Welcome to the Curriculum 21 spring book study!
Each week, questions will be posted based on the chapters being discussed. Please post your comments to some, or all, of the questions. Because participants in the study come from diverse campuses and departments, you will want to frame your responses based on your particular perspective. Ideally, everyone will be able to benefit from each response. I certainly look forward to your input.
Chapter 1
1. How might we determine the year for which we are preparing out learners? For what years should we be be preparing them?
2. What evidence do we see in our classrooms of preparation for ongoing and thoughtful curriculum and instruction?
3. What do we need to know as a campus/department to prepare our students for the future?
4. Are there myths at play affecting our campuses and administration that hold us back from more bold and needed action? Our parents? Our students?
Chapter 2:
1. What assessments and skills do we value on our local level (district)?
2. Might we consider the 21st Century Pledge (pp. 22-23) as a way to begin to upgrade a unit at a time?
3. What resources do we have in our schools and community that are underutilized?
4. What Web 2.0 or technology tools might we add to our school's instructional arsenal?
Donna
Dr. Heidi Hayes Jacobs: Curriculum 21
What year are you preparing your students for? 1973? 1995? Can you honestly say that your school's curriculum and the programs you use are preparing your students for 2015 or 2020? Are you even preparing them for today? With those provocative questions, author and educator Heidi Hayes Jacobs launches a powerful case for overhauling, updating, and injecting life into the K-12 curriculum. Sharing her expertise as a world-renowned curriculum designer and calling upon the collective wisdom of 10 education thought leaders to inspire ideas in your district.
16 comments:
Chapter 1
I believe all three myths have an aspect in my community that is still hindering our progress.
Myth #1 - The good old days are still good enough. I believe the four program structures listed on p. 13 fall into this category and are big obstacles: the schedule, grouping learners, personnel configurations, and the use of space. Parents and teachers find comfort in the traditions of school. A prime example is the weekly spelling test. While some teachers have grasped the idea of giving a test only after many word work activities with a spelling pattern. Then giving the assessment when studnets are ready. Others find they can't let go of the weekly test even if the students are not transferring their knowledge after a test to other aspects of their learning. For those teachers who took the leap and did away with weekly spelling tests, it has been a positive experience. They explained to parents their rationale and parents for the most part have trusted their judgment. I see this as small progress in the area of scheduling.
Myth# 2 - We're better off if we all think alike and not too much.
The most heartbreaking part of this myth is the idea that intellects are looked down upon and considered "not cool" in our society today. I see many students who have great potential, but because they want to fit in with their peers, they will intentionally fail or do poorly. I see this mainly in girls on my campus.
Myth#3 - Too much creativity is dangerous - and the arts are frills.
Just as Daniel Pink says in A Whole New Mind, we have to cultivate and use both sides of the brain. Having knowledge today is just not enough, you have to use that knowledge alongside your creative side in order to be successful.
Chapter 2
The most significant part of this chapter for me was found on p. 18 where the author says, " The way to modernize our work is not to use a computer instead of a typewriter and call it innovative. It is to replace existing practices." The author goes on to say that we need to use the word replace instead of integrate. I believe this use of termonolgy is critical to change.
I believe that teachers want to be 21st century classrooms but because we live in the world of education we do not understand how rapidly the change needs to occur . As she points out, education has not undergone any major changes in the last 100 years, and this means that the reality of what we know as teachers has not changed. In order for us to change, we will have to educate our teachers and parents on the realities of what is really needed for our students to become successful in the 21st century. We will have to share information with our teachers on what people outside of education are actually doing.
It struck a cord with me on page 16 when she talked about our American ideals and how the rugged individualist who makes it with no education is so highly regarded. I have seen this with members of my own family who believe, "if it was good enough for us, it is good enough for them." We will have to explain to parents and teachers, that this is no longer the case, and we are doing our students a disservice if we do not ensure they are intellectuals.
In Chapter 2 I think she set a good timeline for change by asking the teachers to learn at least one new tool a semester or year and to change an assessment once a semester. I would love to include this kind of dialogue throughout the school year and in summative appraisals to ensure that we are setting the right expectations. I believe assessment is a great place to start because it makes so much more sense and is an easier way for teachers to start having those early wins that are going to be crucial for success.
I am intrigued by the question “what year are you preparing your students for?”
