Spotlight Critical Thinking

8/18/2019 Spotlight Critical Thinking

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SPOTLIGHT

CONTENTS

2 Striking a Balance on Early Rigor

4 Can Critical Thinking Be Too Critical?

5 Research Shows Benefits of ‘Deeper

Learning’ Approach

COMMENTARY

6 Teachers as Critical Thinkers

7 Art Matters: We Know, We Measured It

8 Six Categories of Deeper Learning Skillsfor Education Leaders

9 How to Teach for Deeper Learning?An International Survey Provides Insights

2015

CRITICAL THINKING

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Editor’s Note: As schools strive to improvestudent outcomes, educators are working tocreate opportunities for critical thinking. In thisSpotlight, read about the merits and challengesof critical thinking in class discussions, learn howrigor breeds academically and socially engagedstudents, and hear how teachers are buildingskills to promote deeper learning.


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2EDUCATION WEEK SPOTLIGHT ON CRITICAL THINKING edweek.org

By Sarah D. Sparks

T he push for earlier and more aca-demically rigorous preschool for 3- to5-year-olds comes during somethingof an Enlightenment explosion in

the research. Fields such as psychology and

neuroscience are showing that young chil-dren can understand and benefit from deep

learning at the beginning of their lives. Yet early-childhood researchers caution that

the same studies showing what pupils are ca-pable of also suggest that efforts to push downelementary-style instruction to preschoolcould undermine the exact cognitive develop-ment educators hope to build up.

“Over the last 15 years, there’s been a tre-mendous revolution in the way we see veryyoung children,” said Allison Gopnik, a pro-fessor of psychology at the University of Cali-

fornia, Berkeley, and a co-author of the 1999book, The Scientist in the Crib: What Early Learning Tells Us About the Mind. “They are

learning in very sophisticated ways, playingin ways that help them find information. It’snot just that children are defective grown-ups;when you look at children’s brains, they reallyseem to be designed to learn in this way.”

Measuring Learning

At the time Craig T. Ramey started workingon the now-famous ongoing Carolina Abece-darian Project preschool study in North Caro-lina in 1972, “there was a real suspicion thatthe environment really didn’t matter much aslong as the kid had been fed regularly and notphysically abused.”

Most educators and researchers followed themodel put forth by Jean Piaget, a Swiss devel-opmental psychologist who helped found mod-ern child psychology. Piaget studied childrenthrough direct questioning and observationand determined those younger than schoolage were incapable of reason.

“How children learn hasn’t changed verymuch” since Piaget’s work gained wide Ameri-can prominence in the 1960s, said Mr. Ramey,a professor and distinguished research scholarat Virginia Tech Carilion Research Institutein Roanoke. “What we know about how theylearn has changed a good bit. Children are

learning all the time from early infancy; wehave just been too ham-handed to see it.”

As researchers move instead to measuringhow babies and children pay attention, react,and solve problems—“letting them answer intheir own language, rather than ours,” as Ms.Gopnik puts it—they have identified exten-sive, complex thought in infants and youngchildren.

In fact, a new wave of research suggests the very traits educators are desperately tryingto cultivate in high school graduates—criticalreasoning, lateral thinking, creativity, autono-mous learning, and a host of other “college-and career-ready” skills—are not just presentbut the natural learning mechanism of youngchildren.

In a 2014 study, Ms. Gopnik and her col-leagues found that 4- and 5-year-olds werebetter than adults at recognizing when anevent depended on multiple, related causesrather than a direct line of causation. Pre-schoolers were more open to evaluating all

evidence, even that with unlikely or unusualconnections, while adults tended to fall backon their established modes of reasoning.

That’s the kind of insight required to under-stand how the interplay of high blood pressureand genetics can lead to a heart attack—orhow an early strength in critical thinkingcould combine with access to strong content inmiddle school to make a student more likely tograduate from high school.

Programs in Focus

At the same time, researchers and educatorsare starting to take a more-nuanced look at

how early-childhood programs should work.“What we’re seeing is like a tsunami of

research on the science of learning at earlyages,” said Kathy Hirsh-Pasek, a distin-guished faculty fellow in psychology at TempleUniversity in Philadelphia. “Instead of saying,‘Oh gosh, kids are behind by age 3 or 4,’ weknow what curricular pieces are missing andwhat we need to focus on.”

Those in the field have more than a half-century of programmatic research to draw on.Federal Head Start and Early Head Start pro-grams improved the health of children in pov-erty, but results have varied from site to site.

Small-scale, but highly intensive, programslike the Abecedarian preschool study and the

Perry Preschool Project in Michigan haveshown significant improvement in academicsand quality of life over decades, but have beenharder to replicate in larger populations. Anda host of state, local, and private preschoolprograms have shown varying effects.

Critics have pointed out that many pro-

grams, even highly intensive ones, showfading effects as students grow up. In part,that may be because the range of “normal” iswider in earlier grades, Mr. Ramey said. Some4-year-old preschoolers may act more like7-year-olds, while others may appear closerto 2, depending on their background, devel-opmental trajectory, and how much exposurethey have had to academic settings. But thesedifferences often smooth out as students age.

Moreover, “preschool is not a vaccination,”said Barbara T. Bowman, a professor in childdevelopment and a co-founder of the Erik-son Institute, a graduate school in Chicago

specializing in early-childhood-developmentstudies and named for the developmental psy-chologist, Erik Erikson. “If you don’t have a

very good kindergarten program, by 1st gradeyou’ve lost your benefit. Unless they are build-ing on that prior learning, why would they beany smarter? Preschool builds a foundation,but you have to keep teaching them.”

Tomoko Wakabayashi, the current direc-tor of the Ypsilanti, Mich.-based center thatlaunched the landmark Perry PreschoolProject, a study of an intensive early-childeducation program, argued that research onpreschool and early-childhood education musttake the long view—as the Perry Project did—

because many of the benefits in executivefunction and other noncognitive skills don’tstart to show up until much later in life.

“Some of the effects that came out, younever would have found them in preschool,”said Ms. Wakabayashi, who directs for EarlyEducation Evaluation at the HighScopeEducational Research Foundation. “If Perryhadn’t followed students for so long, a lot ofthe discussion around preschool would havebeen different; there would have been just afade out of IQ [benefits], and that would havebeen it.” Yet David J. Armor, a professor emeritus

Published January 8, 2015, in Education Week

Striking a Balance on Early Rigor Research shows young children have a great capacity for deep

learning; the challenge comes in crafting nuanced programs

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in policy and government affairs at GeorgeMason University in Fairfax, Va., arguedin a recent critique of preschool studies forthe Washington-based Cato Institute thatresearchers and policymakers may be tooquick to generalize findings from the prior

programs.“It’s a really complex behavioral model thatsays you see fade-out in the present but [ben-

efit] shows up in the future,” Mr. Armor said.“Before we extend this to universal preschool,we need to find out what is going on.”

