1. Philosophy of Education
1.1. "Pragmatism is a philosophy that encourages people to find processes that work in order to achieve their desired ends" (p.186).
1.1.1. Generic Notions: Dewey believed in progess meaning he wanted to make society better through education. "Children could learn skills both experimentally as well as from books" (p.187). "Dewey's ideas about education, often referred to as progressive, proposed that education start with the needs and interests of the child in the classroom, allow the child to participate in planning his or her course of study, employ project method or group learning, and depend heavily on experiential learning" (p.188). "Dewey advocated both freedom and responsibility for students, since those are vital components of democratic living" (p.188).
1.1.2. Key Researchers: George Sanders Peirce, William James, John Dewey, Frances Bacon, John Locke, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, George Sanders Peirce, & William James
1.1.3. Goal of Education: "Dewey stressed the importance of the school as a place where ideas can be implemented, challenged, and reconstructed, with the goal of providing students with the knowledge of how to improve the social order" (p.188). "Dewey's philosophy of education often referred to as progressive education, was central to all subsequent educational theory" (p.189).
1.1.4. Role of Teacher: "The teacher must encourage, offer suggestions, questions, and helps plan and implement courses of study along with writing curriculum. He/She must have a command of several disciplines in order to create and implement curriculum" (p.189).
1.1.5. Method of Instruction: "Dewey proposed that children learn both individually and in groups" (p.189). He believes problem-solving or inquiry method is a good way that children get to ask questions about what they want to know. Dewey did away with formal instruction, traditional block times, and traditional furniture nailed to the ground. He put tables and chairs up where the students could be grouped as needed. "Children could converse quietly with one another, could stand up and stretch if warranted, and could pursue independent study or group work. Lockstep, rote memorization of traditional schools was replaced with individualized study, problem solving, and the project method" (p.189).
1.1.6. Curriculum: Dewey believed that curriculum is different depending on the students because the curriculum will change as the social order changes along with children's interests and needs. "A particular subject matter under investigation by students, such as whales, would yield problems to be solved using math, science, history, reading, writing, music, art, wood, or metal working, cooking, and sewing- all the academic and vocational disciplines in an integrated, interconnected way. Progressive educators support starting with contemporary problems and working from the know to the unknown" (p.190).
2. Schools as Organizations
2.1. Major Stakeholders in district 7
2.1.1. State Senator: Paul Sanford
2.1.2. House of Representative: Ken Johnson
2.1.3. State superintendent: Michael Sentance
2.1.4. Representative on State School Board: Jeffrey Newman
2.1.5. Local Superintendent: Dr. Alan Miller (Haleyville City Schools)
2.1.6. Local School Board Members: Pres. Steve Stott, Kris Burleson, Barry Burleson, Beth McAlpine, and Donna Jones (Haleyville City Schools)
2.2. Elements of Change with school processes and cultures
2.2.1. Conflict
2.2.1.1. According to Exploring Education, "Conflict in a necessary part of change. Efforts to democratize schools do not create conflicts but they allow previously hidden problems, issues, and disagreements to surface. Staff involvement in school restructuring must be prepared to elicit, manage and resolve conflicts" (p.232).
2.2.2. New Behaviors
2.2.2.1. Exploring Education states, "New behaviors must be learned. Because change requires new relationships and behaviors, the change process must include building communication and trust, enabling leadership and initiative to emerge, and learning techniques of communication, collaboration, and conflict resolution" (p.232).
2.2.3. Team Building
2.2.3.1. "Team building must extend to the entire school. Shared decision making must consciously work out and give on-going attention to relationships within the rest of he school's staff. Otherwise, issues of exclusiveness and imagined elitism may surface, perceived "resistance to change" will persist" (Sadovnik, 2013, p.232).
2.2.4. Process and Content
2.2.4.1. According to Exploring Education, "Process and content are interrelated. The process a team uses in going about its work is as important as the content of educational changes it attempts. The substance of a project often depends upon the degree of trust and openness built up within the team and between the team and the school. At the same time, the usefulness and the visibility of the project will influence future commitments from and the relationships among the staff and others involved" (Sadovnik, 2013, p.232)
3. Curriculum and Pedagogy
3.1. Developmentalist Curiculum
3.1.1. "The developmentalist curriculum is related to the needs and interests of the student rather than the needs of society" (Sadovnik, Cookson, Semel, 2013, p.284). This curriculum relates back to the pragmatists, John Dewey's, view of education. This curriculum is, "student centered and was concerned with relating the curriculum to the needs and interests of each child at particular developmental stages. The importance of relating schooling to the life experiences of each child in a way that would make education come alive in a meaningful manner" (p.284). The teacher is to be a facilitator rather than someone who tells the students what to learn.
