Should the Common Core Include Handwriting?

Will exclusion from the Common Core State Standards be the final death knell for handwriting instruction?

Last week's most-clicked ASCD SmartBrief story had advocates explaining the benefits of handwriting instruction, even in an age of ubiquitous keyed text. Experts say learning handwriting has both cognitive and motor benefits, and that letter formation is a skill that needs to be taught and practiced. Poor handwriting skills may affect reading comprehension, keyboarding ability, and perception of the message being communicated, researchers add.

Education Week reports that failing to mention handwriting in the Common Core State Standards is inconsistent with the spirit of the standards:

"Finland's National Core Curriculum for Basic Education, an inspiration for the common-core standards in the United States, includes 'drawing the form of letters, learning capital and lower-case printed and cursive letters, and combining letters' in its standards for grades 1 and 2."

California and Massachusetts have supplemented their Common Core State Standards (which include standards for keyboarding) with handwriting instruction; should other states follow suit?

Casis Elementary School (1946)

The story of how Casis Elementary School in Austin, Tex., came to be was told across two Educational Leadership articles about six years apart. In November 1946, the one-page story "Experimentation in Elementary Education" announced an agreement between the University of Texas and the Austin Independent School District to open a "cooperative research and demonstration project in elementary education. "Although the article makes the mutual benefits of the partnership clear—for instance, the university would have a venue to conduct research, and the school would benefit from the findings—the particulars about the school itself were left largely unaddressed.

In a follow-up piece that appeared in April 1952, "Special Education in Casis School," author M.G. Bowden details the evolution of the program, which began in 1946 in an old elementary school building, but moved to new facilities in 1951. The new building was "designed with special provision for the education of exceptional children" with what was then state-of-the-art design and technology; a photo depicts two students with hearing disabilities receiving instruction in the "hearing room," and hydrotherapy is offered, for instance.

Read the articles: Experimentation in Elementary Education (PDF)
                           Special Education in Casis School (PDF)

Bowden explains that the school was the first of its kind in the area, and it was expected that those looking to build new schools would visit for inspiration. Through this article, Casis remains an inspiration all these years later, both for its emphasis on inclusion and its fruitful university partnership.

Schools of Thought

CNN's new education blog Schools of Thought does more than simply aggregate existing education stories and video from their website and television network, although that is the blog's backbone. The editors build on this foundation with daily news links, guest blogger contributions, and cross posts from their CNN Student News program, a commercial-free program for middle and high school students that promotes discussion about trending news topics.

The video content is what immediately sets Schools of Thought apart from the herd of education blogs, and the breadth of coverage is impressive. Recent stories include a discussion on the alleged abuse of a special-needs student from Dr. Drew's Headline News show, and footage of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton urging students to study abroad.

So far, the original content from guest bloggers has been promising. D.C.-based writer Sam Chaltain has contributed "Is it time to redesign the report card?," and Penn State senior lecturer Steve Manuel posted "What happens when there is no message in the chaos?" in reaction to the recent scandal at his school.

CNN is smart to create a dedicated space for aggregation, expansion, and discussion of its education content, and we'll keep an eye on our RSS reader to see how it develops.

ASCD Responds to President Obama's 2012 State of the Union Address

The president's call for improving education and training for students and workers comes at a time when ASCD is calling for similar efforts in its 2012 Legislative Agenda, released today at the association's annual Leadership Institute for Legislative Advocacy in Washington, D.C. 

ASCD believes that a quality education is the pathway to a successful future for today's students and society at large. Our 2012 Legislative Agenda makes 10 recommendations that we would like to see built into ongoing efforts to reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA). I'd like to focus on a few points of particular interest in light of the president's remarks this evening. 

First, we call on the president to work with Congress and other stakeholders to clearly define college and career readiness to embrace all core academic subjects and the comprehensive knowledge and cognitive skills required of students after high school. Success in school, as in the workforce, is not limited to just proficiency in reading and math, nor is it confined to a single test score. We must create an education system that meets the needs of the whole child, ensuring that students receive a well-rounded education, are assessed in a comprehensive manner, and are prepared to be successful lifelong learners.

The president wants to offer schools a deal: He seeks to give them the resources to keep good teachers on the job and reward the best ones. In return, he will grant schools flexibility to teach with creativity and passion, to stop teaching to the test, and to hold them accountable for their effectiveness. 

