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This post originally appeared 11/14/16 at http://www.aimsedu.org/2016/11/14/conversation. My work with the AIMS team began last month after 20 years in public education, first as an elementary teacher and later as a mathematics coach. I have spent a lot of hours in TK-12 classrooms, walking alongside teachers as they explored ways to make their classrooms places where authentic mathematics learning could happen. In all of this work I have come to understand teaching and learning as innately human activities that connect us to one another through conversation.
Conversations happen in many settings. Think about the last time you gathered around the dinner table with friends. One person starts to tell a story. Another friend chimes in. Soon everyone starts nodding and laughing in agreement. Then one person tells a slightly different version of the story, revealing details from a different perspective. Discussion follows. Perhaps the story is revised further. More laughing follows. Then there’s the quiet lull that indicates collaborative satisfaction. The interpretation of a story is negotiated through contributions around the dinner table. I’ve been deeply inspired by Paulo Freire, the notable Brazilian educator and philosopher. Freire was committed to dialogue that affirmed the human construction of meaning. “Dialogue is a way of knowing,” Freire wrote. “Dialogue cannot be reduced to the act of one person’s depositing ideas in another, nor can it become a simple exchange of ideas to be consumed… Because dialogue is an encounter among women and men who name the world, it must not be a situation where some name on behalf of others… Dialogue further requires an intense faith in humankind, faith in their power to make and remake, to create and re-create, faith in their vocation to be more fully human.” At the AIMS center we have faith in children. We have faith in their innate, human ability to make and remake, to create and re-create. And we have faith in teachers and their ability to listen to children. Because of this faith, we’re committed to dialogue about how children come to know. Our Early Mathematics Team is particularly interested in how 3-5 year olds develop early counting and number concepts. Much of our work involves conversations with young children–not conversations in which we “deposit” ideas into children, but rather conversations through which we begin to think like children, to seek to understand their approaches, to explore what their mathematical knowledge might be like. As we spend time in preschool classrooms and observe children interacting within their physical environments, it’s very clear that early learning involves dialogue. We know from our efforts to understand the ideas of Piaget and other constructivists that children learn from dialogue with others. In fact, it has been suggested in this work that interactions with others are among the most frequent causes of learning. So, let’s engage in conversation. We’ll learn more about each other and ourselves as a result. It is, after all, a very human thing to do. Further Reading Freire, P. (1970). Pedagogy of the Oppressed. Myra Bergman Ramos, trans. New York, NY: Continuum. Freire, P., & Macedo, D. (1995). A dialogue: Culture, language, and race. Harvard Educational Review, 65(3), 377-403. Von Glasersfeld, E. (1995). Radical Constructivism: A Way of Knowing and Learning. Studies in Mathematics Education Series: 6. Bristol, PA: Falmer Press, Taylor & Francis Inc.
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Less than a month after I read Ilana Horn's thoughtful post on teacher professional development, "Professional Development is Broken, But Be Careful How We Fix It," I came across this article from Education Week:
Here's a brief definition of micro-credentialing from the article:
The article goes on to say that sometimes these badges are accompanied by salary increases worth several hundred dollars.
While this trend isn't likely to replace traditional professional development, it strikes me as an interesting response to the need for teachers to develop new and improved skills. Fundamental to the idea of micro-credentialing is the belief that there are specific competencies that are crucial to teaching, and that these skills can be learned and measured. The folks at University of Michigan's TeachingWorks would agree. They've defined what they call high-leverage instructional practices and are working to create a National Observational Teaching Examination which uses on-demand performance assessments to measure teacher readiness. Researchers at Massey University, New Zealand, explain, "Routines capture the certainties within teaching, and as such can be anticipated and can become part of a knowledge base for learning how to teach." Here's what I like about micro-credentialing for developing these routines:
1. Jim Knight says, "Goals that others choose for us seldom motivate us to change." Micro-credentialing could allow for self-organized cohorts of teachers to select a teaching practice, connect with an instructional coach, explore the teaching practice together, interact with students, and collect evidence of their implementation. That's sound practice.
2. Micro-credentialing could place the burden of proof in the hands of the teacher: collect student work, create a video of your practice, utilize peer observation. In other words, you choose the evidence. 3. Teachers who participate in this process are encouraged to implement, submit for approval, and then serve as reviewers for colleagues. This could generate a culture of adult-learning that could be contagious. Inherent in any system that assigns rewards is the understanding that much of what goes on will be unrewarded. In my work with teachers, a consistent tension is present between developing proficiency in specific competencies and developing a general adaptability to students in the classroom. From Anthony and colleagues at Massey University: "Signifying adaptive expertise, they (teachers) pursue the knowledge of why and under which conditions certain approaches have to be used or new approaches have to be devised."
Teacher: I adapted to my students today. Do I get a badge now?
Reviewer: Sorry, there's no micro-credential for that.
Now on to some concerns about micro-credentialing:
1. External reward systems obscure and often negate internal rewards. Are external rewards necessary because we've done such a poor job of helping teachers recognize the indirect, sometimes hidden, rewards in the lives of their students? As Parker Palmer writes, "As important as methods may be, the most practical thing we can achieve in any kind of work is insight into what is happening inside us as we do it." 2. Much like online safety-training modules or traffic school courses, computer-based "quests" that issue a micro-credential upon completion can't guarantee that any real learning has taken place. 3. Who determines what competencies are worthy of micro-credentials? How are reviewers selected? How do schools or districts ensure that all teachers have equal access and opportunity to participate in the process? In the article from Education Week, Brent Maddin, provost of Relay's Graduate School of Education, questions whether micro-credentials atomize teaching to a fault. He asks, "Is there something powerful about how multiple techniques, or moves, or strategies, or competencies move together that are an even better indication of what a teacher can know and do in the classroom?" The short answer is yes. But there's already a credential for that.
Sources:
Anthony, G., Hunter, J., & Hunter, R. (2015). Prospective teachers development of adaptive expertise. Teaching and Teacher Education, 49, 108–117. Knight, J., & Learning Forward. (2011). Unmistakable impact: A partnership approach for dramatically improving instruction. Thousand Oaks, Calif: Corwin Press. Palmer, P. J. (1998). The courage to teach: Exploring the inner landscape of a teacher's life. San Francisco, Calif: Jossey-Bass.
Here's a salute to one of the oldest manipulatives still in use in today's digital classrooms.
1. Investigating Area by Folding Paper
2. Algebraic Models
3. Tangrams
4. How many times can you fold a piece of paper?
The bow hasn't been out since, and I think I know why. "We should make a target," Aaron said. I agreed. This activity would certainly be more fun and more rewarding with a target. And we could instantly tell if we were getting better at shooting. In his book, Unmistakable Impact, Jim Knight suggests the use of a "Target," a simple, one-page document that clearly states a school's goals for instructional improvement. Most improvement plans fail, Knight suggests, because they are too long, too complex, and too unrelated to instruction. This reminds me of arrows never flying, falling to the ground after a short flight, or soaring over the fence in wild flight. In a typical week, a school leader will receive dozens of emails and several catalogues of teaching practices, and over a year will be presented with literally thousands of options for instructional improvement. |
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