Redefining What High School Is Supposed to Look Like — from edutopia.org by Brittany R. Collins From restorative grading to paid internships, an equity-centered approach to education creates rich learning opportunities for all students.
We have a networking party with special tables and food, and the students have to stand and mingle. We emulate this sort of a networking party, because they have to learn how to do it. They have to dress the part that day, and I film it so we can watch it back to give them some feedback.
Digital Promise announced [on 9/26/23] the launch of the Digital Promise FutureLab. This cutting-edge initiative embodies Digital Promise’s long-standing dedication to innovation in education and aims to not only revolutionize the current state of education, but to reimagine a new world of learning.
FutureLab is funded in part by Digital Promise’s recent gift from MacKenzie Scott.
“Innovation is in Digital Promise’s DNA, and we are reaffirming our commitment to push the boundaries of what’s possible in education,” said Jean-Claude Brizard, President and CEO of Digital Promise. “We believe the Digital Promise FutureLab will be a catalyst for transformative change in education. It’s a significant opportunity to collaborate with visionary educators, technologists, and researchers to create a more equitable future for learners worldwide.”
The idea was simple: ask sixty community leaders to fan across the city’s public schools, follow in the footsteps of its youngest citizens, and report back on what they saw.
Fifty-nine said yes. What they found, Pickering says, “were kids with dead eyes. Kids not engaged. And kids who knew that school was a game – and the game was rigged.”
So the Billy Madison team used its findings to design a prospective high school that would actually produce what its participants said they wanted to see:
Let kids pursue their passions. Give them real work to do. And get them out of the school building, and in the community.
This thought-provoking discussion delves into the topic of system replacement in education. Is school transformation possible without replacing the existing education system? Joining [Michael] to discuss the question are Thomas Arnett of the Christensen Institute and Kelly Young of Education Reimagined.
In an educational landscape that constantly seeks marginal improvements, [Michael’s] guests speak to the importance of embracing new value networks that support innovative approaches to learning. They bring to light the issue of programs that remain niche solutions, rather than robust, learner-centered alternatives. In exploring the concept of value networks, [Michael’s] guests challenge the notion of transforming individual schools or districts alone. They argue for the creation of a new value network to truly revolutionize the education system. Of course, they admit that achieving this is no small feat, as it requires a paradigm shift in mindset and a careful balance between innovation and existing structures. In this conversation, we wrestle with the full implications of their findings and more.
From DSC: This reminds me of the importance of TrimTab Groups who invent or test out something new apart from the mothership.
The 2023 GEM Report on technology and education explores these debates, examining education challenges to which appropriate use of technology can offer solutions (access, equity and inclusion; quality; technology advancement; system management), while recognizing that many solutions proposed may also be detrimental.
The report also explores three system-wide conditions (access to technology, governance regulation, and teacher preparation) that need to be met for any technology in education to reach its full potential.
Bloom Academy is the first and only self-directed learning center in Las Vegas – microschooling as true, nontraditional and permissionless education alternative. 5 Questions with Microschool Founders Sarah & Yamila.https://t.co/RvxtwGXvkZ
Since last spring, journalists at The 74 have been crossing the U.S. as part of our 2023 High School Road Trip. It has embraced both emerging and established high school models, taking us to 13 schools from Rhode Island to California, Arizona to South Carolina, and in between.
It has brought us face-to-face with innovation, with programs that promote everything from nursing to aerospace to maritime-themed careers.
At each school, educators seem to be asking one key question: What if we could start over and try something totally new?
What we’ve found represents just a small sample of the incredible diversity that U.S. high schools now offer, but we’re noticing a few striking similarities that educators in these schools, free to experiment with new models, now share. Here are the top eight: .
What does it take to empower parents and decentralize schooling? Why is a diversity of school models important to parents? Are we at a tipping point? .
Several meta-analyses, which summarize the evidence from many studies, have found higher achievement when students take quizzes instead of, say, reviewing notes or rereading a book chapter. “There’s decades and decades of research showing that taking practice tests will actually improve your learning,” said David Shanks, a professor of psychology and deputy dean of the Faculty of Brain Sciences at University College London.
