A Study on the Value of Teacher Feedback

Teachers spend copious amounts of time commenting on students’ social studies papers. Teachers may comment on the students’ understanding or misunderstanding of the unit content, completeness and balance of analysis, and investigation and comparison of sources. Additionally, teachers typically comment on the logic and structure of the paper, grammar, spelling, proper academic language, and other literacy aspects of academic writing.

If the teacher comments are interpreted as constructive criticism, the student is engaged in a joint productive activity. “Learning occurs most effectively when experts and novices work together for a common product or goal, and are therefore motivated to assist one another”(Center for Research on Education, Diversity & Excellence, Five Standards for Effective Pedagogy, 2002, www.crede.ucsc.edu/tools/research/standards/standards.html). This is well and good, but do high school students interpret teacher comments on papers as constructive criticism? More basically, do the students even read the comments, and if so, do they use those teacher comments as a guideline for the next paper? That was the question I asked 22 High School history students. I was unable to find previous studies that answered my questions. However, I speculate that the research has been done and is in some education or psychology journal. Perhaps I’ve stumbled upon a research idea for someone’s masters thesis.

I gave a tenth grade World History class the following instructions. (The number of students that answered is in parentheses.)

Please put your head down, and don’t be influenced by your neighbor. I want your honest analysis—not what you think I want to hear. You may pick from four possible answers: never, seldom, usually, or always. Raise your hand for the best answer for two questions:
A. When a teacher corrects a paper I wrote, I read the comments… never (1), seldom (2), usually (7), or always (10).
B. When I write the next paper for that same teacher, I use the comments on the first paper as a guideline... never (4), seldom (4), usually (10), or always (2).

The total number of students in the class was 22. Two students refused to participate.

The total sample size was too small to extrapolate to a more general population of high school students. If the same trend was found on a larger sample size, such as fifty or more students, and one drew from a statistically normal population, disturbing conclusions could be reached. Despite lessons from a skillful and accomplished educator, large numbers of students do not engage in a joint productive activity with their teacher. If 40% of students don’t use teacher comments constructively, the assessment process is no longer a feedback loop. Instead, assessment is only a means for the teacher to determine a grade.

Fortunately, schools can fix this problem before high school. Grammar schools can and should teach students how to use teacher feedback.

Race and Cultural Sensitivity in the Public Schools

California schools are witnessing an influx of Latino students, predominantly from Mexico. According to the Federal Department of Education, Latino students are now the majority ethnic group in California public schools. (Link here.) Teachers and administrators want to engage these students and make them feel welcome and valued, aiming to increase their academic performance. What is the best strategy to get “buy in” from these students?

Many believe that cultural awareness and sensitivity will increase participation of these students. Administrators believe, and I write “believe” on purpose, that if school staff demonstrates interest in Latino themes, these students will reciprocate by getting more involved in school activities, completing homework, pushing for parental involvement in PTA, and participating in athletics and clubs. This belief by administrators translates into assemblies highlighting famous Latinos, observation of holidays on the Mexican calendar, and celebration of Latino food, art, and music.

While I also believe that cultural awareness is useful and an important part of secondary education, increasing connection for all those in our community, dissuading students from holding ethnic stereotypes, and reinforcing the curriculums of world history, government, languages, art, and music, I do not believe it will achieve its stated purpose—to increase this population’s interest in school activities. Assuming that other groups, African-Americans, Native-Americans, Asians, Whites, Muslims, Jews, etc. do not react negatively to the lack of attention for their cultural heritage, will Latino cultural activities raise school grades and test scores?

Some empathy about what it is like to be a minority student may show whether these programs will work. As a Jewish kid in a lily-white suburb, I felt that students did not understand my background and culture. Would I have felt more at home if all attended school assemblies describing the achievements of Albert Einstein, Jonas Salk, and Levi Strauss? Would I have felt more connected to my school if they made everyone watch Roman Polansky movies, listen to Simon and Garfunkle, and attend a bagel fest? The answer to these questions, of course, is no. I felt less connected to my school, not more, when I was embarrassed by being asked to bring in a few Hanukkah songs to balance the Christmas concert play list.

There is a better way to connect kids, all kids, to school activities. Teachers can and should make one-on-one connections to students, inspiring students to work harder, apply to college, and join clubs, student government, and athletics. More often than not, these connections make the difference. Many successful minority students say that an inspiring mentor catalyzed their performance. Why not ask teachers to increase their efforts to make a connection with Latino kids? If lack of connection is not the problem; instead, blatant racism is turning off Latino students, administrators can facilitate small group discussions with Latino parents and students and school staff. Administration can then take necessary action. Most of the time, however, the problem can be alleviated by a closer teacher-student relationship.