While I respect the intent of the question, I submit that any discussion of redesigning an approach to instructional delivery should consider a complete shift away from traditional timeframes. Thinking in terms of predicting future trends based either on past experiences or extrapolations of current technologies are no longer applicable to preparing students for the near or far future.
The best use of current technologies is to use them as tools for creating an instructional process that changes and adapts seamlessly. The technology used for instructional delivery should be both disposable and invisible. (Or to use Heidi Jacob’s point, used in a way that is not an “event”.)
Wait, Greg, did you say disposable? Yes, and it relates directly back to the question of how we view the timeframe of “what year are we planning for”…
In a rather full-circle way of looking at it, today’s technology should be used to prepare students to use and develop tomorrow’s technology. This means literally preparing students today for tomorrow. I do not mean “today” as in 2010 preparing for “tomorrow” as in 2012. I mean it in the most absolute terms of preparing students on Tuesday for what they will experience Wednesday.
Let me illustrate with a few examples:
If you were teaching students in 1996, and you wanted to prepare them for 2000, would you have been able to show them how to use “search engines” as we know them today? No. Google wasn’t available until 1997.
As late as 2004 if you wanted to prepare students for locating amateur or professional videos on-line, you would not have been able to use YouTube.
It didn’t exist until 2005.
When the iPhone was released in 2007, even Apple now admits they did not foresee many of the applications that were eventually created and are now widely used.
And now we have the iPad. This time Apple acknowledges up front that they have created a platform for use with applications still unforeseen and yet to be developed.
The iPad is a device (not the only, just the most widely advertised) which demonstrates the next wave of technology that changes HOURLY. I cannot tell you what tasks I might be performing on my iPhone or iPad next week, or even tomorrow. I may log onto iTunes tonight and discover an entirely new application.
If you were to ask me how I will be using my home Mac, iPhone, or iPad next week, I cannot tell you. I do not know what new applications will be introduced tonight, tomorrow, or next week. Forget trying to predict a year from now.
Traditional timeframes are no longer relevant. What should today’s classroom look like, and how should we be preparing students for the future? I suggest we start by integrating into all instructional delivery models the precept of helping students to accommodate ever-changing technologies in order to acquire new learning. If done properly, students should develop a basic 21st Century Life Skill, namely:
The ability to use and discard technologies and applications as quickly as they change in order to apply newer technologies and applications in the acquisition of new learning.
As we share our thoughts in this book study, I will hold the perspective that planning toward an abstract future date is not the way to proceed. Trying to plan for a world which changes so quickly and so dramatically on an ever- increasing basis is no longer the best paradigm. If we are going to truly create an environment in which students create their own future, we should plan to integrate existing technologies as seamlessly as possible into every lesson with the thought that we are not preparing students for next year. We are preparing them for tomorrow.
I hate to do it, but I agree with Greg. We are preparing our kids for tomorrow. We have to prepare them for the unknown. They will be using today's technology/learning in ways never dreamed possible. We have to build that latitude into our lessons. It is a new way of thinking for many of them (the teachers) as what they do many days is so concrete. It is hard to get to a destination when you do not know what the destination is. So, we stick to what got us where we are.
As for the myths, we need to do a better job of educating our stakeholders that divergent thinking, and new ways of doing things are okay. We need to prepare them for this.
We should probably weed the garden of some of the things that we are currently doing in the classrooms. Give the teachers permission to not do some of the things that they traditionally do because they traditionally do them. The spelling tests are a great example. I am sure there are many many more that get in the way.
We also have to dismiss the idea of seat time for credit. You have to spend 90% of 180 days in the seat to get credit for this class... if you made a 70% or better during that seat time. How do you change that? I think what this movement is really all about is getting at what kids know. Getting to the heart of what they know and not forcing them into the our mindset of "You are awesome at calculus... my best student ever, but you still have to spend the next 162 days in here working problems because the state says so.
Does BISD have our own set of myths that are keeping us from doing these things?
I think that Myth #1 was always a fallacy. Education like other things is always in a state of obsolescence. I have heard many educators say "If it's not broken, don't fix it". I have never agreed because we must constantly be learning and moving forward to help our students realize their dreams for the future.
