November in November. Alan that is.

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Testing Madness on the Race to Nowhere

A colleague at a nearby school sent me this link to the NYTimes – just the latest bulletin from a world gone mad with narrow definitions of achievement and success. Test prep for pre-school no less. And a real moneymaker for the lucrative (and unregulated) test prep industry.

Tips for the Admissions test – to Kindergarten

“Kayla Rosenblum sat upright and poised as she breezed through the shapes and numbers, a leopard-patterned finger puppet resting next to her for moral support.

But then came something she had never seen before: a visual analogy showing a picture of a whole cake next to a slice of cake. What picture went with a loaf of bread in the same way?

Kayla, who will be 4 in December, held her tiny pointer finger still as she inspected the four choices. “Too hard,” she peeped.

Test preparation has long been a big business catering to students taking SATs and admissions exams for law, medical and other graduate schools. But the new clientele is quite a bit younger: 3- and 4-year-olds whose parents hope that a little assistance — costing upward of $1,000 for several sessions — will help them win coveted spots in the city’s gifted and talented public kindergarten classes.”

What happened to childhood?

What happened to all the decades of research and study that shows that play is the work of the child and that narrow definitions of achievement serve only to exclude children from their birthright of unique success?

What happened to common sense that knows that getting down on the floor and playing with, and listening to, children is best way to help their cognitive growth? There are ways to promote children’s intellectual growth. Test prep anxiety is not one of them.

This week we both heard Dr. Paul Yellin whose presentation to parents and faculty began by emphasizing what we already know about children’s minds:

• There is no perfect brain
• Intellectual diversity is the norm
• Brains change over time and continue to grow throughout our lifetimes

One size does not fit all.  PDS knows that.  We all know that. All kinds of minds deserve respect and appreciation and can learn. Resilient, creative, flexible, ethical and persistent thinkers and doers succeed. And learning is a habit for a lifetime and directly connected with personal purpose and joy. The best preparation is to build school learning that enables children to develop those skills and the test is life itself. And it begins with play. It does not begin with pumping your child with canned instruction. Programs like Baby Einstein are cognitive dead ends. (You can now apply for a refund from Disney – this is true, check the link.)

We all know that the world needs a variety of aptitudes and experiences and we must value each child’s unique talents and know they are on an individual journey. There are many minds within one family – let alone classroom, school, world. And we need all of them.

Why then do we continue to insist otherwise with our emphasis on testing and the pressure and anxiety that goes with it.

I need a new category for some posts to this blog: Educational Insanity.

And what is the price of this testing madness?  Childhood is the price. And you only get one of those. And if we strip the joy of learning from childhood then the damage is incalculable. And to what end?

At the high school level here’s one answer in Race To Nowhere. This film takes a look at education, childhood and the unintended consequences of the achievement and test obsessed way of life that permeates American education and culture. The pressure on kids is unrelenting and is creating a generation suffering from unprecedented levels of stress, depression and burnout. No wonder 2,000 kids a day drop out of high school. Here’s the trailer:

And in the Hope department: Here comes this from Time Magazine.

“The insanity crept up on us slowly; we just wanted what was best for our kids….”

Read more: The growing backlash against overparenting.

Pranav Mistry and physical-digital new world

Now just start to imagine what this can mean for your life and for education. Astonishing!

How to effect change

Education is all about change. And fun makes it so much more effective. Here’s a great example from Stockholm – sent to me by a parent.

That was then: Are we “betraying most of our children”?

From: We are the people movie people

This landmark independent documentary … explores the education system … and asks whether the current system provides young people with the opportunity to develop their talents. High-profile figures sharing their personal experiences and views include Sir Richard Branson, Germaine Greer, Henry Winkler, Bill Bryson, Sir Ken Robinson and a wide range of education experts from around the world.

This thought-provoking film offers unique insight across generations and nations, and reveals a very inconvenient truth about education. The world is changing rapidly – but our education system is not keeping pace.

And just look at all that great footage of industrial Britain and the classrooms I remember!

The new literacy ladder. What rung are you on?

