Parental Involvement in Education

In response to:

Why Canadian students are among the globe's smartest

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/economy/economy-lab/keeping-up-the-standards-in-science-math/article13926966/

Published in the Globe and Mail (August 23, 2013)

The article entitled “Why Canadian students are among the globe’s smartest” (August 23, 2013), correctly reports OECD evidence demonstrating the lack of relationship between a handful of common parent activities in schools and student achievement. However, the article draws the sweeping and incorrect conclusion that “Parental involvement in schools appears to result in lower test scores, not higher ones.” Parent involvement in school occurs both in the school and in the home. The evidence about parental involvement is more nuanced than the article conveys.

The evidence concerning parental involvement with school in the home context indicates that parents make significant contributions to the success of their children at school when they engage in practices of the following kinds: reading to their children, communicating high expectations and aspirations for their children’s success at school, providing access to school- related social and intellectual resources, talking frequently with their children about school-related issues, and promoting their children’s critical thinking. 

Considerable evidence also indicates that parents are better able to do these things when they involve themselves in the school for the purpose of communicating with teachers about their children’s challenges and progress, and learning about the school’s curriculum, the language of schooling and the opportunities available to their children through the school.

Thus, while some forms of parental involvement in schools have little to do with student learning, others are quite critical to such learning. It is a disservice to parents to categorically conclude that there is an adverse relationship between their involvement and school performance.

• Ruth Baumann 
• Ron Canuel, CEO, Canadian Education Association 
• Gerry Connelly, Co Director Education Sustainability Development Academy, York University
• Lorna Earl, Director, Aporia Consulting Ltd. and President of the International Congress of School Effectiveness and School Improvement
• Sue Ferguson, Associate, Curriculum, Teaching & Learning Dept., OISE 
• Kathleen Gallagher, Professor and Canada Research Chair, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education 
• Joan M. Green, O.Ont., Former Director of Education, Founding CEO of EQAO, International Consultant on Public Policy 
• Bill Hogarth, Retired Director of Education, Education Consultant 
• Ken Leithwood, Professor, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education 
• Penny Milton, former CEO, Canadian Education Association 
• Charles E. Pascal, Professor, University of Toronto, Former Ontario Deputy Minister of Education 
• Jim Slotta, Professor and Canada Research Chair, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education 
• Charles Ungerleider, Professor Emeritus (The University of British Columbia) and Director of Research (Directions Evidence and Policy Research Group, LLP.

Illustrative Studies

Borgonovi, F., Montt, G. (2012). Parent involvement in selected PISA countries and economies.France, OECD (07 May)

Hattie, J. (2009). Visible learning: A synthesis of over 800 meta-analyses relating to achievement. London, UK: Routledge.

Hawes, Carmen Ann, Plourde, Lee A. (2005). Parental involvement and its influence on the Reading achievement of 6^th grade students, Reading Improvement, 42, p. 47.

Jeynes, W. (2005). A meta-analysis of the relation of parent involvement to urban elementary school student academic achievement, Urban Education, 40, 3, 237-269.

Park, H. (2008). The varied educational effects of parent-childcommunication: a comparative study of fourteen countries,Comparative Education Review, 2008, 50, 2, 219-243

Teachers' Unions are Obsolete

Published in the Globe and Mail

January 14, 2013

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/commentary/jan-14-the-relevance-of-teachers-unions-and-other-letters-to-the-editor/article7303132/ 

Re: Teachers’ Unions Are Obsolete (Focus – Jan. 12): Virtually all of the high performing countries on international assessments (Japan, South Korea, Finland, Canada, Australia, Germany, New Zealand) have strong teacher unions, while others (e.g. Singapore) have very favourable salaries and working conditions for teachers. Countries with weak teacher unions and poor working conditions (e.g. the U.S.) have lower achievement levels. There is no evidence that strong teacher unions are inconsistent with high quality education.