I do agree that funding for the arts curriculum is usually lacking and I believe as the book says that by not funding we are not reaching many of our students. This is especially true in elementary when we have no art curriculum and we know that many students are gifted in this area.
We do have some under utilized technology tools in our building that would increase student engagement and improve instruction. We are investing in smartboards, webcams, and digital cameras. We have some experience with CPI units, digital video cameras, voice thread, websites,electronic field trips, and many teachers take online courses. Student access to computers is minimal with only one or two desktop computers available in each class. Most of our students do not have access to a computer at home. If there is a computer, internet service is often not available. I think that replacing some assessments with new technology is a great idea and one that some teachers are beginning to use and all should try. Students love to use the CPI unit to register answers on a quiz.
I am not sure if I am answering any of the posted questions per se, but my area of thought in Chapter 1 has to do with Jacob's thoughts on the "new versions of school". I am so all about the need for a whole new way of "doing" school, and yet we seem to be forever STUCK in this 100 year old model of how curriculum is delivered. Having been in education for 28 years, I know how hard it is to break out of the mold both as a teacher and an administrator. I feel the frustration of teachers who want to sometimes go a different direction for the sake of their students, for I was that teacher. It is so hard to break free from tradition when, even with the tecnological world that we live in today, we still see our great state spend BILLIONS on textbooks that will be outdated in a month. We have technology at our fingertips, yet the difficulty of transitioning a teacher from what they have done for years is overwhelming at times.
Jacobs talks about a growth model rather than a change model, and I want to believe that is possible, but I have also read many authors that believe that a more immediate change is necessary if you want to see any real and pronounced increase in production, including education. I am hoping that I can be convinced as I make my way through this book.
As for Chapter 2, I believe that technology is our best friend and our greatest enemy. Placing technology into the hands of our students is the ONLY way that they are going to have a successful future. We have no choice, and we must do everything in our power to make this happen. It is our enemy because we are going to have to conquer it in making it a daily classroom philosophy, not something that is used occasionally for a cool lesson. It has to BECOME our planning, our instruction, and our assessment on a daily basis. Otherwise, it will disappear like all other "programs" and we will be back in the 100 year old classroom yet again, giving out spelling words on Monday, and giving the test on Friday. Technology..... friend and foe...........
And I echo Bicknell: Do we have myths of our own that are slowing down our progress?
I have been thinking about the section in chapter 2 about upgrading the assessments.
I think a lot of our teachers are trying to advance their assessment types and use projects (with a rubric), and some journal entries as well as "tests" to evaluate their students. I'm not sure it goes much past collecting a grade and possibly going over a test with a whole class. Do they look at how their teaching might change to better reach the student? Do they think about how to regoup stufents to maximize their learning?
I liked that HHJ "replacing" not "integratin" as we change assessments.
I like that she separated teh WHAT assessments were availabel and HOW the students could show their mastery of concepts and skills.
I'm now considering how I can change what I do with teachers to assist them as we all group and move down this road into an unknow future of technology. I think we need to be sure we have the kids with us. They can teach us about what "moves" them the best. We need to be willing to have LOTS of assessmetns and assessment vehicles available to students.
Thanks for the comments this week. I am not at all surprised by the depth and complexity of your thought processes because I consider each of you great thinkers as well as leaders. I appreciate you nudging me (and others at the district level) by asking if as a district we might be impeding the progress toward 21st Century skills. Just like teachers who are not meeting their kids where they are, many of our district practices are continued because we got really good at doing them. It will be incumbent on everyone, regardless of the roles each has, to recognize a need for change and commit to moving toward that change in order to make a difference.
Cultivating a mindset of growth, rather than change, yields positive results according to Heidi Hayes Jacobs. Furthermore, HHJ states that schools need a new form rather than reform. With these ideas in mind and driving our actions, it is time to take action! “Because that’s the way its always been done” is not a good reason to do anything. BISD’s new staff development project for the 2010/11 school year will hopefully open the doors to creative thought that will lead to engaging teaching and learning as we endeavor to prepare student for the future, future learning opportunities that is. I agree with Greg’s post – using the available tools and resources, which are plenty in BISD, students need the opportunity to use their naturally creative minds to produce. The list at the top of page 24 is all doable today, and will prepare students for tomorrow while engaging students in creating their own future.
