I just finished reading Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers (2008). This book looks at how a few individuals have become very successful and explores how and why this happens. I know it was published a few years ago, but its message about how to help public school students become more successful really resonates with me in light of all of the education "reforms" taking place throughout the country. These "reforms" have been concentrated on teacher quality and accountability. I am going to make a few suggestions that could have an impact on education. These ideas have nothing to do with teachers and everything to do with students. Gladwell has some interesting ideas of education that I will discuss later.
I also read today The State of America's Children 2011 Report put together by the Children's Defense Fund. This report paints a very bleak picture for children of poverty ever having a chance at success in this country unless some sort of intervention occurs. In the introduction, founder of CDF Marian Wright Edelman lists seven lessons that America needs to learn in order to save the children born into poverty:
Lesson one: Don't miss the boat...any nation failing that is failing to prepare all of its children for the productive work and life needs to correct course - now.
Lesson two: We are all in the same boat...Black, Hispanic and other children of color will constitute a majority in 2019.
Lesson three: Plan ahead...We must resist our quick fix, quarterly profit driven culture and invest in the future.
Lesson four: Don't listen to the critics and naysayers.
Lesson five: For safety's sake, travel in pairs. Better still, travel in groups able to make a ruckus loud enough to be heard.
Lesson six: Remember that the Ark was built by amateurs; the Titanic by professionals...Use your own power to make a difference.
Lesson seven: Build your future, build our children's future and our nations' future on high ground...This may be the first time in our history when our children and grandchildren will be worse off than their parents and grandparents.
Her report covers many social concerns for children of poverty, but I want to focus on the education. The report provides a ton of statistics, most of which are alarming.
The United States ranks 24th among 30 developed countries on overall educational achievement for 15-year olds.
American schools are resegregating: 78 percent of Hispanic students and 73 percent of Black students are in predominantly minority schools.
More than 60 percent of fourth, eighth and 12th grade public school students are reading or doing math below grade level.
There is page after page of statistics that show how dire the situation is. It is something that educators have been talking about, but those in power do not want to acknowledge. They claim that we are just making excuses for poverty, and that if we can't get the job done then we should get out. They also claim the the problem is with teacher quality.
The connection of these facts to Gladwell's book after the squiggle.
Back to Malcolm Gladwell's book...He spends some time in the book discussing birthdays. You may wonder what on earth this has to do with education reform, but give me a second to explain. In the United States, we have a birthday cutoff for entrance into kindergarten. For example, in Utah where I lived when I began school, the cutoff date was December 1st. My birthday is December 10th, and I had to wait an entire year to start school, having missed the cutoff by a mere nine days. According to Gladwell, this was an advantage for me because I was older when I started school. He goes so far as to say that the way we organize our schools is entirely wrong. He suggests that the age difference in kindergarten is so significant, that students would benefit from month groupings. He suggests putting all the children born in January, February, March and April in one class...All the children born in May June, July and August be put in another class...And all of the children born at the end of the year in a third class.
This idea is very different from what we do now, but it makes total sense! Best of all, this small change in organization will not cost a district a single penny. And it is all about students, and NOT about teachers. Imagine how well a kindergarten teacher could tailor lessons to students who were similar in maturity and ability. This grouping wouldn't need to continue throughout school because as children get older the differences in development become less noticeable.
Gladwell's book is not a model for education reform, but it has some remarkable ideas in it. In one chapter he looks at the disparity between Asian students and American students in mathematics. He attributes the higher scores of Asians on standardized math tests to the words that they use for numbers. In English, the words for numbers are long and confusing, whereas in Chinese they are short and logical. They also allow for easy computations. For example, if you were to ask an English-speaking child to add the numbers twenty-three and thirty-six, he would first have to convert the words to numerals before adding them together. However, in Chinese, the words don't need converting. The word for twenty-three is two ten three and the word for thirty-six is three ten six, easily setting up adding the tens and the ones without any conversion to numerals being necessary. Gladwell suggests that this language advantage that Chinese have puts them ahead of English-speaking students by the time they are lower elementary.
Is there anything here we can use to give young American students more of an advantage in mathematics? Perhaps teaching them Mandarin in preschool, I'm not sure...I just find it interesting that we keep beating ourselves up over the fact that the Chinese kicked our butts on the PISA, but some of it can be attributed to their language and some of it can be attributed to their culture.
In a later chapter, Gladwell talks about testing students, something that is widely popular today. He is not making any judgement about testing, but looks at students test scores from students of poverty versus students from middle class or wealth. When students are given a reading test in September and again in June, one can look at the amount of growth a student makes during the school year. This is nothing new. However, when you look at student test scores the following September, you can see a remarkable difference in students from poverty and students from wealth. Students from wealth increased their reading scores even over the summer, while the students from poverty scored lower than they had at the end of the previous year.
This finding has a couple of implications. One is that we need reading programs in schools for the summer months, especially in urban schools. These reading programs need to involve the families of the students. They need to be fun and non-threatening. They need to be easily accessible. This type of program of course, will cost money, but I think it would be money well spent. Again, here we have a reform that doesn't have anything to do with teacher quality or accountability.
It also implies that we need to take a look at our school calendar. When compared to other countries that kick our butt on the PISA, our students do not go to school long enough per year The average is 180 school days, versus 220 days for students in Japan. If our students are losing gains made in reading over the three month break, why do we continue to have a three month break? Some schools, especially in California where overcrowding is an issue, schools are on a year-round schedule. Kids still get a break in August, but it is no longer the entire summer off. Comparing test scores (like everyone loves to do) of year-round schools and traditional schools, show the year-round schools ahead. Instead of adding days (which would cost money) schools could change the calendar and stop the summer slide.
Another thing we need to look at it the length of the school day. Gladwell discusses KIPP Academy in the Bronx, New York in his book. The students at KIPP are mostly minorities, mostly low income students. They have created a school that has been able to help students make huge gains. Most of their students go on to college, usually the first in their families to do so. KIPP can be a model for other schools in urban areas. Students are at school from 7:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. and most stay after to get extra help. They also go to school on Saturdays for several hours and from 8:00 a.m. to 2 p.m. in the summer. They have vacation for August. Class periods for English and math are 90 minutes. Teachers at KIPP say that this allows them to go more in depth. They don't feel rushed to get through the curriculum.
Now this sort of a change would definitely cost money, especially in states where teachers are unionized. Teachers working longer hours and many more days would have to be compensated. But notice that this reform still has nothing to do with teacher quality or accountability. Again, it is all about the students and how much time they spend in school. If we really want to improve education, we need to shift our focus onto them because that is the reason public education exists.
And now I come back to Edelman's State of America's Children Report. Her conclusion states
We must invest in our children and their families. This means keeping key priorities for children front and center...[We must] provide high quality early childhood development programs for all...[We must] ensure every child can read at grade level by the fourth grade and guarantee quality education through high school graduation.
What we really need is to get off the testing bandwagon and concentrate more on the students and learning than on testing and teacher accountability. I am so sick of hearing about merit pay, value-added, or student growth data that I want to scream. Instead, I think I'll just write...