As the president calls for efforts to improve the skills of America's workers, we encourage him to work with Congress to support educators' ongoing professional learning to address students' evolving needs.  School leaders and classroom educators, like any valuable human resource, need adequate support to gain and sustain professional knowledge and skills. Effective teaching leads to ongoing student achievement and growth and will be one of the key factors in preparing today's students for success in tomorrow's world.

Likewise, we agree that state and federal leaders must create a system of rewards and incentives for states and schools and get away from the No Child Left Behind Act's exclusively punitive school turnaround strategies.

How Do You Move the Message?

"Social media is not just about a shift in communication; this is a shift in power," former Howard Dean campaign manager Joe Trippi told education leaders at this weekend's Leadership Institute for Legislative Advocacy. The institute is an opportunity for educators to meet with policymakers, raise awareness about key federal initiatives, and learn strategies for engagement with their local representatives. The event culminated with attendees meeting with their representatives on Capitol Hill today.

From the Occupy movement to increasing state-level flexibility in federal education legislation, the significance of being both local and vocal was a major theme of this year's institute.

"We don't live in a top-down communication world anymore; messages are peer-to-peer," Trippi explained. "Anyone can challenge the thinking at the top." Trippi encouraged educators to use social media to their advantage to build their "army of Davids" and start "handing out slingshots."

Yet, despite grassroots support, it often seems that education policymakers and practitioners speak two different languages. Staffers and educator advocates offered communication strategies for bridging the divide between Capitol Hill and the classroom. For example

• Using anecdotes, especially stories specific to your representative's jurisdiction, to illustrate your goals or agenda.
• Basing your argument in research.
• Identifying what's working well, what you want to change, and where you can compromise.
• Tweaking the rhetoric from "measurement" to "assessment" and from "compliance" to "engagement."
• Knowing your representative's voting record and commending like-minded voting.
• Asking what issues your representative is working on and how you can help.
• Following up with phone calls, e-mails, and supplemental materials.

"There is a firehose of information coming at your representatives; it's up to staffers to get the best to their bosses," advised one staffer. "Build relationships with staffers and be persistent."

And ask your friends to join you, included Trippi. "YOU move the message."

"It's my professional responsibility to get my voice heard in education policy," said Arkansas educator Marsha Jones. Iowan Claire Struck added, "I'm not just an influence peddler; I'm a slingshot peddler."

How do you leverage practitioner influence in education policy?

Best Practices for Teaching ELLs

The student population of English language learners (ELLs) has been steadily rising in U.S. schools due to immigration. Many districts, which formerly had homogenous and predictable student enrollment and issues, are now scrambling to find the resources to teach ELLs well. What should schools do to bring English learners up to speed academically to ready them for college or careers in a new land? What steps are schools taking to understand the variety of issues—not only academic but also social, emotional, and economic—that these comparatively new students and their families face? Articles should address how schools and classroom practices address the needs of the whole child while keeping the focus on student mastery of essential knowledge and skills to make a rewarding future.

ASCD Express is looking for short, 600–1,000-word essays on the theme "Best Practices for Teaching ELLs." Guidelines for submissions are here. Send us your submissions by February 20, 2012.

Taking a Stand for English Language Learners

Last week, former Los Angeles elementary school teacher and ASCD Emerging Leader Patricia Dickenson did a guest blogger stint at Rick Hess's Straight Up blog.

In her first post, she highlights some of the policies that set up English language learners (ELLs) for failure in U.S. schools. "Too often tests, tracking, and a diluted curriculum impose an oppressive learning environment that fails to connect with students, give a sense of purpose, and foster a love of learning," she writes. As the ELL population grows faster than any other, there must be more widescale adoption of what successful ELL programs do: "Take into consideration school and community culture, teacher professional development, quality of teaching, intensity of instruction, and most importantly students' needs," Dickenson argues.

In the follow-up post, "Reform for English Language Learners," she gets more specific about the policies and practices that will bring equitable education opportunities to ELLs. For example

• Preschool co-ops as an economical solution to diminish inequities in school readiness.
• Postponing standardized testing until ELLs have been in the system for three years, and investing resources instead in expanding access to books and language tutoring.
• Finding ways to integrate native English speakers with ELLs from the onset of schooling.
• Fostering school community by having ELLs pair off or be put into teams to teach their home language to someone not proficient in that language.
• Creating a national council on education to examine education reform and support the whole child.

