Let Kids be Kids

There are many ways to face this issue.

Here's a bitter approach: "At what stage is it right to turn the happy little kids into sad little adults?" Whoa! This looks like a leading question, and it doesn't seem to lead to useful action.

Let's tone it down a little bit: "What is the right mix of work and play for kids of different ages?" One can already see a the committee forming to start discussing the types of committees that would be necessary to define the age groups. Lots of stuff to discuss. Not much useful action in the horizon.

Narrowing the previous question down: "At what age should we start teaching kids how to read and write?" This question assumes reading and writing is the first "academic" subject to be taught. The assumption may be wrong, but let's go ahead with it for a while. Since in the modern - knowledge driven - world, it is commonly accepted that academic achievement is critical to personal success, there is a natural tendency to start as early as possible. In many countries the age of starting school is 6, and there is a drive to push a certain level of literacy into kindergarten at the age of 5: Recognizing all the letters, and writing one's own name. In Finland, our favorite example, comprehensive education starts at 7 years old. And, in spite of the late start, Finland scores very high in international reading performance tests - second place in PISA 2006. At the extreme, reading lessons in some traditional Jewish communities starts at the age of 3. A more thorough analysis of literacy studies starting-age vs. achievement can be preformed to make clear statements, but the Finnish example at least suggests that the intuitive tendency to start early may be wrong.

"How much time should be dedicated to formal study?" Raw intuition may suggest that more is better, yet looking at the number of instruction hours vs reading achievements finds Finland and Korea with some of the lowest hours-count and with the highest achievements. In this, too, a thorough analysis is due, but this anecdotal evidence suggests that the intuitive tendency to study a lot may be wrong.

An underlying question is "What activities is the kid's mind geared for, at different ages?" Developmental psychologists have their theories. It is evident that at a young age children can learn to understand and speak languages quite effortlessly. In immigrant communities, it is common to see 3-4 year-olds speaking one language at home, and another language at the playground. In some cases, it's even one language with their father, another with their mother, and a third language outside. They can generally do that without confusing among the different languages. So, if we think being multilingual is good, it would be wise to give very young children the opportunity to study different languages at a very young age. This doesn't take much effort: We only need to expose children to a language, in any context that is interesting to them. No need to study grammar, just play with speakers of that language - either adults or other children.

What about arithmetic? At the age of 3, children seem to enjoy counting. When they start getting an allowance, they start being earnestly interested in adding, and worried about subtracting. If they have siblings, there appears the somewhat stressful issues of comparing amounts and of dividing. Opportunities for learning the basics occur naturally, and can be seized by parents and other educators.

But we don't settle for only the basics. Making a living in the modern world, requires in-depth studies. The same is true of we consider our society as post-modern. The same is also expected to be true for the next few decades - the time in which the graduates of today's education system will live - and make a living. In-depth studies are not quite as natural for young children. They may not be very natural for anybody, but over the years of going through one class after another, we condition ourselves into being able to learn a lot about a little. And many of us are happy with it. We often find our identity in our particular expertise.

About that conditioning: Looking for a bright future for our kids, we keep looking ahead. In kindergarten there is a lot of emphasis on preparing the children for primary school. In primary school, part of the work is directed at preparing the pupils to secondary or intermediate school - the structure varies among countries. And so on: High-School prepares the students for college, and on to the university. Since we keep looking ahead for the next phase, we are in danger of losing sight of where the children are right now: What is the best skill for them to acquire right now, at their present level of development? Maybe it doesn't have anything to do with the university? In the context of education we consistently neglect the present in favor of a vision of the future. This is probably true for many other aspects of our lives, but that's a matter for self-help books, and not for a blog about k12 education.

We manufacture for our children an environment of study throughout the school year. We manufacture after-school enrichment studies . We manufacture summer-school and camp for them to do something useful with their time. We got convinced that anything worth doing, is managed by someone whose profession is to do it. Unless a product, service provider or an activity is formally certified, we don't quite believe it is real. This is not a surprise: The world has become very complex, so we genuinely don't understand much of what is around us. We really don't have control over much that determines how we live. And in the consumer society there are great forces who have a powerful interest in maintaining our sense that we need someone else to make things for us and do things for us. In general, we create an environment for studying, instead of learning.

Together with the many negative traits of humanity, there are a few nice ones. One of them is our capacity to learn naturally. This capacity is very clearly relevant for the basics: Spoken language, literacy, numeracy and quite a few other skills not mentioned here. We humans do have the additional capacity to condition ourselves to do just about anything, including studying in-depth. And we like knowing things in-depth, so we need our education system to promote that ability. We probably can't rely on natural learning alone.

