Marshall Memo 624
A Weekly Round-up of Important Ideas and Research in K-12 Education
February 15, 2016
1. Did the small-schools movement really fail?
2. Will New York State’s untimed tests be valid and fair?
3. A Massachusetts teacher works to understand his ELL students
4. Six suggestions for effective instruction of English language learners
5. Clearing up common misconceptions about ELLs
6. Three teachers radically revamp their curriculum units
7. Adapting to new standards for teaching world languages
8. An online tool to help students develop world language proficiency
9. What effective school boards do
10. Short items: (a) Ideas for Black History Month; (b) Games for world language classrooms;
(c) Online help for young students learning Spanish
“Making schools smaller was not an inherently unsound strategy. It was a poorly shepherded one.”
Jack Schneider (see item #1)
“Our schools don’t need disrupters, armed with grand notions about transformation. They need facilitators capable of building capacity.”
Jack Schneider (ibid.)
“At its core, good teaching is about relationships – because students allow themselves to learn from people they trust.”
David Saavedra (see item #3)
“Since teacher turnover causes the most harm in schools with large populations of disadvantaged students, our kids struggle to overcome the effects of both poverty and an unstable, rookie teaching staff.”
Bruce Hansen in “In Low-Income Schools, Teachers Need Guidance” in Education
Week, February 10, 2016 (Vol. 35, #20, p. 28), www.edweek.org
“Many educators believe that English language learners will eventually ‘grow into’ correct language usage through continual exposure. Although some students will manage to grow in that way, most students will not.”
Kristina Robertson in “A Lesson in Taking Flight” in Educational Leadership,
February 2016 (Vol. 73, #5, p. 56-61), http://bit.ly/1Tj5CkW; Robertson can be
reached at [email protected].
“Why Small Steps Are Better for Small Schools” by Jack Schneider in Education Week, February 10, 2016 (Vol. 35, #20, p. 21-23), www.edweek.org
In this Education Gadfly article, Robert Pondiscio notes the vociferous push-back on New York state education officials’ January announcement that state’s annual grade 3-8 reading and math tests would henceforth be untimed. The New York Post called the new policy “lunacy” and others questioned the fairness and validity of allowing some students to spend much more time on tests than others.
“I confess that my initial reaction was not very different,” says Pondiscio. “But after reading the research and talking to leading psychometricians, I’ve concluded that both the Post and I had it wrong – untimed tests are not less accurate.” Removing time limits doesn’t significantly alter outcomes for students without disabilities, he says, but it does improve the performance of students with special needs – similar to the effect of their getting an accommodation allowing them more time. Thus, removing time limits has a gap-narrowing impact.
There are two kinds of tests, Pondiscio explains. With speed tests, such as a multiplication drill, the method for getting answers is clear and obvious, and the test measures how many problems students can get right in a fixed amount of time. With power tests, students answer a smaller number of more-complex items, and problem-solving ability, not speed, is what’s being measured. Most state tests are power tests, designed so that nearly all students will be able to complete all the items. Eighteen states already administer untimed, computer-based tests from the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium. What these and other adaptive tests measure is which items students answered correctly, with no premium on speed.
Pondiscio wonders if one factor in New York’s shift to untimed tests was an attempt to make tests less stressful in order to mollify parents who took part in the “opt out” movement last spring (20 percent of students statewide didn’t take the tests). But he believes that what really motivated the opt-out movement was the tests’ high-stakes for teacher evaluation (New York has since put this on hold for several years).
There’s another factor: many parents’ and educators’ contention that too much instructional time is being devoted to assessments. Untimed tests will increase testing time.
“Pencils Down? Not So Fast” by Robert Pondiscio in The Education Gadfly, February 10, 2016 (Vol. 16, #6), http://edexcellence.net/articles/pencils-down-not-so-fast
(Originally titled “Empathy Is the Gateway”)
In this Educational Leadership article, Massachusetts high-school teacher David Saavedra remembers what it was like being a Peace Corps volunteer for three years in Mozambique, and realizes that the experience provides specific ideas for connecting with his immigrant students. Saavedra believes that the greater a teacher’s empathy for what students are going through, the better they will learn. Specifically:
• Treat silence gently. “When a person arrives in a country where he or she doesn’t speak the language,” he says, “observation is the first instinct. Silence is a coping mechanism during this adjustment phase as a newcomer focuses simply on taking in information.” Saavedra remembers arriving in Mozambique and being overwhelmed by unfamiliar words, sounds, gestures, people, devices, customs, and routines. “Imagine how overwhelming this must be for a child,” he says. Teachers need to respect this “silent period” and create a nurturing environment that scaffolds learning experiences and encourages students to speak when they are ready. Some key steps: talking one-on-one with new arrivals, welcoming them, learning how to pronounce their names, getting a feel for their mental state, and perhaps negotiating non-verbal signals for participating in class.
