Voice and Choice Observation

Comments sent to Preservice Secondary Science Teachers
By Ron Bonnstetter, (April, 2005)

I have something on my mind that needs to be shared. Some of you have figured out that I have intentionally NOT played the typical teacher role this semester. I have not told you when you are wrong, or praised comments I liked. I HAVE attempted to have each of you feel what it might be like to take responsibility for your own learning. Just as project based learning in a full blown act may not fit every student, I have seen where my approach has not worked with everyone in this class. That fact saddens me.

One issue that came up last week on our visit to the New Country School that has not been mentioned much, is the comment about where their teachers come from. It was pointed out that teachers who come from "real schools" rarely fit into "project based learning settings. It seems that they are unable to give up control to students. They can not buy into the concept of “voice and choice”. So who or what are the biggest blockers to educational reform; administrators, parents, community, students, or teachers?

I remember meeting with William Glasser several years ago. Maybe I caught him on a bad day, but he was angry! He told me how he and many others have known and seen how education SHOULD function for years, and yet he sees so little change. At the time I was still idealistic enough to feel sorry for him and to believe I, and my generation, would be successful where others had failed. I now understand his feelings.

I now believe that public education is the main problem. Just as in biology, competition leads to survival of the strongest, education needs variety to push reform. Charter schools or some other form of option are long over due. The world is changing, and public education is not keeping pace. Oh we can all give a multitude of reasons for why we are not able to meet the challenge, but do we have the ability to change it??

Business knows that change rarely comes from within, but from the fringe. Maybe some of us are just too close to the problem to see the solution. Maybe we should let the fringe in and listen. And maybe some of us should get out of the way so others can DO what some among us feel can not be done.

I will give you an example. I have worked for years to help TEACHERS to be better questioners. But today I read an email stressing the need to help STUDENTS be better questioners. In a flash I realized that my time might have been better spent teaching students and not wasting my time on teachers. Now you might say, “you teach the teachers and THEY will teach their students”. But sadly most teachers are so tied to control that having students question scares them.

So when graduate students question the material from this semester, I should be elated! Yes, if I believed that the questions were an effort to better understand how to move toward better education, but I believe far too often the questions raised are an effort to defend the status quo. “If it aint broke, don’t break it”. But it IS broken and no one seems to notice. The Emperor has no clothes on, but we see only what we want to see. Our education filters block our ability to see teaching and learning any other way, than what we have experienced for a life time. WE ARE THE PROBLEM. Each of us.

lack of common vision between methods and student teaching

The following is an exchange from one of my distance classes on educational reform. The first writer is in her forth week of student teaching.

Teacher Training!
Ron, I LOVE our program...you know that, but the practicum and student teaching format needs work. I don't feel like we students of teaching get to employ all of the lessons and techniques we learn while out in the classroom. If we do, it is a novelty and an exciting event, but not the norm. I do not fault the teachers we are with, but the restrictions and realities of their day to day job of teaching. We student teachers are guests, that is the reality of the situation. How can we become the qualified teachers this report demands when we cannot fully practice what we learn? That is like training an Olympic caliber athlete for an event then asking them to compete in that event, but not use the techniques they have learned and perform based only on how others are performing around them. "We want you to win, but don't do what we've been talking about, do what others are doing around you...and do your best...this is important!"

Reply from Ron:
I think this is one of those thoughts that is best thought and not written, but most of you know me and know that I share my heart and my thoughts. So here goes.

XXX is correct. The miss fit between current research on effective practice and the realities found in most classrooms leads to a conflict between teacher prep and practice and I am sorry to say, reality wins. I and many other educators prepare teachers with one vision, only to have classroom practicum and student teacher placements force these new teachers into the old outdated mode of operation.

I miss the days of campus schools or lab schools where we controlled the environment for learning and teaching. I miss the days where I had direct contact with each and every cooperating teacher and knew his or her philosophy of teaching.

Today, with greater concerns for security, control issues and Unions, I am not allowed to recruit the best teachers as models, I am not allowed to visit classrooms daily as I did for years, I am not allowed to wonder into schools to see best practice at work. And with greater demands on teacher time, I have not found a way to meet with all cooperating teachers to share the current visions or new practices. For example, I would love for cooperating teachers to follow up in the classroom to reinforce: inquiry based lessons, concept mapping for both the teacher organization and student learning assessment, authentic assessment experiences, rubric designing and use, CBL's in use regularly, preparing lessons with the outcomes established FIRST, portfolios for documenting student learning, understand layered curriculum as a way to implement the latest brain-based learning and simply being part of the teacher prep team, instead of an independent influence. At present, I feel like I prepare one kind of teacher, only to have that vision wiped out by reality and replaced with old school status quo.

I know these comments will offend many good teachers, but I am not convinced that it is their fault. The system is designed and implemented, thus creating constraints that few if any, can break. I am guilty of first creating a teacher with a vision of what should be. I also know that reality must fit this image at some level. But I grow more sickened by reality daily.

I just read this to Nicolette, who of course feels very differently. She feels I should point out that practicum and student teachers should focus on the culture of the classroom and big picture, thus learning about teaching and schooling, and in time what YOU will do in your own classroom.

One primary reality is that during this time, YOU ARE NOT IN YOUR OWN CLASSROOM. The real goal then is to not lose the vision and to work toward the day when you control your own learning environment. She pointed out that the networking during the first three years of teaching is crucial. We MUST work together so we do not feel isolated. That is why I have the listserve for each cohort and why we spend so much time on relationships.

As we confront system analysis of schools these next few weeks, please help me figure out how to regain the communication with the classroom, so teacher prep can once again function as a whole, with a team effort between the teacher prep vision and the classroom practice.
Thanks
Ron

First Science Education Entry

This is an experiment to learn what I can accomplish with a science education blog. I am the secondary science education program coordinator at the University of Nebraska and feel that more and diverse outlets for teaching and learning ideas are needed. There are many reasons for this comment, but let's just say that this blog has the potential to place research and ideas in the hands of educators much faster than our present traditional journals.
It is time to think and act outside the box.