The Drum: Uninformed Nonsense on Education

An ill informed and poor source of debate on education

Tonight’s episode of The Drum on ABC24 is a classic example of what is wrong with the education debate within Australia. Hosted by former journalist Julia Baird, she asked the panel consisting of a politician, editor and ex-political advisor/journalist to comment on new Education Minister Christopher Pyne’s views about the need to review Australian history in schools.

Before we examine the issue, note the composition of the panel: they were all journalists and politicians. If they were to have a discussion about Iraq or Syria I’m sure they could locate an expert on Middle Eastern politics from a university and similarly a medical or technology expert on related matters. Come to think of it, I’m sure there are many teachers like myself or professors in education departments around Australia who would love to get that sort of air time. But no! This is only education after all and Julia’s reminiscence about an out dated history textbook are more than enough expertise to share around.

As such, the debate about the Australian history curriculum replayed old arguments about black arm band views on history with one panellist bemoaning the lack of Australian history in the Australian history curriculum. At least one of them had the decency to admit that he wasn’t an expert but he too had his input.

This is the core reason why education in Australia is going backwards and we are stuck in these old debates. Julia shouldn’t be looking at her textbook for out dated views: she should try the panel and her own views. Teachers are more professional and better trained than in the past and our history curriculum came about through a lengthy consultation process involving ACARA. Of course none of the guests could discuss this because the ABC couldn’t be bothered to get an actual expert on to discuss it. Instead, we have half-baked ideas from people who haven’t taught in a classroom or been a student in a high school classroom for a very long time.

If we want to have proper debates about education in Australia then get some educational experts in to discuss the matter. No one is saying that the history curriculum is perfect but please respect the PROFESSIONALISM and EXPERTISE of teachers by at least giving them primacy of opinion. While we continue to have educational debates run by rank amateurs like on the Drum then we will get nowhere. The attitude in Australia that teachers are not professional is only compounded by TV shows having such debates rather than seeking teacher input. It also makes our jobs that much harder because despite over 4 years of trainings, multiple post-graduate qualifications and more hours in a classroom than most of the people I speak to, almost all of them think they know as much about teaching as me.

Sorry to tell you Julia and the rest but YOU DON’T! When you come back with a teaching degree, have taught in a classroom for more than a few years and have worked full time in this demanding profession then feel free to lecture me on history curriculum and teaching. Until then, please treat me like the professional I am because I have the qualifications and experience to back up my opinion. Unlike you, who think common sense and “back in my day” arguments are better than research and practical experience, I know what I am talking about.

"Because it's there"

Mallory on Everest, did he make it?

Two Sundays ago I had the pleasure of watching the inspiring documentary The Wildest Dream: Conquest of Everest on ABC2’s Sunday Best. The documentary examined the life of famous climber George Mallory and claims that he was in fact the first person to successfully climb Mt Everest. While the evidence might contradict history’s claim that this was done by Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay, George Mallory’s determination to conquer the impossible provides an important parallel to the work of teachers in classrooms: curricula and assessment.

To explain, George Mallory was once asked "Why do you want to climb Mount Everest?"

His response, "Because it's there".

While this has become arguably the most famous quote in mountaineering, importantly, it showed his determination to conquer the impossible. However, it might also be a response many teachers have to the question by students: “Why are we studying this topic?” or “Why do we have to do this task?” That is, we are often forced into covering material or grading students on tasks simply because they are written into curriculum documents or told to us by various heads of department. This can often be at the expense of material that genuinely engages the students and thus destroys a love of learning. Moreover, this view can be expressed in meetings or informal talks between subject teachers yet nothing gets changed at a departmental level because they lack the agency to make it happen.

I find myself struggling with this too when I teach history. The national curriculum has very clear guidelines in terms of content and topics to be covered. Unfortunately, this does not reflect the actual amount of time teachers have to teach the course or whether students want to relearn the same material in a slightly different way for the 10^th time. For instance, I recently taught the section on Movement of People and found that the topic that got the most complaints was Australian experiences of settlement. While I see the importance of looking at convicts, settlers and First Australians, this material is done to death in lower grades and thus students feel like they are being punished. Moreover, the lack of time I had to teach the material meant it was covered in a brief manner that did not do the topic justice.

However, in some senses I was happy to take this criticism. I spent most of the unit looking at the slave trade and William Wilberforce, topics that really engaged the students. We were able to explore the issue of modern slavery, Kony 2012 and the role of politics in creating change. From a curriculum stand point this was barely a quarter of the unit but based on the student’s reaction to and engagement with the topic, I judged it prudent to lose time on these other topics. Furthermore, I had a supportive head of department that was willing to allow me to do this as long as I covered certain topics in enough detail.

So coming back to Mallory: how often do we teach something “because it’s there”? Is this good enough? Should we all just throw out the curriculum and all go our own way? Is following the curriculum exactly the wildest dream after all?

In reality, curriculum is written to provide an outline for teachers with assessment as a way to mark student progress for report cards. Each school is different with some being stricter than others. For instance, at a middle school in Canberra they literally map out a lesson by lesson plan which they expect to be followed. In other cases, curriculum is just a guide with heads of department willing to negotiate certain aspects while ensuring assessment standards are maintained. Thus most teachers follow the curriculum for the most part, try to finish it if they can and if not they don’t get too stressed.

