Lead. Learn. Change.

Mark Garrison - Guilty! Of making a difference. Professional learning that matters.

Episode Summary

Dr. Mark Garrison, of West Texas A&M, founder of NewEdu, and research partner with the Professional Association of Georgia Educators, highlights what he has discovered after spending time with some great teachers, administrators and students in Georgia’s public schools. The conversation touches on many topics, including the origins of standardized tests, practical steps policy makers can take–immediately–to support educators, the importance of listening to what teachers have to say, and the value of a new approach to professional learning.

Episode Notes

Amarillo, Texas, and Buffalo, New York (2:15)

Data, evidence, propositions and their roles in the goals of a case study (4:40)

Focus groups, interviews, documents, email, and student work (7:40)

Standardized test scores and the range of metrics that matter (10:30)

Student input as a vital factor in gauging effectiveness of any approach to teaching and learning (12:20)

The standardized test debate actually started 150 years ago (13:30)

Trust as a pivotal component in “assessing” teachers and schools (14:40)

Technology as a two-sided challenge (15:00)

Standards reflect the values of those who establish them (16:30)

Who should make the decisions? (17:00)

How well do these tests prepare young people for their future? (18:35)

Professional learning that is intentionally transformative (20:30)

Trust surfaces, again – this time as a key to creating the conditions for true engagement (21:30)

The role of a teacher is not simple, one dimensional, or clear to everyone (23:50)

Multiple opportunities for success as an important foundational practice (25:15)

How to “improve things” alongside challenges and constraints (27:35)

Schools do mitigate the negative effects of societal pressures and difficulties, such as poverty (28:15)

The work of teachers has a significant positive impact on students and learning (29:00)

What it really means to offer students choice, and how doing so is a wise move (29:50)

Affirming student performance (31:55)

Quality professional learning uses a framework, not a formulaic, prescriptive, or predetermined set of steps (32:40)

What are these students going through right now? (33:55)

The value of teachers and their work (35:00)

The shifts in the processes used to capture evidence inside PAGE’s research projects (38:00)

Phil Schlechty (the Schlechty Center) – “It’s the activity of the learner that causes learning.” (38:45)

Community and political contexts impact the operational reality of schools (40:00)

Go back to the classroom – the center of teaching and learning (41:25)

One-with-one conversations with teachers – learning from our fellow educators (41:40)

About what do I want to learn more? (45:45)

Suggestions for policy makers (47:05)

Program adoption or a customized approach to an important issue? (47:50)

Organizational health and conflicting initiatives (49:30)

Everybody doesn’t have to do the exact same thing in order to make progress (51:15)

Teaching and learning are all about accountability and responsibility (53:25)

The lack of trust has not improved relationships, interactions, or processes (54:15)

Professional learning can legitimately advance the teaching profession (56:30)

Retirement deferred, career and work revitalized, as a result of thinking about one’s work (59:15)

Skinner’s Ghost and the Smart Machine (1:01:40)

Maybe not measure anything? Analyze patterns instead. (1:03:00)

 

Podcast cover art for Lead. Learn. Change. is a view from Brunnkogel (mountaintop) over the mountains of the Salzkammergut in Austria, courtesy of photographer Simon Berger, published on www.unsplash.com.

 

www.markgarrison.net

garrison@neweduconsulting.com

 

https://www.amazon.com/Measure-Failure-Political-Origins-Standardized-ebook/dp/B007SJNZPI

How did standardized tests become the measure of performance in our public schools? In this compelling work, Mark J. Garrison attempts to answer this question by analyzing the development of standardized testing, from the days of Horace Mann and Alfred Binet to the current scene. Approaching the issue from a sociohistorical perspective, the author demonstrates the ways standardized testing has been used to serve the interests of the governing class by attaching a performance-based value to people and upholding inequality in American society. The book also discusses the implications that a restructuring of standardized testing would have on the future of education, specifically what it could do to eliminate the measure of individual worth based on performance.

 

https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED517705