Still, many students get overwhelmed during tests. Shanks and a team of four researchers wanted to find out whether quizzes exacerbate test anxiety. The team collected 24 studies that measured students’ test anxiety and found that, on average, practice tests and quizzes not only improved academic achievement, but also ended up reducing test anxiety. Their meta-analysis was published in Educational Psychology Review in August 2023.
The End of Scantron Tests— from theatlantic.com by Matteo Wong Machine-graded bubble sheets are the defining feature of American schools. Today’s kindergartners may never have to fill one out.
There are several possible reasons why pretesting worked in this study.
Students paid more attention to the pretested material during the lecture.
The pretest activated prior knowledge (some of them are clearly doing a lot of prework), and allowed them to encode the new information more deeply.
They were doing a lot of studying of the pretested information outside of class.
There are some great spaced retrieval effects going on. That is, students saw the material before lecture, they took a quiz on it during the pretest, then later they reviewed or quizzed themselves on that same material again during self-study.
But this fall, a few educators are quietly charting a different course they believe could change everything: At least two groups are pushing to create new AI chatbots that would offer teachers unlimited access to sometimes confusing and often paywalled peer-reviewed research on the topics that most bedevil them.
Their aspiration is to offer new tools that are more focused and helpful than wide-ranging ones like ChatGPT, which tends to stumble over research questions with competing findings. Like many juveniles faced with questions they can’t answer, it has a frustrating tendency to make things up.
Then, I turned Custom Instructions on and gave it the same starting prompt. Here are a few of the responses (emphases are mine):
“Purpose:What’s the primary goal of the course? Is it to augment your existing offerings at Every, serve as a standalone product, or something else?”
“Content Depth: Given your love for detailed, intellectual writing, how in-depth will you go on each topic?”
“Guest Contributions: Do you plan to involve guest experts, perhaps even some of your writing heroes or team members like Kate Lee and Evan Armstrong?”
“Time Investment: Given that you’re already grappling with being too opportunistic and dutiful, how will you allocate time for this without sidelining your creative work or burdening yourself?”
AI for comics— from aiandacademia.substack.com by Bryan Alexander Exploring an entertaining new Hugging Face application
As generative AI grows, more uses appear. Beyond text and images, other domains for creation pop up as companies, groups, and individuals try out new functions.
Today’s case in point is AI Comic Factory from Hugging Face.* This service will generate a couple of comic book pages based on your text input. It gives you choices of comic style and page layout as well.
Items from Tom Barrett’ Promptcraft: AI for a better learning ecosystem
How many languages do you speak? Thanks to AI, that number could be as many as seven. Los Angeles-based AI video platform HeyGen has launched a new tool that clones your voice from a video and translates what you’re saying into seven different languages. If that wasn’t enough, it also syncs your lips to your new voice so the final clip looks (and sounds) as realistic as possible.
Microsoft and Project Gutenberg have used AI technologies to create more than 5,000 free audiobooks with high-quality synthetic voices.
For the project, the researchers combined advances in machine learning, automatic text selection (which texts are read aloud, which are not), and natural-sounding speech synthesis systems.
It’s crucial – for individuals and the larger community – that students and young adults develop a solid foundation of personal finance knowledge, skills and habits in order to thrive. Practicing good money habits means the difference between long-term financial security and serious financial straits.
Financial literacy education is the responsibility of everyone, but most particularly parents and teachers. This guide focuses primarily on teaching financial literacy in elementary, middle and high schools. However, the concepts discussed below – and many of the resources listed – are also helpful for parents and others interested in promoting sound personal finance practices by kids and teens alike. Below you’ll find our suggestions for what concepts should be taught to kids from pre-k through grade 12, and the best times to introduce those concepts. You’ll also find an extensive list of some of the best resources – books, lesson plans, activities, videos, games and more – to supplement financial literacy education in the classroom.
Big Ideas is Education Week’s annual special report that brings the expertise of our newsroom—and occasionally those beyond our newsroom—to bear on the challenges you might be facing in your classroom, school, or district. Big Ideas questions the status quo and explores opportunities to help you build a better, more just learning environment for all students. Browse our collection.
