This post was mentioned on Twitter by shareski: .@Horizons93 never been a fan of Rhee. I wrote this 18 months ago http://bit.ly/8idsPN...

People dance at parties far more often than they do mathematics puzzles at parties or other social events. Except at the sort of parties I attend, and those parties are mostly made up of people with a lot of formal training in mathematics. I can think of a number of societies that didn’t have schools, or didn’t have schools for girls, but still women in those societies danced.

Dance patterns may be cogntively directly linked to mathematics, but a lot of mathematics is not cognitively linked to patterns. Eg the proof that the square root of 2 is an irrational number.

…children learn to dance outside the classroom far more often than they learn to do mathematics.

Really? What degree or level of dance and what degree or level of mathematics do they encounter outside the classroom? My 3 year old counts all the time, she is now learning addition and subtraction, and she has a vague sense of variables (she understands that a nickel is worth 5 and a penny is worth 1). She is not in school yet but she has learned these things. She also dances but I would not say that one is done more outside of school than the other. Also, for her I think one activity definitely supports the other. When she counts she often bounces her head in a dance-like rhythm. Also, dance is all about patterns which cognitively are directly linked to mathematics. Perhaps if we taught more dance in our schools our students would perform better at math.

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Stop the assumption that reading and writing and math are the most important things everyone needs to learn. Anyone who suggests reading is more important than art scares me.

This I think depends on what institution we are thinking about. Many forms of art, like dance, music, painting, sculpture, can be accessed and enjoyed by anyone with a working brain and the relevant sensory organs. Perhaps we enjoy them more greatly if properly taught, but we can appreciate them, and it is quite possible to acquire an informal education of considerable scope in these areas. But literature and mathematics are forms of art that require, for most of us, some formal teaching to be able to appreciate. So from a school’s point of view, where they can really make the difference is in teaching reading and mathematics. And of course those skills are valuable in a practical sense too.

There isn’t an education system on the planet that teaches dance every day to children the way we teach them mathematics. Why? Why not?

Several reasons come to mind:
– children learn to dance outside the classroom far more often than they learn to do mathematics. Therefore if a child isn’t exposed to mathematics in the classroom you are far more likely to be limiting their future appreciation of the arts.
– mathematics is a skill that opens doorways to a great many subjects. I have had friends who have had to drop out of their desired courses at university because they didn’t have the necessary mathematical background. Children often change their minds about what they want to do as an adult, it is the role of schools to open as many doors for their students as possible.
– mathematics is useful if you expect your children, as adults, will have something to do with money.

I don’t deny the value of teaching children dance. But I think it is secondary in importance to teaching mathematics for those reasons.

These are teacher that in addition to experts in pedagogy and content, understand how to design customized learning and have the resources to find out who is best able to help every student. Fire those that can’t or won’t figure this out.

I don’t like this, this is very harsh. Why not get your good teachers to provide the resources necessary for the not-so-good teachers? Can we really find enough teachers who are experts in pedagogy and content and understand how to design customised learning to fill every single classroom in the country? I have my doubts – the number of people who have those range of skills is limited, and some of them are likely to be just uninterested in teaching.

The journalist writes: “People say, ‘Well, you know, test scores don’t take into account creativity and the love of learning,’” she says with a drippy, grating voice, lowering her eyelids halfway. Then she snaps back to herself. “I’m like, ‘You know what? I don’t give a crap.’ Don’t get me wrong. Creativity is good and whatever. But if the children don’t know how to read, I don’t care how creative you are. You’re not doing your job.”

In a way she is right. Our kids have to know how to read. Data on high school dropouts tells us that non school completers make 21,000$ on average, are at higher risk for incarceration, suffer worse health, have children less likely to graduate high school and are less engaged in civic processes. But what Rhee’s comment shows is a marked lack of understanding about how children learn to read. Reading isn’t simply a scientific acquisition process, but requires enjoyment– the “art” of reading. If we reduce all education to science we aren’t going to get the results we want. Education is also an art form and creative process– as any good teacher knows.

I am worried that in the war between the progressive educators and the corporatists, the establishment and the reformers, once again the only ones who are going to get hurt are the kids. A moderate approach that synthesizes differing ways of teaching, learning, assessment and leadership might take us farther than entrenched positions.

