Education WarMartin Kozloff

2006You may have heard that there’s a war in education. This paper introduces the two main forces: the establishment and the emerging anti-establishment. The education establishment is home to “progressive” educators (constructivists, whole languagists, fuzzy mathists, multi-culturalists, advocates of “student-centered practices,” postmodernists) who range from liberal to radical left-wing and who occupy positions of power in school districts, state departments of public instruction, education schools and the organizations that certify them (such as National Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education), and curriculum organizations in reading, math, and social studies. The education anti-establishment consists of traditionalists or “instructivists” (Finn & Ravitch, 1996), who range from moderately liberal to conservative and who advocate technically proficient teacher-led instruction aimed at mastery of classical ideas and skills, and who therefore challenge progressive education doctrine and methods and offer clear field-tested alternatives (Rosenshine, 1986; Rosenshine & Stevens, 1986). The winner of the ed wars will determine the definition and aims of education; the guiding theory of how children learn; the most effective ways to teach reading, math, science, history and other bodies of knowledge; the moral responsibilities and accountability of states, districts, and ed schools for student achievement; and what teachers need to know and who should train and certify them. The table, below, describes some of the main differences in establishment vs. anti-establishment thinking.

Establishment (Progressive, Constructivist)

Anti-establishment (Traditional, Instructivist)

There are no facts, ideas, truths, or moral principles that exist independently of what persons and groups believe. All knowledge is a social construction. All knowledge is relative.

Facts, ideas, truths, and moral principles do exist independently of what persons and groups believe. Two times two equals four no matter whether persons say it equals six. Knowledge is an accurate representation of what exists. Knowledge is not relative, but its significance (importance, implications for action) may be.

The role of teacher is to guide or facilitate students’ discovery and construction of knowledge.

The role of teacher is to instruct. That is, to communicate in a clear and precise way so that students acquire knowledge—“get” the facts, ideas, truths, and moral principles that are revealed in literature, mathematical problems, historical documents, scientific experiments.

Since learning is discovering and constructing personal knowledge, the process is more important than what is learned. The process should be engaging, interesting, nurturing, and democratic.

Since learning is acquiring facts, ideas, truths, and moral principles imbedded in systems of knowledge, what is learned is most important. An engaging, interesting, nurturing, and democratic process is only a means to that end. It is not the end in itself.

Standardized achievement tests (e.g., in math, reading comprehension, and science) should not be used. They are unfair to certain groups, oversimplify learning, and are invalid.

Of course one test can’t measure everything that’s important, just as taking a person’s blood pressure does not say everything about the person. However, there are valid standardized tests, and they are useful for comparing groups of students or for comparing the same students at different times; e.g., how well students have learned to read with one vs. another curriculum. Without standardized tests you can’t make decisions about which curriculum is better.

The best form of assessment is students demonstrating their

The best form of assessment shows exactly what students are

process of discovery; for example, their reflections, their philosophy, what they think they’ve learned—organized into a portfolio.

learning as instruction goes along, and what they have mastered at the end. Of course students can reflect on the process, but the tangible outcome (how accurately they read, how well they articulate the main ideas in the Declaration of Independence) is the true test of the quality of instruction.

The purpose of education in a democratic, technically advanced, affluent society is 1. Self-development for both

teachers and students, in a quasi-therapeutic, “student-centered” environment.

2. The promotion of a just society, which requires a critique and often a rejection of traditional American social values, social instructions, and cultural traditions (e.g., capitalism, competition, and the idea that a two-parent family is a good idea).

3. Liberation of the individual (children, college professors) from the repressive and coercive force of social institutions (religion, family) and rules of reasoning which oblige a person to have sound evidence to support beliefs.

The purpose of education in a democratic, technically advanced, affluent society must be about the preservation and perfection of democratic social institutions through the intellectual and moral development of the individual (the two being inseparable) by ensuring that individuals acquire the knowledge required for their society’s functioning and betterment, and that persons learn how to think skillfully (reason) so that (knowing how to judge the adequacy of information and argumentation) they will be able to make wise and morally good personal and societal choices.

Social justice takes care of itself when students have an equal opportunity to learn and teachers know exactly how to teach.

Since moral principles are relative, there is no good and bad, no right and wrong. Students should be taught tolerance and acceptance of differences, and even to celebrate differences. “There is nothing good or bad; but thinking makes it so.” [Hamlet]

Treating moral principles as relative and rejecting the idea of good and bad, right and wrong, is acquiescing to the harm that some persons, groups, and societies do to women, children, and other targets of aggression and exploitation. Students should be taught to judge other groups and cultures the same way they

judge their own. “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.” [Edmund Burke]

Students should learn the basics (e.g., mathematical operations, phonics) in the context of “authentic” and “holistic” tasks (e.g., solving math problems, reading stories).

Students should learn the basics before they are expected to solve problems and read stories—which require the basics.

Who is the Education Establishment?The education establishment has controlled public schooling for at least 100 years. The establishment defines itself with terms such as progressive, child-centered, holistic, constructivist, and developmentally appropriate. These words are said to describe a coherent and research-validated philosophy of education, or pedagogy.  The education establishment also promotes curricula and instructional methods consistent with its progressive philosophy. Examples include:1. Constructivist math and reading curricula; e.g., whole language and

Reading Recovery—discussed in later chapters.2. So-called discovery or inquiry learning, even during initial

instruction, when students basically know nothing.3. An emphasis on process over achievements; e.g., children’s so-

called struggle to construct knowledge.4. A strong rejection of teaching subjects (drawn from traditional

bodies of knowledge) to the level of mastery in a logically progressive sequence of increasingly complex skills, with the teacher at first assuming a strong directive role providing extensive practice, systematic correction of errors, and regular assessment to monitor the effects of instruction.

