Grantcoulson's Blog

      I found out about Direct Instruction, in the early 1970s, from a person with whom I went to undergraduate school. He was fortunate enough to be at a center when Zig Engelmann was there for a short time. Next, I came in contact with Eric Haughton, a student of Ogden Lindsley. Eric was far too smart and effective for official institutes of learning, but he spread much information to those of us who would listen, although I almost didn’t.

    I was running a small drug center when I came in contact with Eric. He gave me some suggestions which were so radical, I almost didn’t follow them. We were working with some clients on upgrading and Eric suggested seemingly simple exercises such as repeated reading, mathematics, and short exercises for writing. These worked so quickly that it was impossible not to be impressed. Eric’s contention was that, like chemical compounds, academic behavior was made up of essential, simpler components which would combine. Lack of any of the components would result in the absence of the more complex substance. For example, writing needs the mechanical aspects of writing, forming letters, joining letters, leaving spaces, holding the page with the non-writing hand, etc. It requires ability to use subject, predicate, subject-verb agreement, capitalization, sentence end marks, etc. It also requires ability to use vocabulary, reasoning, concept flow, etc. When one looks at the hundreds of sub-skills used in school, it is no  wonder that so few students get them all when taught by the “hope for the best” methods in vogue. The best that current curricula do is to describe, usually vaguely, the end product of teaching, not the components or sequences required. The Standard Celeration Chart, the center of Precision Teaching, is independent of the method of teaching used, and is a measure of the effectiveness of instruction.

    The third component was the easiest–applied behavior analysis with its emphasis on positive reinforcement. If you want to get along with students, slather on the Positive Reinforcement, but make sure it’s warranted by behavior.

    The other two components, The Personalized System of Instruction and Programmed Instruction, flow from the third.

    The fundamental element of a successful learning center is a teaching method which works quickly. I suppose you can suck some parents in with fast talking and appeals to emotions, but you can’t fool enough people and you don’t get work-of-mouth advertising from bad results. When we talk about results we show parents what the student has done both graphically, on the Standard Chart,  in terms of progress through the curricula we formulate and/or the Direct Instruction programs and in terms of standardized test instruments such as the Wide Range Achievement Test.

    There was a recent discussion on the Precision Teaching listserv about municipal regulations and getting proper authorization, etc. I try to fly below the radar and have no permission from anyone. It’s certainly none of their business.

    I only advertised once spending $600 on a newspaper advertisement which was money wasted. All of our referrals are through work-of-mouth, and occasionally, in spite of my intransigent stance, from schools. 

    I’ve been at this since 1971 in one form or another. In 1994, a friend of my got me some space in a local doctor’s building. I paid only for the hours I worked with students and thought I might have three or four while I wrote and did research. A couple of mothers made it their mission in life to provide me with as many referrals as they could and I was soon hiring more people. This brings me to my last point.

    I still believed in the magic of credentials in spite of listening to Richard Foxx two decades before. Dr. Foxx said the last thing you needed for a successful program was a trained professional. The professional has his own notion of proper procedure and will proceed with it even in the face of contradictory evidence. Once I had a couple of teachers trained by me, I decided I needed another “professional”. I recruited, via the internet, someone with a Masters in Psychology who, in addition, had written a good paper on teaching which seemed in line with what I was practicing. This ended badly because of the personal characteristics of that person. It then occurred to me that it was the personal characteristics of punctuality, hard work, intelligence, ability to follow directions, ability to learn, etc. which count, not training. I now accept about half of those who apply to work for me on the basis of those characteristics. For those in the social sciences, I tell them, “You’ve learned two types of information in university–That which is wrong and that which is useless. The data will guide us, everything else is secondary.”

    I now have approximately 140 students who come from 1 to 20 hours per week and could easily franchise, but never felt the desire. We compete against Sylvan, Kumon, Oxford, and various other local groups including one beside us. We have no sign, no advertisements and no consultations with government or private schools. I don’t consider this a blueprint, but I believe the heart of it all is a method which works and is the polar opposite of the methods used in government schools. We evaluate our teaching and not our students.

Cheers and ttfn,

Grant Coulson

This entry was posted on November 8, 2009 at 12:08 pm and is filed under Psychology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.