• Offer content. Saavedra remembers being shouted at by a woman in a Mozambique market when he didn’t understand that something he was buying needed to be weighed (“PESAR!”). “Not having sufficient context to understand what’s going on around you is incredibly frustrating,” he says. “I felt stupid and believed everyone around me was judging me as such.” Teachers of ELLs need to create a context-rich environment in which students can get the support and cues they need from pictures, objects, exemplary work samples, and, of course, oral instructions.
• Give them breaks. “Functioning in a second language is incredibly mentally taxing,” says Saavedra. “For me, this mental exhaustion came and went for months… At times, I felt an unusual need for sleep, probably because my brain just needed a break.” Teachers of ELLs need to understand this, check in privately if students’ heads are on their desks, and give them down-time when they need it. It’s comforting and helpful just telling students you understand and asking them to do their best.
• Understand being “in between.” Saavedra remembers a point 7-10 months into his Peace Corps experience when he was struggling to integrate his new experiences with his American identity. “Cultural expectations no longer seemed novel, interesting, or exciting,” he says. “They just seemed wrong, and it made me angry.” He’s watched ELLs in his school get to this point and become withdrawn, less studious, and disruptive. Cultural and personal integration takes time, usually longer than a school year. “One small but powerful way to help students through this transition is to simply acknowledge the student’s reality,” he says, “even if you haven’t experienced it and don’t fully understand it.” A teacher might suggest talking to a trusted individual, drawing pictures, or keeping a journal (with no emphasis on grammar or syntax).
• Build trust. Saavedra’s experience in Africa was extraordinarily helpful in empathizing with his immigrant students, but he knew there was a big difference: he had chosen to move there as an adult, whereas most of his students were uprooted and brought to the U.S., sometimes without even having the chance to say goodbye to loved ones. “The trauma associated with this lack of agency demands empathy,” he says. “And effective teaching for language learners demands empathy, the fuel for relationships, too. At its core, good teaching is about relationships – because students allow themselves to learn from people they trust.”
(Originally titled “Engaging Your Beginners”)
In this article in Educational Leadership, Jane Hill (McREL International) offers these suggestions for engaging and challenging beginning-level ELLs:
• Consider each student’s stage of language acquisition. This allows educators to set realistic expectations for what each student should be able to do. These are the levels and the kinds of questions appropriate to each one:
“Although ELLs need to be held to the same standards as native English speakers on what they know and understand,” says Hill, “how they get there and how they demonstrate that knowledge will look different, depending on their level of English skill.”
• Use tiered questions. Teachers should ask students questions appropriate to their level, but when they approach the upper end of a level, it’s effective to start asking questions from the next level up. For example, students at the Early Production stage get yes-or-no questions and then, as they become more proficient, Why? How? and Explain… questions.
• Don’t expect the same product from all students. “When every student receives the same homework assignment, ELLs may struggle because they haven’t learned the skills they’re supposed to practice through that task,” says Hill. “They may even practice incorrectly.” Better to tier homework and in-class assignments, tailoring the language demands to students’ levels.
• Engage Pre-production students at the same level of thinking as other students. Don’t water down the curriculum for ELLs at early stages of English acquisition, says Hill. The five levels of English do not correspond to Bloom’s taxonomy of learning, she says: “How well a student can speak a second language has nothing to do with her or his ability to think abstractly.” A question can be at a low level of English usage but a high level of conceptual understanding. For example, a Pre-production student studying ecosystems might demonstrate analysis by categorizing types of plants found in desert and alpine tundra biomes using pictures and labels.
• Don’t assess language when you want to assess content knowledge. In a science lesson on how the eyeball allows humans to see, it would be a mistake to ask ELLs to write a comparison of nearsightedness and farsightedness. Instead, the teacher might ask those students to use the results of an experiment to construct models of eyeball shapes that would result in near- or farsightedness.
• Be aware of one’s own language use. Teachers should slow their rate of speech, speak in complete sentences, and make full use manipulatives, miniature objects, photos, pictures, drawings, gestures, body movement, pantomime, and facial expressions. Hill also advises that teachers not overuse idioms and pronouns, opting instead for nouns, which convey more meaning to ELLs.
(Originally titled “10 (Usually Wrong) Ideas about ELLs”)
In this Educational Leadership article, Michigan ESOL teacher Barbara Gottschalk corrects these erroneous beliefs about ELL instruction:
• Misconception #1: ESOL teachers should know students’ language. “I’ve had as many as eight different languages represented in my classroom,” says Gottschalk. An ESOL teacher might be fluent in one or two, but not eight! What’s important is good training and empathy for second-language learners.