The world is moving at a tremendous rate. Going no one knows where. We must prepare our children, not for the world of the past. Not for our world. But for their world. The world of the future.  – John Dewey

PDS graduates students who…

• possess a rich academic knowledge base and know how to think as creative, flexible, independent, resourceful learners for life
• are intellectually curious, active seekers, users and creators of knowledge – from our mission

Take a look at this The Social Technographics ladder.  It’s from  Groundswell: winning in a world transformed by social technologies written by Charlene Li and Josh Bernofff .

At the top of the ladder are the Creators. At the bottom rung are the Inactives  who do not engage at any level either by choice or lack of opportunity.  Seems to me that we want all our students to climb on that ladder and ascend to the top rung of this groundswell that the authors define as:

A social trend in which people use technologies to get the things they need from each other, rather than from traditional institutions like corporations.

Think of the world of the web and interactive technology as a new ecosystem – one in which any person, in any place, at any time can participate, contribute, communicate, produce, and share. It’s an ecosystem that has the potential to make prosumers of us all. That is producers and not just consumers of information and media content.

That top rung is small in the wider world (you can see the stats by rung and  country at the link) but in schools with students beyond the early elementary years it should be 100%. In school – at PDS at least – getting engaged, being creative and collaborating is not an optional activity. And technological innovation makes it possible  to engage with a global reach.  And if we believe in the importance of innovation and creativity,  making a positive contribution and changing the world – there is the purpose. It brings a whole new meaning to the eduspeak catch phrases of problem-solving and ethical and creative thinking. It makes our mission possible in effective, dynamic and inclusive ways.

Good schools have always developed prosumers:  Students read novels, poetry and essays;  solved puzzles and problems;  consumed charts and graphs, and watched videos and film. But they also wrote, posed  and created them. Now they can produce them, share them and test their quality with a wider audience. (Authentic assessment.) It’s one big intellectual sandbox and  showcase where everything can be interactive and collaborative. The lines between producer and consumer have blurred. So have the lines between learner and teacher. Both can learn and both can teach. That has always been possible. Now it is closer to essential. Given the pace of change students and learners are in the sandbox together. (Teacher as coach, guide at the side not sage on the stage.)

Once we grasp the concept of the groundswell and see its potential for learning the more we will enter this new ecosystem and learn and teach the skills of navigation.  It a whole new set of literacy skills to be understood and brought into the classroom. And by incorporating these tools and this potential we are preparing students to function constructively in the world where this groundswell is becoming a tide.

What does the ladder look like?

Top Rung: Creators
This is the group who regularly – at least once a month – publish a blog, put an article online, maintain a website, contribute to a wiki, or upload music or videos. They engage, create and contribute online. In the United States it’s about 25% of people. We have top rung students. They all should be top rung. Our job is to move them up the ladder with what we teach, how we teach and what we expect. We need to systematically seek the next level with what we require of students.

Second Rung: Critics
These are the reactors who comment on and critique the work of others. In writing classes it’s a common best practice for students to comment on and respond to the work of classmates. This takes that good practice to a wider world. Our students are growing up in a world where this kind of interactivity is usual practice. How do we prepare them for it in the academic arena and beyond the world of social networking? Everyone’s a critic these days and the online ecosphere is full of commentary. How are we helping students engage in this world by commenting on and contributing to the work of others??

Third Rung: Collectors
These are people who collect bookmarks, RSS feeds, vote for sites on Reddit and Digg, who StumbleUpon, use Diigo or Delicious and amass all manner of digital media from their travels online.

So, what are the best ways to do that effectively? How do we teach how to find, evaluate, filter and store our collected material, bookmarks, feeds and links. Where do we teach that literacy?

Fourth Rung: Joiners
These are the people who have profiles on social networking sites such as Facebook, LinkedIn etc. It was students who gave these sites their initial boost but they are becoming ubiquitous among all age groups of computer users. Teachers are apparently among the most rapidly increasing user group together with the middle aged and elderly. But what are the skills students need to maintain effective sites and use them to promote themselves in a professional or scholarly way? How do they protect their on-line identity and leave the digital trail that accurately represents them?

