Encouraging Innovation in Our Schools: The Nation's Governors Step Up for Education

Inquiry and imagination in the arts builds capacity for innovation in STEM. Training in arts skills develops creativity. The arts and sciences belong together; separating them is like separating heart and mind. For a radical new story of education, consider reading Stephanie Pace Marshall's, "The Power To Transform: Leadership That Brings Learning and Schooling to Life" (2006) Jossey-Bass.

I am grateful that there are many people thinking about the knowledgenetwork. I remember a project called Kidsnetwork. I wonder if that can be redone and be problem based using the new areas of study. I say this because we know that time is a factor and the Kidsnetwork was integrated curriculum, that used technology as a tool, but also as a connector to a mentor, a scientist, and it linked communities in various localities and countries. It was one of the best learning experiences. There were many components of the things we talk about. I was priviledged , on the other hand to work with some of the businessmen , the politicians, the movers and shakers in Washington, for a special project. They don't seem to think much about teachers , nor invite their comment, input or experience. I think about the many teachers who have left the job because of various and sundry reasons, and see those people as a resource too. I always think too about those who have dedicated their lives to teaching to see that most of the new initiatives go to the very new teachers, and those with less credentials and experience. Some of us stick and stay anyway in spite of the politics and policies in teaching. Perhaps there will come a time when the teachers in the classroom are a part of the conversation. Bonnie

Many teachers know the way to innovation. In the current teaching environment in many schools those teachers have been unable to use their skills. Public educational policy and the lack of funds have been a blockade for many. The No Child Left Behind Act has created a gordian knot that claimed creativity, innovation and imagination as victims. Another problem is that in the initiatives that the businessmen have started, there has been little or no involvement of teachers. You said The Innovation America initiative talks about increasing student proficiency in STEM. At a SITE conference in San Antonio, many of the teachers who teach teachers were unfamiliar with the STEM initiatives. You said... We've been hearing that for some time. But then it goes on to say something about "modernizing the teaching force, benchmarking academic standards, and aligning assessments and creating new models for math and science education." There are teachers who have been standing in classrooms who are Accredited, and who have some information on the use of new technologies , and math and science, and engineering. But politics of local, national and state form the permission we have to teach, and often the professional development is not done well. Many teachers have little or now new backgrounds in science, math, engineering and the use of technology. I attended and spoke at a recent conference in New York, working with Project Based Learning and the teachers were amazed that these kinds of projects exist. Since that time I have been inundated by email from the 189 participants in the workshop, none of whom left the room while I was presenting. The template for Project Based Learning served me well, but the teachers wanted to know if I was doing a professional development workshop the next day. So many people asked that I went back to the conference and did an informal discussion of various PBL's that they might want to examine. We often give teachers an idea of what they can do, but we talk to them instead of providing good examples. I had the great examples and the story, but time was a problem. The information was just enough to get them interested and thinking about it. But what if they had had hands on, minds on time to explore, examine, get involved and evaluate what they could use in their classrooms or learning environment. Perhaps in the next conference there will be a professional development workshop that uses a template and gives real world examples at various grade levels and perhaps a short imaginary one to let the participants try out PBL. I like the one that is a part of the Edutopia web site. I liked the old Kidsnetwork ideas as well. I used my most familiar projects, but I think that the course could be exciting. What is PBL? Teachers could take some time to explore the resources on the site ( Edutopia) and respond to them. This is key The Changing Role of the Teacher As part of this initiative, the NGA has assembled a bipartisan task force made up of governors, business leaders, and university presidents. (What! No K-12 education teachers, administrators, researchers, students?) If you were on this task force, 1. How would you envision a modern teaching force? Updated professional development by real professionals, not just school system employees and favorites. This professional development would not be a just offered in the summer but by e-learning and with the polish of an NGS workshop, or a NASA , or NOAA project. 2. What would twenty-first-century STEM teaching and learning look like? Awareness building,the understanding of how, when , why and what it is that is needed. Skill building toward student achievement, not rote memorization. Use of other ways of evaluation, and models and examples and.. and....imaginative uses of technology and tools that require the use of data, problem solving and gathering research. 3. What would you say? The discussions of what to do with students by businessmen, is a good start but the knowledgenetwork should involve tried and true professionals . The students can't be introduced to these subjects at middle school. It has to be ideationally scaffolded through the learning experience. That is, STEM related experiences have to be real, and numerous. We should value our STEM professionals and tell their stories like we tell the stories of sports stars and American idol personalities. We should reward teachers standing in the classroom for involvement, with scholarships and fundings to improve their knowledge. We should involve them in learning journeys that are significant. This is one resource they need. They also need to learn behavior modification. How project-based learning creates a new role for the teacher: mentor and guide. 5/1/2000 There are many resources on the Edutopia site to help teachers with this learning. I attended the various business initiatives. The businessmen sometimes are not inclusive of teachers so they don't get to understand the learning landscape. They did not know about NCLB. Bonnie B.Sutton

STEM activities are logistics intensive. In Industry, Engineers and Scientists have a technical support staff or organization. But these "improvers" apparently believe that teachers are superior to Scientists and Engineers and do NOT NEED a support staff. I have been functioning as a teacher support resource for teaching Science and Math as a volunteer. This activity is logistics intensive and requires a lot of my time. But the "improvers" know much better. They thus guarentee that major improvements will continue to be blocked for a long time to come.

