Curriculum Reform: Separating the Wheat from the Chaff

Are you teaching outdated concepts in your classroom? You may be, and perhaps you don't even realize it. Using two spaces after a period is just such an outdated concept, explains Farhad Manjoo. It is not only obsolete, he says, but incorrect. The convention dates back to the time of manual typewriters, which used monospaced fonts. Correct protocol for typesetters before manual typing, and indeed for those of us using computers today, is to use a single space between sentences.

And yet some teachers persist in teaching their students to use two spaces, a practice which results in a ragged looking text that interrupts the flow of reading. Some go so far as to demand their students use two spaces, even though they know it is not a current standard. One teacher of journalism admitted to Manjoo that she is aware that style guides discourage the use of two spaces, but she demands her students use the old convention because it is how she was taught, and it is what she is used to seeing.

Why perpetuate an error, just because it is what we have always been told? As educators we have a responsibility to our students to set a good example. That should include admitting when we are wrong, working to correct errors and bad habits when we become aware of them, and adapting to the changes in science and technology. Tradition is a wonderful gift we can pass onto our students, but maintaining a practice that is no longer beneficial out of habit alone is not tradition. Rather, it displays a lack of flexibility. It is the mark of a dinosaur.

But if there are things we should no longer teach, perhaps there are also things we are not teaching as much as we should? Today's curriculum is so cluttered, often with learning objectives proposed by experts whose only practical experience in education dates back to the time when they themselves were students. It's easy to lose track of what's important, for teachers to be overwhelmed trying to cover all the new and required materials. Easy to eliminate lessons in penmanship or grammar completely, and to rely on electronic devices when it comes time for spelling or basic arithmetic.

While some educators feel no sense of loss, there are others who see the results of underplaying basic educational skills like penmanship or long division. College teachers complain of students incapable of performing simple arithmetic computations unless they have a calculator in hand. And which of us has not struggled to decipher the message on a birthday card, a spouse's shopping list or a set of directions scrawled out by a friend?

Some skills are worth preserving. Long division is not just a way to arrive at an answer but a foundation upon which the young student can later build an understanding of algebra or even computer programming. Penmanship, especially as taught through old fashioned copywork, is an opportunity to appreciate classic literature and to learn correct spelling, punctuation or grammar from a text chosen as a model of excellence in writing.

Christina Hoff Sommers points out that doomsayers have been predicting the end of handwriting since the introduction of the typewriter, and children and adults alike still are asked to write things out by hand on a regular basis. "By the early 1980s whole language theory was dominant in schools of education and professional associations, and the direct instruction of phonics, grammar, spelling, and penmanship was out of favor. The unhappy effects on children's reading skills are familiar. Less known are the effects of the lack of handwriting instruction on writing skills," she writes.

Actually, it appears some have already been noted by researchers. A child who is "denied explicit and sustained handwriting instruction" will get hung up on the mechanics of writing, much the same way that a child with a speech or reading delay will get hung up trying to decode the question put to him, unable to understand what is being asked and therefore unable to provide the required answer in the allotted time. The child who has never been taught penmanship "will be distracted. Instead of focusing on ideas and quickly putting down the two or three thoughts he holds in his mind, he is held up, and diverted by worries about how to form the letters."

Progress in education is a good thing, but as we make decisions about what elements of our teaching we ought to preserve or retire it is best to give due consideration to the long term effect a decision will have on students. Removing a foundational skill from the curriculum will impact students negatively, but so will teaching an obsolete and incorrect practice.

Sources:
Liz Ditz, "Long division: Why teach it?." I Speak of Dreams

Farhad Manjoo, "Space Invaders: Why you should never, ever use two spaces after a period." Slate

Christina Hoff Sommers, "The write stuff : Schools should teach the lost art of penmanship ." Education Reporter