Data. Glorious data. It makes us feel good, doesn’t it? It tells us we are getting better. We are getting faster or working harder. Yes. Numbers are digestible.
I’d like to paint a picture for you. A couple of years ago I won teacher of the year at my wonderful school. They took a picture of me with the principal and put it in the school newspaper. I looked at that photo and sucked my breath in through my teeth.
My God. I am REALLY heavy.
Not just a little heavy—really heavy—unhealthy heavy. I vowed from that snapshot to change. My husband bought me a Fitbit (which I faithfully wear to this day), I started going to the gym every single day; I tracked my calories via Myfitnesspal. I became the data queen of calories in versus calories out.
I lost 65 pounds over two years.
But then I noticed a plateau. My scale wasn’t moving. In fact, it frighteningly went up. I was running 7 miles a day 5 days a week. I ran 8 – 9 miles on Saturdays. I ate 1200-1400 calories a day. My weight didn’t change or fluctuated up occasionally. I bought a better scale. I measured fat percentage. 30% body fat. Yep. You read that right. 5’1” 130 pounds. 30% body fat. Why? Skinny-fat. I was only calibrating one measurement. I needed to step away from the Fitbit (ha ha) and move into weight training.
School data is a lot like this.
1. SNAPSHOT: It is an important wake up call. I needed that first snapshot—that first data point. I thought I was okay. Overweight? Sure—but not almost-have-a-heart-attack heavy. That first data point was a wake-up call. Some schools need that too. They need to know that nationally, they aren’t doing so great in some or many subjects. Even if they have a great community or wonderful Chorus program or great SAT and AP scores. Sometimes there are holes that they didn’t even realize were there.
2. INCREMENTAL DATA (STEPS): Continual data is intoxicating. Fitbit became my motivator. Hit 10,000 steps a day. Now hit 11,000. 12,000. Watch your calories. Calories in versus calories out. Incremental improvements are great. They makes us feel accomplished. They don’t show the whole picture though. They can even end up causing harm. If you focus too much on Math and Science scores, reading levels can drop. Kids may be able to memorize vocabulary, but that’s not the same as being able to contextualize, analyze, and synthesize high-level fiction and non-fiction. If you focus only on moving the data point, your results may leave you skinny-fat. You look good on paper, but underneath you’re still in danger of not accomplishing the goal: learning for a global marketplace.
3. SKINNY-FAT DATA: Once you hit a certain point, the same type of data is not helpful. In fitness, your body adapts. I have moved to weight training with HIIT cardio. Guess what? There are some days that I don’t even hit 10,000 steps. Part of me cringes at that. It hurts. I want my little data check mark. Parents and teachers—as much as they don’t want to admit it—want that too. We want to look at our kids’ test scores and say to ourselves, “Ooooh. Look at the incremental improvement. Look at the percentile my kid is in. Look at what I need to focus on.” That can be very helpful as a reminder, but it isn’t the whole picture. Small task incremental tracking can lead one to neglect the big-time goal. For students: being able to compete in a global marketplace of ideas means reading more novels, having more debates, discussing more abstract mathematical theorems. You need to lift those heavy, weighty concepts for real learning to take place. Guess what testing and data points don’t measure. Yep. All that stuff. It’s like my Fitbit. It tracks steps—not weight training. Both are important, but when I overly focus on steps, I neglect the good work strength training does for my body. When schools overly focus on data, they neglect the big picture stuff. Sacrifice one more novel so we can focus on reading passage. Devote time to problem-solving instead of discussions on mathematical theories.
4. POR QUE NO LOS DOS? Why not both? I hear you. “Jordan, if you do the steps AND the strength training then isn’t that better?”
Yep. But (and I’m going to scold you here, so brace yourself) I am only human. What DO I do? I get up at 4:30 AM to work out for 1 hour. I drive to school, teach all day and try to get as many steps as possible within that time. Some days I then tutor and don’t get home until 9PM. What SHOULD I do? On days that I don’t get my steps in, after working out at 4:30AM, working all day, I should then drive home and run until I get my 10,000 steps completed.
Aaah. Now I hear you say. “That’s crazy!”
Apply the same metaphor to schools.
Now deplete my calories (or for schools, money) by 15%. Still with me? Now make the days shorter because it is winter so I have to run in the dark (metaphorically this would be the time lost to testing). Now add on top of that a group of people standing outside my door each day as I get up saying “You’re not able to do this. You’re not doing enough. You eat too much (you get paid too much). You’re lazy. Your workouts are unimportant. Your health is unimportant. You’re failing” How am I doing? Still following the metaphor?
So what do schools do? They focus on the steps. They focus on the Fitbit, but that means they often MISS a lot of the critical thinking: novels, discussions, debates. They do what they CAN because we have starved them, cut their daylight, and told them they are failing.
We are doing the best we can, but it is time we stop being intoxicated by data—myself included.
And for God’s sake—why did we just confirm Vlad the Impaler as our personal trainer?
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