Why Today's Schools Need to Be Different

"But, school wasn't like this for me and I turned out okay. We sat at desks, filled in workbook pages, and followed the rules. Sure, a lot of it was boring, but we learned. Why should it be different today?"

It's obvious that today's schools are very different from schools of 20, 30, or 40 years ago. Understandably, as parents, you have many doubts about what's going on in classrooms today. There is constant talk about the failure of our schools and what has to be done to give children a world-class education. Teachers have their concerns, too.

I wasn't taught to teach this way. I'm used to standing in front of the room, teaching a concept, and then giving children materials to practice what I have taught. Why should I change?"

There is no simple single response that explains why schools need to change. The answers lie in the economic and social transformations that continually occur in the United States and the world.

Among the economic transformations, the most obvious is that schools of previous generations were designed to prepare students for a workplace with very different demands from the workplace of the 21st century. Increasingly sophisticated technology requires workers who have a wide variety of high level technical skills. To function in the new Information Age, these workers must know how to access knowledge as well as how to apply it effectively. And not only is the work more complicated, but the means of doing it has changed. Tomorrow's workers must be team players, able to solve problems and work with others.

Among the social transformations is the enormous pressure on both parents and children. Parents are working harder and longer hours; frequently there is little support from extended family members--who often are geographically distant. Whereas in the past, children came home from school and played outdoors with neighborhood friends, many children today are either not allowed to play outside because of safety concerns, or are enrolled in special after-school activities to keep them safe and busy until parents come home from work. Children are exposed from an early age to cultural influences that glorify violence, sex, and drugs. Many watch endless hours of television. As a result, they have fewer opportunities to play informally with friends, talk with adults, or read for pleasure. The skills, attitudes, and understandings they need to become productive citizens must be learned--in school.

In addition to economic and social changes, new scientific information has also influenced education. Extensive recent research on the brain has also informed our understanding about how children learn. We now know that environment and experience can strongly influence the development of intelligence. We know from Harvard professor Howard Gardner's work on Multiple Intelligences that there are many ways to be intelligent; rather than looking at a child and asking, "How smart is this child?" we should recognize the unique strengths of each and ask instead, "How is this child smart?" And finally, we understand that children's ability to use their unique strengths positively may depend on their emotional intelligence--that is, whether they know how to "read" feelings and whether they can control their impulses and delay gratification.

For these reasons, schools cannot continue to rely on practices from the past. It is irresponsible to ignore research about how the brain works, about the role of emotional intelligence in children's ability to succeed (see Daniel Goleman's Emotional Intelligence), about skill development in language and literacy, and about how mathematical and scientific thinking are nurtured in the classroom. Our children deserve an education that reflects up-to-date thinking; they deserve educators who consider not only what they teach, but how they teach.