One branch of the education establishment—calling itself critical pedagogy, critical ethnography, and postmodernist (Michael Apple, Peter McLaren, Henry Giroux, and Paulo Friere) is based on a marxian view of society, and has as its alleged aim the liberation of children from the oppression of schooling and other western social institutions and values. 

Who are the actors in the education establishment?   What are their roles?   The education establishment is a large assemblage of like-minded persons and organizations. There are education leaders and spokespersons, such as Alfie Kohn, Richard Allington, Linda Darling-Hammond, and David Berliner.  There are organizations that spread the dominant philosophy of progressivism, that certify the proper socialization (indoctrination) of teachers and administrators, and that legitimize establishment ideas and establishment-approved curricula and methods.  These organizations include NCATE (National Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education), NCTE (National Council for Teachers of English), INTASC (Interstate New Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium), NAEYC (National Association for the Education of Young Children), ISLLC (Interstate School Leaders Licensure Consortium), NCTM (National Council for Teachers of Mathematics), IRA (International Reading Association), NACTE (American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education), and the NEA (National Education Association).

There are publishers, such as Heinemann, who transform establishment ideas into sellable form for wider distribution. And there over 1400 schools of education. Judging from their mission statements, course syllabi, and faculty publications, ed schools with rare exceptions train new teachers within the boundaries of progressive dogma.  In this way, ed schools disseminate establishment ideas, values, and social agendas, and pass these on to the next generation of teachers.  And this helps sustain the establishment’s control over public schooling.

Ideas and Methods of the Progressive Education Establishment When you read or hear the following progressivist terms used to describe, advertise, or justify a teaching method (what educators like to call “practices”) or a curriculum (e.g., in math), you can be certain it’s not based on experimental research; it hasn’t been field tested; its not likely to work; it will harm children.1. “Best Practices.”

You will often hear progressivist teachers and education professors say

“Students should discover mathematical axioms for themselves. Discovery is a best practice.”

“Children should read authentic literature. Inauthentic literature is not best practice.” [What exactly is inauthentic literature? Literature that only pretends to be authentic?]

“Our school uses only best practices.” [What would you expect someone to say: “Our school uses only mediocre and/or really insane practices”?]

The term “best practices” is arrogant puffery. It has no substance. It’s a sack of wind. There has never been an experiment, and there never could be an experiment, that shows one practice or set of practices to be best. When “educators” say they use best practices, or say something like, “We don’t teach phonics. It’s not best practice,” ask them, “How can anyone know what’s best?” You’ll get a blank stare. They won’t even understand your question.

The phrase “best practice” is an ideological tool. It’s designed to sell teaching methods and social values that so-called progressive, “child-centered” educators want everyone else to use because these methods are consistent with their (false) view that American social institutions (family, religion, capitalism, government, education) are repressive. Therefore, the purpose of education, for them, is not to have children internalize the values and

skills that make American society possible. Rather, the purpose of education (and therefore the mission of progressives, who control education) is to “liberate” children from more traditional values and skills (hard work as the means to achievement and self-esteem; moral responsibility to the nation; assumption that there is such a thing as right and wrong, true and false; mastery of elementary skills as a prerequisite to higher-level skills; rational thinking), and to adopt other values and skills (multiculturalism; the relativity of morals and truth; the idea that feelings can replace reason as a guide to judgment; social justice—as progressives define it). Therefore, progressives Advocate children “discovering” and “constructing” knowledge,

and are against teachers “transmitting” knowledge. Are for “cooperative learning” and group consensus, and are

against individual competition, achievement, and recognition. Are for students selecting their own learning tasks and wandering

from one “learning center” to another, and are against students progressing within a planned, logical curriculum.

Want teachers to “adapt instruction for each learner” based on each student’s alleged “learning styles” and “multiple intelligences”--

which is impossible, because these do not exist--and are against teachers simply using curricula that work well for almost all students.

2. “Developmentally appropriate practices.” So-called “child-centered” “progressive” educators often talk like

this:“Teaching methods should be developmentally appropriate.”“Having children practice math facts is not developmentally

appropriate.”“Teaching young children phonics (the sounds that go with letters)

is not developmentally appropriate.”“Having young children spell correctly is not developmentally

appropriate. Teachers should encourage children to invent spelling.”The idea is that at certain ages children are ready to learn certain skills. Trying to teach skills for which they are not developmentally ready will produce frustration, strain, and failure.

This phrase—developmentally appropriate—sounds like it identifies what will work and what won’t work. But that’s not its function. Its function is to stifle thinking, cut off discussion, and to convince gullible education students, teachers, and parents to accept the teaching methods and curricula pushed by education progressives (for example, “inquiry learning,” “discovery learning,” “constructivism,” “whole language”) and to reject everything that progressives claim is not developmentally appropriate (phonics, extensive practice, systematic and teacher-directed instruction).

However, there is no serious research whatever to support claims about what is developmentally appropriate; for example, when to teach children to read or learn math; when children are ready to write full sentences; or when children can understand big ideas in history (such as democracy). Besides, how can anyone say what is developmentally appropriate for all children of a certain age, or even for one child of a certain age; or for children growing up in different ethnic groups and social classes? Impossible. As with every faddish progressive idea and curriculum, validation for establishment progressives does not require scientific research or data. Instead, validation is repetition of this vapid phrase—developmentally appropriate—until enough persons are saying it that there is mindless group consensus. In the field of education consensus is truth.