Dad, Weather, and Directions--40 Years Ago

Winter mornings were dark but full of life and with a hum growing louder like an orchestra’s slow crescendo. My father, his head on the pillow only moments before and eyes still half-closed put a few scoops of Folgers in the coffee maker and opened a can with a label of some smiling animal probably drawn by an Andy Warhol wannabe. The dogs, of course, were ecstatic, jumping on their hind legs like circus animals badly needing Ritalin, since they were sure they hadn’t ever tried this food before, and it was probably better than fillet mignon. It wasn’t, but I’m sure the dogs’ grating squeaks of gratitude made it to the upper spheres. The coffee machine gurgled and dripped and the bitter aroma wafted through the house. Morning smelled like plain coffee, the stuff that cost a quarter along with your eggs and toast at the local diner. Everyone was awake, eyes still closed, but aware by now. Dad then roused all the kids with four simple words: “Time to get up.” Naturally a morning person, I sprung out of bed and was dressed and eating in the kitchen in ten minutes. (Unfortunately for the rest of humanity, I didn’t discover the wonders of daily showers until adolescence.) My brother usually joined me a few minutes later. I enjoyed reading the San Francisco Chronicle while consuming my usual Life cereal and milk. Now fully awake and in good spirits, coffee in hand, Dad would regale me with questions about the weather in cities around the world. “What was the high in Buenos Aires yesterday? Guess the average temperature in New York City.” Later he became an hour-a-day devotee of the Weather Channel, and he and a few farmers complained bitterly when the cable company dropped this exciting program. He asked me and my brother these questions with such excitement and interest that you’d think he was talking about the end of the Vietnam War or the Apollo Space program, but no, it was whether it rained yesterday in Death Valley. Eventually my brother and I amused ourselves by giving purposely wrong answers and watching Dad’s horror—on this dark December day Anchorage had a high of 95 degrees and it snowed on Oahu. How could his boys be so ignorant after all the training he had given us? Completely disgusted, Dad quit asking us about the weather.

However, my father’s interest in weather was renewed in the days before the family embarked on a summer road trip. Dad would check and double check that my brother and I packed the proper gear for the coldest early morning hours. If there was a chance of a sprinkle, he told us to bring rain gear too. Despite myself, before we left I knew the probable highs and lows of every leg of our trip and the chances for rain at our destination. If my memory serves me, he was usually right—never off by more than a few degrees. He wasn’t just lucky or possessing special skills in watching birds fly. A scientist through and through, he read local weather reports, watched newscasts on television, especially the jerky storm maps (about as interesting as the natural history museums he also loved), and perhaps most critical, forecasted from his “instruments” he perched in various places in the backyard. Using three primitive tools, a thermometer manufactured around the time of the Korean War, a plastic barometer the size of a large clock that my mom found at some G-d-forsaken garage sale, and the dogs’ water dish (which measured precipitation and the night’s low by thickness of the ice) he saw patterns in our area. He successfully generalized these patterns to our trip locale after looking at the television weather maps. To this day, I trust his forecasts better than the professionals—he has a better track record.

Dad occupied himself with the logistics of the trip as well. Three different color pencils and straight edge in hand, he calculated the best route, tracing colored lines in sections over a National Automobile Club map. As he hunched over the well-illuminated table like General Patton in his war room, he let everyone know that he could not be disturbed as he was “figuring out how to get there.” Never have I seen such absolute concentration. I secretly hoped that some day I would possess this manly skill and calculate my way to and from the high Sierra Nevada mountains. Dad didn’t hold much stock in road signs, believing only in following the directions of the compass, usually assessed by the placement of the sun and the name of the highway. On the rare occasions that he lost his way, he, a combination of American Indian chief and US Army Ranger, oriented himself using celestial objects and moss on the trees.

Today I never use a map. I could never come close to the skills of the master, and I prefer depending on road signs and some inner compass to guide me. Dad’s maps, an anachronism for anyone using modern GPS systems, are no longer needed. Dad doesn’t trust the GPS though, and brightens when he proves the machine wrong. Besides, he’s a much better father than any machine, warning us adult children every year about the fog bank one block from his house.

