SECTION V
NEW TEACHERS AND SCHOOLS
CHAPTER 18
ACTIVITIES OF FUTURE TEACHERS IN GENERAL
When computers appeared in a form and price that made them widely available, some parents and educators shuddered. They feared that authorities under the guise of "progress" could foist machines on students and employ these lifeless but adept mechanical monsters to tamper with the minds of children. They anguished that these new instruments could bring a mechanistic world where machines dominated learning, and students became more like automatons than humans. They cringed at the vision of a school system where technology would jettison human teachers and make education mechanical and impersonal.
These nightmares may have contributed to the sluggish employment of the full power of computers in schools. Fortunately, however, these wild fears are totally wrong. Computerized education will not bring a harsh, unfeeling school system because teachers will prevent that catastrophe. They will remain in schools, and they will provide a uniquely human element as machines provide the vast stores of knowledge. They will ensure that education forms and develops the whole person, not merely the intellectual side.
The role of teachers, however, must change. When computers are fully used in schools, human instructors will no longer have a grade or a class assigned to them. They will not relay academic information to students by lecturing, assigning readings, showing films or audiovisual displays, or by using computers to assist their teaching. They will no longer be forced to make daily lesson plans and the routine preparations for classes. They won't have to devise and correct tests. Their paperwork will almost be eliminated. It will not be their responsibility to cover a specific section of the curriculum over a given time. They won't be obligated to produce marks, nor make the painful decision whether to pass or fail a borderline student.
Elimination of these traditional duties will enable them to perform other crucial tasks that only a human can carry out. Feeling, sensitive, human teachers will be better able to develop feeling, sensitive, human students. Long ago Plato said, "The direction in which education starts a man will determine his future life." Computers will give teachers greater freedom to provide that necessary direction. The greatest personal benefit for teachers will be the success they achieve in educating their pupils. Everything detailed in Chapter 12 about the need to succeed applies equally to teachers. Their success is dependent upon the success of their students. If their pupils fail to learn, they also suffer. One teacher in the Florida at-risk program pointed out this discouraging side of teaching to me. She said she always felt she was an excellent teacher, but she had been frustrated by her classroom results before beginning in the computer program. When students are unable to progress, the agony and feeling of hopelessness is found not only in the pupils; their instructors share the pain.
Just as students are held back by the restrictions placed on them by present schools, teachers are also under harsh constraints. Not only must they try to teach the same material simultaneously to twenty or thirty students, but they must also contend with unending activities, many only peripheral to student learning. They are like jugglers who must expend their limited energy keeping everything going and have little time to concentrate on any individual object. They must forego precious opportunities to help students reach their full potential. Thomas Edison's mother came to an appreciation of the brilliance of her pupil through her continual interaction with him. With that knowledge, she was able start him on the path that altered the history of the world. Teachers will know their students better and will be able to guide them more effectively.
Despite many external differences, however, the primary mission of teachers will be unchanged: they will continue to be educators. They will fulfill their true vocation of leading children out of ignorance, and they will do it more effectively. Computers will provide the huge quantity of information now available for students to absorb, but teachers will continually encourage them to integrate this learning into their lives and will show them how to do it. They will ease the difficulties that the explosion of knowledge will impose on children trying to keep up in an information-based world. They will help pupils harmonize the data absorbed from computers into their value systems. They will encourage and stimulate students to obtain a full education. They will smooth the challenges of interpersonal development among youths and will make it easier for them to mature.
Society has always esteemed great teachers. This high regard will continue and increase. Many characteristics of teachers that predominate in computerized education will be the same as those that the best instructors have always had and for which their former students remember them. When adults comment about the teachers who influenced their lives, they recount many meaningful traits. They remember a teacher's ability to inspire them to excel and to show them how to do it. They praise the ability of an instructor who taught them to appreciate a particular subject and stimulated them to seek additional learning. They recall an inspiring human who gave them encouragement when matters looked difficult or who brought out their latent and unknown abilities. Some look back with gratitude toward a teacher who helped them pass through the trying years of youth and to enter better-prepared into adulthood. In computer schools, these same abilities will continue to enhance the lives of students, and teachers will be better positioned for their important responsibilities.
While computers use their unique power to instruct and enlighten, teachers will use their humanness to educate and uplift. They will ensure a distinctly human element in education while allowing computers to convey information, a task for which the machines are singularly equipped. Computers will instruct; teachers will educate.
OBSTACLES
Serious change never happens easily. Certain teachers may fear to relinquish many of their present duties to which they have grown accustomed. These instructors may hesitate or even fight this new program and may suggest a compromise: let teachers remain in their present role but let additional computers be purchased so that children will have more opportunity to interact with the machines while remaining in the familiar classroom situation.
I hope I have shown by now that this "compromise" cannot be successful. Computers - millions of them - have not changed education in the present arrangement. Millions more won't change education either, unless the system is fundamentally different. If teachers continue to control the flow of information in the usual way, they will block the power of computers, and they, themselves, will remain locked in the present inadequate system. Only when computers provide information to students without being subject to the training, skills, and personality of individual teachers can education truly change. Only when computers relieve teachers of the time consuming myriad of their present tasks can these human mentors reach their maximum productivity.
Unquestionably, for some teachers the change will not be easy. For these, their difficulties can and must be eased by the administration. They will need encouragement and will require additional training. This will be a small price for schools to pay for the eventual massive gains they will garner from the more efficient use of teachers and computers.
