A radical idea to improve schools: Do what works

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We know what schools need to do to improve learning, writes Mike Schmoker, the author of Results Now 2.0. He lists three practices proven to be effective:

• The faithful implementation of a clear, sequential, knowledge-rich curriculum

• Daily engagement in liberal amounts of purposeful reading, discussion, and writing across the curriculum

• The routine (though not exclusive) use of explicit, step by step instruction — where each lesson has a clear goal and the teacher frequently “checks for understanding” — and re-teaches when students struggle

Schools that do these things get excellent results, Schmoker writes. Yet many teachers have been told in training and professional development sessions that knowledge is unimportant and explicit instruction is outmoded.

"Actual teaching has been overtaken by staggering amounts of group activity, worksheets and screen time," he writes. The culture of teacher training is dominated by “whims, fads, opportunism, and ideology.”

"A fundamental insight from reading research is that children do not learn to read naturally— reading must be explicitly taught," says a new World Bank report. "In case you needed any additional evidence that education is still stuck in the Stone Age . . . it's still considered groundbreaking research that children have to be taught how to read," tweets Niels Hoven.

Education is not an evidence-based profession, writes Douglas Carnine, professor emeritus at the University of Oregon. When Lister showed hand-washing would prevent infections, doctors started washing their hands before surgery, and never stopped, he writes. "Professions grounded in evidence don’t revert to disproven practices."

Education keeps swinging back and forth. "Phonics has been adopted, abandoned, rediscovered, and abandoned again," Carnine writes. "In the 1980s, whole language shoved it aside. In the 1990s, phonics made a comeback, only to be marginalized again until Sold a Story and the “Mississippi Miracle” brought it back to center stage."

Evidence-based professions such as medicine, aviation, engineering and seamanship are built on five pillars, writes Schmoker.

There's broad agreement on what's known, such as the medical consensus on germ theory.

Training is linked to research, not "vibes." ("A recent review found only 28 percent of teacher-prep programs fully equip future teachers with the essentials of reading, and 91 percent earned 'C' or below for clinical practice," Carnine writes.)

Professionals must prove their skills to earn a license. ("Half of states allow teachers to enter classrooms without passing a research-based exam in reading instruction.")

Low-quality preparation programs lose accreditation. ("Today, 72 percent of teacher-prep programs that fail to prepare candidates effectively still receive accreditation, he writes. "No other serious profession tolerates such laxity.")

Finally, professionals can lose their license for malpractice. (Teachers may be sanctioned for misconduct, but "rarely for persistently poor instruction.")

Education needs to change to regain public trust, Carnine writes. His "Evidence Advocacy Center has crafted a plan" that calls for an alliance of evidence-aligned organizations to build the five pillars and a collaborative of parents, funders, business, community and political leaders and others to provide outside-the-system pressure.

Fordham's annual Wonkathon asks for ideas on how to make states' "science of reading" laws succeed. "In some places," Fordham notes, the “science of reading” has "become more slogan than substance, with laws passed but not fully funded, faithfully implemented, or closely monitored."