The Climate of Fear and How It's Crippling Education

Pretty strong opening, eh?

When FDR delivered his first inaugural address, our nation was gripped by an economic stranglehold. Fear and desperation permeated our very culture. Doubt and paralysis infected our banks, our businesses, and the American psyche. FDR's famous "We have nothing to fear but fear itself" was both insightful and prophetic. While change did overcome fear, it was change through radical policy shifts. Only by embracing new policies, new methods, and science did we transform fear and paralysis to growth.

Are we brave enough to do the same today?

I wonder. The model we trained ourselves in is antiquated. The generations we educate do not learn, function, or exist in a world that we knew and worked within. How are we changing our educational practices to meet these changes and are we doing so in a timely manner to prepare for WHERE our students are going?

I don't think we are; furthermore, we are not doing so fast enough.

There. I said the negative, dirty fact that is looking education in the face. I am not criticizing teachers, our jobs, the work, our dedication. I am, however, criticizing the iron grip that we have on changing what we have done over and over. We love that dinosaur unit, the fun movie project, the participle scavenger hunt that we spent hours designing. We LOVE teaching them. They are like the smell of baking bread to us. LOVE THEM. They are fun, successful highlights of our work. After all, we did spend hours developing them. However: Do we know WHAT students learn from them, what skills they don't get during them? Do we have daily data that helps us pinpoint those who need to move faster through the materials or those who need immediate review?

No. Gulp.

Fear. DON'T MAKE ME CHANGE! We have to own that we are fearful of these changes. What if we NEVER get to teach that special dinosaur unit again? What if we have to change how we DO everything?

We do it.

Why? Because it will help ALL of our students. It will push them harder, further, and faster. We will grow, too. We will have to use our data to analyze, diagnose, and pinpoint how to help each student get up to speed. We will be diagnosticians (along with being counselors, facilitators, and coaches) every day. We will maximize our use of technology, and we will control learning in ways we have never done before. We MSUT be brave pioneers who use science (like those farmers who had to change their ways during the Great Depression and use new farming methods) and become bold policy makers (like those who initiated the WPA Act and put people to work who needed it). We have to change, folks. CHANGE is already here. It's we who are swimming in the wrong direction. If we continue to do so, we will only continue to distance ourselves from our students who are swimming with the current, not against it.

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