I don’t believe that we can determine a year for which we are preparing our learners. We should be preparing them for any year that comes in front of them not a year that we can predict. Bill Gates attended a public elementary school and moved into a private high school. His high school doesn’t look different than any other private high school experience. Other than a greater diversity, Lakeside High School is no different than BISD high schools. Larry Page, founder of Google, attended East Lansing High School. Again, it is not different than BISD schools. We want to produce more students like Bill Gates and Larry Page who can think at high levels and provide us with the tools we are trying to utilize to prepare our students for their future. Bill Gates and Larry Page only used the tools that were available to them at the time, which sparked an interest that they pursued. Did their teachers think about Microsoft or Google when they were teaching them the curriculum provided to them? I do believe their teachers and families allowed them to dream and didn’t discourage innovative thinking. Educating our students is not necessarily about training them to use the tools as regurgitation of an activity, but to have available the tools and allow them to utilize the tools to think creatively, investigate, and shape their own ideas. In order to think creatively and develop new ideas, teachers and students should be learning how to ask the questions to learn and think differently and deeper. We as educators need to let go of our own inhibitions and nostalgia and allow students to create and dream and develop a sense of drive for their own goals.
We are seeing a growing trend to utilize new technology in the classrooms. Students are creating their own story books in Kindergarten and first grade to writing computer programs to develop designs in fifth grade. Students are learning from different places by utilizing distance learning. Students are able to choose some of their own experiences. This is a change from the past in which learning was restricted to paper, pencil; one-size fits all lessons, and an isolated classroom. We must always be looking for the ways to continue to change our instruction and thinking in order to meet the needs of the students. Utilizing the tools available creates the environment for students to investigate their interests.
We need to let go of the confines established in our own minds regarding school. Allowing students to show us what they have learned without using a test would be progress towards the learning that we desire.
If we measure what we treasure, it looks like we value TEKS checks and TAKS results. It would be great to consider the 21st Century Pledge. I had not read this book or heard Heidi Hayes Jacobs speak before planning our campus ALT days for 2010-2011. Our design team and SBDM team spent time planning our ALT days. Our ALT days look like the outline of the pledge for the commitment of the teacher. This book affirms our work as a campus that we are looking to the future for our students. In addition to the commitment of the teacher will be for me to add this type of learning on the website for all of us and others to see our learning instead of posting TEKS checks and TAKS results. The tools that we have available to us are growing. It is our goal to continue to acquire new technologies as they are available in order for our students to have access to these tools.
What year are we preparing our student for?
I like this thought so much that from now on every time I address a faculty or present this will be my first question. As educators we must begin with the end in mind and adjust our teaching to not how we were taught but what is best for our student’s future
Myth #3:
Myth number three really bothered me, I find it interesting that we are supposed to value and appreciate the arts & creativity, however we have no full time art teachers at our elementary schools. That puts a huge responsibility on our shoulders to make sure the arts are taught and creativity is appreciated
Not integrating but replacing...
With in my lifetime I have hand written, typed and used a word processor for written assessment, but they are all essentially the same thing. It wasn’t until I was working on my masters that I suggested to one of my professors that I would rather make a PowerPoint instead of typing a paper. He like the idea and allowed me to do an alternate assignment. I enjoyed working on this assignment because it was a better fit with my learning style.
How many students are out there too afraid to walk up to their teacher and ask to do a podcast, video, or screen play for their assignment? Teachers and administrators must start replacing old assessments with new and relative assessments. I liked her suggestion… “Replace one assessment a semester” that’s only two during an entire school year. I liked this because it is such a small step and ingrains the idea that this in not short term but a journey.
As a historian, I must say that there is much to be valued and learned from the past. However, to value the lessons of the past does not mean one has always to do things/think about things/or teach things that have always been done/thought/taught in an archaic manner.
I most appreciate the plan to replace assessment types in a systemic manner, with buy in from the instructors. The caution in this is, however, not to assume the everyone demonstrating their learning through the same technology tool is any better than everyone demonstrating their learning through older strategy such as essay writing. The better method would be to give students choice in determining the method by which they would like to demonstrate their learning.
Do we have district myths? Yes. Here are some that I hear on a regular basis: "We can't utilize technology because not all of our students have access to technology--especially the poor kids.", "We don't have time to study something in-depth because we have to cover the curriculum.", "I don't know how to use this technology so I don't think it is a good instructional tool or assessment for the curriculum."
