[seul-edu] Moving to an open method in education [was Re: Standards and Requirements]

[William Abernathy <william@inch.com>]

Michael Hall wrote:


> As a teacher working at the chalkface, I have a couple of comments on 
> these basically good ideas:
> 
> 1. Open source software should become a means of letting
> state/government 
> education authorities avoid their responsibilities. We all pay taxes to 
> (apart from bomb the starving and dispossessed) ensure that we have a 
> decent education system. Volunteerism is a wonderful thing and has built 
> Linux, but I wouldn't want to see it go too far without considering what 
> the state should rightfully be contributing (we are looking long-term to 
> a time when Linux/OSS rules, no?).


I think you are interpreting my suggestions a little strongly, or I have not 
been suitably clear. More below.

> 
> 2. Most teachers are very very busy. Even with the technical/cultural 
> resources, asking them to find time to write the curriculum as well is
> not 
> an idea that will catch on immediately with the majority. Don't mean to
> be 
> negative, but that's the reality. All the same, it is a great idea and I 
> would dearly love to see some provision for teachers to make such 
> contributions in paid time as part of their professional development.
> 


The last thing I would want to do is to make another imposition on teachers. I 
have known plenty of teachers, and they are (especially the younger ones) rather 
  idealistic, and frequently extremely frustrated with the materials they are 
required to work with, and the bureaucratic folderol that surrounds and 
frequently impedes their task. I do not envision requiring teachers to cook up 
their own curriculum. What I would encourage, however, is a sharing of folk 
wisdom and expertise. These folkways could become a powerful addendum to a 
bought curriculum, and eventually might even come to supplant it.

In other words, spreading the open source/free method to regimes other than 
software development is the desideratum, and curriculum development is one 
compelling instance under which doing so might work well.

In ye olden days, teachers were isolated. They used ditto printing to run off 
things like tests and assignments. There was no method for immediately sharing 
their work farther than the teacher's lounge. If a teacher came up with an 
especially compelling teaching method that he or she wished to share, the means 
for sharing that method were limited to annual conferences, and eventual 
acceptance only after many years of tireless advocacy and perhaps independent 
validation by researchers. School textbooks (and heck, this isn't even very "ye 
olden") were written and produced in New York (fill in your country's business 
and publishing center here), and set in stone (or at least type) for years. I 
helped make those schoolbooks for a while, and was appalled at the number of 
errors, including some factual ones, that slipped through the cracks. Teachers, 
being intelligent, are certain to catch these errors. Ineffective lesson 
planners, unsound activities, and lame readers would be foisted on teachers by 
dint of a regional bureaucrat's whim, and effective teachers, I can only assume, 
were forced to conjure their own workarounds at the introduction of any new 
materials.

I do not know of any current online venues for teachers to share their errata, 
commentary, and addenda to texts, their teaching methods, their kludges, and 
their personally-crafted teaching materials. As part of our focus (not this 
instant, but eventually) I would want to see us moving beyond persuading 
teachers to use open source/free software and towards empowering teachers with 
the open/free method in order to share their classroom-related experience. I 
suspect that online venues for teachers to share folk wisdom have already 
formed, but (as with the educational software projects SchoolForge is 
endeavoring to conjoin) that these exist in discrete knots of duplicative activity.

What I'm suggesting is that, yes, we focus on open source technology today, and 
that our focus never deviate from making the lives of teachers easier. Once our 
proximate goals are reached and SchoolForge is standing more or less on its own, 
we should think about unifying teachers who have no interest whatsoever in 
software or computers through the open source method. It is not immediately 
important or desirable for teachers to build curricula from scratch. It is 
immediately important and desirable for teachers to be able to interpret and 
improve upon a curriculum once they have been given it (they do so individually 
already), and to share their interpretations and improvements instantly and 
globally with colleagues (I don't believe this is yet done, but is technically 
feasible, and awaiting only cultural acceptance/critical mass to develop).

Once (and only once) this point is reached, it becomes possible to contemplate a 
future in which, having deviated from the script long enough already, teachers 
may simply rely on each other, rather than on centralized publishing houses and 
their own individual, isolated, and arduous reduplication of effort for teaching 
materials and methods. Eventually, teachers may become confident that they can 
rely on each other, rather than publishers, to enable them to hit their 
educational marks.

But one thing at a time...

--WA



> Come to think of it, maybe we could explore ways of getting Linux/OSS
> into 
> official professional development activities (don't know if you have PD 
> days in the US/Canada, but they are common in Australia). Hmm ....
> 
> Anyway,
> 
> Michael
> 
> 
> On Mon, 24 Dec 2001, William Abernathy wrote:
> 
> 
>>When I was in schoolbook publishing, our major push was to gain textbook 
>>acceptance in certain key states, among them Texas, California, and Florida. The 
>>conventional wisdom was that if you were accepted in Texas, you'd locked up most 
>>of the South, and acceptance in California meant most of the Western states. The 
>>economic realities of publishing militate that smaller states often have to take 
>>what their richer neighbors require in terms of their books, materials, and 
>>curricula. As you search for information on the various states, keep this in 
>>mind. When looking for requirements across the country, you may want to ask if 
>>their curriculum and requirements are harmonized with, or otherwise similar to 
>>those of other states.
>>
>>If we can provide the technical and cultural framework for teachers to develop 
>>their own curricula on an open-source basis, we could provide substantial 
>>financial savings and local tailoring of curricula. Schoolbook publishing is a 
>>spendy racket, and school districts, methinks, would love a method for acquiring 
>>educational materials that doesn't cost anything but the shared educational 
>>expertise of their teachers. If we survive, not as a two year goal, but maybe as 
>>a five year goal, we should work towards establish a collegial free-software 
>>style of curriculum design that works independently of the publishing houses. 
>>States would get more flexibility at less cost, with higher teacher involvement 
>>and respect.
>>
>>Anyway, I hope to be able to find out more on the matter of state standards from 
>>former colleagues in schoolbook publishing after the holidays.
>>
>>--WA
>>
>>Chris Hornbaker wrote:
>>
>>
>>>Doug Loss wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>>You know, compiling a list of the US standards state by state might be
>>>>very useful for people developing courseware and curricula.  Outside the
>>>>US such things are generally more centralized, I think, and adding
>>>>non-US standards to such a list could be as easy as adding a new US
>>>>state's standards.  Anyone want to have a go at compiling such a list?
>>>>It doesn't need to be comprehensive from the outset, but as more
>>>>standards are added it would become more useful. 
>>>>
>>>>
>>>This is what I'm working on. I'm trying to make a "common base" so that 
>>>people can have something to follow. I just wanted to know if there was one 
>>>central site I could have gone to instead of going to each states site. 
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>>Does the US Department
>>>>of Education keep information on the developmental standards used in the
>>>>various states in some centralized location?  If so, is it available
>>>>over the internet?
>>>>
>>>>
>>>Don't know. You'd think they would, but I haven't turned anything up yet.
>>>
>>>
>>>C. Hornbaker
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
> 
>