As a result of this discussion, a personal take-home idea for me is this: As much as possible, we should make use of the natural tendency to learn new things, just by exposing children to opportunities and simple motivations to learn the basics: Spoken language, reading & writing, arithmetic, etc. this can be done in play - no need for classes and lessons for learning. Studying should be introduced later, in order to acquire in-depth knowledge of whatever is deemed useful. It is useful to think in concrete terms, just as an example - the ages here are arbitrary and need to be considered carefully. How about: Promote natural learning through play for children up to the age of 9. Then start phasing in some studying (as opposed to learning.) By the age of 18, as much as 50% of a student's time would be studying, the rest will be still natural learning - why give it up?

Dumbing Down

A few days ago, I got an email about the advancement in math teaching.

Teaching Maths In 1970: A logger sells a lorry load of timber for £1000. His cost of production is 4/5 of the selling price. What is his profit?

Teaching Maths In 1980: A logger sells a lorry load of timber for £1000. His cost of production is 4/5 of the selling price, or £800. What is his profit?

Teaching Maths In 1990: A logger sells a lorry load of timber for £1000. His cost of production is £800. Did he make a profit?

Teaching Maths In 2000: A logger sells a lorry load of timber for £1000. His cost of production is £800 and his profit is £200. Your assignment: Underline the number 200.

Teaching Maths In 2008: A logger cuts down a beautiful forest because he is totally selfish and inconsiderate and cares nothing for the habitat of animals or the preservation of our woodlands.
He does this so he can make a profit of £200. What do you think of this way of making a living?
Topic for class participation after answering the question: How did the birds and squirrels feel as the logger cut down their homes? (There are no wrong answers. If you are upset about the plight of the animals in question counselling will be available)

The sharp-eyed reader can notice the county of origin of this particular text, but the dumbing down of education is a concern in many developed countries. There is a strong current of being concerned with the students' self esteem. So strong is this motivation, that it becomes difficult to give a failing grade, a poor grade, or even to point out an insignificant error. In many places, it is considered wrong to correct spelling mistakes, lest it injures the child's self confidence. Why do we think modern children are so brittle? More importantly, what are the effects?

A few observations about changes over the last few decades. These observations are subjective, and need to be verified scientifically:

• Primary schoolers seem to have more spelling mistakes than they used to. As soon as we put aside complex arguments and just look at the obvious, it is not surprising: If we don't point out spelling mistakes to pupils, many of them will retain those mistakes


• Graduation tests, matriculation tests, etc. are getting easier, meaning that the grades become less meaningful


• School graduates being admitted into universities and colleges cannot be taught the same way they were a decade or two ago. The course materials need to be simplified and diluted, and less understanding can be demanded

The reader (that is, if there even is a reader) may be inclined to think that this is an extreme way to present the situation. There are some even more extreme thoughts in the writings of John Taylor Gatto about Dumbing Us Down.

But cynicism aside, and whether the dumbing-down is part of a Prussian whiplash caused by the Battle of Jena (as proposed by John Taylor Gatto in The Public School Nightmare: Why fix a system designed to destroy individual thought?) or part of a post-modern confusion, it would be nice to reverse it. Making changes would be difficult - going against established behavior and thought patterns. But a good start would be taking a good look at it: First at the short-term - the last few decades. We should establish whether we are producing less competent graduates, or just have a case of the Nostalgia. If we get clear results from credible research, and do the PR well enough, we may be able to drive some change.

The long-term - reevaluating a system established centuries ago - is tough. I am not aware of a well-thought revolution ever achieved. Without major bloodshed, that is. Any ideas?

Ask Around

In every profession, a practitioner occasionally comes across a situation that was not perfectly rehearsed. In all forms of engineering, there are new problems to solve, new constraints to overcome, etc. In medicine, there are unfamiliar combinations of symptoms. In education, the students keep presenting an educator with new learning difficulties, misconceptions, missing knowledge and skills, in-class social trends, students' personality disorders, etc. Just to make sure there is no argument about the every profession claim: Even the stereotypical factory worker in Charlie Chaplin's Modern Times comes across unfamiliar situations.