I think that we have a job of "Mythbusting" on the campuses and in the district. How will we model growth and effective work in the 21st century for our learning communities?
Julie
Those that know me well know that I’m an old car aficionado. I have a 1966 station wagon that is a very nice old car, but it is Worlds apart from the 2008 Scion xB that I drive daily. I am amazed at how far we’ve come in a hundred years when it comes to the automobile. The basic function of brakes, steering, safety and reliability have dramatically improved – there is no argument there, but that is not the greatest area of change with respect to the automobile. When you look at a 1903 Ford Quadracycle, you can readily recognize it as an automobile, but that is about as far as the similarities between the two go. As I type this, I am looking at three vintage automobile ads that I have framed in my office, one from 1951, one from 1953, and one from 1962. What these all have in common is that these ads highlight the safety, the newness, and the innovation that has transpired over the previous year’s offerings. When you watch ads today, they, too, will highlight the safety innovations that are included in the year model’s offerings. So what is different? From my perspective, it is the purpose of the automobile. They are still used as a means of getting from one place to another, but what I see is that the new brand of transportation seems to hone in on the experience… like the Cadillac commercials with the lady driver that is talking about all the things that used to separate a man from a woman are no longer applicable when she is behind the wheel of the sporty Cadillac STS. The commercial for the Kia Soul… it’s about a lifestyle, the experience. So, even though cars still have the same basic job they had 100 years ago, the focus is now on the “experience” one has by owning this particular car. So, what does this have to do with education? Today, we are trying to establish a movement that schools should be about the experience, to be able to think, to find information, to apply one’s findings to the World in which they live, but society, squawk as much as they do about the need for change, likes it the way it is. To change is to be too unsettling. For what year are we preparing our students? This question has been burning at me since before reading the chapters. What I find most horrifying is how we, a nation of school systems, are tied to the “committee of 10’s” findings 100 years later. So I know I’m not answering the question completely right, but I honestly feel that barring a catastrophic event, the year that we will be preparing our children for is for the way it was. We have too many folks who are happy with “the way we were” and this makes me sad. Don’t get me wrong, I feel that there will be slow change in the right direction, but it will be in pockets and will be sporadic and not nearly systematic enough. After reading the comments that have been posted, I like what I hear, but as long as we have a centralized governmental bureaucratic organizational framework, schools will always lag behind society’s pace of change and will remain the butt of politician’s ire.
The things that I found interesting in chapter 1 involved the confrontation with schools as they currently are and how they have not changed during the past 80 years and the need to transform our schools into environments where our students will be equipped to function in the 21st century. Recognizing that standards are not the same and as a result students are not achieving the same quality of education is scary. I remember talking with my son about the standards they are using in Virginia and Washington DC. They were not interested at all in what we are doing in Texas and were choosing other standards to work with. Are our children receiving the quality of education they will need to be successful in an increasingly global society?
Challenging our schools to change the way we assess student learning is a major breakthrough. Stepping away from our traditional ways of assessing student progress will be very frightening for most. I liked the suggestion that we examine all the technological tools that are available to us and then begin to explore the different ways to use them. Understanding that using the computer rather than the typewriter does not qualify as using technology. For many, that is the extent of change that we have embraced. It is very important that we move beyond this. The challenge to replace dated assessment with assessment that matches the times we live in was excellent. This is something I hope to implement this year.
We have begun the process of writing secondary ELA in earnest because we have all the things that we need: new TEKS, new textbooks and new tests on the horizon. Our biggest challenge will be replacing existing curriculum with curriculum that will help students in whatever their futures hold.
We're really trying to build units that rest on big concepts and questions that are relevant. We are finding that the biggest differences between this curriculum and our old curriculum are the suggested assessments and products that we've designed. For instance, we're doing short research products throughout the year for 6-10 grades. Julie and Hugh are helping us to come up with relevant topics that relate to the social studies and science of their grade levels. Additionally, we're asking both what and why about the topics.
While technology will certainly be part of the 21st century for our students, interdependence of knowledge will definitely be a part of the futures as well.
I really liked the 21st Century Pledge that was included in Chapter 2. I think that provides a great framework to approach issues presented in this book. I liked how the pledge holds both teachers AND administrators accountable.
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