36% satisfied with U.S. K-12 education quality, matching record low in 2000
76% of K-12 parents satisfied with own child’s, 41% with U.S., education
Republicans’ satisfaction with K-12 education at new low of 25%
Still, parents of elementary and secondary school students remain quite satisfied with the education their child is getting, and they offer mostly positive reviews of the performance of their children’s teachers. If parental satisfaction wanes, however, parents may choose to move their child to a different school.
Exclusive new polling by The Chronicle suggests Americans still believe that college credentials have value, even as many hold reservations about higher education’s track record of benefiting society and educating students, our Eric Kelderman reports.
People would generally tell a close friend or relative that getting a college degree is worth it, according to a national survey conducted for The Chronicle. Almost eight in 10 respondents said they’d tell a close friend to seek a bachelor’s degree. Even among those who thought their own associate or bachelor’s degree wasn’t worthwhile, 57 percent would tell a friend to go for a bachelor’s.
… But wait. Respondents were tepid when asked how well colleges were fulfilling key parts of their missions.
Only 30 percent said colleges were doing an excellent or very good job leveling the playing field for success.
Just 40 percent said colleges are excellent or very good at educating students.
A flashing red light: Those with more education felt worse about colleges’ ability to educate students than did those with a high-school degree or less.
The bigger picture: Colleges still have reservoirs of public support to tap, but they can’t expect to win more hearts and minds merely by telling their stories better. Higher ed’s skeptics include many people who’ve passed through campuses, suggesting business as usual won’t cut it — even when it comes to the core work of educating students.
Despite enrollment and completion rates declining and Americans’ confidence in higher education falling, the economic case for earning a college degree remains solid. College graduates earn about $1 million more over the course of their working years than U.S. adults with no college degree, on average.
However, a college degree has value beyond financial gain.
…
The results show that additional years of education beyond high school make for a healthier, more civic-minded individual who is more likely to interact with neighbors and family members, and to do work that aligns with their natural talents and interests.
Habit #2: Engage students in a brain dump or two things as an entry ticket or exit ticket. Spend one minute or less having students write down everything (or just two things) they remember from class. The key: Don’t grade it! Keep retrieval practice no-stakes to emphasize it’s a learning strategy, not an assessment strategy.
Teaching from the heart in 13 steps — from timeshighereducation.com by Beiting He Engaging your students through empathy requires teachers to share their own stories and vulnerabilities and foster a safe space for learning. Here, Beiting He offers 13 ways to create a caring classroom
In summary, “I wish” is about proposing positive changes and improvements, while “I wonder” is about asking thoughtful questions to gain insight and foster meaningful conversations within the team.
PXU City HS has no physical site — its 83 students create custom programs, choosing from a menu of some 500 options fromPhoenix Union High School District’s bricks-and-mortar schools; its online-only program, internships; jobs; college classes; and career training programs.
But in the process, it became clear just how many high school-aged students were working, caring for siblings, filling in for their parents or significantly behind — or ahead and bored — academically.
…
If PXU City works as well for all its students as it does for Dominguez, he adds, every high school in the district ought to throw away the bell schedule and offer a truly personalized education.
There are 10 areas of study students chose from:architectural design, business administration logistics-distribution, computer science, construction technology, cybersecurity, diesel/auto technology, energy technologies, human and social services, teaching and training, and sports medicine.
Students pick a job within the program they’re working toward, but that can change, Cordia said, noting that there are hundreds of possible jobs within the automotive program.
The school received e more than 1,000 applications from interested students, he said, calling it “very humbling.”
Addendum that also involves changes within the K12 learning ecosystem:
From DSC: If we can’t get violence in schools under control (a very difficult task without trying to impact peoples’ hearts and minds), this trend could pick up steam big-time.
They talked instead about issues like pay, stress and the sense that they no longer had the solid backing of school administrators.
Sue Harper, who retired this summer from Kreeger Elementary in Fowlerville, blamed what she called “bulldozer parents.”
…
“I have never been one to quit anything, and teaching is my passion, but this is not teaching,” one teacher wrote. “This is hours of endless paperwork, this is social work, this is counseling, this is parenting, this is babysitting, this is coaching, this is everything but teaching.”
