Books, must read: CURRICULUM 21, edited by Heidi Hayes Jacobs

Most of us are buried under piles of must-read books on educational topics, but I'm afraid I generally prefer books whose prefaces and cover blurbs don't tell the whole story--a common failing of education books. Thus, when Curriculum 21: Essential Education for a Changing World (ASCD, 2010) arrived as a premium with my ASCD membership, I read the back and started the Introduction without expecting much.

Don't get me wrong. I've been a fan of Heidi Hayes Jacobs, who edited the book and wrote the key early chapters, ever since spending the better part of a week in a workshop with her and Grant Wiggins in 1994; I'm a long-time believe in curriculum mapping, and every time I've heard Dr. Jacobs since then I've come away with lots of good ideas and inspiration. Nonetheless, I tend to put my ASCD member books in pile to be skimmed at some future point and then read carefully only if the skim captivates me. Well, it's the truth; there are are other things I like to read more.

Jacobs' introduction to Curriculum 21 starts perilously close to edu-porn, about which I've written earlier, starting with the usual 21st-century indictments of the work writers seem to enjoy accusing many schools of continuing to do: "What year are you preparing your students for? 1973? 1995?"

But quickly enough the justification and the overview give way to Chapter One, "A New Essential Curriculum for a New Time," that lays out an excellent case for change. In the following chapters Jacobs even suggests an entirely practical process for initiating and working through this change.

For the rest of Curriculum 21, Jacobs and the books other contributors--including Steven Wilmarth, Vivian Stewart, Tim Tyson, Frank W. Baker, David Niguidula, Jaimie P. Cloud, Alan November, Bill Sheskey, Arthur L. Costa, and Bena Kallick--make not only the case for incorporating the full menu of 21st-century skills--including 21st-century habits of mind, from Costa and Kallick--but also some plausible, do-able ideas for doing the work.

It's pretty extraordinary: powerful case statements by the educational leaders most associated with the program elements generally regarded as the foundation stones of 21st-century curriculum, written in a style that is neither shrill nor hectoring. Curriculum 21 offers a rare thing, which is a mature, measured perspective on the best practices that will inform the work of schools in the decades to come.

What I like best is that the authors, Jacobs and all the rest, write in a way that feels grounded in the educational history that has come before, incorporating the new understandings of cognition, child development, and curriculum and assessment design that educators have gained in the last half-century or so. They even suggest that students and teachers are human beings with a range of responses to change--and that the process of change needs to acknowledge this. Yes, it's progressive, even New Progressive.

So, to haul out a cliche that seems especially apt, if you read only one book on 21st-century education this year--and there are plenty of choices around--check out Curriculum 21. You will actually want to read, and learn from, this one.

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Edu-Porn

A smart blogger at Toxic Culture correctly identified as "edu-porn" those feel-good articles and films that show a well-meaning rebel thinking outside the box and transforming schools and classrooms, one caring little environment at a time. Ever since Mr. Daddy-O decided to come back for another round of teaching would-be juvenile delinquents in the 1956 film Blackboard Jungle, audiences and voters have been comforted to know that one person can make a difference in schools, at least until they leave (as Evan Hunter, author of The Blackboard Jungle, the novel on which the film was based, did after 17 days as a teacher).

But there is another kind of edu-porn, the sadomasochist side of the genre, that gets an awful lot of airplay these days and that must offer the same frisson of pleasure to its purveyors that those teacher-savior stories provide. I am talking about the mountains of statistics--seldom represented by the same numbers twice, so it seems--that "prove" that American children are falling ever farther behind their peers in other nations, particularly those with growing economies in Asia. These numbers are regularly hauled out by commentators on the right and increasingly the left as evidence that our schools are failing, our children are doomed, and our society and nation are plummeting into irrelevancy.