Many of today's teachers, however, will find their shift to this new world of education easy and natural. They will immediately realize that many creative approaches, which they wanted to use but had been unable to handle in the past, will now be open to them. The joy that they now experience from educating children will be enhanced.
CHAPTER 19
SPECIFIC ACTIVITIES OF FUTURE TEACHERS
It is now time to become more explicit and to detail ways by which teachers will use their additional time to become better educators. I will take two chapters for this explanation. This first will lay out the basic ideas, and Chapter 20 will follow one teacher for one day. One important caveat must be included: it is impossible to visualize precisely what the future will hold because innovative teachers will use their new found time to devise ways to enrich students that we can't imagine today.
Of all the changes that will flow from computerized education, perhaps the most visible will be the new relationships that will develop between teachers and students. Each student will always have one instructor who will have personal responsibility over a period of time for assisting that child to learn and grow and progress. I call this person the Leader Teacher. As a result of Leader Teachers, no student will pass through school without individual attention throughout his or her scholastic career. This is radically different from today when some students do not meet with a teacher for a personal conference for months or even years.
Leader Teachers will have access to all scholastic records of their individual students. The computer will provide information about every subject, and instructors will know if their pupils are progressing, or are deficient according to norms for finishing school by an approximate age. In turn, students will always be aware if they are advancing at a sufficiently fast pace. The first objective of their teachers will be to ensure that they are on track to reach the basic goals.
Leader Teachers will meet with their students for individual discussion as often as is helpful. For some students that will be more frequent than for others depending on their age, status, and individual needs. These sessions will help bring the child's education to fruition. In addition to directing the student, teachers will be able to add a human element to the continual encouragement that computers will be giving to pupils. They will be able honestly to build upon and enhance the success that pupils will attain as shown in Chapter 12. They will encourage students to go beyond the basic educational requirements and to delve into other areas that might prove interesting, or to go much deeper into intriguing subjects.
This book has emphasized the rewards that students will reap because computers will serve them as private tutors to instruct them individually. I believe another important gain will accrue to pupils because they will have private teachers to direct them individually. In computerized education, teachers will know students better and direct them, not as members of a class of thirty but as an individual person. Students will harvest phenomenal gains from this personal attention, while teachers who chose their profession because they wished to help students to become educated, will find their activities rewarding and satisfying.
Students, together with their parents, will choose their Leader Teachers, who will then direct the pupils over the course of at least a year but often for several years. This arrangement of having a specific assigned teacher will be somewhat analogous to a doctoral candidate in a university who has a faculty member responsible for directing him or her through the pitfalls of writing a dissertation. Leader Teachers will shepherd their students through the pitfalls of achieving an education. The supervision necessary will vary with age and ability. While students are least mature, teachers will provide the most intense direction. As the children advance, they will assume more self-direction, but they will always meet regularly with their Leaders.
Difficulties of students that are not scholastic may be addressed by the teachers themselves, or by counselors in consultation with the teacher. Normal discipline problems will be first relayed to the Leader Teacher. For example, the computer will track absences and immediately notify the Teacher. If a student is disruptive in a class, the monitor will note it on the student's record, and the main computer will make this known to the Leader Teacher immediately. When a discipline problem is beyond the capability of a Teacher, the child will be referred to the proper authorities.
Leader Teachers will meet with their students individually but also in groups. These meetings will not be like today's ordinary classes but will aim to have students interact and to discuss topics of interest under the direction of their Teacher. Specific times will be allotted to the meeting of students who have the same Leader. Depending on circumstances including the number of students whom a Teacher is directing, all or only some students may participate each time.
While teachers will be a resource for students for help in deciding the direction they should go and the optional courses they should take, no one can be qualified or knowledgeable in every subject. Students may, at times, need information on a subject outside their Leader Teacher's field. Another instructor with that expertise will be made available to the student for a conference on the recommendation of his or her own Leader Teacher.
LEADER TEACHERS AND PARENTS
Whatever the underlying strength of schools, additional encouragement and direction from parents will always provide invaluable assistance in the education of their children. Therefore, involving parents will remain a high priority of schools. The Leader Teacher will be the one whom parents contact.
This will have an immediate benefit: parents will need to meet with only one teacher who will have information on all the child's classes and activities. Whenever parent-teacher conferences occur, instructors will easily be able to provide complete and up-to-the-minute information on the child's progress through the computer records and through their own intimate contact with the student. Teachers will provide not only verbal reports but also graphic computer print outs that will explain clearly how the child is moving toward the goal of obtaining an education. The machine will provide additional information about possible future educational objectives based on the current status of the child.
The additional time available to teachers will make it easier for parents to arrange conferences that will fit in with their own sometimes-hectic schedules. Moreover, the bonds between teacher and parents (as between teacher and student) will be stronger, especially if they and the child choose to retain the same Leader Teacher for several years. This stronger bond will, in turn, encourage greater parental involvement.
Despite the undeniable value of having parents participate in the education of their children, many parents will forego or minimize this activity. Computerized education can partially compensate for this inescapable condition better than present schools. Often the child whose parents do not become involved with the school is the one for whom guidance at home is also deficient. A teacher can never assume the position of the parent, but a concerned instructor can provide an important supplement and be a role model. For the sake of children and of society, youths must be directed during their formative years. Where the parent does not do it, someone else may be able to help. Excellent teachers have always done this, and they will be able to expand their efforts in the future.
