Let’s Teach History, Not Watch the Scoreboard
Max W. Fischer, Teacher
"Winning isn't everything. It's the only thing."---Vince Lombardi
Lombardi was a great coach who articulated the bottom line for any professional sports franchise. However, it's a gross distortion to apply that axiom to the education of children. Nonetheless, when one looks at the essence of NCLB, we are left with a Victorian mentality of drill and practice until we achieve collective victory on a series of one-size-fits-all tests measuring fragmented pieces of the whole puzzle that is learning. NCSS's and the AHA's endorsement of history/social studies into the NCLB testing regimen makes those organizations complicit in promoting this anachronism.
Education should be about helping students make sense of their surrounding world. Integrating the "well told story" of the past into our students' reality is the authentic charge of our discipline. Standardized testing does not measure that. It does, however, function well as an auditioning tool for "Are You Smarter than a Fifth Grader?"
With the knowledge that exists today about how we process information, does any competent educator deny that students develop at different rates and are wired with unique talents? NCLB ignores the reality of learning to the point of statuary neglect because of the narcotic allure of quantitative assuredness.
A Department of Labor study of employers (What Work Requires of School, 1991) itemized critical components of a quality education. Naturally, skills of reading, writing and mathematics were emphasized. What was underreported was the prominence placed on abilities such as problem solving, creative thinking, oral communication, information organization and collaboration. Document analysis, problem-centered learning, moral education, democratic values and civic discourse juxtapose well to those overlooked skills of the study. I fear they will be forgotten in the game of academic football.
However well intentioned NCSS's détente with NCLB is, advancing social studies as an elitist discipline in an ever-narrowing conduit for learning will merely continue to fill an established profile of "dumbing down" American education. Existing data show a significant number of states reducing standards on their tests in order to make a favorable impression on reported results. No state or district wants to be embarrassed on the public scoreboard of testing.
From single wings to "three yards and a cloud of dust" to "West Coast" offenses, even the Neanderthalian enterprise of football has constantly evolved over the past century. Can we stop watching the scoreboard long enough to let learning evolve as well?