Universal or Targeted?

That’s tough to do, because modern pre-school policy is both spurred by and pulledbetween the twin concerns of anxious mid-

dle- and upper-class parents trying to findthe “best” academic foundation for theirchildren—often enrolling them in programsdesigned for highly at-risk children—anddisadvantaged parents often unable to accesspreschools at all.

“The vast majority of our research has oc-curred in children with extremely low-re-source homes; very often, we’re taking infor-

MILESTONE STUDIES RESONATE DECADES LATER

Researchers are gaining new insights into how children learn, but they build on a rich history of studies of preschool programs in

the past 50 years. From tiny, highly intensive projects to those with a national scope, the studies—some of them still ongoing after

decades—continue to shape the debate around preschool today.

The Abecedarian Project

BASICS:The University of North Carolina atChapel Hill randomly assigned four cohortsof poor and minority infants, born between

1972 and 1977, to either a control group oran intensive educational program for infancythrough age 5. Those taking part in the

program had individual activities and gamesthroughout the day focused on social-emotional,general cognitive, and language development.

Participants were found to have both higher testscores and better reading and mathematicsperformance throughout their school years.

CRITIQUES: The intervention is highly intensive

and continuous from as early as 4 monthsold up to kindergarten, unlike most preschoolprograms.

LEGACY: Follow-up studies were conducted whenthe students were ages 12, 15, and 21, andthe former participants continued to outpacethose who did not take part: They are likelier

to have gone to college and to have had theirfirst child at an older age. Also, the mothers ofparticipants completed more education and had

better employment than those whose childrendid not participate.

Head Start Impact StudyBASICS: Head Start, the national preschoolprogram, was launched in 1965 as part

of the War on Poverty initiatives. An earlystudy in the 1960s found early school gains

that faded by 3rd grade. A congressionallymandated follow-up was conducted in the2000s. Researchers assigned a nationally

representative sample of 2,559 low-income3-year-olds and 2,108 low-income 4-year-olds,in two newly entering cohorts, to either a control

group or one of nearly 400 randomly selectedcenters in 23 states that were oversubscribed

and had waiting lists. The children were

followed through 3rd grade. Head Start pupils

gained about two months of additional learningduring their time in the program, particularly invocabulary skills, and they were more likely tohave better relationships with their parents and

more health care by the end of kindergarten.However, benefits faded by 3rd grade.

CRITIQUES: Nearly 60 percent of the control-group pupils ultimately took part in some sort of

early-childhood education program, and someof the participating children did not complete

a full year of Head Start. There was also widevariation in effects from site to site.

LEGACY: Head Start still serves about a millionchildren up to age 5 and their families, at a

budget of about $8.6 billion as of fiscal 2014.

The findings of the impact study, released in2010 and 2011, are being used in debates

about funding and program reauthorization.

HighScope Perry Preschool

Project

BASICS:From 1962 to 1967, researchersidentified 123 3- and 4-year-olds who were both

poor and at high risk of failing academicallyin the Ypsilanti, Mich., district. The youngsters

were randomly assigned to either a controlgroup or a program of two years of intensiveeducation activities in small classes, plusweekly parent-education sessions in the

children’s homes. By age 10, participantswere less likely to have been retained in theirgrade or identified for special education, and

by age 15, they showed significantly higherachievement-test scores.

CRITIQUES: There were two parents in theoriginal program group who were switched tothe control group, as well as a few programdropouts, though the authors argued these

were not significant. The program’s two-yearcurriculum and parent-involvement requirement

are considered more intensive than manypreschool programs’.

LEGACY: In the most recent follow-up study,when the children were age 40, formerparticipants were roughly 20 percentage points

more likely to have graduated from high schooland be earning at least $20,000 per year, andless likely to have been arrested five times by

age 40.

Voluntary Pre-K for Tennessee

Initiative

BASICS: The program began in 2005 to providepreschool, with licensed teachers instructing

at least 5½ hours per day, five days a week.Enrollment priority is given to youngsters

in poverty, English-language learners, andchildren with disabilities. Researchers randomlyassigned 3,000 pupils to preschool or control

groups in 2009-10 and 2010-11, with 1,100 ofthem selected for more intensive study. By thestart of kindergarten, children in the preschool

program had gained 2½ months more learning,particularly in language, than peers in thecontrol group. Those benefits faded by the end

of 1st grade, however.

CRITIQUES: Pupils in the control group hadsignificantly lower participation rates in thestudy than those attending the preschool. That

required researchers to statistically creatematched groups of students who participated in

the program and those who did not.

LEGACY: As of the 2013-14 school year,Tennessee school districts are serving morethan 18,000 4-year-olds in nearly 1,000classrooms through the program, with a budget

of more than $85 million.




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mation from studying an extremely high-risk, vulnerable group and trying to apply it to allchildren,” said Sharon Landesman Ramey, apsychology professor at Virginia Tech Car-ilion. “But there’s no evidence that childrenfrom upper-middle-class families and beyond

have need of public pre-K.”In fact, an analysis of Head Start data fromOctober found that about a third of the dif-ferences other studies have seen in the ef-fectiveness of different sites is accounted forby differences in the format and audienceof the centers. Full-day programs improvedchildren’s cognitive skills most, and programswith home visits were most effective at boost-ing social-emotional learning. Moreover, chil-dren with less-educated mothers got the mostbenefit from the centers. A separate study by the National Center

for Research in Early Childhood Education atthe University of Virginia, in Charlottesville,

published in the journal Early Child Devel-opment and Care, found preschool programsuniversally available had, as one would ex-pect, more middle- and upper-income andwhite children than did programs that tar-geted children in poverty. Universal programstended to run for longer hours and haveteachers with more education, but teachersin targeted programs rated higher on teacher-student interactions and classroom climate.

More recently, a study of Tools of the Mind,a preschool and kindergarten curriculumdesigned to improve executive functions likeattention and reasoning, showed better ef-

fects for pupils in high-poverty schools thanin wealthier schools.“The concern is, there will develop a pre-

school inequality: The middle- and upper-class kids are going to Montessori and Wal-dorf preschools, … but for poor kids, we justhave to get them reading and writing to getthem through school,” Ms. Gopnik said. “Thatwould be a terrible waste.”