CONDUCTING SEMINARS AND WORKSHOPS
Beyond their role as Leaders, teachers will have other interaction with the children. These additional duties will also be ones that only a human educator can fulfill. Devising and carrying out seminars, workshops, debates, and other cooperative and interactive projects will be prominent duties of teachers. In these activities, teachers will again enhance and extend education beyond the limits of computer competency.
Teachers will spend a substantial portion of their time on these undertakings. Most teachers will be expected to develop projects in their field of academic training. These activities will not be limited only to a narrow section of work defined by a curriculum since all necessary fundamentals will be taught to students by computers. As teachers plan and develop their workshops, there will be few limits on their imagination. They will be able to lead small groups of students into new and perhaps at times, uncharted areas where creativity of both teacher and students can flourish. Instructors will encourage students to develop advanced habits of thinking and analysis while teaching pupils to work together. Seminars and workshops will provide important opportunities for discussions among students and will help them learn to work together.
Teachers are accustomed to initiate interactive student learning in classrooms today. They will continue these familiar patterns while conducting these seminars and workshops. In computerized education, their success in this type of undertaking will be magnified because they will have more time to prepare for these activities and ideal conditions to carry them out. Students will be better prepared and will have better attitudes because they will be participating in something they choose to do.
Students will have a certain freedom in making their choices of groups in which they wish to participate. Since various topics will be available, they will be able to delve into subjects that intrigue them. Most of the seminars or workshops that they attend will not be with their own Leader Teacher, but their participation will always require the approval of their personal mentors who will know them and their abilities intimately. The immaturity of the student that might result in poor selection will be tempered by the experience of the Leader Teacher.
Allowing pupils to select their seminars will give them an opportunity to take an active part in setting up their educational program. On the other side, giving students the right to choose seminars in which they wish to participate might frighten some teachers when they first think about the possibility. Until now, they have had an audience that was required to attend, and usually they weren't concerned about filling their classes. When students can choose to take or pass up workshops or seminars, a new element will appear in education.
Some teachers may find the transition to a student choice arrangement difficult without additional help from authorities. It should be made available to them exactly as other advanced learning is provided today. Teachers, however, will not be judged on numbers of attendees they attract. For example, only a few students will be interested and have the ability needed to analyze characters in Shakespearean tragedies. Teachers conducting these seminars cannot be considered as less able if only a few students sign up. Courses of this caliber probably will be held with students from several schools able to participate.
Since teachers will establish requirements for entry into workshops, students will be prepared when they attend. The interaction of well-prepared students with similar interests under the direction of an enthusiastic teacher will provide conditions for optimal learning. Teachers will spark and foster this interplay. They will prod students to think deeply. They will also provide a valuable and professional opinion on subjects under discussion, but bright, motivated participants will often come to their own conclusions. These students will be advancing in self-directed learning that will have had its beginning on the first day in kindergarten.
All these group activities will be ungraded, but only students will be allowed to attend who have fulfilled the prerequisites and are willing to make the efforts needed to be prepared. The teacher or teachers who direct the seminar will assign multimedia presentations to be viewed together with readings both from books and from the Internet. That will encourage adequate preparation to ensure that students are ready and qualified to take part in discussions.
Since individual striving for grades will not interfere with group effort, cooperative work toward a common goal will be fostered more easily. The push of competition might still be employed with one class competing against another class in another school. Students working together in a common struggle will allow both cooperation and competition. Telecommunications will make this possible.
Critics might question whether students will do more than go through the formalities of attending seminars without grades to motivate them. In reality, powerful precedents already exist for students taking courses without getting grades or credit. School systems often conduct summer sessions and attract students with unusual courses that don't carry credits. Many learning camps require pupils to pay to attend although the courses are without credit. Learning also takes place in many extracurricular activities that consume time of students but with no consideration of school credits.
Merely because only a few students in today's schools would take non-credit seminars means nothing. The current educational system often deprives students of the necessary enjoyment. In the Florida at-risk programs, learning is stimulating and intrigues students who had been completely disdainful of schooling before their computerized education.
Although some students may shirk their responsibilities in ungraded seminars, they will still be much better educated through computerized education than in today's schools. Teachers will have the time to make seminars interesting, and that will entice students to take them and work in them. Peer pressure will also be a valuable force. Schools will be smaller as will be seen in Chapter 21. Peer pressure has many negative effects today, but in smaller schools it will be a positive force. Students will find education in enjoyable seminars to be stimulating. Today's frequent condition where students are apathetic in gigantic impersonal institutions will no longer be a factor in education.
OTHER CONSIDERATIONS
Although computers are powerful teachers, they have obvious limits to what they can achieve. For example, computers can't judge creativity since they only carry out what has been included in their programming. Anything truly creative is therefore new, and consequently, is outside the scope of what they can have in their memories. This restriction may change sometime when work on artificial intelligence achieves greater results. In the foreseeable future, however, and probably always, judgment of creativity will be restricted to humans.
Advanced fiction writing is an area that is dependent upon creativity. All students will learn to write a decent paper with proper use of grammar and sentence construction. Computer programs now exist that can teach and evaluate basic writing skills, and these, like all software, will continually improve. Any student, however, who wishes to go further in writing, will need other options. Creative writing seminars will be an important possibility. Some students may want to start magazines in their fields although they will have limited circulation or may be available only on the Internet.
