The Interpersonal Relationship in Learning

As a career educator, I have the opportunity to appreciate little by little the factors which support successful instruction. It is my goal to constantly reflect upon my practice, and to continue to improve as I develop in the teaching profession. The views I held when I was a neophyte are in some cases very similar to the views I hold now, but in other cases, they are radically different.

As I have aged in the profession, I have come to appreciate more and more the importance of the interpersonal relationship (IR) between the teacher and the student. The IR is at the heart of every other dynamic which occurs in the classroom, and either supports or injures all attempts at learning. If the IR is strong, vigorous, trusting, and nurturing, it supports and underpins a successful learning experience. On the other hand, if the IR is weak, ailing, destructive, or combative, it works directly against successful classroom instruction.

All interactions between the teacher and the students occur through the mechanism of the interpersonal relationship. Therefore, its quality is of the utmost importance in permitting successful instruction.

Most importantly, the positive IR between teacher and students creates a safe, trusting space where students feel secure enough to take risks. These are not physical risks, but rather emotional and intellectual risks. If a student is unwilling to take the risk of being wrong, then there is no opportunity to correct errant thinking. In order to feel comfortable enough to do so, it is crucial that the teacher create and maintain a safe, supportive emotional environment in which ALL students feel valued and defended. This is not easy to do, and requires perhaps 2-3 years of experience at the minimum before the average teacher is able to achieve and sustain such conditions in the classroom. It requires effective but positive classroom management, and even beyond that depends on the personality of the teacher and students involved. It is absolutely NOT necessary that every classroom look identical in this respect, but there will be certain hallmarks of expression, both on the part of the teacher and students, which indicate that it has been achieved.

Some signs that a positive, safe, trusting culture has been achieved include:

-The teacher is respectful of students.
-Students are respectful of the teacher and of their peers.
-There is a sense of calm and productivity in the classroom.
-Students are productively engaged, but also comfortable, relaxed, and happy.
-In discussion or group work, students feel safe seeking support and assistance from their peers as well as the teacher.

As I mentioned previously, achieving this balance and dynamic is NOT easy, and is often the sign of a very well progressed teacher. To be sure, teachers often have a knack for creating the social conditions which are supportive of learning, but actually doing so, year in and year out, even considering different student personalities, abilities, and inclinations, is the sign of a very well developed teacher. This sort of ability cannot be achieved in one or two years, which is yet another reason I take issue with the very alarming trend of populating our most vulnerable classrooms with what are effectively short-term teachers (see post on Teach For America).

There is another very important outcome of a positive interpersonal relationship between the teacher and students. When the teacher does her best to create and maintain positive interactions with each student, it reduces the occurrence of behavioral issues. In any classroom where several students come together, from so many diverse backgrounds and upbringings- some which stress education and others which might even see it as a hindrance- there is the potential for a clash of cultural values which threatens to upend the positive social culture which is necessary for successful learning. It is the teacher's responsibility to be sensitive to all cultures, but also to work tirelessly towards the establishment and maintenance of a positive, supportive, trusting classroom culture which furthers the task of education. As you can imagine, this is no small task, and goes back to why it takes several years at the minimum to master this aspect of teaching.

In a sense, many of the relationship dynamics which describe a healthy parent-child relationship also apply in the classroom, though the parameters and boundaries of the teacher-student relationship are obviously different and distinct. Just as a healthy parent is one who is seen as an authority, but not authoritarian, neither too strict nor too permissive, so this "sweet spot" applies in the classroom as well. A teacher who is too permissive quickly and in some cases irrevocably loses control of her classroom, while one who is too strict loses the interest, care, concern, and regard of her students, turning all interactions into arguments and differences of opinion. Much as with the successful parent, it is the teacher who toes the middle line, being authoritative, but not authoritarian who manages to successfully establish and maintain a positive classroom culture.

Once a positive classroom culture has been created, a shift takes place which I have never seen described in the textbooks. At this point, while it is crucial to maintain the overall positivity and safety of the classroom, it is NECESSARY for the effective teacher to at times challenge thoughts, statements, or behaviors which the teacher views as injurious to the educational process. That is, again as in the case of a successful parenting relationship, a great parent doesn't simply permit their child to say or do whatever they want, but does their best, according to their own beliefs, values, and experiences, to guide their child towards positive behaviors and away from negative ones. As an example, if I am circulating around the room, and I find one of my students off task, it is my job as an educator to confront that behavior (as politely and positively as possible, of course) because in the long run not completing their work will damage their educational performance. Likewise, if I overhear a negative interaction between two students, it is my job to step in and assure that both students have a chance to get their opinions across, but that they do so in respectful language. Not effectively managing a classroom is a sign of an underdeveloped teacher, and can quickly lead to the devolution of the classroom environment, such that the learning environment is impeded.