Chasing Trends

Moreover, early-education researchers re-peatedly voice concern that both ends of thesocioeconomic spectrum would end up poorly

served by making preschool more “formally”academic.

“I’ve been in some classrooms that makeme want to pull my hair out, because the4-year-old program looks like a bad, dumbed-down 3rd grade program,” Mr. Ramey said. “Ifyou walk into any program and don’t see kidslaughing and deeply engaged, you are lookingat a bad program.”

Neuroscience and cognitive researchersmay be partially to blame for encouragingeducators and parents to “run after and dothe next best thing,” and apply it too broadly,said Nathan A. Fox, a distinguished professor

and interim chairman of human developmentand quantitative methodology at the Univer-sity of Maryland, College Park.

Take a hot K-12 focus like inhibitory con-trol, for instance. The classic Stanford Uni-

versity “Marshmallow Study,” in which young

children tried to delay gratification in orderto get more treats, showed later benefits forstudents who were best able to resist temp-tation. But it also showed that the ability towait develops naturally with age, and that5-year-olds are better able to hold off for anextra marshmallow than 4-year-olds.

Trying to push that skill earlier has trade-

offs, argued Yuko Munakata, a psychologyprofessor specializing in developmentalcognitive neuroscience at the University ofColorado at Boulder. “Just because we canimprove inhibitory control and executivefunction doesn’t mean we always want to,”she said at the International Mind, Brain,

and Education Society meeting in Fort Worth,Texas, in November.

Brain-imaging studies by Ms. Munakatahave found 8-year-olds’ brain activity forimpulse control looks “pretty similar to anadult’s,” but “3½-year-olds’ [brain activity]seems nothing like adults. They show noplanning; they react in the moment.”

Pushing 3- and 4-year-olds to think morelike adults may “impair statistical bottom-uplearning, like that used to learn language andsocial conventions,” Ms. Munakata said—re-moving the mental flexibility preschoolersshowed in Ms. Gopnik’s study on causal ef-

fects.“The problem is, there’s a misinterpreta-tion: When scientists say, ‘Children are learn-ing a lot more than we thought,’ people thinkthat looks like what people do in schools,” Ms.Gopnik said. “The message that children arelearning and [that] this is a really criticalstage has gotten through. But people are mis-interpreting it to mean that children shouldbe in scholastic settings earlier and earlier.”

Just as they changed how they viewedyoung children’s ability to learn, Ms. Hirsh-Pasek said researchers and educators maybenefit from changing how they view thegoal of early education, from closing poten-

tial achievement gaps to building students’intrinsic skills and motivation to learn.

“What we’ve been doing is teaching kidshow to build the tower,” she said, “but we arenot giving them the context to explore the ...things they can do with the blocks.”

By Ellen Wexler

A ccording to Wesleyan UniversityPresident Michael Roth, thefirst thing inquisitive studentsdo when they read a new text

is point out exactly what’s wrong with it.The reason for this, Roth argues in a

New York Times commentary, is that in

a classroom setting, intelligence is becom-ing equated with debunking, unmasking,and exposing. If you’re a good student, youcan argue why the authors you read arewrong—but that isn’t necessarily the bestway to learn.

Roth says that when students feel theneed to find flaws in every text they study,they lose the ability to use those texts tocreate meaning and find inspiration. Stu-dents are rewarded for their cynicism inclassrooms, but that cynicism will harmtheir ability to engage with compellingideas throughout their lives.

“As debunkers,” Roth writes, “they con-tribute to a cultural climate that has littletolerance for finding or making meaning—a culture whose intellectuals and culturalcommentators get ‘liked’ by showing thatsomebody else just can’t be believed.”

Throughout the piece, Roth labels thisfocus on poking holes in arguments as“critical thinking”—a term that is beingincreasingly emphasized in K-12 educa-tion. If teachers place too much emphasison critical thinking, Roth argues, studentswill become immune to texts that mightotherwise challenge their beliefs about theworld:

“Hard-nosed critical thinking is a use-ful tool, but it also may become a defenseagainst the risky insight that absorptioncan offer. As students and as teachers wesometimes crave that protection; without itwe risk changing who we are. We risk see-

ing a different way of living not as some-thing alien, but as a possibility we mightbe able to explore, and even embrace.”

About a week after Roth’s piece ran inThe New York Times, Noah Berlatsky, acorrespondent for The Atlantic, publisheda response critiquing Roth’s position oncriticism.

Published May 30, 2014,in Education Week Teacher’sTeaching Now Blog

Can Critical

Thinking BeToo Critical?




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T hree sweeping reports have taken

the temperature of the so-called“deeper learning” movement and

given the approach a fairly clean bill

of health in a set of American high schools.

On average, students at deeper learning

schools had better test results and people

skills, the studies found. They were also

more likely to graduate from high school on

time and enroll in four-year colleges.

The American Institutes for Research, or

AIR, a Washington-based research organi-

zation, released the reports last week. The

researchers studied 20 schools, mostly in

California and New York, that belonged to

10 different networks that focused on deeperlearning, and compared them with a similar

set of 13 non-network high schools. The Wil-

liam and Flora Hewlett Foundation, which

funded the reports and some of the learning

networks that were studied, defines deeper

learning as education that emphasizes core

academic content, critical thinking, problem

solving, collaboration, effective communica-

tion, self-directed learning, and an academic

mindset. (The Hewlett Foundation also sup-

ports coverage of deeper learning in Educa-

tion Week.)

After accounting for demographics and

prior achievement, researchers found that

the advantage to students of attending a

deeper-learning school was equivalent to

moving from the 50th to the 54th or 55th

percentile in reading, mathematics, and

science, as measured by the Program for

International Student Assessment-Based

Test for Schools. Researchers gave the exam

to 11th and 12th graders in the spring of

2013. Deeper-learning schools had a simi-

larly sized advantage on state math exams.

In English/language arts, deeper-learning

schools attained a smaller advantage, equiv-

alent to moving from the 50th to the 52nd

percentile.

Nonacademic Skills

Survey results from the study suggested

that students who attended deeper-learning

schools were more academically motivated

and engaged than the comparison group of

students. They also had better collaboration

skills. The two groups were similar, however,

when it came to creative thinking, persever-

ance, and other personal traits emphasized

by deeper learning.

