Marva Collins

I had no idea who this woman was before about 15 minutes ago. I was doing some research for a completely different project and came across some of her quotations and I can't remember the last time I reacted out loud to something I read on quotes website. Take a read...

“I have discovered few learning disabled students in my three decades of teaching. I have, however, discovered many, many victims of teaching inabilities.”

Marva Collins is an iconic American educator who started Westside Preparatory School in an impoverished neighborhood of Chicago. Unfortunately, the school closed down in 2008 after 30 years due to declining enrollment and funding. Collins championed the Socratic method. I've heard many a teacher poo-poo this method, but she saw true value in its use when it came to teaching those students who were deemed "unteachable". Her method is described as follows:

The first step is to select material with abstract content to challenge students' logic, and that will therefore have different meaning to different students, in order to aid discussion. This is done specifically to teach children to reason.

Next, the teacher should read the material, because unknown material cannot be taught. New words, the words to watch, should be listed, and taught, for pronunciation, use and spelling before the material is read. Without this step, the reading is meaningless.

Next, one begins a series of pertinent questions as the reading progresses, starting with a reference to the title, and a question about what the material is about. Predictions should use logic, reasoning and evidence without fallacy. The reading must be out loud, so the teacher can ask questions at pertinent points. Students are taught to test their reasoning. Afterward, they write daily letters to the author or characters, and write a critical review. Why is the work important to them? The child must be taught to refer to what was previously learned to support their opinions.

In the Socratic method, the rate of information is controlled by the teacher. Properly paced, this encourages participation, reducing discipline issues and encouraging self-discipline. The program specifically avoids work-sheets and inane busy work. It establishes an intellectual atmosphere, a general attitude suspending judgement, and examining reasoning.

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marva_Collins)

I think the rationale for this method can summed up in another remark made by Collins:

“The essence of teaching is to make learning contagious, to have one idea spark another.”

It's time for a little introspection in education and whole lot less looking at standard test scores to diagnose what's wrong with our students. It's time to start asking what is wrong with us...