There is a harmful side. Many children are denied the systematic, teacher-directed instruction they need. For example, some advocates of “developmentally appropriate practices” believe that preschool kids should not be taught in a systematic fashion how to read, spell, think,

speak, and write. Maybe some kids don’t need this, but disadvantaged kids often do. So, advocates of “dap” either don’t know (are so blinded by their beliefs that they don’t care) that disadvantaged kids will be denied exactly the sort of instruction they need to catch up with their advantaged peers. This is how “educational philosophy” means the same as “the higher immorality.”3. “The teacher is a facilitator not a transmitter of knowledge. Students should discover and construct knowledge on their own.”

This is the mantra of “constructivism.” Constructivism is THE major theory (if you can call moonshine theory) in the field of education. It misguides almost everything that is done—from selection of objectives through evaluation. Constructivism asserts the following gibberish. http://people.uncw.edu/kozloffm/ContraConstructivism.html There is no such thing as knowledge (for example, history, or a

body of facts and laws in physics) external to the individual. Instead, knowledge is a construction BY the individual or group. Facts, evidence, proof, and truth are merely the result of group

consensus. Since there is no such thing as knowledge external to the

individual or group, teachers cannot transmit knowledge and students cannot take in, get, or acquire knowledge from another person. Rather, individuals and groups must construct knowledge as they interact with each other and with the physical world.

This weird philosophy (which makes perfect sense to progressive education professors) challenges the basic fact that the world exists independently of what we think of it. Regardless of how a person constructs beliefs about gravity, he or she can’t jump more than a few feet straight up and will come right back down. But weirdness and defiance of reality and common sense never stop the education establishment from pushing crackpot pedagogies on schools and

teachers. So, constructivism leads to advocacy of “instruction” that is “student-centered” and student led—in which the teacher does not try to impart or “transmit” knowledge but merely facilitates students’ inquiry and knowledge construction. (Constructivists assume—wrongly—that children come equipped with the observation and reasoning skills needed to construct knowledge without intensive teacher direction. This is of course absurd and destructive.) Constructivist theory bitterly opposes pre-planned, step-by-step curricula; memorization of essential facts and rules; lecture; performance assessment; and grading based on the notion that there are right and wrong answers. Imagine what sort of knowledge students end up with in math, science, history, and literature when they construct knowledge of these subjects (which means they often construct nonsense). It’s not what Shakespeare has to say. (For constructivists, Shakespeare has nothing to say.) It’s the student’s “take” on Shakespeare that’s important. The historical record reveals no laws. (For constructivists, history has no laws.) Historical events are merely a “text” that students interpret. One student’s construction is as valid—because it feels right—as another’s. (Which is reasonable because they become equally ignorant.)

Would you want your children’s physicians to have been taught this way—discovering how to do surgery rather than being taught systematically and directly by a master surgeon? Would you want your children to discover how to swim by being “immersed” in the ocean? Of course not. This sort of anti-intellectual solipsism (reality is what I take it to be) can exist only in a field that doesn’t receive immediate adverse consequences for making a hash of children’s minds and lives and teachers’ careers. How so-called progressive educators can advocate (in fact, insist on) “inquiry” methods regarding reading, spelling, math, and science is no longer a great mystery. Staggering ignorance, arrogance, and skill at deception are possible answers.

4. “Homogeneous grouping for a short time each day for certain subjects based on students’ current skills is bad. It lowers self esteem and creates tracks. It is discrimination. Students with different levels of skill should be in the same (heterogeneous) groups”

Homogeneous grouping means that students in the same class or across classes are given a pre-test to see where they place in a curriculum (math, for example). The very beginning? A dozen lessons in? A higher-level? Students are then grouped, temporarily, for instruction with other kids at the same place in the curriculum. This means that each group works at the right tasks and receives the amount of teacher-directedness and practice needed. If done correctly, students are moved to faster groups depending on their progress.

To me, homogeneous grouping serves the value of equity: kids get what they need. However, homogeneous grouping is rejected by establishment education progressives. They claim that homogeneous grouping is somehow anti-democratic and lowers self-esteem. But the data say quite the opposite. It works. In fact, progressives reject homogeneous grouping because in rejecting it they get to mouth their self-serving claims about working for social justice. But by forcing kids into heterogeneous groups (mixtures of kids with high, average, and low skill), progressives deny many kids the amount of close instruction they need. This produces injustice. Because in mixed groupings kids with the strongest backgrounds move the fastest and the rest fall behind and feel like morons.5. “It’s better for teachers not to correct students’ errors immediately. Error correction makes students dependent on the teacher. Students should discover errors themselves and learn to correct them.”

This is another (false) notion that is based strictly on ideology—that when teachers control instruction (decide what is correct and

incorrect, expect mastery) it is repressive. In fact, research on error correction shows that failure to correct errors results in chronic error patterns and worsening knowledge gaps. For example, if a teacher does not immediately correct reading errors, a student will not be able to read math problems accurately either. Timely error correction yields higher achievement and self-esteem.6. “Frequently practice (drill) is not an effective way to foster mastery and self-esteem. Frequent practice inhibits creativity and is boring. “Drill and kill!”

