The Very Beginnings - the 1970's

HIS was born in the early seventies as a part of an education renaissance, the more extreme manifestations of which saw the education system as a tool of oppression by capitalist society, a way of entrenching class divisions and ensuring a pool of minimally educated working class drones to feed the machinery of capitalism.  Thinkers such as Ivan Illych, Paolo Friere, John Holt, and AS Neill proposed alternatives which were aimed at unlocking the human potential within each child, developing analytic skills and creativity, thus breaking down class divisions and contributing to a more just, equal society. So the “free school“ movement was born with its “open classrooms”, and  child-centred philosophies.   

Dalhousie University's  Department of Education operated out of a large house on Oxford St., and trained elementary and secondary teachers. It was not insulated from this intellectual ferment: somewhere  during this time, Dalhousie hired Dr. Edgar Friedenberg, author of the Vanishing Adolescent and Coming of Age in America, and appointed Dr. Doris Dyke as  Dean of Education. Dr. Dyke later became the first woman professor at a United Church theological college where she taught educational ministry and feminist theology, but during her time at Dalhousie, she had the foresight to establish a small school, and give the responsibility for it to Anthony Barton, a newly hired professor. The year was 1974, and the  "Dalhousie University Experimental School" gave new meaning to the term "lab school" as it was housed in a 1960's Skinner Psychology Laboratory, complete with a one-way mirror so that children could be observed. Its purpose was to teach Bachelor of Education students to work with children, most of whom were the children of Dalhousie faculty.

The curriculum, which was developed by Barton, and his brother Charles Barton, an educator from Singapore was called "To the West" and was inspired by the writings of Marshall McLuhan. Anthony Barton, author of "Didactic Tales" and "On the Methods of Famous Teachers" was also influenced by the Dalton Plan, an educational philosophy with its roots in the turn of the last century thinking about education. The Dalton Plan was created by Helen Parkhurst, and aimed to achieve a balance between the needs of the community and the talents and needs of the individual student. She developed this progressive philosophy during her early years sharing a classroom with Maria Montessori and later on at the Children's University School which she founded in Dalton Mass. This philosophy lives on today in the Dalton School of New York, and a scattering of schools around the world, particularly in the Netherlands and the Czech Republic. The Plan has 3 parts as its foundation: The House, the Assignment and Lab. Each child is part of a House according to their age, and enters into a contract to complete an assignment. The lab refers to the interaction between the child and the various specialists who guide them in their examination of each theme or assignment.

The tiny D.U.E.S did not directly adopt this system, but its curriculum did involve "lots of physical activity and discussion". To teach themselves about evolution, for example, the children created a tunnel into which one entered into "the chamber of primordial ooze at the beginning and crawled along the tunnel (your parents in tow, if they were brave enough) and passed through the Age of Sharks, the Dinosaur Era and emerged in the end into the Present Day." (Barton) Initially there was one teacher, who was followed by two graduates of the B.Ed programme, Anne Everts and Gail Waddington, who shared one position. They were later joined by Gail's husband Marcus.  By 1976 there were about 25 students, divided into 3 groups called Young Ones, Middle Ones and Old Ones, and there were annual plays, often satirical in nature written by Barton and featuring the personalities of the children. One  character  popped up constantly throughout a Play and uttered its one line, "Batteries not included" - obviously based on a very active (perhaps ADHD) child.  Another of Barton's ideas was the "Fairs", where students presented their work to parents and others each Friday afternoon. During these afternoons, the students  taught the audience (parents and B.Ed students)  and  that became like an examination. After 6 weeks there was a "Super Fair" which went all day. The teachers displayed everything people had made so it was a lot of work for them. The children learned good presentation skills, and gained confidence -- but I'm pretty sure the teachers were exhausted! Finding an audience for these weekly events must have been difficult too, although with a steady stream of B.Ed students who were required to be there that may not have been an issue.

Marcus Waddington described Barton as a genius with "incredible vision", who had very high standards and expected a lot of the children. Among his other talents, he was an amateur architect, and built a room within the laboratory for the Old Ones which resembled a monastic cell. He would not approve of our present system of having the children write their own plays, as he felt they did not have the skills to do it properly, and would learn from good writing (his own). One of the plays was based on Gerald Durrell's "Talking Parcel" which had been read to the children.  Waddington remembers a couple of activities in particular: creating a "Paper City" where the children would send constant memos to each other, thus simulating a bureaucracy gone wild. Another time, they had "Machines Week" when all kinds of machines, including audio-visual and other media were brought in and explored. This was very exciting for the children, who generally learned without the benefit of audio-visual aids, and the changes observed in their behaviours were thought to prove some of McLuhan's basic principles.  Waddington left the school after only a couple of years to join the public system where he was paid almost double the salary, and regrets that the demands of raising a family made it necessary. He says that he had some wonderful relationships with his students and their families at the Experimental school, and learned much from Anthony Barton. So much in fact that when he was later granted a sabbatical from the school board where he was teaching, he went back to Dalhousie to work on his M.Ed with Barton.