Now there’s a grant funded to WestEd to devise a tech literacy framework that would be added to NAEP’s repertoire of tests. Recent news articles in eSchoolNews defined this effort as one that would lead to another test. I hope it’s not a test in the traditional sense. I hope the committees will think way outside the traditional boxes. I think, Dean, you’ve stated the issues well in your post. I hope we, the educational community in the U.S., will decide collectively that character is more important to us than perfect test scores, that creativity is not so easily measured but is very highly prized, and that emphasizing tests over a constantly enriching learning experience does not create balance or progress.

Really? If there’s a citation that gives evidence for her firing people based on tests scores, please post it. I have neither seen nor heard of any such thing.

She’s fired people, but just whomever she pleased, because they didn’t “fit”

Now we find that it was the art, science, social studies, PE, sports programs and more that built the schema for reading. If you spent much time at my school and others like it, you would note that students are pretty good at reading aloud … they just don’t understand much of what they read because they have had so few experiences in life. Kids that have never played sports, don’t understand or get too excited about a story involving sports. Students don’t make relationships between even the simplest concepts … so even if I can sound out all the words it doesn’t have much meaning.

I look around my classroom and know that if it follows the statistics … about half my students won’t graduate from high school. The high school isn’t that far away, so I see former students. Very few get to play sports or take art classes or computer programming or auto mechanics because they are behind in language and math skills OR because they have zero experience with art or music or sports so they have no interest or personal knowledge if they are good at them or like them. Even though only a very small percentage of people ever use anything above 4th grade math in their lives we force students to take ever higher level math classes in high school even if they have art skills or mechanical skills to even graduate. So school is a place where I go and take the same classes I have always struggled in and I rarely get to do the activities that might make meaning of reading and writing or get me excited about something and give me reason to stay in school… when I graduated from 6th grade I already had gone further in school than anybody in my family ever … so I’m already a success .. I guess. Why bother?

So yes, students should have good reading and math skills, but how many do we disenfranchise from school beginning in kindergarten when little of school builds on or respects the talents students do have? It’s interesting how many times an art project or a science experiment or “building something” as part of a project will reveal talents and ways into the curriculum for elementary students … things you can draw connections with in stories they read that continues that interest. Students require both … reading instruction and math … but also quality science, social studies, art, music and PE programs and that will cost more if for no other reason students in at risk schools will need an expanded day and year to get ALL of that. The Rhee’s of the world do not want to acknowledge that … they want prove it can be done with less and to do what has tried and failed because they feel it just wasn’t done hard or rigorous enough.

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I actually think there are times when canoe building should supersede reading. Reading is not the panacea cure all drug for everyone. It is vitally important but I’d rather have an caring illiterate than a socially misfit reader.

Again, no reason why we have to choose but in some cases, we need to choose where we begin connecting with students. Learning to build a canoe can involve reading but to the students and others, they’d never think of that connection, they’re building a canoe and by the way, in order to do, they have to read.

I’d also concede that sometimes kids have been cheated out of learning to read in order to participate in fluffy, meaningless activities. My point is that every child should be assessed according to their needs and sometimes it might seem unorthodox to others but in fact is based on data, observation and an understanding of what they need as a human being, not an academic. If schools are only about academics, then ya, scrap the canoe building. But public education’s mandate goes far beyond academics. At least I think most would agree that it’s certainly multi-faceted.

Not to be scary and/or naive, but how can a teacher find fault with this statement? Ok, maybe an art teacher, but your students should know how to read the labels on the turpentine can, right?
I think when people argue against measuring the success or failure of educators they point to those kids with other issues — ADHD, crack-head parents, etc — instead of at the whole, which is like saying Tom Coughlin can’t be judged as a coach, look at Plaxico! We’re talking about the huge numbers of students failing tests and dropping out of school, and producing kids of their own that cannot read… where do we think those high, homeless, illiterate 15 yr olds come from? We do need better and better teachers, and we DO need art and canoe building, but not at the expense of a school full of children failing to learn.

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But you’ve said it better than I have.

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I wonder how much of our efforts to become literate, numerate, pro social…have to do with our need to create and consume art. I’m guessing a lot.

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This person, let’s call her that, thinks test scores are what build a human being, hmmmm? That being able to ‘read’ is it? And I don’t think she actually means read, she means get a good score on a test. Because test scores are tangible.

