Friday, October 29, 2010
Friday, October 22, 2010
An Invitation
Today’s blog is about the Teaching and Learning page on www.tsta.org. You can find it in the middle of the blue bar at the top of the page or just hit the link at the end of this post. There are some great resources that have just been added, and it seems like we should take every opportunity to let you know what is there. Here are some very recent examples of new and helpful items.
1. There is a new document from TEA that’s designed to help teachers understand the new STAAR tests. The document came today, and it’s already posted.
2. There is a set of forms that work well for conducting a Manifestation Determination and a Behavioral Intervention Plan for students with special needs.
3. You can find a document called, “College Advising 101 Worksheet.” It gives high school students important questions related to financial planning, academic preparedness, and life on campus. This is a nice document if you teach in a high school.
Check back often to this page. In fact, you may want to bookmark the page. TSTA is here to help. That includes the things you do in the classroom.
http://www.tsta.org/teaching/current/index.shtml
1. There is a new document from TEA that’s designed to help teachers understand the new STAAR tests. The document came today, and it’s already posted.
2. There is a set of forms that work well for conducting a Manifestation Determination and a Behavioral Intervention Plan for students with special needs.
3. You can find a document called, “College Advising 101 Worksheet.” It gives high school students important questions related to financial planning, academic preparedness, and life on campus. This is a nice document if you teach in a high school.
Check back often to this page. In fact, you may want to bookmark the page. TSTA is here to help. That includes the things you do in the classroom.
http://www.tsta.org/teaching/current/index.shtml
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
Charter Schools and the One “Superman”
Many self-appointed experts use charter schools as justification to eliminate tenure, teachers’ unions, and salary schedules. One of the most famous of all charters is called, The Harlem Children’s Zone. The idea is a noble one: Geoffrey Canada started with one square block in Harlem and transformed the education in that area with a charter school. The HCZ now encompasses 97 square blocks in Harlem. This success is based on high-stakes test scores. It gets A LOT worse. The board of HCZ had Canada throw out the entire first class--the high-stakes test scores were not high enough. Talk about high stakes!
But new graduates of the HCZ are showing promise in the outer world. That’s the real test, isn’t it?
I think Mr. Canada’s current model is one to follow. He focuses on the whole child. Students receive medical care, a safe environment, a suddenly safer neighborhood, parents who have become involved, an 11-month school year, and extended school days. The cost of all of this? About $16,000 per year. That includes bonuses for students, who perform well on multiple measures. It also reflects the costs of longer schooling, and other factors. It does not include the costs for out-of-school things.
See last week’s posting for some perspective.
It’s amazing what happens when you see a child as human and not numeric. Geoffrey Canada’s ideas wouldn’t float here, though.
Today, we find that Texas is one of the very worst states when it comes to financial equity in schools.
The Education Law Center just released a report stating what most of us already knew: rich kids get better schools than poor kids, and Texas is awful on this measure.
This shows something else we already know: it takes money to teach children the right way.
Geoffrey Canada is a superhero because he is not afraid to spend money on kids. It’s too bad this governor and this legislature are more villains than superheroes.
You don’t have to put up with this, though.
Vote.
But new graduates of the HCZ are showing promise in the outer world. That’s the real test, isn’t it?
I think Mr. Canada’s current model is one to follow. He focuses on the whole child. Students receive medical care, a safe environment, a suddenly safer neighborhood, parents who have become involved, an 11-month school year, and extended school days. The cost of all of this? About $16,000 per year. That includes bonuses for students, who perform well on multiple measures. It also reflects the costs of longer schooling, and other factors. It does not include the costs for out-of-school things.
See last week’s posting for some perspective.
It’s amazing what happens when you see a child as human and not numeric. Geoffrey Canada’s ideas wouldn’t float here, though.
Today, we find that Texas is one of the very worst states when it comes to financial equity in schools.
The Education Law Center just released a report stating what most of us already knew: rich kids get better schools than poor kids, and Texas is awful on this measure.
This shows something else we already know: it takes money to teach children the right way.
Geoffrey Canada is a superhero because he is not afraid to spend money on kids. It’s too bad this governor and this legislature are more villains than superheroes.
You don’t have to put up with this, though.
Vote.
Thursday, October 7, 2010
Open Memorandum to the State Board for Educator Certification
To: Bonny L. Cain, Ed D., Board Chair
Christie Pogue, Board Vice Chair
Janie Baszile, Board Secretary
Brad W. Allard
Sandra Bridges
Jill Harrison Druesedow
Ben W. Morris
Curtis Culwell, Ed D.