• Misconception #2: ELLs won’t learn English if they don’t speak it at home. Research says that strong native language skills facilitate learning English. Gottschalk tells parents, “We’ll take care of the English at school; you can help us by trying to develop your child’s native language at home and encouraging good study habits in general.”
• Misconception #3: ESOL students excel at math. “I wish this positive stereotype were true more often,” says Gottschalk. Language demands in math pose challenges for many ELLs – especially requirements to explain one’s thinking.
• Misconception #4: Teachers need to simplify the curriculum. Teachers need to stick with appropriate grade-level standards but find ways to support students’ learning.
• Misconception #5: ELLs should be retained if they’re behind. It takes 5-7 years to fully master a new language, says Gottschalk. Better to move ELLs along with modifications, accommodations, and support from ESOL teachers or trained paraprofessionals.
• Misconception #6: ELLs should speak English with one another at lunch. While English is expected in the classroom and ELLs shouldn’t exclude peers by speaking an unfamiliar language, they have a right to chat in their language outside the classroom.
• Misconception #7: Immigrant families are uninvolved. Many ELLs’ parents believe it’s the school’s job to educate their children and consider classroom volunteering and fund-raisers odd. Lack of time, money, or transportation are additional reasons they may not be a frequent presence in school.
• Misconception #8: ELLs should know about U.S. cultural events. Asking an ELL about his or her Super Bowl pick, for example, could be a conversation stopper. Don’t assume cultural assimilation.
• Misconception #9: ELLs are ignorant. “Ms. G., the new girl, she don’t know anything!” said a student. In fact, ELLs come to school with many life experiences, and it’s the teacher’s job “to tap those experiences and link them to the new information we’re teaching,” says Gottschalk. “Newcomers aren’t nearly the blank slate they appear to be.”
• Misconception #10: Recently arrived immigrant students won’t be behavior problems. Frequently untrue! says Gottschalk. ELLs need the same rules, routines, and expectations as native-born students.
“A Teaching Makeover Improves Learning for Diverse Students” by Kristina Doubet, Jessica Hockett, and Catherine Brighton in Phi Delta Kappan, February 2016 (Vol. 97, #5, p. 64-69), www.kappanmagazine.org; Doubet can be reached at [email protected].
In this article in The Language Educator, curriculum directors Greta Lundgaard (Plano, Texas) and Brandon Locke (Anchorage, Alaska) say that the 1996 Standards for Foreign Language Learning and their “Five C’s” made a positive difference to world language instruction across the U.S. But over time, say Lundgaard and Locke, the standards became “comfortable and routine.” The 2015 publication of the World-Readiness Standards for Learning Languages has been a jolt for many foreign-language teachers with its emphasis on college and career preparation, critical thinking, creativity, and the collaborative interplay between language, culture, and communication. To overcome teachers’ natural resistance to change, there will have to be “solid modeling,” says Sheryl Castro of Catalina Foothills, Arizona. “They will want examples of what the World-Readiness Standards look like and sound like in the classroom. They will need time and feedback as they make adjustments to their assessments and daily teaching and learning practices.”
Lundgaard and Locke suggest three guidelines to create a “greenhouse” that will
help nurture the transition to the new standards: (a) communicate and share everything;
(b) celebrate breakthroughs, large and small; and (c) consistently involve the entire community of learners. They suggest focusing on several significant changes in the new standards:
• The definition of communication – The 1996 standards said: “Students communicate in languages other than English.” The 2015 standards require that students: “Communicate effectively in more than one language in order to function in a variety of situations for multiple purposes.” The professional development challenge is addressing the concept of functional language in different settings – interpersonal, interpretive, and presentational.
• The emphasis on analysis – The 1996 standards described the presentational mode thus: “Students present information, concepts, and ideas to an audience of listeners or readers in a variety of topics.” The 2015 standards say: “Learners present information, concepts, and ideas to inform, explain, persuade, and narrate on a variety of topics using appropriate media and adapting to various audiences of listeners, readers, or viewers.” The new standards ask students to notice, reflect, and analyze communication in real-world situations, which is more cognitively demanding. It’s the emphasis on analysis that poses the biggest shift from the previous standards’ emphasis on the more passive modes of understanding and interpretation.
• The definitions of connections, comparisons, and communities – The 2015 standards put more emphasis than their predecessors on developing students’ cultural competence – “a skill that is now, more than ever, of critical importance,” say Lundgaard and Locke. The ability to communicate and understand across cultures offers economic as well as intellectual advantages to students. Curiosity, empathy, compassion, and flexibility will serve graduates well, and it’s an important part of the mission of world-language teachers to develop these traits in their students. Technology is a key classroom tool in helping teachers and students escape their parochial limitations. On this point, the new standards say, “learners often do not recognize and understand the cultural roots of many of the behaviors and beliefs in their own society until they see how these are manifested in another culture.”