At 65 percent, the on-time graduation rate

for students in the deeper-learning schools

was 9 percentage points higher than at

comparison schools. Both groups enrolled in

college at similar rates, though the students

in the deeper-learning schools were more

likely to choose four-year and more-selective

schools.

The study students are less than four

years out of high school, so it’s too soon to

estimate the rate at which they attained

bachelor’s degrees, a key outcome for the

approach, which emphasizes life after high

school.

“This is about preparing young people for

college and career, both objectives, not just

one or the other,” said Gary Hoachlander, the

president of ConnectEd: The California Cen-

ter for College and Career, a Berkeley-based

network that took part in the study.

For example, William Kested was a sopho-

more two years ago at Tech Valley High

School in Albany, N.Y., which is a member of

the Napa, Calif.-based New Tech Network.

Interested in a career in medicine, he spent

time shadowing a physician at a hospital

near his school.

“I learned that I didn’t want to be a phy-

sician,” he said. “It would have been really

awkward if I went through my school and

got to residency and then figured out that

Research Shows

Benefits of ‘DeeperLearning’ Approach

By Holly Yettick & Kara Brounstein

Students did better in and out of class

Published October 1, 2014, in Education Week“So here I am doing that thing that Roth

doesn’t want me to do,” Berlatsky writes. “I amnot taking his writing as an opportunity for in-spiration. Instead I am finding in it material toobject to. Mea culpa.” According to Berlatsky, it’s impossible to de-

cide which texts are beyond critique. For in-stance, it makes little sense to examine politi-cal writings without examining their flaws, too:“Should we open ourselves and be absorbed andinspired by Birth of a Nation? By Mein Kampf ?”he asks. “What about the speeches of George W.Bush or Bill Clinton?”

Berlatsky argues that there is no differencebetween ordinary thinking and what Roth de-fines as critical thinking. When you form anopinion about a piece of art, how can that opin-ion be unrelated to your critical evaluation ofthat art?

“If I love Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet,”Berlatsky writes, “how is that love separable

from my evaluation of his use of language, hissubtlety of characterization, or his criticism ofthe protagonists’ families?” According to Roth, overly-critical students

will devalue the arguments of the authors thatthey study. Berlatsky counters students study

those authors for a reason—their argumentsare the best of the best. They can withstandstudent criticism.

“The truth is, Emerson doesn’t need help,”Berlatsky writes. “James Baldwin doesn’t needprotection from students. Away with this trem-bling art. Give me art that gets stronger whenyou fight it, not weaker. Give me the art that’s

left after the hammer comes down.”




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I hated everything.” He now hopes to studybusiness management in China.

Shadowing and internships were more com-

mon at deeper-learning schools, according tothe AIR study, as were project-based learning,group work, opportunities to develop intrap-

ersonal skills, and longer-term cumulative as-sessments, such as portfolios.

Multi-Faceted Evaluation

The study relied on a variety of social sci-ence research techniques, including inter- views, focus groups, surveys, and exams. Allthe schools enrolled high percentages of mi-norities (80 percent, on average) and studentsfrom low-income families (60 percent).

But the school networks were otherwise very different. For instance, ConnectEDworks to implement career pathways, whilethe Internationals Network for Public Schools

focuses on recent immigrants.James W. Pellegrino, a professor of psychol-

ogy and education at the University of Illinoisat Chicago, was not directly involved with theresearch but is familiar with deeper-learningapproaches and the AIR studies.

“This is both a challenging and rigorous at-tempt at conducting research on what’s hap-pening at some of the Hewlett deeper-learningnetwork schools,” he said. A more critical assessment came from Tom

Loveless, a senior fellow at the Brookings In-stitution, a Washington think tank, who hassuggested that deeper-learning approaches

downplay the importance of content knowl-edge. He said the deeper-learning schoolsmight have differed from the comparisonschools in important but unaccounted-forways. For instance, average enrollment at thedeeper-learning schools was 398 versus 1,350at the comparison schools.

“In a school of 398, I would expect the stu-dents to be closer to the teachers,” Mr. Lovelesssaid. Despite such advantages, he said, thetest-score differences between the two schoolgroups “aren’t huge.”

Mr. Pellegrino said, however, that the re-searchers appeared to have identified “realdifferences” between the practices and ap-

proaches of deeper-learning schools and com-parison schools, despite the challenges of cre-ating a comparable control group.

But, he added, “it’s not a set of findings thatsay let’s run out and emulate what theseschools are doing, because the schools are notall doing the same thing.”

He also said that, although the studentsin deeper-learning schools were doing betterthan their comparison peers, their achieve-ment levels were still lower than “what wemight hope ... with respect to their likelihoodfor future academic and adult success.”

I n my last few years of teaching high

school English, I developed a senior

elective called “The Art of Memoir,” for

which students read such authors as

Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Ernest Heming-

way, Richard Wright, and Mary Karr. Thestudents wrote essays evaluating and com-

paring and contrasting the works; they also

wrote short memoirs of their own that we

workshopped in class.

Because this was a new course, I designed

the curriculum, created the rubrics and as-

sessments, and came up with the “big” ques-

tions I wanted students to consider, such as,

“Does the reading public’s fascination with

memoir suggest a healthy interest in other

people, or does it too often indicate a voy-

euristic urge to look through the debris of

broken lives?” I also sought out colleagues

for advice on choosing texts and dealingwith the problems such a new endeavor

would inevitably encounter.

In essence, the thinking and problem-

solving I took on were akin to the kinds of

things the Common Core State Standards

now ask students to do in the 46 states that

have adopted the standards for English/

language arts: to analyze complex texts, to

weigh evidence, to make clear and effective

arguments, and to work with others with

very different views.

In short, I had to think my way through

this new course every day, exactly as stu-

dents are supposed to do in courses alignedwith the demands of what many call the

common core’s “thinking curriculum.”

This point is important because too much

of the discussion about the common core

has focused on what students are going to

have to do—and not enough on the fact that

the standards can succeed only if teachers

become the critical thinkers we now expect

students to become. There is no other way.

Teachers cannot push students to think

more deeply unless they do so themselves.

All great coaches have to have played the

game, and the teacher is first and foremost

the students’ coach.

This represents a huge shift for teach-

ers because, in the United States, the

public has often perceived teachers—and

the education schools that have prepared

them—not as thinkers, but as taskmasters

who force-feed “content” to students whohave to be kept in line. The goal has long

been coverage—to go at supersonic speed

over everything from the Roman Empire to

thermodynamics—without ever having to

stop to explore anything in depth. In short,

teachers have often been asked to focus on

the lowest rung on the Bloom’s taxonomy

pyramid: remembering.