PT Poker

Note: My son, who is studying to be a teacher, invented this game to keep physically fit. He is a Marine Corps cadet, and, like me, knows that physical fitness is a key element of teaching performance.

PT poker is a two-player game. Players bet in pushups. The loser takes the pot. If player A owes 100 pushups and there are 50 pushups in the pot and player A wins the hand, 50 pushups are not subtracted from his total. Player B simply owes 50 pushups.

Since pushups can get tiresome, players may exchange a number of pushups for other exercises. In our version, five pushups are equivalent to one eight-count-body-builder. 100 pushups equals a sprint up a very steep hill. Ab workouts or different types of runs can also be applied.

We keep track of pushups owed on paper. Players are not required to complete all pushups instantly. They may do them at any point during or after the game.

There is an additional penalty if player A does not fold and player B has some rare combination. The penalties we play with are the following: 10 pushups for a straight, 50 pushups for a flush, 100 pushups for a full house, 200 pushups for quads, 500 pushups for a straight flush, and 1000 pushups for a royal flush. So far, nobody has ever owed more than 500 or 600 pushups.

A winner is never declared. If someone wants to quit they can quit, but they must complete all pushups owed at some point during the day.

My Dining Experience and Culture Change

I assumed that my childhood dining experience was the norm everywhere until I served, in my late 20s, as a counseling intern in a poor urban area of California. I co-facilitated a group of teens in a diversion program. Similar in philosophy to traffic school, the attendees avoided a worse alternative—juvenile hall—by attending sixteen sessions of group therapy. Most of the kids wanted to quickly get through the program and get on with their lives, but more than a few enjoyed engaging in macho posturing and making the therapist squirm. One time my partner went on vacation and I was on my own with seventeen teens, many of them well over 200 pounds with a recent history of low impulse control. My boss told me to call 911 if things got out of hand. Boy, that made me feel empowered! The group sensed my discomfort and I heard comments like, “I’d like to tear off, one by one, the fingers off that cop that hassled me.” “Have you ever done crack?” And my favorite, “Man, this group sucks.” Somehow I survived. Teaching high school was easy after these experiences.

One day I asked the group what they talked about at the dinner table. I received back seventeen blank stares. My more astute partner was familiar with inner city life, and asked, “How many of you eat dinner with your family at the same time?” None did. Instead they would grab something out of the refrigerator and eat it, in their room, alone. Taken aback, I realized that the family life of many inner city children was qualitatively different from mine. What glued these families together? Perhaps their family glue was less sticky than mine. My family’s dining experience was the centripetal force that held us together.

For my first seventeen years of my life, from birth to when I moved away to college, my family ate together whenever possible but especially at dinner. If someone was away or sick their presence would be missed. Dinnertime was when we kids told everyone about our day, usually what happened at school. Topics included who in class got in trouble for placing a tack on the “kiss up” girl’s chair; whether plants grow from the top or from the bottom; pi to ten digits; who got the weekly “room 13 citizen of the week” award; and who threw up during running drills in P.E. and who was forced to clean it up. If you weren’t talkative, you were angry at a family member or “something was wrong with you.” Religion and politics were also highly prized topics of discussion, and non-believers and political enemies were described in colorful and draconian terms as barbarians and evil-doers. Specifically, I remember a dinner time discussion that included the Vietnam War, President Nixon, and Eugene McCarthy after some Berkeley radical or reactionary tore off my father’s McCarthy for President bumper sticker. After a Christian missionary came to our door, we discussed a few differences between Christianity and our Judaism. I was a good son that agreed with his parents and as a devout junior Hasmonean and budding politician looked forward to dinnertime, hungry or not.

Indeed, when I started forming opinions of my own, the discussions became more heated. Our dinner table conversation would have made excellent court room training. We all used time-tested rhetorical techniques on each other, especially ad hominem attacks, and sarcastically questioned our opponent’s intelligence. Yet we children also learned that our opinions mattered and were valued and were taught how to think and retort quickly and sometimes cleverly.

Update: 
My pulse quickened when I found a New York Times article, Why Does it Matter that Families Eat Together? Sam Sifton writes that this communal time inoculates family members somewhat from depression, drug use, obesity and teenage pregnancy. The children do better in school. Read the article here.

Does Teacher Tenure Help or Hinder Student Learning?