Besides writing, many other areas of learning could be enhanced by development of creativity. For example, finding possible solutions for any of the myriad of crises in the nation and around the world could prod students to devise and justify new approaches. Teachers will be responsible for encouraging innovation in their seminars and workshops. They will have more time to help students formulate and then elaborate new ideas because workshops will extend over a full day, or over several days, or perhaps may occur periodically throughout a lengthier period.
An added benefit for students, but also for teachers, will be interchange of ideas from other students and teachers in other schools. Certain participants in advanced seminars will make their work available for criticism through the Internet. In turn, they will evaluate student work from other locations. These will be learning experiences both for the student doing the review and for the one being judged.
The self-directed element combined with seminars and workshops, and teachers directing this learning will have similarities with what takes place in better graduate schools today. This emulation is desirable because American graduate schools provide some of the foremost examples of outstanding education anywhere in the world. Their value entices many foreign students to come to the United States for advanced studies.
EXERCISING THEIR INITIATIVE
Teachers will find the potential of computerized education and their position in it to be exhilarating. They will find new outlets for their initiative and ingenuity, and the educational system will be enhanced even further. Although education, both in and outside the classroom, advances today through their creativity, they are still restricted and often stymied in their attempts. When they are able to use their talents more fully, both they and their students will benefit.
An example of the abilities of teachers aiding education beyond simple teaching is in a movement known as "empowerment." The basic idea is that teachers assume more responsibility for schooling by being "empowered" by authorities to make many decisions that higher authorities formerly imposed upon them. A continuing difficulty is that teachers must grapple with these new responsibilities without any additional time. Nonetheless, empowerment has shown laudable results. Teachers, freed from many present burdens, will be able to give the movement a valid test.
The individuality of teachers will be retained, and they will never be carbon copies of each other. Even in the duties they choose, their different skills and talents will be stressed. For example, some instructors may be better as Leader Teachers, and others may be exceptionally well qualified to conduct advanced learning seminars and workshops.
In computerized education, students will be the primary beneficiaries, but teachers will share in the rewards. When instructors are relieved of tedious routine work, they will be better able to educate youth, the reason they became teachers. These new opportunities will likely attract more of the brightest young people into education as their life's work.
Computers will never eliminate human pedagogy. They will make the profession more satisfying, engaging, and fulfilling. They will allow teachers to be better educators, the ultimate reward for any dedicated instructor.
CHAPTER 20
OCTOBER 19, 2010
The workday of different teachers in computerized education will vary widely just as do the schedules of today's instructors. Nonetheless, we can come to a feel for the pattern of teachers in that era if we look at one day in the life of one teacher. We'll choose Mary Johnson, who has a degree in English literature. We'll look at her activities on October 19, 2010. Mary is the Leader Teacher for students that range in age from eleven to fifteen
When Ms. Johnson comes to school at 8:30 AM on that day, she goes immediately to her 'office' that is small and simple but is hers alone. In her room she has two chairs, her computer station, and storage shelves holding her books and the successors to today's computer disks and CD-ROMS. Her walls are decorated with a couple of pictures that she likes and that she has brought from her home because they add a warm touch to her surroundings.
On the morning we are watching her, she begins, as she begins everyday, by signing on to her computer and connecting to the main computer of the school. From there she receives the list of activities she has previously scheduled for today. On any given day, these might include a class that she will oversee, a group meeting that she has set up with all or some of the students for whom she is the Leader Teacher, a seminar that she is conducting, individual conferences with her students or parents that she has previously arranged, or a meeting with the other teachers to discuss many decisions that must be made by the school such as allocation of the funding that the government provides to the school.
Her computer will check to see if any student for whom she is the Leader Teacher has left her a note requesting to see her today. If there is such a message, that will take priority, and she will immediately allocate time on her schedule for that meeting. She will leave her reply on the main computer giving the student a time to come to her office. Her student will see the message as soon as he or she logs on for the day. Notice of that meeting will go into the record of that pupil. After the conference is completed she will add a note about what took place.
Mary is the Leader Teacher for thirty students. This is about average across the nation although some have more, some less, depending on many factors such as the age of students and their difficulties, and the preferences of teachers themselves about expending their time.
Mary's pupils look to her as their friend, guide, and primary resource. She has been in this role for five of her students for three years; the rest have been with her for either one or two years, except for the six that are with her for the first time this year. Each day the computer will check the records of all thirty of her students to see if any are having obvious problems with keeping up, with attendance, with discipline, or with any other problem. If the computer finds anything that may be the least bit askew in the record of any of her pupils, Ms. Johnson will be informed. If she concurs that something may be wrong, she will probably schedule a meeting with that student also for today.
Next she will see the list of all of her pupils and the time that they last had a personal conference with her. She may at that time schedule meetings with some of them for a couple of days later. Notification to the students will appear on their computers when they next sign in.
Mary will then check her phone and E-mail messages. These might be from a parent wishing to arrange a meeting with her, or from the school authorities giving her information to relay to her students during their next group meeting. There may be a message from a fellow teacher or from someone on the Internet to whom she had sent a question previously.
Mary's schedule is now fairly well set for the day. She has a group session with the older sixteen of her thirty students from 9:00 to 9:45. At this group meeting, she has a couple of announcements about routine matters that were first brought to the students' attention in messages from the principal's office to their computers. Mary's main objective of this meeting, however, is to generate discussion about the election that will take place in November. She will have some of the students take the Republican candidates and some the Democratic for a debate on the Monday before Election Day. It will be up to the students today to lay down the ground rules for this debate including the offices to be covered and how to find the opinions of the candidates on the important issues.