However, if Mallory could have the wildest dream of conquering Mt Everest, why can’t teachers have the wildest dream of freedom of curriculum? Clearly various forms of national or state curricula and testing lead to targeted lessons to help students do best in the final exam (and this is of course a natural outcome of this model) but is there an alternative?

If our focus of schooling is to ensure students can pass a written exam on a given day on a given amount of content then we are on the right track but this does not reflect the real world. No worthwhile job in the real world nowadays relies on a set amount of content with a written exam at the end. Most jobs require students to be flexible and creative thinkers: problem solvers who can adapt to a range of situations. The school model with its mandated curricula and assessment in no way reflects this reality.

Wouldn't it be better to give students a topic area and ask them to come up with a task to hand in? Of course guidelines would be required and students may not love every topic area but at least they could explore the topic area in a way that engaged them. Rather than saying we will study and do a test on First Australians, settler men, settler women and convicts, imagine if I had said to my class: choose an area on the settlement of Australia from 1788 to 1901 and decide on an assessment task to give me. I can now imagine a class full of students bursting with ideas about what to research and how to present it. Imagine: all the students with relatives who were convicts, students who had visited Indigenous communities and learnt some of their customs, students interested in the politics of early Sydney and the various other possibilities. Now imagine all the various ways they might like to show their knowledge: iPad apps, websites, computer games, museum displays, videos etc.

In summary, like Mallory, this post may meet its end in the death zone: starved of oxygen, not at the pinnacle and forgotten about until dug up 75 years later (see picture). However, just as Mallory had the wildest dream of conquering the impossible, there is nothing wrong with the wildest dream of education: genuinely engaging classes with all students buying into the process. This may not be achieved under current curricula and assessment practices but we need to start making attempts at the summit. Who knows, we one day might make it.

Time to Meet Your Maker... Model

There is one good reason why every high school in Australia should have an iPad or laptop program for every student: differentiation.  Not only does this technology provide opportunities to support every learner in the classroom but they make implementing a differentiated curriculum that much easier.

For those educators who have been living under a rock for the past couple of years, differentiation is

“the recognition of and commitment to plan for student differences. A differentiated classroom provides different avenues to acquire content, to process or make sense of information and ideas and to develop products. The goal of a differentiated classroom is to maximise student growth and to promote individual student success.” (Tomlinson 1999)

In essence, differentiation is ensuring that you modify:

•  what you teach
• how you teach it, and
• how the students show you they understand

for every student. While this may seem daunting, it is something teachers naturally do every day in the classroom. From a slightly more complex question to a small extension task, these are great examples of modifying the curriculum to suit a particular student’s needs and abilities.

Recently I started an online PD about differentiation in order to get more skills in this area. One of the models of differentiation they used was the Maker Model and I used it this week to teach my Year 7 English class film analysis skills. Essentially, the Maker Model focuses on:

• Content – varying the level of abstraction and complexity of concepts covered
• Process – giving students alternative methods to complete tasks as well as different types of graphics organisers
• Product – allow students to demonstrate mastery through a variety of forms
• Learning environment – student-centred and flexible areas that encourage independent learning

Using this as a template, I tried to design a lesson where my best kids could push themselves to deeply analyse the ideas and techniques behind the film we were studying while also providing my lower ability kids with the chance to successfully write an analytical paragraph. In terms of content, the Maker Model helped me focus on the bigger concepts behind the film as well as the task. So rather than just add more clips for my better kids to analyse as I might have done, I tried to choose clips with different themes that showed different aspects of the message of the film. While each student had to write an analytical paragraph, I used the process and product elements to really differentiate what I was doing. Hence, I had students completing everything from 1 properly structured paragraph through to mini-essays. Thus, rather than have my better students finish early and become bored, I was able to keep them on task and occupied for the whole lesson. Importantly too, it pushed them to make connections between the themes and film techniques and hence engage their higher order thinking skills in a meaningful way. Finally, I was able to utilise the student laptops to allow them to work individually or in pairs to view the clips and type their responses.

In terms of the actual lesson, it turned out to be a success. My introduction and explanation of the task definitely needed work, especially in distributing the tasks (which I could have used the laptops to do), but once the class got started they were quiet and on task for the whole lesson. I really enjoyed the opportunity to work more one-on-one with the lower ability students as well as seeing the higher ability kids embrace the challenge I set them. In particular, two students who usually get all their work done but I don’t really extend all that much, were a little surprised when I gave them the mini-essay task but were animatedly talking and writing for the whole lesson. Moreover, they asked more questions than usual and I was able to teach them some new technical terms that I wouldn't cover with the rest of the class. On the other end, all my lower ability students produced an edited, structured, analytical paragraph and were beaming with pride because they had completed all the class work. So all up, every student was engaged and on task for the whole lesson as they developed their film analysis skills.

The important thing for me from this experience was that using a structure like the Maker Model made my differentiated class more focused and effective. Sure, I have been differentiating my lessons for years, but the Maker Model helped me see my lesson content and procedures in a new light and thus be able to better tailor my differentiation for my own purposes. It is a model I will use to plan differentiated lessons in the future and I think it is definitely worth a try.