Sincerely,

• Ruth Baumann, Chair, Curriculum Council for the Ontario Ministry of Education
• Ron Canuel, CEO, Canadian Education Association
• Gerry Connelly, Co-Director, Education Sustainability Development Academy, York University
• Michael Fullan, Special Policy Adviser in Education to the Premier of OntarioJ
• Jane Gaskell, Professor and former Dean, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education
• Joan Green, Former Director of Education, Founding CEO of EQAO, International Consultant on Public Policy and Performance
• Kathleen Gallagher, Professor and Canada Research Chair, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education
• Avis Glaze, President, Edu-quest International
• Sue Herbert, former Ontario Deputy Minister of Education
• Bill Hogarth, retired Director of Education, Education Consultant
• Ken Leithwood, Professor, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education
• Ben Levin, Professor and Canada Research Chair, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education
• Karen Mundy, Professor and Canada Research Chair, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education

Op Ed Response to 'Failure' Articles in The Globe

Why kids need to fail to succeed in school

September 1, 2012

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/parenting/back-to-school/why-kids-need-to-fail-to-succeed-in-school/article4513436/

Math teacher applies the power of failure squared
August 31, 2012
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/parenting/back-to-school/star-math-teacher-applies-the-power-of-failure-squared/article4513390/  

 

The Globe’s pieces on ‘failure’ (Aug.31 & Sept.1) makes some very important points but readers were badly served by the headline. These stories are not about the value of failure, and certainly not about ‘crashing and burning’; rather, they are about efforts to help students achieve success by learning from their mistakes and limitations. The whole goal in all these cases is success through coaching, feedback and persistence. Good athletes or artists, for example, don`t always reach their goals, but they do see themselves as competent and getting steadily more so, not as failures. It would be a gross misrepresentation of what Paul Tough has to say, and of the broader research on these issues, to conclude that more failure would be a good step towards better results in our school system or anywhere else.

One of the clearest findings in all the research on psychology, supported by thousands of studies in many different fields, is that failure tends to depress effort. When we are not good at something, and don’t see much chance of getting better, our natural instinct is to try to do less of it. Note the important difference here; the issue is less how well we are doing than whether we see a way to improve and be successful. Simply failing, then, is mostly discouraging to people. Nor does Paul Tough suggest at any point that failure itself produces later achievement – a contention that would be contrary to all the evidence. Rather, it’s the guidance around improvement that matters. In the case of schools, this means teachers and other adults who believe in students and support them in doing better. We have lots of evidence in Ontario and elsewhere that those practices do indeed result in better achievement.

It’s very dangerous to draw generalizations from single cases as the Tough interview does. While some people may beat the odds, they are ‘the odds’ precisely because most people don’t beat them. Our failure to understand this basic principle is why casinos make money (and so many people lose so much gambling). It is also the reason that students in poor communities have to be more motivated and more persistent to achieve the same level of success as their more fortunate peers. The question we have to ask is not what is possible for exceptional people or under unusual circumstances, but just the opposite: what would be most helpful at the system level, for all young people, under normal conditions. Relying on what a single person can do, while it may be inspirational, does not make for good policy; despite Oscar Pretorius, or Canada`s own Arne Boldt, we would not have more great athletes if we had more people without limbs.

There already is lots of failure in our schools. More than 25% of students don’t finish high school in the standard four years, meaning they are failing something along the way. Even more students fail at least one course along the way. (And by the way, in our cost conscious time the cost of those extra courses amounts to several hundred million dollars annually.) We know that a student who fails even one course in grade 9 is much less likely to graduate, making the point again that failure now does not tend to lead to success later, but the opposite. Large numbers of students learn that they are not good at things in school, from reading, to math, to physical education. Just ask kids and you will learn that most are acutely aware of their deficiencies.

On the positive side, while Margaret Wente suggests in a question in the Tough interview that ‘nothing works’ in helping poor children be more successful, that is not so. In fact we have growing international evidence of what does work, and not just in one classroom with an exceptional teacher but across whole systems - for example Poland, Chile, Shanghai, Korea, Montgomery County in Maryland, Hackney in England, and even Ontario, where graduate rates have risen significantly in the last few years. It takes persistent effort, high expectations for all students, high quality teaching, good outreach to families and communities, and most of all a relentless determination to do what is needed to help all students develop their capabilities – all the kinds of supports mentioned by Tough.