Barton arranged regular meetings with the parents to discuss the issues of the time, and states that parents were very involved in the activities of  the school. As he says, "Some found the curriculum innovative and interesting, while others wanted more direct instruction for their children in the three R's." When he moved on to other responsibilities at the end of the decade, it seems the parents and the School Committee were ready for a change, and tasked Winnie Kwak, the newly hired teacher, with developing a curriculum which would allow the children to learn more about their own environment. Thus the Nova Scotia theme was developed. 

"What does a pupil do when given, as he* is given by the Dalton Laboratory Plan, responsibility for the performance for such and such work? Instinctively he seeks the best way of achieving it. Then having decided, he proceeds to act upon that decision… Discussion helps to clarify his ideas and also his plan of procedure. When he comes to the end, the finished achievement takes on all the splendor of success. It embodies all he had thought and felt and lived during the time it has taken to complete. This is real experience. It is culture achieved through individual development and through collective co-operation. It is no longer school---it is life." ~ Helen Parkhurst in Education on the Dalton Plan, 1922

"What does a pupil do when given, as he* is given by the Dalton Laboratory Plan, 

My Early Experiences with Education

Born into the height of the post-war baby boom, I attended public schools in the east end of Ottawa in the 50’s and 60’s; the smell of stencil fluid from Gestetner machines

on damp copies still evokes vivid memories of quiet classrooms of 35 plus children, all working away at the same task. Penmanship, good spelling and circling the right answer were rewarded; teacher/student interaction was limited to the teacher asking questions and a smallish number of children waving their hands frantically hoping to be chosen. Being chosen too many times however could get one labelled “Teacher’s Pet” – an epithet which for some time I mistakenly thought was a compliment. We were only dimly aware that there were a large number of children who never put their hands up; as we grew older we realized many of them were no longer in school with us.

It was the age of the “Reading Group” – reading ability groupings of children with cute names like  Chickadees, Hummingbirds,  Ravens and Turkeys. We actually had inkwells in our desks, and in grade 5 were privileged to be given straight pens which we learned to use. Not many of us mastered them however, and were relieved when we were allowed to use new-fangled  ballpoint pens. When I tell children now about nibs and inkwells, they look at me in disbelief; however, I still have some of my scrawly, blot-strewn notebooks to prove it. Up until this point, school was largely squirm-inducing boredom – its main saving grace was the long outdoor play times, when we organized our own baseball games, played singing ball and skipping games and established a strict pecking order through fighting, running and other informal competitions. However, I was very lucky that mine was a very small elementary school, whose principal and Grade5/6 teacher, Mr. MacLaren, eschewed the strap (fairly universal at the time), encouraged us to make up plays and perform them for the class and taught problem solving in math – he was definitely ahead of his time!

In Middle School, we learned grammar, (how to parse sentences), the facts of life (according to Kotex), and how to be good homemakers ("Homemaking is an art, the skills of which, to a mere male, seem to be part and parcel of a woman's make up. But she is not born to these skills, and must be trained...This we do in the Ottawa Public Schools - and do very well." W.T.MacSkimming, Home Economics Manual). I also learned about the effects of streaming, as each grade was divided into 8 sections, each one of which was known to us for the ability level of its students. I’m pretty sure the learning opportunities for the “C-stream” children were much more limited.

By the time I finished high school and first year university where I enrolled in an Honours Math programme (because it seemed to be the only thing I was good at), I was ready to escape formal education, and took a year off to explore the world – it was the early 70’s and what I discovered outside my cozy middle class existence changed me profoundly. I set off to explore Europe, hitchhiking and backpacking around, but quickly settled in a little town in the Highlands of Scotland. I worked at a couple of low wage jobs, including as a housemaid in a geriatric hospital. This came to an untimely end, when I managed to wind the cord of the Matron’s TV around the floor polisher (which weighed more than me), yanking it to the floor. I’ll never forget the Matron’s words when she fired me, “I don’t think you are suited to this type of work… you might do better working in a shop.” During this time, I became part of a sub-culture of working class young people, many of whom had left school at the minimum age of 14 and were forced into menial jobs, but whose intelligence and grasp of world affairs impressed me. My ability to flee this lack of opportunity, back to my university place, brought home the effects of the class system and made a huge impression on me.

