Walking to DC March 29 and 30, 2010

The end of March in Connecticut means our CMT’s (state mastery tests) have ended. Most schools have been focus on these assessments for the past two months. For the months of February and March children in grades 3 to 8 lose Art, Music, social studies, and science. If you are poor and attend one of our regular urban elementary schools then art, music, social studies, and science most likely left long before February.
We keep hearing about the growing behavior issues with our children. Well this is what happens when you take away art, music, social studies, and science.
Who are these policy makers and politicians who can’t understand that what children read counts, art counts, and music counts. Do they really believe their test inspires learning?

March also bring parents to my office with their concerns and questions. Some I have known for years, and others are new.  Before the new ones say the first word I can read their thoughts. Our son or daughter needs help. He/she doesn’t do well with these tests.  I’ll ask is she/he passing their classes? Often the answer is yes, but these tests.  I always point outside our windows in the Literacy Center, and ask do you see all of these young people walking around our university? They say “yes.” I say this university never once requested any those state mandated test scores from any of these students.
This university does not care about those scores, Yale down the road does not care, and not one other university in our state requires those scores as part of their admission policy.
Then the real conversation begins, we always find a few real gifts their child possesses, and we build from there, and finally develop a plan of action. There are no miracles here. No promises, no lies, just hard work, and the realization that everyone can learn. Everyone can do better, and we work on doing better together.

The notion that more testing will improve reading scores is a pipe dream (a fantastic hope or plan that is generally regarded as being nearly impossible to achieve). Instruction feeds academic achievement not testing. Let me say it loud and let me say it clear, instruction feeds academic achievement not testing! We have spent the past 8 years testing our children in reading and math in elementary schools all over this nation. We have virtually moved art, music, social studies, and science out of the curriculum, and the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) data suggest we have little on nothing to show for it.  750 billion dollars spent on educational reforms that gave us little or nothing in return. Do we really need to continue down this road?

A curriculum without art, music, social studies, and science will not inspire learning in our children.  My whispered prayers today are for more art, more music more history, more geography, and more science in our schools. You know the stuff that inspires learning.  I am not opposed to standardize testing, but the notion that the only measure of a child’s academic success is a single standardized measure is wrong.  This type of assessment is not balanced.
I define Balanced Assessment as a "photo album of performance - over time". Such an album includes classroom-based daily performance of students, alternative assessments as well as authentic assessments.  There are formal, informal, and differentiated assessments. Norm reference tests are included with criteria reference assessments.  Individualized assessments, motivation and effort put forth by the student.  There are notational observations by teacher, a student's grade point average, along with teacher, student and parent reflections and goals.  Balanced Assessment portfolios provide a clear picture of the whole child - from multiple perspectives.
Assessment and evaluation as rooted exclusively in formal standardized testing is narrow, it is essential to include the voices of all stakeholders; students teachers, parents, pupil services, and multiple assessment instruments and various assessment approaches while conducting a balanced and thorough assessment. Assessment is a photo album of performance over time that includes so more than state and federal mandated tests.

I walked 3.5 miles yesterday, but today I was inspired by those Florida parents and teachers that started posting  on the facebook wall of the Florida Senate Majority  notes against SB 6 and HB 7189, (bills to tie tenure and pay increases to test scores). Reading their posts inspired a fast 6.5 miles, and burned 1010 calories as well. I loved reading this on the page at noon today:

“Florida Senate Majority Office  Due to a high volume of comments on our wall, we respectfully request that any individual who wants to share an opinion on legislation being considered by the Senate, use the discussion tab to post your remarks. We appreciate having a lively discussion of the issues and want everyone interested in participating to have an opportunity to share”

So they do notice, and we can act, and we can post. GO Florida teachers and parents! Tell them we don’t want their 30 pieces of silver. Let them know Florida children are more than test scores. The crazy guy walking to DC loves Florida.
Almost forgot to mention my music choices for my walk today. Lots and lots of Creedance Clearwater Revival You know 'have you ever seen rain," Born on the bayou," "Green River," "Spirit in the sky," and I end with Aretha Franklin's "Respect"... Let me say it was all good. 
I am walking to DC,
Jesse

Walking to DC March 28, 2010

My hero and dearest Friend Dr. George Gentile United States Marine and Iowa Jima survivor.

