| Re-thinking, Re-designing and Re-building the Schools
The Basic Needs and Changes in a Nutshell
by
Daniel J. Dyman, Ed.D.
We must:
Change the orientation of teaching and learning. All of education has become configured to teach with the hope that students will correctly respond to trivia focused criterion test items whether these test are state authorized or are college admission associated. It is time to open the windows on perspectives. Really what should schools be about?
The focus on the trifling is a shortfall point of view directing a noble cause that no child should be left behind. But, maybe in so doing, all are left behind in some way to some extent.
Reduce the daily load. More is often less. Let kids be fully kids before they must become adults. Permitting the individual the needed time for maturation may lead to the development of more mature adults.
Set aside management by fear. A better alternative is growth and development through possibilities. Troubled youngsters know how to deal with fear, rebelliously. The have grown to deal with it.
Present a caring disposition that provides the needed security and thus enables the progression of positive perspectives and pursuits. Treat students with reverence in all regards. It is the minimum of what all by nature deserve. Understanding goes a long way.
Trust rather than distrust and trust will likely be rendered in return. Give student time off from the labors of the day. As a reward for diligent effort, let students mingle of course in a supervised setting as the cafeteria or recreational center. Their work is mentally strenuous perhaps more so than that of their parents. The refreshing moments may well serve a greater than otherwise accomplishment.
Give up the notion that one size fits all. Individualize the system and move individuals through the system as quickly as possible but not more quickly than possible. Boredom must be prevented. Students should not have to linger when they can advance. Let them attend classes at the nearby college. Give them the opportunity to grow up in a setting that requires self-reliance. Otherwise, they waste away.
Support curiosity that is the toehold for all learning. Give students the appropriate latitude to explore and discover. These qualities are the foundation serving evaluation and synthesis coveted essentials for problem solving.
The learning windows are open into the youthful mind. The opportunity should not be waived in deference to arbitrary established age-associated rules and regulations. Do not limit students by the limits of their teachers who were stuck in a best-of-intentions system.
Students as they are prepared should be given the “right of passage.” Age cannot be correlated with ability. It should not be the criterion that determines grade level. While in high school students should be excused from the mundane and should have access to on-campus college courses. School should be about caring more than about the imposition of cumbersome and stifling rules and regulations. If children are expected to behave as adults, when will they be able to children? Reasonable is always the desired course.
Advance the well being of students as needed. The school structure should not serve as a barrier, the product of a culture focused on “weeding and sorting” as if it were a mandate. Who knows the achievement potential that is housed within the unrestrained mind? Who should be so bold as to decide for anyone? Yet, it is customary to place individuals into groupings as momentarily they are be perceived by pretentious supervisors of education.
Relinquish the use of categorizing terminology. Give up on the use of generally descriptive terms such as “kinesthetic learner” that is burdensome rather than emancipating. Admittedly everyone learns differently and at different rates, under different circumstances, during different times, and about different subjects according to personal experiences and interests. Give students needed space coupled with supporting help and assistance.
Fit the school day to match up with physiological readiness of the students. Schools need to be community centered in which students gather by walking during reasonable sunlit morning and not-too-late afternoon hours. Physiologic needs must be met. Only when the mind is ready can learning occur.
Whatever may be gained through consolidated building maintenance that ultimately depends upon bussing is offset from the real purpose of providing for student growth and development, helping students become Good Citizens of Earth.
Busing costs short change the purpose of school. They are an excessive and prohibitive burden on the school budget. Redesign schools. Reduce their size. Turn them into neighborhood schools, representatives of the community.
Schools as they function are more as shopping malls where each classroom is not unlike an adjoining shop where through different entrepreneurial individuals different items are available even under the same heading. At the end of the day what seems to be important is whether or not the internal configurations have survived.
Importantly, school systems need to include programs that enable the enrichment and enhancement of student dispositions. This is essential for the local as well as global marketplaces.
Put into place a head master solely responsible for the teaching / learning enterprise. With this leadership configuration the essential classroom processes can be orchestrated rather than a principal burdened with an assortment of unrelated tasks. Schools need a head master with the primary responsibility of coordinating the totality of instruction working with associate and assistant teachers as students may benefit from direct contact with tutors and apprentice teachers.
This structure would permit teacher advancement through the ranks and it would allow for the development of appropriate curricula, the needed research studies that would refine the processes of teaching and the design of instructional systems increasing effectiveness of teaching and efficiency in learning.
Develop internal research programs that are supported with the application of statistical systems analysis methods and share the gathered information by way of published papers and reports of findings.
The most beneficial and useful presentation structures that result in efficient learning need to be teased out. Teaching should not be random but rather purposeful. A program of lessons learned must be put into place in the context of a business fashioned learning organization.
2/19/20
Dyman Associates
27916 Crestview Drive
Elkhart, IN 46517
574.295.9098
http://www.DymanAssociates.com
Creation date : 20/02/2009 @ 16:18
Last update : 20/02/2009 @ 16:18
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