I participated in a discussion thread earlier this week about the need for the Federal Department of Education.
I said:
While I was teaching in Detroit I encountered daily students who could not read anywhere near their grade level. That, of course, was the result of student failure to learn what they should have learned before they reached my classes in high school.
I had been taking courses in linguistics at Wayne State University. I decided to make a practical application of this knowledge to reading and writing.
I wrote my own self-instructional programmed learning lessons and they worked for all of my students.
In one semester of work, many of my students were as far above grade level as they had been behind in reading comprehension.
One year while teaching American history I used my lessons again to boost my students’ reading skills so they could read the required course textbook. Eleventh grade students were required to take the California Achievement Test in reading comprehension.
I was called into the principal’s office (almost never a good thing–what did I do wrong this time?). It turned out that my high school was the most improved/highest in reading achievement of Detroit’s 22 high schools and sleuths in upper level administration had traced that to students in my history classes!
I was made the school reading specialist right after that.
If I figured out how to solve the problem, what happened to the “experts” at the Department of Education that haven’t figured it out yet?
At my expense I have placed my reading program titled “The Language Enrichment Program,” on Amazon at the lowest price possible so anyone of any age who wants to easily improve their reading ability can do so. Sales are very slow. I will likely never recover the costs of making this resource available, but you can be sure it actually works!
A Facebook friend kindly responded:
That is amazing!!! I don’t know why your schools improvement didn’t spark curiosity from other schools in the district and from there lead to a widespread adoption of your methods. It is sad that programs that work are ignored, everyone is always trying to explain why this is an issue instead of looking at how this could be remedied. They want to investigate “new” theories and systems and thought leaders…instead of looking at what has already been proven to work.
I replied:
Research has carefully demonstrated that attention to “outliers” would lead astute administrators and researchers to those teachers who have discovered ways to improve student learning and success that could be of help to other teachers.
I was told that there may be a hidden factor involved. If this major problem were to be solved, further funds would no longer have to be asked for to support efforts to solve it. Therefore, avoid actually solving the problem in order to get more financial support..
There are hidden cultural reasons involved, as explained to me by a very wise African American teacher in the room next door to mine. He said that in the Black community there were “house” and there were “plantation” blacks. The administration represented the “house” strata who did not want the “plantation” blacks (the students) to succeed to their level.
My own black students asked me, “Mr. Smith, why have you never been named teacher of the month or teacher of the year?” They said they thought I was one of the best and most helpful teachers they had ever had. On another occasion when I had scolded them a little for talking too much when they were supposed to be working on their writing assignments, they said “Mr. Smith, we love you.” On another occasion they said, “Mr. Smith, you’re black!” I have been told that that should be considered a very high honor. They also said they had been told that white teachers would treat them unfairly and be prejudiced against them; they said they did not find that to be true of me at all.
I must say that my students attended my classes faithfully. They did not drop out, even though the school had a class of 1000 ninth graders but only a class of 300 seniors that graduated four years later, which by my understanding of the mathematics about equals to a 70% dropout rate. My students went on to college and graduated from college and did well thereafter. Even my administrators asked me, “Mr. Smith, what is your secret?” I had two classes that were “looped.” That means I was their English teacher for all four years of high school. I lost only one student over four years time and she dropped out the final card marking of her senior year.
The top administrator for the Language Arts Department of the Detroit school district was very aware of the success I had with my students. He arranged for me to be one of the two teachers to represent Detroit at the Michigan State Board of Education MEAP test writing committee. There were about nine teachers from across the state of Michigan chosen to serve on that committee. We evaluated student responses to the writing proficiency test and set the standards each year for evaluating student responses to the writing prompts on the test.
After I retired, that administrator commented on a post on Facebook where I mentioned that my reading program would work for anyone who would use it and follow its directions carefully that “If Mr. Smith says it works, it works!” He went on to say that I was the best teacher by far of all the teachers he knew and evaluated throughout his career in Detroit. That was nice to hear he remembered me that well these many years later!