3.2. Dominant Traditions of Teaching
3.2.1. "Mimetic Tradition is based on the viewpoint that the purpose of education is to transmit specific knowledge to students"(p.296). The didactic method usually is used by lecturing or presenting as the main form of communication. The teacher presents information while the students take in what the teacher is saying. "The mimetic model stresses the importance of rational sequencing in the teaching process and assessment of the learning process" (p.297).
3.2.2. "Transformative Tradition believes that the purpose of education is to change the student in some meaningful way, including intellectually, creatively, spiritually, and emotionally. The process of teaching involves the conversation between teacher and student in such a way that the student becomes an integral part of the learning process. This tradition is based upon John Dewey's work. The transformative educators believe that all teaching begins with the active participation of the student and results in some form of growth"(p.297).
4. Equality of Opportunity
4.1. Class, race, and gender impact educational outcomes.
4.1.1. Class can depend on your educational outcome. Exploring Education states, "children who come from working-class and underclass families are more likely to underachieve, drop out, and resist the curriculum of the school." The working-class and underclass students are not expected to graduate, whereas the upper and middle class students are. In schools, it is sometimes seen that teachers think more highly of upper and middle class students. "Social class and level of educational attainment are highly correlated" (Sadovnik, p.342).
4.1.2. According to Sadovnik 2013, "An individual's race has direct impact on how much education he or she is likely to achieve. The minorities do not receive the same educational opportunities as whites, and their rewards for educational attainment are significantly less. Minority students receive fewer and inferior educational opportunities than white students. The minorities have on average, lower SAT scores than white students." (p.343)
4.1.3. Throughout history, an individuals gender has always been related to his or her educational attainment. Over the years, the differences in gender in terms of educational attainment have been reduced. Although males are more likely to score higher on the SAT that females, females overpower the males in all areas besides mathematics. (p.343)
4.2. The two responses to the Coleman Study from 1982.
4.2.1. 1. Responses to Coleman: Round Two explained the differences between public and Catholic schooling. Studies have compared the two different schools, but they found that private schools seem to "do it better," mainly for low income students. "Catholic schools seem to advantage low-income minority students, especially in urban areas. However, they are also becoming more elite and like suburban public schools." (Sadovnik, p.369)
4.2.2. 2. Responses to Coleman: Round Three explains that depending on where an individual goes to school is often related to his/her race and socioeconomic background. "The racial and socioeconomic composition of a school has a greater effect on student achievement. Borman and Dowling's study concludes that education reform must focus on eliminating the high level of segregation that remains in the United States' education system and that schools must bring an end to tracking systems and biases that favor white and middle-class students." (Sadovnik, p.369)
5. Educational Inequality
5.1. Two types of cultural deprivation theory
5.1.1. "In Mexico, cultural deprivation theorists assert that the poor have a deprived culture; one that lacks the value system of middle-class culture. According to this perspective, middle-class culture values hard work and initiative, the delay of immediate gratification for future reward. This deprivation results in educationally disadvantaged students who required achieve poorly because they have not been raised to acquire the skills and dispositions required for satisfactory academic achievement" (Sadovnik p.423)
5.1.2. "Another criticism of cultural deprivation theory concerned the relative failure of many of the compensatory education programs that were based on its assumptions about why disadvantaged children have lower levels of achievement than more advantaged children" (Sadovnik p.423).
5.2. Four school explanations
5.2.1. School Financing
5.2.1.1. "Public schools are financed through a combination of revenues from local, state, and federal sources. The majority of funds come from state and local taxes, with local property taxes, with local property taxes a significant source. More affluent communities are able to provide more per-pupil spending than poorer districts, often at a proportionately less burdensome rate than in poorer communities" (Sadovnik p.428).
