Slow

It's a rainy Sunday afternoon, and since it's the last day of September, I thought I would add some thoughts to my blog. My life seems to be moving in slow motion these days, partly because I have nothing I HAVE to do, and each day I can pick from a smorgasbord of options from small to grandiose. Usually I pick from small, and at the end of the day wonder why I didn't choose grandiose. Oh well!

One of the joys of having the day stretch ahead of me is the opportunity to read more. I just finished a fascinating book called God's Hotel, a nonfiction book by a woman doctor who also has a PhD in the history of medicine and who practiced medicine at a hospital which was the last refuge for the poor and the elderly. Now I never would have thought that a return to the Middle Ages for medical treatment would seem like a good idea, but I loved how she discovered the work of Hildegard of Bingen, a German nun who not only composed music, but also served as a healer. In Hildegard's time, herbal medicine, and paying attention to the body's balance of the 4 humors as well as how the body was interacting with the 4 elements, earth, air, fire and water led to her treatment options.

Compared to modern medicine, Hildegard's methods were crude and inefficient. On the other hand, when the author began to think like Hildegard, she found herself first sitting with patients and quietly observing them; touching their hands, looking at their scars, and talking with them if they were conscious, all before reading their case history. Many times, this fifteen minutes of close observation would inform her further treatment of the patient.

Many would say that this method is highly inefficient, that modern tests, x-rays, MRIs, CT scans yield everything the doctor needs to know. In fact, Hildegard's method was the first step in creating a relationship with a patient, and the author came to believe that the secret of healing a patient depended on the doctor-patient relationship. To use modern terms, this would be described as "slow medicine."

All of this was in the back of my mind when I saw two gentlemen interviewed on the News Hour about the decline in SAT scores. One man represented Educational Testing Service (ETS), the folks who have made millions on SATs, CEEB Achievement Tests, GREs and all the other alphabet soups of tests. His take on the situation: Students need to be held to higher standards and take a more rigorous curriculum. He re-stated this as his answer to several questions.

I have a different take on the situation: Students taking SATs this year have been subjected to 10 years or so of "teaching to the tests" required by No Child Left Behind. They have grown up in an educational system that requires memorization of facts and figures. The focus of education has narrowed, particularly in so-called "failing schools." The Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) has been demonstrated to be biased against minorities, and now, more and more students lack the exposure to breadth and depth in their education, and I would suspect have never acquired the ability to think which has helped earlier generations compete successfully on the SAT.

In general, I'm opposed to all of these tests, because like modern medical tests, they can only offer a tiny window into the individual who is taking the test and a very tiny window into what constitutes a quality educational program. We don't need more efficient methods to teach; we need inefficient methods that recognize the differences in individuals, that create a bit of organized chaos in every classroom, and that offer students the opportunity to create, collaborate and critically think. I would call this "slow education." Instead of Arne Duncan's "Race to the Top," which is really nothing more than an extension of the previous No Child Left Behind, I would like to see a return to looking much more holistically at education, and placing the student, not his/her test scores at the center of our focus.