Plenty of ink has been spilled about whether tenure contributes to better or worse high school instruction. Tenure insulates teachers from education stakeholders, more specifically parents, fellow teachers, and administrators, who may want to remove an unpopular but otherwise good and effective teacher. These successful teachers must contend with political pressures from administrators, parents, or colleagues. A principal may demand that the teacher teach to the test to produce higher test scores or inflate grades to generate higher pass rates. Parents may complain to the principal about the curriculum, the teacher’s political or religious views, or their child’s grade. The school board may object to whistle blowing activities. Fellow teachers may object to the teacher’s activism. Administrators may want to hire those that can be more easily molded to carry out their policies and fire those that get in their way (Brekke, 2001, Koorstra, 2000). Teachers should not be terminated for political reasons, and tenure insulates teachers from these political winds.

However, tenure may be a redundant protection since public school teachers are guaranteed due process by state and federal governments and additionally sheltered by union grievance procedures. Tenure acts as a disincentive for some teachers to give more than a minimum effort (Pound, 2000) and makes it quite expensive and difficult for school boards to fire incompetent, destructive, and dishonest teachers. From 1990 to 1999, “Los Angeles Unified School District—the second largest in the nation—dismissed only one teacher.” Administrators tend to move bad teachers rather than fire them, so they gravitate to schools in low-income areas where supervision tends to be more forgiving (Schwab, 2005) and where, ironically, the best teachers are needed. High school tenure requires no record of published research or long probationary period required at the university level (Stephey, 2009). In California, teacher probation is only two years.

Let’s conduct a mind experiment. What would high school education look like if both teacher protections, unionization and tenure, were removed? We would then be a nation of private schools! My oldest son attended a private high school five years ago. Nine out of thirteen former teachers and the principal have moved on. Not all private schools suffer from the high turnover that plagued this school, but public schools without union and tenure protections would certainly approach the higher turnover rates of the private sector. University of California, Berkeley education researcher Xiaoxia Newton shared with me by email that a national study comparing private and public school churning was conducted by R.Ingersoll in 1995. (Teacher supply, teacher qualifications and teacher turnover. Washington DC: National Center for Education Statistics.) This study showed that small private schools have relatively higher levels of teacher turnover. (See Dr. Newton's work comparing charter and public schools here.) Does higher teacher turnover hurt student performance? According to the National Commission on Teaching and America’s Future, teachers at low-performing schools often leave before they have mastered their craft and created a successful learning culture (Barnes et al., 2007). If all schools suffered from much higher turnover, student learning would suffer. Additionally, private schools often pay less than public schools and fewer good candidates would be attracted to the profession.

What if we kept unionization in place and limited the use of tenure in high school, either requiring a longer probationary period or weakening tenure that shields teachers receiving poor performance reviews? Five years ago California voters discarded these ideas, packaged as a ballot measure, Proposition 74. I see little evidence that changing probation and tenure policies will more than slightly affect the aggregate of teacher performance and therefore, student performance, but it may be worth looking at the probationary period again. Would students be better served if California had a three-year probationary period? I think so. Most California high school teachers are good at what they do, but, anecdotally, I have come across poor-performing teachers who weren’t quite weeded out after two years of probation. One more year of hard scrutiny, adding fifty percent more time to their probationary period, may have convinced them to find ways to improve their skills or seek another line of work. Since these teachers, now mediocre performers at best, cannot be removed and have little interest in improving, student performance suffers. Would beginning teachers be discouraged by a three-year probationary period and one more year of high-stakes performance reviews? I think not. Most states demand a longer probationary period than California.

Alternately, the law could be changed to weaken tenure protections for poor-performing teachers. If a teacher receives inferior performance reviews from administrators AND a board of peers AND state tests scores declined for a majority of students under this teacher, we have a pretty good idea that something is wrong. This teacher should lose tenure protection. Notice that tenure would still protect teachers against overzealous parents, administrators attempting to remake departments to their liking, and faculty objecting to a teacher’s politics. Only truly bad teachers would fail performance reviews run by both administrators and fellow teachers, including subjective examinations of performance and an objective analysis of state test scores. Those teachers could choose to learn necessary skills or leave the profession and student learning would incrementally improve.