This is beginning to change, especially

within the teaching profession itself. An

increasing number of education schools are

now emphasizing higher-order thinking

skills, and many teachers rightly chafe at

being seen primarily as purveyors of basicskills and information. Nevertheless, the

historical tendency to dumb down teaching

remains largely in force. This can be seen

in some of the highly scripted common-

core materials popping up in curricula and

teacher-development materials.

One website marketing common-core

products, for instance, writes of a “suite of

solutions [that] takes the guesswork out of

the common core so you can ensure ... all

teachers consistently provide students with

successful learning opportunities.” Another

company advertises its common-core prod-

uct as taking teachers from “Zero to Mas-tery in as Little as One Year.” Yet another

consulting company actually calls its pro-

gram “Common Core Made Easy.”

“Easy,” as it turns out, is a favorite word

in common-core marketing. But it’s an illu-

sion. It can never be easy, for teachers and

students alike, to analyze texts such as the

Federalist Papers, or to understand the

causes of World War I, or to use effectively

any of the intellectual skills the common

core now charges students with mastering.

And it’s not easy to assess students on the

Teachers asCritical Thinkers

By David Ruenzel

Published March 26, 2014, in Education Week

COMMENTARY




8/15

Of much importance is the culture that is

created in today’s classrooms. What teachersay and do can foster and find significance in

tudent thinking. Students learn what deep

hinking looks like by the actions teachers take.

Classroom cultures that support and promote

hinking are essential to student success.

by Sandra L. Love, Ed

Best practices of teaching and learning reveal that teachermodeling and the Think-Aloud strategy should be present

n classrooms if the end result is to develop student

understanding. These two strategies are prevalent in thoughtful

classrooms. When teachers place their thinking on display,

students can observe what quality thinking looks l ike. Telling

students the traits and dispositions needed for effective thinking

helps, but making thinking visible and authentic creates a real

mpact on learning.

What does a thinking culture look like? What can teachers

do or say to take an active role and promote dispositions thatstudents also need to exhibit?

Ask questions and use language to show curiosity.

Did you notice how ___ ? / I found a book that ___. Read this. /

Watch this video clip. You won’t believe what you see!

Model open-mindedness and willingness to listen toperspectives.

Let’s look more closely at ___. I was thinking ___, but now I am

not sure. / Good thinking, Amy! That information is interesting.

/ Mike, you said ___. Can you tell me what led you to say that?/ What does your point of view ignore? / Is my view the only

reasonable one?

Model how to clarify and seek deeper meaning.So are you saying ___? / Is this what you mean?/ Give me an

example of ___. / What is another way to say ___? / What are

he implications of ___? / Why is ___ important?

Model reflective thinking.What is likely to happen if we ___? / After the discussion we

had, I now wonder ___. / I learned ___ from researching, bu

am still confused about ___. / So help me understand. Wher

the evidence that leads you to reach that conclusion? / Does

interpretation make sense?

Model healthy skepticism.

Listen to this. It says ___. Can that be true? How will we find

out? I think if I check other sources, then I can be sure. / Jim

you said you heard ___ on a documentary last night. That se

unbelievable, doesn’t it? What if we gather additional informato verify what you heard? / What is the other side of this story

What is the logic of this ___? / Does this seem right to you?

Taking time to actively l isten to students and respond in

meaningful ways is crucial. Thinking out loud and sharing

individual thoughts also incorporate authentic experiences. M

(2008) recommends teachers place their thinking on display,

purposeful language, and make thinking visible to all. Building

classroom focused on thinking and understanding helps moti

students to become intellectually independent.

Miller, D. (2008). Teaching with intention. Portland, ME: Stenhouse.

Ritchhart, R. (2002). Intellectual character: What it is, why it matters, and how t

get it. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

mentoringminds.com

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Because the standards expect that students are prepared to be critical thinkers and

problem solvers, educators must plan engaging lessons that emphasize higher-order

thinking so that students naturally and seamlessly apply these skills. A few strategies

suggested for developing these thinking skills.

• What-If Thinking can lead to deeper thinking. Discuss what if an event happened

differently or had never occurred, then that would cause other changes. Allowing studen

to speculate about what they had previously learned helps them construct logical

alternatives. As students research and answer what-if questions, they will choose one

thing that would change and explore the resulting consequences that might exist in todworld. Incorporating what-if activities into topics across various content areas creates a

awareness needed for innovative thinking and future success.

• Question Asking is a skill that is often over looked. Teaching the difference in literal

and interpretive questions helps students learn to ask questions that probe deeper. Lead

students to see that literal questions are those with answers readily available. The answ

are right there, such as in the text, whereas interpretive questions are those they must

think about. As students practice designing and asking interpretive questions, they will g

the skill and see the value as it relates to their lives. After students know the difference

between the two types of questions, ask: “Is it is important to ask interpretive questions

Why?” Numerous and varied activities using read-alouds, video clips, art, and quotation

associated with the content taught can provide the basis for interpretive and literal

questions. This activity can jumpstart a search for other strategies that teach students h

to develop thoughtful question-asking skills.

• Reflection can help students process their learning and develop thinking skills. Use

questions that guide students to review and self-assess: What caused difficulty? What w

confusing? What do you still not understand? What did you do that helped you develop

meaning? / Invite students to journal how to apply the learning to their lives. / Provide

prompts for summarizing: What are two key ideas you learned and why are they import

Use words and pictures to represent what you learned.

Higher-order

thinking skills are

required of students

as they transfer or

apply knowledge to

newly encountered

situations and

problems. Students

who learn to thinkcritically can make

nformed decisions,

reach reasonable

solutions, analyze

and evaluate

evidence, andmuch more.

mentoringminds.com

Developing Higher-Orde

Thinking by Sandra L. Love, Ed.D.

https://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-storyhttps://www.mentoringminds.com/total-motivation-story


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mentoringminds.com

Critical thinking. Creativity. Collaboration. Communication.

How can educators integrate these 21st century skills inclassrooms? An authority in the field of thinking, Edward de

Bono, authored a self-help book titled Six Thinking Hats. This

hat concept serves as a unique strategy for administrators

o use when leading teachers to solve problematic situations

or issues. In turn, teachers can model this strategy in their

classrooms to enable all students to utilize this valuable tool

when engaging in whole- and small-group discussions about

he real world.