Meeting an unfamiliar situation happens more to novices than to the experienced workers. The novice can be expected to ask around - find someone to consult with. It may be a more experienced peer or a superior expert. Interesting: Even these last two simple sentences give hints as to why people may refrain from asking questions: It may brand them as "novices", and it may position others as "superior". God forbid that!

Still, in many professions it is acceptable and expected that people will consult with others. In medicine - mostly at hospitals - consulting with colleagues is an established practice. Many other professions take the need for granted to a great extent. I once knew an engineer who lost his job because he wouldn't ask questions. His problem was not a specific error that could have been avoided, but the habit of not asking. His bosses had a few talks with him, explaining the need to consult with others, but he couldn't.

Ok, so the graph below is not very pretty. But I do like the idea.

• The X-axis represents Independence - growing rightwards
• The Y-axis represents Effectiveness - growing upwards
• The graph is a total lie - not based on research - but it illustrates the claims below

The blue line - especially the left-hand-side of it - shows what we know intuitively: That someone asking way too many questions doesn't do much good, and interferes with others' work, which may even cause some damage. The more experienced and independent the worker (or volunteer, or parent, or player, or whoever), the less they tend to ask questions, and the more effective they are in whatever endeavor in which they are engaged.

But then there is the red part of the line, which is less intuitive, but ultimately familiar. Asking too little leads to unnecessary mistakes. The damage depends very much on the type of activity. A salesperson in a shop, who never calls a peer of a superior to deal with new situations, will occasionally lose a customer. A doctor who never calls a peer or an expert, will occasionally lose a patient. What would such a teacher lose?

This is not a new idea. Hubris is an old problem.

The profession of education - specifically teaching classes - brings the practitioner into extremely complex and unpredictable situations: Many students, each of them a whole world of knowledge, skills, habits, preconceptions, moods and emotional state. All interacting with each other. All interacting with an ever-changing external society. It is totally clear that not all situations can be predicted, memorized and rehearsed. The skilled and experienced teacher can deal with many such situations, but clearly in some cases a consultation is essential. In more than one country, this doesn't happen.

When teachers do ask around, many interesting things can happen: Pupils are more likely to get better answers to their own questions, as the teacher is more likely to get a better answer from peers or other sources, when confronted with a new question. Minor emotional problems - such as during adolescence - can be dealt with according to the accumulated experience of the teacher's peer group rather than according to the individual teachers' experience, which is by definition more limited. This will give a better chance that the minor problem will remain limited in degree and duration, and not turn unto a lifelong learning issue, dealing-with-authorities issue, or anything else. Pupils can learn that it's ok not to know everything, and that it is important to know where and how to get help with tough issues. Last but not least, the teachers themselves keep reminding themselves that they are dealing with a complex and deep reality. They can gain more respect for their own profession and for themselves, while also maintaining a healthy humility.

A semi-personal note: When I consider the employment of people, and go through a trial period, sometimes they come across a problem they can't solve. If the prospective employee asks a friend and manages to solve the problem this way - I consider it a success. It's a positive type of resourcefulness. I don't expect anyone to be able to do everything on their own. But I do value a person's ability to notice their own limits, and their ability to seek extra knowledge elsewhere. It's not just my idea: In the movie Magnum Force, Dirty Harry said: "A good man always knows his limitations." Who am I to contradict him?

In business management circles, there is (or was - fashions change quickly) a debate around the maxim that "It's better to apologize later than to ask permission first." This is a brilliant demonstration of rationalization: I don't like to ask questions, fearing I will look indecisive, so I will create a nice little ideology around it. Admittedly, in the extreme, it usually is better to make a mistake once a year than ask three times a day. But I hear this statement sometimes being used to justify never asking. By saying that, those people define themselves as existing in the red area in the graph above. They prefer to make mistakes rather than to appear less than all-knowing. Such an attitude, if it cannot be cured, should be grounds for dismissal from any position where one has an effect on people's lives.

Teachers, and everybody else in the education system, have a profound effect on people's lives. Even those teachers we don't remember have such an effect. Either positive or negative. Either by action or by omission. We are neither omniscient nor omnipotent. By asking around and getting support, we can all improve our work, and even ourselves.

Defining a system

The Definition for the system is an interesting issue. A poorly defined system can prevent success, and assure endless hours of entertainment. The example that pops into my mind is that of customs: I once had to release a table from customs. I went to the offices and started filling forms, using translation books for item types and classifications - none of which matched the particular type of table exactly - standing in one line to get a form, standing in a new line to get it stamped, and in a third line to get it stapled. It took me two work-days to release a single $200 item. The staff were extremely helpful, and tried to help as much as they could, but the release-from-customs system was defined so poorly that they could not help much. Many government "services" suffer from such extremely inadequate definitions. Education services are not an exception.