I think that classroom teaching needs to go from a teacher standing in front of a room of 25 kids to a teams of educators who are teaching and learning alongside their students. I think this is required in order to have the materials-intensive labs and projects that are necessary to really understand STEM content. I think the way to do this is to make much more use of high school and undergraduate students. I think that you really find out what you know when you have to teach it - so I think for high school kids to work in lower grade classrooms and for undergraduates to work with high school teens would give everyone some opportunity to learn and teach these important subjects. I think that curriculum for all high school students should include more of the apprentice/service-learning model. And this would allow the teacher to handle the logistics of a class working with lots of materials in small groups.

Tthe NGA report and the Rising Above The Gathering Storm report and others often miss critical resources and/or comments. For instance the "Storm" report omitted the great need for college teaching to improve. NGA wants innovation, but Achieve's American Diploma Project wants us to move back to a 60's post-sputnik era of science. Modern teaching force?: trained in many technologies (ipods, online data, simulations and so forth), use of data everywhere, multiculturalism in teaching and learning, many kinds and uses of assessments and learning methods, and on and on. The bachelor's degree should be in the content. A master's degree should be the gateway to teaching, and include clinical work. Separate Ementoring in at two areas (content and classroom management skills) should follow the novice for at least 3 years. Teachers should be trained as most professionals are trained. They must be trained and allowed to think and to risk. 21st STEM teaching and learning?: Include both project and problem based learning, real data sources, applied content (built on industries in a state, for instance), build on what people know (start with foodstuffs rather than invisible atoms and electrons), keep firmly in mind what society needs as future workers and thinkers, cross-content, and very rigorous. What would I say?: Too often people talk, create policies, and not much gets done. Policy-makers, adminstrators, teachers and many adults don't treat education as integral to (not only essential to) the society. Money, ideas and new (or retreaded old) are cast about. A perfomance-based model is essential for all areas of the tetaching/learning process.

#3: What would I say? Governors, business leaders, and university presidents may be able to advise us educators on *what* students need to know, but such a commission must have the input of teachers and teacher educators. Educators know a lot about how to teach our kids, about what works and what doesn't. If teachers didn't have to spend their time and energy preparing their students for high stakes assessments, they could actually spend more time teaching for understanding and application. I fear that such a commission will come up with more standards and multiple choice tests, because that has been the trend. They obviously won't propose more money to be spent on assessment so that a variety of assessments, and appropriate assessments, might be possible!

The modern teaching force would be experts in effective classroom practice first, spend far more time out of the classroom improving their classroom practice and be far more knowledgeable in at least one key content area (math, reading, science). They would also work the same number of days per year as a nurse and be paid on par with engineers. 180 six hour days of classroom time is insufficient for the twenty first century. Teachers would understand and be committed to using tools that can be employed outside the classroom at home, in public libraries or in after school programs that improve students academic performance. The teachers would encourage and enable students to spend time outside of the classroom employing effective online tools to increase their level of academic and artistic achievement. STEM would employ the existing and developing web based tools to create "force multipliers" that allow teacher's scarce and valuable time to be spent in areas of instruction not able to be done by "smart" software and improving their classroom practice. Unfortunately the existing excellent online programs for reading and math are ignored (headsprout.com, mathscore.com, heymath.com etal) or unknown to the present body of educators. If you benchmark the world's most effective education systems they are doing a good job of integrating everything from basic tools (the abacus in China) to modern online programs (www.heymath.com). The state of California discourages the use of online programs because the content can be changed quickly. The support staff of the future is online. Given the new Algebra is Calculus STEM means a significant increase in the level of academic achievement for the vast majority of students. Bill Gates claims he won't hire our high school graduates and then he spends his money trying to fix the present high school system. To quote Bill Gates "That is Random". If you don't "fix" early elementary education in math you will never achieve the objectives of STEM.

The nation's governors have never held an "education summit" to which they have invited educators. 1989. 1996. The new one. This is one reason why they are so pitifully wrong about so much when it comes to education. And when they have these bi-partisan commissions ala "Beyond NCLB," they usually have one single teacher on the body.

Last year I tried to suggest to our state supt. in California to hold a conference with a few of our state's teachers (less than 20) representing various sections of CA. He turned me down, saying that the state would offer assistance but no money to do it. He also turned down a suggestion that would save schools millions of dollars in textbook costs. I have long been an advocate of talking to the "front line" teachers for feed back. As an example, in a recent survey of 40 Interns I supervise, they indicated that they needed district level support for classroom management techniques, lesson planning guidance and planning time with other subject/grade level staff. Your writer has pointed out the obvious, the people appointed to these commissions are almost always not in the classroom and have been out of it for so long that they have lost sight of what is needed...just look at our state school board with only 3 teachers on it and the rest are political appointees. I would be willing to help organize a summit of teachers, provided we have funding, and to develop a real needs assessment instead of presenting a viewpoint that often is based on somebody's power trip and very little practical knowledge to the feds. and state powers. Perhaps Edutopia might help with the funing...? This way teachers could have a real voice based on real facts from the real front lines of the educational community. Think about it.