The color of the hat signals the type thinking required by the

students before speaking. A poster representing the six colors

of hats or an actual hat arrangement may be displayed in theclassroom with descriptions that explain the thinking required

when a particular hat is called upon to ‘speak.’

• White Hat – information, facts

• Red Hat – emotions, feelings

• Yellow Hat – benefits, advantages, pluses

• Black Hat – critical viewpoints, disadvantages, minuses

• Green Hat – new ideas, creativity, innovation

• Blue Hat – overview, summarization, process organizer

During a discussion, the six hats may be repeatedly used in

any sequence. White Hat thinkers present objective facts orhe information they know about the topic; Red Hat thinkers

share their emotions and feelings about the topic; Yellow Hat

hinkers are optimistic and share positive or good points;

Black Hat thinkers tell why an idea might not work or what

obstacles might arise; Green Hat thinkers generate solutions,

possibilities, or creative ideas; Blue Hat thinkers are active

steners and move the discussion forward. The (teacher or)

acilitator from the blue group may ask certain thinking hats to

contribute again, before the Blue Hat thinkers summarize what

has been shared by each of the groups and form a conclusion.

The hat strategy maintains productivity during a discussionwhile also serving as a classroom management tool to

prevent students from venturing off topic. Discussion topics

or issues might relate to content areas of study, or are relevant

o today’s world inside and outside the classroom. An example

might be: Should students be allowed to bring cell phones

o school?

• All students may participate in either a whole-group or

small-group discussion about the topic, communicatingonly the thoughts associated with the designated thinkin

hat. The teacher may call for the thinking (e.g., Let’s beg

our discussion with White Hat thinking. I want to hear yo

Red Hat thoughts, but this is not the appropriate time. N

I would like to hear Yellow Hat thinking.) Once students

understand the thinking process, a Blue Hat thinker may

facilitate discussions.

• A second option requires students to be divided into six

groups, with each group assigned a different color of the

six thinking hats. After the teacher selects a topic, each

group will collaborate using the assigned hat to focus ththoughts. Then, each group member shares an individua

perspective or the group’s designee may present the

collective ideas that emerge from the discussion. The B

Hat thinkers offer an overview, orchestrate the thinking

process, and conclude the discussion.

de Bono, Edward. (1985). Six thinking hats. Boston, MA: Little, Browand Company.

Critical thinking. Creativity. Collaboration

Communication. How can educators integr

these 21st century skills in classrooms?by Sandra L. Love, Ed.D.

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common core, either—especially with a newwave of the same old fill-in-the-bubble tests.The common core requires, or should require,

that teachers do the hard work of assessingreal work by students—their writing, theirlabs, their presentations—that showcases

what the standards are really about.The proponents of the common core like totalk about how the standards set out a new vi-sion of learning for students. And this is true;it will no longer be enough for youngsters tomemorize information or rely on formulas.But if the common core is to succeed, it mustset out a new vision for teachers, too—one thathelps them practice the kind of deep-thinkingskills they will now be required to preach.

David Ruenzel is a freelance writer who reports on

education for several organizations, although the

opinions expressed in this essay are his alone. He

is a former contributing editor for Education Week

and senior writer for Teacher Magazine. He taught English at several high schools, most recently from

2001 to 2012 in the San Francisco Bay Area. He is

on Twitter @druenzel. T

hough the arts receive relatively

little attention from policymakers

and school leaders, exposing young

people to art and culture can havea big impact on their development. The

problem is that almost no one is bothering

to study and document the extent to which

the arts and culture can affect students.

Instead, policymakers, researchers, and

schools are typically focused on what is

regularly and easily measured: math and

reading achievement. This leads defenders

of the arts to attempt to connect the arts

to improved math and reading scores—a

claim for which there is almost no rigor-

ous evidence. Other arts advocates believe

that the benefits cannot and need not be

measured.But the important effects of art and

cultural experiences on students can be

rigorously measured. In fact, we recently

conducted two studies that used random-

assignment research designs to iden-

tify causal effects of exposure to the arts

through museum and theater attendance.

In the museum study, we held a lottery with

nearly 11,000 students from 123 Arkansas,

Missouri, and Oklahoma schools, roughly

half of whom were assigned to visit Crys-

tal Bridges of American Art in Bentonville,

Ark., while the other half served as the

control group. In the live-theater study, weconducted a lottery to offer free tickets to

roughly half of the 700 Arkansas students

applying to see “Hamlet” or “A Christmas

Carol” at a professional theater in Fayette-

ville.

By comparing outcomes for students who

had these art experiences—by chance—

with the outcomes of those who did not, we

can identify with confidence what the arts

do for young people. The approach we took,

which is typical in medical research, creates

treatment and control groups that are, on

average, identical in their backgrounds and

prior interests, with only chance determin-

ing the distinction between the two groups.

Therefore, any subsequent differences we

observed in the students were caused by

touring an art museum or seeing live the-

ater, not a result of pre-existing differences

among them.We were also careful to focus on outcomes

that could plausibly be altered by the arts.

We didn’t look at math- and reading-test

scores because we have no reason to ex-

pect that arts experiences would have an

impact on them. Lois Hetland and Ellen

Winner, who are affiliated with the educa-

tion research group Project Zero at Harvard

University, have conducted systematic re-

views of the research literature and found

little credible evidence that the benefits of

the arts transfer to other academic subjects.

We should no more expect the arts to boost

math scores than expect math to enhanceappreciation for the arts.

Instead, we looked at whether exposure

to the arts affected students’ knowledge

of the arts and altered their desire to con-

sume the arts in the future. We also looked

at whether art experiences had an effect on

student values, such as tolerance and empa-

thy. Finally, we looked at whether students’

ability to engage in critical thinking about

the arts was affected by these experiences.

The results across our two experiments

were remarkably consistent: These cultural

experiences improve students’ knowledge

about the arts, as well as their desire tobecome cultural consumers in the future.

Exposure to the arts also affects the values

of young people, making them more toler-

ant and empathetic. We suspect that their

awareness of different people, places, and

ideas through the arts helps them appreci-

ate and accept the differences they find in

the broader world. Arts experiences boost

critical thinking, teaching students to take

the time to be more careful and thorough in

how they observe the world. Noticing details

in paintings during a school tour, for exam-

Art Matters: We Know,We Measured ItBy Jay P. Greene, Brian Kisida,

Cari A. Bogulski, Anne Kraybill,

Collin Hitt, & Daniel H. Bowen

Published December 3, 2014, in Education Week

COMMENTARY




12/15


By Karen Cator

D

eeper learning is an umbrellaterm for the skills, understand-ings, and mindsets studentsmust possess to succeed in

today’s careers and civic life. They musttackle challenging interpersonal issues ofcross-cultural understanding and conflictresolution, and the urgent global issuesof our time, such as availability of cleanwater and nutritious and affordable food,poverty, and climate change. Increasingly,schools are taking a lead role in support-ing students as they develop the criticaldeeper learning skills to address thesechallenges.

