NO LONGER WEEDING OUT STUDENTS WHO CAN'T CUT IT \doc\web\99\10\tecred.txt\ Don Crawford: "Education courses often require a lot of assignments but tend to pass students who do all their assignments, even though they may be below average in intelligence and insight" Date sent: Fri, 16 Jul 1999 13:04:10 -0700 To: "ClearingHouse" From: Don Crawford Subject: [education-consumers] Re: Education Majors Send reply to: Don Crawford ===================================================================== At 8:11 AM -0400 7/15/99, Dan & Judy Konieczko wrote: > Fordham Foundation's "A Nation Still At Risk" recommendations that >teachers be fully grounded in the subject material in which they teach. snip > STUDY MAKES SURPRISE FINDING ABOUT TEACHERS: A new study has found > that >high >school students whose teachers have emergency teaching >certificates - >typically issued by states to meet shortages in the >classroom - perform about >as well in mathematics and science as >students whose teachers hold regular >teaching credentials. I've been teaching a special ed class for prospective secondary teachers for a couple of years now in two different universities. None of my secondary students have been "education" majors. Instead they all have a major in the area in which they plan to teach in addition to their education courses. However I am not at all surprised by the "surprise findings." Some simple facts may help on this issue. 1. Most colleges are no longer selective and enroll many students who are poorly skilled in academics and who have less than average intelligence. This is inevitable in a society where we want EVERYONE to go to college. While I firmly believe that individuals with less than average intelligence can learn good skills for studying, thinking, and writing. However, the kind of intensive-focused-instruction-needed-to-develop-high-academic-skills-for-t he-bel ow-average-half-of-the-population is not happening in K-12 schools and it has never happened at the college level. So there are many more students in college today who do not learn, think or write to "college level" standards. 2. Nor are colleges any longer expected to be selective institutions that fail large numbers of students who are trying as hard as they can. A common expectation is that if a student is making a sincere and honest effort they ought to pass. Only a very few professors structure their courses in such a way that students who study, complete assignments and so on will fail because they just aren't smart enough. The culture of the public university no longer supports the mission of "weeding out" students who "can't cut it." (Probably because the colleges are competing for enrollment, but the reason doesn't matter). And education courses are no better. Education courses often require a lot of assignments but tend to pass students who do all their assignments, even though they may be below average in intelligence and insight. So just because someone makes it through college and a teacher prep program no longer guarantees that they are above average in intelligence, nor are they flawless in their academic skills. 4. Requiring a college level major in a secondary teaching area is often academic overkill. All the coursework required is more specialized or far beyond what is taught at the high school level and so is irrelevant. For example in math: college math majors begin at a level of calculus that they would likely never teach and they go UP from there for 50 to 70 college credits! They never take algebra, geometry or trigonometry in college, so their years of higher level calculus does NOTHING to prepare them for teaching the courses they will teach. Another example: History majors may take a bunch of classes on some specific area of history but may not ever take a survey level course in the area they may end up teaching. And the methods used in these college level classes for majors are not often effective with the less motivated and far more diverse K-12 students. 5. And finally many of the constructivist/progressive educational philosophies and methods that are so commonly taught in ed schools sometimes immunize prospective teachers from considering employing the kinds of explicit teaching methods that can be very much more effective. While an untaught person may work hard helping students use a textbook effectively and study for written exams, an ed school graduate may avoid tests and the textbook altogether in favor of more projects and activities that may not teach as much of the body of knowledge kids need to learn. In short: a college degree no longer guarantees that one is smarter than the average person; a college major doesn't guarantee that prospective teachers have spent a lot of time studying the same body of information they will be asked to impart in the high school classes; and education classes don't necessarily do a great job of teaching one how to teach. Therefore someone with all the required degrees and credentials would not be any better at teaching than a really smart person who carefully studies the information to be presented and who is not averse to using un-hip, but effective teaching methods. ****************** Don Crawford, Ph.D. Western Washington Univ. Dept. of Special Education - Mailstop 9090 Bellingham, WA 98225-9090 http://www.wce.wwu.edu/depts/Sped/DCrawford.html (360) 650-7443 Fax:650-4992 I am responsible for the content of this message, which does not in any way reflect the position or policy of Western Washington University.