In other words, practice allegedly kills interest and motivation. There is absolutely no research to support this bogus claim. In contrast, 100 years of serious research shows that practice makes perfect and that perfection makes for pride. Ask any musician, dancer, writer, karate master, marksman, cook, medical intern, or barber. But practice, for progressives, is a bad thing. 7. “Teachers should not use commercial programs. They should create their own curricula and lesson plans.”

Progressives professors in ed schools (which is most professors in ed schools) tell ed students that they should invent their own math, reading, and science programs. Why? They say that using commercial programs disempowers teachers and stifles creativity. This is nonsense. Using a field-tested and effective program (e.g., to teach beginning reading) will enable a teacher to be more effective. In fact, all of the serious professions (medicine, engineering, architecture, accounting) create protocols (techniques) for accomplishing routine tasks (surgery, designing buildings, examining the books), and skilled professionals follow the protocols. The place for creativity is not in reinventing the wheel, but in adapting the protocols in unusual situations; e.g., when a program does not seem adequate for some students.

Besides, teachers are not prepared to develop and test curricula. Teachers take perhaps one course in instructional design. Nor do they

have the time. It takes years to write and field test a program for teaching even one year of a subject (say, first grade math). When will the teacher do that? And what will she do when she finds out that today’s lesson was not well-designed and did not work? Will she revise it overnight and try again the next day? And what about the hundred other lessons that will not work, and need revision? Is that why the public sends its kids to public schools—so that teachers who have virtually no training in instructional design will experiment on their children?

Let’s be honest. The reason education progressives—the establishment—do not want teachers to use commercial curricula developed and tested by professional curriculum designers, is to maintain their monopoly. If enough schools used effective commercial programs, the education professors, gurus, conference organizers, and curriculum consultants would be out of business. If ed school students knew they could teach beginning reading simply by using Teach your child to read in 100 easy lessons (Twenty dollars from Simon and Schuster) why would they take three ed school courses in “literacy”—and still end up incompetent? The same goes for math, science, history, literature, and other subjects, for which there are many excellent, field-tested programs, easily available from Singapore Math, Saxon Math, Sopris West, Curriculum Associates, SRA McGraw-Hill, Core Knowledge and other publishers. Indeed, you can get effective programs right off the internet.8. “Higher-order thinking.”

This is another of the assorted trite and meaningless phrases in establishment education.

“We don’t work on elementary math routines first. We work on higher- order math skills, as in solving problems.”

“We don’t have students memorize facts. That’s rote learning. We want students to ask and to answer authentic questions.”

Talk about irony! Higher-order thinking is almost as rare as technical proficiency in the field of education. The purpose of this 50 cent phrase is merely to make education professors and other progressives look scholarly. The field is loaded with new words for old stuff. “Sustained silent reading” = “Read to yourself.” “Cooperative learning” = “Work as a group.” “Multiple intelligences”= “Some kids draw better than other kids.” “Construct knowledge” = “Figure it out.” “Portfolio”= “My junk in a scrapbook.” “Portfolio assessment” = “Let’s see the junk in your scrapbook.” “Reflection” = “How do you know?”9. “Reflection.”

“We want our students to be reflective learners.”“Reflection is key to higher-order thinking.”“Portfolios foster reflection.”

Some establishment educators never tire of using this word and associated practices, such as journal writing, because it’s easier than teaching. Instead of ensuring that students know the meanings of words in Shakespeare plays, the interplay of characters, the nature of a tragedy (which requires knowing Shakespeare and teaching in a systematic way—which few teachers are taught how to do), teachers dumb down instruction and ask students to reflect on what they read; i.e., to talk about how it makes them feel. “Okay, everyone, so how do you think Anne Frank felt living in that closet with her family. That wouldn’t be much fun, huh?” Of course, students are taught nothing about fascism, because the teacher herself doesn’t know. After all, she majored in education, not history. In other words, “reflection” disguises superficiality. Much in education is exactly that: disguising ineptitude, as you will see in later chapters.

The nine items of nonsense above are part of the core curriculum in most of the 1400 schools of education in this country. Teacher

candidates hear the phrases and learn to repeat them every day for years in their courses. Graduate school in education (especially in reading and elementary education) is merely a refresher in moronitude. In the end, it’s not teaching proficiency that graduates bring to their own classrooms. It’s skill at saying the phrases—which is little help when, finally, they are responsible for the serious business of teaching, which requires more than slogans.

Here are some internet addresses for leaders of the education establishment.1. Whole language at http://www.google.com/search?

q=whole+language&btnG=Google+Search&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF8&oe=UTF8

2.  Developmentally appropriate practices at http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF8&oe=UTF8&q=developmentally+appropriate+practices

3. Critical pedagogues.  Michael Apple, Peter MacLaren, Henry Giroux, and Paulo Friere http://carbon.cudenver.edu/~mryder/itc_data/crit_ped.html

http://www.wvu.edu/~lawfac/jelkins/critproj/pedagogy.html

4. Alfie Kohn  http://www.alfiekohn.org/ 5. Organizations that promulgate and legitimize the dominant ideas and

practices, and ensure the indoctrination of teachers via certification. a.  NCATE  http://www.ncate.org/ b.  NBPTS   http://www.nbpts.org/ c.  NCTM   http://www.nctm.org/ d.  NAEYC  http://www.naeyc.org/ e.  NCTE  http://www.ncte.org/f.   NCSS (social studies.)  The font of multi-cultibabble  at

http://www.ncss.org .  