Her final post, "Driven by Competition . . . Compelled by the Heart," shares her experiences as a teacher in South Central Los Angeles, Calif., and explores what teachers of ELLs can do to support the those students in their classrooms. 

Check out Dickenson's blog series and tell us how you advocate for the ELLs in your school!

Metaphors Open College Doors

Using dichos, the Spanish term for figurative sayings, teacher Ben Johnson gets his students thinking abstractly—a skill he says is essential for some types of mathematics and college-level learning.

Though students struggled with discovering the meanings behind many of these sayings, Johnson let students linger in their cognitive discomfort and used questions to help them tease out the deeper meanings behind metaphors.

Johnson uses metaphors to exercise students' higher-level, abstract-thinking skills. What do you use?

In Case You Missed It

 Here are some highlights from from ASCD from this past week:

• Educators nationwide are urged to sign a petition calling for a President's Council on the Whole Child. Please sign it to help promote better outcomes for all students.
• The full schedule for the 2012 Virtual Conference has been announced. This conference will run concurrent with the 2012 Annual Conference, March 24–26, in Philadelphia, Pa.
• Why do some people look at education in a poor light? This issue of ASCD Express explores and counters the views many people hold.
• Robyn Jackson is back with a new post exposing some of the lies people tell about professional development, including things like, "You just have to work harder."
• Glenda Horner talks about the essential first step in implementing professional development: assessing where the campus is and setting a list of non-negotiables. 
• Having guests visit the classroom is valuable, Eric Sheninger says.

Add your own highlights in the comments, and check this spot for our regular weekly digest of ASCD activities.

Why You Should #SignForWholeChild

ASCD is calling for a President's Council on the Whole Child, and to get this initiative started, we have 30 days to get 25,000 people to sign the petition launched January 19 through the White House's We the People petition tool. 

Such a council would include educators, community members, state officials, national leaders, and other experts who would provide the president with expert guidance to coordinate the education, health, and social service sectors in support of our nation’s youth.

Why should you sign the petition to establish a President's Council on the Whole Child?

• The current federal programs and offices that address the education, health, and safety of students are disparate and function in isolation. Collaboration among these agencies will increase efficiency and help focus scarce federal resources where they can have the greatest effect.
• Educators need support from the White House and other partners to continue to support each whole child in every classroom.
• Congress continues to ignore the importance of teacher, school leader, family, and community influence on student achievement. This council would serve as a bully pulpit from which the executive branch can speak about the value of the whole child approach to education.
• The White House has a national security council, a council on environmental quality, a council of economic advisors, a council on women and girls, and a council on jobs and competitiveness. Education is just as important as the economy, the environment, or national security. And the president deserves similarly expert counsel to coordinate the education, health, and social service sectors in support of our nation's youth.
• Existing White House advisory councils, like the President’s Council on Fitness, Sports, and Nutrition, are too narrowly focused on individual aspects of child well-being.

In addition, the president's council could 

• Interject the whole child approach into a host of issues where it has heretofore not been a priority, including Race to the Top competition, school turnaround strategies, and No Child Left Behind waivers and reauthorization proposals.
• Draw attention to the fact that current definitions of college, career, and citizenship readiness are confined merely to proficiency in reading and math and don't reflect the comprehensive knowledge and abilities required of students after high school graduation.
• Help the administration translate rhetoric into action on the importance of a complete, well-rounded education and safe, healthy, and successful students―all of which appears in its Elementary and Secondary Education Act blueprint.

Schools, families, and communities must work together—that is the goal of a whole child education. If you agree that educators alone can't support students' comprehensive needs, sign the petition to create a President's Council on the Whole Child. Recruit your friends by sharing this message on Twitter (#signforwholechild) or Facebook.

Countering the Negative Spin on Education

Does it feel like educators are constantly under attack? From sensational media stories about failing schools to public opinion polls that blame teachers for the downfall of modern society . . . where is all this negative energy coming from? Can we attribute it to the media's endless hunger for controversy, or do real problems arise from within the profession itself?