I don't even care whether these numbers, based on all kinds of comparative test data, are right or wrong; in the aggregate I know that they are real and alarming. What concerns me is that I have long sensed a kind of weird, cruel "I-told-you-so" pleasure among some of those who are most eager to tell us that the children of China, India, Singapore, Japan, and even Finland (Finland!) are soon going to be our superiors in the global economic and political order; better start learning Mandarin so that we'll have a few interlocutors who will be able to speak with our new masters!

Often enough the blame for this trend, which goes back to the post-Sputnik era in its most statistical and malevolent form, seems directed at whatever version of "progressive education" the blamer has created in his or her own mind and doesn't like.

Mathematics instruction--which is clearly in need of improvement in the U.S., with Singapore and Japanese models offering tremendous promise--usually tops the list of curricular and pedagogical culprits, but "multiculturalism," project-based instruction, school schedules and calendars, and of course anything associated with the word "self-esteem" are among the usual suspects. I think that I occasionally catch a whiff of regret among the most vitriolic of education critics that the American education system has invited girls, and then students of color, into the classrooms where white boys once reigned, and of course there is the strange and apparently countervailing abhorrence of "elites" and elitism that lets the harshest critics have it both ways--hating both the education system and those who have succeeded at a high level within it.

Clearly those who have expressed hope that the Obama presidency will fail--regardless of all the human suffering that would accompany the kind of failure for which they most hope--are a model for a kind of political schadenfreude that is equally turned on by the idea that American schools are failing and that American children are victims of this failure. This stance lets those who are just plain cynical claim at least equal air time with those who propose legitimate or at least well-meaning solutions, from charter schools to vouchers to serious reform. In the avalanche of dreadful numbers, it's hard to see who is offering real hope and who are just gratified by watching educators and the initiatives of the past three or five or twenty decades twist in the wind.

Of late I have noted from the more progressive side of the field some of the same. In particular, some of the strongest (and in some cases most accurate) advocates around technology in education and "21st-century skills" can sometimes be heard pronouncing the same kind of doom on education and educators, suggesting that the "failure" to move forward quickly enough toward a more tech-informed, more New Progressive approach to teaching and learning is a kind of crime being practiced on children. Like angry educational conservatives who believe they know it all and take pleasure in pointing out the failings of education as it is currently practiced, the more shrill voices on the other end of the spectrum risk turning their critiques into the kind of splenetic, empty rhetoric that makes them feel good and impedes real progress.

Sadomasochistic edu-porn is not, apparently, the province of the right only, but I hope that those who are most sincere and thoughtful in their efforts to reform the system can restrain their delight in pointing out what's wrong and focus rather on moving the American educational system toward what is effective and what best meets the real needs of children.

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The Intentional Teacher, at last

I'm pleased to mention here that The Intentional Teacher: Forging a Great Career in the Independent School Classroom is at last available. Although the book can be ordered by phone directly from the publisher, Avocus Publishing (800-345-6665; their website is undergoing renovation), the best way to purchase at this point is from Amazon.

The book is intended for aspiring and working teachers as well as for administrators, mentors, and others who hire and support teachers in their schools. There are chapters on
* what it takes to be a teacher
* finding a job
* getting to know students
* classroom management
* planning
* setting standards
* feedback
* working with families
* diversity and equity
* advising and supervising outside the classroom
* coaching
* child and adolescent development
* curriculum and pedagogy
* professional behavior
* the teacher's role in the school
* career paths

There is a resource section for each chapter and a few useful templates--unit design, project planning, daily planning--that should be useful to schools.

The educational philosophy underlying the book is New Progressive in every way; it's about building relationships with students and creating learning experiences that are purposeful, engaging, exciting, and challenging. The independent school focus is really about making the most of one's personal and professional capacities in an environment that often calls upon teachers to play many roles in students' lives.

The sticker price is $26.95. Avocus has produced a number of books on independent school issues, and I have to say they have put this one together very nicely.
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Best practice or travesty?

A while back I went to the Progressive Education Network's biennial gathering, held this year in D.C. (well, Bethesda, actually). It was an interesting experience to say the least, and perhaps one I'm willing to wait a couple of years to have again.

