Why great teachers aren’t enough to make schools work

[proud2BlibKansan]

We love to talk about teachers — good teachers, bad teachers. Our entire narrative about schools seems to revolve around finding good teachers and firing bad ones.

In a way, it’s not surprising. We love to reduce complex issues to “people stories,” especially when we can paint one kind of people with white hats and pin black ones on somebody else.

As appealing as it is, there are two problems with the “good teacher, bad teacher” narrative. The first is that it plants certain unspoken images in our heads, which we often wind up accepting as true without examination. We unthinkingly know what we know — to our peril.

One of these unarticulated assumptions that takes root as a result of the “good teacher, bad teacher” narrative is that teachers are either naturals or they’re not. The number one strategy, then, is to find and retain the “right” people.

more . . . http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet

[xchrom]

1. recommend

[Supersedeas]

2. maybe A Duncan should read this

[Pooka Fey]

3. K&R

[janet118]

4. The most successful models . . .

have a team approach wherein seasoned teachers mentor less experienced teachers and both trade ideas and methods for implementing them. An essential element of this model is the strong support and cooperation of the principal and administration. The whole school/whole system becomes the focus of improvement instead of individual classrooms and star teachers. Rewarding "good" teachers individually sets up one-on-one competition between educators rather than creating a common goal of successful, well-educated students.

[msanthrope]

5. I'm interested that you find Harold Kwalwasser a credible education source.

He isn't a teacher, nor even an administrator. What's his authority to speak on education?

[Bill McBlueState]

6. The Nation ran something along these lines recently

http://www.thenation.com/article/162695/can-teachers-alone-overcome-poverty-steven-brill-thinks-so

"Can Teachers Alone Overcome Poverty? Steven Brill Thinks So"

Not surprisingly, given Brill’s history of interest in only the most controversial school reform issues, the book is filled with misleading discussions of complex education research, most notably a total elision of the fact that “nonschool” factors—family income, nutrition, health, English-language proficiency and the like—affect children’s academic performance, no matter how great their teachers are.

[proud2BlibKansan]

7. Steven Brill doesn't have a clue

Diane Ravitch literally roasted him the other day on BookTV. It was a thing of beauty.

[msanthrope]

8. No, I think she just got petulant because Brill critiqued her for not disclosing the speaking fees

she got from unions and the like.

Not that Diane Ravitch should not get speaking fees....she should make all the money she wants off of education reform. And in fact, Brill didn't think her views were influenced by the money.

But Brill is correct--when she is paid, she should disclose the fees.

[Starry Messenger]

9. k&r

[LWolf]

10. Great teachers are demoralized and denigrated by current policies:

FAILED policies that benefit no one but politicians and their neoliberal donors. The article goes on to point out:

The result in this case? We have wound up betting many of our reform dollars on things like pay for performance, where we are going to pay wonderful teachers whose kids do well on standardized tests. That is going to get us thousands of new and better teachers and motivate the best of the educators already in the schools. We persist in believing this idea is fundamental, even though virtually every recent study on pay for performance based on student achievement has failed to find any improvement in scores.

Here's the link for the article on those recent studies:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/report-test-based-incentives-dont-produce-real-student-achievement/2011/05/28/AG39wXDH_blog.html

Here's what they have to say:

The researchers concluded not only that incentive programs have not raised student achievement in the United States to the level achieved in the highest-performing countries but also that incentives/sanctions can give a false view of exactly how well students are doing. (The U.S. reform movement doesn’t follow the same principles that have been adopted by the other countries policymakers often cite. You can read an analysis of that by educator Linda Darling-Hammond here.)

Then there's this point:

Similarly, several states have adopted school reform legislation where one of the centerpieces is ending tenure. The unspoken part of the narrative is something like: We’ll now be able to fire lots of bad teachers and replace them with better ones. Unfortunately, there is no great pipeline of new, brilliant teachers waiting in line to be hired. If we fired just 10% of the current public school faculty, we would need a whopping 320,000 teachers to replace them. We don’t have that, and even if we had the numbers, we would have no assurance any of the new recruits would be more effective than those they are replacing.

Well, we know the end goal here; to hire a bunch of TFAs and/or other underqualified, non-professional people. To downgrade teaching from a profession to a clerk and babysitter: supervise behavior, read the scripted lessons, process the paperwork.

[proud2BlibKansan]

11. Thanks

This should be an OP.

[October]

12. So are students. Every generation hears that they aren't as good/smart/obedient/curious as _________

It's endless.

[LWolf]

13. My students have never heard that from me.

Not since I entered the classroom in 1983.

If there is one thing I know I've done right, it's that my students know I value them, believe in them, and care about them. ALL of them.

[October]

14. That's nice.

But the media screams it at kids -- they did when I was young, too.

It's demoralizing beyond belief. Appalling.

[seabeyond]

15. sittin at the table talking about a job done. said something about what you gotta learn

is step away from the job and LOOK to see if it is complete and done well.

dad said, true that. i remember my mom telling me the same thing.

my oldest son said with relief. i am so glad you said it was normal behavior and not our generation

being lazy, stupid, incompetent, ect....

agreed october