Outcomes-Based Education at ALA

[Debbie Abilock <debbie@NUEVA.PVT.K12.CA.US>]

Greetings from ALA!  Our committee met and approved scenarios to go along
with the AASL Position Paper on Outcomes-Based Education.  I beleve that
these little vignettes will be posted to LM_Net in the next few days.
(If not, I will do it after July 4th.)  At my "Hot Topics for
Supervisors" presentation, I got a number of comments about the issue of
"outcomes."  Some schools and states are encountering resistance or
opposition to them, either based on fears that "tests would be
eliminated"  (I guess this is a peverse understanding of performance
assessment as it relates to outcomes) or on the basis of fear that this
movement would end up teaching values that would conflict with home (this
includes the fear that critical thinking might make a child critical of
home beliefs).

As various librarians, administrators, et. al. have discovered (some
through horrendous judgement errors) the key is communication.  If
parents, educators, administrators, and citizens understand that teaching
toward outcomes is what they have probably always done or should have
always used to inform their teaching (I want Mikey and Suzie to learn how
to do research from primary sources, therefore one of the things they must
learn is how to interview a person and therefore I must teach them how to
refine their interview questions...and so forth working backwards toward
individual lessons), then the irrational fears around this topic can be
addressed.  Some schools have taken staff to see programs in their area
which reflect such practices.  Others are calling it something other than
outcomes (I've heard "results based").  Teachers need to know that this
is *not* the minimum competencies movement, or that their jobs are in
danger if they do not attain certain results.

I'm not a "bandwagon" person (I can testify that our school has been doing
outcomes-based education without that name for at least the 15 years I've
been there).  I have seen (in combination with hands-on learning, inquiry
methods, ostensible teaching of critical and creative thinking, integrated
curriculum delivered by teams including the librarian, performance and
traditional assessment, *no* textbooks except for math, incorporation of
learning styles and multiple intelligence and other sound practices) that
planning backwards is useful and a sensible way to think as you develop,
execute and evaluate curriculum.

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Debbie Abilock              "It is important that students bring a certain
The Nueva School            ragamuffin barefoot irreverence to their studies;
Hillsborough, CA            they are not here to worship what is known, but
debbie@nueva.pvt.k12.ca.us         to question it."  (Jacob Bronowski)
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