As an advocate for that drippy creativity, the arts are what prepare students to become human beings. Prepared to take on the real world. They promote expression, communication, team building, confidence, independent thought. Real world skills. Hasn’t Rhee heard that companies want creative thinkers? Where do you think students become creative thinkers?

Ah, I know I’m ranting in the wrong place. It just drives me nuts. It’s having people in charge of education, who don’t actually like kids all that much. Nutty.

And I don’t know where she gets that education is touchy-feely. Not the schools I’ve been in….

A quick Google search brought me to this site with a list of famous and successful people with learning disabilities like dyslexia that make reading a struggle for them: Famous People with Dyslexia, Other LD and/or AD/HD. To what should we attribute their success to if reading is not their strong suit?

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One could argue that the arts are arguably more important than reading. We base more decisions every day on aesthetics than we do on reading. The things we see, the spatial relationships between objects, the expressions on people’s faces, textures we encounter on surfaces of things we come in contact with, sounds we hear, the way someone gestures while talking, the tone of a person’s voice and the like are all more important most of the time than what can be gained through reading. These things also inform everything about how we interpret what we read. They provide understanding and definition to the adjectives, nouns, verbs, and adverbs we use in our language. Even the design of the typeface the words we read are written in informs how we interpret meaning from the text. To say reading is more important than art is like saying that vowels are more important than consonants. A person who is visually, kinesthetically, and auditorily literate but cannot read text is far better prepared to thrive in our world than a person who can read but is aesthetically inept.

Also, you write:

Schools which fail to teach students the basic skills needed to be a part of this society fail in their core mission – to prepare students to be citizens.

For this to be true we all have to agree with the last phrase. Is this really the core mission of schools today? If this were universally accepted we would have laws making school completion a prerequisite for full citizenship. To suggest this today sounds ludicrous. If it were true this would be the natural conclusion would it not? So, if school completion is not prerequisite to full citizenship than what other purpose is there for schools. The other purpose that is thrown out there a lot is that schools are meant to prepare students to be productive members of our nation’s workforce. This is changing now too. This was an easy to see conclusion during the industrial era but in the information age the school must serve some other purpose.

Carl Andersons last blog post..What is Online Learning Anyway?

Well that’s the point. I absolutely agree with you that a one-size-fits all solution does not work, and this is not a zero sum game.

My problem is with the statement that:

Stop the assumption that reading and writing and math are the most important things everyone needs to learn. Anyone who suggests reading is more important than art scares me.

As you just admitted to, reading is needed to even have any semblance of success in our society. No matter what way you try to spin it, art is not needed. With that in mind, I would argue that reading thus is more important than arts education. One is required, the other helps but is not absolutely required.

Sure, we can talk about how everyone is different – everyone is. But everyone is also part of a literate society, which expects you to read and write. Schools which fail to teach students the basic skills needed to be a part of this society fail in their core mission – to prepare students to be citizens.

If a teacher teaches to increase test scores, they decided that was most important. If a teacher decides to base their teaching on creating responsible adults, he/she has decided that is most important. If a teacher decides to base their teaching around using tools (like technology), that is what is most important.

Maybe our strength as teachers are that we have differing ideas of what is important and subsequently emphasize different ideas. Maybe it is our weakness. What do you think?

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To me anyone who feels the need to assert that reading is more important than art usually does so as a quick segue into, let’s get rid of it. I suppose it’s hyperbolic in some respects but I’m not prepared to rank the value of either. I don’t see the value. Is Math more important than reading? Is reading more important than writing? Is hearing more important than seeing?

The person who says that, I fear has something up their sleeve.

Morgante,
Again, not saying don’t teach reading but political decisions, filing taxes and a job isn’t all there is to life. For some students, they may never get a job without some help in basic social skills. Everyone is different and people like Rhee fail to see that diversity in learning. Again, I never said we shouldn’t teach art but those presume we have to choose and indeed prescribe one size fits all learning concern me. That was point and still is.

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Then you will have me convinced.

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I think your example in some ways justifies my belief that one size does not fit all. For a time, perhaps that’s exactly what that student needs…intensive literacy education. But not forever.

At the same time, the students that cannot socially function might not do well in your classroom and needs something different.

How did I do?

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