What makes a school successful? Teacher autonomy

[j brown's body]

"When teachers at A.D. Henderson School, one of the top-performing schools in Florida, are asked how they succeed, one answer is universal: They have autonomy. Nationally, most teachers report feeling stressed and overwhelmed at work, according to a Pew Research Center survey of teachers last fall. Waning job satisfaction over the last two decades has accompanied a decline in teachers’ sense of autonomy in the classroom, according to a recent study out of Brown University and the University of Albany.

But at this South Florida school, administrators allow their staff high levels of classroom creativity — and it works. A public school of 636 kindergartners to eighth graders on the campus of Florida Atlantic University, Henderson scored in the top 1% to 3% in every subject and grade level on the state’s latest standardized tests, with the exception of sixth grade math, where students scored in the top 7%. In almost every subject, 60% or more of Henderson students score significantly above the state average.

“There is a lot of our own individual input allowed in doing the activities that we want to do in the classroom,” said Vanessa Stevenson, a middle school science teacher finishing her third year at the school. She plans to start an equine medicine class next fall even though the school has no stables — she believes she will find a way.

“It’s a bit of trial and error because there’s nothing being handed to you saying, ‘Do it this way.’ You just have to figure it out,” she said."

Administrators, politicians and parents need to get out of the way and support teachers.

Link

 

[nvflash]

I was real interested in the anatomy of a few teachers I had.

 

[Integrityrespec]

"When teachers at A.D. Henderson School, one of the top-performing schools in Florida, are asked how they succeed, one answer is universal: They have autonomy. Nationally, most teachers report feeling stressed and overwhelmed at work, according to a Pew Research Center survey of teachers last fall. Waning job satisfaction over the last two decades has accompanied a decline in teachers’ sense of autonomy in the classroom, according to a recent study out of Brown University and the University of Albany.

But at this South Florida school, administrators allow their staff high levels of classroom creativity — and it works. A public school of 636 kindergartners to eighth graders on the campus of Florida Atlantic University, Henderson scored in the top 1% to 3% in every subject and grade level on the state’s latest standardized tests, with the exception of sixth grade math, where students scored in the top 7%. In almost every subject, 60% or more of Henderson students score significantly above the state average.

“There is a lot of our own individual input allowed in doing the activities that we want to do in the classroom,” said Vanessa Stevenson, a middle school science teacher finishing her third year at the school. She plans to start an equine medicine class next fall even though the school has no stables — she believes she will find a way.

“It’s a bit of trial and error because there’s nothing being handed to you saying, ‘Do it this way.’ You just have to figure it out,” she said."

Administrators, politicians and parents need to get out of the way and support teachers.

Link

I bet that was a lot of progressive teachers, liberals, democrats and kooks and a very few conservatives who said that. Unless, the way you phrased this and the way they answered are not exactly the same.
Teachers want creative freedom with developing a lesson, but they don't have nor need to have compete autonomy over what lesson they decide to teach. It's entirely different things. Teaching that America is ,a bad country in your classroom is dangerous and is not truthful. The most generous country in the world, the most free country in the world, the very country that allows free speech and the right to vote, even when it's attacking America and/or it's leaders, and they protest it as oppressive, corrupt, and prejudiced is laughable. Support of things like "we are Hamas" in our schools, "denying the holocaust", wiping out the jews, is just wrong. Bullying the jewish students on our campuses is not freedom of speech, it's criminal. These idiots have an agenda of their own and it's not one that goes with education, school policies, educational standards and what both parents and lawmakers have deemed proper and necessary.

Your post says the study was from Brown? A liberal left wing progressive univeristy, filled with people who think America is bad. The post also says, as I indicated above the teahcers are allowed input and creativity in the activities, it's not blanket freedom. Equine medicine isn't a controversial thing, it may not be a workable course in a public school for lots of reasons, funding and other resources, but it's not really way outside the box.

So you tried to make it sound like teachers can and ought to be able to do anything they please and it's just not so.

 

[nvflash]

Bring back one room community schools with one teacher and a aid or two.

Worked for the greatest generation.

Don't forget to bring a big paddle and use it whenever necessary. Then when the kid gets home and cries to mommy and daddy, they should beat them too.