It is entirely true that we do students no favour by protecting them from life’s challenges. No students – or anyone else – should get something that they don`t deserve (which is why high inheritance taxes might be a good policy to help reduce our deficit!). The goal is to develop public systems, whether education or child welfare or criminal justice, to help people discover and build on their strengths. Occasional failure might be part of this, but widespread failure cannot be the basis for success any more than a company with a high proportion of defective products or poor services can make a profit!

Ben Levin, Professor and Canada Research Chair, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education

Ontario Cannot Buy Labour Peace, Hudak Says

Published in the Toronto Star
Thursday, August 23rd, 2012
http://www.thestar.com/opinion/article/1246379--ontario-cannot-buy-labour-peace-tim-hudak-says 

Dear Editor,


Political debate about education policy in Ontario is important and many different views can have merit. However, Tim Hudak’s claim that performance in Ontario schools has ‘gone down’ in recent years is contrary to all the available evidence, whether from Ontario’s Ministry of Education, the Educational Quality and Accountability Office, the OECD, McKinsey consultants, or the Council of Ministers of Education, Canada. All these sources show that Ontario has a very high performing system by international standards, and that our performance relative to previous years and other provinces has improved. Sources for this claim can be found on our website – factsineducation.blogspot.com.


Sincerely,

• Ruth Baumann, Chair, Curriculum Council for the Ontario Ministry of Education
• Ron Canuel, CEO, Canadian Education Association
• Lorna Earl, Director, Aporia Consulting Ltd. and President of the International Congress of School Effectiveness and School Improvement
• Sue Ferguson, Associate, Continuing Education and Curriculum, Teaching & Learning Depts
• Michael Fullan, Special Policy Adviser in Education to the Premier of Ontario
• Kathleen Gallagher, Professor and Canada Research Chair, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education
• Jane Gaskell, Professor and former Dean, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education
• Joan Green, Former Director of Education, Founding CEO of EQAO, International Consultant on Public Policy and Performance
• Bill Hogarth, retired Director of Education, Education Consultant
• Kenneth Leithwood, Professor, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education
• Ben Levin, Professor and Canada Research Chair, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education
• Penny Milton, former CEO Canadian Education Association
• Charles Pascal, Professor, University of Toronto, Former Ontario Deputy Minister of Education
• Jim Slotta, Professor and Canada Research Chair, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education
• Charles Underleider, Professor, Sociology of Education, the University of British Columbia, and Director of Research, Directions Evidence and Policy Research Group, LLP

See, for example:

EQAO’s Provincial Elementary School Report: Results of the 2010–2011Assessments of Reading, Writing and Mathematics, Primary Division (Grades 1–3) and Junior Division (Grades 4–6):

http://www.eqao.com/pdf_e/11/EQAO_ProvincialReport_Elementary2011.pdf

EQAO’s Pan-Canadian Assessment Program (PCAP), 2010

Highlights of Ontario Results:  http://www.eqao.com/pdf_e/11/PCAP_Highlights2010e_web.pdf

Levin, B. (2012). More High School Graduates: How Schools Can Save Students from Dropping Out. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

Levin, Ben. (2008)  How to Change 5000 Schools. A Practical and Positive Approach for Leading Change at Every Level. Cambridge, MA:  Harvard Education Press.

