Reflections on Learning Progressions

Learning progressions have captured the imagination and the rhetoric of school reformers and education researchers as one possible elixir for getting K-12 education “on track” (Corcoran et al.’s metaphor, 2009, p. 8). Indeed, the train has left the station and is rapidly gathering speed in the education reform and research communities. As we are concerned about this enthusiasm—and the potential for internecine warfare in a competitive market for ideas— we share the Center on Continuous Instructional Improvement’s view of the state-of-learningprogressions as quoted above. Even more, we fear that learning progressions will be adapted to fit various Procrustean beds made by researchers and reformers who seek to fix educational problems.