Enhancing understanding

Too often teachers think of assessments in terms of one-shot deals. Students have a clear-cut performance to accomplish and they are often given just one chance to get it right. Some students are self-starters and welcome the tension this produces. Others become shy and withdrawn or lose interest in the material. Many times, the view which students have of “getting it” versus “not getting it” is based on the intentions the teacher puts forth. Many teachers think in terms of students “getting” the content or “not getting” it. Instead, “(H)elping learners embrace a more incremental perspective enables them to view learning as a process and to regard themselves as capable of advancing their own learning through effort, practice, and revision” (Wiske, Franz, and Breit, p. 83)

Teaching for understanding, according to Wiske et al., requires that the interest and experience of both learners and educator be considered when developing lesson plans. There needs to be a focus on concepts. The lesson plan must be constructed in such a way as to enhance student thinking on these concepts. An environment must exist in which students can share their knowledge with others whom they trust so that they may construct their own knowledge. Finally, lesson plans must allow for ongoing assessments of products which foster metacognition in the learners and allow each learner to become critical judges of their classmates’ products.

Teaching for understanding, then, requires an environment of mutual support. This support comes not only from the educator but from fellow classmates. Students need to feel comfortable communicating their viewpoint to others, whether these are classmates in the classroom or other students in far-away lands. In either case, a sense of community is fostered. “Engaging students in reflective, collaborative communities of learners is important, not only because it promotes their understanding of academic content but because such experiences also help students learn how to cooperate in teams to solve problems and create products no one of them could accomplish alone” (Wiske et al., pp. 99-100).

Source:

Wiske, M., Franz, K., & Breit, L. (2005). Teaching for understanding with technology. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

School-Corporate Partnerships

Often a symbiotic relationship exists between schools and companies that wish to support them. At one local middle school, for instance, a fencing company installed a decorative fence in front of the school on which it tacked a prominent sign promoting itself. On a national level, a cable channel, Channel One, has been able to show advertisements to teenagers under the guise of offering free educational material. Are these companies acting ethically? Are they within the boundaries established by the National Education Association and Consumers Union? This organization established that building brand recognition and acting as good corporate citizens was allowable. Selling products, however, is not. There is a fine line between building brand recognition and selling a product.

Although schools in Prince William County run site-based operations, many times they rely on central administration to establish the corporate partnerships. Parkside Middle School, like many other schools in Prince William County, rely on the results of CMS tests to determine the level of achievement of students. Students use Scantron sheets to record their answers. The information from these sheets is automatically tabulated by a computer which assembles reports for administration. In this manner, the Scantron Company facilitates the measurement of student achievement in core subjects. It is a valuable tool for measuring student progress. Currently it is being used by our school on a weekly basis to measure students on key points tested in Math and English by the state of Virginia. Teachers’ performance is also being assessed according to their students’ success on the CMS tests.

Prince William County schools, along with over a dozen other school systems and private schools in the area, have teamed up with the NorthTIER consortium to provide staff development opportunities to its teachers. NorthTIER offers online classes designed to facilitate technology integration into the curriculum by training teachers in this area. Unfortunately, this is not a service which is widely publicized in the school system.

Parkside Middle School does promote its partnership with one local company, Koons of Manassas, a car dealership. In return for free advertisement, through mention of its company name as the sponsor, Koons supports the school’s homework hotline. Since many students do not have access to computers at home, the school has its teachers call into the homework hotline every day so that students will not miss assignments and parents can be involved in their child’s education.

The school’s technology plan, still in draft stage, makes no mention of utilizing corporate partnerships. There is only mention of using “vendors” to investigate new and emerging technologies. Perhaps there is a respect for what Richards states as the “need to be free of direct marketing to students” (LeBaron, p. 116). Or, perhaps awareness of the debate and ensuing protests over the cable channel, Channel One, which stepped out-of-bounds by meshing corporate advertisement with educational programming. In any event, corporate partnerships are delicate affairs which need elaborate preparation and implementation to sustain the symbiosis.


Sources

LeBaron, J. and Collier, C. (Ed.). (2001). Technology in its place: Successful technology infusion in schools. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Quart, Alissa (2004). Branded: The buying and selling of teenagers. New York, NY: Basic Books.