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9486 in the collection
Critics lambaste education board on English curriculum
Ohanian Comment: I happen to disagree with both the revisionists and those speaking for more "basics" in this matter. In short, I don't think corporate-politicos have any business deciding what a teacher should teach. Some teachers are more inclined to a "back to basics" approach; others more temperamentally and pedagogically suited for an approach leaning more toward whole languge.
Live and let live. Why does everybody have to do the same thing????
For an in-depth look at the proposed changes, go here. This vote is taking place in Texas, but we all have a huge stake in the outcome.
You will read in the two accounts below that None of the 65 people who signed up to speak during the hearing defended the plan to revamp the Texas English and reading curriculum. This doesn't mean the curriculum in place is worth a damn.
By Gary Scharrer
AUSTIN — A preliminary vote on a new English and reading curriculum is expected today after scores of teachers, language experts and civil rights leaders blasted it Wednesday at a public hearing before the State Board of Education.
Board leaders contend they are under strict deadlines to approve a new English language arts and reading curriculum for the state's 4.7 million public schoolchildren and say the critics are misguided.
English teachers complained their expertise went ignored and told the 15-member board the proposal falls far short on reading comprehension and grammar. It also fails, they said, to provide a transition from grade to grade and ties teachers' hands by recommending what books students should read.
They begged for more time to perfect the plan. Others complained bitterly of the lack of Hispanic experts involved in the three-year process of writing the new curriculum.
None of the 65 people who signed up to speak during the hearing defended the plan.
Hispanic input
Board Chairman Don McLeroy of Bryan, who supports the plan, could not speculate on how the board will act.
"I want to clarify some of the mischaracterization," McLeroy, a Republican, said. "They are just inaccurate to say that we haven't had any Hispanic input."
Part of the disagreement revolves around "teacher-centered versus students-centered approaches," McLeroy said.
Some of the critics suggested that board members would trigger a firestorm if they adopt the curriculum.
State Sen. Eliot Shapleigh, D-El Paso, opened the hearing by warning the exclusion of Hispanic experts in developing the new curriculum will short-change Texas.
Nearly half of the state's 4.7 million public schoolchildren are Hispanic, and the percentage of Hispanic first-graders in cities such as Austin, Dallas and Houston top 60 percent, Shapleigh said.
The most important priority is developing the academic vocabulary of students, Shapleigh said, "and to not gather input (from Hispanic experts) at this very important junction puts at risk public education in the state of Texas."
State education officials face deadline pressures to adopt an English curriculum by this summer. Textbook publishers need time to develop textbooks for the 2009-10 school year. The curriculum will last 10 years.
Shapleigh urged the board to take more time.
"Somehow, I think the publishers will accommodate you. Do it over if you are not going to do it right," Shapleigh said.
The standing-room-only crowd applauded, which drew a rebuke from McLeroy, who told the audience: "If everyone continues to applaud, I will have the room emptied out. We're here to conduct business. We're not here for a pep rally."
Later, board member Terri Leo of Spring said, "I want to get it right, but I'm not so sure that the answer is more time to get it right."
'Very dissatisfied'
Two former national presidents of the League of United Latin American Citizens scolded the board for excluding Hispanic experts in the rewriting of the English and reading standards and urged revisions.
"We are very dissatisfied," Hector Flores of Dallas said.
Tony Bonilla of Corpus Christi warned the board that its action would make state education officials look "ignorant or indifferent to a constituency that needs more help than ever before because of the high (number of) dropouts."
"What you end up with is creating a perception that this board is controlled by the right-wing element in politics in the state of Texas, and what we need from this board is some balance where you become inclusive rather than exclusive," Bonilla said.
"That's so ridiculous," Leo, a Republican, said during a break. "What is Democrat, Republican, conservative or liberal about English ... about math?"
The critics should bring specific complaints instead of saying, "I want the document changed," Leo said.
Cindy Tyroff, a secondary language arts instructional specialist in San Antonio's Northside Independent School District, is considered an expert.
"We want to be able to teach children to read," Tyroff said. "We want to be able to teach grammar within the writing because that's where it matters. We want to make certain that when you go from one grade to the next it makes sense. We want to be able to make the decision about what literature, what non-fiction our students should read because we best know our students."
Alana Morris of Houston, president of the Coalition of Reading and English Supervisors of Texas, also served on a working group that the board appointed to help craft the new curriculum. But that effort has been wasted, she said.