Bibliography

G. Barnes, E. Crowe, and B. Schaefer, The Cost of Teacher Turnover in Five School Districts, Executive Summary, National Commission on Teaching and America’s Future, 2007, http://www.nctaf.org/resources/demonstration_projects/turnover/documents/CTTExecutiveSummaryfinal.pdf

Brekke, Stewart E, Why Teachers Need Tenure, 2001, http://teachers.net/gazette/JAN02/brekke.html

Koorstra, Dirk, Tenure Protects Good Teachers, Too, Mackinac Center for Public Policy, February 10, 2000, http://www.educationreport.org/pubs/mer/article.aspx?id=2696

Pound, Gerald A, Tenure Law is Impediment to School Reform, Mackinac Center for Public Policy, May 12, 2000 http://www.educationreport.org/pubs/mer/article.aspx?id=2874

Schwab, Alexander, Teacher Tenure Protects Jobs Instead of Education, http://www.cfif.org/htdocs/freedomline/current/guest_commentary/reform-teacher-tenure.htm

Stephey, M. J., A Brief History of Tenure, Time, Nov. 17, 2008

How Teachers Should Dress

From my manuscript, Mindful Teaching:

When I go to work, I dress up as if I’m attending a corporate board meeting in San Francisco. In other words, I wear slacks and a tie four or five days a week, and if I attend a public event such as Back to School Night or a district board meeting I wear a suit. My outfit radiates professionalism, purposefulness, maturity, wealth, and ambition. Parents mistake me for an administrator or district official and ask me questions, because I look like I am in charge. Students notice this attention, deserved or not.

Would I teach better in jeans and a flannel shirt? My dress does not alter my teaching nor does it change my classroom technique one way or another. However, my outfit does generate more respect from both students and parents than if I wear jeans and a flannel shirt. I feel that as an uber-authority (in the students’ eyes) I will be subject to less acting out than the teacher in jeans and the flannel shirt. I will enjoy less disruptions and more successful lessons. I advise all high school teachers to dress up like business professionals unless they are preparing science labs, art projects, or physical education programs. Unfair as it is, a kid will construct a poor first impression of a teacher that looks like a grounds keeper. He will maintain that impression for a long time, saying to himself, “If he doesn’t have respect for his appearance and his profession, why should I?”

I want a student’s, parent’s and administrator’s first impression and subsequent sentiments to be working for me, not against me. Psychologists state that visual clues are used more than other modalities. Abraham Lincoln bought a new suit so voters would not “judge the peanut by its shell.” You may be subject to some mocking by your teacher peers who dress like fast-food workers. Accept the teasing in good cheer. It’s still worth dressing up.

Motivating Students: Rogers V. Skinner

BF Skinner

Carl Rogers

This is a scholarly piece but worth the effort. Please read on...

The book, Taking Sides (Noll, 2002) states, “Should Behaviorism Shape Educational Practices?” The chapter compares the theories of B.F. Skinner with those of Carl Rogers. These two psychologists see behavior quite differently. Skinner, a determinist, believes that all behavior can be traced to a causal relationship with the environment, or, more technically, to contingency cycles of positive or negative reinforcement or punishment. Rogers, an existentialist, believes that behavior is dependent on human choice and free will. Skinner, a logical positivist, is only interested in overt behaviors that can be measured. Rogers is comfortable talking about internal motivation. Despite opposite approaches and very different terminology, both psychologists have influenced educational theory and, surprisingly, often agree on the best types of learning. An eclectic teacher may want to use techniques derived from both theories.

Skinner (1974) rails against “mentalistic theories.” These involve mental states such as motivation and various idea and emotional conditions. Rather, education, in behavioral terms, is when “a teacher arranges contingencies under which the student acquires behavior which will be useful to him under other contingencies later on” (pp. 202-203). Desirable taught behaviors must be constructed in advance. Skinner‘s imagination runs freely in his utopian novel Walden Two (1948), and he writes how a small society, run by behavioristic principles, would educate children. The novel’s protagonist explains how, using contingency schedules, he would teach self-control.

"We set up a system of gradually increasing annoyances and frustrations against a background of complete serenity. An easy environment is made more and more difficult as the children acquire the capacity to adjust…. But…these potentially unhappy situations are never very annoying. Our schedules make sure of that…. [and] what they get is escape from the petty emotions which eat the heart out of the unprepared. They get the satisfaction of pleasant and profitable social relations…"(pp. 101-102)

The managers of Walden Two control adversity to build strength rather than allow, as in the natural world, adversity to destroy many and select only the strong. Self-control and other aspects of ethical training are completed in Walden Two by the age of six! These children, now fortified with longer attention spans, are rarely taught anything. They prefer to learn by themselves.