She is to monitor a class today from 10:00 to 11:00. She enjoys these monitoring sessions because she sees exactly how students interact with computers and with their fellow students.
She found when she checked at the beginning of the day that one of her students asked to see her today. She will see him from 11:30 to 12:00 after she has called all his records and looked them over. He didn't give any indication of what he wanted the conference for, but she does know that he has been considering adding extra time on history since he enjoys the subject. Ms. Johnson is probably going to suggest a weeklong seminar on the World War I era about which she has just been informed. It will be held at another school early next year.
She will see two other students after lunch. These are regular sessions that she usually has about every week to three weeks with her pupils. She will have all their records and will discuss how they are getting along and where they are going. One of the pupils comes from a family with only one parent. The mother died last year, and this pupil, a girl, is struggling with the death and needs a lot of attention. Mary always sees this pupil every few days. The other, also a girl, is at the opposite end of the spectrum. This youngster delights in school, has great deal of support and encouragement from her parents, and does not need as much day to day attention. This is one of the students who have had Mary as Leader for three years. The girl chose her primarily because she likes literature and Mary has been able to encourage and foster that liking. Although she only sees this student about once every three weeks (except when the student attends one of Mary's seminars) the computer brings up her record regularly and Ms. Johnson knows the girl is continuing to progress. She will spend time today simply encouraging her and trying to stimulate her to do more creative writing and to submit pieces to several of the varied publications that are springing up in schools across the city. Mary has toyed with the idea of urging some students that she knows to start one of these publications, but she feels she needs additional training on the basic idea before getting the students involved. She has applied to attend a statewide conference on this subject in March.
When these conferences with the students are finished today, Mary will enter something about each meeting in the pupil's computer record, which she will again see before their next session. All her notes are always available to her through her password anytime she calls the child's records. The rest of the afternoon she will devote to preparing for the seminar on Elizabethan England that she is scheduled to hold from 9:00 to 3:30 on November 17th, 18th, and 19th. Three of the participants will be students for whom she is the Leader Teacher, and attendance of eight other pupils, including four from other schools, has been approved by their own Leader Teachers.
Mary wants to put out her preparatory list of materials today. She knows that there is a new material available that she believes might give additional background information. She will spend time this afternoon checking on that. If that disk has what she expects, she will notify all eleven participating students that it is being held for them in the library and she will spell out the sections that she wants them to read before the seminar. The manufacturer of that particular disk allows material to be downloaded to the computers of pupils at school without infringing on the copyright, since the company feels it is good advertising. Mary will also give the attendees a list of other materials, including several sites on the Internet that she expects them to preview before November 17th. She will send this message to their computer box numbers, and they will all see the message sometime today before they leave school. Students from other schools will be notified by E-mail, and they will be expected to respond telling her they have received her message. If any of the pupils from her school is absent today, Mary will be informed and will be told when the pupil returns and receives the lists.
Mary will spend considerable time making her preparations for the seminar over the next few days. One objective she has already determined will be to have the students consider how the various authors in that time frame influenced each other. Since these attendees are particularly bright, this will probably stimulate them to jump into the controversy that periodically erupts about who actually wrote the plays of Shakespeare. She, of course, has her opinion, but she will keep that to herself. It is always intriguing with a group of outstanding students who obviously have an interest in that era (or they wouldn't be taking the seminar) to see what ideas they will develop.
Finally, Mary will have one more important activity for today. She has a parent conference at 5:30. That will take about an hour while she goes through all the records of the student, and she and the parents and the student discuss what his future course of studies should be.
When 6:30 comes, Mary will have put in a lengthy day. She is planning on taking Friday off because she and her husband have a long weekend planned and the extra hours today will cover part of that day off. She has already accumulated several hours with other parent conferences during the past few weeks.
When Mary finally does leave school she has one advantage that earlier teachers could only dream about: her work is finished. There are no tests to correct, no lesson plans to make for tomorrow, no grades to develop. She is free to rest to be ready to give her students her undivided attention tomorrow, Wednesday, October 20, 2010.
Chapter 21
Future Schools
That imposing figure in American education, James Bryant Conant, was mentioned in Chapter 1. His tenure as president of Harvard University gave him credibility in the teaching community and made his suggestions readily acceptable. Nothing was done about his accurate prediction of impending turmoil in the inner cities, probably because no one knew what to do. One suggestion of his that was embraced and followed was about the size of schools. In the late 1950's he headed a group of educators and researchers who studied many facets of schooling. They completed what appeared to be a thorough evaluation of the condition of secondary education. Their conclusions of that study were issued in a short book in 1959. They advanced several recommendations, but one idea predominated. Conant authored the book covering their ideas and he wrote, "The number of small high schools must be drastically reduced .... Aside from this important change, I believe no radical alteration in the basic pattern of American education is necessary to improve our public high schools."
The reasoning of Conant about school size was based on a simple principle: larger schools can offer better education because a small school is unable to hire instructors with the education needed to teach advanced classes if only one or two students would take them. Without these teachers, small schools must forego offering superior courses in math, science, social studies, and languages. A large school, however, can provide these highly skilled instructors because many students will want these opportunities. Eliminating small schools, therefore, would improve education. Larger schools should also be less expensive to operate because of savings of volume. For example, only one cafeteria is required in a large school instead of three in three smaller schools.