I had been invited to present on The New Progressivism, which I did both as a proponent and as a reporter of what I see as going on in the field. (You can find the PowerPoint of my presentation here; I apologize that Slideshare wasn't able to take in the rather nice old display font I used for the titles, leaving some oddly proportioned text here and there.)

First, though, there was the opening ceremony and keynote, given by the redoubtable Marian Wright Edelman. Ms. Edelman was late for the event, having been testifying at the capitol all day on health care issues and children. Not a problem, of course.

What was a problem, at least for me, was the kind of giddy glee I sensed in the crowd as the schedule unraveled--"in the spirit of progressive education," as one of the emcees said while filling in the time.

No! No! No! The idea that progressive education is some kind of loopy, anarchic "go with the flow" version of education is exactly what makes much harder the work of those of us who are trying to convince serious people that progressive education, done well by serious people, is serious. Sure, things go wrong, and sure, as educators we work hard to be responsive to student interests and teachable moments, but let's not start with the assumption that it's all going to get weird, anyway.

The expectation that progressive education is when things don't go as planned--or maybe they aren't planned at all--undermines pretty much everything that serious progressive educators from John Dewey forward have been trying to do. Progressive teaching, the crafting of educational experiences that may feel fluid and spontaneous but that are in fact extremely focused on achieving specific goals, is hard work.

But the next day, at my presentation, things got a bit more strange.

A very nice and thoughtful group of listeners paid polite attention as I went through my spiel. I thought the slides looked nice. So I wasn't quite prepared for a pretty personal tirade from one attendee, who accused me of a kind of intellectual totalitarianism, "pushing" "my" New Progressivism to the exclusion of all other kinds of education.

Jeepers! Hadn't meant to do that. Thought I had been talking about the ways in which some of the thinking of the Old Ones from the Progressive Education Association era had evolved, informed by new understandings about cognition, development, and social issues, into something new that preserved the intent of the founding generations but that used new science and new pedagogical principles to strengthen the educational impact of the work. I had also wanted to convey a sense that this kind of thinking about curriculum, kids, and teaching is becoming pervasive in many schools that are forward-thinking and outside the constraints of the standardized testing monster.

One listener helpfully suggested that what I was saying was that New Progressive teaching is pretty much best practice these days. Yes! That's it; although I'm glad I didn't use the superlative term there or the totalitarian brand might have burned even deeper. An Australian educator wanted to know why what I was talking about even merited discussion; it's the way things have been done Down Under for a while, as we know.

Thankfully, I guess, the conversation in the all-white group devolved into some talk about diversity, and everyone could agree that it posed serious challenges for schools. Then time was up, and I was off to catch my train.

On the way home, and since then, I've been wondering what inspired the philippic and the defensiveness. At best, I might think I hadn't been clear enough in stating my thesis, which was just to talk about how the ways had changed even as the intent remained the same, Dewey to Sizer.

At worst, though, I had to wonder whether the anarchic strain of progressive education as well as the political strain that grew up in the Free School era of the 1960s remains at the core of what many practitioners of "progressive education" believe. The idea, then, that scientific discipline might be imposed on the "child-centered," "go with the flow," "we love kids and you don't" version of progressive education that is regularly ridiculed and condemned in the popular media might just look like being co-opted to folks who got into this work in a certain time period.

And of course, being co-opted--progressive practice as BEST practice; horrors!--would be a terrible thing, selling out your values to a host of straight-line, "traditional" schools whose faculties could hardly appreciate the spirit and genius of kids as progressive educators do. It would be, if you were a true believer in the idea that progressive education meant a kind of affectionate disorder, nothing less than a travesty.

Well, I think that the practices that I call New Progressive are indeed natural outgrowths of the work done by the "old" progressives of the pre-tie-dye era. I also happen to believe that the host of straight-line, "traditional" schools that have begun to grab hold of and thoughtfully, mindfully implement New Progressive practices are on the right track and that what they do every day both defines and refines what can be generally regarded as best practice in education.