"Since our children remain happy, energetic, and curious, we don’t need to teach “subjects” at all. We teach only the techniques of learning and thinking. As for geography, literature, the sciences--we give our children opportunity and guidance, and they learn them for themselves [italics mine]. In that way we dispense with half the teachers required under the old system, and the education is incomparably better. Our children aren’t neglected, but they’re seldom, if ever, taught anything…. And a good share of our education goes on in workshops, laboratories, and fields" (P.110).

Skinner’s techniques of learning and thinking, mentioned above, include logic, statistics, scientific method, psychology, and mathematics. The students, without much supervision, obtain any other college-level information from Walden Two’s library (P.111) or in the field. Notice that Skinner’s students, naturally curious about the world, learn for themselves. Behavioristic learning is not delivered by lecture, but is, to use today’s terminology, child centered. Much learning is project based: “We teach anatomy in the slaughterhouse, botany in the field, genetics in the dairy and poultry house, chemistry in the medical building and in the kitchen and dairy laboratory” (P.112). Skinner is rarely called a progressive educator, but John Dewey himself would probably approve of Skinner’s methods that “emphasized the idea of children being part of a community and of learning by doing” (Provenzo, 2002).

Now compare the typical classroom with Skinner’s Walden Two. Students in California schools, at least until the age of 16, are forced, under threat of punishment, to go to school. They are forced to do the same work everyone else does under threat of punishment. If they act in a disorderly or unruly way they will be punished. Can the constant threat of punishment be a good thing? Skinner (1971) writes “Except when physically restrained, a person is least free or dignified when he is under threat of punishment” (P.56). Since punishment induces people not to behave in certain ways, to suppress behavior, but not how to behave, punished “behavior is likely to reappear after the punitive contingencies are withdrawn” (P.58). A boy that is punished for yelling out of turn will very likely resume this behavior once a substitute teacher is in the room. A child that refuses to do school work receives a poor grade and a call home (so the parents can inflict additional punishments). The child resumes doing his schoolwork only to raise his grade. Skinner suggests minimizing punishable behavior “by creating circumstances in which it is not likely to occur” (P.60) or by breaking up the contingencies under which punished behavior is reinforced (P.61). For example, by removing gum from the school, it is less likely to be found in the classroom. Then the teacher no longer has to punish students for chewing it and leaving it under desks. If a teacher ignores a student having a temper tantrum, the behavior is no longer reinforced and often goes away on its own without the use of punishment. “It should be possible to design a world [or a classroom] in which behavior likely to be punished seldom or never occurs” (P.62).

One should not become too enamored with Skinner’s thought without examining the writings of his critics. Perhaps the most forceful, Ayn Rand (1972) shakes the foundations of behaviorism by attacking the circular reasoning of “reinforcement,” the illogic in Skinner’s determinism, Skinner’s semantic dodge in accounting for the phenomenon of language, and his hostility toward the power of the human mind and virtue. Rogers (1983) attacks Skinner’s extremist exogenous view. In contrast, Rogers believes that internal motivators exist.

However, Rogers (1983), like Skinner, wishes to change punitive learning environments. He describes one in an impoverished ghetto area. “It was impossible to tell which student he [the teacher] had just paddled because all the students, black and white, looked equally sullen and angry…. Their whole sullen stance was saying, ‘Just try to make me learn anything’” (P.16). When will students learn, and what is the best learning environment? According to Rogers, children will learn when the curriculum has personal meaning and the learning is significant and experiential (P.19). More precisely, Rogers defines the elements involved in experiential learning. It has a quality of personal involvement. It is self-initiated. It is pervasive. The learner herself evaluates it. Lastly, its essence is meaning (P.20). This type of whole-person learning combines both the intuitive and the logical and uses what he calls both masculine and feminine capacities.

Rogers compares experiential, whole-person learning against an atomized type of learning. Some have distorted behaviorism by writing that Skinner cares only for pigeons pressing levels. Indeed, Skinner often looks at man as a machine as a contrast to Rogers (1965) who prefers to examine the complete human being. However, Skinner also feels that learning should be significant, useful, and self-initiated. Skinner as well as Rogers (1983) could have written the following paragraph:

"When we put together in one scheme such elements as a prescribed curriculum, similar assignments for all students, lecturing as almost the only mode of instruction, standard tests by which all students are externally evaluated, and instructor-chosen grades as the measure of learning, than we can almost guarantee that meaningful learning will be at an absolute minimum" (P.21).

