It discusses the misconceptions that many people believe about education, that are blocking true learning.  Over the past few decades we have learned a lot about how students learn and these misconceptions don’t fit with the science.

Here is the list of misconceptions and Strauss’s comments on each.

Basic Facts Come Before True Learning

This one translates roughly as, “Students must do the boring stuff before they can do the interesting stuff.” Or, “Students must memorize before they can be allowed to think.” In truth, students are most likely to achieve long-term mastery of basic facts in the context of engaging, student-directed learning.

 Rigorous Education Means a Teacher Talking

Teachers have knowledge to impart, but durable learning is more likely when students talk, create, and integrate knowledge into meaningful projects. The art of a teacher is to construct ways for students to discover.

Covering It Means Teaching It

Teachers are often seduced by the idea that if they talk about a concept in class, they have taught it. At best, students get tentative ideas that will be quickly forgotten if not reinforced by a student-centered activity.

 Teaching to Student Interests Means Dumbing It Down

If we could somehow see inside a student’s brain, its circuitry would correspond to its knowledge. Since new learning always builds on what is already in the brain, teachers must relate classroom teaching to what students already know. Teachers who fail to do so, whether due to ignorance or in pursuit of a false idea of rigor, are running afoul of a biological reality.

 Acceleration Means Rigor

Some schools accelerate strong students so that they can cover more material. Schools in the Independent Curriculum Group are more likely to ask such students to delve deeper into important topics. Deep knowledge lays a stronger foundation for later learning.

 A Quiet Classroom Means Good Learning

Students sitting quietly may simply be zoned out — if not immediately, then within 15 minutes. A loud classroom, if properly controlled, includes the voices of many students who are actively engaged.

 Traditional Schooling Prepares Students for Life

Listening to teachers and studying for tests has little to do with life in the world of work. People in the work world create, manage, evaluate, communicate, and collaborate.

This article made me think about the many wonderful teachers that I work with across the country and the engaging classrooms that they create.  As they implement high quality service-learning projects with their students, they go against all the misconceptions above.

It goes on to say that tasks resulting in higher levels of student engagement consist of these attributes:

    Meaningful or related to the student’s life or interests;

    Working together with peers;

    Incorporates games;

    Created by the student (authentic);

    Result in a piece of work the student is proud of and wants to share;

    Challenging (but not so challenging it is unattainable);

    Considers learning styles;

    Allows for student choice;

    Can be extended by students;

Tasks resulting in lower levels of student engagement consists of these attributes:

    Easy and quick to complete (requires low levels of thinking);

    Is teacher designed (such as a worksheet);

    Has right or wrong answers;

    Considers none or all of the attributes of high engaging tasks.

As I reflect on the tasks above-it seems to me that high quality service-learning meets all of the attributes of meaningful learning and high student engagement.    What do you think?  What are some of your class rules that imply student engagement?

Looking for new evidence and support to make your case about the importance of civic learning strategies?

We highly recommend checking out two new reports – one by the U.S. Department of Education and the second by a national coalition of experts:

1.     The U.S. Department of Education recently issued a Road Map and Call to Action called Advancing Civic Learning and Engagement in Democracy.   (We blogged about a White House event in January that rolled out this initiative.)  Here’s a quote from the introduction:

“Few would question that post-secondary institutions and public schools must today prepare students for a global, competitive job market, or that a good STEM education and superior reading and writing skills are important components of a world-class education. But it is a mistake to assume that advancing civic learning and democratic engagement is a zero-sum proposition that comes at the expense of STEM preparation and higher order communication skills.”

The report makes a strong case for the importance of civic knowledge and skills and lays out a set of steps to advance civic learning and democratic engagement.  One of the nine steps focuses on the Department’s support for civic learning as part of a well-rounded K-12 curriculum and even cites service-learning as an evidence based program (see page 24).

2.   Another report, Guardian of Democracy: the Civic Mission of Schools, was produced by the Campaign for the Civic Mission of Schools in partnership with the Leonore Annenberg Institute for Civics of the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania, the National Conference on Citizenship, the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement at Tufts University, and the American Bar Association Division for Public Education.

This report builds on a 2003 Report, the Civic Mission of Schools (CMS).  The introduction to the new report notes that the, “education movement spawned by CMS eight years ago has accomplished much, but much remains to be done. To improve civic literacy, skills and engagement, this report proposes that schools adopt six proven practices in civic learning, ranging from high-quality classroom instruction to several innovative pedagogies and activities outside of formal classes.”  On page 29, service-learning is identified as one of the proven practices endorsed by these experts.