5.2.2. Effective School Research
5.2.2.1. "If student differences are more important than school differences, then teachers cannot be blamed for the lower academic performance of nonwhite and working class students. The finding that within-school differences are as or more significant than between-school differences raised questions about the common-sense argument that students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds do poorly simply because they attend inferior schools" (p. 431). Ronald Edmonds stated that we should compare schools within the lower socioeconomic communities and if there are significant differences in the student performance, then it has to be school effects. There are some characteristics of effective schools that explain why the students achieve academically. "The characteristics include: a climate of high expectations for students by teachers and administrators, strong and effective leadership by a principal or school head, accountability processes for student and teacher, the monitoring of student learning, a high degree of instructional time on task, where teachers spend a great deal of their time teaching and students spend a great deal of their time learning, flexibility for teachers and administrators to experiment and adapt to new situations and problems" (p.432)
5.2.3. Between-School Differences: Curriculum and Pedagogic Practices
5.2.3.1. "Bernstein suggested that schools in working-class neighborhoods are far more likely to have authoritarian and teacher-directed pedagogic practices, and to have a vocationally or social efficiency curriculum at the secondary level. Schools in middle-class communities are more likely to have less authoritarian and more student-centered pedagogic practices and to have humanistic liberal arts college preparatory curriculum at the secondary level. Upper-class students are more likely to attend elite private schools, with authoritarian pedagogic practices and a classical-humanistic college preparatory curriculum at the secondary level" (p.433).
5.2.4. Within-School Differences: Curriculum and Ability Grouping
5.2.4.1. "At the elementary school level, students are divided into reading groups and separate classes based on teacher recommendations, standardized test scores, and sometimes ascriptive characteristics such as race, class, or gender. Elementary students receive a similar curriculum in these different groups, but it may be taught at a different pace, or the teachers in the various groups may have different expectations for the different students" (p.434).
6. Politics of Education
6.1. Purposes
6.1.1. 1. "The intellectual purposes of schooling are to teach basic cognitive skills such as reading, writing, and mathematics; to transmit specific knowledge and to help students acquire high-order thinking skills such as analysis, evaluation, and synthesis" (p.22).
6.1.2. 2. "The political purposes of schooling are to inculcate allegiance to the existing political order; to prepare citizens who will participate in this political order; to help assimilate diverse cultural groups into a common political order; and to teach children the basic laws of the society" (p.22).
6.1.3. 3. "The social purposes of schooling are to help solve social problems; to work as one of many institutions, such as the family and the church to ensure social cohesion; and to socialize children into the various roles, behaviors, and values of the society. This process, referred to by sociologists as socialization, is a key ingredient to the stability of any society" (p.22).
6.1.4. 4. "The economic purposes of schooling are to prepare students for their later occupational roles and to select, train, and allocate individuals into the division of labor. The degree to which schools directly prepare students for work varies from society to society, but most schools have at least an indirect role in this process" (p.22).
6.2. Perspecitve
6.2.1. 1. Conservative : "Individuals and groups must compete in the social environment in order to survive, and human progress is dependent on individual initiative and drive. Free market or market economy of capitalism is both the most economically productive economic system and the system that is most respectful of human needs" (p.24).
6.2.2. 2. Liberal: "Free market, if left unregulated, is prone to significant abuses, particularly to those groups who are disadvantaged economically and politically. The liberal perspective insists that government involvement in the economic, political, and social arenas is necessary to ensure fair treatment of all citizens and to ensure a healthy economy. They are primarily concerned with balancing the economic productivity of capitalism with the social and economic needs of the majority of people in the United States" (p.24).
6.2.3. 3. Radical: "The radical perspective says that democratic socialism is a fairer political-economic system. Radicals believe a socialist economy that builds on the democratic political system would more adequately provide all citizens with a decent standard of living. Also, social problems are structural in nature. It recognizes the productive capacity of its capitalist economic system, but it argues that the society structurally creates vast and morally indefensible inequalities between its members" (p.26).
7. History of U.S. Education
7.1. Reforms
7.1.1. Charter Schools
7.1.1.1. Independent of local district control, but receive public funding.
7.1.2. Race to the Top (RTT)
7.1.2.1. Enlarging the federal support of charter schools, has also enhanced NCLB's accountability mechanisms. RTT has supported Value Added Models of teacher quality linked to standardized tests of students achievement and negative sanctions, including school closings.
7.2. Historical Interpretation
7.2.1. The Democratic Liberal School
7.2.1.1. "Democratic-liberals believe that the history of U.S. education involves the progressive evolution or a school system committed to providing equality of opportunity for all" (p.83). Cubberly and Curti's first goal was to make U.S. education open to all. Cremin, in his three volume history education and in a study of the Progressive Era says that when schools begin to have students with more diverse backgrounds, they begin to change the goal of becoming more diverse with social goals being important as intellectual ones. Equality and excellence are ideals of democratic-liberals. "Democratic-liberals believe that the U.S. educational system must continue to move closer to each, without sacrificing one or the other too dramatically" (p.83).