Mourshed, M. Chijioke, C. Barber, M. (2010). How the World’s Most Improved School Systems Keep Getting Better. McKinsey & Company.

http://mckinseyonsociety.com/downloads/reports/Education/How-the-Worlds-Most-Improved-School-Systems-Keep-Getting-Better_Download-version_Final.pdf

Ontario Ministry of Education (re: High School Graduation rates): http://news.ontario.ca/opo/en/2010/03/ontario-graduation-rates-rise-again.html

Editor’s Note: Why violence has declined

By John Macfarlane

Published in The Walrus

May 2012

http://walrusmagazine.com/articles/2012.05-editors-note/

 

In the May Editor’s Note John McFarlane puts public schools in the category of things that people think may be getting worse over time.  To be fair, he freely admits that this may simply be nostalgia and that one should reserve judgment unless one has real evidence.  The Facts in Education team (factsineducation.blogspot.com) was created precisely to ensure that media reports on education are factual and to provide evidence that will help people come to informed views.  Walrus readers might like to know that a great deal of international evidence shows that Canadian students are among the best educated in the world.  While real challenges remain in public schools, and we should never feel that our education system is as good as it can be, the evidence strongly suggests that we are educating more students to higher levels than ever before, and doing it better than most other countries.  Please consult our website for evidence for this claim.

Sincerely,

• Ruth Baumann
• Harold Brathwaite, Executive Director, The Retired Teachers of Ontario
• Ron Canuel, CEO, Canadian Education Association
• Gerry Connelly, Co Director Education Sustainability Development Academy, York University
• Lorna Earl, Director, Aporia Consulting Ltd. and President of the International Congress of School Effectiveness and School Improvement
• Sue Ferguson, Coordinator, The Learning Consortium, Ontario Institute of Studies in Education
• Michael Fullan, Special Policy Adviser in Education to the Premier of Ontario 
• Kathleen Gallagher, Professor and Canada Research Chair, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education
• Avis Glaze, President, Edu-quest International Inc.
• Joan M. Green, Former Director of Education, Founding CEO of EQAO, International Education Consultant
• Sue Herbert, former Ontario Deputy Minister of Education
• Bill Hogarth, Retired Director of Education, Education Consultant 
• Ken Leithwood, Professor, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education
• Ben Levin, Professor and Canada Research Chair, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education 
• Penny Milton, former CEO Canadian Education Association 
• Charles E. Pascal, Professor, University of Toronto, Former Ontario Deputy Minister of Education
• Jim Slotta, Professor and Canada Research Chair, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education
• Charles Ungerleider, Professor Sociology of Education (The University of British Columbia) and Director Research (Directions Evidence and Policy Research Group, LLP.)

Is there something wrong with the way math is taught in Canadian schools?

The recent Cross Country Checkup (April 15, 2012: http://www.cbc.ca/checkup/main-blog/2012/04/15/is-there-something-wrong-with-the-way-math-is-taught-in-canadian-schools/), draws welcome attention to the teaching of mathematics in Canada.

The program’s description makes the claim that, “Canadian students have usually done pretty well in international rankings of math performance but lately they've been slipping.” Murphy infers that performance is slipping because Canada’s ranking among countries in the OECD’s PISA test of 15 year olds went from 7th in 2006 to 10th in 2009. But that inference is not supported by a careful look at the evidence.

First, the number of countries increased, from 57 in 2006 to 65 in 2009.  The significance of a rank depends on a) how many are in the total ranking (i.e.it is better to be 10th out of 100 than to be 5th out of 20) and b) the accuracy of the measure on which the rank depends.  The OECD is clear that not all differences among the rankings are meaningful, just as a poll result may vary by 3 or 4%.  Accordingly, it would be more accurate to say that Canadian performance in math is ‘stable’.  That is, in fact, the conclusion put forward by the Canadian report on PISA 2009.

We also note that there is a substantial literature on the effective teaching of mathematics; we would urge interested Canadians to consult this literature (for example that reported by the U S National Council of Teachers of Mathematics http://www.nctm.org/news/content.aspx?id=23989 or this 2009 report from England - http://www.bestevidence.org.uk/assets/What_works_in_teaching_maths_%28primary_and_secondary%29.pdf), since the research evidence is not always consistent with public opinion.

Canadians should not be complacent about our national education performance.  There is clearly room for improvement as there is in every country, but the mathematics skills of Canadian students are good and there is no reason to think that they are declining.

