Six silly school practices that aren't impossible to fix

When I founded The Little Middle School, I had not taught in a public school setting in over a decade. Therefore, I was a bit of an outsider to the world of formal education.

This had some disadvantages, but also distinct benefits. I could look at existing practices with fresh eyes. Below, I will share a few conventions that are taken for granted but don’t have to be. Best of all, changing them doesn’t require a complete overhaul of our education system.

1) Allowing students to raise their hands while someone is talking. Even worse is the practice of allowing students to raise their hands higher and higher and make insistent noises (“Ooh! Ooh! Me! Me!”) when the person speaking does not appear to have stated the correct answer.

By raising my hand in the middle of your answer, I am saying that your answer isn’t good enough and I don’t even need to hear the end of it before I make my contribution. Instead, let’s put the focus on the person speaking and put our effort into listening to what they have to say, giving them the time and space to think. Then, we can raise our hand respond to what they actually said, not to try to offer a better answer.

2) Studying each continent separately. This shows up in many state curricula. But how can you study the Roman Empire, which spanned three continents at its peak, if you look at each continent separately? How can you explore trade routes, the spread of religion, or colonization? You can’t.

It’s far better to undertake a study of world history, incorporating physical and political geography as you go. Many teachers have already figured out ways to do this even within the restrictive continent-by-continent framework they’re responsible for.

3) Teaching tricks like “keep change flip” before students have understood the underlying concept. To really understand math, following a procedure isn’t going to cut it. If a student doesn’t understand the why, they aren’t going to just “keep change flip” when dividing a fraction by a fraction — they’ll do it with multiplication, subtraction, and anything else that comes up. Responsible teachers make sure that students can explain what the are doing by using diagrams or similar.

4) Giving zeros. When a teacher gives a zero, they are grading behavior, not mastery of the topic at hand. The two should be dealt with separately. The authors of the book Grades Don’t Matter, in light of recent scholarship on the subject, recommend marking the assignment incomplete and requiring the student to turn in the assignment late with no penalty to the final grade — and then providing appropriate behavioral support or consequences as needed.

5) Asking kids to use all five senses in their writing. I can’t even tell you how many essays I’ve read that go, “I saw the kids playing on the jungle gym. I heard everyone yelling and laughing. I smelled the freshly-spread mulch. I felt the breeze and warm sun on my face. I tasted the residue of the day’s lunch on my face…”

I understand the well-meaning instructions from teachers to “use the five senses in writing” (I just Googled it and got 304 million hits). But it leads to trite prose that obscures the kid’s actual emerging voice as a writer. It’s better to ask them record their observations in a list and then choose which ones to include in their piece. You can remind them that not all of their observations will be visual — but that’s very different from saying, “Use all five senses.” Your well-trained students will take you all too literally.

6) Being obsessed with holidays. In December, the worksheets and bulletin boards are festooned with candy canes and Christmas trees; February is all pink and red hearts, and March is shamrocked and leprechauned to the max.

Maybe people became teachers because they had been dying to make Pinterest-worthy bulletin boards from childhood, but I find it to be a bizarre practice that’s reductive at best (snowflakes for January — in Georgia?) and exclusive at worst (because not everyone celebrates the same holidays).

What happens if we let the students decorate? It’s done in many classrooms. And many teachers have created new traditions and special days to look forward to (Dress Like Your Favorite Author Day, The 100th Day of School) that are inclusive and serve the intended purpose of creating festive moments and building community. There are so many possibilities.

My point in poking at these six practices is not to criticize the hard work of teachers. I’m most interested in encouraging everyone to question the way things have always been done so that we can be intentional about the way we educate the next generation.

What other school practices do you think we could reconsider?