When I came back to university, I dropped all my math courses and switched to experimental psychology – I was fascinated by the workings of the human brain and all the ways it can be tricked, moulded and manipulated.

I think I had always wanted to be a teacher; as a child I forced/bribed my younger brothers into playing endless games of  school, and even taught one of them to read (thereby probably contributing to some of his later behavioural problems in school). However, it was a serendipitous event that found me enrolled in the B.Ed programme at Acadia University in the fall of 1974. The coursework seemed boring and irrelevant – however I fell in with a group of other disaffected education students and along with organizing protests, sit-ins and hunger strikes we also were introduced to the writings of  educational thinkers such as Ivan Illich,  John Holt, A.S. Neill, Neil Postman. We formed a tight knit group who met frequently, sometimes with one of the younger faculty members, and had several weekend retreats where we discussed these "radical" ideas. These group discussions became more influential for me than anything that was taught in the courses. 

 My first teaching job, again a serendipitous appointment in August after a job in Scotland fell through, was in Great Whale River, a fly-in community in Northern Quebec, teaching Inuit and Cree children. Here I was introduced to the poverty and social issues facing aboriginal peoples, as well as being thrust into the middle of the great language debate, having arrived in Quebec just after the passage of the infamous Bill 101 which declared among other things that English should not be used on signs and all children should be educated in French unless they had a parent educated in an English school in Quebec. This did not go down well among Quebec’s native people, who were also in the middle of negotiating the James Bay agreement…I arrived into a highly divided community, with 4 distinct language and cultural groups (Inuit, Cree, French-speaking provincial employees and English-speaking Federal employees). It was also divided physically with the runway neatly separating the whites from the natives: on the one side, bungalows with electricity, phones and running water and on the other side overcrowded, ramshackle wooden houses with none of the above.

My first classroom was one of those wooden houses in the “village” with a large oil stove in the middle. I had about 15 Inuit and Cree non-English speaking 7 year olds – it was their first year of English, and the first year without a native-speaking assistant in the classroom. The Inuit and Cree children couldn’t talk to each other either, except to say things like “Eskimos eat dog”, so language became a major issue. I realized that I didn’t have a clue how to teach reading (my education degree dealt almost entirely with theory, and gave me virtually no practical strategies for classroom management or how to teach anything), and all the children were non-readers – I was expected to use the Ginn 360 series of readers,  “The Dog Next Door” all about a lovely white suburban family. Since I didn’t know what I was doing, I fell back on how I was taught and wrote vocabulary lists on the board, used a pointer and, horror of horrors, divided the children into ability groups for reading. I thought I was being very modern by naming the groups after local animals that in no way implied speed or slowness. However, the whole thing fell apart the day a few months in when we encountered the word “park” in the reader; even with the picture in the book of a treed, grassy space, I could not make them understand. So that was the end of the Dog Next Door, and the beginning of my theme teaching. The children wrote journals everyday (for months, some of them wrote “Today I had bannock and tea for breakfast.” every day), we played ESL games, wrote stories using the “Language Experience” approach and built models. I still remember the papier mache beaver dam we worked on for weeks!  I found the Creeways series of books about life in the north, but there were far too few of them, so we wrote our own books. 

Since my classroom was isolated from the main school and was down in the “village”, no one from administration ever came down and I got away with ditching all the textbooks. I have no idea how much the children learned that year – it seems that most of them learned to read a little, and I think their English became more fluent, but I doubt that they met too many of the benchmarks for grade 2 (since it was a federal school, all of which were gradually being fazed out, it’s possible we didn’t even have benchmarks).

My second year, I taught kindergarten, Inuit children in the morning and Cree in the afternoon. I was blessed with two wonderful native speaking classroom assistants who taught me so much about their respective cultures, and helped me adapt local folk tales into little dramas the children would act out. It was here that I learned more about the innate differences between boys and girls – it didn’t matter that guns and weapons were banned from the classroom. For the boys, any block or toy would substitute, and whenever a flock of geese or other noisy birds flew over, regardless of what was going on in the classroom, all the little boys would race to the window with whatever gun substitute was closest to hand, shooting wildly at them. 

It was at this time that my good friend Joanne from the rebel group at Acadia joined the staff, and the two of us banded together, starting clubs and drama groups. Our first  production was a full scale musical of“The Wizard of Oz”, chosen because I had a record of the songs, and slightly adapted to the culture. The next year’s production “Kung Fu and Cowboys” was written by the children and totally reflected the local culture: the movies shown weekly at the Rec Hall. As time went on, Joanne and I felt more and more at odds philosophically with the rest of the staff; quite a feat in a teaching environment which definitely attracted oddballs and loners, one of whom used to brag about napping in the classroom with his feet on his desk while the children “worked”!

