Education reform has been sweeping the country the past few years. Some say that it began with the federal legislation of No Child Left Behind (2001) put in place during the Bush administration. This law increased school accountability and began the increased emphasis on standardized test scores as a measure of success. Others may say that this law did not “reform” education, but rather caused increased de facto segregation (most of the worst-performing schools are located in poor, urban neighborhoods) and that it has opened up a new market for education publishers in the area of standardized test preparation. For at least the last decade, government at both the federal and state level have been trying to “reform” education, but this is not going to happen if the teachers themselves do not change the way they think and what they do in their classrooms.
As a teacher for the last fifteen years, I have grown and changed in the practicing of my craft. I will admit that when I first began my career I approached teaching and learning in a way that was very similar to the way I had been taught. Typical classroom activities included lectures, readings, vocabulary, quizzes, projects, presentations, and unit tests. These have been the staple tools of teachers for over a hundred years. Education is changing, and teachers are going to need to change as well.
The Race to the Top legislation of the Obama administration increased the emphasis on student test data even more than NCLB did. Now, even more pressure to perform is on teachers and schools. Many states across the country have enacted "reform" legislation in the hopes of receiving this federal funding. Many states are creating teacher databases where student test scores will be tied to individual teachers. This, even more than NCLB, is putting pressure on teachers and administrators to raise test scores.
All of this top-down reform is not going to matter unless teachers make a shift in their attitudes and classroom practices. It is no longer okay to close your classroom door and do what you have been doing for the past ten years. It is no longer okay to pass the blame for students' lack of achievement on last year's teacher, the parents, poverty, or whatever other excuse we tend to use. Now, we must take the children that arrive in our classrooms and help them grow as learners in spite of the odds.
You may think that this will take a miracle, and it might. One thing is for sure, we must do everything in our power to help all students succeed. What types of things do I mean? Teachers need to look at their grading practices and understand how those practices impact student learning. For example, giving a zero on an assignment that has not been turned in. This is a fairly common practice that can cause a student to just give up when he is so far in the hole that no hope for recovery exists. Another example is not accepting late assignments. Sometimes a student doesn't want to do an assignment and actually feels relief when the due date passes and the assignment isn't done. They have essentially gotten out of doing the assignment by missing the due date. Instead, teachers need to shift their thinking and make the student do the work. For me, I call home and explain the situation to the parent. This does two things: it gets the parent involved, and it gets the student to do the assignment. Many teachers have negative feelings about this because it doesn't teach responsibility or the importance of turning in something on time. This is the very shift in thinking I am taking about. What is better for the student, doing the assignment late, or not doing it at all?
Another shift in teacher thinking should be with their assessment practices. Teachers need to ask themselves what the purpose of assessment is. I think most teachers would say that we assess students to see what they know and what they can do, but I think that that is not really what many teachers think. I think many teachers use assessment as a method of accountability for the students (much the same way that lawmakers are using assessment for accountability of teachers). They want to hold the students accountable for ALL of the content of their course. If students don't complete a portion of the content, their test scores will suffer and that will be their "punishment." Maybe next time, they will study. This attitude toward assessment is as faulty as the idea that student test data can show effective teachers. An effective assessment is one that is aligned to standards or benchmarks and tells the teacher which concepts the student understands. If the standard is for the student to understand the theme or main idea of a piece of text, why are there so many questions about specific details on the test? This is because many teachers, whether they would admit it or not, want tests to be a "gotcha" for students.
Why do teachers even issue grades to students in the first place? It is supposed to be communication to the student and the parent of the students’ current level of achievement. This is rarely the case. The assigning of grades is very competitive amongst students. Students are often measured against the other students in the class instead of against a standard or a benchmark. When we look at letter grades, there is much variation between teachers. These letters really have little meaning at all as to what a student can or cannot do, what he or she knows. Instead of measuring students against each other, teachers need to measure the student against a standard. When students have successfully demonstrated the standard or benchmark, they pass the course. This is not a competitive method. Everyone in the class can achieve the highest level. Many teachers have a difficult time accepting this idea. It is not the way most of us were educated.
There has been a shift towards this standards-based assessment, but it is primarily at the elementary level, not the secondary level. In order for true reform to take place, teachers need to look in their own classrooms first. Legislators can pass all of the laws they want in the name of education reform. True reform doesn't begin at the top. It begins with one teacher.