Conant's strong recommendations ushered in a new era in school building. The influence of his credentials drove the switch to larger institutions, and the movement quickly gained momentum. Small schools became passe. "Bigger is better" became a cliche in education. The recommendations were dutifully followed by school districts across America. Conant's wishes were fulfilled. The number of small schools was sharply reduced. Enormous schools, especially in metropolitan areas flourished. Conant had started a major movement.
As proponents of bigness gained adherents and school boards fell in line, extensive research attempted to substantiate the theoretical value of the larger institutions. The results were not conclusive but indicated that the original ideas about better education and monetary savings probably were valid.
That early research, however, had a flaw: it overlooked the psychological well being of students. When later studies looked at the mental health of students in large schools, the results were quite different. Better teachers provided better education for some students, but many students suffered in the massive institutions.
Small schools make many contributions to student well being. For example, pupils in small schools participate more in extra curricular activities and are less alienated than students in large schools. Other benefits of smaller schools also are important to the mental health of children: closer staff-pupil relationships aid students, and smaller schools are "more conducive to participating, emotionally healthy student populations."
One group that never fully accepted the principle that "bigger is better" were the mothers and fathers of students. They couldn't get their wishes recognized while the juggernaut rolled on. Nonetheless, parents continued to prefer smaller schools. Reduced size brings more neighborhood locations, allowing greater interchange among guardians because they are more likely to know each other. Smaller schools also promote better communication between school staff and parents.
A study of schools in Montgomery County in Maryland gave other possible reasons why smaller schools are better. In that district smaller schools were found to have teachers who were more innovative, and their staffs took on administrative responsibilities more readily and had a voice in running the school. They were credited with a family atmosphere in which children, teachers, and parents could know each other and create a supportive environment, while developing close community relationships. These smaller schools tended to have a principal who knew staff members better and could make the best use of them.
Even the supposed diminished costs in larger schools began to be questioned because of the expense of busing. When more students enroll in a school, the average commute of students must increase, requiring more extensive transportation. Advocates of large schools had often ignored this factor when they estimated savings.
Unfortunately, it was only after jumbo schools were well entrenched that the later studies negated their supposed positive features, and their corrosive negative effects became apparent. The more investigators examined large schools, the worse conditions appeared. In 1990, thirty-one years after Conant had made his original proposal, a review of the research literature concluded: " Today, small is related to school effectiveness, community and school identity, and individual fulfillment and participation. Big corresponds with school inefficiency, institutional bureaucracy and personal loneliness."
Unfortunately, while Conant's proposals were in their ascendancy, the nation was saddled with thousands of massive schools. They remain today, particularly in the inner cities where education reaches its nadir.
Despite the unforeseen effects of Conant's ideas, his contentions were not completely wrong. Smaller schools can have adverse features. A summary of the Montgomery County study concluded that schools with a small number of pupils "had staffing problems because there were fewer staff members, students had little choice of teachers, there were fewer approaches to teaching, there was little use of specialists, and there were fewer books, materials, and pieces of equipment.
Authorities today must choose between the gains and losses of large schools as opposed to smaller institutions. Computerized education will make the same positive features available in all schools while avoiding the negatives. Outstanding courses will be available everywhere. Since each student will be taught individually, it won't matter if one student is enrolled, or one hundred pupils take the same class.
Eventually, multiple smaller learning enclaves will be able to eliminate the behemoths that alienate students today. Minimum size limits will be almost eliminated. In remote areas the school system could return to one-room establishments. The major difference between the old and new one-room schoolhouses is that the computer-based classrooms will be more conducive to expanded learning than any former school, large or small. Not only will students in every school have almost unlimited numbers of classes available, but they will also be hooked in electronically through the Internet with schools and resources worldwide. By telecommunications, children will discuss unlimited numbers of topics during their dozen pre-college years and be exposed to diverse viewpoints. They will evaluate ideas of other students, and their own work will be judged by their peers everywhere. They will exchange opinions with youth in areas and in countries that their parents, as students, could only read about in impersonal and inert textbooks. The relative size of the world is appreciably smaller, and diverse cultures understand each other better through immediate transmission of events on television news programs. These trends will be augmented as pupils correspond instantaneously with their peers in other lands and learn about them and from them. These interchanges will be supervised but will allow freedom to develop independent thinking and will be equally accessible in any school.
Other advantages will follow. The small schools can be located closer to the homes of the students to reduce travel time and busing costs. Many teaching materials will be more plentiful. The successors to today's CD-ROM disks will eventually provide expanded opportunities, and equipment will always be abundant and state-of-the-art as was illustrated in Chapter 14, which described computer simulation of microscopes and telescopes.
In recounting the pros and cons of large and small schools, I have said nothing about violence and vandalism that befoul many large institutions. The greater alienation of students is probably a contributor to the horrendous discipline problems of giant schools. The more extended a school becomes, the more impersonal it is, making education more difficult for students and authorities. Discipline can be better controlled when students feel more accountable for their actions as happens in smaller institutions. Peer pressure in a small school can be more beneficial and more easily enhanced.