In my third year, I was teaching grade 4, up in the big school on the other side of the runway. By this time I was receiving a little more attention from the administration, and was told that my classroom was too messy, I needed to follow the curriculum more closely etc. When the James Bay agreement was signed, and the Inuit and Cree took over their own school boards, I took the opportunity to transfer to another Federal school in Nova Scotia. Three years of “isolation” were enough, and a Mi’kmaq reserve in rural Cape Breton seemed like the height of civilization!

However this is the year I learned about “mainstreaming” children with special needs; I had a grade 4 class of about 20 children – about 10 of them were bright nine year olds who were motivated and fun to teach. The others ranged in age from 12 to 16, and had an array of difficulties such as Down’s Syndrome, what I now recognize as undiagnosed autism and every known behavioural problem. One 14 year old girl came about once a week to school, another teenage boy who today would probably be labelled with “Oppositional Defiant Disorder” used to make a great show of coming into the classroom with a wad of chewing tobacco stuffed in his cheek and when I asked him to get rid of it would spit it into the waste basket from across the room, often missing it completely. Another boy, whose father was a prominent local politician, called me an unprintable name whenever I asked him to do anything he didn’t like; this was echoed by the Down’s Syndrome child constantly… When I tried to speak with his parents, I was told that this type of language was the local dialect and reflected Mik’maq culture. I also learned about how the politics in the community can affect school atmosphere. I was unfortunate enough to arrive just after the long-serving non-native principal was fired by the band council and replaced with a prominent (but not local) Mik’maq educator. A petition was started by the other faction, and the first principal was reinstated; to make a long story short, there were two principals that year, but neither seemed able to take charge.

Another important lesson I learned from this year; how not to set up a student government/peer mediation team. Someone had an idea of how to tackle the discipline problems in the school – make the students responsible for monitoring each other’s behaviour, on the theory, which I think is fundamentally sound, that if you want to change a child’s behaviour, give them more responsibility and put them in charge of something. However, having older children (some with violent tendencies) barging into my classroom and dragging children out to "question" them started to give me the feeling of teaching under a despotic government with the habit of "disappearing" the opposition. A few of these children did let the power go to their heads, and after some children were hurt, the programme was stopped.

After this difficult year, I resigned from the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development and took a break from teaching for a couple of years. My year at Eskasoni had been positive in many respects: I had the privilege of teaching next to and getting to know some excellent educators : Sister Dorothy Moore and Murdena Marshall, people whose paths I would cross later on in the multicultural milieu in Halifax.

 My next job was with CUSO; a two year contract as part of the TESL programme teaching English in Nigeria. I was sent to a boys boarding school in a medium-sized town called Pankshin,  Plateau State. In addition to teaching English literature to the secondary school boys, I was also asked to teach in a staff primary school situated on the compound. By my second year there, I was the Headteacher of the Staff School, by virtue of being the only teacher on staff with an education degree (indeed a degree of any kind). Here I learned a multitude about cross-cultural issues, about running a school with few resources and no trained teachers and about the impact on a culture of an education system which does not reflect that culture at all. Nigeria inherited the British education system and the Cambridge examinations which it applied to its secondary schools with little or no adaptation. As a result, students who started learning English in first year of secondary school were expected to write the same type of exams at the end of their 6 years of school as native-speaking English students.  Understandably, the pass rate was about 2%, and a great many bright  students missed out on going to university.  The statistics do not reflect the huge effect on a nation’s psyche caused by the sense of failure this engenders, and as a teacher, I can attest to the loss of many teachable moments when students are demanding strict adherence to the syllabus. Understandably, students do not want to “waste” time learning things that they will not be tested on – with such high stakes testing, it makes perfect sense.

Coming back to Canada after 2 years in a developing country was a difficult transition, particularly since it was a time (early 80’s) when teaching jobs, and employment in general were scarce.  I began working at the International Education Centre at Saint Mary’s University in Halifax, one of a network of Development Education Centres across Canada, funded by CIDA whose mission was to work with schools and the community to educate Canadians about global, multicultural and enviromental issues.  My first job there was as Speakers Bureau Co-ordinator, linking up international students and others from the developing world with classrooms and community groups around the province. Because it was not well known as a resource (and it was free!) we used to take groups of speakers on tours to schools in different regions, and  I spent a lot of time promoting the service and travelling to schools. One school I didn’t have to promote to, but which used lots of speakers was the tiny Dalhousie University School, an “alternative” school on Dalhousie campus. They made up in enthusiasm for what they lacked in numbers – sending a speaker for 12 or 13 children didn’t do much for our statistics (# of contacts), but the speakers always spoke highly of the children, their knowledge and curiosity. Later on I became Education Co-ordinator, and worked with teachers supporting their work on incorporating a more global perspective in their teaching.

