Posts Tagged "Purpose"
Expectations…. Maybe I’m Dreaming….
I’m very proud of my Daughter. She has survived the first term of High School. And has done exceptionally well. Now I know I have a smart kid who loves to learn new things however I was concerned at how she would go when it came to the difference between primary school and high school. Surprisingly she jumped right in. After receiving her report card I couldn’t be happier but now I’m starting to wonder if the education system is failing her. Her best subject is Spanish in which she earned an A+. In talking with her Spanish teacher I inquired as to how we could extend her further as obviously this is something she is good at. The teacher’s response was to tell me I should ask for her to skip a grade as she felt that my daughter could be still achieving this result in Year 9. My daughter isn’t achieving the same results in her other subjects (similar but not the same), nor does she want to leave her friends and nor do I believe she is socially and emotionally equipt to skip a grade. This got me thinking about our education system. At the point where a student is receiving the highest possible result in the grading system whether this is a 5 point scale, a 7 point scale or a 50 point scale we are telling our students that there is no more to learn at this stage in your life. Why can’t students if they can achieve an “A+” in Year 7 subject not move on to the Year 8 subject? Why aren’t our high school classes based on levels rather than age? Once we leave school whether in the work place or in further study age is no longer a factor, ability is. While our classes have students in them that range from learning support to gifted we are failing our students. Now I need to make it clear I’m not necessarily an advocate for streamed classes as I do believe that mixed abilities in classes helps all students as there is plenty students can learn from each other with the different perspecitives students bring to the classroom.
But what are we doing to help our students who happen to excel in one area or struggle in another. I do think we need to rethink how our high school classes work. Whats stopping us from setting up a system of units where each subject has a selection of units at each level. Once you receive a passing grade in a unit you could select from the same list or from the next level of units. Take my hypothetical Economics Course below. You must start in Level 1 once you complete a single unit with a passing grade you can then move to Level 2. If for example the Globalisation and Trade unit needs the International Economics unit then it would be listed as a prerequisite.
I know this is potentially a complicated or messy system however its just a suggestion…
Please let me know some of your ideas of how to make our education system suit students of all ages and ability levels…
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What Kind Of Grading System Should We Use? (Classroom Q&A With Larry Ferlazzo)
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Image by purplemattfish via Flickr
There is no other way to explain it. Our school year starts on Monday that is two days away. As I sit here in the dark writing, its midnight on Friday night and I can’t sleep. I can’t sleep because I have never, ever, EVER felt so unprepared for Day One in my teaching life. I have been teaching for seven years and with the exception of last year (where I was on maternity leave for the first six weeks of Term One) I have never not had Term One planned to at least to Week Five. This year I am rushed. I am rushed because everyone is rushed. I am stressed because everyone around me seems to be stressing.
This year I’m doing my ELF role AND taking on an academic class and not just any academic class its a Year 12 IB Economics. Our PD days like every other year have been planned down to the minute. Usually this hasn’t phased me because I am planned and calm but this year I’m pushing my luck. This year preperation week seems to have just disappeared.
Day 1 – your general intro to the year and this is the direction we want to take includes a bit on our new e-learning environment and time management (this is funny!!)
Day 2 – Habits of Mind – something we so desperately needed – was a brilliant session and I learned a whole heap of things to take into the classroom
Day 3 – Public Holiday (yes a breather) – spent… you guessed it… working!!!
Day 4 – Understanding by Design and Differentiation – again a great session and I have a good tool kit to go into the classroom with
Day 5 – Department Planning, E-Learning Environments, and various meetings depending on what you teach. – today
This was the hardest day of all. As one of the E-Learning Facilitators I spent the day going from planning session to planning session assisting staff with their E-Learning Environments. This was great however as the day wore on and more and more things went wrong and patience was tested. It got harder. So now I need to write my to-do list and try and get some sleep so that tomorrow (well today now!!) I can try and plan at least my first lesson and hope that I find the time to complete the tasks on my ELF to-do list (132), my classroom teacher to-do list (62) and my parent to-do list (44).
And this just about sums it up….
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What Exactly is the Purpose of Education?
This week I have spent my time in primary school planning meetings. Each of these has started the same way with the teachers being given a copy of the draft National Australian Curriculum. Each of these meetings has then gone in a very different direction depending on the combination of teachers. One thing that did stand out is that the teaching staff got caught up with the content of the Australian Curriculum and how the content was different from what they currently taught.
Something which has stood out to me is the severe lack of skills being taught in the National Australian Curriculum. And the swift way in which teachers (myself included) seemed to throw the thought of teaching students skills out the window.
I was reading Digital Literacy Across the Curriculum tonight and it got me thinking about what exactly the purpose of school and education is? What do we take from school into the big bad world when we leave the gate at the end of year 12? What do we take from school into university? And then our degrees into our job? So as I always do when I start thinking I ask Twitterland!
What is your clearest memory of primary school? High school? University?
My clearest memory of primary school was as a whole class (year 3) being praised for being proactive and going into the classroom after first break everyday and reading while we waited for the teachers to return from their morning tea meeting. Then on the sixth day of doing this scoring a lunchtime rubbish clean up (the whole class did) for going into a classroom without a staff member.
For High School the memory is of me making a fool of myself dancing to Rip Rip Woodchip by John Williamson in Year 8 to explain the meaning of logging. (I doubt I got the meaning across but it was fun even if it was embarrassing!)
Meanwhile in University my memories are of me trying to get my readings complete with one or two children hanging off me.
None of this was about the content or even the skills I learnt at school.
So I asked my twitter friends. And their responses were the same. They were about fights, arguments, results, excursions, bullying, parties, punishments and handing the last piece of assessment in. Nothing about content or skills.
So WHY as teachers do we get so hung up on the content? Reality is none of us really remember it later in life.
We should be teaching skills. Lets throw the content out that window instead.
Who’s joining me?
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