Explicit Instruction, Student Conferencing, and Teaching Foreign Languages

Insights from Education, 24th Edition

Photo by Ling App on Unsplash

Welcome back to Insights from Educate, a curated newsletter of professional learning and education news from authentic voices in education.

This week’s roundup has a spicy take with Michel J. Petrilli questioning whether U.S. high schools should stop teaching foreign languages.

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The Schooled newsletter on Substack is one of my favorites and one that I read consistently every week. After reading the article about teaching foreign languages, I had a conversation with a colleague about whether Petrilli made some good points.

Ultimately, the question in education always comes down to “what do we want students to learn and be able to do when they graduate?” The problem with that question is that many of us have different answers to that question, based on our own personal experiences and ideologies.

If the goal is for a student to be able to speak a different language fluently at some point, well, we should probably start teaching languages much sooner than high school and/or college.

But if the goal is to simply expose students to a variety of content areas and challenge their brains in different ways, then I can see the argument for keeping foreign languages around in high school.

As I highly value minimalism and streamlined systems, I do wonder why we are asking every student to meet the same graduation requirements. If students have various available paths, then shouldn’t our graduation requirements reflect that?

Professional Learning and Inspiration

**No, Explicit Instruction Does Not Cause Learned Helplessness**

The Science of Learning newsletter is chock full of professional learning goodies. This is an article that I shared with my instructional coach a few months ago, as I am despairing at the lack of explicit instruction in classrooms. Nidhi Sachdeva and Jim Hewitt write:* “*In other words, the goal of explicit instruction is not permanent dependence on the teacher, but to provide enough support early on that students can build the competencies necessary for independent practice.” In other words, this is not an either/or discussion; there is room for balance, with the bottom line being that students DO need explicit instruction to scaffold learning meaningfully.

Read more at Science of Learning

**A Case for Conferencing With Students Instead of Giving Written Feedback**

David Cutler outlines a strategy to provide meaningful feedback to students:* “*I have students assess their papers, filling out a rubric as honestly as they can, right after they submit their work. I complete a rubric of my own as well, but they don’t see it until after we meet.” Cutler notes that providing students with feedback in-person, rather than on paper, gives him an opportunity to answer questions in real-time and provide context on the feedback that students might not understand otherwise. I love a good feedback session and asking students to pre-assess their own work and then conference about their writing is a great to way to put them front and center in their own learning.

Read more at Edutopia

A Versatile Seating Arrangement That Really Works

This Edutopia video describes using the L-shaped seating arrangement to create classroom community and improve teacher mobility around the space. The video also describes how this arrangement can help support students that need extra support and attention. Retired teacher Jay Schauer notes that paying attention to seating is an “overlooked part of teaching practices.

Learn more at Edutopia

Education News and Research

• Michael J. Petrilli delivers a spicy take in last week’s newsletter of Schooled: **U.S. high schools should stop pretending to teach foreign languages. He brings up some good points: we start teaching students too late (often in high school), which goes against research that language teaching should start much earlier if we really want it to stick. He also comes out with an alarming statistic: “*Only 11 percent of Americans report speaking a second language “very well,” and just 7 percent* of those eleven percent report learning that language in school.” As someone who spent four years learning Spanish in high school and college and still can’t speak any Spanish, I can personally attest to the fruitlessness of my tryst with a second language.
• Dale Chu writes that [Congress learned the wrong lessons from No Child Left Behind](http://Congress learned the wrong lessons from No Child Left Behind), three lessons that can be gained from the previous legislation. The first is don’t legislate aspirations, as NCLB turned “noble moral aspiration into an inflexible statutory trap,” expecting every child to be proficient in reading and math. The second is to focus on what matters most, as NCLB narrowed curriculum to just reading and math tests, when federal policy should focus on “whether students are learning, whether they are making progress, and whether schools are serving all groups of students.” The third lesson is that accountability should create urgency, not additional bureaucracy for schools to wade through. There is a way forward if policymakers can figure out how to establish accountability without muddying the waters.
• In more optimistic news, Cory Turner reports on a group of teens that figured out how to **establish AI rules in schools.** The proposal includes using AI for editing, brainstorming, and studying after 8th grade; citing how AI was used and still being able to demonstrate knowledge through discussions and handwritten tests; and using both plagiarism software and school officials to review submitted work.

The Latest Articles from Educate.

• **Rewiring Education** by Laura Schroeder
• **I’m a Teacher, and AI Terrifies Me **by Brian M. Williams, JD
• **AI Won’t Replace Your Child’s Teacher — But It Can’t Teach a Student Who Isn’t There by Roger Flowers**
• **The Hidden Faculty: The Cost of Fitting In **by Jennifer Osborne, Ph.D.

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About the Editor: Jennifer Osborne, Ph.D.

I am the Founder and Editor of Educate, a publication on Medium. I am an experienced educator with graduate degrees in both Educational Leadership and Guidance and Counseling. I have taught in five different countries while educating students at public, international, Department of Defense, and virtual schools.

I am passionate about authentic education and engaging professionals in targeted development that is organic and self-driven.

Thanks for reading Insights from Educate. Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.