Success in Teaching

by Wendy Fischman

Today is the second day of the Expeditionary Learning (EL) National Conference 2010, in Kansas City (where the temperature outside seems to be “warming up” to a whopping 30 degrees!). The conference has been inspiring and powerful thus far, and even more so for us on the GoodWork Project because of its focus on “good work.”

Lynn and I are facilitating two “master classes” in which we have about 40 participants in each—teachers, administrators, and counselors at schools engaged with EL practice. (For more information about this organization, please visit their website, link below). We planned a similar course outline to others we have facilitated in the past. In the course, we ask educators to reflect on their own work lives and to consider their own goals, objectives, and interests in education. Participants pair-up and interview each other with 5 questions:

– What initially attracted you to your work?

– What kinds of things are you trying to accomplish in your work right now?

– What are you hoping will be the greatest impact of the work you are currently doing?

– How do you define success?

– What direction do you see for the future of your own career?

Although each course takes different shape, participants share similar feedback about this activity. Specifically, they report that considering these questions is a helpful and rare opportunity to think about their own work, and that the question about success is the most difficult. This is not a surprise to us, we hear this from most participants.

Why is it that it is so hard to define success in this domain?

We frequently hear educators struggle with the definition of success. For most educators, it is defined through the actions, behaviors, and performances of the students, and rarely about themselves (even though educators’ work is focused on students). So, for example, students’ improved test scores, engagement of students who are not usually “present” in the classroom, or students coming back to thank their teachers for the impact they had on their lives —are all indicators and signs of success for educators. But what about the educators themselves?

One participant in the EL conference talked about a personal dilemma he faced in teaching. At one point in his career, he taught individuals who were going into teaching. There was at least one student that he felt was not ready to become an independent teacher—he was concerned about his lack of skills for future students. This participant was faced with the decision about whether to pass this student or to confront him with honesty and hold back his career plans. This dilemma reminds me of the story of Steven in the Toolkit, an engineering professor that faces a dilemma about grade inflation. Even though he was in a university setting that supported grade inflation to move students swiftly through the program, he refused to compromise his values of honesty and integrity—and only gave students the grades that reflected their work and progress, even if these grades were not always favorable. We’ve heard similar pressures from other educators who have participated in our courses. For example, an administrator told us she was pressured by a superintendent to fabricate attendance records of students in an inner city school. And a teacher, who when she covered for a colleague on maternity leave, discovered that students were not being graded fairly. She struggled to decide whether to make other administrators aware of this (and jeapordize her colleague’s job) or just let it go.

In all these cases, the stories are complex. One EL participant stated that she likes to let students know that lives are complicated—there are not always going to be easy “right” and “wrong” answers, but that students should be equipped with experiences and skills that help them make the best choices at that time. This is exactly the purpose of the GoodWork Toolkit. And we believe that with these genuine, real complexities, thinking about tough choices in terms of levels of responsibility is helpful: responsibility to self, responsibility to others (colleagues, peers), responsibility to workplace, responsibility to domain, and responsibility to society. These different responsibilities do not necessarily make decisions any easier, but they do provide a framework that can be used to think deeply about the choices with which we are confronted and the consequences of our decisions.

All of this gets me back to that pesty topic of success. I believe it is hard for educators to talk about success because there is no alignment in the domain about this issue. In general, politicians believe success is favorable numbers (test scores, attendance numbers, etc.). Students strive to excel and move to the next grade. Parents may define success as having their children get into top colleges and eventually get good jobs. For teachers, it is different. At least for teachers involved with EL, success is about thinking deeply, being able to solve problems, being a “good” citizen, and pushing the boundaries. We have a lot to learn from this group.