Both Skinner and Rogers wish to arrive at child-centered learning. The road they take, however, is different. Skinner, a pragmatist, values what works. He discards traditional pedagogy because it’s inefficient. A teacher must set up external contingencies to allow learning, which is naturally reinforcing, to take place. Child-centered learning leads to better learning, not because the child is free, but because it is efficient and reinforcing. Freedom does not really exist. Rogers, an existentialist, values meaning. He believes that people are free to chose and if the learning is meaningful, the learned outcomes will, by themselves improve. Rogers (1983) admits that humans can be examined as both (unfree) machines and subjectively free individuals.

"A part of modern living is to face the paradox that, viewed from one perspective, man is a complex machine…. On the other hand, in another significant dimension of his existence, man is subjectively free; his personal choice and responsibility account for the shape of his life…. If in response to this you say, 'These views cannot both be true,' my answer is, 'This is a deep paradox with which we must learn to live'” (pp. 280-281).

Do Rogers’ methods work? Will a classroom where students make most or all the choices of what books to read and how they should be graded be a classroom in which learning takes place? John Steadman Rice, in his article The Therapeutic School (2002), criticizes Rogers and other founders of humanistic psychologists for promoting a therapeutic ethic instead of content learning in the schools. Rice states that, according to the humanists such as Rogers, if society is to work well, people must be set free from cultural and societal repression” (P. 21). Education must become involved in the child’s feelings. Thus, students are taught to think well of themselves, to have high self-esteem. Quoted in Rice’s article, Rita Kramer argues that self-esteem has replaced understanding as the goal of education. Unfortunately, these same students that think their math scores are outstanding rank internationally at the bottom for math.

Under the influence of Rogers, Maslow, Glasser, and their adherents, education has ceased to be about instruction, or the passing on of an accumulated body of knowledge; in essence, it has become group therapy. It is not the case, then, that students did not receive an education; rather, they received an education, but in the vocabulary of emotion and in the practice of self-absorption. Tests designed to tap into those competencies would likely tell a different story than data from, say, the Scholastic Aptitude Test-which continues to measure academic, rather than therapeutic, ability (P. 28).

Despite these criticisms, both Skinner’s behavioristic approach to education and Rogers’ person-centered model of instruction are still popular. I examined my children’s learning software, especially Reader Rabbit’s Kindergarten, Davka’s Ready for Reading (Hebrew), and The Learning Company’s Gizmos and Gadgets (engineering). All three of these software programs use common behavioral techniques such as immediate rewards for the correct answer, sustain infinite patience in eliciting the desired behavior, and avoid punishment. Rogers’ theories have also entered educational technology. Miller and Mazur (2000) developed a person-centered model of instruction for designing Web-based environments.

By emphasizing students’ interests and abilities, courses taught in virtual environments such as certain applications delivered via the internet, can create an atmosphere of mutual participation and allow for accommodations of various skill and ability levels. Students can exercise the freedom to choose, which is encouraged by the user-controlled hypermedia web environment. However, the elements promoting the success of such as approach — user responsibility, ability to be self-assessing and proactive in learning — are the very elements, when lacking, which will result in an instructional experience that is non-productive at best and frustrating at worst (p. 298).

In conclusion, the eclectic educator will find much to use from both theories, the behavioral and the person-centered. Choosing between behavioral and person-centered models, the educator may wish to assess the amount of choice available to the student and the rigidity of the learner outcomes.

Bibliography

Miller, Christopher T. and Mazur, Joan M. (2000). Towards a Person-Centered Model of Instruction: Can an Emphasis on the Personal Enhance Instruction in Cyberspace? Annual Proceedings of Selected Research and Development Papers Presented at the National Convention of the Association for Educational Communications and Technology, 1-2, 293-299.

Noll, William James (2002). Taking Sides. Clashing Views on Controversial Educational Issues (12th ed.). Guilford, Connecticut: McGraw-Hill/Dushkin.

Provenzo, Eugene F. (2002). Teaching, Learning, and Schooling. A 21st Century Perspective. Boston: Allyn and Bacon.

Rand, Ayn (1972). Philosophy: Who Needs It. New York: Penguin.

Rice, John Steadman (2002). The Therapeutic School. Society, 39 (2), 19-29.

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Drama as Superior Instruction

Your students are enjoying themselves, visibly happy, engaged and attentive. They are tackling challenging subject matter--the different economic philosophies of two 19^th century Europeans-- and they are focused. They are working together, on a dramatization, and you are standing off to the side, observing the process and assessing for understanding. It’s a memorable day in your history class.