 

[eman623]

Is "autonomy" code for ignoring parents wishes and teaching modern progressive woke assholery?

Hoe about if a teacher wants to start each class with a prayer and include the bible in the curriculum? Is autonomy still a good thing?

 

[AJG]

I bet that was a lot of progressive teachers, liberals, democrats and kooks and a very few conservatives who said that. Unless, the way you phrased this and the way they answered are not exactly the same.
Teachers want creative freedom with developing a lesson, but they don't have nor need to have compete autonomy over what lesson they decide to teach. It's entirely different things. Teaching that America is ,a bad country in your classroom is dangerous and is not truthful. The most generous country in the world, the most free country in the world, the very country that allows free speech and the right to vote, even when it's attacking America and/or it's leaders, and they protest it as oppressive, corrupt, and prejudiced is laughable. Support of things like "we are Hamas" in our schools, "denying the holocaust", wiping out the jews, is just wrong. Bullying the jewish students on our campuses is not freedom of speech, it's criminal. These idiots have an agenda of their own and it's not one that goes with education, school policies, educational standards and what both parents and lawmakers have deemed proper and necessary.

Your post says the study was from Brown? A liberal left wing progressive univeristy, filled with people who think America is bad. The post also says, as I indicated above the teahcers are allowed input and creativity in the activities, it's not blanket freedom. Equine medicine isn't a controversial thing, it may not be a workable course in a public school for lots of reasons, funding and other resources, but it's not really way outside the box.

So you tried to make it sound like teachers can and ought to be able to do anything they please and it's just not so.

I think you're placing too much emphasis on a few contentious issues that has nothing to do with the vast majority of what's taught in school. The AP article lists a few of the creative activities that happen in Henderson School classrooms and none of them have anything to do with the things you mentioned:

In Jenny O’Sullivan’s art and technology classroom, kindergartners learn computer coding basics by steering a robot through a maze. Fourth and fifth graders make videos celebrating Earth Day. Students learn design by building cardboard arcade games like Skee-Ball for their classmates. Legos teach engineering.

Working in small groups while dressed in white lab coats and goggles, the sixth graders in Amy Miramontes’ Medical Detectives class solve a mystery daily. They have examined strands of rabbit muscle under a microscope, using safe chemicals to determine what neurological disease each animal had. They have tested fake neurotoxins to determine which ailments afflicted their imaginary patients.

On this afternoon in her Science as Art class, Wuest and a visiting artist are showing third graders how to make clay bobblehead dolls of endangered species — while also teaching the chemistry of why glazes change color in the kiln.

“Hopefully those students who love art can also develop a love of science,” she said. “Project-based learning sticks with the kids for longer.”

Henderson’s drone teams have a room to practice flying the 3-inch-by-3-inch (75 millimeter), four-rotor devices through an obstacle course, plus flight simulators donated by the local power company.

What about these activities make you feel like most of the teachers are liberals, progressives, democrats and kooks?

 

[AJG]

Hoe about if a teacher wants to start each class with a prayer and include the bible in the curriculum? Is autonomy still a good thing?

If teaching that kind of stuff helps students score in the top 1% to 3% in every subject and grade level, then sure. But seeing as how teaching that stuff contributes nothing to giving students a good education unless the subject is biblical studies or religion that's probably not the kind of autonomy they're looking for.

 

[eman623]

If teaching that kind of stuff helps students score in the top 1% to 3% in every subject and grade level, then sure. But seeing as how teaching that stuff contributes nothing to giving students a good education unless the subject is biblical studies or religion that's probably not the kind of autonomy they're looking for.

It is not possible even in theory for every school to score in the top 1% to 3%.

But if we give teachers autonomy, then we should expect student scores to improve. And if they do not, then maybe that particular teacher needs to go back to teaching the accepted curriculum.

Not all teachers can be above average no more than all students can be.

 

[tshade]

"When teachers at A.D. Henderson School, one of the top-performing schools in Florida, are asked how they succeed, one answer is universal: They have autonomy. Nationally, most teachers report feeling stressed and overwhelmed at work, according to a Pew Research Center survey of teachers last fall. Waning job satisfaction over the last two decades has accompanied a decline in teachers’ sense of autonomy in the classroom, according to a recent study out of Brown University and the University of Albany.

