Visiting schools in the UK

A young man fetches his eleven years old boy from school. He is dressed in a nylon anorak from under which a long frock falls low on his calves. He is bearded and wears an Arabic cap. His right hand clutches his son's left hand. The young one is wearing the attire of the western male, a suit, white shirt and tie. It is the boy's school uniform.

To me those two clutched hands bridge Samuel Huntington's “Clash of civilizations”. I made a one week visit to schools at Small Heath, one of the most depraved urban districts of the UK in terms of employment, crime rate, health conditions and housing. Not so in terms of schooling, I learnt. The three schools I visited, a primary school and two comprehensive schools for secondary education, were all located in this area, and all three of them were appraised “outstanding” by Ofsted, the UK school inspection board. Of course these schools had not been chosen at random, I travelled with a group of Dutch teachers, on a study tour organised by the international branch Inet of the Specialist School and Academies Trust. Nevertheless, how is such a remarkable result achieved?

The Head

Firstly you need a visionary, charismatic school leader. The type of person you go along with, even when you don't buy into all the minutiae of his plans. One school was upgraded by such a leader within four years from the bottom of school ranking to the top. He expanded the school's remit from the school's premises, fenced with barbed wire, by reaching out to the community around it. One of the strands in his programme meant offering courses to adults. “Only the parenting course didn't catch on.” Such a leader is good at attracting sponsorship. The school's brand new van drove us from the hotel to school every morning and I guess such a vehicle can't be bought with state funding only. Not only is he a good manager but he motivates his staff on a daily basis. During briefings to all staff early in the morning he stands in the line of heads of departments, listens to their messages and shows his approval. He joins the roars of laughter. He meets all students weekly in the main hall and addresses them.

Secondly the school instils confidence in children and makes them ambitious. The school doesn't concede defeat, nor does it accept that the best children from poor backgrounds can hope for is a career as a taxi driver. Every student must get the education that enables him to materialise his talents. The school wants the academic inclined students to attain their A* levels and go to university.

Behaviour policy

With such aspirations the school cannot allow its students to indulge in silly behaviour. Sitting at the back of classrooms I only once in those four days saw a student do something which contradicted goal oriented student attendance. She took the pin out of the headscarf of the girl sitting before her. This was not perceived by the teacher, but the harassed girl griped and was expelled from the classroom straight away. To my amazement the insulted student left without any objection, while the perpetrator smiled smugly. In an other lesson I heard the teacher say: “I put you on a C1”, referring to a certain level of misbehaviour in a scheme for students understandably represented in “The Behaviour Snake.” You had better avoid spiralling down the curves towards the beak of the serpent. Ultimately you are sent away forever. I hadn't even noticed something was going on.
I witnessed this wonderful discipline at all three schools. All students seemed meek and obedient, not to compare with the rumbustious boys and chattering girls I meet in Dutch education. The whole situation seemed wholly otherworldly to me. I can come up with two explanations only. Possibly a school population of only immigrant students is more amenable because they share a completely different parental background. In their cultures the revolution of the sixties never took place, so to say. The other rationale might be that the discipline system is enforced rigorously in a concerted effort of all staff because everyone understands that giving some leeway would set hell loose. Probably both thoughts are valid: the problems we have in The Netherlands with young boys from Moroccan background often is explained by the gap between the rather loose Dutch society and home where they are flogged by their fathers.

Control

Just as school cannot allow students to create havoc, can it allow teachers to have it their own way. The outcome of lessons must be secured. So every lesson I observed started with stating goals to achieve by students. Students were asked to appraise their knowledge and skills with respect to this goals. Subsequently the lesson was executed, after which the students had to reflect on their success during this lesson. The teacher then would comment on their reflection by giving feedback leading to advice how to improve. This format of four steps was implemented in an amazing variety of ways, but always it would lead to evidence on paper, to be archived. I learnt that heads of departments checked their teachers and thereby produced more paper work to be delivered on demand. Clearly Ofsted has a stranglehold on every level of the hierarchic structure, felt every moment of the school day.

This ubiquitous lesson format guarantees a basic quality in any educational arrangement. The four steps are good practice. All lessons I observed were well executed by skilled teachers. The level of attainment by students was remarkable. I definitely took home a lot of ideas to improve my own practice. Albeit, the time spent on producing evidence on paper painstakingly cannot be used to produce new teaching tools and invent new directions. Some of my art lessons are adventures, for me and for my students. “Actually, I don't know what you are going to come up with,” I quite often hear myself explain to a student. I have not become a teacher to execute lessons only, though mostly this is what I do. I like to explore what teaching and learning is about by experimenting with unpredictable results. My teaching is learning, and it defies formats, not all of the time but sometimes. I guess my teaching would not be acclaimed in an English school. Ofsted would not approve of it.

