The more I read about Education Reform, the more I believe nobody in that “field” knows what they are talking about. Larry Cuban of Stanford is one historian who was also a teacher and superintendent. Most others have never, once, sat face to face with a nine-year-old and gotten something completely unfamiliar across to them.
It is a very rare occasion (like once or twice in a lifetime) in a family situation, that a parent teaches their child something completely unrelated to the child’s experience, and unrelated to immediate experiential need (meaning, “I’m going to teach you to fish because we are arriving at the lake and are going to be fishing for the rest of the day.” type of immediate experiential need). No, the parental “teaching” that goes on in the family is always immediately related to something.
Anything else (like sex education) is immediately farmed out to schools, where professionals can do the work.
So the vast body of “Education Reform” is touted by Politicians, University Professors, Think Tank Wonks, and Vendors with a financial interest. In other words, people who have never actually felt what it’s like to cause a child to learn something they are only learning because they have to. It’s harder than one might think.
Of course there’s the argument if you’ve been educated, you know Education. Which is as ridiculous as saying if you can drive a car, you can design and build a car. Or if you can eat a gourmet meal, you’re a great chef. Or if you’ve been sued, you are an expert in tort reform.
Many of the folks in Education Reform are looking to the intersection of online assessment and remediation as the key. Henry Ford’s model, for Education.
Many of us who are actually Educators, look at this video and shake our heads.
Click below to watch video:
The reason Education Reform rarely works, is because it’s usually a bad idea, badly implemented.