6. A list of ed schools at http://www.alleducationschools.com/find/ Examine their mission statements and “conceptual frameworks.” They are models of delusional thinking, and they all say the same thing.

7. Praxis exams.  The Praxis is one of the ways ed students are certified. The Praxis has nothing to do with how exactly to teach anything. It really tests the degree of indoctrination.  Since most students pass, ed schools  look good.  “99% of our students pass the PRAXIS.”  http://www.ets.org/praxis/Note the superficial fluff and the absence of anything on teaching here.  http://ftp.ets.org/pub/tandl/0522.pdf                      Who is the Education Anti-establishment

For the past hundred or so years, the progressivist establishment of education professors, education gurus (John Dewey and William Kilpatrick in the early part of the 20th century; Paul Goodman, Kenneth Goodman, Linda Darling-Hammond, Ernst von Glassersfeld, Alfie Kohn, and Harvey Daniels in recent decades), and education organizations (National Council for Teachers of English, National Association for the Education of Young Children, National Council for Teachers of Mathematics) has sustained dominion over public education—dominion over what is taught in public schools, how it is taught, how instruction will be evaluated, what education means, how learning is understood, what a good teacher is, and how a person becomes a teacher.

This would be fine if core establishment ideas had a passing acquaintance with common sense, if progressive instructional “practices” were tested and validated by scientific research, and if the “holistic” and “inquiry-based” curricula that they teach (and require new teachers to use; e.g., whole language, constructivist math and science, open classrooms, politically correct history) actually yielded education students. But they don’t. And the result is the:1. High rate of student illiteracy in reading and math.

2. Low level of students’ knowledge of history, logic, and science.3. High rate of teacher burnout from too many years trying to get students engaged and learning using methods derived from education professors’ pseudo-progressive “student-centered” fantasies—which are disastrous for students and teachers but do help professors to get publications, royalties, tenure, and nice retirement annuities. Thankfully, enough parents, consumer organizations, state legislators, serious educational researchers, and even federal agencies (the emerging anti-establishment) have tied together three simple facts that escape the education establishment:1. Too many students aren’t learning much.2. This has something to do with how kids are taught, or mistaught.3. This is not good for our country.And therefore, our nation has begun to look at scientific research to determine which methods of instruction and which curricula in reading, math, and other subjects work best and which do not, and to critically examine what is taught in schools of education. See, for example,Cheri Pierson Yecke, The war against excellence, Praeger, 2003. Rita Kramer, Ed School Follies, Authors Guild Backinprint.com, 2000.E. D. Hirsch, The schools we need and why we don’t have them, Anchor Books, 1999.J. Martin Rochester, Class warfare, Encounter Books, 2002.Diane Ravitch, Left back, a century of failed school reforms, Simon & Schuster, 2000.Laurence Steinberg, Beyond the classroom, Touchstone, 1996.Maureen Stout, The feel-good curriculum, Perseus Publishing, 2000Charles Sykes, Dumbing down our kids, St. Martin’s Griffin, 1995.Martin L. Gross, The conspiracy of ignorance, Perennial, 1999.Elaine McEwan, Angry parents, failing schools, Harold Shaw Publishers, 1998.

http://www.nationalreadingpanel.org http://www.mathematicallycorrect.com.

The opposition, or anti-establishment, consists of scholars (such as E.D. Hirsch, Jr., Diane Ravitch, Chester Finn, Martin Rochester, Thomas Sowell, John Stone, Lynne Cheney, Sandra Stotsky, Christina Hoff Sommers, Lisa Delpit, Richard Mitchell, and the National Association of Scholars) who critically examine empirically empty, educationally destructive, so-called progressive, Romantic modernist beliefs and practices at the core of establishment doctrine. There are researchers, such as Mike Podgursky (on whether NCATE approval and National Board certification have anything to do with teacher quality), Eric Hanushek (on whether advanced teacher training makes a difference), Lance Izumi and the Pacific Research Institute (who show how ed schools refuse to alter the constructivist core of their curricula despite major shifts in research and education policy), and Barak Rosenshine, Edwin Ellis, Robert Dixon, Edward Kameenui, Deborah Simmons, Jerry Brophy, Barbara Foorman, and many others on designing effective instruction.

There are foundations and unions (such as Heartland, Council for Basic Education, No Excuses, National Right to Read, Heritage, Fordham, and the American Federation of Teachers) that advocate research-based curricula, greater consumer control, and argue for either radical reform of schools of education or their replacement by more effective and less expensive alternatives. There are consumer organizations and movements, such as Education Consumers, Oregon Education Consumers, http://www.mathematicallycorrect.com, homeschooling, and vouchers. There are national organizations (such as the National Council on Teacher Quality, the Education Trust) that are critical of progressivist ideologies and social agendas, and are creating alternative forms of

teacher preparation and certification that could be adopted by states. Finally, there is the federal government (specifically, the Department of Education) that has criticized ed school curricula; presented an alternative description of what effective instruction looks like; developed an alternative, research-validated description of effective reading and early language instruction; identified the minimum set of skills new teachers need; and, through the incentive of grant money, is encouraging states to reform everything from their conception of reading acquisition down to how ed schools train new teachers to teach reading. The education anti-establishment is larger than it has ever been.  Its criticisms of dominant, progressive/constructivist philosophy and curricula are highly focused and widely shared within the anti-establishment (in other words, the anti-establishment is cohesive and has a focused mission). It is vocal.  And some of its members and organizations have control over money, law, regulations, and certification. 