There are many aspects to the definition of a system or a job. We can concentrate - as an example - on the definition of a teacher's work schedule and a few related issues, as it is implicitly defined in the Israeli education system:

Facts:

1. Short work hours: Teachers don't work during the summer vacation and during the many other school vacations. Also, the standard workday is short
2. Captivity: Teachers can't take a vacation whenever they want - almost only during school vacation
3. Low pay: Teachers are paid so poorly, that it bis standard for them to get state benefits designed for the underpaid
4. Mooching: Teachers are often expected to work after-hours without pay. Also, schools get such a limited allowance for office services, that it often runs out and teachers are expected to use their home equipment, such as a computer printer, without pay
5. Tenure: Teachers have tenure

Each of these definitions can be justified one way or another. For the fun of it, I will list a few such justifications:

1. Short work hours: The kids are out of school, so there is no work for teachers
2. Captivity: The teachers have enough vacation time, and adapting to vacations during schooldays is a planning nightmare
3. Low pay: There are many teachers in the system, not much money to pay them high salaries, and it works
4. Mooching: No money, and the bums work short days and a short year anyway
5. Tenure: Workers rights

Some of the above justifications are supposed to balance each other. 1 and 2 balance each other. 1 and 3 balance each other, etc. But any number of wrongs doesn't usually make a right. The supposed balance between 1 and 2 is especially amazing to me: Give a wildly excessive right, and take away a basic right.

Let's go for some mild rage now:

1. Short work hours: Why on earth should a teacher work less hours than me?
2. Captivity: What did teachers do wrong to lose their freedom?
3. Low pay: Isn't teaching a real job? Doesn't it have value?
4. Mooching: Come ON! Yuck!
5. Tenure: How come the teacher owns the job? I don't own mine - I need to be good at what I am doing in order to remain there

The real effects in terms of the way the profession is being viewed - not for the faint hearted:

1. Short work hours: Teaching is a pastime for young mothers
2. Captivity: Teaching is for those who don't expect to control their life
3. Low pay: Teaching is for those who can't get a real job
4. Mooching: Teaching is for those who don't expect to control their life
5. Tenure: Teaching is a good place to hide. Headless nails

You may notice that nowhere there is a need for accountability, competence or enthusiasm. Teachers who do bring these qualities into their work-life, do it at their own peril, and in spite of the system - not because of it.

What if we made a few changes?

1. Standard work hours: A teacher's job is for a full day for the whole year. When there aren't students in school, the teacher can study, teach other teachers, help students with difficulties, plan. Effects: Teaching is a real job
2. No captivity: Teachers can take a vacation just like any other profession, with due notice given to the school, so the school can adjust. Effect: Teachers are people, too
3. Standard wage: Pay teachers a living wage. Effect: Enthusiastic potential teachers are more likely to become teachers. Easier path to self-respect
4. No mooching: No need, thanks to 1. Standard work hours. Effect: Some self-respect
5. No tenure: Teaching is an important position. Only those who are good at it may be there. Effect: Respect

... Or not ...

The example above is oversimplified and naive, but it gives an idea of the situation. There are many more details on the same level as the five facts (claims?) listed here. There are many more levels of definition, such as system goals, personal goals for teachers, feedback mechanisms, etc. I suspect there are many levels of definition where we are not aware that we have a choice and we make arbitrary implicit decisions. For most parents, even the decision of "to which school should we send the kids?" is such an arbitrary decision, made without any consideration.

Seems like a good basis for a lifetime of philosophical musings. While we are doing that, we can look into different working definitions of existing education systems. Check how well they are doing. Start applying them, adapting them, re-checking. After a while, we will have a Research Based System Definition.

Paid Volunteers

It sounds demagogic, but there is a basic truth in it: To function at their best, people need to be so motivated to do their work, that they would have done it for free. At least they should think they would have done it for free. But it is not always a good idea to test if they would really do it. Specifically, it is not a good idea for the education establishment to test whether the teachers would actually do their work for free, though it seems like some sort of such experiment is going on in many countries.

Many democracies are happy to pay teachers almost as if they were volunteers - too little. This is unwise, and it misses an important distinction: The education system is a non-profit organization, but the individual teachers aren't. Teachers should indeed be treated as volunteers, but not in terms of pay.

