District Administration - January 2007 - (Page 61)

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It’s fourth grade. “It’s fourth grade” is supposed to connote some meaning—that the dominant curriculum for fourth grade is misery. An Inconvenient Truth Questions about student happiness are neither rhetorical nor frivolous usa n Ohanian recently wrote an article for The Pulse: Education’s Place for Debate “What Schools Need Is a Happiness Index” in which she advanced the radical idea that schools should be happy places where children learn. Ohanian disputes the notion that the Founding Fathers believed happiness should be pursued everywhere—except school. One reader responded that American student s are on a “happiness trip” and are coddled into believing that being “fat, lazy and happy” is just ﬁne. There is just “too much happiness in our schools,” he said. Is unhappiness a key to academic success? No credible learning or management theory suggests that fearful, unhappy or insecure people are more productive. Common sense and countless studies demonstrate that love is a better master than duty. For example, one popular yet wrong view of education suggests that school is a child’s “job.” This reduces learners to forced unpaid workers, as they do piecework in the name of higher standards, competitiveness and accountability. W hat would Charles Dickens or Upton Sinclair say about today’s score-obsessed classrooms? Oh, I forgot. Dickens isn’t on the test, but gerunds and capitalization rules are, and literature is instead relegated to testing isolated grammatical skills. S No learning theory suggests that fearful or insecure people are more productive. if that accomplishment is unment ioned. He reads voraciously and last year collaborated with a handful of other third-graders on the writing of a mock trial that won statewide awards. They even performed in front of actual judges at the state’s law school. Doog ie no longer loves school. His teacher is mean, the homework seems excessive and pointless, his classroom is punitive and grades are dispensed like food pellets to Skinnerian pigeons. Recess is a foreig n concept. I bought a trumpet for Doogie so he could play in the school band, an educational activity I value. The teacher announced on the ﬁrst day of band class, “You must practice 30 minutes four times per week, and if your parent doesn’t sign a document verifying that you practiced, you will fail band!” What a way to inspire kids, Now this is personal My fourth grade nephew “Doogie” once loved school. In fact, I found his affection for the place a bit unnervi ng. He is the type of kid who goes to school while ill because he wants to maintain perfect attendance—even www.DistrictAdministration.com Higher standards A lt hough I’m against uniform onesi ze-ﬁts-all standards, I believe that we can all raise our game. Fourthgraders should read great literature, speak coherently, solve problems, express ideas through a variety of media, program computers, edit video, interpret and understand information found on the Web and in print. They should play an instrument , speak a second language and develop skills necessary to participate in a democracy. Pa radox ica lly, the same adults who destroyed the timeless liberal arts tradition in schools sacriﬁced many of those “standards” at the altar of accountability and unhappiness. If schools are failing, each school employee who advances such nonsense weakens support for public education and advances the pernicious curriculum of misery and helplessness. The Flip Wilson defense of “The devil made me do it” is unacceptable. I therefore share Ohanian’s contention that too many classrooms have become unhappy places. Isn’t it time we did something about it? DA Gary S. Stager, gary@stager.org, is senior editor of DISTRICT ADMINISTRATION and editor of The Pulse: Education’s Place for Debate www.districtadministration. com /pulse . January 2007 61 DA_107_GaryJP.indd 61 12/13/06 3:43:44 PM Warning : Unknown : The session id contains invalid characters, valid characters are only a-z, A-Z and 0-9 in Unknown on line 0 Warning : Unknown : Failed to write session data files . Please verify that the current setting of session.save_path is correct /var/lib/php/session in Unknown on line 0 http://www.districtadministration.com/pulse http://www.districtadministration.com/pulse http://www.DistrictAdministration.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of District Administration - January 2007

Contents
Editor's Letter
Update
Inside the Law
Curriculum Update
Administrator Profile
District Profile
Overheard on the Pulse...
Teaching Techniques for Supervisors
Why Buy New When Used Might Do?
Past Becomes Future
Financial Rescue
Speaking Out
The Online Edge
Research Corner
Problem/Solution
Computer Literature
New Products
Calendar of Events
Understanding the Times

District Administration - January 2007