Although studies show that students in small schools participate more in extracurricular activities, a possible problem could arise. Having fewer students in a school may conflict with the American penchant for winning varsity sports teams. Development of these better teams is aided by having more athletes available in a large school. Whether this demand for winning teams would be a difficulty is problematical. If, however, it does cause objections, smaller schools can be united in a group to form athletic teams. Where one large school now exists, five small schools can replace the monstrosity but with only one football team. The five small schools could be Adams1, Adams2, etc. The football team would go under the name of Adams. Even without athletics as the driving force for this arrangement, it may still be valuable. Bands and orchestras require more participants than can be found in a small school. Other activities might also benefit from occasional larger gatherings while keeping the basic small school structure.
NEED FOR SCHOOL BUILDINGS
If children can learn from computers, why not let them stay home and plug into their machines? They could thereby be educated without the hassle of going to school and without the cost of schools to the community.
Chapter 3 includes reasons for retaining schools. In summary, schools enable students to develop social skills by interacting with other children, they furnish structure to ensure that students devote time to necessary studies, and they can develop and foster beneficial peer pressure to aid learning. Although, the home-schooling movement is able to overcome these obstacles, most parents would neither wish to take on the task, nor have the time and ability to do so.
Additional basic requirements for buildings flow from the role of teachers in computerized education. Although, theoretically, it might be possible for teachers to meet with students on an individual basis even if the children were not in schools, it would be extremely difficult. Moreover, for teachers to be able to conduct seminars and workshops, it is critical that students be able to gather in a central location, and this is usually the school building. For all these reasons, schools must remain.
SCHOOL CONFIGURATION
Although buildings will remain, they will differ from present structures. The first and greatest change that computerized education will bring in schools will be to reduce their bloated dimensions; in addition, it will drastically and permanently transfigure the layout of classrooms. A computer will await the arrival of every pupil. Schools will need as many computers as attendees at one time. Machines will probably be set up next to each other, with their backs abutting the walls or the backs of other computers.
Classrooms can be larger than at present. The size of today's classroom is usually restricted by the need to teach only thirty students. That size has developed because teachers are at their wit's end when they try to impart knowledge to more than that number of pupils at one time. That difficulty will be eliminated when a computer tutors each student individually.
Where and when students take classes will be irrelevant. Only discipline and order will be important, but even these will differ from what present classrooms require. Rigid silence will be less necessary than today, although horseplay and unlimited interaction will always be interdicted. Under specified conditions, students will be permitted to change to another room or to another section or time period. Although students will each have a computer, they may use different ones at various times. By occasionally shifting machines and physical locations, pupils can meet other groups during school sessions. This will also allow certain computers with special capabilities to be used by different pupils and will avoid costs of duplicating the more expensive equipment needed for some lessons. The central computer in the school will handle all such scheduling.
Pupils will usually be assigned to a room for a given time although defined periods are not essential. Computers can download proper lesson material and can interact with a child wherever he or she happens to be. Each pupil will sign on to a machine at a specified time. The computer will have a record of subjects the student is to study. Instruction will begin exactly where the student ended in the previous session. The machine will make available the lessons that the pupil is to cover, and extra material on the subject will be accessible. Not all students will use additional subject matter but for those who have time and the interest to proceed further, supplemental opportunities will be available.
All computers will be connected on a network, and lessons and records will be kept on the central machine. That computer will maintain a record for each student. When each pupil logs in with the appropriate password, the machine will determine the subjects that are to be taken in each time period and will check the student's previous work to determine exactly where the lessons should begin. The material will be immediately available. A unique identification system like fingerprints or voiceprints could be used in the unlikely event that a protective device is needed.
The pupil will then begin the class and continue until the appointed stopping time. Class periods of equal length will probably continue in many schools because they allow students to be free at the same time and encourage informal interaction among them. Educators and researchers will decide the time that should be spent in each session by experience. Initially, length will probably be about the same as in present classes, but that may change in the future. Many options are possible.
The last class a student had may have been the previous day, or it may have been several days before if the student was sick. The lag between classes may have been even longer if the student took a vacation or was absent for other reasons. Pupils will have many justifications, such as workshops or seminars, for being away from school for periods of time. If the Leader Teacher has told the computer that the absence is legitimate, the computer will wait patiently for the student's return on the appointed day.
If a computer fails to work properly, the student could use the machine of an absent student in that room or another room. The correct study material can be downloaded to any computer.
Computers and programs are rapidly becoming ever more "user friendly." Nonetheless, programming difficulties are inevitable. Most problems can be resolved through the instructions of the computer. When one arises that the student cannot readily solve by working with the available instructions and help from the software, someone who is familiar with the program will be needed. Similar difficulties happen in computer applications in business and experts, usually in the office of the software developer, are easily reached by phone. In schools, the same practice can be followed. When a problem, insoluble to the student arises, a computerized education expert will be available to the student by using the modem and phone. The expert will interact with the student to help unravel the difficulty. Technology is available for the computer specialist to appear on the screen and talk directly to a student. The outside expert can always develop a solution, whether permanent or temporary, even if that means simply telling the student to go to another lesson. A record of the problem will be recorded, and the information will be passed back to the programmers who devised the software. They can correct the glitch and download it to the school. Each upgrade will prevent similar future troubles.
It may happen that the computer expert will be tied up with another pupil when the call is made and will be unable to provide an immediate answer. The student's computer could hold that lesson in abeyance and proceed to another subject until the expert is able to return the call.
