This is the Reading Instruction Show.
I'm your host as always, Dr. Andy Johnson.
The topic of today's podcast is called a sane person's guide for addressing academic
standards for writing.
Now the impact of academic standards on students' ability to actually write is questionable.
Some believe that they impede more than an enhanced effective writing instruction.
However, academic standards are part of our current educational life.
Hence this podcast where I will present some ideas for evaluating and assessing academic
standards related to writing and pragmatically documenting students mastery of them.
So let's first talk about teaching to an academic standard.
At first we should not allow academic standards to narrowly define our writing curriculum.
Quite frankly many of the academic standards related to writing are silly at best and counterproductive
at worst.
There's a grand bit of mistaking going around that if you create a whole bunch of academic
standards and force teachers to teach them that a whole bunch of learning will take place.
It's somehow assumed that good standards teaching is good teaching.
This of course is a fallacy based not on research but on a whole bunch of I thinkisms.
Here's the simple truth about academic standards.
There's generally too many of them.
A few standards are good but that doesn't mean that a whole bunch of standards are better.
You can't standard your way to good education.
Good education comes from good teachers.
Too many academic standards clutter up the teaching process and disallow good teachers
to be good teachers.
Some teacher then find themselves teaching standards and not students and this is not
good.
Now if you really wanted to improve our educational systems I mean really and ask yourself if
that's something you really want to do there would be far fewer academic standards.
As a matter of fact you could improve education significantly by having a single standard
for every school and here is that single standard.
If this one standard was held for every school our education would be better than it is today.
Average superior and here it is.
Every classroom will have a well-paid knowledgeable creative and intelligent teacher who is empowered
to use their knowledge creativity and intelligence to design the kinds of learning experiences
that enable all students to achieve their full potential.
That's it.
Now this would mean of course that our educational systems would stop investing in academic standards
and standardized tests and expensive one size fits all programs.
We would instead invest in good teachers and high quality teacher professional development
but that's not going to happen.
So let's look at how to effectively teach toward an academic standard and we'll start
by defining our terms.
An academic standard defines what you want students to know or be able to do in a general
sense.
Now here's an example of a third grade standard the Minnesota academic standard for writing
here's just one standard.
The standard is students will demonstrate knowledge of oral language, orthography, grammar and
mechanics to express ideas.
Demonstrate knowledge of oral language, orthography, grammar and mechanics to express ideas.
Okay very good nothing wrong with that.
A benchmark in education of the products or performances used to determine if students
have met a standard.
Now benchmarks must be measurable or observable.
This means it could be a student product found in a portfolio or a measure of that product
using a checklist or a rubric.
Benchmarks are used to help you meet the standard and to document that the standard is being
met.
Now for that first standard there are three benchmarks.
One use correct punctuation, spelling, capitalization and grammar authentically in writing.
That's the first one.
Benchmark two, apply spelling patterns and rules to spell multi-syllabic words, high-frequency
words authentically in writing.
And benchmark number three, use nouns, verbs, frequently used adjectives and adverbs, conjunctions,
prepositions and pronouns in simple and compound sentences authentically in writing.
By the way what are the frequently used adjectives and adverbs?
It really doesn't tell us.
So let's do a little bit of unpackorating.
The first step in teaching toward an academic standard is to unpack the standard.
With each standard you must ask what exactly does it mean and what does it ask for?
For example in that standard what does it mean to demonstrate knowledge of oral language,
orthography, grammar and mechanics to express ideas in writing.
Do all these things in order to express ideas in writing?
Well demonstrate knowledge of oral language.
They can speak correctly.
Demonstrate knowledge of orthography, they can spell correctly.
Demonstrate knowledge of grammar, they can use words correctly and construct sentences
that are grammatically correct.
Demonstrate knowledge of mechanics, they can use capitalization and punctuation correctly
and express ideas in writing.
Here they must demonstrate this knowledge of all the above within the context of authentic
writing.
Not on the standardized test.
Authentic writing to express their ideas.
Those are the standard.
The benchmark, the second step in teaching toward an academic standard is to unpack the
benchmarks.
Now keep in mind that learning related to benchmarks does not occur in one or two lessons.
Most often you'll need to teach and reteach and review and reinforce the benchmark skill
over time using many lessons.
When it appears that students have mastered the benchmark then you'll design the product
or performance to demonstrate and document mastery.
