Category Archives: Education

What makes a school safe? Caring teachers

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In our penultimate post on data from the annual School Satisfaction Survey, we explore safety and the sense of community in our schools. Previous posts have detailed the appalling lack of student engagement in schools, and the severe lack of learning in high schools.

The data above was pulled from the provincial average. Overall, the majority of students believe they respect others, an important marker of safety in a community. Expectations for behaviour, although sharply declining in high schools, do not seem to have an immediate impact on the reported rates of bullying or the reported rates of perceived safety. A feeling of welcome, certainly what we would contribute to a sense of community, seems to also have minimal impacts on safety and bullying.

The survey also asks about the adults in student’s schools. Based on the data, teachers helping students with work does not necessarily correlate to higher achievement. The perceived lack of fair treatment among students, while certainly a topic worth exploring on its own right, did not seem to associate with other achievement or safety factors either. However, the blue bar in the graph, i.e. two or more adults that care about you, does seem to have a correlation on student safety in schools.

In comparing a number of districts, this trend became evident. The districts of Coquitlam, West Vancouver, and Richmond, all had higher rates of perceived safety and lower rates of bullying in secondary grades. These variable changes associated with increased reports that two or more adults cared about the student.

Why does Vancouver beat the trend? I suspect it would be because of more aggressive policy, awareness, and action taken against bullying in general. Vancouver is also the centre of the media’s world, so if there are incidents of student bullying occurring in Vancouver, they will be reported and receive the attention of the region and province, whereas cases elsewhere generally wouldn’t receive such treatment.

If this is in fact a trend, then it is quite clear what makes school safe. It’s not policy statements or school expectations, not a sense of school spirit or community, nor is it a sense of equality or fair treatment – although these are all worthy objectives worth striving for. At the end of the day, having somebody to confide with, somebody to speak to, somebody in a position of authority who cares – that’s what makes students feel safe, and that’s what reduces bullying.

On the power and pitfalls of inquiry-based learning

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For the past couple weeks, I’ve been immersed in deep, self-directed research to gain a full understanding of two topics: the DNA replication process and logical proofs. Because I missed classes in both of these subject areas during the time of their instruction, it was incumbent upon myself to rectify these gaps of knowledge. In the process however, my faith in the power of inquiry-based learning has been renewed.

According to Queens University, with inquiry-based learning, “students arrive at an understanding of concepts by themselves and the responsibility for learning rests with them.” Students take more responsibility for:

  • Determining what they need to learn
  • Identifying resources and how best to learn from them
  • Using resources and reporting their learning
  • Assessing their progress in learning

By missing classes and the direct instruction provided on these topics, it became necessary to conduct my own individual research to understand the concepts. While the process certainly isn’t easy, and could’ve functioned quicker with the appropriate facilitation, I do believe being forced to research the topic in greater depth has given me an improved understanding of the concepts. Here’s how it went down:

With DNA replication, my issue stemmed from an inability to understand the process via the textbook. I certainly appreciated the little colour pictures of meiosis and chromosomes, but there was just too many terms/steps and I didn’t see how they connected. Most of the static information I found on websites left me with the same problem, although those pages without pictures completely threw me off (there’s real value in visualization sometimes!).

The one source I ended up finding tremendously useful was the Khan Academy, a one-man repository for visual lectures on math and science topics. Fortunately for me, Khan had a couple great videos explaining DNA, the replication process, and the difference between chromatin, chromatid, and chromosome. His videos, coupled with the brief background I had established from my textbook and other research, allowed me to finally grasp the concept. Unfortunately, the midterm had far more questions on archaeologists than on biology!

For logical proofs, I haven’t quite reached my ‘aha’ moment. Without the class lectures, I’m undoubtedly at a loss. My textbook’s semantics make for a difficult read (it is written by philosophers!), and, as I’ve noted in a prior post, my TA for the class doesn’t provide much aid due to a lack of background in effective teaching. As a result, I turned to the internet to solve my problem – this time however, it hasn’t quite helped.

Logical proofs is one of those higher level, less common topics, which I think is at the core of my issue. Because it is such a specialized area, there’s a severe lack of information about it online. While I found a couple of great videos on YouTube made by teachers or profs for their courses (but shared for the world!), a lot of this information covered the foundations of sentential logic, rather than discussing how to actually solve proofs.

The one resource that has proven handy is a free online course from Carnegie Mellon. While the curriculum certainly isn’t parallel to my class, it has been a great resource. By structuring and teaching the content in a different way, it forced my brain to dig up what I had previously learnt and use it in unfamiliar methods, helping to review and solidify concepts.