Content and Language Integrated Learning

One can't help comparing when being in a completely different setting of your own job. At primary school I observed a reading lesson. The lesson prepared the kids for the Standard Assessment Test. That means teaching to the test. In Dutch schools the same lesson could have taken place in preparation of our CITO-test. In both countries the results of the tests are crucial, not only for the child but for the school as well, as the outcome will position the school in rankings.
I admired the quality of reading and the level of answering quite difficult questions, comparing these aspects with the reading abilities of my students in Dutch and my bilingual students in English. So I asked the teacher how many of these kids, twenty eight there were of them, spoke English at home. She answered promptly: “One.” This may not necessarily have been the one white kid in the room, there are a lot of people from Poland in the UK.
I teach in a Dutch immersion programme in which children are taught in English across half of the subjects. The kids in the English classroom are involved in an immersion programme in which all of their subjects are taught in a language not spoken at home. All these kids are bilingual, not just the gifted middle class kids as is the case in my school. These students speak Asian or African languages at home. All the teachers I met are involved in an immersion programme with a deep impact on the lives of their students.

Diversity

My colleague of art told me that, after having evaluated the results of a lesson on portraits, some of her students repaired the transgression of a taboo by scratching the eyes from their drawings. The English enjoy the advantage of having a tradition in wearing a uniform at schools: it hushes up differences in cultural backgrounds. In this district of Birmingham the school uniform includes a headscarf with the school's logo for girls who wish to cover their head. Also the school instils proud in diversity by organising “Diversity Days” which feature cultural backgrounds.

Conclusion

The most remarkable difference between the schools at Small Heath and my own educational environment in The Netherlands is the grip school management has on the classroom situation. Compared with these schools a Dutch school resembles sheer anarchy. A teacher in The Netherlands is quite autonomous with respect to his classroom management, the content of his lessons and the feedback he gives to his students. Any school leader wishing to steer his school towards a shared goal has to fight obstinate staff. At the Small Heath schools clearly all staff complied with diktats issued by the school management. Although this may be rooted in a different tradition it can also be related to the context in which the schools have to function. Having to cater for children in a multicultural inner city area sets clear targets which ask for a concerted effort by all teachers.

About dogs, kids and standardized tests

Can we compare the kids we meet in our class room with dogs? Are we trainers or educators?
Source image

Jason Flom has posted a highly peculiar metaphor at Ecology of Education. He has been on vacation to Scotland and has admired the remarkable skills of the Border Collie.
This leads him into thinking about a crucial dilemma in education. Shouldn't we accept that some children are inept at maths or science, or history?

It isn’t that many different breeds can’t be taught to herd, lead high-altitude rescue efforts, or kill foxes. They can. It’s just that teaching all dogs to do things which one particular breed can do better than any other doesn’t make much sense.
We accept the reasonableness of that argument for dogs. We reject it for kids.

His observation of dogs shepherding in the Scottish highlands triggers Jason Flom into rejecting standardised tests.

Think a promising trumpet player shouldn’t be kept out of the school orchestra or pushed out on the street because he can’t remember the date of the Boxer Rebellion?

This is a lousy metaphor. It is based on poor ethology. It results in detrimental ethics.

I have had a happy dog for sixteen years

Dogs are bred to demonstrate predictable behaviour to meet to their master's wishes. Being descendants from wolves, domesticated by mankind, they love to follow the leader of their pack, which happens to be a human being. That's why dogs are eager to show their innate qualities and don' t need to overcome their flaws. Dogs are not aware of their flaws. Don't teach your dog to overcome his dependency, it will result in a mean companion. You can train your dog to do tricks based on his natural behaviour, retrieve a stick and so on. That's all.

There is a difference between training and education

Humans are educated to enable creative versatile behaviour with which they can react to unpredictable circumstances independently and thereby pursue their personal happiness and shore up the common good of their tribe. They may heed the chief's stance, but only if it makes sense.
That's why they need a broad knowledge and understanding even in those fields in which they are not that talented. They need to learn a lot of things. Being able to learn a lot of things is the quintessential talent of our species. Homo sapiens is a far better learner than Canis lupus familiaris.

You do not own your classroom, you owe it to the world at large.