8. Sociological Perspectives
8.1. Relationship between school and society
8.1.1. functional: "education in all societies was of critical importance in creating the moral unity necessary for social cohesion and harmony" (p.118).
8.1.2. conflict: "understanding of how social class differences in social capital within family and their relationship to child rearing and schooling contributes to the reproduction of social and educational inequalities" (p.120).
8.1.3. interactional: students who are in school are taught proper behavior for a society
8.2. Effects of schooling on individuals
8.2.1. 1. Employment is super important for the rest of our future. By going to college and getting an education, you are more likely to get a job. "Academic credentials helps individuals to obtain higher-status jobs early in their careers, possession of college degree is significantly related to higher income" (p.122).
8.2.2. 2. Teacher behavior carries a major impact on a students learning and/or behavior. "Teacher expectations do indicate that the attitudes of teachers toward their students may have a significant influence on student achievement and perceptions of self" (p.124).
8.2.3. 3. "Tracking refers to the placement of students in curricular programs based on students' abilities and inclinations" (p.127). Although student abilities and inclinations are not the only ways that students are placed, a students' race or class could also be a reason of placement. In some ways I feel this is unfair because the students are not all given the same opportunity of success. The "high ability" track students generally have better facilities and teachers. This is unfair for the lower track students. "Track placement directly affects cognitive development" (p.127).
8.2.4. 4. De Facto Segregation creates racial and ethnic inequalities. " One study found that African-Americans from low-income communities who attended racially mixed schools were more likely to graduate from high school and college than similar African-Americans children who attended segregated schools. African-American students who attended integrated schools were less likely to have a child before the age of 18" (p.127). Although these statements are positive, evidence shows that school choice mainly results in segregated rather than integrated.
8.2.5. 5. Gender discrimination has been around forever. Girls generally have always been seen of as lesser than boys. "Over the past two decades, however, the gender gap in academic achievement has all but disappeared, with female students outperforming males in language arts and social studies, and closing the gap significantly in mathematics, sciences, and having higher college attendance rates" (p.128).
9. Educational Reform
9.1. School-Based Reforms
9.1.1. School-Business Partnerships
9.1.1.1. "In 1991 the Committee to Support Philadelphia Public Schools pledged management assistance and training to the Philadelphia School District to restructure and implement a site-based management plan. Other school-business partnerships include scholarships for poor students to attend college and programs where businesses "adopt"a school. The Walton Foundation has funded charter schools and voucher initiatives. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has contributed humdreds of million dollars to small schools and more recently to teacher effectiveness" (Sadvonik p.526).
9.1.2. Teacher Quality
9.1.2.1. According to the NCLB act, all schools but have highly qualified teachers in every classroom. For the most part, all teachers qualify for meeting the standards of the NCLB. Sometimes teachers are assigned to teach a subject that do not match their training or education. This is called out-of-field teaching. Some principals find it easier to higher a teacher who is unqualified rather than qualified. "Recently, school improvement reformers have stressed the existence of teacher tenure and seniority based transfers and layoff provisions in union contracts as a primary factor in preventing an improvement of teacher quality" (Sadvonik p.531).
9.2. Reforms
9.2.1. School Finance Reforms
9.2.1.1. In 1990, the court ruled that there was to be more funding for students in school districts who were poorer. "In order to provide a thorough and efficient education in urban districts, funding was equalized between urban and suburban school districts. It was also determined that extra funding was to be distributed to provide additional programs in order to eliminate disadvantages within poorer school districts" (Sadovnik p.538). In 1998 the state was required to have preschool programs for all three and four year olds, whole school reform, full day for kindergartners,etc. "Other supplemental programs included social services, increased securtiy, a technology alternative education, school-to-work, after-school, and summer-school programs. In 2009, SFRA implemented a formula for allocating funding to all districts based on student needs" (Sadvonik p.539).
9.2.2. Full Service and Community Schools
9.2.2.1. "A way to attack education inequity is to examine and plan to educate not only the whole child, but also the whole community. Full service schools focus on meeting students' and their families educational, physical, psychological, and social needs in a coordinated and collaborative fashion between school and community services. Schools service as community centers within neighborhoods that are open extended hours to provide multitude of services such as adult education, health clinics, recreation facilities, after-school programs, mental health services, drug and alcohol programs, job placement and training programs, and tutoring services" (Sadvonik p.539).