Now a change management coordinator for Fifth Third Bank, she said, “I don’t take the stress from my job home. I don’t feel guilty, like I always could be doing more for someone.”
Thousands of experienced teachers have retired or left the profession in the years since the COVID-19 pandemic first closed schools and shifted classes to Zoom.
Teachers say they’re burnt out, tired of a lack of support and lack of respect, feeling the impact of the increasingly acrimonious politics surrounding public education.
So, in addition to asking ChatGPT to think like a school communications professional, a principal, or a teacher, what if we asked ChatGPT to think like the populations we’re serving, as a way of improving the education (or UX) we’re delivering?
Why I Keep Teaching — from edutopia.org by Rachel Jorgensen A veteran educator explains why, despite the many challenges, she continues to try to change students’ lives, in turn enriching her own.
EVERY TIME I SHOW UP FOR WORK, A STUDENT MIGHT CHANGE MY LIFE FOR THE BETTER
EVERY TIME I SHOW UP FOR WORK, A STUDENT MIGHT CHANGE MY LIFE FOR THE BETTER
MY WORK HAS INVISIBLE RIPPLE EFFECTS
34 Ways to Quiet a Rambunctious Class — from edutopia.org by Daniel Leonard From “Silent 20” to imaginary marshmallows, these teacher-tested strategies for all grade levels can help you snap an unruly classroom back to attention.
Per EdSurge:
‘THE MOTH’ GOES TO SCHOOL: For more than a decade, the nonprofit behind the popular storytelling podcast The Moth has run workshops in schools to help students share impactful stories from their lives. Now the group started a spin-off podcast, Grown, highlighting those student stories. Here’s what they’re learning, and why they say storytelling needs to be taught in schools.
The single narrative education system is no longer working.
Its main limitation is its inability to honor young people as the dynamic individuals that they are.
New models of teaching and learning need to be designed to center on the student, not the teacher.
When the opportunity arises to implement learning that uses immersive technology ask yourself if the learning you are designing passes the Ready Player One Test:
Does it allow learners to immerse themselves in environments that would be too expensive or dangerous to experience otherwise?
Can the learning be personalized by the student?
Is it regenerative?
Does it allow for learning to happen non-linearly, at any time and place?
Her program is part of a company called Prenda, which last year served about 2,000 students across several states. It connects home-school families with microschool leaders who host students, often in their homes. It’s like Airbnb for education, says Prenda’s CEO, because its website allows customers – in this case, parents – to enter their criteria, search and make a match.
An explosion of new options, including Prenda, has transformed home schooling in America. Demand is surging: Hundreds of thousands of children have begun home schooling in the last three years, an unprecedented spike that generated a huge new market. In New Hampshire, for instance, the number of home-schoolers doubled during the pandemic, and even today it remains 40 percent above pre-covid totals.
From DSC: This is another great example of the morphing going on in the PreK-12 learning ecosystem.
The Mass Exodus of Teachers — from educationoneducation.substack.com by Jeannine Proctor Understanding Why Educators Are Fleeing the Classroom and How to Bring Them Back
Stemming the tide will require nuance, empathy, and listening to what teachers say they need. While pay raises are indispensable, they alone won’t be enough. Districts must take an integrated approach that also addresses unmanageable workloads, lack of resources, and toxic school cultures.
Some best practices include utilizing multi-classroom teaching models, providing duty-free “coverage” periods, and hiring support staff to shoulder non-instructional burdens. Investing in mentoring and leadership opportunities can stem the turnover of principals and administrators too. Public recognition and appreciation can also go a long way.
Most importantly, we must work to restore teacher well-being, purpose, and passion.
From DSC: The primary things that would help this very troubling situation:
Dee’s analysis found that since the pandemic the number of students who were chronically absent nearly doubled to about 13.6 million, with 1.8 million of them in California.
Compared with before the pandemic, Dee found that about 6.5 million additional students became chronically absent in 2021-22, including more than 1 million in California.
The idea of default is also an important idea. If we do it by invitation, what we have noticed is that those who know about it know to say yes to the invitation. If it is a default schedule, and then you have to opt out, then our ability to address equity and enrollment for our low-income students and students of color, it makes us much more successful.