I guess I should on the record here as understanding that there are many kinds of education, many kinds of kids, and many kinds of schools. I understand that some kinds of education are based on extreme structure and that these systems work for many kids; and that's more than okay--it's necessary. New Progressivism isn't the only approach to education, but I think that it happens to be a very good one. What I like about it, and what I respect about the approaches of, say, KIPP and Waldorf schools, is that, properly executed, all are the product of thought and planning. The spirit of New Progressive education is a spirit of purpose that accepts serendipity, not a spirit of serendipity alone.

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Theodore Sizer

I would happily fill this space with a tribute to the late Theodore Sizer, but a colleague has written one that cannot be surpassed insofar as it says all the things that I think most need saying about our fallen comrade and leader. So check out "Losing Another Lion" by Jonathan Martin. The rest of the 21K12 blog is pretty great, as well.

What I will say about Ted Sizer is that his work on school reform came along just as many of us seemed to be ready to enter into a comfortable if perhaps a little lackluster academic middle age. The Horace books shook us up, and the Coalition gave us a set of ideals to which we might aspire. Later writing, such as The Students Are Watching and The Red Pencil, inspired even the least reflective among us to ponder our work deeply and powerfully. Along the way we discovered the complementary genius of Nancy Faust Sizer, Ted's estimable spouse and collaborator.

We will miss Ted Sizer, but thankfully his legacy will live on for generations of schoolchildren yet unborn.
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The Old Progressivism, redux

On my office wall for many years I've had posted a copy of "The Principles of Progressive Education," a seven-point 1924 document written on behalf of the Progressive Education Association by, I am told, Eugene Randolph Smith, a progressive educator who was founding head of both the Park School of Baltimore and Beaver Country Day School, outside Boston.

Mirroring the troubling national rise in politically intemperate speech, I have noted in recent weeks that the U.S. citations on the Google Alerts I receive on "progressive education" are getting weirder and more shrill. Progressive education, as usual, is blamed for all kinds of things and related to atheism, ignorance, socialism, and even (my late favorite) to a progressive educational plot to decrease literacy in America--the blogger who came up with that one found a Dewey quote, or rather a quote from a book about Dewey, that supported this wacky notion. So much for rigorous use of evidence.

I thought it might be time to trot out the 1924 Principles, which graced the inside cover of the PEA's magazine for five years or so and which pretty seriously fail to live up to any of the exciting, crazy things that are being imputed to it by 2009 blogsters.

I'll quote the entire document after the break.

"The Principles of Progressive Education

"I. Freedom to Develop Naturally. The conduct of the pupil should be governed by himself according to the social needs of his community, rather than by arbitrary laws. Full opportunity for initiative and self-expression should be provided, together with an environment rich in interesting material that is available for the free use of every pupil.

"II. Interest, the Motive of All Work. Interest should be satisfied and developed through: (1) Direct and indirect contact with the world and its activities, and use of the experience thus gained. (2) Application of knowledge gained, and correlation between different subjects. (3) The consciousness of achievement.

"III. The Teacher a Guide, Not a Task-Master. It is essential that teachers should believe in the aims and general principles of Progressive Education and that they should have latitude for the development of initiative and originality. Progressive teachers will encourage the use of all the senses, training the pupils in both observation and judgment; and instead of hearing recitations only, will spend most of the time teaching how to use various sources of information, including life activities as well as books; how to reason about the information thus acquired; and how to express forcefully and logically the conclusions reached. Ideal teaching conditions demand that classes be small, especially in the elementary school years.

"IV. Scientific Study of Pupil Development. School records should not be confined to the marks given by teachers to show the advancement of the pupils in their study of subjects, but should also include both objective and subjective reports on those physical, mental, moral and social characteristics which affect both school and adult life, and which can be influenced by the school and the home. Such records should be used as a guide for the treatment of each pupil, and should also serve to focus the attention of the teacher on the all-important work of development rather than on simply teaching subject matter.