Secondary education must guarantee that everyone can participate in society and contribute to the survival of the species. That's why everyone has to attain a basic curriculum. On top of that everyone has to develop his natural talents for making a living as an expert, as a plumber, a rocket scientist or as a trumpet player. We need all those special skills and talents.
But we definitely need the excellent trumpet player to have also an educated opinion on matters of science: he has to vote on legislation which deals with environmental issues, for example. We don't want daft voters, do we? We don't want to treat musical talents like dogs who are rewarded with a cookie or hug when showing their tricks on request of the master, do we? We don't want the plumber to be invoked as a politician's running gag “Joe the Plumber,” do we?

No education without testing

Standardised testing guarantees that students push themselves to pass muster in a broad range of subjects, not only in their favourite activity. Without standards they would be too lazy and bail out. The trumpet player might get his applause but the world will collapse

I don't get it

I do not understand my fellow teachers from The United States. I only ran into this contentious issue while blogging. I am ignorant about “No Child Left Behind” or “The Common Core Standards.” I am a humble teacher from The Netherlands, who has been dogged for years and years by the standards of our national exams. But looking at international comparison of efficacy of education, I can only conclude that The Netherlands rank perennially in the top ten, if not the top five, while the United States lag way behind. Albeit, we, Dutch teachers, we are embarrassed, because we used to be in the top three. Apparently we have a problem and we are enviously looking at Finland: number one. Their secondary school concludes also with a nationally graded matriculation examination, devised in the ninetenteenth century, just like our national exams. They keep their exams up like we do.

Dear fellow teachers from The States: heed your chief's caution: you need standardised tests. You need national exams. It makes sense!

By the way

It goes without saying that any promising trumpet player who can memorise an intricate musical pattern is capable of remembering the date of the Boxer Rebellion. If he is too lazy to work at it, then just send him on the streets to busk. He may earn his bread and butter while other people decide on his future.

Guided instruction versus Independent Learning 2

A four-leaved clover only will be found when knowing what to look for

Mr Teacher commented on my last post about “Guided Instruction versus Independent Learning":

Without going in to specific details, surely the best option is an appropriate balance between the two?

Spot on! But what is being balanced?
The content of the lesson cannot be left to the students' inventiveness, as followers of constructivist learning theories all too often will have it.

A politician's ideology

In the Netherlands teachers have been harassed by a fierce lobby for constructivist learning theories during the last decades. This has lead to a thorough refurbishment of our secondary education, aiming at independent learning, the “Studiehuis,” in which supposedly the teacher's role shifts towards coaching students instead of directing students. This is epitomised by “De Nieuwste School,” a school whose curriculum is integrally constituted by students' questions.

Recantation

I have been an ardent follower of these ideas, and I am backpedalling.

Firstly, I have become disappointed too often with the results of learning arrangements in which students have to study more independently.
Most students cannot come up with relevant questions or topics that lead into effective research, or interesting art work, for that matter. Questions are the result of perception. You have to see that something weird is happening before asking yourself what is going on. Wonder about the relation between phenomena is impossible without actually experiencing these. Alas, perception is the result of learning and training.

Another fundamental problem is that questions can't be answered properly without a method of inquiry. Methods are related to disciplines, scientific systems, artistic disciplines, or professional procedures. The subjects traditionally taught at school offer training in these methods. Students' questions often tend to spring the boundaries of these subjects, which may be very interesting. However, these questions do not lead to a coherent learning process in which students really have to think deeply. Especially when expertise pertaining to the question is not available at school the research is bound to be shallow. I am fed up with copy cat answers from the internet, as I am with cliché art work.

Constructivist theories are being outmoded by neuroscience

Secondly, recent research has contradicted shallow constructivist ideas about learning independently. This was mentioned in my post.

Lastly, it has been made clear that the brain is developing at least until the age of twenty. Young students cannot cope with adult learning strategies, planning as adults do. Learning at secondary level cannot mirror the university system. Young students cannot plan their studies. they must be guided.

Between a rock and a hard place

So, what is being balanced? I am not going to ask my students what they want to learn. I know what they need being taught. The content of the lesson is my province, and I aim at the exam programs that run in my country. They need their diploma. That certificate guarantees a certain level of attainment. I may not agree with it completely but I have to comply with it and so must my students.

This content must be balanced with my didactics. Aiming for an exam program not necessarily means teaching to the test. By the way, the program is not that simple, as mentioned, it even asks for proofs of independent learning. At all cost I must prevent these students being bored by education. I need their rapt attention, which means that I have to fulfil their needs, I must give them ample opportunity to express themselves, to wonder, to ask any question. I need all my expedience to guide them cleverly by showing them where to go. Otherwise they get lost in meaninglessness.