Cycle 3 Schools as Embryonic Communities

The resources for this cycle prompted deep and central questions as to the role of schools and the impact on students.  The central focus around the concept of the school “community” can be interpreted in various ways and contexts, thus providing numerous avenues for discussion, debate, and conversation.  The idea of the school community, whether as a district, or individual school, or smaller units within the school have common themes and aspects that can enhance student learning and impact the role the classroom teacher will play for students.  Looking forward as educators the concept of community will impact, positively or negatively, any proposal, idea, or policy and thus needs to be addressed at every level.

The article regarding Finland’s educational success, as measured by international standardized testing, prompted many questions for me personally and professionally.  While the point of the article was to describe the success of Finland and their educational principles I began to wonder about how this could or could not “work” in America.  I situated this concept in the context of my own position as a high school social studies teacher in a suburban district.  The first major question regarded the testing policy of Finland.  The article stated Finland does not have many standardized tests throughout the schooling experiences and quoted one teacher as being surprised by the amount of focus and energy U.S. education places on testing. 

With the success Finland has had in recent decades, I wondered how each teacher measures their own practices without testing?  How does the state or nation actually know if their teachers and methods are working?

Although I acknowledge that testing is not the only form of assessment and far from perfect, I still wonder how teachers know that they are effective.  With many teachers I have worked with there tends to be a feeling that we all “know” we are “good” teachers, but when asked “how do you know?” many teachers find it difficult to answer.  With the current debates about evaluations of teachers, schools, etc. this question has fascinated me.  I do not have a great answer for how can we measure “good” teaching and “effective” teaching but I think we need to have that conversation as teacher, even amongst our colleagues as a school community.

The Felner piece regarding smaller learning communities connected with my thoughts on Finland and establishing what is effective and how do we know as teacher.  This article provided tremendous research into the field of smaller learning communities at the school level and even smaller communities within the school.  I have worked for the past three years within a smaller learning community team in my subject area of economics.  The principles discussed in this article about communication, structures, etc are necessary to define before crafting the SLC and need to be reinforced within the group.  I think this structure can work extremely well for various reasons, many cited in the article most importantly the personalization of the school community for the students.  The impact on each individual student is profound when they are aware teachers are working together and have similar expectations for them.  This consistency provides structure and care for students, hopefully resulting in increased motivation.

Working with an SLC has been important for my own professional growth as a teacher.  Colleagues have provided resources and assistance in many situations as well.  The most important aspect of working in an SLC for me has been my ability to have feedback as to my own practice and see if what I do actually works.  We have had many opportunities for peer observations which have been very productive.  This has worked extremely well to increase the overall morale of the teaching staff without the intrusive presence of an official “evaluation”. 

 

Another aspect to the SLC model is the ability to teach the same group of students and know the other teachers on much closer level.  With a school of many thousand students, individuals can feel lost and fragmented from class to class.  However, when students know that a group of about 90 have the same teacher for the core subjects they feel a bit more comfortable but also accountable.  I know the evidence of the SLC model is mixed however, when implemented in our schools I have seen definitive benefits in my own classroom.  How this would translate district-wide or state-wide I do not know.