CCCS Website Review

Although the website is devoted to informing interested parties about the Core Curriculum Content Standards, I wonder how many teachers routinely visit the site. While all teachers are familiar with the standards and tailor their instruction accordingly, the standards are probably supplied to them by their district or department heads. Teachers know the standards associated with the subject they teach but may have little awareness of the standards governing other disciplines despite the movement to integrate instruction and information across content areas. Still, I wonder how many parents find themselves looking at the site to find out more about what is required to be taught in school. I imagine even fewer parents are even aware such a site exists.

The site is relatively well organized in its description of the standards, strands and progress indicators and its connection to the No Child Left Behind legislation. It illustrates the natural progression of movement from one part to the next and gives information to facilitate instruction between and among all disciplines. While teachers likely can navigate the website, parents might be less successful—at least at first—due to the amount of information contained in each discipline. To its credit, the site offers several different ways to access the standards so that it is available to people in a variety of ways. Still, when attempting to tap into the Gifted and Talented and Preschool Expectations portions of the site, error messages sometimes appeared.

Despite the comprehensive way it covers the standards, it does not seem to address the way in which the standards translate into instruction and offers few, if any, links to other sites that may be of interest to educators and parents. While the enormity of information presented can be a meaningful guide for some, it may be overwhelming and off putting to others—particularly as its description of what should be accomplished comes up against a host of natural barriers to its complete and full implementation.

180 Days: Too Much or Too Little?

Watching the 180 days video was quite an eye opener. With all that happens in school, I was shocked to learn that we get as much as 65 days of “real instruction.” But what constitutes “real instruction?” If instruction focuses strictly on traditional academics, it is a wonder that anybody learns anything. Still, schools seem to produce competent and productive adults who contribute to their world.

While all institutions look to be more productive, a certain amount of time is always misspent or, more likely, taken up by mundane tasks that keep things working and operating smoothly to a reasonable degree. Apart from the routine tasks undertaken by schools to keep them up and running, what, if any, value do assemblies, pep rallies and specialty programs like character education have to offer? More and more seems to factor into the modern school day as schools are being required to address a seeming range of needs that are thought to be related to the betterment of individuals and society. If the purpose of education is to prepare students to meet and master the challenges of their present and their future and a greater variety of skills are expected of citizens to impact their world and effect meaningful change, then perhaps 180 days of instruction is not enough. To be sure, schools need to provide academic instruction but they must also provide experiences that enrich the lives of students.

Although many say education has lost its focus by expanding it, I wonder if it is fair to say more meaningful or “real” instruction occurred in previous decades. My guess is that every generation grapples to define the nature and scope of education even if we think doing so is unique to our experience.

Sabertooth Curriculum

The Saber-Tooth Curriculum is a wonderful story of the way in which educational change—and perhaps any meaningful change in virtually any area—evolves over time. The evolution, however, is not without its bumps and is rarely an easy road to travel. The messages contained in the story seem as meaningful and appropriate today as they were when it was first written.

New-Fist was truly an innovator and a somewhat progressive thinker who questioned the established and traditional ways of doing things and recognized and proposed that the life of his children and the tribe as a whole could be improved and its continuation secured if changes were made in what and how information was taught. While some progressive members embraced his thinking and his approach to fish grabbing, horse clubbing and tiger scaring—all of which were necessary for survival—other more traditional members would have none of it and opposed changes on religious grounds—grounds which often are used as the basis to resist change and was seen in the famous twentieth century Scopes trial and in the current discussion of intelligent design. To enable traditional members to appreciate his point of view, New-Fist—like many other revolutionary thinkers who propose change—had to find a way to mesh his ideas with their conservative beliefs and their belief system, help them assimilate new ideas and accommodate new ways of thinking and enable them to overcome their fear of what changes would bring.

As demonstrated in the case of the Saber-Tooth Curriculum, once changes are adopted, they become the new established ways of doing things and those who heralded their arrival years before become those who remain steadfast in their resistance to change in the present. In my district, those who have been teaching the longest have found it difficult, if not impossible, to recognize and accept the changing role of education, understand and work with the changing needs of students and their parents and alter and modify the ways in which they teach. Most resist exploring their inability and/or unwillingness to change and, as a result, continue on their way to the detriment of the students.

While the district’s Superintendent/Principal encourages and wants change—particularly with respect to increasing differentiated instruction—and makes technical assistance available to all teachers, it is not enough. To effect real change, teachers and other stakeholders in the educational process have to alter their mindset, buy into new concepts, see themselves as agents of change and recognize its benefit to students, the community, their world and themselves. Still, it just may be as New-Fist’s society found, that necessity truly is the mother of invention—replacing old fundamental knowledge and the prevailing zeitgeist with new fundamental knowledge or at least expanding old knowledge to prepare for an ever changing world.

Change is the product of an often difficult birthing process. When making changes, you must make sure that you are not throwing out the baby with the bath water.

Response to Change Theory

In his proposal that change unfolds when forces promoting it are increased or forces hindering it are decreased, Fullan rightly recognizes the need to “unfreeze’ or alter the current situation, existing mindset or typical ways of doing things. While his description of change is simple in its conception, the process by which change is accomplished is more complex in its practice—particularly as it depends on individuals appreciating the need for change, accepting their responsibility as change makers and taking the steps to implement it—even if the outcome is not always assured.

Change, in any industry, organization or system, is difficult under the best of circumstances and school systems are no exception. Although many pay lip service touting the benefits of change, much of what happens in schools remains the same year to year especially among veteran teachers whose experience span decades. Meaningful change is often blocked by resistances that have their origin in fear—particularly with respect to the perceived ability to cope, handle and manage change and its potential impact on self-esteem if efforts are unsuccessful. For many, the status quo provides a level of familiarity and comfort that change threatens to disrupt.

Even the most progressive educational system—one whose teachers accept education’s moral purpose to educate today’s children for tomorrow’s world—will fall short without the willingness and courage to take a step—a step made easier when knowledge is acquired and shared among staff who experience supportive relationships that nurture growth.

Change may be inevitable but you would not always know it in schools.

Prensky, Marc, "The Prensky Challenge, www. marcprensky.com, 2004.

Response to Prensky

I think the Prensky Challenge is more theoretical than practical in its proposal that students spend the bulk of the school year immersed in a technologically based learning environment after accomplishing more traditional learning in the course of one semester. While I agree that teachers need to better examine what they do in the classroom and how they can enhance and facilitate learning among all learners—including those with special needs—the challenge presented by Prensky seems overreaching in its conception.

Although virtually all students embrace technology and often are better at working new gadgets than most adults--adults who frequently need the assistance of children to use their own technological devices—not all students learn best using the technological materials and approaches Prensky advocates. To be sure, technology enriches the lives of all who use it but it may not function as the principal motivation that underlies the desire to learn and the ability to do so. Motivation is based in part on the need to accomplish, achieve and learn and the sense of competence, mastery and esteem it provides. To the extent approaches to instruction tap into what motivates the learning of individual students and how successful they will be in their mastery of tasks, learning and the process of learning will be welcome challenges in its own right.

Is Prensky’s Challenge the right approach for some groups? Absolutely. Is it the right approach for all students? Probably not.