Interestingly, the instructional approach recommended by the World-Readiness Standards demands less of teachers in terms of being an expert on specific aspects of the target culture and students’ home cultures – historically a source of anxiety for teachers. The new standards suggest that students should act as “cultural sleuths,” investigating, explaining, and reflecting on the target culture’s perspectives, practices, and products. Orchestrating this process should be more comfortable for teachers – and more productive for students.
“No longer can we view ourselves simply as elective teachers teaching luxury classes,” conclude the authors. “We must embrace the innovation and change embedded within the World-Readiness Standards and recognize the critical importance of our profession.”
In this article from The Illinois School Board Journal, Chuck Dervarics and Eileen O’Brien list the characteristics of school boards that get the most positive results with their students:
• The board commits to and stays focused on a vision of high expectations for student achievement and quality instruction, with clear goals toward that vision.
• Members have strong shared beliefs and values about what is possible for students and their ability to learn, and about the system and its ability to teach all children at high levels. Poverty, low parent involvement, and other external factors are seen as challenges, not excuses.
• The board is accountability driven, spending less time on operational issues (no micromanaging) and more on policies to improve student achievement.
• The board has collaborative relationships with staff and the community and establishes a strong communications structure to inform and engage internal and external stakeholders in setting and achieving district goals.
• Members are data-savvy, asking for, embracing, and monitoring key information, not shying away from bad news, and using data to drive continuous improvement.
• Members align resources (e.g., professional development) to meet district goals, sustaining funding even in tough budget times.
a. Ideas for Black History Month – This Edutopia article by Matt Davis has numerous suggestions for effective teaching during Black History Month, as well as for the rest of the year: http://edut.to/1PzfqES.
b. Games for world language classrooms – Games2Teach is a free resource with ideas on how to incorporate games into language learning: https://games2teach.uoregon.edu. Languages include Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Russian, and German.
c. Online help for young students learning Spanish – This free resource from Kentucky’s PBS LearningMedia http://ket.pbslearningmedia.org/collection/exploraciones has a video series for students with little or no prior experience in Spanish, as well as themed units, lesson plans, activity ideas, and other materials.
© Copyright 2016 Marshall Memo LLC
About the Marshall Memo
Mission and focus:
This weekly memo is designed to keep principals, teachers, superintendents, and others very well-informed on current research and effective practices in K-12 education. Kim Marshall, drawing on 44 years’ experience as a teacher, principal, central office administrator, and writer, lightens the load of busy educators by serving as their “designated reader.”
To produce the Marshall Memo, Kim subscribes to 64 carefully-chosen publications (see list to the right), sifts through more than a hundred articles each week, and selects 5-10 that have the greatest potential to improve teaching, leadership, and learning. He then writes a brief summary of each article, pulls out several striking quotes, provides e-links to full articles when available, and e-mails the Memo to subscribers every Monday evening (with occasional breaks; there are 50 issues a year).
Individual subscriptions are $50 for a year. Rates decline steeply for multiple readers within the same organization. See the website for these rates and how to pay by check, credit card, or purchase order.
Website:
If you go to http://www.marshallmemo.com you will find detailed information on:
• How to subscribe or renew
• A detailed rationale for the Marshall Memo
• Publications (with a count of articles from each)
• Article selection criteria
• Topics (with a count of articles from each)
• Headlines for all issues
• Reader opinions (with results of an annual survey)
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Subscribers have access to the Members’ Area of the website, which has:
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Core list of publications covered
Those read this week are underlined.
American Educational Research Journal
American Educator
American Journal of Education
AMLE Magazine
ASCA School Counselor
ASCD SmartBrief/Public Education NewsBlast
Better: Evidence-Based Education
Center for Performance Assessment Newsletter
District Administration
Ed. Magazine
Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis
Educational Horizons
Educational Leadership
Elementary School Journal
Essential Teacher
Go Teach
Harvard Business Review
Harvard Educational Review
Independent School
Journal of Education for Students Placed At Risk (JESPAR)
Journal of Staff Development
Kappa Delta Pi Record
Knowledge Quest
Literacy Today
Middle School Journal
Peabody Journal of Education
Perspectives
Phi Delta Kappan
Principal
Principal Leadership
Principal’s Research Review
Reading Research Quarterly
Responsive Classroom Newsletter
Rethinking Schools
Review of Educational Research
School Administrator
School Library Journal
Teacher
Teaching Children Mathematics
Teaching Exceptional Children/Exceptional Children
The Atlantic
The Chronicle of Higher Education
The District Management Journal
The Journal of the Learning Sciences
The Language Educator
The Learning Principal/Learning System/Tools for Schools
The Reading Teacher
Theory Into Practice
Time Magazine
Wharton Leadership Digest