By 1991, the International Education Centre along with all the other Development Education Centres had lost its CIDA funding when the government of the time changed its focus from educating Canadians about global issues to promoting Canada’s business ties with the developing world. Its legacy can be seen today in the generation of students of the 80’s who benefited from attending IEC programmes on topics ranging from liberation movements in Central America to World Food Day to Amazonian deforestation, whose teachers were inspired by Global Education for Teachers conferences and by two courses (Global History and Global Geography), now part of the Nova Scotia curriculum, which were promoted and nurtured by the IEC.

After obtaining an M.Ed from University of Ottawa, it seemed like fate when I was hired as a contract teacher at the same Dalhousie University School to which I had sent so many speakers in the 80’s. From the beginning, I was ecstatic to find a place which so closely reflected my personal philosophy of teaching – the theme approach with its integrated, discovery based, hands-on teaching.  Although I was hired to replace a teacher on maternity leave (in those days it was only four months), by the following year I was on a one year contract and the year after, I was Headteacher. With only 37 students at the time and 3 teachers, two of whom were part-time, this was not the mercurial rise it sounds like – I had found my niche, and no one else wanted the job.

Assessment at HIS

I have a confession to make: in my early years, I was an enthusiastic test-taker, test creator and test administrator. Since I, myself, was good at taking tests,  I made all kinds of ridiculous assumptions like: everyone enjoys taking tests; tests really measure what they are supposed to; if you don’t do well on tests, a) you are not working hard enough or b) you aren’t smart enough. I really believed that testing helps people improve by telling them what they are doing wrong; it worked for me, so why wouldn't it work for everyone? The idea of tests being used to compare schools and teachers, thereby creating a culture of test-driven teaching did not occur to me; for me tests were all about helping children learn and improve.

As a young teacher teaching primary school, I enjoyed designing tests, and administering them. Marking not so much... but I did love compiling all the results and building up records of test results that one could show to parents. Since my first job was teaching non-English-speaking Cree and Inuit children, I was fairly quickly doused with some cold realities, and had most of my assumptions overturned. I found out that most children don’t enjoy tests – a tiny proportion might, but a much larger group finds them extremely stressful, boring, or if they don’t do well (according to their standards), devastating to their self-esteem. Years of seeing children work very hard, but still do badly on tests, blew away my assumptions, - dismissing more than half the children as “not smart enough” just didn’t work. Going over tests and correcting them with the children, seemed to benefit the few who made just a few mistakes, but lost the majority who quickly became discouraged when confronted with many errors. I came to see that at the primary level at least, the negative emotional side effects of testing outweighed any benefits.

Later on teaching in a secondary school in Nigeria, I was exposed to yet more realities of an exam-based curriculum.  At the time, (early 80’s) Nigeria was following the Cambridge curriculum, complete with final school-leaving exams all set in Britain, with no worry about making them culturally appropriate or taking into account the fact that most students were exposed to English for the first time in secondary school. Our teaching was completely bound by the syllabus, and I got a good lesson in “teaching to the test”  and the human toll of this "high stakes" testing. It all seemed very futile when we realized that only about 2% of our students were destined to pass the exams; for those that passed the stakes were very high indeed (entrance to university, international scholarships). For the huge majority who failed, their options were much more limited - second tier colleges (including teachers college) or more commonly an end to formal education.

When I came to HIS I was overjoyed to find that formal tests were not part of the philosophy. This does not mean no assessment; on the contrary, keeping detailed notes on children, selecting representative samples of their work to keep in their portfolios, checking off their accomplishments on the extensive benchmarks which have been developed over the years, and frequent meetings with parents ensures that children’s progress is well monitored.  Curriculum meetings with parents familiarize them with the skill benchmarks for each level, as well as the topics to be covered. Fairs, and other presentations provide opportunities for all to see how the children have integrated what they have learned. As the children approach Middle School, feedback on their work becomes more formalized in the form of written comments, rubrics and exposure to occasional tests and quizzes. Infrequent Math tests are introduced, and the process of reviewing work, and strategies for effective test taking are seen as important as the test itself.  When students get to Middle School, testing is one part of the overall evaluation. Since the majority of our students enter high schools where testing is a large part of the curriculum, these tests are seen as essential preparation for the “real world”. All the tests given at HIS are designed by the teachers and based on the material covered as well as the benchmarks for the particular level.

