I've been struggling with a term and idea that I've heard a lot of lately: "evidence-based practices" has been all over the education world and with it, a notion that all of our instructional practices should be rooted there. All the practices I know are very good, sound, instructional practices that are good for kids. My problem isn't with the practices, it's with people saying that you need to implement evidence-based practices in a way that comes off as if it should be a singular approach. Before you go blowing up my comments section about my blasphemous rantings, follow me down the rabbit hole for just a second. Alice was glad she did.
My problem lies with us saying we need to be grounded in evidence-based practices without any thought or consideration given to how we might innovate and develop the next "evidence-based practice." By their definition, evidence-based practices are not highly innovative. There's evidence to support what they do, how well they do it and what some expected outcomes might be by implementing them. The long and short, they've been studied and they've been done before. That's great and wonderful. We should do things like this. My question is who started this practice and what evidence did they have to support it? The answer? None. Someone was innovative, Somebody designed something that they thought would work well and put it in place. We must be innovative too. We can't focus our entire approach on the use of evidence-based practice. We need innovators, someone to create something that works or something that doesn't. We need those risk takers to keep us moving forward. We have to be like a starting pitcher in baseball, we need more than a good fastball to get us through an outing.
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There was a really interesting article I read in the Los Angeles Times by Brian Caplan today. I came across it after it was shared by George Couros (@gcouros) on Twitter. I've linked to the full article at the end of this post. There was one paragraph in particular that I found very interesting, slightly controversial but just about 100% accurate in its' assessment. It reads: The last line in that paragraph is what really grabbed my attention. As I thought about that statement, I couldn't ignore the way it resonated with me. It sadly seems all to true. Thinking back on my college days I think Mr. Caplan's assessment is spot on. I don't remember a lot of people checking attendance, making sure that you had paid the appropriate tuition to attend a class or anything of the sort. In fact, I don't dare say I could have taken 80% or greater of my classes without having paid one nickel to the school. I could have learned nearly everything I learned as a paying college student with the one exception that is identified, I wouldn't have left with a diploma.
Truthfully, the diploma is what I was there for. The diploma was the essential ingredient to getting employed, and that's coming from someone who chose to be an educator; a profession in which we allegedly value the learning above anything and everything. Interestingly enough, after 13 years in that profession I still have never been asked a question on a job interview about what I learned. I've been asked to review my credentials, certifications and diplomas, but nobody has ever asked me about the learning. I think the sad truth is that we don't value the learning. We value the networking, the credentials, the licensure and certifications, but the learning seems to fall by the wayside. As Mr. Caplan writes "most of education's payoff comes from graduation, crossing the academic finish line." I think this is the reason why we hear about so many successful entrepreneurs, President's and many others having been "C" (or worse) students. They didn't conform. They got by but they actually applied what they learned in a way that it resonated with them, not the way someone else wanted it to resonate with them. Personally, I value the learning. I don't feel validated by having a degree nor do I believe that having a degree means I have accomplished a great deal. In fact, I believe I have learned more in my last year or so since I started engaging in Twitter chats, blogging and other on-demand learning activities than I did in six years of undergraduate and graduate school combined. That's what makes me proud of where I am; the way I have challenged and grown my own thinking on this journey. FULL ARTICLE: www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-caplan-education-credentials-20180211-story.html You've probably heard some iteration of the quote "Behind every student success story is a teacher or principal who championed for that student." It's a great quote and certainly one that many of us would find to be motivational. However, we're about moving forward, improving on things. Making them better. So my question is simple. How can we move from the singular (teacher, principal, student) to engage the power of the plural (teachers, principals, students)?
Just imagine the impact we would have had if that quote read "Behind every student success story are teachers and principals who championed for all students." Please know that this post is not a critique of the quote but rather a way to think about things. If a student walks out of our school system after attending K-12 and they can only identify one teacher that made a difference in their lives have we really done our best? Our calling is to educate all students and ensure that every student has a success story. That story should have several chapters written in it and his or her teachers should each be the author of one of those chapters. If you haven't written a chapter in someones story yet this year, tomorrow is a great time to start. If you're like me you've seen a lot of infographics about learning in your professional life. Yes, a picture is worth a thousands words and a visual often lends clarity to an idea expressed in words. However, one thing I have noticed is how many times we equate learning to a cyclical pattern. It's an idea that has never sat quite right with me. In recent years there has become a great acceptance around the idea that learning is messy. We've embraced mistakes as learning opportunities and removed the notion that learning was meant to be done with the teacher at the front of the classroom, students in rows and the sound of silence filling the moments when the teacher wasn't talking. My question is if learning is so messy, how come we still put together such neat, uni-directional flowcharts and graphics to describe the learning process? Why do we embrace the idea that a cycle or flow-chart with arrows only pointing in one direction is a true representation of learning design and implementation? I think the learning process and learning design is much closer to a scatter plot than a cycle or flow-chart. Why? Because the needs of every learner are different. Their experiences and prior knowledge are different. The rate at which they will learn information not only varies from student to student, but from topic to topic and subject to subject within each individual student. You see, in learning we have to be prepared to be at any point at any given time. We also have to be prepared to move to a different point on a moments notice. That movement may go against the flow of your standard cyclical process, it might go with the flow, it might jump to a point further away or even to a point that wasn't even originally on the continuum in the first place. Learning is messy. Learning design and execution are messy, and that's exactly what makes them learning experiences. Learning is...
I was reading a recent blog post by George Couros about having parents attending professional learning alongside teachers. I loved the premise. Beyond that the post got me thinking, who else would be a great person or group of people to attend schools professional learning?
What if we brought in working professionals? Could they give us some insight into our approach, things that they need/would like to see from recent graduates entering the workforce? What about people who are involved in some type of second chance programs? Could they help us identify what causes some people, teachers and parents alike, to temporarily or permanently disengage from school? Could they help us develop strategies to bring them back on board? What about community leaders or elected officials? We always say that we want their support in our local and state governments but have we truly ever invited them to see what goes on not just at school, but how hard we work to grow and improve our practice? I believe this is a real opportunity for education. We always preach that learning shouldn't exist in isolation so let's open our doors to these folks and get them in. It would be great feedback, great opportunities for growth and a great opportunity to garner support for public education. |
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