Classroom teachers with expertise indeeper learning skills can more success-fully orchestrate these experiences for

their students. To support teachers in developing their expertise, Digital Promiseis building a system of micro-credentialsbased on deeper learning skills to iden-tify and recognize teacher competencies.Micro-credentials are much more focusedand granular than diplomas, degrees orcertificates. As such, they are more flex-ible, and support educators with many op-tions for both formal and informal learningthroughout their careers.

While teacher competence in deeperlearning is important, it is also essentialfor education leaders at all levels to un-derstand, articulate and model deeper

learning skills. Leaders who operate froma deeper learning mindset can support acoherent culture of inquiry and risk-takingin schools, essential for continuous andtransformative improvements. For eachof the six areas of deeper learning below,we identify ways education leaders can de-

velop their skills.

1. Master core content. Education leadershipis its own domain, and learning the coreprocesses, procedures, history, and lan-guage is critical as a basis for groundinganalysis and decision-making in a local

context. Much of this is learned throughformal classes, as well as through reading, discussion and reflection.

2. Think critically and solve complex problemsLeaders face a constantly changing land

scape, political pressures, and daily challenging situations. They must be able todraw on tested methods and processesfor analyzing a complex question, problem, or issue, identify its relevant partsor dimensions, and consider possibleapproaches. They must recognize factsevaluate the reliability and validity onew information, analyze evidence, andincorporate ideas from multiple sourcesand perspectives. And, they must de velop skills to change course when aplanned approach is not working. Thikind of critical thinking is a skill that

can be theoretically learned in formaenvironments, but the ability to apply idevelops over a lifetime of trial and reflection. Many effective leaders have amentor to walk through situations with

them, providing guidance and perspective.

3. Work collaboratively. Leaders must buildtheir trusted teams and develop sharedleadership throughout the organizationincluding teachers and students. Thismeans setting and reviewing goals, sharing information, listening, developing aculture of “yes, and,” and encouraging

questions in order to work productivelytowards goals. Although conflict resolution skills and other skills of collaboration can be learned in a formal environment, the application of those skills aswell as the benefits are learned on the

job - every day.

4. Communicate effectively. Of course, communication goes a long way towardsstaving off conflict and developingshared understanding. But leaders musbe able to identify varied audiences andcreate clear, accessible, and useful mes

Published April 27, 2015, in Education Week’s Vander Ark on Innovation Blog

Six Categories ofDeeper Learning Skillsfor Education Leaders

COMMENTARY

ple, helps train students to consider details inthe future.

These improved outcomes may not boostscores on math and reading tests, but mostparents, communities, and educators careabout them. We don’t just want our students

to learn vocationally useful skills in math andreading. We also want them to be knowledge-able and frequent patrons of the arts. We wantthem to be tolerant and empathetic humanbeings. And we want them to be astute observ-ers of their surroundings. Some of these quali-ties may help students earn a living, but theirimportance has more to do with students’ de-

velopment into cultured and humane people.Our experiments suggest that rigorous

study can document the additional effectsof the arts on students, including the edu-cational benefits of poetry, literature, music,film, and dance. Future studies could alsoconsider other possible outcomes. Perhaps the

arts encourage students to be more engagedin school, improve graduation rates, and in-crease college attendance, all of which tend tocontribute to happiness and productivity.

None of this research will occur, however,until defenders of the arts recognize theneed for it. Arts advocates can no longer relyon weak studies that simply compare stu-dents who participate in the arts with thosewho don’t. Such studies are pervasive, andthe claims they make are likely overblown.Skeptics can correctly wonder whether theresearch truly demonstrates that the artsmake people awesome, or if awesome people

are simply attracted to the arts. To convinceskeptics of how the arts can influence a stu-dent’s trajectory, future studies will have toadopt rigorous research designs that can iso-late causal effects. Art collectors are bidding up prices, and

enormous fortunes are devoted to acquiringand displaying art. It makes little sense forarts patrons to spend a fortune acquiring andcommissioning masterpieces, while failingto demonstrate the benefits of the arts withquality research. To determine whether thereare important social benefits derived from artsactivities, money should be invested in fund-ing rigorous research, which can be expensive.

If the arts and culture are to remain a vi-brant part of children’s education, arts patronswill need to step forward to help pay for thekind of quality research that shows not onlywhat those benefits are, but just how signifi-cant they can be.

Jay P. Greene is a professor of education reform

at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville,

where Brian Kisida and Cari A. Bogulski are

research associates, and Anne Kraybill and Collin

Hitt are doctoral students. Daniel H. Bowen is

a postdoctoral fellow at the Kinder Institute for

Urban Research at Rice University in Houston.




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By Dion Burns and Linda Darling-Hammond

T he skills students need from school-ing today are dramatically differ-ent from those needed in the past. And while much is known about

these deeper learning skills, less is under-stood about how schools and teachers can

be supported to provide them. The Teachingand Learning International Survey (TALIS)study, released last year, provides some fruit-ful insights.

In 2003, research by David Autor, FrankLevy, and Richard Murnane showed the pre-cipitous decline in the demand for routine cog-nitive and manual skills in the modern work-place, matched only by the even greater risein the need for critical thinking and commu-nicative skills (see graph on next page). As isnow often said in the education policy world,children entering school today will graduateto work in jobs that don’t yet exist, using tech-

nologies that haven’t been invented, to solveproblems that we don’t yet even realize areproblems.

How we prepare students for the futureworkplace has led to the development of sev-eral educational frameworks that capturethese skills. They include the Partnership for21st Century Skills framework and the Inno-

vation Lab Network Framework for College,Career, and Citizenship Readiness. Theseframeworks tend to emphasize learning andinnovation skills, including the “4Cs” of criti-cal thinking, communication, collaboration,and creativity.

But deeper learning requires a shift not

just in what is taught, but how it is taught.Students need opportunities to work collab-oratively in groups on extended projects thatrequire them to plan and conduct inquiriesand to incorporate the use of information andcommunications technologies in projects andclass work.