After about 8 years at HIS, years in which its assessment procedures were  strengthened and formalized, I took an unpaid sabbatical leave for the school year 2001-02. During that time, I worked part-time in an English junior school, where I was introduced to a system so dependent on standardized testing that its effects were felt everywhere. Before we arrived, we were advised to check the League Tables (charts that report the average student scores on standardized tests for each school) to find a "good" school for our 15 year old daughter. After choosing an average Comprehensive school for her, we were startled to find that based on her age, she would be spending the entire year revising (reviewing and studying) for the "GCSE" exams - apparently all the new material and actual teaching had happened the year before. Then when I started teaching, I was immediately surrounded by anxious teachers, worried about the impact the results of the next round of standardized tests would have on themselves and their students. The Headteacher was worried about the funding implications for the school if their results should slip, or not improve enough. But the biggest effect of all this testing was the impact on the children themselves. My job was to teach two groups of children, both of whom had "failed" the Key Stage 2 (for 7 year olds) exams the year before. The first group consisted of 12 8 year olds, who had failed the literacy portion, largely because their reading skills were low. A small number of these children had some severe learning problems, but the majority were normal, bright 8 year olds who had taken a little longer than average to learn to read. It was easy to see the impact this streaming had had on their self-esteem and desire to learn. (exerpt from diaries)

Britain underwent an educational revolution in the 1980's under Margaret Thatcher, a revolution which reversed the "child-centred" education that had spawned Theme Studies,  and which culminated in the Education Reform Act of 1988. The drive for more accountability led to an increased reliance on standardized testing which became the stick for educators charged with raising standards. A similar process happened in North America - over the past 25 years, the "steroidal school reform movement" described by Andy Hargreaves (the 4th Way) has seen the stakes of standardized tests rise to a point where

How we can operate in a world without report cards or tests? How do you get the children to work without the reward of marks or grades? These are questions frequently asked by both parents and educators from other systems. The answer can be found in the HIS motto “Learning and Loving it” - the strength of the theme approach is that curiosity and excitement about learning is built in, modelled by the teachers and expected of the students. Each child is expected to do their best work, and is held to a high standard...but it is a standard unique to each child, made possible by the teachers’ in-depth knowledge of her/his abilities. Small classes ensure that teachers get to know each child and their strengths well. Children are also encouraged to know their own limits and strengths, and to get satisfaction from knowing their work is the best they can do. Comparing themselves with others is discouraged; the emphasis is on  constructive criticism and honest feedback, from both peers and teachers. External rewards such as grades pale in comparison to the praise children receive from their parents, teachers and peers for a job well done at Fair, or in class. Read Alouds, when children prepare and read a passage from a book they are reading, are a good example of  this type of feedback. It is not uncommon to hear a comment from a child listening to a reader such as, “I think you chose a good book, but you should have practiced a bit more - there were a lot of difficult words.” When a child or teacher identifies a weakness or a difficulty, strategies are put in place to help the child surmount it. Usually it can be done through grouping the child with others at a similar level. Sometimes extra practice work is given; occasionally a child will get extra help outside the classroom. 

 "Certain uses of achievement test results are termed "high stakes" if they carry serious consequences for students or for educators. Schools may be judged according to the school-wide average scores of their students. High school-wide scores may bring public praise or financial rewards; low scores may bring public embarrassment or heavy sanctions." (American Educational Research Association, Position Statement 2000) at that time only existed in other places, and had been eliminated in Ontario. Provincial Grade 13 exams had disappeared the year before I would have had to take them (1969?), and even when they were in existence, I don't remember high schools being compared on the basis of their student's results. 

How do we know that our students are performing as well as students in other school systems? Anecdotal evidence coming from children who have left the school tells us that our students often excel in other systems, and have an advantage in that they are motivated learners, who can take a leadership role when tackling group projects. Solid research skills, honed through years of theme studies, are utilized as students tackle essays and other independent projects. Nonetheless, there are times when it is useful to have an objective measure of our students’ basic skills. Hence, yearly graded spelling and reading assessments are done with each child, and this information is used to help the teachers decide who needs extra help, or some extension.




In 2011, teachers decided that it would also be useful to have an objective writing assessment tool that would inform our teaching, (and reassure ourselves that our teaching of writing was on track). Two separate writing tasks were developed; one for the upper elementary (Olds and Elders) and one for the lower elementary (Youngs and Middles).We worked over several days with experts to develop a rubric to use in evaluating samples of children’s writing, and then, with graded writing samples from other jurisdictions, the levels were calibrated to give an idea of where on the writing continuum students were. For example, the upper elementary rubric was divided into: Ideas, Organization, Voice, Word Choice, Sentence Fluency, Punctuation and Spelling. By rating  a piece of writing in each category on a scale from 1 - 6, we were able to refine our feedback to both students and parents. Each piece is rated independently by at least two teachers, which allows us to check our perceptions against those of our peers. When reporting to the students and their parents, the emphasis is always on what the children do well, the progress made since the last assessment, and what they need to work on next. Because each assessment requires at least a day and 5-6 teachers, it is done sparingly. However, the process of developing the rubric has been extremely valuable, for the teachers and the students.