Both reports can be downloaded for free.  They are worth the read.

www.ed.gov/civic-learning

http://civicmissionofschools.org/site/guardianofdemocracy

The guide contains brief descriptions of programs and organizations from all over the U.S. that support youth in STEM. Some you will recognize as they have been around for several decades–others will probably be unknown to you. So do some browsing. You may find a program or an organization whose materials and approach will be a great fit for the youth with whom you work.    

KIDS Consortium and the Maine Math and Science Alliance are in the Collaborate section of the guide as organizations that can help educators to combine high quality service-learning with high quality STEM instruction. See examples of projects from the partnership.

This post is just a quick reminder to take a page out of your service-learning facilitation book and to take advantage of the MLK Day experience to help the people in your group connect their actions of the day to thoughts and feelings they’ll have during the day.

Make some time to gather your group in a circle before wrapping it up and lead a meaningful debriefing and reflection on the day’s activities. You can do this in a thousand different ways (see reflection lessons suggested on the MLK Day site.), but it seems that including Dr. King’s words and deeds is an appropriate way to prompt the individuals in your group to connect their day’s efforts with their thoughts and feelings.

Consider creating an opportunity for people to share their reflections—hearing from others will increase the power of the experience for everyone.

The MLK Day site has a concise list of nine things to remember to help everyone have a wonderful experience. Take a look at it before you set off tomorrow morning.

The event marked the release of the U.S. Department of Education’s own report, “Civic Learning and Engagement in Democracy: A Road Map and Call to Action,” and highlights the American Commonwealth Partnership, which brings together schools, colleges and other civic partners to promote civic learning and civic identity throughout American education.

Individuals representing many groups from campuses and communities dedicated to reinvigorating democratic engagement gathered for the afternoon’s kick-off.

The event coincided with the publication of “A Crucible Moment: College Learning & Democracy’s Future,” a report from the National Task Force on Civic Learning and Democratic Engagement. A Crucible Moment was prepared at the request of the U.S. Department of Education under the leadership of the Association of American Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) and the Global Perspective Institute, Inc. (GPI).

Over the next days and weeks I will post video clips from today’s event (I expect that they will be available soon) and excerpts from the reports as well as ideas and thoughts from you and others about what today and the reports suggest moving forward. The reports were released today and to be honest I’ve barely skimmed them. The Crucible Moment report has a “Highlights” PDF that you can review until you get a few more minutes to dig into the rest of the report.

I am looking forward to reading the reports and comparing them to the Guardian of Democracy report released this fall that I mentioned it in a post a few weeks ago. All this attention to civic learning is a positive thing!

Links to get your STEM fix:

Out-of-School Time Drawing Girls Into STEM  is an article this week’s in Education Week.

Go to the Education Week home page to register for a free webinar on STEM focused schools. The webinar is January 17.

This blog post on the STEM Connector site: January is Mentor Month! discusses STEM mentors helping students using the MentorNet program. MentorNet could help you find wonderfully qualified community partners for service learning projects.

The last link is to a blog by the Minnesota Campus Compact Network. The title of the post is Motivation. It has statistics that suggest the motivation students need to enter STEM fields and what we can all do to help.

“Cultivate an ongoing commitment to learning.”

Cultivate—I appreciate the verb in this context and what it connotes. There is a metaphor for gardening suggested—for nurturing and growing and stewardship—that I think is appropriate.

So how and why does service-learning cultivate that commitment? As usual, lots of answers to a question like that.

Engaged For Success, a 2008 report by Civic Enterprises (CE), is wonderful and relevant to this discussion. It followed two other reports by CE, The Silent Epidemic: Perspectives of High School Dropouts and America’s Civic Health Index that fit together in a trilogy. The reports describe the issues of disengagement in school and civic life by significant portions of students. While Engaged for Success lays out the case for service-learning and policy suggestions from the local to federal levels for supporting service-learning, it also nails the question “how does service-learning cultivate a commitment to learning.”

If you are fortunate enough to talk with lots of people who have led service-learning experiences, you know from their anecdotes that the experiences have a different effect on kids than other instructional strategies. You will often hear comments like, “I thought that our project was completed, but by that point the kids were so into it that we continued. I was helping, but I wasn’t really leading it. They were.”  Or you’ll hear, “I thought that our project was completed, but by that point the kids were so into it that we continued. I was helping, but I wasn’t really leading it. They were.” “As we were sharing our last reflections one student asked what we were going to do next.”

KIDS Consortium‘s founder Marvin Rosenblum speaks of how and why service-learning cultivates a commitment for learning that impacts individual students and eventually whole communities—see below. Marvin starts speaking 22 seconds into the clip.

Through well-facilitated service learning, the commitment to learn is largely cultivated by empowering students with the knowledge from their own experience that “I can make a difference.” During the experience, everything that a  of the process does to empower students increases their commitment.