But at this South Florida school, administrators allow their staff high levels of classroom creativity — and it works. A public school of 636 kindergartners to eighth graders on the campus of Florida Atlantic University, Henderson scored in the top 1% to 3% in every subject and grade level on the state’s latest standardized tests, with the exception of sixth grade math, where students scored in the top 7%. In almost every subject, 60% or more of Henderson students score significantly above the state average.

“There is a lot of our own individual input allowed in doing the activities that we want to do in the classroom,” said Vanessa Stevenson, a middle school science teacher finishing her third year at the school. She plans to start an equine medicine class next fall even though the school has no stables — she believes she will find a way.

“It’s a bit of trial and error because there’s nothing being handed to you saying, ‘Do it this way.’ You just have to figure it out,” she said."

Administrators, politicians and parents need to get out of the way and support teachers.

Link

Let them teach.

 

[j brown's body]

I bet that was a lot of progressive teachers, liberals, democrats and kooks and a very few conservatives who said that. Unless, the way you phrased this and the way they answered are not exactly the same.
Teachers want creative freedom with developing a lesson, but they don't have nor need to have compete autonomy over what lesson they decide to teach. It's entirely different things. Teaching that America is ,a bad country in your classroom is dangerous and is not truthful. The most generous country in the world, the most free country in the world, the very country that allows free speech and the right to vote, even when it's attacking America and/or it's leaders, and they protest it as oppressive, corrupt, and prejudiced is laughable. Support of things like "we are Hamas" in our schools, "denying the holocaust", wiping out the jews, is just wrong. Bullying the jewish students on our campuses is not freedom of speech, it's criminal. These idiots have an agenda of their own and it's not one that goes with education, school policies, educational standards and what both parents and lawmakers have deemed proper and necessary.

Your post says the study was from Brown? A liberal left wing progressive univeristy, filled with people who think America is bad. The post also says, as I indicated above the teahcers are allowed input and creativity in the activities, it's not blanket freedom. Equine medicine isn't a controversial thing, it may not be a workable course in a public school for lots of reasons, funding and other resources, but it's not really way outside the box.

So you tried to make it sound like teachers can and ought to be able to do anything they please and it's just not so.

There is an incredible irony in your insistence that teachers teach that America is bad without providing any proof, while the FL legislature passes laws demanding that it be taught that America is good and communism is bad.

It is conservatives that promote indoctrination, not liberals.

 

[j brown's body]

It is not possible even in theory for every school to score in the top 1% to 3%.

But if we give teachers autonomy, then we should expect student scores to improve. And if they do not, then maybe that particular teacher needs to go back to teaching the accepted curriculum.

Not all teachers can be above average no more than all students can be.

Generally speaking nowadays, curriculums provide overarching questions and then teachers create the content.

What would you make of a teacher who does poorly at one school, yet goers to another, teaches the exact same way and the students are successful. It happens all the time. Is it the teacher's fault?

 

[j brown's body]

I think you're placing too much emphasis on a few contentious issues that has nothing to do with the vast majority of what's taught in school. The AP article lists a few of the creative activities that happen in Henderson School classrooms and none of them have anything to do with the things you mentioned:









What about these activities make you feel like most of the teachers are liberals, progressives, democrats and kooks?

Probably Fox News and Breitbart.

 

[Rexedgar]

Louisiana has something working;

How two high school students solved a 2,000-year-old math puzzle

Calcea Johnson and Ne'Kiya Jackson surprised the math world when, as seniors in high school, they produced innovative solutions to a 2,000-year-old puzzle.

www.cbsnews.com

 

[j brown's body]

Louisiana has something working;

How two high school students solved a 2,000-year-old math puzzle

Calcea Johnson and Ne'Kiya Jackson surprised the math world when, as seniors in high school, they produced innovative solutions to a 2,000-year-old puzzle.

www.cbsnews.com

They've moved up to 41st!

 

[eman623]

Generally speaking nowadays, curriculums provide overarching questions and then teachers create the content.

What would you make of a teacher who does poorly at one school, yet goers to another, teaches the exact same way and the students are successful. It happens all the time. Is it the teacher's fault?