Current activities at federal and state levels challenge the education establishment and are providing concrete opportunities to replace failed progressive ideas and practices with logical and scientifically validated ones. Examples include (1) No Child Left Behind (despised by the progressive establishment); (2) Reading First—which provides grants to states contingent upon using effective reading instruction; (3) critical examinations of education schools; (4) revisions of state standard courses of study to replace vague objectives with concrete ones and to add essential skills; (5) charter and home schooling; and (5) alternative forms of teacher training and certification (e.g., the American Board for the certification of Teacher Excellence). The more the public can do to support these efforts, the more likely the education war will be won by the right side.

Serious Instruction Advocated by the Education Anti-establishmentHere, in a nutshell, is what you do want to see. Following are some of the core ideas and instructional methods advocated by the anti-establishment, who want to see fundamental changes in schools of education and education generally. The anti-establishment wants to replace education professors’ speculations, bright ideas, and preferences with methods that have been validated by scientific research. It wants schools to replace indoctrination in social engineering with instruction in the values and skills needed to sustain a democratic republic. It wants to replace feel-good classrooms that resemble therapeutic communities with serious study needed for mastery. It wants to transform anomic (normless) school environments that foster egoism, defiance, and apathy (so that schools gradually resemble prisons, with a sheriff’s deputy on every floor) into places that require respect for teachers, learning, and self.1. The teacher knows and can state exactly what she wants students to learn at all times; i.e., she can say exactly what students will be able to do.

If teachers can’t state objectives clearly and precisely (and most teachers can’t), it means that they don’t know what they are doing. Imagine an operation performed by surgeon who doesn’t know what every movement of the scalpel is supposed to accomplish. Here are examples of the vague objectives you will see on student-centered progressivist lesson plans. These vague objectives are consistent with education professors’ opposition to what they consider the tyranny of precision and the oppression of accountability. That’s what they pass on to teachers. See if these objectives tell you what to teach and how to assess what you have taught.

“The student will appreciate different literary genres.”“The student will demonstrate skill at simple addition.”

“The student will be able to decode words.” “The student will understand the difference between

democratic and nondemocratic political systems.”Contrast the above vague objectives with the following—objectives

crafted by an anti-establishment teacher who is concerned with outcomes.

“I am teaching the strategy for decoding words.  By the end of the week, students will correctly sound out nine out of ten words within one minute: sit, cat, sam, am, can, man, fit, mat, ram, and ran.”

“I am teaching the concept democracy.  By the end of the lesson, students will state the verbal definition of democracy, identify democratic and nondemocratic forms of political society from a

sample, and create examples and nonexamples of democracies.”“I am increasing fluency at math facts.  By the end of the week, students will solve at least 15 one-digit addition and subtraction problems per minute with at least 90 percent accuracy.”

When objectives are this clear, teachers are able to plan exactly what and how to teach and how to evaluate what students have learned.  2. The teacher stays focused and keeps students focused on the task (the clearly-defined objective) at hand. 

Lectures, demonstrations, and discussions do not wander off. The teacher does not make irrelevant commentary or give excessive explanations. Here is what you do not want to see.

“Boys and girls. This is the letter m. It says mmm, like a cow. What does a cow say? moo. Can you think of a word that has mmm? moon.”The objective should be that students connect m with “mmm.” But the teacher--dumbed down by progressivist literacy professors at a school of education--has thrown in so much other stuff that many students will not get m says mmm. Here is what you do want to see—focused

instruction.“Boys and girls. Here (points to m on the board) is a new sound. Listen...mmm. Say it with me (points to the m). mmm. Your

turn. What sound? mmm. Yes, mmm. Again (points), what sound? mmm. Yes, mmm.”Notice that when instruction focuses on exactly what you want students to learn to do (say mmm when they see m), instruction is very likely to be effective. Does that sound like commonsense—focusing instruction on clear objectives? Well, it’s not common sense in the field of education. 3. The teacher moves at a brisk pace—to sustain attention and get more taught.

What music do kids like? Slow or fast? Which do kids prefer to do: walk or run down the hall? If instruction plods along, students soon zone out. In addition, if teachers speed up instruction (how quickly they speak; how fast the back-and-forth interaction moves) so that the class is focused on objectives for only five more minutes every half hour, that amounts to 50 additional instructional minutes each day, and 30 full days per year. Instruction should be perky.4. The teacher corrects errors immediately. 

Instead of expecting students to catch and correct their own errors, a technically proficient teacher uses a format that quickly reteaches or firms up weak knowledge. For example, the sentence says, “She stepped on the twig and it went ‘snap’.” But the student reads “She stepped on the twig and it went ‘slap’.” An effective correction is:

“That word is snap.  What word? snap.  Spell snap. s  n  a  p.  What word? snap. Okay, start that sentence again.”5. The teacher immediately tests or checks whether students are getting what (the objective) she’s is trying to teach.

“State our definition of democracy.”

“Okay, your turn to read these words.”“Now, you solve this problem yourselves.” 

If students make errors, the teacher re-teaches the problem spot.  This shows that the teacher understands that: The only valid measure of teaching effectiveness is students’

using what the teacher taught. If the teacher taught the strategy for decoding (sounding out) words, then students will accurately sound out new words.