So what do you do to empower students during a service learning project? Comment  below…

[discussions of the other 6 21st Century Skills supported by service-learning are posted in this blog: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]:

On December 23^rd H.R. 2055 was approved. Although not all the dust has settled, the passage has implications for CNCS programs in FY 2012’s. Check out some sources that are following the process:

Save service

Voices for National Service

Points of Light

This was posted by Robert Velasco in the K-12 Service-Leaning Listserv on December 23^rd:

Today President Obama signed H.R. 2055, the Fiscal Year 2012 Final Consolidated Appropriations Act, which funds the federal government for the rest of fiscal year 2012.

In total, the legislation provides $1,048,883,856 for the Corporation for National and Community Service and its programs, including an across-the-board rescission of .189 percent.  This level is about 98 percent of our FY 2011 enacted level.

In a time of fiscal constraint, this budget will allow CNCS to continue its critical work in communities across the country.  CNCS and our network of grantees and sponsors engage millions of Americans in sustained service to solve problems, improve the lives of vulnerable citizens, strengthen America’s nonprofit sector, and create economic and educational opportunity for those who serve.

We are reviewing the legislative language, committee report, and other guidance from Congress as we develop our implementation plans for this legislation.  As we complete that analysis, we will be sharing additional information with you in the near future.

Thank you for your hard work and commitment.  Your contributions touch people’s lives in so many significant ways, and I greatly appreciate your dedication to national service.

Sincerely,

Robert Velasco, I

Acting CEO

Corporation for National and Community Service

Two celebrated days of service are approaching, and there are resources to help increase the meaning of the engagement.

January 16th marks Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Although there are not many days left to plan an action:

1) I encourage you to register your planned action so that others will know of and perhaps assist your group. Registered actions are searchable by zip code;

2) Check out the weekly Nation Service Briefing’s special update on MLK Day.

3) To help prepare students for MLK Day, the Corp. for National and Community Service has a toolkit of resources, and Scholastic will be releasing materials targeted for grades three to five.

Some groups use MLK Day as a kick-off for a service effort, and then celebrate the culmination of the effort on Global Youth Service Day (GYSD), which is April 20-22 in 2012. Here is one group using that approach.

GYSD, coordinated by Youth Service America, is massive. Quoting the YSA web site, “On Global Youth Service Day 2011, over 550,000 young people  strengthened their communities through more than 3,500 service or service-learning projects reported to YSA in 102 countries on 6 continents.”  See what I mean? A very big deal.

Not yet planning something for GYSD? It is not too late.

While many grants have been awarded, there are still grants available to support actions as a part of GYSD, as well as other resources.

I’m reminded of John Dewey when I read, “Participate in civic life and democratic decision-making.” Dewey told us that, “Education is not preparation for life but is life itself.” (This quote, which is how I usually see it in print, is truncated—here is the whole thing.)

Service learning does not simply prepare students to participate in civic life and democratic decision-making.

Service-learning immerses students in civic life; and there are many opportunities for students to exercise democratic decision-making including, but beyond, simply voting and acting on the majority’s ruling.

But, as usual, there is more to it than that…I’ll try to be succinct.

One of the principles of KIDS model service learning is apprentice citizenship. By having students work with community partners to solve authentic problems and fill real needs, students learn, like an apprentice working and learning with a master craftsperson, why and how to be effective members of our participatory democracy.

The results from evaluations of students doing service learning clearly suggest those dispositions and skills are honed on a range of outcomes. Students develop civic skills (as well as social and academic skills) while doing service-learning.

Perhaps the most interesting outcomes are the measures of an essential attitude—civic efficacy—the belief that, “I can make a difference!” Students involved in service learning score higher on measures of civic efficacy. Because service learning cultivates that attitude it is an invaluable tool for tuning our society.

If you are looking for an example of a project in which students engaged in civic life and modeled democratic ideals, then the winner of the 2009 State Farm Youth Leadership for Excellence in Service-Learning Award is a project about which you should know. As you read the short description, think about how the actions of this group exemplify the spirit of the democratic ethic of valuing all the members of a community.

Reform of this size, involving this many people, requires a lot of feedback. I am posting a link to the STEM Education Coalition’s site and blog. Go to the blog and complete the survey. The Coalition is gathering information to get a snap shot of how people in the STEM Ed. world view the efforts and the issues related to STEM Ed. reforms.

If you are looking for some information on what your state is up to regarding STEM Ed, check this--it has data for every state.

Or, go to the ACHIEVE site, get an update on the NextGen Science Standards and visit this page. It too has data on every state’s efforts

T. Hobbes...he warned us about ourselves:)

a collaborative learning strategy that I was developing 21^st Century students, and it looked more like Hobbes’s 17th Century description of the state of nature. Clearly, I forgot an important step…to teach them HOW to work in groups.

