tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25541994.post114848620969010415..comments2024-03-26T14:44:37.985-04:00Comments on D-Ed Reckoning: I'm Not Dead YetKDeRosahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06853211164976890091noreply@blogger.comBlogger15125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25541994.post-1148698277266230702006-05-26T22:51:00.000-04:002006-05-26T22:51:00.000-04:00"Parent involvement" means reteaching.Wrong. Typic...<I>"Parent involvement" means reteaching.</I><BR/><BR/>Wrong. Typically wrong.<BR/><BR/>This is what <I>you think</I> "your enemy" is saying about parent involvement. <BR/><BR/>And hey, you may be right about that. Prove it.<BR/><BR/>Otherwise, encouraging children's schooling, putting pressure on them when grades are low, making them recognize the value of an education, and reinforcing a good work ethic as it relates to school are ALL parent involvement.<BR/><BR/>I did <I>not</I> say that this should not also be a teacher's responsibility, so get a grip. <BR/><BR/>You know you're working this as a wedge issue. Fess up. And get real.<BR/><BR/>Yours is not the only skin in the game.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16517742269292732960noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25541994.post-1148610521906412382006-05-25T22:28:00.000-04:002006-05-25T22:28:00.000-04:00"The Parent Involvement meme is EVERYWHERE on the ..."The Parent Involvement meme is EVERYWHERE on the web; it's amazing."<BR/><BR/>Not just the web. I got a call at my business today from someone at a "oldies" radio station. My first reaction was that they wanted money to sponsor some public service or non-profit message. (These calls are usually about drug or alcohol prevention.) They wanted sponsors, but the message would be to parents about helping their kids in math, or teaching them the importance of math. I didn't have the wits about me to ask who got this started. The caller wanted to know if I (my engineering firm) didn't think it was a good idea to help prepare the workforce of "tommorrow". I told him that I thought it was very important, but radio messages to parents were not the best use of the money.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25541994.post-1148604022857865082006-05-25T20:40:00.000-04:002006-05-25T20:40:00.000-04:00However, I think we generally agree that more pare...<I>However, I think we generally agree that more parental involvement isn't the easy alternative to system-wide change.</I><BR/><BR/>Absolutely.<BR/><BR/>I do think it's possible to pull parents through measures short of system-wide reform....apparently this was done in Rochester while Ed was living there.<BR/><BR/>I don't know how much difference it made to the kids' achievement.....<BR/><BR/>The Parent Involvement meme is EVERYWHERE on the web; it's amazing.<BR/><BR/>I hadn't realized that this is a major plan on the part of schools and even states for school reform.<BR/><BR/>The state of MI actually has whole big documents on the importance of Parental Involvement posted all over creation.<BR/><BR/>I've actually started to wonder just how far you could take this.<BR/><BR/>At this point I'm convinced that wealthy suburban schools are completely dependent on parents.....and I'm starting to think everyone knows this at some half-conscious level.....<BR/><BR/>So.....say you persuaded single black moms to take over the school's job - what would happen??<BR/><BR/>I'll get around to posting the various documents I've found. Amazing stuff.<BR/><BR/>I guess my position is that I don't know whether "parental involvement" might "fix" the schools, but if parental involvement <I>did</I> fix the schools, the parents shouldn't be paying salaries & pensions.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25541994.post-1148603169389653592006-05-25T20:26:00.000-04:002006-05-25T20:26:00.000-04:00Catherine, you have a good point that changes in i...Catherine, you have a good point that changes in institutions can cause changes in the behaviour of those people who interact with the institutions. <BR/><BR/>However, I think we generally agree that more parental involvement isn't the easy alternative to system-wide change. I had my doubts about whether getting more parental involvement is possible at all, you present a good argument that it will only happen if there's a system-wide change in schools in the first place.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25541994.post-1148568011921155952006-05-25T10:40:00.000-04:002006-05-25T10:40:00.000-04:00I read a fascinating study yesterday in which a sc...I read a fascinating study yesterday in which a school district set up a peer tutoring program in math. Peer tutoring, apparently, works extremely well - something I'm beginning to believe.<BR/><BR/>The other part of the change was that whenever a child was having trouble with a math concept, the peer tutor was told, but not the parent.<BR/><BR/>Whenever a child did well in math, or mastered a new topic, <I>the parent was told immediately</I>.