Indeed, when asked to name what I learned as a student in my high school history class, I recall role playing a United States Senator. I can tell you all about that simulation that took place 32 years ago-- the political horse trading with the President, the pressure from the party leaders, and the post mortem analysis after the simulation was complete. I do not remember anything about my textbook or even the term papers I wrote in my 1978 U.S. history class, but I have remembered my role as a senator and the lessons my teacher taught with it. I believe that the mind is hardwired to enact and remember dramatic performance.

Drama and history are a good classroom mix if you enjoy excitement, combining "right side" emoting with "left side" analyzing, student-centered learning, group work, creativity, the study of literacy, and doing what comes naturally.

Students enjoy doing a task that comes naturally to them. And role play is very natural behavior during the teen years, the time for testing and discarding societal roles. Think back to when you were seventeen. How often did you daydream that you were completely self-actualized or someone else, perhaps a famous musician, a star athlete, an adored leader, a gangster, a beautiful sex goddess, a cool, handsome rebel, the life of the party, a rich and successful entrepreneur, or an outstanding scholar? When we use drama to clarify historical ideas, we use an educational technique that melds well with the psychological processes that our students constantly use throughout the day.

Gardner (1993) and others have criticized our classrooms for emphasizing verbal-linguistic and logical-mathematical learning over other forms of human expression. Like singing, drama allows heart (emotional expression) to be combined with head (verbalization and linguistic meaning). Learning about the Battle of New Orleans through song or through the histrionic arts (drama) is fun in class, because we rarely learn through heart and head at the same time. Do you have trouble sitting still for 50 minutes? It was very hard for me when I was seventeen, near the peak in my energy level. Drama lets fidgety kids get up and move around.

What should be done with the shy student who dislikes participating in any type of public presentation or performance? These students will learn vicariously from watching others act and will usually be attentive and very interested to see how their “braver” colleagues do. On the other side of the spectrum, the student that is constantly disrupting class, looking to be the center of attention will love performing. You will transform this student’s need for public attention, usually manifested as self-defeating, immature behavior, into commendable, productive performance.

I use historical fiction to outline important historical, political, economic, philosophical, and moral questions. By fictitiously bringing together people of different places and eras I can better clarify and accentuate these historical, political, economic, philosophical, and moral questions. For example, as president, Bill Clinton and Richard Nixon had very different backgrounds and political philosophies. They both presided over very controversial administrations. As far as I know they never had a serious conversation. So I created a dialog, trying to be true to their personality and worldview. In this dialog the characters show little liking for each other, sparks fly, and the student and teacher acquire a deeper understanding of Clinton and Nixon as well as an improved awareness of the characters’ differences. The characters boldly try to convince others of the correctness of their views. If that means trying to refute a rival’s opinions, using wit and humor, so be it. I placed together controversial and adversarial characters in these skits, creating as much entertainment value and learning as possible. Secondly, I often placed historical characters in the present. Haydn for example argues with a hip-hop artist and joins my students’ world. You can do this too.

Why teach all viewpoints?

We teachers want to teach the "truth" or reality. What is reality? First, there is a religious reality, which cannot be proven or disproven. I think it exists but I have no means other than argument to convince. The other reality is a logical, scientific reality based on proving a hypothesis. Hypotheses are checked using replicated experimental studies. These can be proven at a certain confidence level, typically 95 percent, meaning that we have a 95 percent certainty that the change in the dependent variable is due to the intervention and not to chance. This is how we know, through experiments, that medical or other interventions do certain things.

We also have correlational studies, but these are less convincing because variables are not controlled, so a third variable could be the cause. Anecdotal evidence is similar. It has emotional weight, and we really believe it when we see it in front of our eyes, but it is not logically convincing because another variable could be the cause. For example, a kid gets sick after a vaccine. It could be the vaccine, but it could also be thousands of other things. Only the scientific method, experiments, will find the truth. So, not all evidence has equal weight or validity. Otherwise, reality would be a matter of opinion and personal choice (as it is in the religious realm).

In psychology, biology, physics, and chemistry classes we test reality through experimentation as described above. As a history teacher, how do I teach reality? We do not perform or cite experimental studies in history. All of the evidence is correlational at best and usually anecdotal. So how do we know if the Democratic party ensures greater prosperity or the Republicans defend the country better? How do we know if Keynesian policies work? We cannot be as sure that past successes or failures were due to this or that policy, though if the same results keep happening I would form biases. Since we don't really know the truth, the only fair way to teach non-scientific controversial issues is to give our students information about all the major viewpoints.