My friend Dr. George Gentile a Iowa Jima marine who past away a few years ago loved coming to Pulaski Middle School in New Britain to talk to students about his experiences, and they adored Dr. Gentile.
They made him feel like a rock star once by asking him for his autograph after a talk he gave at Pulaski Middle School. That is George up there signing his autograph. He had a line of students asking for his autograph that day.
One group of students loved Dr. Gentile so much they came out to clean the New Britain Iowa Jima Memorial for him.
This was before NCLB. Even back then the Connecticut newspapers loved to print negative stories about children and their low-test scores. I remember one day George calls me up at CCSU, and starts telling me:
“Jesse you tell those kids they are all right in my book.”
“I can’t believe the Hartford Currant could print that these kids are failures.”
 "Where was the newspaper the day those kids cleaned our Memorial?”
You see Dr. Gentile understood that our children are more than test scores. This morning I visited the Iowa Jima Memorial, and said a few prayers for George, my uncles, and the boys that gave their all to this nation. Something tells me Dr. Gentile would say walk Jesse walk, and walk with your head up high. 

My Whispered Prayers on this 2010 Palm Sunday were thank you(s) for Jan Resseger, Minister for Public Education and Witness of United Christ whose written testimony submitted to the reauthorization NCLB provided the committee with a moral rejection of NCLB’s “Blueprint for reform.” Here are Minister Resseger 6 priorities for reauthorization of NCLB:

1.    Recognize that it is unfair and immoral to demand equal outcomes while remaining silent about equalizing the resources at the federal and state levels that create the opportunity for children to learn: address with resources the generational educational debt of poverty and segregation:
2.    Address economic and social issues outside the school day that impair learning;
3.    Improve the most vulnerable public schools turn away from blaming teachers and punishing the schools that serve the poor;
4.    Test children only in ways that improve instruction, measure real performance, and encourage exploration, imagination, and critical thinking;
5.    Set a visionary and at the same time workable school improvement time line to replace the utopian 2014 deadline; and
6.    Develop the unique gifts of each child, created in the image of god, rather than worshiping data and standardization.

Today my music was spiritual. While walking I kept thinking about how strange this concept of measuring the achievement of our children through test scores really is. On this 2010 Palm Sunday I imagined what would Abraham, Mosses, David, and Jesus think about viewing children as data?  What would they think about political leaders and policy makers spending one trillion dollars on bubble sheet tests, standards, assessment tracking systems, and public school reforms based on business models?

Somehow I find myself thinking they would say walk on Jesse, Walk on, and bring your message that children are more than test scores to DC.

Today my music was all-spiritual. My mother loved listening to Merle Haggard’s version of  “He walks with me”. Momma love her gospel music, and she left us with that love. Today I walked my 6 miles with my mother God rest her dear soul walking right by my side.  So I cried as I walked my 6 miles this 2010 Palm Sunday singing “ He walks with me, He talks with me, He tells me I am his own”.  My mother would approve of my walk to DC. She would cheer me on, she would say go tell it on a mountain Jesse, go tell them Children are more than test scores.
I am walking to DC,
Jesse

Walkng to DC, March 25, 2010

Today my whispered prayers were for Florida's teachers. The Florida Senate passed a bill that ties half a teacher's salary to test scores and placing their job on the line over a set of years. My prayers are whispers that some day our political leaders in Florida, Washington DC, and in every corner of this nation will come to understand this simple truth America's children as more than test scores.


Music for my walk today, lots of folk stuff, Pete Seeger, Peter Paul, and Mary, Dylan, and lots of rockers singing versions of "We shall over come". I love Bruce Springsteen’s version. I was outdoors; Shirley from Connecticut said you need practice on streets, curves, hills, grass, and tar mat surfaces. What Shirley says people tend to do! Outdoors it was, and it was a perfect walk.


Another 6 miles down. My meditations today led me to consider reading as a form of resistance and action. If an author exposes a powerful lie, (even if she may have been an insider) does reading her book become a form of civic action when it questions the status quo pushing that lie? I decided yes reading is an action, so is writing, emailing, calling, faxing, twittering, facebooking, standing up, sitting down, walking, and speaking up. Silent acceptance is not an action.

Our children are so much more than test scores, and so are parents and teachers. Wake up Washington DC!

I am walking to DC,
Jesse