Last week, a California appeals court sent a tremendous blow to the homeschooling movement, ruling that parents must obtain a state teaching license in order to home-school their children. The ruling puts the parents of an 166,000 children at risk of prosecution.
But does certification make for better teaching? Over at Cato @ Liberty, Neal McCluskey points to research that says 'no.'
More details here.
2 Comments
Ismone | March 10, 2008, 11:04am | #
I think the decision is particularly hypocritical because in California, private school teachers need not be credentialed.
Also, since it was a family court decision (initially) none of the homeschooling organizations were able to get involved. They were completely blindsided.
Michael | March 14, 2008, 9:41pm | #
As I said in a commment to a post about this later in time (I'll put this here in case someone comes to this post only):
Credentialed teachers??? What??? For their "expertise" and "critical thinking skills????"
Here is some commentary from the "front lines."
I tutor privately. One student I tutor in algebra 2 had a question we call a "work problem." This question asked:
"John can get 1/4 of a wall painted in 1 hour. Working together, John and Betsy can paint the wall in 35 minutes. How long would it take Betsy to paint the wall alone?"
The teacher said the way to get the answer was to solve:
1/4 + 1/x = 7/12 (She got the 7/12 by simplifying 35/60.)
Wrong!!
Everyone makes mistakes. I sure do, and I will fight for my right to be wrong. But I catch my mistakes and I admit it when I am wrong.
But what did this much-vaunted "credentialed teacher" do?
Solve the equation, and you get x = 3 hours. Common sense should make you wonder immediately how the two could get the wall painted so quickly, if it took each person, on his own, so long.
You might also wonder about your answer if another professional got something different -- this teacher knew I had gotten a different answer; the student I tutor had told the teacher.
In either case, you should start asking questions:
1) How much would they get done at that rate if they worked an hour? (7/12 of the wall. So...how did they finish in 35 minutes???)
2) How much would John get done in 35 minutes? (Even an estimate gives you that he would do about 30/240 = 1/8 of the wall. That means Betsy would have to do the other 7/8 in about 35 minutes. You could then do 7/8 = 35/x, which implies x is 40.)
This teacher did neither. She continued to say she was right.
Another (public) school I worked at years ago made mistakes in teaching how to solve trigonometric equations. When we got to that topic and I looked at the notes all the trig teachers used, notes which had been used for 3+ years, I found they were wrong. In some trig equations, you have to solve for multiple angles; they were getting answers in the wrong quadrant.
Another student I tutored in trig had a teacher who said that the period of the tangent function was pi/2. My student had to argue with the teacher to correct the teacher on several other occasions.
Some teachers in public schools are awesome, some are horrible. Credentials as such are no guarantee you can teach. Or even think logically...
Thanks for the good work ya'll do here Allison!! There is a bit I don't agree with, but there is a bit I do. :)