In both scenarios, I had been provided with a brief, sometimes unintelligible background on a topic through my assigned textbooks. With these pieces of knowledge, I ventured out into the world wide web to discover how other people explained the topic. Some were helpful, many were not, but the process of researching, sifting through information, and collating the most useful tidbits ultimately helped develop a deeper understanding of the topics than I would have received via direct instruction. Certainly, I remember much more about DNA replication than almost anything else this entire semester.

Inquiry-based learning isn’t perfect by any means though. As I noted with logic, a lack of accessible information online has made the process much more difficult than with simple biology. In addition, researching can become overwhelming to those unaccustomed to the process of information gathering. The lack of control over what a student learns can also be an issue – i.e. I ended up focusing way too much on DNA replication than on learning what archaeologist discovered which fossil, although this can be solved with the proper direction and clear guidelines provided by a teacher. This final downside, a lack of scaffolding in my case, is the biggest concern with inquiry-based learning and, I believe, reveals exactly what teachers need to be to help their students engage deeply in research: education facilitators on the student’s side, helping and challenging them every step of the way, providing that essential human scaffolding as the student’s skills develop.

Just what are students learning in school?

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What are students learning in their classrooms? Data from the province-wide, annual School Satisfaction Survey pulls back the veil. Take a look…

First off, the question posed is one of improvement – “Are you getting better at?”, not “Is this covered in class?”. This puts an obvious performance/progress filter on the data. Yes, English 10 may be mandatory, for example, but apparently 40% of students aren’t actually improving their writing or reading skills.

The focus of resources on early literacy is obvious with the spike in reading improvement in the early years. Oddly enough, writing doesn’t seem to get nearly as much attention. Improvement in all realms seems to decline with time, which begs the question: Are students just not challenged enough, does learning stagnate due to a lack of support (students are trying but failing to improve), or does learning fit to a general law of diminishing returns?

This graph shows that numeracy continues to be neglected in exchange for literacy, and that progress decreases dramatically by the senior years (could this have to do with the advanced math curriculum and its lack of relevance to students?).

Note: for Art and Music, the original question was “Are you learning about”, not “Are you getting better at”. That said, I wanted to place them in this chart as the Arts an generally viewed as one of two main supplements to the elementary curriculum, along with PE. As you can tell, the arts receive a fair amount of resources and support in elementary school, at least compared to the significant decline witnessed in high schools – less than 1/5 experiences an arts education (That subjective definition is a source of contention however – does it mean an “arts class”? Art can be integrated throughout other subjects…).

These four realms – health, environment, aboriginals, and finances – tend be to viewed as add-ons to the curriculum. These are the types of topics brought about by the political climate of the day to solve a societal issue. For example, an aboriginal education is part of raising awareness about the historic mistreatment towards First Nations and a component towards reconciliation with Aboriginal Canadians.

Again, there is a noticeable decline in the learning as the years progress. Is this because there is more to learn when the topic is first introduced in elementary?

The spike in Aboriginal education tends to be associated with First Nations having large sections in the Social Studies curriculum. It declines outside of those years.

Health and the environment both receive a good degree of coverage in elementary, but are almost cut in half by senior year. Health education tends to be pushed aside for sports in PE, while the environment presumably appears in Science classes. Neither however have a dedicated class or teacher, which may explain their decline (as well as the general decline of learning in these extra topics in high school).

Financial education is by far the worst of the bunch. The Globe and Mail recently called money ed the sex ed of this generation. There is a spike in Grade 10, likely associated with Planning 10. Up until now, dealing with money has generally been a family affair, although it seems this too may soon fall into the sphere of the public school curriculum. The only place money is currently acknowledged is in elementary math, or secondary businesses classes.

On the appalling lack of student engagement

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Continuing with my data-based exploration on the current state of education in BC, I decided to examine some of the statistics from the School Satisfaction Survey. The survey is completed annually in every school in the province. The student component of the survey is of tremendous value, providing us with a snapshot view at the distressing lack of engagement in our schools. Take a look…

Note: All the visualizations below are based on province-wide data.

As you can plainly see, children arrive at school prepared, ready to apply themselves and try their best. Over time, there is a noticeable decline, to the point where almost 1/3 senior students is not trying their hardest in class. Is this because interest wanes over time, or is it because youth reverse-engineer the system of test taking and grade maintenance?

This chart should be cause for alarm for the entire public. Our children spend close to the first 20 years of their lives in schools, and yet, for the vast majority of that time, they seem to dislike it! Certainly, school, like anything in life, cannot always be wonderfully fun, but that doesn’t mean school should come across as a prison for children!

My assumption would be that the enjoyment numbers rise in Grade 12 because most who dislike school leave by Grade 10 (note, where the lowest levels of satisfaction can be found).

These numbers reflect interest in the curriculum, although that could also be mixed to some degree with delivery methods. In any case, there seems to be a correlation between these rates and the general stats from “Do you like school?” To me, this would suggest that most students associate “school” with “content” – the curriculum defines the experience.

First off, it should be noted that this question on the survey asks whether a student would like to transfer to a different school. It does not ask whether a student would like to leave school and go do something else – these are two very different options. These transfer numbers rise as the numbers in school satisfaction decline, as you can see in the graph below.

Can you believe, 1 out of every 5 sophomore students wants to go to a different school?

When the school satisfaction metrics are plotted together over time, one can easily see the peak in dissatisfaction in Grade 10, as well as the general declining enjoyment as the years progress. By the time students enter high school in Grade 8 (at least here in Surrey), more than half dislike going to school, what they are learning there, and a large portion of them want to go somewhere different.

Would these rates of dissatisfaction be allowed to continue with a government or a workplace?

How is nobody calling this a state of educational emergency?

The need for choice and personalized learning

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I was sitting in a tutorial, listening intently to my TA trying to explain a rather convoluted concept. As his pace quickened, my mental acuity lagged and soon enough my brain simply shut down. He was headed somewhere that my cranium just couldn’t understand. My attention quickly turned from active learning to examining the detailed vandalism of the desk for the rest of the class.

Having not been in class for some time, I had forgotten how often this happens in school – either the teacher progresses too quickly, too slowly, or just in a language that a student doesn’t understand, and bam, attention is lost and learning dissolves.

For this particular university class, I’m actually rather fortunate. Learning in this class occurs in three different ways: the lectures by the professor, the readings from the book, and the tutorials from the TA. Each has their benefits and disadvantages, and I’m sure some work better for others than they do for me.

The lectures, despite the fact that I generally am not an audible learner, are actually quite stimulating. First off, the prof is an engaging speaker. He has a Hollywood-like baritone voice, moves around in the lecture hall, and looks at students directly. In addition, he knows his stuff and has a keen ability to explain his knowledge to students. I don’t always understand everything he says, but his lectures provide a good primer for the lessons of the week.

The book is my primary source of learning. Through the years, I’ve become quite adept at reading, thanks in part to following news sites and blogs daily, as well as having done many courses through distance education, which are usually based primarily on written literature. The book is valuable for two reasons: first, it includes activities, with which I can practice and reviews my learning, and second, it is a static source of knowledge. The inelasticity of the information is quite helpful precisely because I can move at my own pace – if a concept hits a mental barrier, I can stop, take a break, and read the passage multiple times until it settles. With instruction, whether in a small class or a lecture theatre, I can’t go reverse, pause, or even fast-forward the class.

Finally, the tutorials, which I had expected I would find useful, have been the least effective for my learning. I would attribute a significant portion of that reality to the fact that the sessions are led by a graduate student who has no formal training with teaching. He is uncomfortable in front of the class, does not know how to adjust his instruction for the students (meaning he is focused more on himself as the teacher than the students’ actual learning), is unprepared and constantly modifying his learning materials on the spot (causing confusion), and is not able to translate his own knowledge into a language that is comprehensible to many of the newbies in the class. This experience has reminded me how critical an experienced and talented teacher in the classroom truly is to the amount of learning that will actually occur.

I am fortunate that I have three different learning options within the class. The flexibility of delivery, or rather the choice students have to appropriate the most valuable elements of instruction from each option, is so critical to overall achievement. No one person learns the same way and differentiation or personalization is essential to success.

When we talk about educational change, we cannot lose sight of the hard fact that every single person learns differently. Our education system tends to be based around mass, industrial-like instruction of knowledge that is “fed” into the empty receptacles that are students. While our understanding of human cognition has evolved dramatically, and our educational philosophy has become more student-centred with time, there’s no doubt that such a one-size-fits-all mentality is foundational to our education system. Choice and the personalization of learning, in whatever methods possible, needs to be the foundation of an education system for the 21st century so that all students can succeed by harnessing their developed and natural learning talents.