An Apology with Further Clarification

Several weeks ago I posted about our school's quarterly summative assessment of reading indicators that were taught during the second quarter. In that post (which I have since removed) I offended parents who found the post via Google.

Specifically there were two statements that were most troubling to parents. There was a comment about the perceived importance of donuts as recognition for a job well done. As a teacher and more importantly a parent I am a big believer in intrinsic rewards.....i.e. doing something because it feels good on the inside...not because of external prizes or rewards. As a tech teacher and classroom teacher I have participated in many morning recognition ceremonies. The focus of these ceremonies is to recognize students for a job well done. However, some teachers feel that with the addition of donuts to the recognition ceremony the original purpose of the ceremony has been lost. Before we had morning recognition ceremonies our school listed the names of students who achieved the different honor lists in the cafeteria prominently for all students to see. It was a concerned parent who thought posting names was a bit too exclusive and asked for a different approach to recognize students. Teachers, parents, and administration decided that a simple breakfast be used to recognize those same students before the school day even began. I am sorry that my comment summarizing teacher observation of these breakfasts and grading practices was offensive.

A second comment was made concerning the reading assessment and the "shattering of dreams". I believe that our most powerful learning comes from mistakes. I want all children to achieve and realize that with the greatest growth will come many mistakes along the way. It is my greatest hope that children who miss questions on the reading assessment have the opportunity to work with their teachers and parents to better understand the tested objective. One purpose of the test is for teachers to use the results to guide future instruction. In addition to a simple grade, teachers receive a variety of reports that will help them understand the test results and organize the results in a way to further enhance future instruction. Teachers are working hard to create mini-assessments to identify "problem" areas so they can be addressed before the reading assessment is given.

While grades may be important to students and their parents, it is important that we all look beyond those to the bigger picture of the learning. Sadly, grades are not always the best indication of how much or well a student has learned.

If one could overlook the two troublesome lines of my post, I hope that they would see my post was directed to teachers asking them to question their own practices. We live in an age of accountability and while I don't agree with everything that is the No Child Left Behind law I find its basic tenet that all children will learn and grow to be an admirable goal. I also agree (but sometimes question the methods of calculation) that a child should "grow" a year in skills and ability during the course of a school year. If we are to be making gains towards NCLB's lofty goal of 100% proficiency then we (teachers) need to look at how we approach our professions quite differently than we have traditionally.

A teacher can no longer simply lead his or her class through the curriculum....because they are no longer teaching a class....they are teaching 24 or depending on the subject/grade level as many as almost 100 individuals. And to truly meet the needs of the individuals we need to know what each individual has learned and is capable of achieving. We need to know what approach or method of instruction is most successful for each learner and we need to document that knowledge so that other teachers may benefit.

Our superintendent often reminds staff that each day we make important decisions about what to teach.....and equally important what not to teach. My post asked teachers to take a hard look at their grading practices and the assignments they give and ask themselves which of those grades/assignments truly is aligned to the standards the state and district has employed us to teach. To ask themselves which grades really give an indication of student learning. It is when our gradebook becomes bloated with assignments that don't clearly correlate to a student's proficiency, ability or acquirement of some skill, that we as educators begin to do a disservice (perhaps even a misrepresentation) to the people we are here to serve -- the students and their parents who want nothing but the best for their children.