Link: http://www.elschools.org/

Digital Media and American Youth

by Katie Davis

Have the digital media changed American youth? That’s the question that a group of researchers, including members of Howard Gardner’s research team at Project Zero, met to discuss last December in Princeton, New Jersey. The MacArthur Foundation’s Digital Media and Learning Initiative sponsored the day-long event, which gave researchers from a variety of disciplines the chance to share their research and reflections on the changes over time in youth’s interests, experiences, and development that appear to be associated with their digital media practices. Katie Davis, a researcher at Project Zero, wrote about the event for MacArthur’s Spotlight Blog. Her full report on the convening is also available from the link below.

Document: princeton_convening_report_dec09.pdf

Surface Manifestations of Leadership

by Howard Gardner

With President’s Day around the corner, it seems a good time to reflect on the nature of leadership. Below, we share Howard Gardner’s responses to some questions recently posed by an Italian journalist.

Until the 20th century, most citizens had no idea of what their leaders looked or sounded like, and certainly did not feel that they had any personal relations or connections to the leaders. This did not matter so much, because most countries were not democracies, and even those that were usually had parliamentary systems rather than direct election of leaders.

We live in a time of more direct voting for leaders and where most citizens have access to the media– first radio, then television, now a 24-7 news cycle which includes Youtube, Facebook, Twitter etc. Even though leaders themselves do not know that many citizens, citizens feel that they know the leaders. Indeed, they might well want to use the first name with Tony or Bill or Silvio because they feel that they have an intimate relationship to the leaders, even if the relationship is obviously one way and largely illusory.

Also, politics in terms of parties has declined universally. Fewer and fewer people ALWAYS vote Labor, or Christian Democrat or Communist. Indeed, as the world now knows, my home state of Massachusetts, regarded as the most liberal state in the United States, just voted in a Republican Senator by a wide margin. In most elections, only a tiny minority of voters actually know the stated positions of the candidates, and even fewer understand the issues well enough to paraphrase a law (like health care legislation) or a policy (on immigration, on nuclear test ban, on carbon emissions etc).

Accordingly, we now have a state of affairs where elections are significantly ‘beauty contests’. Just as voting on television programs like “American Idol” have a lot to do with how comfortable the audience feels with the performers now invading their living rooms, so, too, elections often hinge on how likeable and simpatico are the candidates. It is not that most Americans thought that George W. Bush was MORE competent than Al Gore or John Kerry. They liked Bush better and that sufficed for him to win two elections, against individuals who were arguably more competent and certainly more knowledgeable, but with whom the voters would not have liked to ‘share a beer’.

Your questions focus on the faces and on the body language of leaders in the world today. In ordinary life, we do judge people in terms of how comfortable they seem to be with themselves (that is signaled by body language) and on how sincere and friendly they seem (and that is signaled by eyes, mouth, and facial expression). With respect to the British case, it is clear that the smiling, comfortable charming Blair wins out over the rather dour and awkward Brown. And Cameron also wins in that comparison against Brown, and perhaps that is why he is the head of the Tory party.

Turning to France, Sarkozy comes off as too active, too energetic, too frenetic, but with the passage of time, people are getting used to these personal characteristics and, for his part, Sarkozy has calmed down a bit.

Obama certainly comes off as likeable and as comfortable in his own skin, and those are major reasons why he was elected. But there is something about the presentation of self that is rather distant, rather professorial. Obama likes people well enough but, unlike Clinton or Blair, does not seem like he NEEDS to have people around him. And that sense of distance– which served Charles deGaulle well– does not play well in a determinedly demotic, populist environment.

Which leaves Silvio Berlusconi. Truth to tell, most of the rest of the world cannot understand why Berlusconi remains a popular leader, despite his checkered past and his obvious personal and professional involvement in shady activities (financial, sexual). I have to think back to Latin leaders, like Juan Peron, for a similar example. And of course, Berlusconi cannot really be a ‘man of the people’ with his billions of dollars and control of the media.

I suspect that Berlusconi prevails for two reasons: l) There is no viable opposition (Sarkozy benefits from this lack of opposition as well); 2) His rascal personality and behavior has an appeal to the Italian population, particularly older males– just as Zuma’s persona in South Africa justifies sexism on the part of macho males. This is not just an Italian or South African phenomenon: Both Scott Brown in Massachusetts and Arnold Schwarzenegger in California benefit from this male chauvinist persona.