Teachers should be treated as volunteers in the sense that they must be constantly motivated to do their work as well as possible, regardless of the effort, and without having to look over their shoulder to check if someone is taking advantage of them. While this is true for just about every profession, especially knowledge-work, it is particularly true for teachers. With them, such motivation is supposed to be easy, because it's clear to see the impact a teacher can have on the whole lives on many children. Yet, it is not very common to meet teachers who feel they are following their divine calling by being teachers... Or principals... Or administrators... Or education ministry officials. On the other hand, if you talk to just about anyone in The Salvation Army, The Sierra Club, etc. - they have a very clear sense of the importance of their work, and they are happy to do it, regardless of the effort. How come some organizations maintain this sense of "calling" and others don't?

Some answers can probably found in Management. Which in this case, mostly translates as: Definition of the system, Administration and Consistent Leadership. Each of these sub-issues is worthy of its own discussion.

The very title of this post - "Paid Volunteers" - is an oxymoron, and at the same time, it is in line with the view that all people should be as motivated as volunteers. Humanity doesn't have a clear idea how to reconcile these seemingly contradicting characteristics of modern work. Unpaid volunteers often do a great job, and feel great about it. Paid employees... I don't have any statistics, but I suspect they are less flattering than for volunteers. Both in the "great job" department and in the "feel great" department. Still, paid employees get money and they can buy a flat screen TV, so they are probably happy. Then again, most volunteers have a paying job, so they try to combine doing good and doing well. Since the paying job is usually quite different than the volunteer job, there is a distinction between the two, and each can serve its own purpose.

But what if the same job has a voluntary aspect, and a making-a-living aspect? There is an unintuitive clash here: Sometimes, when one has two different incentives for the same desired action, the total motivation is clearly lower than with just one of the two incentives. Specifically, offering money sometimes reduces people's overall willingness to "do the right thing". This fact was demonstrated by Bruno Frey and Felix Oberholzer-Gee when they researched the willingness of Swiss citizens to allow a socially necessary but undesirable use of their land. When asked about the possibility of building a nuclear waste disposal site in their area, over 50% were willing. But when they were offered some money to agree to have the site in their area - less than 25% were willing. Somehow, considering the money crowded out the sense of social responsibility. A similar claim was made by Richard Titmuss regarding blood donations: Offering money reduces the tendency to give (see Blood and altruism - Richard M. Titmuss' criticism on the commercialization of blood).

What may follow from this apparent destructive effect that payment has on altruism is very strange to the modern western mind: If we really value the job of teachers, we mustn't pay them too much. Not only is this strange-sounding, it may be false, too. I am told that in the USSR, teachers were well-paid, and the best and the brightest sought teaching jobs. It needs more research.

No solutions today. Just one last thought:

In the book The essential Drucker, Peter Drucker asks volunteers: Why they do this? "Far too many give the same answer: In my paying job there isn't much challenge, not enough opportunity for achievement, not enough responsibility; and there is no mission, there is only expediency." If we ask teachers about their paying (not much) job, would they give a more enthusiastic account?

Teaching Teachers

Defining the education system is a just the beginning of a long journey, which will hopefully lead to having a well-functioning educational establishment. Defining the teachers' education framework is one part of the job, and not the biggest part. To get some sense of the size of the job, consider some basic issues that need to be addressed when defining the teachers' education. I had the good fortune to meet a few accomplished education reformers in Finland, who were willing to share some of their experience-based insights. This is a list given to me by Prof. Erkki Niskanen, and it shows the basics that need to be covered when defining teachers' education:

1. The aims of the teacher education
2. Administration
3. The resources
4. The teacher training institutes
5. The qualifications for the teachers of the teacher training institutes
6. The basic education of the students of the teacher training institutes
7. The qualifications of the teachers for different educational institutes
8. The detailed curriculum of the teacher training institutes
9. The further education of the teachers
10. The research on the teacher education

Imagine the amount of professional discussion each of these requires. Then imagine (just for a moment - it's too painful) the amount of political haggling possible over each of them. And these are only the headings of the sub-issues of just defining one part of the education system. Getting definite results from an advanced education system can take decades, or even generations.

We'd better start.

Research Based

The world around us is in a constant state of flux - for better or for worse, so when we prepare children to live in it, we need to keep updating what we teach and how we teach. Therefore, teaching pupils and teaching teachers are fields that need to be in a constant state of being-developed. Lacking an oracle to tell us what to do, we need to fall back on the scientific method of determining the right coarse. It takes research - or in this case - Applied Research.

