The PERSON Heart-Head-Hands Horace Mann

3 PHILOSOPHIES OF EDUCATION

FOCUS ON PHILOSOPHY ERA

The PERSON Heart-Head-Hands Horace Mann The PROCESS Readin’-Riting-Rithmetic John Dewey PERFORMANCE Academics-S.A.T. Scores Current

Systems are guided by philosophies, or focus. Change the focus and the system will change. The early philosophy of focus on the whole child was influenced by Johann Pestalozzi of Switzerland and Friedrich Froebel of Germany. These two were the role models for Horace Mann and the early American school systems.

As the school system in America exploded in growth the focus, promoted by educators such as John Dewey, shifted from the person to the process, and we entered the philosophical era of Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic, or the “3 R’s.

In the 1960’s another shift took place as standardized testing became the focus. So we went from the “3 H’s” to the “3 R’s” to “A.S.S”, or academics and S.A.T. scores. Darrell Scott presented this philosophical portion.

Marzano Research and Rachel’s Challenge have teamed together to encourage a blend of all 3 of these philosophies. There is a need for focus on the whole person. But there is also a need for focus on the process with a view toward excellence in performance.

Dr. Robert Marzano presented a hierarchy of needs in the form of a pyramid, similar to Maslow’s. The top of the pyramid he labeled the “self-system”. He pointed out that our educational system does a great job in the lower levels of the pyramid which represent both knowledge and the cognitive skills. However very little focus is placed on the metacognitive and self system components. The self system that Dr. Marzano presented had 6 levels. These progress from physiology to safety to belonging to esteem within a community to self actualization and reaches the pinnacle at “connection to something better than yourself. Dr. Marzano also talked about the growth versus the fixed mindset.

He also gave suggestions for verbal feedback:

There was an emphasis on creating an invitational approach to education versus a “disinviting” approach. The invitational included: Music playing as the students entered the classroom. Greeting each child by name with a handshake, hug, or high five. Sharing stories or quotes to illustrate lessons. The “disinviting” approach included: Different rules for the students than the teacher, i.e. the teacher chews gum but the students are not allowed to. Too much homework. A bad attitude, etc. Dr. Marzano also shared the 3 forms of assessment available: The obtrusive, the unobtrusive, and the student-generated.

Darrell Scott wrapped up the session with a formula for climate and culture provided by he and Dr. Marzano’s friend, Al.

The formula Albert provided was C+C+C2 = AAA. This equates to Climate plus Culture plus Character and Conduct equals Awakened, Aware, and Achieving students.

With the help of Jack Black, Darrell shared the full formula for an effective classroom: Most of the teaching sessions centered around the picture on the cover of the book co-authored by Darrell and Bob: