How do we judge when a school is successfully preparing students for success in the 21st Century? Is it through standardized tests? School accreditation? IB scores? International School Assessment (ISA) scores?
Or is it through careful monitoring of student learning by teachers and school leaders? Is it visiting classrooms daily? Is it using data, triangulating all sorts of data, to make professional decisions about how successfully we are preparing students for the rigors of the 21st Century? Who makes these decisions? Where do the conversations take place?
Right now I am worried that we are using only test scores such as IB, MAP (Measure of Academic Progress), ISA etc and I have questions about that. According to The Data Coach’s Guide to Improving Learning for All Students (Nancy Love, Katherine Stiles, Susan Mundry and Kathryn DiRanna) if we judge school success by these standardized tests, we are only using the top part of the Data Pyramid.
What does this mean? That we judge our students success by the most mundane testing tools? I worry that many teachers at our school (and other schools) have gone back to the model of teaching to the test, but not on purpose. My worry is that if we, as international school leaders judge success by test scores, judge good teaching by test scores, value only test scores, then we are not truly preparing our students for success in the exponentially changing world.
What makes me say that?
Tony Wagner writes in ASCD’s Educational Leadership (October 2008, Volume 66, Number2) Rigor Redefined that “even our best schools are failing to prepare students for 21st century careers and citizenship.” He goes on to list the skill set that students will need to have for success in the 21st century:
- Critical thinking skills
- Collaboration and Leadership
- Agility and Adaptability
- Initiative and Entrepreneurism
- Effective Oral and Written Communication
- Accessing and Analyzing Information
- Curiosity and Imagination
When was the last time we really looked deeply at our schools and found these skills being taught or even demanded? Can we even say whether or not we see these being taught in schools unless we visit classrooms daily and have conversations about these at the leadership level? Do standardized tests assess these kinds of skills or are they more the ‘drill and kil’l kind of tests?
What do we as school leaders do when we don’t see these skills being taught in classrooms? I think we need to start thinking about what we value, what the 21st century will value, what 21st century employers will value and start judging our school success (and teaching) with a more open mind.
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October 13th, 2008 at 8:12 pm
[...] The Frustrations of Schools – how do we judge success? [...]
October 14th, 2008 at 4:40 pm
I agree. There needs to be some accountability that these skills are being taught. Where that fits, who is to hold teacher’s accountable? I’m not sure. In a perfect world teacher’s would hold themselves accountable right?
I like what Chris Lehmann said in his recent video. “Data is the work kids do everyday”. We’re so into this “snapshot” phase of education, this phase of a test, or a once or twice a year formal observation that we forget that good teaching and good learning is what happens every day. If we truly believe in student centered learning then the kids should be the ones telling us what they are learning through their projects, reflections, and portfolios. It should be the students responsibility to tell us what they have learned or are learning.
http://www.practicaltheory.org/serendipity/index.php?/archives/1042-IgnitePhilly-Five-Minutes-To-Communicate.html
Of course we’ve been doing this as parents for years. “What did you learn today?” has been the welcoming cry of students coming home for generations. Are we doing that in our schools? Are we asking students to question and reflect on their learning? Or do we just ask them to ace the test?