When I started teaching, I believed absolutely in the virtue of tests as a means of measuring children’s progress. I was well started was on the road to seeing tests as an end in themselves. Now,  I think that the development and refinement of assessment   should be about improving tools to aid teachers in doing what they do best – encouraging children to love learning, and to bring their curiosity and critical thinking to every task they undertake, and to create work that is their very best. 

Part 2 (Read Part 1 first)

When asked about the early use of the "Whole Language" approach at the school, Winnie said, “You just write down what you hear. You don’t sound things out, you say things slowly,  and you start to remember but basically it is the thoughts that are important not the spelling. The more you read the more you write. Sometimes you talk about spelling rules, to help them along.” With the 5 year olds, the letters and sounds are taught, and practiced all the time. At these early stages, the teacher "always praises them for everything...you never say that's not right." Spelling was taught, Meredith said, "Just in time...when the pencil went towards the paper." As children get older, they write "reams and reams" and then the focus was on organization, and on deepening their thinking. In the Middles, a lot of time was spent encouraging the children to broaden their thinking, and then take a second or third look before organizing a long text. At this stage, punctuation and grammar were secondary - they were seen as aids to organization.

We talked a little about the school's early reputation as a place which handled "difficult" children well.  Children who did not read as early as others were given more of the teacher's time, but were not referred to specialists or resource teachers.  There were several children who had undiagnosed syndromes such as ADHD and Asberger's Syndrome, and who were sent by parents who believed that the school's holistic, hands on approach would suit them. This often happened, and parents were generally very supportive - the work produced was impressive, the children seemed very engaged and active, and the public schools at the time were often uninspiring. 

Some of the elements of HIS which are key to the school's philosophy had their origins during these early years. Meredith recalls watching Winnie facilitate the whole school meeting, which happened every day, "She was brilliant, and took on really challenging social issues, giving the responsibility back to the kids. It was non-threatening, as no names were used (a tradition that has lasted to this day) and even children with issues would participate. Follow through was important, and the children would trust that their problems would be solved.  Sometimes, a kid who was in trouble would have others agree to help them with their behaviours."

I asked where the concept of "Mini-Society" originated, and with a little thought, Winnie recalled that it probably started with a Valentines Day activity which became a unit on the postal system, with children designing stamps, buying and selling them, and writing letters which had to be posted. This went on once a week for a month, and was so popular that it was extended into another unit where children made things themselves one afternoon a week, a currency was created, and on the last Friday afternoon,  everyone set up shops and buying and selling occurred. At the end of the afternoon, the teachers said, "No more" and the children realized that the currency was worthless. A lot of discussion ensued about value and how we decide what something is worth. The next time this was tried, discussion happened beforehand about the value of labour, and it was decided to set the labour cost at about 10 minutes work for 1 point (or dollar) as a guideline for children to know what to charge for their goods. Apparently some parents didn't like Mini-Society, because it was all about money, and they didn't want to promote the idea that we only do things for money - the Board concurred, and it was stopped for a while. The children kept asking for it, and so it was revived several years later.

Finally, I asked for some memories and stories about the early days. Meredith remembered that Winnie was always scavenging for natural objects to use as catalysts for teaching...one day she came in to the school and Winnie was boiling a seagull on the stove to articulate the skeleton. Another time, said Winnie, "Somebody had described where you could find the skeleton of a moose all eaten away– find that rock, by that tree. So we (the teachers) decided to go there – it was late fall, a little bit cold, so we go there and we take 2 cars, coffee and sandwiches. I hit a bit of black ice, slid around and of course the woman behind me drove right into my car, and I was so shaken, so what did I do?  I started handing out coffee and sandwiches."

Meredith continued, "We turn around and come back and there was Winnie giving out food, but the car was schmucked. No moose was found that day!"

Ruth relates, "We were driving somewhere, and all of a sudden, Winnie says, "Stop!" and I slam on the brakes, and there was a dead porcupine there, and Winnie runs up, but  no, no, it's not dead enough!"

Another time, Meredith's class went down to the Northwest Arm on a Friday afternoon to collect creatures to put in the cold water tank which they had borrowed from the biology department. "It was mainly  little snails, and they were all put into the tank to hold them until Monday when we could discuss the various ecosystems, foodchains etc. So, I came in on Sunday afternoon, and  I remember opening the door, and the room was covered with snails – everywhere. They missed their low tide so they were traveling. They were in holes, up in the bathroom, and of course by now it was high tide so they were looking for water so some were in the toilets. It was a huge clean up!"