And why is it that people think teaching is easy? "I have heard people state that those who can, do and those who can't, teach. What these nonteachers fail to realize is that teaching is doing; it is doing a multitude of challenging tasks every day," says education professor Angela Dalhoe in her recent ASCD Express article, "Those Who Can, Teach."

"I believe that my students could find success in many other career paths, but they choose to teach. They choose this amid the current downspin; they choose this path because of their desire to become effective educators," she writes. Diane Ravitch also wants to rewrite this "poisonous narrative" about education because too many politicians who know too little about teaching are making decisions that are harmful to kids.

So, what can educators do to change the conversation? Education expert Douglas Reeves urges educators to quit the tit-for-tat public debate and set a new agenda that embraces accountability measures, focuses on 21st century skills assessments, and encourages leaders to admit their mistakes. Get more perspectives and practical solutions in this entire issue of ASCD Express on "Countering the Negative Spin on Education" (free).

Are we in the midst of crisis? How do you counter negative spin in your school community?

Getting Started With Project-Based Learning

With the day-to-day instruction, teachers can get so caught up in the what and when of learning that we don't have time to discuss why students should know what we're teaching or how they can put their new knowledge to use beyond the classroom, ASCD Outstanding Young Educator Brad Kuntz writes in his monthly column.

Project-based learning—whether related to the school community, local businessess and nonprofit organizations, or global concerns—can make learning more meaningful and often inspire unmotivated students to participate in their own education and help them imagine their own futures, Kuntz says.

Project-based learning can seem overwhelming to plan, at first, so Kuntz recommends starting small—integrating real-world connections (like working with authentic data sets or using first-person interviews as a research paper source) into the work students are already doing.

From small beginnings, students will begin to see their role as active participants in creating not only their education, but also the world around them.

What advice do you have for getting started with project-based learning?

How to Involve Students in Formative Assessments

Formative assessments track the pulse of learning in your classroom—but should teachers be solely responsible for taking that pulse?

Last week's most-clicked ASCD SmartBrief story polled several prominent educators on how they involve students in formative assessment processes. Larry Ferlazzo curates responses that include students

• Reflecting on what they've learned from mistakes.
• Setting their own specific, achievable goals and tracking progress and actions necesary toward achieving those goals.
• Creating and using rubrics to self-evaluate work and and realize growth over time.
• Knowing daily learning objectives and discussing why they are relevant.
• Learning how, when, and why to use learning strategies.

Read the full post for more details on these and other examples. How do you involve students in formative assessment processes?

In Case You Missed It

Here are some some recent updates from ASCD:

• The newest issue of ASCD Express looks at different techniques educators can use to help students with disabilities.
• When attitudes and behaviors are included in a school's improvement process, changes are more likely to take root, says Mamzelle Adolphine
• How can educators deal with stress? Education Update offers insight into how to cope. 
• When you find your buttons being pushed, Muriel Rand says, tell yourself a new story.
• Policy Priorities examines how social media and education mix.
• Keep up to date with what's happening with ASCD's Healthy School Communities.
• Students, and the adults who teach them, need to really believe that being good at math is attainable with enough effort. 
• In an attempt to give students real-world context, try leveraging local resources and bringing in experts as guest instructors.  
• To keep skills sharp, professional development must be included as part of the work week and administrators must provide teachers with the time and the support for it. 

Add your own highlights in the comments, and check this spot for our regular weekly digest of ASCD activities.

Can Principals Lead in Curriculum Development? (1979)

What holds back principals from being leaders in curriculum development? New York teacher Allan Vann set out to answer that question in his doctoral dissertation and published a summary of his findings in a March 1979 Educational Leadership article.

Read the article: Can Principals Lead in Curriculum Development? (PDF)

Vann states that previous studies have established that principals say they'd prefer to devote more time and energy to curriculum development leadership. However, for various reasons (such as administrative and other duties precluding such leadership) that Vann refutes, they don't lead curriculum development or argue that they aren't given enough autonomy to do so.

His study of 50 principals found only one variable that correlated with time spent on curriculum development: whether principals felt that such work was important to their supervisor in the central office.

It's not surprising that employees devote time and effort to tasks that they are judged on or that they perceive as important to their supervisors. In this context, the insight provides a useful perspective on what motivates principals and provides a hint about moving desired education outcomes from discussion to implementation.

In "My Back Pages," we look at important issues through the historical lens of the Educational Leadership archives. ASCD members can access EL issues from 1943 to the present by signing in at www.ascd.org.