Sincerely,

·         Ruth Baumann

·         Harold Brathwaite, Executive Director, The Retired Teachers of Ontario

·         Ron Canuel, CEO, Canadian Education Association

·         Gerry Connelly, Co Director Education Sustainability Development Academy, York University

·         Lorna Earl, Director, Aporia Consulting Ltd. and President of the International Congress of School Effectiveness and School Improvement

·         Sue Ferguson, Coordinator, The Learning Consortium, Ontario Institute of Studies in Education

·         Kathleen Gallagher, Professor and Canada Research Chair, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education

·         Jane Gaskell, Jane Gaskell, Professor and former dean, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education

·         Avis Glaze, President, Edu-quest International Inc.

·         Joan M. Green, Former Director of Education, Founding CEO of EQAO, International Consultant on Public Policy and Performance

·         Sue Herbert, former Ontario Deputy Minister of Education

·         Bill Hogarth, Retired Director of Education, Education Consultant

·         Ken Leithwood, Professor, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education

·         Ben Levin, Professor and Canada Research Chair, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education

·         Penny Milton, former CEO, Canadian Education Association

·         Karen Mundy, Professor and Canada Research Chair, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education 

·         Jim Slotta, Professor and Canada Research Chair, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education

·         Charles Ungerleider, Professor Sociology of Education (The University of British Columbia) and Director Research (Directions Evidence and Policy Research Group, LLP.)

Why Separate Schools are Out Performing Public Boards

Published in the Globe and Mail
October 12, 2011
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/economy/economy-lab/stephen-gordon/why-separate-schools-are-outperforming-public-boards/article2198221/

The article makes the claim that, "the Ontario education system has set up a remarkably clean and ongoing experiment in the effects of school choice", and argues that, “…competitive pressures on separate school administrators [provide] stronger incentives to provide better education outcomes.” This conclusion is not substantiated by the evidence provided for several reasons.

First, the ‘effect’ is very small; much smaller than other effects such as improving the quality of teaching or using better assessment methods. Second, choice in Ontario is not a ‘clean’ experiment; it is primarily based on religion, so the study cannot rule out other factors that might explain the differences, such as values related to religious education that lead parents to Catholic schools. Third, a very large literature on school choice around the world has produced quite equivocal results and certainly has not consistently reported positive effects of school choice. While there may be many reasons to support school choice, it would be an error to support choice as a primary means of improving school quality.

Sincerely,

• Ruth Baumann
• Ron Canuel, CEO, Canadian Education Association
• Gerry Connelly, Co Director Education Sustainability Development Academy, York University
• Lorna Earl, Director, Aporia Consulting Ltd. and President of the International Congress of School Effectiveness and School Improvement
• Kathleen Gallagher, Professor and Canada Research Chair, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education
• Avis Glaze, President, Edu-quest International Inc.
• Joan M. Green, Former Director of Education, Founding CEO of EQAO, International Consultant on Public Policy and Performance
• Ben Levin, Professor and Canada Research Chair, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education
• Penny Milton, former CEO, Canadian Education Association
• Karen Mundy, Professor and Canada Research Chair, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education
• Jim Slotta, Professor and Canada Research Chair, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education
• Charles Ungerleider, Professor Sociology of Education (The University of British Columbia) and Director Research (Directions Evidence and Policy Research Group, LLP.)

Please see the following for further information on School Choice:

Fuller, B., Elmore, R., and Orfield, G. (eds.). (1996). Who chooses, who loses? New York: Teachers College Press.

Gorard, S., & Taylor, C. (2002). Market Forces and Standards in Education: A Preliminary Consideration. British Journal of Sociology in Education, 23(1), 5-18.

Lubienski, Chris. (2001). The relationship of competition and choice to innovation in education markets: A review of research on four cases. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association, Seattle, WA. Retrieved April 2010, from http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICDocs/data/ericdocs2sql/content_storage_01/0000019b/80/17/14/ec.pdf

Whitty, G., Power, S. & Halpin, D. (1998). Devolution and Choice in Education. Buckingham: Open University Press.