Finally, they reminded me of DUS' brush with fame:  Mark Garneau, who at the time was the first Canadian astronaut to go into space, came to officially open the Playhouse which was built by the children as part of the first "People and their Work" theme.

Meeting with the Old Guard

Part 1:
On Friday afternoon, I had a tea party and invited Ruth Gamberg, Winnie Kwak and Meredith Hutchings, 3 of the 4 authors of the book "Learning and Loving it: Theme Studies in the Classroom", the book about my school. Heather B also came along, and we had lots of fun telling stories about the early days in the school. I taped the conversation, and here is what transpired.

When Winnie (W) first came to the school in 1980, it was run by an Education professor named Anthony Barton, who had been in charge since the early 70's. Anthony Barton wrote the whole syllabus, week by week, day by day. It contained the main ideas, suggestions as to what to teach and examples to use. Judith Newman was lecturing about the Whole Language approach, and Winnie took a course from her.  She learned about holistic learning, the theme approach and all about how kids learn. They need a context, and whole environment, “not just one little piece here, one little piece there, you learn everything, you grow up in this context. The theme approach seemed to be a completely natural approach, I didn’t know any better.”

When I asked her to describe Barton’s approach: She said, "It was called East to West…children were read to a lot, and when they started to write, it had to be really neat and tidy – kids had to think great thoughts, formulate them in their heads and then write them down perfectly”

One of Ruth’s first memories is that there was a coffin in the school, but she has no idea why.

Meredith said that Barton wanted to offer something different to the public school.  There were about 30 kids in 1980, and it was situated in a long building, since torn down, on corner of Oxford and Coburg. In the summer of 1980, the school moved  to the  Education  building right on the Quad. Parents/board were wanting a change – they wanted the children to learn something about their own environment. The Nova Scotia theme was born, Winnie was hired, and she and the other tteachers came up with a whole new curriculum. “This is your task, figure it out”. They came up with a programme and discussed it with the School committee. The first year was “something else” as they tried hard to fit in with the new view,  and had monthly meetings to report back to committee. They got lots of input, bounced back ideas, mistakes, and got advice. There was not much talk about methods of teaching. School committee consisted of parents, teachers and faculty (one from MSVU).

After a while the committee support changed to only organizational support, which is when Ruth became involved. She was assigned the School Committee as part of her departmental duties. 

At this point, the school had the full age range of age 5 to Olds. Tuition was minimal as  Dalhousie covered teachers' salaries then. The next year Gail Waddington started teaching, and another theme, "Living Things" was born. The themes were gradually developed year by year. Winnie loved Britain's  math programme, but was not really aware of theme approach being practiced there at that time. When Meredith (M) joined in October 1982 she felt like she was coming into something established; a rich atmosphere. There was lots of talk about holistic, integrated learning, but although similar things were happening in other places, DUS' theme approach was definitely homegrown.

So here I am, starting my brand new blog on this, International Women's Day! I am not making this public yet, but if you happen to stumble on it, I'd love to hear from you.

I am doing this so that I have at least an imaginary audience for the book that I am working on. It seems to help with my writing when I am writing for someone, and out there in the blogosphere exist unknown readers who are faceless, and therefore non-intimidating and infinitely accepting. The ideal reader is someone who is as passionate about education as I am, and who values the unexpected, seizes the teachable moment, and understands the messiness and joy of young children's learning. S/he will appreciate the absurdities and complexities of structuring learning experiences for children without hemming them in needlessly with restrictions, boring them with repetition or holding them to expectations geared towards some imaginary middle.

So, ideal reader, although I have given you infinite understanding, it doesn't mean that I am adverse to constructive criticism or helpful comments. I crave debate about some of these ideas, and it may be that in these pages I will present more than one point of view, as I seek to test my ideas while working out my philosophy.

Being I.W.D., I have to comment on something that I saw in the Globe and Mail today that makes me despair a little over what has happened to feminism. There was a lovely article about Max, a Downs syndrome young man whom I have known since his birth, and his passion for exercise. The reporter interviewed his mother, who was reflexively given the same last name as Max, even though she had never taken her husband's name. Did the reporter not ask her name (one of the first rules of interviewing as my young journalists at school are taught)? Why, after 40 years of feminism, do young people who must  know many women who keep their own names, still assume otherwise? I know there is a trend backwards in that respect - most of the young teachers at my school who have married have taken their husband's names, but surely we could at least expect people to check! Oh well, perhaps, Audrey did change her name after 30 some years of marriage, and 15 years of widowhood - after all I haven't seen her for some time.