As an American with little sympathy for Berlusconi or Zuma, I like to quote Abraham Lincoln: “You may fool all of the people some of the time, you can even fool some of the people all of the time; but you can’t fool all of the people all the time.” There will be a post-Berlusconi era!

The Ministers’ Misconceptions

by Howard Gardner

Of all the findings from cognitive psychology that are relevant for education, one stands out. That is the repeated demonstration, across a number of disciplines, of the prevalence of misconceptions and the difficulty of getting rid of them and replacing them with more powerful and more veridical conceptions. The most famous examples occur in physics. Students at outstanding universities, who have studied the laws of motion and have done well on standardized measures of achievement in physics, are asked to explain a new phenomenon—one that they have not studied but one governed by the laws of motion. Not only do these star students typically fail on these performances of understanding. More dramatically, their responses are often indistinguishable from those obtained from students who have never studied physics. Comparable examples can be found in biology, astronomy, psychology, economics — indeed across the disciplinary spectrum.

These difficulties can be blamed in part on inadequate instruction, but they also reflect a disturbing reality. When young, without the need for formal instruction, nearly all human beings develop ‘folk theories’ of how the world works: the physical world (if an object is broken into tiny, no-longer-visible parts, it ceases to exist); the biological world (all organisms were created at a single, pre-historical moment) and the social world (people who look different from me are to be feared and shunned). More effective theories can only be constructed in the mind of the learner through effective teaching and significant involvement with the materials (object, data) for which the disciplinary understandings are appropriate.

Nowadays almost everyone goes to school. And even in the remaining unschooled societies, there is informal tuition. Nonetheless, misconceptions continue to hold sway. Here are the some of the powerful misconceptions about learning and teaching that characterize the folk theories of human beings:

• Education involves the transmission of ideas and skills from older and more powerful persons to those who are younger and under the control of their elders.

• The young mind is a blank slate on which correct ideas and needed skills need to be implanted.

• Learning should occur bit by bit; to the extent possible, errors should be identified, discouraged, corrected.

• The best way to teach—indeed, the only effective way — is to reward correct answers and punish wrong ones.

• On any dimension worth considering, you can array people from the best to the worst (a so-called ‘league table’).

• If someone does not do what you want them to do, just ask them to do it, louder and louder, over and over again.

Now, since misconceptions like this are part of the human condition, it is not surprising that most children and most parents believe them. But that does not mean they are correct, any more than that the world is flat or that all creatures were created at the same moment. Indeed, considerable social-scientific research over the last century calls each of these so-called truisms into severe question.

It might seem reasonable to expect that those who are in charge of educational policy should have moved beyond these misconceptions. And indeed, if engaged in quiet discussion, at least some policymakers reveal their awareness of the research. And yet, in observing ministers of education all over the world, I find them remarkably tied to these powerful, though erroneous ideas. Indeed, I sometimes think that for most Ministers of Education, their only goal is to improve the performance of their nation in the international comparisons, independent of the worth or utility of that comparison. In fact, I’ve recently encountered a new ironical twist on this: The absolute standing of Scotland is less important than its relative position vis-a-vis England. Better to be 20th if Britain is 21st, than to be 10th if Britain is 9th.

Going beyond this ‘league table’ mentality, I am constantly surprised at the persistence, in ministerial talk and writing, of allegiance to the ‘transmission theory’ of education; the focus on rewards (even monetary ones) and punishment; the lack of openness to multiple answers, productive errors, creativity; and the preferred solution to bad performance on tests—the administration of more and more tests. It is like the misguided belief that if the patient is sick, the royal road to health involves repeating measurement of temperature.