So how can education systems help teach-ers engage in practices and behaviors thatpromote deeper learning? The Teaching andLearning International Study (TALIS) pro-

vides some clues. The study, conducted by theOrganisation for Economic Co-operation and

Development (OECD), surveyed over 100,000teachers and principals from 34 countries regarding their teaching and the conditions inwhich they work. The findings show that opportunities to share and learn from colleaguescan help create the conditions for the innova

tive and effective teaching that provides thedeeper learning today’s students need. Among

the key findings:

1) Although teachers generally agree with thegoals of deeper learning, instructional practices that foster these skills are relativelyrare: Across TALIS countries, more than94 percent of teachers agreed that theirrole was to facilitate students’ own inquiryand 84 percent agreed that thinking andreasoning processes were more importanthan specific curriculum content. Yet lessthan half of all teachers indicated they frequently used small group discussions intheir classes. These proportions were even

smaller for the use of information and communications technology in class work (37percent), and for extended projects of atleast a week in length (27 percent).

2) Collaborative teacher professional learningsupports instructional practices that promotedeeper learning for students: In many countries, teachers were more likely to incorporate these “active” teaching practices--thosethat require students to be more engaged inthe learning process--when they had participated in a teacher professional develop

ment network, individual or collaborativeresearch, or mentoring and peer observa

tion. This underscores the importance oongoing professional development that isgrounded in teachers’ day-to-day work inthe classroom and connected to school-widegoals.

3) Collaborative professional learning also fostersa positive school climate and ongoing teachelearning: TALIS shows that teachers weremore likely to use joint teaching, observeand give feedback on a colleague’s classand engage in joint activities across classeswhen they had participated in professiona

Published February 19, 2015, in Education Week’s Learning Deeply Blog

How to Teach for DeeperLearning? An InternationalSurvey Provides Insights

COMMENTARY

sages tailored for each one. And, sincecommunication is two-way, listening iscritical and garnering feedback from reli-

able sources by engaging with questions,critiques, counter arguments, and sugges-tions are skills to be honed.

5. Learn how to learn. Underpinning all ofthese skills is the motivation and abilityto embrace intellectual, creative, and per-sonal challenges that lead to growth andlearning. Setting personal goals and keep-ing track of progress, recognizing what youdon’t know, and understanding and find-ing support and feedback from others arethe hallmarks of a lifelong learner. Tak-ing risks and supporting others in takingrisks requires understanding the role ofmistakes, and even failure in supportingcontinuous improvement and learning.Reflection is a must.

6. Develop leadership habits of mind. All of theseskills contain aspects of the best habits forleading in the complicated, people-inten-sive endeavor that is public education. Thebest leaders are persistent and remaintrue to their core ethical values, even inthe face of challenges.

Education leaders embrace and modeldeeper learning skills and encourage ev-eryone within their organizations to do thesame because, deeper learning supports alifetime of learning!

This post is part of our “Preparing Leaders for

Deeper Learning” series. If you have thoughts

about what today’s school leaders should know

and be able to do and how they should be

prepared, we’d love to hear from you. Contact

[email protected] with the subject

“Preparing Leaders” for more information.




14/15


learning activities with colleagues. Mentor-ing and coaching from peers was shown tobe especially important, related to greaterteacher collaboration in 33 of the 34 countriessurveyed. Thus collaborative forms of profes-sional learning appear to be particularly ef-

fective in supporting ongoing collaborationand opportunities for teachers to learn fromtheir peers and a more positive school climate.This can create a snowball effect in terms ofspreading more ambitious classroom prac-tices.

4) Time and resources matter: Despite this compel-ling evidence, there is great variation aroundthe world in the opportunities teachers havefor collaboration. For example, more than 50percent of U.S. teachers surveyed indicatedthat in their current school they never par-ticipate in team teaching or observe anotherteacher’s class. One of the major impediments

for the kind of collaboration that fostersdeeper learning for students is lack of time.

Around half of all teachers surveyed indicatedthat their work schedule was a barrier to par-ticipation in professional development. Thismay not come as a surprise to U.S. educators.Teachers in the United States were found tohave among the highest number of teachinghours of their OECD counterparts (27 perweek vs. the TALIS average of 19).Time is not the only resource that matters.

Funding and instructional materials are criti-cal as well. For example, funding for substituteteachers can provide classroom teachers with

the time to participate in professional learn-ing. Yet many schools already face resource

crunches. TALIS data indicate that 1 in 3 U.S.teachers work in a school in which a shortageof teachers or computers is hindering the provi-sion of quality instruction; around 1 in 4 work ina school facing a shortage of instructional ma-terials. And schools with many students from

socioeconomically disadvantaged backgroundsface even greater shortages.Other OECD data show that the high-per-

forming education systems invest in teachingquality; for example, by providing a balancebetween teaching and non-instructional hours,structured time for teacher collaboration, andfunding to support structured induction andmentorship opportunities.

Teachers, like other professionals, need op-portunities to continually adapt and innovatetheir practices, to learn about new curricularresources, technologies, and strategies to en-gage students. To meet those needs, they re-quire opportunities to work in close partner-

ship, share resources, and exchange ideas withcolleagues.

Education systems can support this work by valuing teacher professionalism, and throughadequate and equitable investments in teach-ing quality. By doing so, they can enhance thepossibilities that teachers will learn the sophis-ticated practices required for deeper learning,and students will have opportunities to developthe skills needed in the modern workplace.

This post is by Dion Burns, a research analyst at the

Stanford Center for Opportunity Policy in Education

(SCOPE), and Linda Darling-Hammond, the

Charles E. Ducommun professor of education at Stanford University and the director of SCOPE.

Copyright ©2015 by EditorialProjects in Education, Inc.All rights reserved.No part of this publication shallbe reproduced, stored in a retrievasystem, or transmitted by anymeans, electronic or otherwise,

without the written permissionof the copyright holder.

Readers may make up to 5 printcopies of this publication at no costfor personal, non-commercial use,provided that each includes a fullcitation of the source.

Visit www.edweek.org/go/copiesfor information about additionalprint photocopies.

Published by Editorial Projectsin Education, Inc.

6935 Arlington Road, Suite 100Bethesda, MD, 20814Phone: (301) 280-3100www.edweek.org

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M e a n t a s k I n p u t i n P e r c e n t i l e s o f 1 9 6 0 D i s t r i b u t i o n

Worker Tasks in the U.S. Economy, 1960-2009All Education Groups

1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010

Non-Routine Analytical

Non-Routine Manual

Routine Manual

Non-Routine Interpersonal

Routine Cognative




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