‘Prediction is very difficult, especially if it’s about the future’*

As I was unable to attend the Education Future Forum, held in Sydney earlier this year, Dr Phil Lambert kindly emailed me his presentation, 2010-2020: Ten Propositions for the Decade.

Phil’s paper is lengthy and it is not my purpose here to cast a cold eye over it but to take one issue of interest and seek your input, dear readers.

Phil has the following tables outlining some ’false dichotomies in education’ that are of particular interest to those, enthralled with ’21st century learning’, who want to keep the best of what are considered traditional practices.

Figure 1 – old versus new models of schooling and Learning

Old Model	New Model
Reform existing schools	Create new schools
Larger schools	Smaller schools
Delivering education	Students learning
Read books, listen to talk	Explore the Web
Time-bound/place-bound	Any time/any place
Technology as textbook	Technology as research
Groups, classes	Individualised
Time is fixed	Time is variable
Standardisation	Customisation
Cover material	Understand key ideas
Who and what	Why and how
Know things	Apply knowledge
Tradition	Relevance
Over-reliance on multiple – choice tests	Written/Oral demonstrations
Testing for accountability	Testing for understanding
“Make ‘em”	“Motivate ‘em”
Instructors	Advisers/facilitators
Teachers serve administrators	Administrators serve teachers
Administrative management	Professional partnership
Adult interests dominate	Student interests dominate

The second example, developed by Shaw (2009), presents windows into a supposed classroom of last century and that of a preferred C21 classroom.

Figure 2 – 20^th Century Classroom versus 21^st Century Classroom

The 20th Century Classroom	The 21st Century Classroom
1960s typical classroom – teacher-centred, fragmented curriculum, students working in isolation, memorising facts.	An architectural firm establishes an alternative school providing internships for high school students.
Time-based	Outcome-based
Focus: memorisation of discrete facts	Focus: what students know, can do and are like after all the details are forgotten.
Lessons focus on the lower level of Bloom’s Taxonomy – knowledge, comprehension and application.	Learning is designed on upper levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy – synthesis, analysis and evaluation.
Textbook-driven	Research-driven
Passive learning	Active learning
Learners work in isolation – classroom within 4 walls	Learners work collaboratively with classmates and others around the world – the Global Classroom
Teacher-centred: teacher is centre of attention and provider of information	Student-centred: teacher is facilitator/coach
Little to no student freedom	Great deal of student freedom
Discipline problems – educators do not trust students and vice versa. No student motivation.	No “discipline problems” – students and teachers have mutually respectful relationships as co-learners; students are highly motivated.
Fragmented curriculum	Integrated and interdisciplinary curriculum
Grades averaged	Grades based on what was learned
Low expectations	High expectations – “If it isn’t good it isn’t done.” We expect and ensure that all students succeed in learning at high-levels. Some may go higher – we get out of their way to let them do that.
Teacher is judge. No one else sees student work.	Self, peer and other assessments. Public audience, authentic assessments.
Curriculum/school is irrelevant and meaningless to the students.	Curriculum is connected to students’ interests, experience, talents and the real world.
Print is the primary vehicle of learning and assessment.	Performances, projects and multiple forms of media are used for learning and assessment.
Diversity in students is ignored.	Curriculum and instruction, address student diversity.
Literacy is the 3 Rs – reading, writing and maths.	Multiple literacies of the 21st century – aligned to living and working in a globalised new millennium.
Factory model, based upon the needs of employers for the Industrial Age of the 19th century. Scientific management.
Driven by standardised testing.

Phil says:

“What we see here are two separate models suggesting that what happens in all schools and classrooms is one approach that is stuck in the past and must become the other (preferred approach) today. There is no room for a model that incorporates new approaches along with some proven practices. Instead we are presented with what is considered “in” (the “new model”) and what is now “out” (the “old model”).”

Your ideas

Q: Do exponents of the ‘new model’ completely have to reject the current paradigm to evolve?

Q: How is this binary to be resolved positively and our schools evolve?

*Phil’s speech opened with a quote from Niels Bohr, prediction is very difficult, especially if it’s about the future which amusingly sums up the challenges of crystal-ball gazing.

Stick in the Sand

Thanks to Monika Hardy for posting this video.

more about “Stick in the Sand“, posted with vodpod

 

Teaching for a living

Holidays always give one room for reflection.

 

I am really starting to miss classroom teaching. In my role as a deputy principal, at a large state school, there are many opportunities to promote quality teaching & learning but having only one class (who have just finished school to prepare for the HSC) is starting to sadden me greatly.

 

As one who didn’t have a ‘calling’ to be a teacher (and I have met many teachers who knew they would be teachers from a very young age) it is obvious to me that my greatest professional rewards have come from being in the classroom. Ironically, I never had any intention of seeking promotion for the first decade of my career but was persuaded by colleagues when we needed a relieving HT.

 

I’ve been a DP for exactly two years and sought the position for financial reasons. Quite simply, no matter how hard you work or try to develop professionally one can just not earn more money (‘merely’) teaching. One is forced out of the classroom by ‘the system’. Of course, I recognise the importance of educational leadership and the responsibilities, challenges and reward this entails. Much of the job is fine but basically I prefer teaching and take any opportunity to be with a class.

 

You may remember the Business Council of Australia (BCA) recommended earlier this year that teachers achieving a high level of proficiency should be paid up to $130 000. The paper, Teaching Talent: The Best Teachers For Australia’s Classrooms suggested a quality teacher had (p.12):

 

1. A high level of knowledge, imagination, passion, and belief in, and for, their field.

2. An overriding commitment to, and high aspirations for, their students’ learning.

3. A rich repertoire of skills, methods and approaches on which they are able to draw to provide the right ‘mix’ for the specific needs of individual students.

4. A detailed understanding of the context in which they are working; of the specific expectations of the community; and of the needs of the cohort of students for whom they are responsible.

5. A capacity to respond appropriately to students, individually and collectively, and to the context, through their teaching practice.

6. A refusal to let anything get in the way of their own or their students’ learning, and what they perceive as needing to be addressed.

7. A capacity to engender a high level of respect and even affection from their students and colleagues, a by-product of their hard work and professionalism.

8. A great capacity for engagement in professional learning through self-initiated involvement in various combinations of professional development activities, some provided by the employing authority; others sought out by the individual.

9. A great capacity to contribute to the professional learning of others, and a willingness to do so.

10. Moral leadership and professionalism, in that they exemplify high values and qualities and seek to encourage these in others.

 

I’d like to think our teachers would have an opportunity to be remunerated on their level of proficiency. The ‘system’ needs nothing less and anyone with the qualities listed above is a highly desirable person to have teaching my children. Industrial issues aside, we need to make progress towards this goal!

A Portal to Media Literacy

Everything’s changed or changing – fast. Michael Wesch commences with some of the issues of teaching in an inappropriate space before moving on to new media. I particularly love the Marshall McLuhan quote referred to at the opening of this hour long presentation: The past went that-a-way. When faced with a totally new situation, we tend always to attach ourselves to the objects, to the flavor of the most recent past. We look at the present through a rear view mirror. We march backwards into the future.

more about “A Portal to Media Literacy“, posted with vodpod

 

 

 

 

What makes a good HSC teacher?

What makes a good HSC teacher? is a great (updated) article by Wayne Sawyer based on research he did a while ago. Thoughts?