Putting aside the hypothesizing and planning stages, research activity may be divided into two main types: What could be described as passive research activity involves observing and analyzing the subjects, without any interference. What could be described as active research activity involves making a change to a group of subjects, then observing changed groups and control groups, and analyzing.

The most basic activity is that of observing, and already here we have some difficulty - people like their privacy: Teachers like their privacy, and parents worry about the privacy of their children. Privacy and visibility inherently contradict each other, but without visibility of teaching and learning, we can't know where we are, and we can't manage our way from where we are to where we want to be. Living in an imperfect world, we can't have full visibility with total privacy. But we can design a system to enable enough visibility without serious breach of privacy. A general guideline towards such a system is that of anonymization: Minimize access to information that can identify individuals (e.g, names), while keeping information relevant to analysis (e.g., transcripts of class discussions). Another major guideline is zealous maintenance of trustworthiness. Every breach of privacy - real or perceived - will cause damage that would take much time and effort to reverse.

Active research as defined above is based on making changes to the teaching method, or learning environment. As discussed in a previous post, such experimental changes are not guaranteed to work. They can even create problems that will need to be fixed. This leads to some justified concern. But as shown in the same post, there is no way around that risk AND such experimentation already takes place. The best we can do about it is to make sure that experiments are well managed, and any damage is promptly identified and mended, using the best resources available to the education establishment. As in the case of privacy, trustworthiness is paramount: Every problem must be seen to be identified and fixed, without any appearance of a cover-up and without sparing any effort. The system - and people within it - must resist the temptation of presenting the research as perfectly safe. This would be a very short-lived lie. Accidents will happen, everybody should be aware of it, and the system should be geared towards dealing with them quickly and effectively.

The common research activity of data analysis has many facets which are widely - and wildly - discussed in the context of various scientific fields: Quantitative and qualitative analysis, Statistical analysis, etc. I don't have anything to add to the general concepts and methods, which are in a continuous process of being developed over the past few centuries by the greatest scientific minds.

Academic research in education is often financed by grants, and is often done by Masters or PhD students. The grants run out, and the researchers move on. Usually, there is no money and attention left for follow-up research. A comprehensive education research system must adhere to a different line: Always follow up on past research. Passive research should be repeated periodically, to verify its continuing validity in a changing world, or to determine that it is no longer valid. This needs to be done also after an active research experiment that was deemed successful and resulted in a change of method, in order to validate it. Active research should be followed up, to check the teaching/learning experiments longer-term effects: Long term retention of knowledge and skills; habits strengthened or weakened by the experiment; and residual damage or benefits.

So much for the research methodology - a few paragraphs which can stand for a few books. Now: Research Based... What?

Generally, based on the research, we should have an organized way of updating teaching methods. For research to have real-world effect, it has to be able to cause a change in the behavior of the education system: Students, parents, teachers, administration, government, and probably more. This connection between research - which relies to a large extent on the academia - and the real world, is not trivial. The language is different, the pace is different, the natural priorities are different. It will take thought and work.

Research-Based Learning Environment: Many factors possibly affect learning: The arrangement of the class, the size of the class, the number of teachers, types of teachers, teachers moving between students' home classes or students moving between teachers' home classes, whether there are computers in the classroom, whether there is one or more students per computer, whether students use calculators in the classroom, generally whether much technology is available, lecturing, group-work or a combination, online or offline, etc. etc. etc. All these need to be methodically researched.

Research-Based Teaching Methods: There are many schools of thought - almost religions - in the field of teaching and learning, many of which are application of psychological theories to the field of education. Cognitivism, Connectivism, Constructivism, CHAT, and quite a few that don't start with a "C". For a deeper and more detailed discussion, see Learning Theories and Educational Psychology. Each school of thought can give rise to many possible methods. Many of them have been tried by different individuals, but methodical research can give clearer answers, regarding what we can use at this point in time and with the current state of civilization.

Research-Based Teachers' Education: The same issues as for pupils - learning environment and teaching methods - need to be resolved for educating teachers. See Research-based Teacher Education in Finland (sorry, it's a for-sale book) for a discussion of a proven system.

For all of the above, continuous research is due.

If We Build It, Will They Come?

