A Whole Child Education

ASCD (Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development) in a recent op-ed in the Washington Post asked people in the United States to join its We the People initiative and sign a petition to make “a whole child approach” to educational reform a national priority.

In previous blogs I’ve highlighted on core tenets and distinguishing features of progressive schools like Orchard. A whole-child focus is a vital quality of progressive schools, but it has been neglected in many other schools, particularly in the past ten years.

“A whole child approach to education enhances learning by addressing each student’s social, emotional, physical, and academic needs through the shared contributions of schools, families, communities, and policymakers. It is a move away from education policy that far too narrowly focuses on student standardized test scores as the key school accountability measure and that has resulted in the narrowing of curriculum as well as rigid teaching and learning environments.”

Many schools have moved away from programs and pedagogy that don’t help to raise student scores on standardized tests. Recently I read an article describing a new teacher evaluation system in Tennessee that holds all teachers equally accountable to how students perform on reading and math tests regardless of the discipline the taught by the teacher; as a result, PE teachers in some Tennessee schools devote their class to reading lessons rather than physical education.

“The true measure of student success is much more than a test score, and ensuring that young people achieve in and out of school requires support well beyond effective academic instruction. The demands of the 21st century require a new approach to education to fully prepare our nation’s youth for college, career, and citizenship.”

As I mentioned in previous blogs, there seems to be a mounting backlash against the testing emphasis of the past ten years that has not resulted in enhanced student learning and had often led to less student engagement and classroom relevance in student lives. A great read about the missteps of the No Child Left Behind era is Diane Ravitch’s The Death and Life of the Great American School System where Ravitch, who once championed high-stakes testing, now is a strong opponent of these tests.

“No one would argue that we need a relevant, personalized and meaningful education system. But we won’t get there with a short-term focus on proficiency in reading and math. Instead we need to address the broad array of factors influencing long-term success required of students after high school graduation.”

The longer I am at Orchard, the more I value the wisdom of the founding school mothers and their deep belief in the values and tenets of a progressive, child-centered, active learning school environment.