"V. Greater Attention to All that Affects the Child's Physical Development. One of the first considerations of Progressive Education is the health of the pupils. Much more room in which to move about, better light and air, clean and well ventilated buildings, easier access to the out-of-doors and greater use of it, are all necessary. There should be frequent use of adequate playgrounds. The teachers should observe closely the physical conditions of each pupil and, in cooperation with the home, make abounding health the first objective of childhood.

"VI. Co-operation Between School and Home to Meet the Needs of Child Life. The school should provide, with the home, as much as is possible of all that the natural interests and activities of the child demand, especially during the elementary school years. These conditions can come about only through intelligent co-operation between parents and teachers.

"VII. The Progressive School a Leader in Educational Movements. The Progressive School should be a leader in educational movements. It should be a laboratory where new ideas, if worthy, meet encouragement; where tradition alone does not rule, but the best of the past is leavened with the discoveries of today, and the result is freely added to the sum of educational knowledge."

I won't comment at length here other than to say I don't see anything crazy here, or for that matter many things that are far removed from what has become educational best practice in the age of New Progressive education. Don't think there's anything here that most of us wouldn't happily and proudly stand by today, 85 years after this was written. Perhaps what's most disturbing is that many of these ideas would seem new to some of our colleagues.

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You've Gotta Be Sincere, But There's More

Had an interesting response from a reader (and former student) to the previous post in reference to the writing I've been doing on school sustainability. She is about to start a job at a nature center that works with a number of independent schools, and she is excited about some of their initiatives in the context of the broader rubric of school sustainability--as long, she says, as "it turns out to be sincere and holistic and not just a gimmick."

She hits the nail on the head, I think, at least from the perception side. Educators everywhere can be accused of grabbing onto any number of great-sounding ideas--the gimmick du jour, it sometimes seems--and of then failing to continue the work that would turn the idea into a sustainable and sustaining part of the practice and learning culture of their institution. Thus do good ideas shrivel into "gimmicks."

I like to believe that the issue is almost never one of sincerity or a failure of holistic thinking. Rather, educational ideas that are bruited about in schools and then fail to take root are almost always victims of a kind of institutional ADD, an almost extreme distractibility that stems from schools' failure to discipline themselves to stand firm in their missions and values as well as from the seductive allure of so many new currents in educational thought--what my boss quotes a consultant as calling "the tyranny of good ideas."

In recent years good ideas, many of which are part and parcel of New Progressive core practice, have swept through schools like Southern California wildfires, causing much consternation and giving birth to a host of committees and strategic goals around technology, globalization, environmental practice, curriculum, service learning, character education--you name it. All of these are good ideas, deeply rooted in sound educational thought and a profound belief in the capacities of children and the promise of schools. How could a thoughtful educator or a forward-thinking school turn its back on any of them?

If it sounds as though I am about to advocate doing just that, hold on. Earlier I made reference to mission and core values, and if a school is going to go "whole hog" in any direction, mission and values dictate what that direction must be. Rather than become an environmental school, or a laptop school, or a global school, or a character-education school, an institution must be the kind of school it is at its core, in its heart, and in its heritage. All the good ideas in the world, pasted on or plunked into the program just because they're good ideas, won't make a wobbly school sustainable or a weak school strong.

My commentator's word "holistic," I think, holds the key to doing it right. Find the parts of the good ideas that resonate with the core and that can be thoughtfully and intentionally integrated into practice, and make them work. Oftentimes they will supplant or replace existing work, and sometimes they will supplement it in a way that enriches current practice. The work may be hard for the school and its teachers and challenging to its students, but if (and only if) it is OF A PIECE with what the school already does and stands for, it will embed itself sincerely and holistically in the fabric and life of the school. It won't be just another abandoned gimmick receding in the rear-view mirror as the school careens into an uncertain future but rather a part of the engine that drives the school forward on a course about which there is shared understanding and excitement.

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