Parents involvement in the schooling of their children is a funny issue. The funniest part (ha ha) of it is the very fact that it's an issue, and not a self-evident pillar of the concept of education. Denmark is an atypical phenomenon, where it is taken for granted. In most other countries, the establishment maintains control over education decisions, keeping the parents away from a position of decision, and from information. As in most issues where humans are involved, there are different reasons for keeping the parents away from education. Some bad reasons, some good.

Underlying the bad reasons is the basic premise of power: "because we can." The authorities have the authority, and they are not inclined to give the power away. A more specific origin cited in some places, is the religious establishment of previous centuries, which was worried about uncontrolled groups raising children outside their particular religious doctrine. The way to prevent that was to maintain central control over education. An often heard reason for avoiding parental authority, is the issue of expertise: The education establishment and education academia maintain a sense that they know better. Though in some circles of academia one can see signs of healthy humility - nobody knows very much.

There are also a few good reasons to mitigate parents' control over the education of children. In a mass education system it's hard to manage the effect of the many contradicting opinions. Maybe even impossible. Also, while it is my belief that humanity in general doesn't quite know how to educate its young, and while it may be true that some parents may have a knack for educating their kids, it is probably also true that some other parents are spectacularly bad at it, and it would be a shame to give them more power.

But these two arguments against parental control over education have obvious holes in them: If there is a contradiction between mass education and parental control, maybe we need to back off from mass education, instead of keeping the parents away. Maybe we can have it both ways: Mass public education for those parents who choose to let the state make the decisions, and state-supported private education for those who want to make their own decisions - again, see the Danish system. And with regards to those parents who we agree are no good at making education decisions, there are two familiar problems: First, why punish everybody for the potential errors of the few? Second, as parents, we have control over many aspects of their kids' life, and we can make mistakes, and we do make them, in their feeding, exercise, habits, opinions, etc. There could be a case for taking all kids away from their parents. This has been tried on many occasions, often as part of a racist assumption that kids of a minority race are better off being raised by others. Communal upbringing has also been tried with an ideological basis in communist societies, and in places where the people ultimately have a say - such as Israeli Kibbutzim - it was ultimately rejected.

I hold this truth to be self-evident, that when you let people be involved in something they care about, they will do much more and much better than you would expect. They will put into it more than the free time they think they have. They will function beyond the level of skill they think they have. This is a great potential resource. It would be very good to get a piece of that potential in the context of K12 education. What we need is to face and resolve the various difficulties we come across.

Managing contradicting opinions of parents contributing to mass education: Leadership + Administration. Leadership can help minimize the contradictions. Easier said.
Meticulous administration can allow different contributors to work in the same environment without much friction. Such administration can break the mass education system to smaller units - each with its somewhat different direction and rules. At the same time, the contributors can be grouped together according to the same lines of direction and beliefs, to match the education units.

Dealing with particularly bad parents: Let's divide and conquer: Among the "bad" parents, some want to be involved in their kids' education, and some don't want to. Those who don't want to be involved are not an issue, because they don't interfere. Among those who do want to be involved, some are defined as "bad" by the law, and some are not. Those who are legally "bad" need to be dealt with on the legal plain, and are not to be allowed to interfere. Regarding those who are not legally "bad" parents: Who are we to call their parenting "bad"? They have their own way, they pull in their own direction, and they are part of "managing contradicting opinions..." above.

For those of us who believe they know better than the parents: That's ok, if you can lead the parents willingly in your direction. Again - Leadership.

The common themes seem to be the same themes as for management of any organization: Leadership and Administration. Leadership can be bought in the same stores as charisma. No further details are available for its procurement. Good administration is less elusive. There are many devils in the details, but an administrative mechanism can be created and continuously tuned. Again, easier said than done.

A few features of a mechanism that supports parents' contribution:

• Types of contribution from parents: extra teaching, real-world examples, logistics, technical help, etc.
• Inform parents of what the system thinks it needs
• Keep parents informed about the activity in schools, so the parents can come up with suggestions for relevant contributions
• Keep active contributors informed about changes in needs, schedules and plans, so they don't waste their effort on dead ends and irrelevant deadlines
• Seek feedback from active contributors
• Seek feedback from non-contributing parents
• A dispatching mechanism to accept offers from potential contributors, with a quick positive response for almost every offer
• Strictly voluntary contribution, to prevent it from becoming a casual money-making opportunity

If we build a convenient and responsive framework for parents to contribute, to be involved constructively - parents will come and contribute.

I think.