So the teacher did poorly, then went to another school and taught the "exact same way"? No changes, no tweaks? No adjustments for a different class with different kids?

I would think that teacher is inflexible to the point of being an automaton, not autonomy. That teacher doesn't seem to much care about the outcomes.

 

[The Mark]

Is "autonomy" code for ignoring parents wishes and teaching modern progressive woke assholery?

Hoe about if a teacher wants to start each class with a prayer and include the bible in the curriculum? Is autonomy still a good thing?

I think it's more about allowing them to be creative and flexible in how they teach the students what they need to know, rather than requiring them to teach a certain way. Not everyone learns the same way, so having flexibility to find what works for the individual students probably is good.

 

[Grand Mal]

Bring back one room community schools with one teacher and a aid or two.

Worked for the greatest generation.

Don't forget to bring a big paddle and use it whenever necessary. Then when the kid gets home and cries to mommy and daddy, they should beat them too.

Anyone, teacher or otherwise, who beat my child would have me to contend with. I never raised my hand to him and he grew up just fine. He never raises his hand to his son either.

 

[j brown's body]

So the teacher did poorly, then went to another school and taught the "exact same way"? No changes, no tweaks? No adjustments for a different class with different kids?

I would think that teacher is inflexible to the point of being an automaton, not autonomy. That teacher doesn't seem to much care about the outcomes.

But if this teacher was successful, you'd reward him, and punish him if he failed. Yet he would have done the same thing at both schools. How can this be?

 

[eman623]

But if this teacher was successful, you'd reward him, and punish him if he failed. Yet he would have done the same thing at both schools. How can this be?

What has this got to do with teacher autonomy?

If the teacher has control over the curriculum, then wouldn't you think they have more responsibility to find a way to reach the students.

That means being flexible and teaching to the class.

 

[j brown's body]

What has this got to do with teacher autonomy?

If the teacher has control over the curriculum, then wouldn't you think they have more responsibility to find a way to reach the students.

That means being flexible and teaching to the class.

It has to do with the illegitimacy of ranking teachers based on student performance.

You think teachers can just train themselves to reach a galaxy of different student capabilities and learning styles?

 

[BirdinHand]

Bring back one room community schools with one teacher and a aid or two.

Worked for the greatest generation.

My greatest generation parents couldn’t work a touch screen electronic device and still had record players.

My child is being educated for a world with technology as a daily part of life thanks.

Don't forget to bring a big paddle and use it whenever necessary. Then when the kid gets home and cries to mommy and daddy, they should beat them too.

If anyone lays a hand on my kid, they’d better have a damn good attorney.

Because I’m getting their teaching license revoked, I’m prosecuting them for assault and battery and then I’m suing them for every penny they have.

 

[BirdinHand]

It has to do with the illegitimacy of ranking teachers based on student performance.

You think teachers can just train themselves to reach a galaxy of different student capabilities and learning styles?

I think teachers are most successful when parents are actively involved in their child’s education

 

[j brown's body]

I think teachers are most successful when parents are actively involved in their child’s education

Yes, particularly by supporting them in the home which begins by reading to them when they are infants and modeling good reading habits thereafter.

I wondered if a lot of my students even had a single book in the home.

 

[eman623]

It has to do with the illegitimacy of ranking teachers based on student performance.

We rank other professions that interface with the public on their effectiveness. Salespeople are ranked on how well they can sell.

You think teachers can just train themselves to reach a galaxy of different student capabilities and learning styles?

You think they cannot? Then why give them any autonomy? Why not just tell them to teach the materials that are provided and don't make any adjustments?

 

[BirdinHand]

We rank other professions that interface with the public on their effectiveness. Salespeople are ranked on how well they can sell.

Sales people aren’t rated on whether the consumer correctly and efficiently uses the product or uses the product correctly.

A more apt comparison would be Apple’s salesmen being held responsible for how well a 75 year old can use their newest iPhone they sold them.

You think they cannot? Then why give them any autonomy? Why not just tell them to teach the materials that are provided and don't make any adjustments?

Because kids aren’t cogs in a wheel - every single one is different and if you want to actually TEACH them, you have to meet them where they are and explain things.