I don’t mean to demean all Ministers of Education. As already suggested, some of them know better, and a few try to do better. It may be that there is something about the air in the ministries of the world, and in their all-too-frequent meetings with one another, that reinforces the worst of these misconceptions and repeats them endlessly to the public at large.

Of course, we do know a great deal about what actually brings about strong achievements in education around the world; plausible goals, understood and subscribed to by the range of constituents; awareness of the changing nature of knowledge and the need to prepare learners for an uncertain future; respect for teachers who, because of their knowledge of content and pedagogy and sensitivity to individual differences, merit respect; regular parental involvement; instilling in young people a love for learning that endures throughout life, even when no one is looking. If I were trying to determine in which school system to send my children or grandchildren, I’d beware of Ministers bearing misconceptions, I’d look instead for ones who understand these equally simply, and yet surprisingly elusive powerful ideas.

A Choice with Real Value

by Kathleen Kury Farrell

Choice and opportunity are emblems of freedom. But researchers tell us that the myriad options available to us are no longer liberating but quite oppressive. Studies indicate that the number of decisions we make every day – in the cereal aisle, at the espresso stand, on our cable TVs – are literally exhausting us. Perhaps more significant is the implication that the constant stream of relatively minor decisions we make may lead us to make poorer choices across all areas of our lives.

I wonder whether the number of choices available to us is the real problem. Maybe choice has become so challenging because we aren’t really equipped to make decisions, or because our communities don’t encourage a habit of using knowledge and tools that may help us. Most of us make daily decisions quite automatically: we eat what our families ate, what our friends eat, what is readily available, or what is on sale this week. And yet we all have decisions we just won’t compromise on, such as eating organic food, being loyal to a brand, or supporting family businesses.

What we care about deeply can be an invisible hand that guides the big and small decisions that we make: our human inclination is to bring our actions into alignment with our image of ourselves. Throughout life – and certainly throughout the K-16 years – this “self” is a work in progress. A tough choice for educators is whether and how to explicitly help young people develop not only self-understanding but to help them acquire tools for checking-in on who they aspire to be as students, community members, parents, and employees. You likely found the GoodWork community because of your own commitment to supporting students and/or colleagues in defining what excellence means, exploring meaningful pursuits, and considering how their decisions affect others.

Our research at the GoodWork Project consistently shows that young people struggle to make decisions about major aspects of their lives. Too often they fall prey to the mantra “not to decide is to decide.” The latter is certainly true when they follow their close peers into a college major – a trend documented in a study published by the National Bureau of Economic Research earlier this year. We witness them “falling back” on their parents’ dreams or the profitable occupation du jour. It is also evident in their stories about taking the path of least resistance – often one down an unethical road – in order to develop traction in their careers. Not surprisingly, students struggle with the “minor” decisions too, choices that pit their personal values against what is the norm in their families and peer groups.

The great news is that most students are grateful for opportunities to stop and think about what they find personally meaningful. They are often surprised that not only can their personal values be a compass to guide decision-making but that, in fact, many admirable adults intentionally make time to think about decisions past and pending in order to evaluate how their choices measure up to their personal dreams, standards, and commitments. One university vice president who I much admire made it his habit to have weekly lunches with the president of the student government association. To a one, these students expressed gratitude not simply for the generosity of the V.P.’s time, but for the his willingness to model and share the ongoing process of aligning the responsibilities of one’s position and an organization’s dreams while refining personal ambitions, too.

It is similarly encouraging that many teachers, coaches, and parents are finding ways to help students discover what they care about deeply and encourage them to be mindful of how their choices reflect those personal values. We know, however, that this is difficult work at a time when economic decline casts a shadow on students’ aspirations and focuses the public’s eye on “basic skills” that rarely address how life gets lived or how work gets done. We invite you to use the Toolkit Forum to share ways you are honoring the third “E” of good work by helping young people in your life to discover what is personally engaging while, of course, helping them focus on the implications enacting their dreams may have for others.

Related Links:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-tyranny-of-choice

http://www.nber.org/papers/w14948