You must check teaching effectiveness every single time you teach something new—the next letter-sound relationship (r says rrr); the next vocabulary word (“What’s another word that means to sustain?”), the next rule (“If we subtract a number from one side of the equation, what do we do to the other side?”); the next fact (“How many amendments are in the Bill of Rights?”).  This means that the teacher might be checking understanding every 15 seconds in some cases.

6. The teacher asks questions of the whole group, and has the whole group respond together. 

“Who wrote the first draft of the Declaration of Independence?”  The teacher also calls on individual students, and the teacher asks the question first. 

“When was the Declaration signed?  (Pause for think time)  Johnny.”7. The teacher gives specific praise. 

“Excellent for reading that passage with no errors!”  Not, “Good reading.”

8. Instruction is a logically progressive sequence.  It begins with elementary skills (e.g., counting, math facts); and

moves to increasingly complex skills (adding, subtracting; solving word problems; and then using these skills in other places; e.g., adding the number of plates and cups in a cupboard at home).  Students are

always taught pre-skills needed for next lessons.9. The curriculum focuses on a skill (e.g., the strategy for multiplying two-digit numbers) until it is mastered before the teacher moves to another kind of skill (e.g., decimals). 

Otherwise, students master nothing, and basically have to start all over next year.10. The teacher works on all phases of the mastery process.

Education schools are guided largely by progressive social agendas and by professors’ faddish ideas. For example, a few professors in a college read about “multiple intelligences” and get all excited. “Oooo, this sounds important. Also, it gives us something to publish.” Pretty soon half the courses in the ed school are telling ed students to “foster development in the whole child by designing instruction so that all intelligences are covered (social, emotional, artistic, physical, mathematical).” Sadly, there is no such thing as multiple intelligences.

Teacher education is so disconnected to scientific research on learning and instruction that graduates of teacher colleges don’t even know that there are phases of mastery. If you say the names of these phases, they will not tell you what the words mean. And they have no idea how to provide instruction for these phases.

Instruction based on scientific research—advocated by the education anti-establishment--recognizes that mastering a subject or a skill involves progress through at least five phases. Here they are. Acquisition. This is the first phase. Student “get” it. Accuracy

is the aim. Student accurately sound out words, solve long division problems, or state differences between feudalism and capitalism. Very few teachers work on any of the later phases. They never heard of them. That’s why students forget most of what they were taught.

Fluency. The student is both accurate and fast. The definitions, rules, and strategies (e.g., for solving equations) are so internalized that the student hardly has to think about what she is doing. Fluency instruction involves teacher demonstrations, scheduled practice, and short “speed drills.”

Generalization. During the first phase—acquisition—the teacher uses examples to get the idea (a fact, concept, rule, strategy) across. But the point of education is to apply knowledge to new examples. Technically- proficient teachers work on generalization by selecting new examples that make generalization easy; they show how the old and new examples have the same essential features and therefore should be treated the same way; they give students practice at applying acquired knowledge to the new examples; and they continually add new examples.

Retention. Teachers are generally not taught to think about retaining knowledge over time and across learning new material. However, technically-proficient teachers do realize they must plan and provide instruction on retention. They do this by scheduled review and practice; teaching students routines for checking and correcting their own work; and separating instruction on material that may be confusing (e.g., they teach metaphor and simile at different times).

11. Homework is not used to teach the skill; e.g., how to multiply, or how to spell new words, or how to write a paper. 

Work on the acquisition phase should be done in school.  Homework is used to generalize or apply skills learned in school.

Here are important persons, writings, and websites from the anti-establishment.A. Critiques of the Establishment1. E. D. Hirsch, The schools we need and why we don’t have them,

Anchor Books, 19992. Martin L. Gross, The conspiracy of ignorance, Perennial, 1999.3. Rita Kramer, Ed School Follies, Authors Guild Backinprint.com,

2000.4. Elaine McEwan, Angry parents, failing schools, Harold Shaw

Publishers, 1998.5. Melanie Phillips, All must have prizes, 1998.6. J. Martin Rochester, Class warfare, Encounter Books, 2002.7. Diane Ravitch, 2003). The language police. Knopf, 2003.8. Diane Ravitch, Left back, a century of failed school reforms,

Simon & Schuster, 2000.9. Laurence Steinberg, Beyond the classroom, Touchstone, 1996.10. Maureen Stout, The feel-good curriculum, Perseus Publishing,

2000.11. Sandra Stotsky, Losing our language. New York: Free Press,

1999.12. Charles Sykes, Dumbing down our kids, St. Martin’s Griffin, 1995.13. Cheri Pierson Yecke, The war against excellence, Praeger, 2003.14. Chris Woodhead, Class war, Little, Brown, 2002.B. Scholars and Organizations1.  Richard Mitchell, The Underground Grammarian.  “The Graves of

Academe” and “The Holistic Hustle.”  Online at http://www.sourcetext.com/grammarian/

2. J.E. Stone.  “Developmentalism: An Obscure but Pervasive Restriction on Educational Improvement.”  On-line at http://olam.ed.asu.edu/epaa/v4n8.html

3. Grossen, B.  (1998).  “What does it mean to be a research based teaching profession?”  On line at http://www.higherscores.org/

4. The case against teacher certification.  See also Mike Podgursky’s critiques of NCATE, national boards, and teacher certification.  At http://www.missouri.edu/~econ4mp/Downloadable_Articles.htmhttp://www.missouri.edu/~econ4mp/Downloadable_Papers

5. Eric Hanushek’s critiques of the assertion that class size and advanced teacher training make a difference in student achievement http://edpro.stanford.edu/eah/eah.htm

