It’s been just over a month since the November 1st information session on Building Thinking Classroom. It was at this session that I became aware of this approach to teaching math and that there were parents who were very upset over the implementation of this approach. Since then:
1. The administration took less than one day to re-evaluate and moved to a more “hybrid” approach.
2. The Education Matters forum collected questions from parents. One representative met with Mr. Ziobro. Some parents felt that not all questions were answered and that there was a disconnect between how parents felt their kids were impacted vs the administration view that things were improving or fine.
3. Mr. Ziobro encouraged parents to reach out to teachers and to himself. I had a meeting with Mr. Ziobro and we went over our scheduled time to allow me to ask all of my questions.
4. At the November BOE meeting, Dr. Varley stated that it would be inappropriate to survey parents even though parents are the ones dealing with the impacts of BTC (including financial impacts by hiring tutors)
5. BHCW forum conducted a survey that closed on 11/29. Survey had 107 responses for 135 children. It was clear that the overwhelming majority, especially those responses for GL, have kids who are disheartened and whose grades have declined. The full results can be found here.
6. I attended a small working group session where we worked through an example. We went over the scheduled time due to the robust discussion and teachers were taking notes.
So what did I learn…
– BTC practices are considered best practices and teachers are ENCOURAGED to use best practices. It is not mandated. What this means is every math classroom can look very different. There is no consistency. The administration stated that teaching is an art. However, teachers do collaborate to share lessons learned. This still leaves parents very confused as to what’s happening in the classroom.
– When asked why BTC needed to be implemented when kids were just coming back from Covid, the Administration responded that it was the right approach to address the learning gap. The idea is that teachers in a BTC classroom are better able to assess kids who are behind rather than just teaching new material (which is the traditional method). I don’t believe this rationale as BTC was in the works prior to Covid. And in a more traditional setting, teachers would also identify kids that were struggling. In my opinion and echoed by other parents, the BTC big-bang implementation created another layer of uncertainty for both teachers and students. The grades reflected it. And if not all teachers are implementing it or partially implementing it, are they really in a better position to assess kids who need help?
– When asked about grades, the administration said that grades are in line with prior years. When asked to see the analysis, there was a lot of, “you have to be careful” as there are many variables including the pandemic. Administration believes that pandemic grades were inflated as kids took tests at home. Given all that, how can ANYONE determine if grades are in line?
– When asked about if / how many kids are struggling in BTC classrooms, once again the administration says it’s difficult to say as they could be struggling because of the pandemic. This is the very reason why BTC should NOT have been implemented this year. How can the administration tell if kids are struggling because of the model or because of the learning gap? The administration believes the number of kids struggling is declining. When asked for data to support this, it seems that it is based on observation.
– When asked about surveys, the administration believes that it’s very difficult to construct a survey that will reduce bias. The other argument is that you have to factor in the level of TBC practices in a given classroom. This will result in parsing the data into small samples that can’t be shared. I completely disagree with this reasoning. It may be that mostly those who have an issue will complete the survey, but you will still be able to tell the number of families / kids that are having a hard time. And you can still publish survey results on an aggregate level. Having said that, some teachers (at this point maybe 2) are conducting surveys at the end of a unit. The student responses are anonymous. As I understand it, this data will not be shared with parents.
– When asked why it seem that so many are looking for math tutors, Mr. Ziobro responded that BH always had a high number of kids being tutored, likely due to the competitive nature of the academic environment. He doesn’t believe there is an uptick though many parents newly signing up for tutors would disagree.
– When asked about quiet or shy kids who may get left behind as the teacher can’t always see every group, Mr. Ziobro responded that eventually, there will be a right mix of kids where the quiet child will become the leader.
– The administration is working on standardizing how teachers post notes and materials.
– The teachers are doing their best. This is new for them as well.
So what does this mean for the parents:
– In my opinion, there is no indication that there will be any pullback on this approach. Therefore, I don’t believe we can solve this broadly.
– Every parent whose child is struggling needs to reach out to the teachers and administration and have those meetings. The administration needs to feel those numbers from the survey. Otherwise they can argue the number of impacted families is not as large as the BCHW survey suggests and that it’s just social media not to be taken seriously.
– Ultimately, the community needs to elect BOE members that will force a change in the administration.
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