"No Child Left Behind" Leaves Many
Teachers Behind
What takes place within the four walls of my classroom
each day is way beyond the mere subject matter that
I teach. I tell my high school students that a classroom
is a miniature society, and while we may not be able
to change the world, we can create an ideal society
within our classroom. We can have a society of respect,
support and encouragement for each other, a society
that recycles waste, and a society that is trusting
and peaceful. It is only after children feel safe and
have a sense of self-worth can they begin to learn.
Learning theory substantiates that claim: children
learn when they are emotionally receptive and do not
have their defenses up.
Since I began teaching in 1973, I found that the teachers
who lasted within the profession became life-long master
teachers. They knew how to motivate students and how
to translate the subject matter into building blocks
of knowledge using multiple approaches that left a
minimum of children behind. Classroom management was
a function of mutual respect and engaging lessons.
They knew how to nurture the emotional and developmental
needs of their students while making them interested
in learning.
Currently, under the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) mandates,
the criteria for qualified teachers and succeeding
students leaves out the basic essentials of teaching
and learning. If students were simply vessels into
which teachers poured knowledge, then maybe NCLB standards
would be valid. However, the classroom, where learning
is supposed to take place, is often the focal point
of personal, family and social traumas mixed with the
pressure to meet or exceed what often seem like arbitrary
expectations. Under these pressures we expect teachers
and students to have the high morale and enthusiasm
necessary for success as proved by standardized tests!
What is missing from NCLB is a basic understanding
of what it means to teach and to learn. There are three
critical truths that NCLB ignores:
First, teaching is an art as
well as a science. Teaching is a calling, not just
a skill. What this means
is that a “teacher” is a quality of a person’s
being, a talent such as we recognize in artists or
in people who have the gift of healing. A teacher who
becomes a master teacher has to first have the inner
qualities and passions that cause perpetual striving
for improvement. A true teacher improves not because
of what he or she knows, but because of the desire
to better serve students — physically, emotionally,
mentally and psychologically.
Second, teaching is first and foremost a relationship.
Students and teachers spend most of their days together,
and much of what teachers do is parenting and mentoring.
The classroom is not different from life and therefore
the teaching of life skills goes hand in hand with
instruction of subject matter. In fact, if one may
compare a classroom with theater, the knowledge is
the script while the real drama is the social and psychological
dimensions of human growth, human motivation, and human
interaction directed by the teacher.
Third, the ultimate goals of education are relevancy
and personal growth. We, as teachers, are charged to
develop the higher level thinking skills and the application
of knowledge necessary to help students adapt to real
world and unexpected situations. Employers surveyed
about the top ten traits they value in prospective
employees consistently rank the qualities of teamwork,
problem solving, adaptability, interpersonal skills,
and communication skills as more essential than basic
skills tested by standardized tests. In the classroom,
teachers use these key traits to engage students, to
create a positive learning environment and to make
knowledge relevant.
No Educator Proficiency Assessments
(EPA) can indicate if a teacher is “highly qualified” to
teach, just as no standardized test can indicate
the real progress a student has made in developing
the key characteristics essential for a successful
human being. These assessments in fact belittle the
core values of education.
Teachers and students are partners
in the educational adventure. They both benefit and
develop from the same dynamic. Education is a process
of developing one’s
potentials and testing the limits of one’s known
world. Education is a process akin to nature, and it
is successful when there is a nurturing environment
that respects the qualities and needs of students and teachers.
It is not a forcing according to an arbitrary timeline.
Students become successful adults when they learn to
set goals and make choices that promote the welfare
of themselves and their community. The most knowledgeable
person is a failure if he or she is unable to have
successful relationships and cooperate with others.
Teachers who are able to create a learning environment
that achieves that, themselves grow and develop professionally
and as human beings.
In my state, Arizona, a teacher
may not be approved in a teaching or subject area
based on university transcripts or experience if
there is an Arizona Educator Proficiency Test for
that area. Basing “highly qualified” status
on EPA’s rather than on coursework is a vote
of no confidence in our universities’ academic
and teacher training standards. I have taken the AEPA
for French (which I have been teaching for thirty-four
years) and was astounded to find that there was nothing
that evaluated my ability as a teacher, but only tested
my proficiency in French and knowledge of a few terms
of language teaching jargon.
Many teachers express extreme
frustration with these assessments. They feel that
the tests are geared to exclude people from teaching
who don’t have book
knowledge at a high university level. My overall impression
about the “highly qualified” requirement
of NCLB is that it is a means of discouraging many
teachers. The tests for teachers favor a certain type
of learning while excluding the most important measures
of a successful and dedicated teacher. Our society
should make teaching an inclusive, welcoming profession,
but the emphasis on tests is shutting many potentially
great teachers out.
Even the most highly trained
and naturally creative teacher will learn “on the job.” Every
day and every year there are new demands for improvement
and adaptation. A teacher does not teach in a vacuum,
but develops by interaction with students and with
other teachers. Administrators are trained to evaluate
their staff in ways that reflect teaching ability and
interpersonal skills. An administrator who is an instructional
leader will mentor and guide his or her staff to an
ever-progressive level of effectiveness. It goes against
the spirit of education to discourage students who
want to learn and teachers who want to teach by making
them submit to the authority of arbitrary tests. All
the requirements of NCLB are eroding morale and confidence
in our teachers and in our schools while not improving
teaching or learning.
© 2007
Richard V. Sidy