Fifth Rung: Spectators
Consumers. This is the largest segment because it includes everyone in all the rungs above.  And given just how much is available participation in this rung is all about the choices we make online. Where do we go for what and how and why?  To “develop educated citizens” we need selective spectatorship.

The bottom rung: Inactives
Out of the loop and off the grid. These are the people who have no access to the technology or the web or who choose not to participate. This is not an option at PDS. Although it does provide an opportunity to help others start climbing the ladder.

Do we have a choice?

Getting on the ladder and starting the climb is a literacy and survival  issue for the 21st century.

Non participation is not optional for educators who want to educate children for their futures   I began with quotations from John Dewey and our mission.  I did that because I believe that this work is consonant with a progressive approach to education.  I believe that the tools of the online world bring exciting new possibilities for finally making the ideals of progressive education a reality. The question for me is not why? But how? In what ways? With whom? And to which mission-consistent ends?  Teaching these skills and engaging in the ecosystem is an outgrowth of our mission and is what our students need and deserve.

How do we get started?

We already have. Take a look at what is required of students at every level and every subject and you will see students using technology  (remember – a crayon is technology) to engage in the information and social ecosystem. It may look different at various grade levels and subject areas but students are already on the ladder in school and at home. And there are so many examples throughout the school. And it starts with what good teaching at PDS has always looked like – active, engaged students and teachers  learning by doing.

“Each step on the ladder represents a group of consumers more involved in the groundswell than the previous steps. To join the group on a step, a consumer need only participate in one of the listed activities at least monthly.”

Each rung of the ladder represents a literacy challenge for us and our students. We need to climb the ladder and we need to help our students climb the ladder. And what an opportunity for community learning! I used to teach English. We have middle school students at PDS who have published more short stories than I have in all my years of teaching writing (none).

Our job  is to help students build the skills they will need to understand and thrive in the ecosystem in which they must swim.

Here are the presentation slides of the ladder:

Social Technographics Explained

With the guns

Buttercup Farm November 2009

With school closed for the day there was time for a walk. Buttercup Farm Sanctuary off Route 82 just north of Stanfordville has one path that tracks along Wappingers Creek as it runs down from the head waters at Thompson Pond south toward the Hudson. It was quiet except for the rustle of squirrels, a few birds – juncos, jays and titmice mostly – and the occasional commotion of mallard startled up from the rushes. Beavers had been at work with trees gnawn down to sharpened pencil stubs and their work had blocked a waterway and flooded the walks.

And then the sound of single gunshots from across the water toward Stissing Mountain. Hunters perhaps. Or a target range. But because of the incident yesterday I thought of nearby Pine Plains. And because it is Veterans Day, Armistice Day, my mind went to “With the guns” – D.H.Lawrence’s August 1914 essay from the Manchester Guardian written just as the first world war was beginning. Watching reservists giddy with excitement and anticipation clamber aboard a train he has no such illusions about guns and war:

Last autumn I followed the Bavarian army down the Isar valley and near the foot of the Alps. Then I could see what war would be like – an affair entirely of machines, with men attached to the machines as the subordinate part thereof, as the butt is the part of a rifle.

Many greeted the war with jubilation. The streets of the great cities of Europe were thronged with crowds thrilled by the sense of adventure and the opportunity to take part. But not Lawrence.  He recalled what he saw and felt at that rehearsal for the war to come:

Then out of a little wood at the foot of the hill came the intolerable crackling and bursting of rifles. The men in the trenches returned fire. Nothing could be seen. I thought of the bullets that would find their marks. But whose bullets? And what mark. Why must I fire off my gun in the darkness towards a noise? Why must a bullet come out of the darkness, breaking a hole in me? But better a bullet than the laceration of a shell, if it came to dying. But what is it all about? I cannot understand; I am not to understand. My God, why am I a man at all, when this is all, this machinery piercing and tearing?

It is a war of artillery, a war of machines, and men no more than the subjective material of the machine. It is so unnatural as to be unthinkable.

Yet we must think of it.

It was unthinkable then. It is unthinkable now. But we must think of it.