Mind the Gap

All men - and women - were not created equal, and even more so - they didn't come to the world in the same circumstances. That's a rather general statement, so let's refocus on the issue of K12 education, and students achievements. No matter how we may measure these achievements, we are very likely to find out students are not equal. There are gaps between students in the same school, between schools in the same nation, between nations and between continents. With a little effort, we can find gaps in the investment in the education of these students, schools, nations and continents. We may even find some correlation between the investment and actual achievements.

So much for facts. When discussing these facts, soon enough people tend to talk about social justice. This ensures there will be very little done about the issue, because everyone has their own justice, and we start arguing about that instead of discussing the gap and what should or can be done about it. An alternative starting point is to agree that a large gap is bad for everyone - for the top percentiles as well as the bottom percentiles. One may think the reason it's bad is the issue of social justice for the bottom. Another may think the reason to avoid excessive gap is that it may create a revolution that's unpleasant for the top. Regardless of the motivation, we can agree in general that it would be good to limit the gap. We can then start working on how to minimize the gap, rather than argue about why to do it.

Another shortcut I am going to make for this post is that I will only discuss gaps within a nation. That's hard enough for now. Can't tackle the gap between nations and between continents at this point. Call me in a generation or two about that.

Managing the gap and the average level of achievement involves judicious allocation of resources. An illustration of resource management for a more simple example: Consider painting a fence. We have tow painters - Painter 1 does a length of 100-inch per minute, Painter 3 does a length of 300-inch per minute. We have two brushes - Brush 1 is 1-inch wide, Brush 3 is 3-inch wide. Who should get the 1-inch brush, and who should get the 3-inch brush? If we give Brush 1 to Painter 1 and Brush 3 to Painter 3, Painter 1 will do 100x1=100 square inch per minute, and Painter 3 will do 300x3=900 square inch per minute, and together they will do 1000 square inch per minute. If, however, we give Brush 3 to Painter 1 and Brush 1 to Painter 3, Painter 1 will do 100x3=300 square inch per minute, and Painter 3 will do 300x1=300 square inch per minute, and together they will do 600 square inch per minute. If we aim for overall achievement (the first case - 1000 square inch), we get more of a gap (100:900). If we go for equality (the second case - 300:300) we get lower overall achievement (600 square inch). Such is life.

When discussing education the relevant resources are mostly money, management attention and teachers. To reduce the gap in education, we need to allocate more resources to the weaker students and schools. To increase the average level of achievement, we need to allocate more resources to the stronger students and schools. You probably can't have it both ways... Or so it would seem, but it turns out that the successful overall countries, such as Finland, also seem to manage the gap between schools better than others - See Figure 5 on page 32 in this report. Just to make sure you don't think there is a magic formula, notice that even in Finland, the variance within schools is rather high.

Much research has been done with regards to the gaps, where they appear, and - tragically - how they are retained in certain groups. From what I have encountered, it seems that success stories are mostly anecdotal, and not clearly repeatable. More discussion is due as to what goals we need to set and how to balance overall achievement with minimal gap. More research is due how to realize these goals, though this research will suffer from being outside the consensus, as long as we have to choose between different types of justice. More research yet is due, to look into ways of doing both: Reduce gaps and improve overall/average achievement at the same time. I would normally think it is overly optimistic, but the Finland example above suggests it may be a good use for our time to look in that direction.

Wild Ideas - Anarchy

Suppose we create an anarchic education system with minimum central control. Where the rights of parents and of children comes clearly and explicitly before the opinion of the state.

There may be many different types of schools, each based on its own specific methods, philosophy, religion, etc. Any group of parents can establish their own school to suit their own beliefs, and the state won't interfere. Such schools can even get funding and formal approval from the state if they want. Children may even be home-schooled with the approval of the state. The state won't tell the state-funded school how to teach anything, and it will have very basic requirements regarding the content - issues such as literacy, for example.

In direct contradiction to other posts in this blog, this anarchic education system will have almost no accountability mechanisms, very weak mechanisms for sharing data about schools and how they function, and very little oversight on what and how kids are being taught.

I won't tire the reader with more details of this fantasy... You get the point. It's a sort of nutty utopia that couldn't work in the real world. Except it does, in Denmark. And it seems to get reasonable results - on the 2006 PISA tests, Denmark was at about the OECD average.

It is not necessarily the "right" way to manage a national education system, but it is interesting to see that anarchy is a viable way - semi-anarchy, anyway. For more information, see The Case For School Choice: Denmark, or the chapter about Denmark in Yoshiyuki Nagata's book Alternative education.