When each session is finished, a record of what was completed and other pertinent information will be uploaded back to the main computer. The machine will record the date, determine the material that should be relayed to the student for the next lesson, and note when that lesson should take place.
Students will receive all academic lessons by computer. Classes like physical education, where intellectual attainment is not essential, will continue unchanged with present methods.
A person will never be "teaching" in a classroom. A human will usually be present as a monitor or a facilitator to encourage learning and ensure that classroom behavior is appropriate. Discipline problems will always arise as youths grow into adulthood. Human monitors will deal with those obstacles to learning as is done today, and will notify the pupil's Leader Teacher when that is appropriate. These problems will be reduced sharply since computers are able to make learning much more enjoyable than in present classrooms. I have shown in Chapter 5 that increased student interest has resulted when computers have been used to instruct. This enhancement of the joy of learning will increase as computerized education progresses, for software can increasingly use psychological principles that will make learning even more stimulating and enjoyable.
Adjoining students may be taking the same course, but that will be irrelevant. All students could be studying different subjects in the same room. Even students taking the same course will usually be at different levels since students vary and have different learning rates.
At times, it will be advantageous for a group of students to work on a common project. The computers could schedule students to be in the same room simultaneously, provide the material, and prod students to solve the problem by group action.
When students are younger, human monitors will be more important. As students grow older, humans will still be necessary for many classes. The need for supervision, however, will diminish for some students, especially for those who become involved in intriguing projects. Computers have demonstrated repeatedly even under today's conditions, that they can totally absorb the attention of students. In certain classes with students that show few discipline problems, it will be possible to dispense with monitoring, partially or completely. Computers will keep accurate assessments of students and the work they are doing. If students require personal supervision to help them behave or learn well, the computer will quickly spot the errant pupils. They can easily be changed to a room with a human present.
Computers will check work accomplished by students in every class. If any problems develop, the Leader Teachers will be involved at once. Attendance will be mandatory, and figures will be available to authorities through computer records. Any unexplained truancy will be made known to the Leader Teacher, who will know the student well and will try to uncover causes and solutions.
As detailed above, multimedia will be an integral part of computerized education. Computers can use material either through a player on their own machine or through file servers. If the disk is used at the student's machine, record keeping will be similar to that of library books today. Computers could process paperwork needed to retrieve the disk, and it will be ready when the student comes to the library. The computer will keep a record of the loan until the disk is returned. Computers will "know" what material students will need for the next lesson and can tell them on the previous day to check out a specific disk from the library.
Computers will have modems. Safeguards against making unacceptable outside calls can be arranged. Access will require use of a password unique to each student and authorization of the central computer, which will ascertain if a student is in a course that necessitates a specific type of call. Numbers to which calls can be made could be specified.
Every computer will connect to at least one printer for necessary "hard" copies including homework assignments. For subjects like mathematics, copies of the problems will be taken home. For other subjects, the computer will print a list of the assigned reading material. In the next class, the computer will test immediately. This will serve as a check on whether homework had been done. The practice will also take advantage of the value of frequent testing as an aid to learning.
For those who have computers at home (and eventually they will be as common as TV sets are today), material from the computer at school can be downloaded to a disk and taken home. If they wish, pupils without computers will be able to remain after school and do "homework." This practice will be easier as schools become smaller, are located closer to students' homes, and busing is drastically curtailed or even eliminated.
Computers could be available to students in libraries for homework or to do additional work on subjects that interest them. Extra study by students can be expected since learning by its nature is enjoyable. Many instances have been recorded of students in classes today who use computers, and who want to continue their work on lessons when the class ends.
Eventually, laptop or portable computers will be available for at least some students to take home with them. They might also be made available for pupils who will be absent for extended periods for various reasons with appropriate lesson material loaded in from the main school computer.
All students will be required, of course, to fulfill certain basic levels of achievement in fundamental courses. These will include reading, writing, math, science, foreign languages, and social studies.
Although students will neither receive grades nor go through a regular series of advancements such as moving from grade six to grade seven, the computer will show if he or she is making sufficient progress to complete the basic courses in the years allotted. A student who is moving at a satisfactory rate will be able to branch off when part of the course is particularly interesting. Students will be able to request additional learning materials in these subjects that intrigue them. For example, a student studying history might become interested in the various personages who appear. A simple request will cause the computer to search for available materials including multimedia presentations that will add immeasurably to the pleasure and enjoyment of following these inclinations.
A fear may arise that students will become hackers and raise havoc within the system. Banks, where computers manage billions of dollars have similar dangers, but they survive without untoward difficulty. Schools will also prosper despite this supposed threat. Exceptionally bright students who might be able to create some minor disruption will find their talents even more challenged as they progress at a much faster rate through the computer lessons. Moreover, with today's sophisticated computers and constantly updated programs, it will be a rare student who can effectively interfere with the system even to a small degree.
This chapter began with the studies of James Bryant Conant. Although some of his ideas about the value of large schools have been discounted, his eminent position in education remains. He was dedicated in his pursuit of better schools and better teaching. Conant was also a renowned scientist, recognized for his brilliant research. At the time of his death in 1978, personal computers were in their infancy. We can only speculate how this man of science with his passionate desire to improve education might have reacted if the opportunity had existed during his life to integrate modern science and technology with education. Advancements in computers now make it possible. One conclusion seems certain. Conant surely would have wanted to try something new if he were still here and had witnessed the futility of the changes in education since his original studies.