The number of people studying for careers in education has been declining for years. At the same time, schools have struggled to hold on to new teachers: Studies indicate that about 44 percent of teachers leave the profession within their first five years.
Then the pandemic came along, hammering teachers and the profession as a whole.
“The first three years of teaching are really, really hard even in a perfect school system,” said Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers. So for teachers who entered the teaching profession at any point during the pandemic, “this has been a helluva ride.”
A study from World Remit shows that the cost of school supplies in the United States has increased by over 25% compared with 2022.
Though inflation is the lowest it has been since March 2021, high prices are still stressing shoppers and increasing their reliance on local and national back-to-school drives. The nonprofit organizations that sponsor those drives, in turn, are struggling to meet the growing demand.
Excerpt from Tom Barrett’s Dialogic #329:The Transformative Power of Compassionate Leadership
Your Next Steps: ?Commit to action and turn words into works
Reflect on your current leadership style and identify opportunities to incorporate more compassionate practices. Consider the Appreciative Inquiry model to guide this process.
Develop an empathy-driven approach to problem-solving and team dynamics, focusing on fostering a culture of understanding, collaboration, and mutual respect.
Revisit your feedback mechanisms and explore how they can be made more compassionate. Consider how critique can be delivered with kindness to empower, rather than tear down.
Against that backdrop, Ken Montgomery, co-founder of Design Tech High, known as D-Tech, and Keeanna Warren, who just became the CEO of the Purdue Polytechnic High School network, joined me to talk about their school designs, in particular the importance of:
helping students connect to something bigger than the school itself;
offering competency-based learning pathways with a transformed assessment system;
allowing students to find their creative purpose aligned to the common good;
and building a more permeable school that is connected to the community and offers a deep sense of belonging.
They also talked about the role of AI (artificial intelligence) and the anxiety that their students feel around its emergence, as well as the barriers that arise to building school models that break the traditional molds—from policy to human capital.
VIEW CHILDREN AS ACTIVE LEADERS IN THEIR LEARNING I was co-teaching in an inclusive preschool classroom 20 years ago when I led my first professional development workshop (the project approach). The aim was to show teachers that children could co-construct their learning experiences when they were invited to do so. Two groundbreaking Reggio Emilia books came to mind—Shoe and Meter and Everything Has a Shadow Except Ants. These inspirational books were part of a series published in collaboration with the Italian Ministry of Education called “The Unheard Voice of Children.”
The series recognized children as active leaders of their learning and endeavored to document the process of learning through children’s learning experiences.
Let Kids Make Decisions — from edutopia.org by Sean Cassel An overreliance on rules can backfire. Instead, teachers can focus on providing students with choices and teaching good decision-making skills.
I’ve deeply thought about that last part over the course of my career: Let kids make decisions. Twenty years later, I am a high school administrator tasked with enforcing rules every day. Let me be clear: Schools need rules to function, but they don’t have to be the focus. My school focuses on allowing students to make choices: It is a centerpiece of how we operate. And although kids don’t always make the right choices, often enough they do. An overreliance on rules, in either a classroom or an entire school, can limit the ability of students to grow and develop their decision-making skills.
From DSC: Some nice ideas and tools listed here to start developing relationships even before the first day of school.
An Intentional Approach to Improving Your Teaching Practice — from edutopia.org by Marcus Luther By selecting one area for growth, collecting resources, and connecting with others, teachers can make meaningful improvements in the classroom.
Last summer, my focus was improving the level of inquiry in my classroom. I describe my process below, which transfers to any area or topic on which you might hope to focus your own professional learning.
Setting Up Libraries to Be the Best Space in School— from edutopia.org by Paige Tutt We took a peek inside school libraries across America to see how librarians are reframing the space to support students’ social, emotional, and creative growth—while still prioritizing excellent reads.
The recently renovated library—now known as the Learning Commons—is a bright, spacious multipurpose hub within the school. There are bistro tables where kids can work together; comfortable and flexible seating; a makerspace where students can explore activities like sewing and jewelry making; an audio recording and production studio; and a video production studio where kids can create TikToks or YouTube videos using their phones or school-issued laptops. It’s a far cry from the space it used to be—an attendance sheet from 2008 tracked just 21 students signing into the library one day.