There are of course many other aspects and uses of the IR between the teacher and student, but I hope this post helps to illuminate some. Even a seasoned teacher will suffer injuries and blows when trying to maintain this positive classroom culture, but perhaps the more important point is the effort towards re-establishing the classroom equilibrium as quickly and as effectively as possible, for it is within this positive classroom culture that students learn best, and that teachers are most successful.

If You Want to Live the American Dream, Move to Finland!

Worldwide, people are cooing over the Finnish educational system, and in many cases, rightly so. Finland, while spending far less money per pupil than many other nations, including the United States, still manages to score far higher on international educational comparisons (e.g. PISA). What are Finnish schools doing that we don't? How have they achieved such elite educational status, while America continues to score far lower in these rankings?

Dr. Pasi Sahlberg has written a thought-provoking book entitled Finnish Lessons, and also lectures widely on the success of the Finnish educational system. Dr. Sahlberg is a native Finn who started as a classroom teacher, but now works most closely with OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development), which sponsors the PISA tests, while also serving as a Visiting Professor at Harvard University.

Dr. Sahlberg is very candid in his opinions about why Finland has experienced such success, and his answers may surprise more than a few. Obviously, a full treatment of this topic is well beyond the scope of a single blog entry, however, those who discover a deeper interest in the topic may of course refer to his text.

Here are some of Dr. Sahlberg's major points:

-All teachers must attain Master's level training before they are allowed to enter the classroom.

-Becoming a teacher in Finland is in some cases harder than becoming a doctor or a lawyer. That is, the profession of teaching is highly regarded in Finland, and as such , it draws the very best and brightest the country has to offer.

-Finland believes in, and proffers by way of its investments, a deep and abiding faith in the value of public education. The public education system is well funded by all political parties which take office, and this in turn produces and maintains stability in the educational sector.

-Finland seeks to identify students in need of special assistance at early ages, and offers them early interventions aimed at ameliorating or eliminating deficits.

-The Finnish poverty rate for children is the second lowest in the world at 5.3%, while America's poverty rate for children is a whopping 22%. That is, there are over four times as many children growing up in a state of poverty in the United States of America as compared to Finland.

-Teachers are highly regarded professionals in Finland. The public in general trusts its teachers and its schools, and teachers for this reason have a high degree of autonomy, freedom, and choice in determining the best educational strategies to use in a given situation. They are encouraged to be innovative and creative, and to foster that same innovation, creativity, and lateral thinking in their students.

Finland has ONE standardized test which students MAY elect to sit for. It occurs towards the end of their entire educational career (around high school by our standards), which means that students are close to the age of an adult by the time they do so.

-Ironically, Dr. Sahlberg points out numerous times that many of the techniques which Finland has used to create one of the world's most successful educational systems were first described and designed here in the United States.

There are many other points which Dr. Sahlberg makes, and his treatment of the topic is obviously far more thorough, but hopefully this will give readers a very rough and ready understanding of some of the key differences between the Finnish and American educational systems.

I read a funny quote a while back which has acted as the title for this entry: "If you want to live the American Dream, move to Finland". Obviously, this is meant to be taken a bit tongue in cheek, as the ideal circumstance would rather be to build and sustain an educational system here in the United States which would become the envy of Finland itself. It would foster a deep and abiding love of learning, and a life-long curiosity in our world. It would use positive reinforcement and reward based systems preferentially over punitive and punishment-based systems. It would inspire students to learn, rather than force or scare them into it. In short, it would be a system which esteems and embraces the unique gift which a child offers to the world, and it would seek to identify and maximize the special aptitudes of each learner. Children would be highly regarded, yet still understood as learning, and offered effective, supportive guidance in their path towards independence and the successful realization of their goals.

I grew up in the United States. I believe in the United States. However, I have to say that I am very concerned about the direction of education in America, and specifically in New Jersey. I have heard too many stories of children suffering panic attacks, crying and refusing to go to school. WHAT IN THE WORLD IS GOING ON?? How can the rhetoric lie so far from the reality? Children are our most precious resource, and if we do not preserve and sustain their faith in our way of life, then what will become of our country? We MUST invest in our young. We MUST put their welfare above our own. And not just the welfare of our own brood, but that of all children globally. I appreciate that money and resources are not always easy to come by, however, it appears to me to be more a matter of priorities than profits. Finland, for example, is a far smaller and less economically dominant country than America, yet they manage to maintain a far smaller poverty rate in general and as applies to children. It all seems to me to be simply a matter of priorities. And, as with so many before us, we also will reap what we sow.