"Those of us on the work group have been discounted, disregarded and disrespected by those who should be the most supportive," she said. "Please do not tie our hands any longer."
State board of education struggling to decide how best to teach reading and writing
After hearing from the public, board expects to vote later this week.
By Laura Heinauer
American-Statesman
March 26, 2008
Want to get English teachers really worked up? Try telling them what their students should be reading in class ... or, for that matter, what they shouldn't.
If that doesn't work, spark a debate on the best way to teach grammar.
That is exactly what the State Board of Education is doing this week as it prepares to rewrite the state's English, language arts and reading curriculum standards — a debate that has already brought some people to tears and lit up the blogosphere with fiery commentary alleging censorship of books.
The board is split on the best way to teach children to read and write. How board members resolve the issue, with a public hearing today and votes later this week, will determine which textbooks school districts buy and will shape what is taught in the classroom.
The contentiousness also foreshadows upcoming debates about the science curriculum, which will be set later this year.
A coalition of educators and publishers now has a slim majority of support among board of education members who support an English curriculum that encourages students to learn to read and write by doing it — the kind of instruction that has been going on in Texas for the past decade.
"A teacher will teach a mini-lesson in grammar and then follow up with a student application in writing," said Cynthia Tyroff, an instructional specialist with the Northside school district near San Antonio. "Studies show ... picking out verbs and nouns on a worksheet is not going to teach students how to write."
On the other side are supporters of a more traditional approach proposed by Donna Garner, a retired teacher and conservative education activist. Those board members say students need more spelling drills, phonics lessons and practice in grammar identification to learn to read and write properly. This side also favors developing suggested reading lists with a heavy emphasis on classical literature.
"They teach reading by getting them to read every third or fourth word," Garner said of current methods. "But the problem is when they start getting the harder (words) at about Grade 3, and they hit a wall."
The debate started heating up in January when seven of the 15 state board members began pushing to abandon the curriculum standards being developed in the past two years by a committee of curriculum writing experts and state educators. They support Garner's alternate standards, which she says she and other teachers developed. Those standards were rejected by the board in 1997 during the last curriculum revision.
The two sides sought a compromise after a contentious board meeting in February by assigning a subcommittee to work with consultants and other outside experts to revise the standards. Their compromise includes ideas from Garner's proposal such as a reading list, which many educators oppose because they say even "recommended" books are interpreted as mandatory by teachers and publishers, and can take states one step closer to censorship of books in schools.
With the subcommittee's revisions, however, new issues have cropped up.
Tyroff's group objects to the reading lists altogether and says some of the repetition being taken out of the standards was meant to ensure students practice their reading, writing and comprehension skills.
Garner says the new reading list has several objectionable books, such asJ.D. Salinger's"The Catcher in the Rye." She also said the compromise proposes too much material to be taught at each grade level.
The stakes are high.
A reading list or a major shift in teaching philosophy in Texas, one of the largest textbook-purchasing states in the nation, would have major ramifications nationwide for publishers, who typically anthologize selected readings and publish textbooks based on prevalent methods and readings. A major change in teaching philosophy also would require an overhaul of teacher training programs.
There's also the question of what methods are best for teaching a diverse population.
State Board member Mary Helen Berlanga, D-Corpus Christi, was moved to tears during a news conference last week in the Rio Grande Valley, where she said her fellow board members were ignoring the needs of Hispanic children.
Some education policy observers say the debate offers hints of what's to come when the board considers the science curriculum.
Some of the board members who support Garner's proposal say they also support teaching the weaknesses of the theory of evolution, which some science educators say is a tactic creationists use to circumvent laws that prohibit the teaching of religious doctrine. Some board member favor the teaching of the Discovery Institute's idea of intelligent design, which holds that the universe was created and not the result of a series of random events.
Dozens of passionate educators are expected to attend today's public hearing. Garner won't be among them; she says her presence is too polarizing. But that doesn't mean she isn't devoted to the cause.
"I've committed years to this cause, and I cannot believe that people can be so wrong about what kids need to learn," she said. "We've lost millions of Texas children in the last 10 years. We can't afford to lose millions more."
— Gary Scharrer & Laura Heinauer
Houston Chronicle & American Statesman
2008-03-27
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/5651807.html
INDEX OF OUTRAGES
Pages: 380
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