Whose Learning Is It Anyway?

I recently came across a report submitted to Congress by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) titled “As Students Struggled to Learn, Teachers Reported Few Strategies as Particularly Helpful to Mitigate Learning Loss.” The report was published by the GAO last May.

The GAO found that “During the 2020-21 school year, students in all grade levels, whether learning in person or virtually, struggled with many obstacles. These ranged from lack of appropriate workspaces and adequate support to competing demands on their time, disengagement, and absences. Such obstacles hindered student learning, according to GAO’s nationwide survey of K-12 public school teachers and discussion groups with teachers, principals, and parents.”

“In particular, a higher percentage of teachers who taught students in virtual or hybrid (mix of virtual and in-person) environments consistently reported that their students experienced learning difficulties than teacher in an in-person environment. For example, an estimated 60 percent of teachers in a virtual environment had students who had more difficulty understanding lessons than in a typical year, compared to 37 percent of teachers in an in-person environment. Differences in the responses between virtual and in-person environments could reflect the instructional setting and other factors that GAO did not measure, such as school resources or certain student characteristics. In addition, obstacles affecting students varied by grade level. For example, 92 percent of grades 9-12 teachers who had students who made less academic progress compared to a typical year indicated that social or emotional issues were contributors compared to 83 percent of grades 3-8 teachers and 69 percent of K-2 teachers.”

“Teachers used many strategies to mitigate learning loss. They reported that two strategies in particular helped at least half their student make academic progress: live instruction and technology apps or platforms. Specifically, 85 percent of teachers who taught students fully of partially in person indicated that live instruction helped many of their students. In contrast, 56 percent of teachers who taught students virtually all or part of the time indicated that live virtual instruction (i.e. synchronous learning) helped many of their students. Regarding technology, nearly two-thirds of teachers who used apps or platforms for students to submit their assignments and to provide feedback thought it was helpful for many of their students. Teachers used many other strategies as well, but they were generally helpful to fewer students and used less often. One notable exception was asynchronous learning, in which students work independently without live instruction. This strategy was used regularly by 69 percent of teachers, yet fewer than 40 percent thought it helped at least half of their students.

I wish the GAO had included “student voice” in this report, or, in other words, what did the kids think were the most and least effective practices when it came to their learning. It seems student feedback, which is extremely important when it comes to any learning process, hasn’t been captured during the COVID-19 pandemic as much and as well as what the adults have felt to be successful or not.

Here’s my guess to what the young learners might have said if they had been interviewed by the GAO. I think they might have told interviewers that their teachers preferred live instruction best because that is what those adults felt comfortable doing. A large number of teachers still today were trained to perform inside classrooms. Their ability to lead learning outside of those spaces and outside of schools is still suspect. On the other hand, most young learners today expect at least a mixed or hybrid approach of in-person support along with an on-line learning platform. We learned, when we ran a pilot personalized learning lab school in Houston several years ago, it was difficult to find adults who were trained and felt comfortable supporting learning alongside a robust learning platform. We were lucky to find two, one with literacy experience, the other specializing in problem-solving. The difficulty in scaling up our pilot was mainly due to our inability to find more like these two.

At the beginning of the pandemic, those interested in a different type of learning system for our kids were hopeful COVID-19 would cause serious shifts in the way teaching and learning happened inside the traditional school. I’m afraid, and this GAO report pretty much reinforces, that opportunity is no longer available. It seems most school districts are more than happy to go back to total and complete in-person instruction – classroom and school-based. As usual, more often than not, the adult agenda, within the traditional school system, has carried the day. “Student voice” remains a cute thing for schools and districts to brag to their communities about, but we all know most of that “student voice” falls on deaf ears when it comes to important issues like learning.

And that makes for a very sad day.

Friday News Roundup tomorrow. SVB