So let's unpack just one of the benchmarks to try to get a sense of what it calls for.
The benchmark number one, use correct punctuation, spelling, capitalization and grammar, use
all things authentically in writing.
So to unpack this, this means that they can produce a written document that does not have
errors related to punctuation, spelling, capitalization and grammar.
Gives us a sense of what to teach but what it means in other words is you teach students
how to use a spell check and a grammar check.
In the real world that's what you do you see.
We want to make what we do in the classroom reflect reality to the greatest extent possible.
I'm not giving weekly spelling tests.
I send out articles and I have to have the words spelled correctly so I use spell check
and grammar check.
So here's the big unpack.
What that first standard is really calling for is for students to be able to write using
correct spelling, punctuation and grammar in their authentic writing.
This standard provides some ideas for the types of things you might teach but mastering
all the benchmarks does not assume that these sub skills will transfer to real life writing
situations.
And as I said, a spell check and grammar check function addresses much of what's asked for
in this first standard.
However, to be pragmatic and to be sane and to demonstrate and document most benchmark
standards related to writing, you create a very simple checklist.
Students would then submit a sample of the writing and the checklist would have the things
you're looking for, the traits and you'd rate the degree to which each element on that
checklist is present.
The numbers used on this type of rating checklist enable you to quantify students' ability
to meet each standard.
And how wonderful is that?
Checklists could be submitted separately or stapled to the front of a writing sample.
That would demonstrate and document that they met that standard.
Now you could also create a checklist with each of the benchmark skills on it and when
students demonstrate mastery of a benchmark skill in their writing, you check it off with
the date and the title of the paper.
Whenever dealing with standards and benchmarks, the key is to keep it simple, simple, simple.
Now a distinction needs to be made between academic standards and curriculums.
When academic standard defines in a general sense the concepts and skills to be learned.
Academic standards should be used to inform curriculums but they should not be a curriculum.
A curriculum is a systematic plan for instruction designed by teachers within a school district
or at various grade levels for each subject area.
It describes what specific concepts and skills are taught in what general order and in what
context.
Curriculums are usually designed by teachers based on their knowledge of the content, their
knowledge of their students' developmental levels, interests and needs, and their pedagogical
content knowledge.
That's the knowledge of how to teach various subjects.
They use all this.
They're in the best position to design curriculum.
This points to the need for knowledgeable teachers and the importance of continued professional
development.
Now, planning and designing a writing curriculum is beyond the scope of this current podcast.
However, neither standards nor curriculum should be an excuse to teach the skills that
are unnecessary or won't be helpful in moving your students forward as thinkers and writers.
This means we must empower teachers to differentiate between what's required and what's necessary.
So let's look at this difference.
Required means that somebody outside your classroom has mandated that certain skills
be covered.
This person or persons do not know your students, so these required skills should be covered
but not taught.
This means you go over them very briefly, giving them minimal attention, document that
you'd cover them by creating a list of these required skills, put the date when you teach
them and leave a space to describe the context.
That's required.
Now necessary means that you have identified the skills that your students need to become
better writers because you are in the best position to determine which skills these are.
You know your students.
You know what your students need to achieve, to need to achieve their full literacy potential,
not somebody outside your classroom.
Now necessary skills should be taught.
Required skills should be covered.
Necessary skills should be taught.
This means that you use direct and explicit instruction and you spend the amount of time
and attention needed to ensure that your students know and are able to use them.
Then you'd create a second checklist with the necessary skills.
And of course this list would be much shorter than the list of required skills.
Keep track of when each necessary skill is introduced, reviewed and reinforced.
And create a similar checklist for each student as part of their portfolio assessment.
Use this checklist to document when you see mastery of each skill in each student's writing.
Now am I promoting anarchy with my recommendation to give required skills very little attention?
Will there be a sudden implosion of all that is right and good if teachers separate the
necessary from the required?
Well, I hardly think so.
In fact, students might actually become better writers.
Imagine that.
Isn't that the purpose?
The last thing I want to say about academic standards is this.
We are or should be preparing our students to communicate with other human beings in
an increasingly diverse and complex world, communicate in speech and writing.
We are not preparing them to live in the top-down confining world defined by academic standards.
What we teach in our classroom must reflect reality.
This has been the Reading Instruction Show.
I'm your host, Dr. Andy Johnson.