Out with the Old...

It's time for them to go.  Our old, outdated standards that focus on topics that hold no interest or relevance for our students.  I spent the weekend creating pacing for our new Social Studies standards and found myself asking "Why?"  Why do we continue to focus our standards on events that happened hundreds of years ago?  Why do we continue to focus our standards on topics that hold no benefit for our students as they progress through life?

Case in point, one of our standards addresses cultural diversity.  Now, I am not trying to say that cultural diversity is outdated and needs to go.  My problem is with the way in which our new standards limits our students in how they can learn about cultural diversity.  The new standards focuses on the study of American Indians.  Yes, the Indians were very cultural diverse when you look at the traditions that were valued by the numerous tribes that existed.  However, how is the study of American Indians going to benefit our students in the culturally diverse world that we live in today?  I'm not trying to minimize the overall effect of the Indian culture, but why not allow our students focus on and study the various cultures that surround them today?  In today's society, we can connect with just about anyone in the world with a simple click of a button through video conferencing programs such as Skype.  If I chose to, I could connect my classroom with students from England, Australia, Japan, Finland, India, Taiwan, Germany, Mexico, France just to name a few.  So, why not focus on the diversity of cultures today?  That way our students are learning information that is relevant to them so that if they do connect with someone from a different country they don't offend them out of their ignorance for that culture.  Why are we forcing them to focus on ancient cultures of groups that are no longer in existence, such as the Incas and Mayans, which are another cultural focus for this standard.  When will my students ever be able to put to use cultural knowledge of these societies that are no longer in existence?  It's time to update our focus to the cultures of today in order to provide our students with some relevance and authentic learning that could benefit them at some point within their life.  Maybe, if our students were allowed to learn about the various different cultures that surround them today, they might develop an appreciation for them and won't be so quick to judge or discriminate against those who are different.

Another case in point, exploration.  Our new standard focuses on the European Exploration that occurred some 500 years ago.  In order for my students to understand the importance of exploration, they are to study what men did 5 centuries ago, and this is supposed to inspire my students to do what?  Very few, if any of my students, are excited to learn about these topics.  But, what if?  What if instead of European Exploration, the standard focused on Space Exploration?  Instead of making events that happened 500 years ago the primary focus for this standard, why not focus on the type of exploration that is relevant for today?  Yes, European Explorers should be a minor focus within exploration, so students can learn about what they accomplished through exploration and the mistakes that they made.  However, just imagine all of the critical thinking and problem solving skills you could pull in while focusing in on space exploration.  Students could also focus on the types of advancements that we would have to make in order for space exploration to become a reality for humans, the possible benefits of discovering new minerals on different planets, asteroids, or meteors, the circumstances that we would have to overcome in order to have a human travel to, land on, and then return from a different planet, asteroid, or meteor.  What kind of creativity or innovation could the study of space exploration lead to within our students?  What new technological advancements could they discover as they learn about the various obstacles that we currently face when it comes to space exploration?  I'm guessing it would be much more beneficial than the creativity or innovation that is inspired within them when they're busy focusing on the events of the European Explorers that happened 500 years ago.

When are we finally going to realize that it's time to update our standards and the topics that they focus on so that they carry some relevance and authentic learning for our students?  We need to re-evaluate the manner in which we expect our students to learn about these standards.  We need to make our studies current and relevant to the society that our students currently live in, not the one that we've been focusing on for the past 150 years.  The world has drastically changed and it's time for our education system to do the same.

Please note, I'm not saying this is the only thing we need to address in order to fix our education system.  This is just one of many different aspects or approaches that we need to update in order to re-engage our students within the learning process.

What 5th Grade Students Say about Technology

In my mind, one of the strongest voices out there when it comes to transforming our educational system is that of our students.  I often get requests to write articles about the changes I have made within my classroom as I have moved to incorporate a student-centered environment that allows my students to advance at their own pace while incorporating as much choice as I can into what my students are doing while still covering all of our required standards.  Anymore, when met with these requests, I state that I would rather have them talk to my students and get their opinions on the matter in lieu of hearing just another teacher talking about 'what great things they think they are doing'.  If we truly want to effectively transform learning for our students, then, it's only through including our students in the conversation that we can effectively and relevantly transform learning in a manner that will once again engage and excite the students we teach.

from:  The Fremont News Messenger 3/22/13

The article is now a 'paid archive' within our local newspaper, so this is the best way I could think to link to it since I'm pretty much a novice to Blogger.