Developing students and citizens who work effectively on teams is a valuable 21^st Century Skill. Service learning projects offer ample and authentic opportunities to teach and to have students demonstrate their ability to work successfully in groups throughout the project and on civic groups throughout their lives.

Like other 21^st Century Skills I’ve discussed in this blog series , the opportunity for teachers and program leaders to instruct discreet skills and  to model respectful attitudes, then be able to give feedback when students are actively applying the skills and attitudes in the most authentic of contexts is wonderful instruction and assessment.

When KIDS Consortium facilitates a four-day summer institute we make time to review a few of the basics to help a class become a collaborative unit.

To help teachers help their classes to develop collaborative environments, we model the creation of group norms and how to encourage students to democratically, not autocratically (although, back to Hobbes, he would have approved of the autocracy approach), maintain a respectful environment.

Throughout the institute we engaged in activities designed build trust, communication and a sprit of cooperation through facilitated team-oriented initiatives, starting with low-personal risk activities and building to more difficult challenges as the group’s cohesion grows, as a model for working with youth.

An activity that helps students to know and appreciate the different preferences for working with others —typically falling into one of the four categories of Action, Caring, Structure and Meaning—that their classmates have, is an important part of preparing students to be successful collaborators.

An activity that is always appreciated as a helpful reminder  is Stages of Group Development. Based on the work of Bruce Tuckman, this activity has two important outcomes: 1) it reminds teachers to remind students that through the life of a project, groups will go through predictable stages and not to give up when stage two, STORMING—arrives with its challenges 2) it gives teachers ideas of how identify where a group is in the cycle  and how to support and guide the group successfully in the various stages. Teachers frequently acknowledge that they eschew the inevitable conflicts that collaborative work brings and have shied from group work because of it, but that the activity gives them tools to make those situations into learning opportunities.

A beautiful example of the benefit of careful modeling, instruction and assessment of collaboration comes from a middles school team led by a gifted and experienced service learning teacher. The teacher, as always, intentionally helped the team to develop skills and attitudes that contribute to collaboration. About half-way through the team’s project, one of the students, I’ll call him Ben, was diagnosed with a serious illness and needed to begin intensive treatments that kept him from school. In a gesture of respect and unity, a life-sized cardboard cut-out in Ben’s image was made and included in all the activities for the remainder of the project. The cut-out did field work with the water samples it “took” (fell in the brook, really), posed for pictures and sat in the debriefing circle. And when the team was posed with a decision and they were tugging back and forth, genuinely, someone asked, “I wonder what would Ben say?”

Listening for, seeking, including, valuing everyone’s voice…those are skills, habits and values that sustain our communities in the 21^st Century.

How do you help to develop skilled collaborators? Share your tips and tools the comment box.

REGISTRATION IS OPEN THROUGH DEC. 16, 2011.

STEM and service-learning groups…this looks like a match for you.

After reading a few articles over the last couple of days (I’m not linking to them), I’m a bit frustrated with a couple of refrains in civic education I hear, so while this post needs some work, I want to get it off my chest–here is the essence and I’ll overhaul it later.

Here is a breakthrough I’d really like to see…

A pledge by all who teach civics to not utter the following words until students need to know about them to solve a community problem or fill a need about which they care.

1) the U.S. Constitution

2) the Bill of Rights

3) the U.S. Constitution—repeated for emphasis

You see, the focus of conversation on teaching civics seems to be on the WHAT—specifically on what many surveys show too many adults don’t know. Not enough of the conversation is about HOW to teach civics so that we are developing civically interested, engaged and knowledgeable citizens. That is, after all, the point, right?

It is not that the WHAT is not important, it’s just that it is not important until you have to know it to get something done/fixed/changed/improved.

Instead of developing civic knowledge with the founding documents , you can start by doing many other things—here are just a few quick ones:

• Take students for a walk (a colleague calls this the Look and Listen) around the school, and ask them to look and listen (and take notes ) for things that should be better;

• Do the same thing as above, but outside the building;

• If it is raining or for some other reasons your group cannot walk around the building, do a brainstorm inside and ask:

1) What are some things that bug you?

2) What are the needs in our community?

3) If you could work on changing something in our community, what would it be?

From those lists there is bound to be something that a) can be impacted by some level of government and b) the students care about fixing enough to want and need to learn about how aspects of the government work. Then bring in the U.S. Constitution…

Okay, like I acknowledged above, the entirety of this post is not done–to add: links to strategies, successful approaches, examples of how this approach works to integrate civic knowledge and skills with other content areas, etc…I’ll work on it, but feel free to add some, too.