Passchendaele, November 1917

“I deserve it, you don’t”: Marshmallows and crime

Deferred gratification – that ability to work for something now at the expense of immediate reward in order to receive a greater reward later – has long been a social staple of the middle class. Work hard in school,earn a place in college and get a better paying job. Save for a deposit and buy a house. It is a system that plays out in innumerable ways involving early sacrifice in order to realize later gains.

Perhaps the recent economic meltdown put a dent in the system – high credit card debt and the housing bubble where too many were encouraged to take on mortgages they could not sustain. Some say that an ethos of “live now-pay later” has replaced the “work hard-wait for your just desserts”.

But deferred gratification is still very much in place in the thinking about education. And that is as it should be. Students do need to work hard in school and as importantly establish the habits of sustained effort, impulse control and persistence. And when they are supported in doing so the rewards can be enormous. But sometimes there is another and less attractive side effect. It involves the sense of entitlement. Students who begin with every advantage of background and support and who then must endure a school atmosphere of such stress and competitive pressure that they develop a sense of privileged entitlement. “I worked so hard I deserve the (name your reward) – a place at a highly competitive college, a well paying job, position, privilege. They are oblivious to the efforts of others and feel entitled to the success they have been enabled to achieve. It’s an unattractive “I deserve it, you don’t” mentality. The hard work they refer to is often the absurd levels of pressure in their ridiculously over stuffed high school years where stress is relieved in self destructive ways and the sense of entitlement is instilled with a heavy hand.

But what about the marshmallows?

In the 1960’s psychologist Walter Mischel developed The Marshmallow Test. He would give a children a single marshmallow, then leave them alone in the room after making this offer: eat it right now – or – if they waited for him to return, get two marshmallows. A recent New Yorker article Don’t! The Secret of Self Control put it this way put it:

Footage of these experiments, which were conducted over several years, is poignant, as the kids struggle to delay gratification for just a little bit longer. Some cover their eyes with their hands or turn around so that they can’t see the tray. Others start kicking the desk, or tug on their pigtails, or stroke the marshmallow as if it were a tiny stuffed animal.

As illustration, take a look at this:

But what about the crime?
A study – from the University of Wales at Cardiff published in the October issue of British Journal of Psychiatry hypothesized: “…that excessive confectionery consumption increases the likelihood of violence in adulthood.”
To test this hypothesis, the researchers used the British Cohort Study to obtain information on the frequency of sweets consumption at age 10 and on violence convictions by age 34.
They found that 69% of people convicted of violence had in fact eaten sweets nearly every day when they were younger. Only 42% of those who had been nonviolent until age 34 reported such daily consumption.
The researchers conclude:

One plausible mechanism is that persistently using confectionery to control childhood behaviour might prevent children from learning to defer gratification, in turn biasing decision processes towards more impulsive behaviour, biases that are strongly associated with delinquency. Furthermore, childhood confectionery consumption may nurture a taste that is maintained into adulthood, exposing adults to the effects of additives often found in sweetened food, the consumption of which may also contribute towards adult aggression. Moreover, although parental attitudes were associated with adult violence, the effect of diet was robust having controlled for these attitudinal variables. Irrespective of the causal mechanism, which warrants further attention, targeting resources at improving childhood diet may improve health and reduce aggression.

You can make of that what you will.

Meanwhile back to the marshmallows. Here is in a TEDtalk by Joachim de Posado that includes footage of children being faced with the cruel choice of eat now or hold back and eat more later.

Objects of desire

Objectified - a film about the creative process of influential product designers – those people who create the “must have” gadgets and those design upgrades to toilet brushes and other quotidian items that Daniel Pink spoke of in A Whole New Mind. The film explores our complex relationship with manufactured objects and, by extension, the people who design them. It’s a look at the creativity of the designers who create the future by re-inventing the world of made objects And it’s about the stuff we have and the stuff we desire and therefore about who we are – our personal taste, style and expression – consumerism, and sustainability. What does what we have tell us about who we are and who we want to be?

Here’s a trailer of Gary Hustwit’s documentary Objectified.

Why school?

We go to school to become economically competitive as individuals and as a nation.
Is that all? Why do we go to school?
Here’s Mike Rose talking about his new book: Why School? Reclaiming education for all of us.