It has been another active fire season here out west and once again firefighters have been attacking the fires systematically and efficiently. As a teacher it is interesting to look at the way these fires are attacked. The contrast to the way problems are attacked in education is staggering.In wildland firefighting when the problem (the fire) becomes big enough, a two-pronged attack is launched. Firefighters coordinate their efforts to fight the fire from both the ground and air. In contrast, when the problem in education (student achievement, mainly) gets big the most common response is to narrow the range of approaches. By and large this usually means demanding more time strictly devoted to teaching the critical academic subjects (math and reading) at the expense of everything else.
In this sense, we could learn a lot from our wildland firefighters. Mainly, don't assume that doing more of just one thing will make things better. Instead, schools should embrace a multifaceted approach to improving student achievement that includes social and emotional learning, something ignored by the dominant response to lagging student achievement. It's a shame, too, because strong social and emotional skills help students cope with issues that limit their learning. From my experience these include: an incarcerated or deported parent, bullying, emotional abuse, and low self-esteem. Social and emotional skills also help students succeed in classrooms where teachers are increasingly telling students to "turn and talk," "work with your group," or some similar collaborative task without being taught the skills to do so effectively. In fact,