Supporting Beginning Teachers

Beginning teachers, both recent college graduates and second-career teachers, face a host of challenges. Often placed in a classroom to sink or swim, they must take responsibility for their students' learning even as they are learning to manage the basics of their new role.

ASCD Express is looking for short, 600 to 1,000-word essays on the theme "Supporting Beginning Teachers." This issue will examine common characteristics and needs of new teachers. What training should prospective teachers receive before they enter the classroom? Do alternative certification programs provide adequate preparation? What are the most effective ways schools can support new teachers, whatever path they took into the profession? When so many teachers stay in the profession for fewer than five years, how can schools retain the beginning teachers with the most potential? Articles by teachers in their first five years of teaching are especially welcome. What do you wish you had known when you began your career?

Guidelines for submissions are here. Please send us your submissions by February 6, 2012.

Don't Error-Proof Learning

Failure is a part of learning -- you know it, Marzano knows it; but do your students know it?

Once again, the most-clicked ASCD SmartBrief item relates to letting students experience a certain amount of frustration as part of learning processes that lead to deeper understanding. Students learn by using and misusing information, says instructional coach David Ginsburg.

"Lesson planning should thus be more about anticipating students' errors and preparing to help them learn from those errors than trying to develop presentations that prevent all errors. Provide students activities that involve applying information, and be ready to help them when they get tripped up."

Find more on this topic in these Educational Leadership and Inservice articles:

• What is "Process" Praise and Why Should You Use It? (helping students cultivate the growth mindset necessary to risk being wrong in school)
• A Dutch study found that students age 12 and up are better at learning from mistakes
• The Benefit of Getting Things Wrong (a profile of a Paris-based event encouraging at-risk students to apply trial-and-error thinking to science experiments)

 How do you invite mistakes as part of the learning process?

Blog Watch: Intercepts

Intercepts, a blog that describes itself as "a listening post monitoring public education and teachers' unions," is keeping a skeptical, bemused eye on education unions in the news.

In a time when unions are players in several major education story lines, from state-level changes in labor law to the Elementary and Secondary Education Act reauthorization, Intercepts is a valuable source for underreported stories and interesting perspectives.

Intercepts blogger Mike Antonucci consistently uncovers interesting and unusual education union news, such as a recent principal strike in a Butte, Mont., public school and a discussion between Maine Governor Paul LePage and the Maine Education Association about professional development funding. Antonucci has opinions, but the blog stands out by emphasizing aggregation and analysis over grinding ideological axes.

Perhaps the strongest posts are those in which he picks apart questionable media coverage. For instance, "Did NYSUT Prez Really Get a $45,000 Raise?" digs into a sensationalistic salary story in the Albany Times-Union to uncover what the compensation figures on tax forms really mean.

Keep up with posts at www.eiaonline.com/intercepts.

Are We Doing Our Part?

As a nation, are we content that 70 percent of our entering 9th graders read below grade level? Is it acceptable that one out of every three minority students attends a high school where 40 percent of the students drop out? Are we willing to continue spending $2.6 billion a year replacing teachers, half of whom choose to leave the profession before they begin their sixth year in a classroom? Can we excuse the fact that kids are twice as likely to be assigned to inexperienced or uncertified teachers in schools with large enrollments of poor and minority students? As a country and as a profession, we have not systematically asked these questions, let alone answered them.

Improving schools alone can make a significant difference in reducing poverty. Yet systemically eliminating poverty is a both/and proposition, because transformation must occur in both the broader society and in schools. Educators must both become knowledgeable about issues related to poverty in the broader society and take action where they can have the most influence—in their own schools and school systems. As a profession, the question we must consider is not "Can schools solve all of society's perpetual problems, chief among them high rates of poverty?" Rather, the question is "Are we doing our part?" Must we, as a society, address poverty before we can improve schools? High-performing, high-poverty (HP/HP) schools demonstrate that successfully educating students who live in poverty significantly counters many barriers posed by poverty and improves children's life chances. Isn't that proof enough to compel us to act?

Excerpted from Turning High-Poverty Schools into High-Performing Schools, the new ASCD book by William H. Parrett and Kathleen M. Budge. Preview sections of this book -- including the Introduction, Chapter 1, and the Study Guide -- for free.