On Teach For America

As a large, impoverished urban district, we have several Teach For America (TFA) staff members. Many people are unfamiliar with this program at all, and for those who are familiar with it, few have intimate knowledge and experience working side by side with such teachers. Here are my impressions, having done so for several years at this point.

My TFA colleagues are truly an exceptional group of young, bright, and talented individuals. Many of them go on to enter medical school, law school, graduate schools in varying specialties, and other highly acclaimed programs. However, as bright, talented, and promising as they are, my point is already made in the idea that they almost always, without fail, go on to do something else.

For the vast majority of TFA members, teaching is a brief stop on the road of their lives. It is not, and never has been, their ultimate goal. For those few who do stay in the field of teaching, even fewer remain in a public school setting, most electing to join this charter school or that. Hence, one of my main criticisms of the TFA program is that it deeply destabilizes schools that already experience far higher than average instability.

As has been alluded to in earlier articles, the lives of urban students are often rife with instability. Some are combating homelessness; others are teen mothers or fathers; most are living in heartbreaking and soul-crushing poverty. For many of them, the neighborhood school is one of the few places where they can come into contact with trained professionals who will treat them with dignity, respect, and regard. Even more so than in the suburban areas, our students need stabilizing influences, though predictably, they are often the very last to receive them.

Urban schools appear to be the crucibles of the state department of education. Perhaps the thinking goes, "Well, they're already failing. We may as well experiment with this program or that. After all, things can't get any worse, right?"

Unfortunately, I must dissent from this last consideration. Scary and surprising as it may seem, things in urban areas very much can get better or worse. I have seen cases of both in my tenure as an urban educator. And in many cases, this improvement or degradation of school quality runs hand in hand with some new state mandate. My goal here is not to unnecessarily criticize the state department of education, but perhaps to encourage them to proceed MUCH more slowly and carefully in their efforts to reform our largest, most ailing districts.

At any rate, this article is supposed to shed some light on TFA teachers, so back to it. These young people are deeply intelligent and often very, very talented. On the other hand, their tenure is often all too brief, exacerbating a culture of instability which already persists in urban areas. As Ravitch has pointed out, a large study has now compared TFA to non-TFA teachers, and discovered no appreciable difference in the quality of these two groups. That is, in addition to their destabilizing impact on an already unpredictable system, TFA teachers demonstrate no significant benefit over non-TFA teachers. Perhaps this is owing to the fact that TFA provides a paltry six weeks of training before throwing their fresh recruits into some of the toughest classrooms in our country. Perhaps it is the tacit disrespect communicated in thinking that six weeks is adequate to train a teacher, but for whatever reason, while I admire and regard TFA teachers highly as individuals, I don't feel that the TFA program offers anything more than a band-aid approach to staunch the veritable hemorrhaging of educational difficulties which preside in urban areas.

Sincere reform efforts might instead try to recognize, recruit, and SUPPORT teachers who take on the additional challenge of teaching in the urban classroom. They would seek candidates who really wanted to become teachers, and even ideally those who almost felt as though they had a "calling" to work with our nation's most disenfranchised. They would perhaps offer these candidates additional compensations for the special effort which is required to teach in our country's most challenging classrooms. All is all, sincere reform efforts would shift the conversation once again to the idea of education as an INVESTMENT rather than an EXPENSE.

I wonder if you too have noticed the incredible shift in perspective and policy regarding education in our country. When I was younger, education was thought of as an investment in our children, our country, and our way of life. It made sense that if we wanted to see our American way of life perpetuated and enriched, that we would have to invest in raising our children to appreciate the values which we ourselves as Americans hold so dear. Now-a-days, funding education seems to be little more than a dollars and cents game whereby every penny is pinched and budgets are reduced year after year. If nothing else, let us remember that our ideas inform our policies, and our policies enact our goals. If we see education as an expense, then we will constantly be on the look-out for new ways to slash those costs. On the other hand, if we care about our country, our children, and even our way of life, perhaps reframing educational spending as an investment will help us to appreciate the true intent of offering a free, public education to every child.

What Works and What Doesn't in Urban Education

As a teacher with several years of experience in an urban district, I am often asked what exactly is going on in our urban schools. Why do these districts fail, while so many other succeed? What about them is causing the "drag" on performance? In this and several subsequent posts, I will do my best to elucidate what works and what doesn't in urban districts.