Laurie Bricker
Judy Robison
Homer Dean Trevino
Grant W. Simpson, Ph. D
Fr: Paul T. Henley, Ph. D
Teaching and Learning Specialist
The Texas State Teachers Association
Greetings—
As Senate Bill 174 moves from legislation to fruition, your duties will be adjusted. You will now have more control, and thus more responsibility, to make meaningful decisions regarding educator preparation programs. When doing so, please look past overall data and focus quite specifically on what principals are saying about these programs. What follows is a case in point. I will just touch on the most salient points.
One of the largest certifying agents in Texas sent an evaluator, who watched a bilingual teacher work with a student in Spanish. He seemed happy during the lesson, smiling often. Under content knowledge sections, the teacher was rated at “Exceeds Expectations.”
One problem: the evaluator didn’t actually speak Spanish. He had no idea what was going on. He wasn’t even sure what content was taught…or should be taught.
The principal eventually confronted the evaluator, telling him that the next evaluation should be done by a bilingual evaluator.
This very large certification company has no bilingual evaluators.
The principal told the evaluator that the for-profit certifying company was failing their teacher-client.
“No, sir. We are doing exactly what we contracted to do with Ms. Watkins.”
In other words, this multi-million dollar corporation feels no obligation to ensure that the student was taught anything, just that he looked busy and interested.
If you hold these preparation programs to such miniscule standards as contractual agreements between savvy for-profit preparation programs and well-meaning people, you make teaching effectiveness and student learning meaningless in this system. Your job is to make sure that whatever gets taught in a situation like that is meaningful. You do that through SB 174. You do that through a staff that is given instruction not to put up with that. You do that by giving enormous weight to the aggregated opinions of those principals that have to live with the educator preparation programs’ shortcomings.
You have finally been given the power tools to make something beautiful. You have pilot data, and you can use upcoming data right now to begin holding certifying agents accountable. The first thing you need to do, though, is clear out those programs that put money too far ahead of kids. Don’t worry. It won’t be hard to figure out. The principals will tell you.
So listen.
Christie Pogue, Board Vice Chair
Janie Baszile, Board Secretary
Brad W. Allard
Sandra Bridges
Jill Harrison Druesedow
Ben W. Morris
Curtis Culwell, Ed D.
Laurie Bricker
Judy Robison
Homer Dean Trevino
Grant W. Simpson, Ph. D
Fr: Paul T. Henley, Ph. D
Teaching and Learning Specialist
The Texas State Teachers Association
Greetings—
As Senate Bill 174 moves from legislation to fruition, your duties will be adjusted. You will now have more control, and thus more responsibility, to make meaningful decisions regarding educator preparation programs. When doing so, please look past overall data and focus quite specifically on what principals are saying about these programs. What follows is a case in point. I will just touch on the most salient points.
One of the largest certifying agents in Texas sent an evaluator, who watched a bilingual teacher work with a student in Spanish. He seemed happy during the lesson, smiling often. Under content knowledge sections, the teacher was rated at “Exceeds Expectations.”
One problem: the evaluator didn’t actually speak Spanish. He had no idea what was going on. He wasn’t even sure what content was taught…or should be taught.
The principal eventually confronted the evaluator, telling him that the next evaluation should be done by a bilingual evaluator.
This very large certification company has no bilingual evaluators.
The principal told the evaluator that the for-profit certifying company was failing their teacher-client.
“No, sir. We are doing exactly what we contracted to do with Ms. Watkins.”
In other words, this multi-million dollar corporation feels no obligation to ensure that the student was taught anything, just that he looked busy and interested.
If you hold these preparation programs to such miniscule standards as contractual agreements between savvy for-profit preparation programs and well-meaning people, you make teaching effectiveness and student learning meaningless in this system. Your job is to make sure that whatever gets taught in a situation like that is meaningful. You do that through SB 174. You do that through a staff that is given instruction not to put up with that. You do that by giving enormous weight to the aggregated opinions of those principals that have to live with the educator preparation programs’ shortcomings.
You have finally been given the power tools to make something beautiful. You have pilot data, and you can use upcoming data right now to begin holding certifying agents accountable. The first thing you need to do, though, is clear out those programs that put money too far ahead of kids. Don’t worry. It won’t be hard to figure out. The principals will tell you.
So listen.
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