6. Lance Izumi’s and K. Gwynne Coburn’s critique of constructivist curricula in schools of education, Facing the classroom challenge: Teacher quality and teacher training in California’s schools of education, at http://www.pacificresearch.org/pub/sab/educat/facing_challenge/challenge.pdf

7. Pacific Research Institute at http://www.pacificresearch.org8. Education Consumers at http://www.education-consumers.com/

See articles by John Stone. 9. Fordham Foundation at http://www.edexcellence.net/  See this on

social studies (history stripped on content and lessons)  http://www.edexcellence.net/foundation/publication/publication.cfm?id=317

10. “The Tyranny of dogma.” Chester Finn & Dianne Ravitch, at http://www.edexcellence.net/foundation/publication/publication.cfm?id=192

11.  Hoover Institution at http://www-hoover.stanford.edu/research/k-12initiative/k12publications.html

12.  National Council For Teacher Quality.  Alternative certification at http://www.nctq.org/

13.  Education Leaders Council at http://www.educationleaders.org

14.  Dale Ballou.  Better Teachers... at http://www.edexcellence.net/foundation/publication/publication.cfm?id=15

15. Diane Ravitch at www.dianeravitch.com16. John Gatto at http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/17.  American Federation of Teachers (AFT) on reading 

http://www.aft.org/pubs-reports/american_educator/issues/index.htm and math  http://www.aft.org/pubs-reports/american_educator/fall99/wu.pdf

C.  Breaking the EduMonopoly1. Roger Bacon Academy and Charter Day School at

http://www.rogerbacon.net/2. Morningside Academy at http://www.morningsideacademy.org/3. Arthur Academy at http://www.arthuracademy.org/4.  Classical Charter School at http://www.classicalcharter.com/5.  US Charter Schools at

http://www.uscharterschools.org/pub/uscs_docs/index.htm6.  Baltimore Curriculum Project at http://www.baltimorecp.org/7.  American Board for the Certification of Teacher Excellence at

http://www.abteach.org/handbook_information.html8.  Home schoolers. 

http://homeschooling.gomilpitas.com/http://www.midnightbeach.com/hs/http://www.mises.org/fullstory.aspx?control=1167http://www.homeeducator.com/FamilyTimes/current.htm http://www.home-school.com/ http://www.hslda.org/

D.  Scientific Research on Sound Instructional Design and Effective Curricula (Not Child-Centered, Constructivist Hugger-muggery)

1.  Barak Rosenshine’s papers at http://www.uncwil.edu/people/kozloffm/rosenshine.html

2.  Papers on effective instruction at http://www.usu.edu/teachall3.  Ellis et al., “Research synthesis on effective teaching principles

and the design of quality tools for educators.” On-line at http://idea.uoregon.edu/~ncite/documents/techrep/tech06.html andhttp://idea.uoregon.edu/~ncite/documents/techrep/tech05.pdf

4.  Grossen, B. et al.,  “Reading Recovery: An evaluation of costs and benefits. On-line at http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~bgrossen/rr.htm

5.  Effective reading instruction and arguments against whole language at http://people.uncw.edu/kozloffm/reading.html

6.  Anderson, J.R., et al. Applications and Misapplications of Cognitive Psychology to  Mathematics.  Department of Psychology, Carnegie Mellon University. On-line at http://act.psy.cmu.edu/personal/ja/misapplied.html

7. Dixon, R. “Review of High Quality Experimental Mathematics Research.” University of Oregon.  National Center to Improve the Tools of Educators. On-line at http://idea.uoregon.edu/~ncite/documents/math/math.html

8. Critiques of constructivist math.   Mathematically Correct at http://www.mathematicallycorrect.com/

9. Heartland Institute: School Reform News at http://www.heartland.org/

10. Market Driven Schooling; e.g., vouchers “Understanding market-based school reform.”  Walberg, H.J., & Bast, J.L. (1998).  Heartland Institute. Online at http://www.heartland.org

11.  Publishers of scientifically researched curricula: a. Sopris West http://www.sopriswest.com

b. Curriculum Associates http://www.curriculumassociates.comc. SRA/McGraw-Hill

http://www.sraonline.com/index.php/home/curriculumsolutions/di/9

12.  Federal and state government: money, law, certification, moral leadership. Examples include the Reading First Program, large-scale research on reading, and research reviews.  See http://www.ed.gov/offices/OESE/reading_resources.html SummaryThis chapter revealed some of the core ideas and practices advocated, disseminated, and defended by the progressive education establishment. These ideas and practices are based largely on political ideology, speculation, intuition, and personal preference—feelings. They are disseminated via education school courses and teacher licensure, by curricular organizations (such as the National Association for the Education of Young Children), and by organizations that certify (legitimize) schools of education (e.g., the National Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education). These ideas and practice are embedded in state and school district curricula and standard courses of study, in student textbooks (e.g., math, history) and other teaching materials, and in classroom instruction. They are directly responsible for the generally low level of intellectuality fostered in schools, the blasé and often hostile attitudes of students to schooling (repetitive, empty, superficial, plodding, low expectations), low student achievement, and teacher burn out.

The chapter also presented core ideas and practices advocated by the education anti-establishment. These are derived largely from logic, scientific research, and from the idea that the purpose of education in a democratic republic is to inculcate the attitudes, character, and knowledge necessary to sustain vital social institutions, not to “liberate”

(alienate) the individual and thereby destroy those institutions.