (This is one of the reasons that I write this blog.)  Unfortunately, positive stories about public schools and American education are not told nearly as much as negative stories.

       Still, if so many people are happy with their child's school, then how can these same people be so negative about public schools in general?  Does this fall into the same category of, "Drivers around her are crazy, but I'm a good driver."?

       Our schools aren't perfect, and we certainly have challenges that need to be addressed.  I believe that these challenges can be better addressed when we have the support of the public that we serve.  Indeed we need all our collective "best thinking" to solve our most entrenched problems--such as the education of our poorest students.

       So cheer up American.  Maybe things aren't as bad you think--or should I say "As bad as you read in the press".

Top Five Posts of 2014

       As I complete my first full year of blogging, here is a look at the top five posts of 2014.

#5) This is our finest hour

       This was published on November 21st.  This post recalled the Apollo 13 moving scene when the Ed Harris character said, "This is our finest hour".  I compared this to educators today that view the exciting things happening in the world of education today.  I said that today's educators do amazing things in (sometimes) difficult situations.

       I do believe that is our finest hour and we are fortunate to be teaching in this exciting time!

#4) Everyone has value

       I was inspired to write this post after seeing a middle school student in my district give a speech titled, "Everyone has value."  She told a story of a one-hundred dollar bill.  She said, if she asked anyone of they would like to have a one-hundred dollar bill, people would say, "Yes" because everyone recognizes its value.  And if she were to take that one-hundred dollar bill and crumple it up and step on it and then ask people if they wanted it, people would still take it because we still understand and appreciate its value.

       Then she said that everyone has value and we should appreciate ourselves for who we are.  It doesn't matter how we look or the clothes we wear because all of us have value.  

       What a joy it was to listen to this middle school student talking to other middle school students about self worth.  This post really touched a soft spot in many of my readers.  She is a beautiful example of the many great things that take place in our public schools everyday.

#3)  The middle school principal everyone wants to have

       This post was a reprinting of an essay written by my daughter's middle school principal in the school newsletter.  In it, he talked about looking back at his life and wishing he spent more time telling his children how special they are to him.  The essay talked about appreciating every day and all of the people around you.  It talked about something we all want--no regrets in our later life.

       He said that we shouldn't take ourselves too seriously.  He said that we should do our best everyday and not worry if we make mistakes sometimes.  It was a bit of a tear-jerker essay and my readers real enjoyed reading his words.  I first published this post in May, but republished it recently and (once again) it got a good response.

       Principals are the most visible leaders in our public school system.  They have a huge responsibility.  This is the principal that everyone wants because he cares so much about his students. 

#2)  We must do better - part 1

       This was the first of a three part series that I wrote in November of this year.  And it was the most popular of the three parts.  The series talked about the three things (in my opinion) that public schools must improve upon if we are to move forward with higher student achievement in the future.

       This part talked about the achievement of poor students in our public schools.  We know that poor students often have lower achievement than middle class and upper class students.  This has been the case for most of the history of public schooling in America, and we continue to struggle to improve this situation.  Still, we must do better by our poor students if we truly wish to see student achievement (overall) to rise.  Also, we have a moral obligation to help these most vulnerable of our student populations.

#1)  This is how we learn in the 21st century

       After a successful Google Hangout session in front our our Mid-Maryland Mathematics Specialist Group back in March, I wrote this post about professional learning among educators today. No longer do we need to see people face-to-face to learn and to improve professionally.  Today we have so many options from journals to books to online courses to social media to learn from others.

       This was the most popular blog post in 2014 for my blog.  My readers really responded to this idea of using the tools available to us today to learn from educators and others from all over the world--especially via online tools such as Google Hangout.

       It has been a great learning year for me and a great year to talk about the great things that are happening in our public schools.  Thank you for the feedback from my readers and I look forward to more learning and more positive stories about our schools and our educational system in 2015!

Why Do You Blog?

     Recently a number of people have asked me, "Why do you have a blog?"

     I have an answer--that I will share with you below--but it got me thinking about why other people blog.

     In my case, my blog is about my thoughts and ideas about my profession of education.  Additionally, I blog because I believe that my own professional development comes from reading and listening to other people in the education field (and outside of the education field) who talk about issues that I care about.  I blog because I want to contribute to this professional conversation.

     In the 21st century, learning comes from a large number of sources.  Ordinary people who are passionate about something become experts at that something.  People like me hear about these self-made experts and seek them out for their knowledge on the subject.  To me, blogging and the associated contacts that I make via blogging help me to gain a much wider perspective on the issues that I care about.

     What about you?  Why do you blog?  Send me an email (cincottapeter@gmail.com) or a tweet (@cincottapeter) and tell me why you blog.  I may compile your answers and share (in a general way) the responses I receive in an upcoming blog post..  I will not share anyone's email or other contact information.

The Art of Education

       The challenge of education is the art of education.  Namely, it is the art of finding the best way to reach every single student.  Learning styles and teaching styles have to "mesh".  Someone said that teaching really IS rocket science.  I've also heard that teachers make hundreds of decisions everyday--often on the fly while the class is going on.

       We know that our best teachers connect with their students.  They get to know them.  They talk with them in the hallways and in the stands during football games.  They care about their students.  And their students want to make their teachers proud of them.

       This blog is constantly on the lookout for positive stories about public education in America.  Let me know your stories.  Maybe I'll have some guest contributors.  And I want to post pictures and videos of the good and great things that are taking place across the nation in our K-12 classrooms.

       When I taught high school and middle school mathematics, I always enjoyed making Positive Phone Calls home to parents.  It's amazing to me, but nearly every parent told me that they never received a positive phone call from a teacher.  It made me feel good and the parents loved it.  Word got out to my students that I did this and students actually WANTED me to call their parents.  It was great.

       Teachers are always looking for ways to connect with their students.  I see it every time I visit a classroom.  And I read about it on Twitter and in journals often.  I am anxious to share these great ideas with others.

       Congratulations to all the teachers who have mastered the Art of Teaching.

       Keep it up!