Education Reform:
Welcoming Strangers

Robert King

These days, people talk about xenophobia—the fear of strangers. In the ancient world, though, people had xenophilia—the love of strangers. Locals were expected to welcome travelers into their homes and offer them food and entertainment. After all, strangers brought news from far-off places, gifts of precious spices, music, art, and ideas.

Five Strangers in the Classroom

As we strive to create student-centered classrooms, we need to invite certain strangers into our midst. These strangers may make us uncomfortable, may rock our routines—but they also introduce the wonders of the world. Make sure to welcome the following strangers into your class:

• Uncertainty: In the teacher-centered model, you control everything, minimizing uncertainty. The problem is that you have to control everything, and that’s a huge burden. In the student-centered model, you and the students share the burden. That means there will be moments of uncertainty: Welcome them. Uncertainty creates space for students to step up, propose a direction, and learn leadership.
• Shared Responsibility: Oddly enough, education reform has stripped students of responsibility for their success or failure: A bad test grade is somehow the teacher’s fault. Students used to cheat on tests, but now teachers do because they have more at stake. This has to change. Students need to actively seek their education, not passively receive it. After all, they’re the ones who will suffer the consequences of a poor education. Empower students by making them responsible for their own failures and successes.
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In the News

These thumbnail descriptions point to recent articles on 21st century skills, inquiry, project-based learning, media literacy, and education reform.

Three Rs of Asian Education: Rigorous, Rigid and Results: In the Sydney Morning Herald, Andrew Stevenson reports that despite China’s position as an education leader, “East Asian educators are not at all happy with what they have achieved; they look at what they have not achieved. They look at the children’s lack of confidence, for example, creativity, entrepreneurial spirit and imagination.”

Why Education Without Creativity Isn’t Enough: At Fast Company, Anya Kamenetz writes that while India is revising its STEM model to include creativity, the U.S. is emphasizing STEM at the cost of creativity.

How Finland Became an Education Leader: In Salon, David Sirota reports that Finland has become an educational leader by deemphasizing testing and emphasizing teacher quality.

Immersive PBL: Indiana Project Reaches Far Beyond the Classroom: At Edutopia, Suzie Boss reports about a science class in Indiana whose water-purification project became a lifesaving mission after the Haiti earthquake.

Unleashing the Scientist in the Student: In the New York Times, Lisa W. Foderaro writes about a public parks project that enlists students to find, monitor, and record the health of salamanders in the Staten Island Forest. Students learn science by being scientists.

Austin Hay, 16-Year-Old, Builds Small House in Backyard: The Huffington Post presents an article and video about a boy who was so inspired by a school project that he built a house on wheels in his backyard. He hopes to live in it during high school.

YouTube Launches Space Experiment Contest for Students: Space.com announces a contest conducted by NASA and YouTube inviting students to submit experiment ideas to perform aboard the International Space Station.

Digital Badges Could Help Measure 21st-Century Skills: On ESchool News, Meris Stansbury reports that Mozilla and the MacArthur Foundation are launching a contest to develop a digital badge to trace 21st century skills. The badges would collect information about the wearer’s experiences on the Internet.

Inquire in the News

This section provides information about recent and upcoming events connected to Inquire.

The Thoughtful Learning Blog Launches The new Thoughtful Learning Blog features timely articles about 21st century skills, inquiry, project-based learning, media literacy, and education reform. The blog also includes an archive of Thoughtful Inquirer newsletter articles.

Inquire Online Launches In the Inquire Online student handbook and teacher’s guide, you’ll find the same great content you get in the print books—and a lot of extras. Learn more.

Thoughtful Learning Upcoming Events

American Association of School Librarians Conference

Thursday, October 27 – Saturday, October 29, 2011, Minneapolis, Minnesota. Drop by our Booth 1132, at the American Association of School Librarians (AASL) National Conference.

National Middle School Association (NMSA) 38th Annual Conference & Exhibit

Thursday, November 10 – Saturday, November 12, 2011, Louisville, Kentucky. Visit us at Booth 936, and be sure to join Inquire author Rob King for concurrent session 2115—Using Project-Based Lessons to Teach Language Arts—on Friday, November 11, from 10:00 a.m. to 11:15 a.m.

National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) Annual Convention

Thursday, November 17 – Sunday, November 20, 2011, Chicago, Illinois. Visit us at Booth 1213, and be sure to join Inquire author Rob King, middle school teacher Cindy Smith, and Thoughtful Learning president Chris Erickson for session K.22—Using Inquiry Projects to Teach Language Arts—Saturday, November 19, 4:15-5:30 p.m., Palmer House/Chicago Room, Fifth Floor.

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