Urban schools face problems that suburban schools may not even consider, and if they do, it is almost always on a much smaller scale. For example, I have had several teen parents in my classes, both the fathers and the mothers. When they become parents, these teens are asked to balance the incredible demands of raising a child with their education. In many cases, the young parents must now work long hours after school (if they didn't already before) in order to provide support for their child or children. While I can appreciate that some might be very quick to judge these young people for "getting themselves into this situation", or some other similar line of thought, and I cannot in honesty say that my own thoughts have not occasionally turned there, such an attitude is inevitably counterproductive to any effort to help the teen parent to successfully complete their education. Hence, in my professional capacity, I do my best to stay out of judgement, and instead focus on providing as ideal a condition as possible to help these young parents succeed in obtaining their educational credentials. My reasoning in this process is the result of years of angst and turmoil over what would be the best way to approach such a difficult situation. I am still of the mind that it is much better for a young person to hold off on having children until they are emotionally, financially and in all other ways ready to support a child, however when I have a teen parent in my classroom, that die is already cast. Once the teen is a parent, it is now time to help offer that teenager and their child or children the best possible chance for success in life, and a solid education is part and parcel of that process.

Certainly in a suburban school, there is the occasional scandal where a teen gets pregnant, but I would say that the scale and scope of the issue is completely different. In like fashion, there is also of course the possibility and threat of violence in an affluent, suburban school, however, there probably are not several different and well recognized gangs, some smaller and less well defined, and other with national and even international presences. In urban schools, we see all of this and much more.

My point in bringing up these issues is that urban teachers really are up against a different set of odds than suburban teachers often face. This is NOT an attempt to whine or cast blame. Rather, it is an effort to honestly and clearly provide information regarding what it takes to succeed in an urban setting as an educator. When teens are being awakened 3-4 times a night by their newborn child, or when they live with the constant threat or actualization of violence in their communities, it has a grave and negative impact on their psychology, and in my opinion, fundamentally alters their attitude about the importance of education. There is the old adage that "a hungry child can't learn". I would add to that that neither can a sleep-deprived, homeless, or otherwise endangered child.

Hence, there are social issues that come into play in an urban district that a suburban teacher rarely faces. To succeed in situations where the stakes are so high is in my eyes an admirable endeavor, but admittedly it is harder to pull off, and there are bound to be more times when things don't go the way we want them to. This is no excuse to stop trying, but hopefully it helps to put into perspective some of the differences in graduation rate, drop-out rate, and the like between urban and suburban schools.

Urban children, on the other hand, are children like any others, and as such they are young, full of hope, sometimes naive, and require the assistance of their elders to successfully integrate into society. It is our job as educators to play whatever part we can in helping these young people to find their ways in a world that only seems to increase in complexity and challenge.

The Student as Learner

Educational reformers, both those authentic and inauthentic, are always asking themselves the rhetorical questions, "What factors influence student learning? How can we most effectively invest so that students will have the best outcomes?"

In recent years, the Instructional Core (IC) has served as a rather expedient (if not simplistic) solution to address these questions. The Instructional Core is a diagram which asserts that three criteria above all others influence student learning and growth. Here is a quick image:



As you can see, the three criteria of Student, Teacher, and Content are each placed at the vertices of an equilateral triangle. The assertion of the Instructional Core is that above all else, interventions aimed at one of these three classroom elements can impact performance, whereas anything which is aimed outside of these three elements is extraneous and unlikely to produce improvement.

My issue with the Instructional Core is not that it is incorrect, but that it is relatively simplistic, and even potentially belies a very inexperienced and uninformed author. Each of these three elements is quite obviously a sine qua non of learning. To develop this model, all one has to do is sit back for a moment and consider the question, "What elements are absolutely essential to the educational process, in such a way that if one were removed, it would irreparably damage the process of learning?" I would think that even an unpracticed, yet thoughtful person could probably develop the three criteria listed here. Their arrangement at the three vertices of an equilateral triangle is eye-catching and provides a reasonable visual summary of their equal importance in the eyes of the designer, and the bidirectional arrows show that there is a constant and reciprocal feedback between these three classroom elements.

While a bit simplistic, nevertheless, the Instructional Core is presently a commonly used tool to assess whether a staged intervention is likely or unlikely to have the desired impact, and in the sense that these three elements are absolutely essential to the learning process, we can use it to quickly assess the likely outcome of planned interventions.

In my experience as a classroom teacher, much effort has been aimed at improving the teacher and assuring rigorous content, but the student element has been woefully left behind. Even worse, it is the intervention point which offers the most hope and promise for improvement.

Regarding content, much has been done to address and ensure that the information that is being presented in the classroom is of a high quality and rigor. Long before the introduction of Common Core (which I do NOT think are presently very good standards), the state of New Jersey has had a history of rigorous, demanding educational standards. These standards have been both content- and process-based. That is, the content element ensures that students are learning the basic foundational facts regarding a new topic, and the process-based standards ask teacher to address procedural or learned skills. A student is considered well educated when both content and process based standards have been successfully inculcated in students.

