On Education

I think the proliferation of charter schools speaks volumes to America’s frustration with our traditional antiquated school program. A school system based on an agrarian calendar and an assembly line time schedule in this age is past archaic.

We now know that people have different learning styles and learning times. A system that dictates when you must know something and is instruction based vs. teaching based is not working and is adding to the frustration of the very people we are trying to reach, ergo the high dropout rate.

I think teachers are more like the shepherd who had ninety-nine sheep and went to find the one that was missing. That would be no child left behind. Get every child to the same knowledge regardless of how long it takes. We all know that, depending the lesson, someone is always going to get it first and someone is going to take the longest getting it. Good teaching works through this and gets everyone on the same page.

Technology has been with us long enough for everyone to come to the conclusion that it is not going away. Babies are bombarded with visual stimulus for near birth. By the time they are in kindergarten, they more than likely have manipulated some sort of gaming or computer based device. They are used to being entertained. They are familiar with the hand/eye coordination of gaming. They are used to a faster paced environment.

As educators, we have to move and teach in a similar environment. For youth who are not familiar with this type of environment we have to introduce them to it because it is the environment of the workplace as well. Expediency may be the current traditional schools goal, but quality and quantity should be today’s goal.

This means that we drop the Carnegie method, forget about needing summer off for crop retrieval, and forget about schooling taking twelve years. Learning is a womb to tomb process. Basic knowledge, which is needed to function in the market place and home environment, should be infused in all aspect of this process, and it should be practical.

One of the things that I think we fail to incorporate or capitalize on in school is the social aspect of school. There is a lot of conversation about bullying and popularity, but has the education arena tried to tie into this as a vehicle for learning? Sometimes the only reason youth go to school is to talk and play with their friends. Is there an opportunity to use this to educators’ advantage?

Some things that I’ve seen that work well:

Multi grade classrooms

Themed education (usually done in an alternative school – literature based, math/science based, foreign language based programming)

12 – month programming

Hands on learning environments

Learning on site (apprenticeships for example)

Field trips (which can be done very well virtually nowadays)

KIPP. Here is a program that is designed for troubled youth who are behind in school, but I think if they had this program from day one, no one would be behind.

I could probably write a chapter on each paragraph above and still come up with more…….. but I have gone too far for a BLOG page anyway. Holler back if you’d like to talk about this.