<BR/><BR/>These were urban disadvantaged kids.<BR/><BR/>Basically, the school decided to deal with the negatives themselves, and give parents positive feedback about their kids.<BR/><BR/>Reading that, I thought, this approach would make a HUGE difference to us.<BR/><BR/>We basically only hear bad stuff from our school. <BR/><BR/>The result was predictable.<BR/><BR/>I'm still trying to follow a common-sense rule that I should give positive feedback, but I <I>realy</I> have to think about it, and discipline myself to do so.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25541994.post-1148567793672094402006-05-25T10:36:00.000-04:002006-05-25T10:36:00.000-04:00There are no obvious levers I can think of that sc...<I>There are no obvious levers I can think of that schools can use to motivate any parents who aren't already motivated.</I><BR/><BR/>Actually, that may not be true when it comes to school.<BR/><BR/>Ed heard an interview with Jay Mathews & someone from Harvard who said that parent involvement goes up or down <I>depending on the school</I>.<BR/><BR/>They both said parent involvement was important, BUT parent involvement was a function of the school's quality, not the other way around.<BR/><BR/>You can see that easily in my own school, which does everything it can to keep parents at bay. <BR/><BR/>How much parent involvement is there in our middle school?<BR/><BR/>Zero, apart from angry emails and phone calls to the teachers & principal.<BR/><BR/>Apparently it's the same phenomenon in inner city schools, too. If the school is good, the parents come.<BR/><BR/>If the school is bad, parents stay away in droves.<BR/><BR/>An institution isn't directly analogous to a marriage, because in an institution you have all kinds of institutional restraints & constraints shaping & distorting behavior. <BR/><BR/>You can see that clearly in our middle school, too. It's a bad school with a harsh, negative culture - but there are all kinds of good people trying to function inside it. The problem isn't the people; it's the culture.<BR/><BR/>This is why I can get an email from Christopher's very kind English teacher telling me she is "not at liberty" to supply Christopher with examples of A-level writing. Her natural instinct was to do so, and before Christmas she said she would do so.<BR/><BR/>Probably sometime between then and February she figured out she's "not at liberty." That's the school talking, not her.<BR/><BR/>I'm coming to see the schools' attitude towards low-income parents as being directly analogous to their attitude towards low-income students. <BR/><BR/>The school does everything in its power to drive parents away, then blames parents for low involvement.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25541994.post-1148514127995033392006-05-24T19:42:00.000-04:002006-05-24T19:42:00.000-04:00But neither is a system-wide change. At least righ...<I>But neither is a system-wide change. At least right now. At least right now. I am the first to jump on the bandwagon of any argument that suggests total systemic change from the education industry, but I'm also aware enough to know that's not happening now.</I><BR/><BR/>Knowing what I do about human nature, I'd say that a system-wide change in the education industry is rather more likely than turning all currently dismotivated parents into deeply involved ones.<BR/><BR/>There are no obvious levers I can think of that schools can use to motivate any parents who aren't already motivated. It is extremely difficult to change another person or to get them to do something they don't want to do - I think every married person knows this. I know my mother spent over twenty years to get my father to the point where he will submit to her buying him new clothes (he never objected to her buying new clothes for herself or for us, just for himself) - and he still doesn't have much of a sense of taste or motivation to dress smartly, he's just given up objecting when mum tells him to go and change. And my mother is far more entangled in my father's life and has far more opportunities to apply pressure than any educator does. I can't see any school system or government managing to put that sort of pressure on a diverse set of parents, with a teacher/parent ratio of much less than one.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25541994.post-1148511981104814412006-05-24T19:06:00.000-04:002006-05-24T19:06:00.000-04:00Parents have to get their kids to school, and that...Parents have to get their kids to school, and that's about all the school should count on. <BR/><BR/>The school should have supplies on hand.<BR/><BR/>The issue is to educate the kids, period. The focus should be entirely on the kids.<BR/><BR/>This is why we have truant officers, of course. If a parent <I>isn't</I> getting the kid to school, the state steps in. <BR/><BR/>The school isn't legally allowed just to say, "Oh, well, the parent didn't do his job; the kid's not here; I guess that's that."Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25541994.post-1148511864819399632006-05-24T19:04:00.000-04:002006-05-24T19:04:00.000-04:00There's a great post over at "My Short Pencil" (ha...There's a great post over at "My Short Pencil" (hard to find) detailing how the author has used the ITBS over a number of years to monitor his daughter's achievement. (I'll find the link.)<BR/><BR/>I don't know whether he gave it to her himself, or whether the school did.<BR/><BR/>Our school, naturally, has taken the opportunity of NCLB to dump all standardized testing except for the state test, which is incomprehensible.<BR/><BR/>A doctor friend of mine told me she couldn't make head nor tails of it, and she spent some years doing medical research.<BR/><BR/>A high school guidance counselor told me that the one test they'd had that predicted future academic success well (i.e. from grade school to high school) was the TONYSS, which was the private test schools used in the years other than grades 4 & 8.<BR/><BR/>Now that's gone, too.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25541994.post-1148500722480967382006-05-24T15:58:00.000-04:002006-05-24T15:58:00.000-04:00Parent involvement also means filling in the gaps ...Parent involvement also means filling in the gaps the newly implemented curriculum is creating. And that's if you catch them.<BR/><BR/>And you can only do that if you can compare the difference between what the newfangled curriculum's goals are against the actual nuts- and-bolts techniques used to teach them.<BR/><BR/>If you don't have the ability or the education to anticipate the problems of a bad curriculum you'll find yourself with a middle schooler who can't spell or do basic arithmetic. By then, it is pretty late in the day to be doing anything about it.<BR/><BR/>SusanSAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25541994.post-1148496674754890332006-05-24T14:51:00.000-04:002006-05-24T14:51:00.000-04:00JG, yes, parents should provide these things, but ...JG, yes, parents should provide these things, but it's such a petty expense, if the schools know this is a problem, why aren't they providing supplies. There are simple wyas to handle this. In fact, some school districts mandate that schools provide these supplies.KDeRosahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06853211164976890091noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25541994.post-1148495804292411692006-05-24T14:36:00.000-04:002006-05-24T14:36:00.000-04:00What about parental support at a lower level? Lik...What about parental support at a lower level? Like making sure your child has the supplies he needs, shows up to school on time etc? Somewhere in there at least the parents must take some responsibility? No matter what program of instruction is used it won't be effective if the student isn't there or doesn't have the supplies need.jghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07898818315012405063noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25541994.post-1148491911857906772006-05-24T13:31:00.000-04:002006-05-24T13:31:00.000-04:00All the examples of parental involvement you've li...<I>All the examples of parental involvement you've listed (encourage their children's schooling, get on them when grades are low, instill in them the value of an education ..., reinforce a work ethic as it involves school, etc.) are motivational. First, all of these things should already be part of a competent classroom management system directed toward disciplining and motivating students, reducing the need for motivation at home and second, all this motivation is for naught anyway when the kids are getting the constant negative feedback when they are not learning caused by a curriculum that is sufficiently lousy that.</I><BR/><BR/>ditto<BR/><BR/>Schools flatter themselves when they put out word that the parents' job is to function as pep-talk giver and Homework Overseer.<BR/><BR/>The parents' job is to reteach the material.<BR/><BR/>Some schools are now openly saying so; yesterday I came across an article about schools sending parents off to community colleges to take math courses so they can teach their kids math.<BR/><BR/>This is called "help with homework."Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25541994.post-1148491654457115932006-05-24T13:27:00.000-04:002006-05-24T13:27:00.000-04:00[T]he short answer is they can't--EXCEPT to encour...<I>[T]he short answer is they can't--EXCEPT to encourage their children's schooling, get on them when grades are low, instill in them the value of an education (think immigrants), reinforce a work ethic as it involves school, etc.<BR/></I><BR/><BR/>no<BR/><BR/>"parent involvement" means reteachingAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25541994.post-1148491541553463082006-05-24T13:25:00.000-04:002006-05-24T13:25:00.000-04:00Check it out: parent involvement online report car...Check it out: <A HREF="http://www.kitchentablemath.net/twiki/bin/view/Kitchen/ParentInvolvementReportCard" REL="nofollow">parent involvement online report card</A>Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com