Comments on: Indiana Jones and the Teacher Quality Crusade

By: matthewladner

matthewladner — Fri, 14 Jan 2011 11:25:32 +0000

We published at study on this concept:

http://www.goldwaterinstitute.org/article/3172

Since the publication of this study however, educators have succeeded in using technology in a hybrid school model which is better still:

http://jaypgreene.com/2010/05/27/the-way-of-the-future-carpe-diem/

By: Pajamas Media » Why Public School Teachers Burn Out

Pajamas Media » Why Public School Teachers Burn Out — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 08:06:14 +0000

[...] better teaching, and reformers would be wise to pay more attention to how the government monopoly warps the teaching [...]

By: JB Haglund

JB Haglund — Tue, 12 May 2009 13:47:31 +0000

Having spent two years in South Korea, there are a few things about their high school system that help to explain why their students do better on those tests. The top group of high school kids go to school every day all year. They might take Sunday off, but generally don’t. They go to institutes to study before school and after and their focus is all on studying for their big college entrance test.

If their system is so fantastic, why is it that the top Universities in Korea don’t even crack the top 50 worldwide?

We are often willing to take far too narrow a view of things in a quest for finding that easy answer. While I couldn’t agree more that we need lots more great teachers (I someday hope to be just good) but the incredible weight placed on these tests is (as I’ve said before) incredibly dangerous. If we want to have high school kids that score well on science and math tests and then completely fall apart (in general) once they pass the college entrance exams, we can do that.

But at what cost?

By: Mr Ulrich

Mr Ulrich — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 17:47:37 +0000

Great. I misspelled “science” in my first sentence. So much for my credibility as a quality educator!

By: Mr Ulrich

Mr Ulrich — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 17:45:58 +0000

As an experienced HS schience teacher, I am sick and tired of being pointed to as the biggest determinant of a student’s achievement. Those posters that identify the cultural differences between American schools and other schools have hit the important button. The tendancy of Americans to look for a single, extrinsic explanation of why their kids fail to achieve speaks directly to our cultural need to over-simplify issues. Why do we need to over-simplify? Because it provides an easy explanation that doesn’t require thought. We have a cultural avoidance to thought. Thinking is hard work and work is for chumps. I read a study that compared American and Chinese students. No, they didn’t compare scores per say (they were factored in). Instead, they asked the kids what it took to be successful students. American students most often mentioned innate ability and quality teachers as the most important factors. Hard work and time spent studying were mentioned the least. The Chinese students responses were exactly opposite. They valued hard work and study time as most important and teacher quality last. As a culture we are primed to throw up our hands and say “it wasn’t my fault” or, “I have no control over that” as soon as things get difficult. When I was in school and was struggling with some geometry problem or other, I’d often go to my mother for help. She’d say something like, “keep working at it, you’ll get it eventually.” Nowadays, the more typical parent response is more like, “yeah, I never could do this in school either. It’s OK. I’ve never had to know how to do it since so don’t worry about it.” Education needs to be thought of as something each student does rather than something each student has done to them. I believe the difference between these two ways of looking at school is the locus of our achievement gap with the rest of the world.

By: Lila

Lila — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 16:38:50 +0000

Here’s an idea: don’t force people to sit through months of mindless education classes to become teachers. Many intelligent, highly educated people wouldn’t mind becoming teachers, at least for a while, if they knew it wouldn’t involve sitting in more school with other people who aren’t as talented as they are. If you have a Master’s degree in a subject, you should be allowed to teach it in high school after, say, a month of training the summer before you begin. Problem solved.

By: Micha Elyi

Micha Elyi — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 09:44:30 +0000

Ms_teacher’s comment displays excellent reasons for eliminating compulsory attendance laws. Such laws turn schooling into a (fraudulent) right. School attendance should be a privilege. Privileges are much more likely to be valued than something called a “right” that is imposed on those who receive it. Privileges can also be revoked.

By: matthewladner

matthewladner — Fri, 23 May 2008 00:23:46 +0000

Andromeda-

Controlling the culture of the school is key to success in any school, and there are charter schools that are developing a teacher and aide model with larger class sizes. Student discipline is a real issue, but I don’t think the problem in unsolvable.

By: Andromeda

Andromeda — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 14:25:15 +0000

I agree with Mike, and I think Matthew misses the importance of cultural factors. Catholic schools can work not just because they develop a certain culture, but because the parents have bought into it and expect their children to do the same.

I’m a teacher, and I have one of those standard indicators of high quality (I went to an undergrad school with sky-high SAT averages). I can assure you that it doesn’t confer any special aptitude for classroom management. You couldn’t pay me enough to teach 40-student classrooms unless you gave me very carefully selected students…at which point you could not really argue that their achievement was due to my quality.

By: The 40-student solution at Joanne Jacobs

The 40-student solution at Joanne Jacobs — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 13:38:06 +0000

[...] can afford very smart, very well-paid teachers — if we raise class size, writes Matthew Ladner on Jay Greene’s blog. He cites [...]