Regarding teachers, could they be any more the focus of attention and effort? After his Small Schools Initiative failed (which at least was targeted in the right place, but perhaps did not address the bigger issues of poverty and inequality), Bill Gates next decided that the reason schools were "failing" was that they were populated with inadequate, ineffective teachers. Thus began a virtual Inquisition of teachers; schools were labeled failing and "bad teachers" were rooted out and removed. No thought was given as to why teachers in the hardest hit areas might be struggling. Could they be fighting against the larger social issues of inequality, inequity, and the soul-crushing weight of poverty on student performance? The answer was an unequivocal "no" from the world's richest man. Poverty is an excuse, he declared, from high atop his ivory fortress. And the irony is not lost on me that a man who is so incredibly influential in reforming our nation's schools never completed his own formal schooling. Perhaps we should at least require that Mr. Gates complete his own undergraduate degree before he is permitted to evaluate the educations of our nation's teachers??

At any rate, teachers have been very heavily investigated as a factor of influence on student performance. However, I do not see this as a great investment of resources. Teachers, by virtue of their position, have necessarily demonstrated the skills to complete university. They often have graduate-level education under their belt. In order to get the job in the first place, they had to undergo a significant interview process, which usually involves at least two interviews, one of which requires a "demo lesson", during which the teacher has to demonstrate their ability to conduct a lesson in front of the decision-makers regarding their position. They are then regularly re-evaluated every year thereafter, to ensure that they are still delivering quality lessons, with the actual expectation being that they will rather improve their ability to do so over time.

Hence, while obviously a classroom teacher should constantly be reflecting on their performance, and adapting and adjusting their lessons as appropriate, I don't see this as an area of fertile growth. Much has already been done to ensure a high quality candidate long before they ever enter the classroom, and these measures do help to keep the quality high.

Hence, the only remaining part of the Instructional Core to be addressed is the Student. We must ask ourselves the most difficult question: What is the student doing to ensure the quality of their own education? I know that many people, professional educators and non-educators alike, will bristle at this idea, but please hear me out for a moment, for I feel that it is the great untapped reservoir of educational change. Professional educators often shy away from addressing the issue of student involvement and engagement. The most common excuse rendered is, "We can't control that, so we're not going to focus on it." Okay, true, we certainly cannot completely control what a students decides to do or not do, but I would argue that as educators, parents, and invested community members we can certainly influence the way that a student behaves, and even how involved they get in their education. And this, my friends, is the linchpin of educational change. More than any other factor, I would argue that the student's involvement and engagement is the most important element of the Instructional Core. In fact, I would argue that the diagram should be redrawn to show the student as occupying a more important role than the other two positions.

Consider a simple thought experiment:

Scenario # 1: Imagine a poor student in a great teacher's classroom. The teacher is widely recognized as an expert in pedagogy and content, and works hard to create exciting, inspiring lessons. Yet the student is not interested. In this case, the student will probably learn little.

Now picture the opposite condition:

Scenario #2: Imagine a classroom in which a truly ineffective teacher is found. The teacher is negative, demoralizing, and even mean to the students. The teacher does little to inspire or awaken any natural inclination towards learning which exists in the learners. Yet, hiding in this classroom is a great learner, a deeply invested student who really wants to learn. What will happen? How will this unfold?

While obviously, a great teacher in the company of great students produces the best results, I would argue that the quiet learner in Scenario # 2 will still learn more than the uninterested learner in Scenario #1. This is obviously more anecdotal than research-based, but I hope it brings home the point that in my opinion, of the three factors introduced in the IC, the learner is by far the most important. And sadly, the learner is also the most neglected in educational reform efforts.

While it may not be comfortable, while we may want to shy away for lack of control, and while it may ask our students to take on the truly challenging task of owning their learning, this is in my opinion as a seasoned classroom teacher, the key which will unlock the educational potential of our classrooms. We should keep assuring that our standards are realistic, but rigorous. We should also continue to insist on high quality teachers, and obviously remove those who weigh down the profession. However, more than any other focus, we must re-direct our attention to the behavior and effort of the learner. For in my estimation, more than any other factor, it is the involvement of the learner which predicts educational success or failure. And as the simple scenarios above hopefully demonstrate, learning is, ultimately speaking, in the hands of the learner. That is, while a society can deeply desire that a student learn, and while parents, teachers, administrators, and all sorts of stakeholders can want this for the student, what the student wants for herself is far more important than all of these other factors.