I'm Thinking . . .

I'm thinking that I worry too much.  I'm an Otter/Beaver/Lion  - a Liottereaver - or something like that.  That means I can be the life of the party and meticulously clean it up while directing others on what they should be doing to make sure the party is a success.  The Beaver side of me loves order and wants to be right - or at the least know what's right. The Beaver is highly critical of self and others.  I've matured enough to curtail my critique of others, at least publicly.  But my critique of self is relentless.  

Should I have the students do a project?  Mr. X did a project and it was wonderful. What am I doing that my projects aren't like that? Should I be on the same text as Ms. ZZ? Why are my students so wound-up today? I did YY so why didn't I see AA? I'm just not doing this right.  Maybe I don't need to teach, just work with teachers.

On and on the thoughts swirl in my head in a vortex of cataclysmic self-reflection and doubt - the Otter said. 

Okay, some reflection is good. Constant, negative self-reflection is the basis of anxiety and neurosis.  Why does the act of teaching make me anxious more so than -- say -- raising kids, preaching a sermon, or singing and acting in front of hundreds?  Is it the fact that teachers are judged based on their behavior, students' behavior and other factors which may be out of one's control? Is it the desire to have one right answer for every problem teaching presents?  Or is it simply that teachers are highly neurotic and anxiety driven?

Life is best lived free from worry. As I prepared for today's lesson, I was too tired to think.  I knew what the goal would be and how to know if the goal was achieved; I just didn't stress about it.  I decided to relax.  I allowed the students time to discuss their warm-ups.  When they were done, I moved on. I shifted into finding textual evidence for an essay.  Students highlighted text and then decided which text supported their inferences.  Some students helped pass out highlighters. Students who finished first helped look up synonyms for overworked words used as character traits. I was relaxed.  The students were relaxed and working.

I'm thinking I need to continue to learn to let go of anxiety and the need for perfection and just live.  Live in the moment, whether it be the classroom or the dining room.  Enjoy the moment without worrying about being perfect.  Just be.

Thoughts on Ladson-Billings Notions of "Culturally Relevant Pedagogy"

"Culturally relevant pedagogy rests on three criteria or propositions: (a)Students must experience academic success; (b) students must develop and/or maintain cultural competence; and (c) students must develop a critical consciousness through which they challenge the status quo of the current social order."
 taken from "But That's Just Good Teaching! The Case for Culturally Relevant Pedagogy" by Gloria Ladson-Billings.

"The trick of culturally relevant teaching is to get students to 'choose' academic excellence." 

I must learn this trick again.  When I first entered the teaching field after spending several years in academia (PSU for undergrad and U Penn for grad), I could've tackled this challenge with quite a bit of vim and vigor.  20 years later, battle-weary and worn, I must re-learn what I once took for granted --Teaching is the art of transformation.  

When I first exited the hallowed halls of U Penn, transformation was what I was seeking, was what both my husband and I assumed we were pursuing. We attended school at the University of Pennsylvania's Graduate School of Education where we read the works of Bell, Dewey, and --yes -- Ladson-Billings. Our fingers were on the pulse of micro-aggressions and "White Privilege."  We spent countless hours with our peers discussing the state of the black community and our passionate desire to make a difference in the world. We talked in terms of Dubois's "double-consciousness," the concepts of code-switching and the then-popular "Ebonics."

It was a glorious time in our lives -- meeting friends at Valley Forge for brunch and conversation, biking on East River Drive with only our passionate convictions in tow (children would come much later).

Fast forward two decades.  After having to defend myself against false accusations of racism during my first year of teaching, it has taken me almost as much time to rebuild my confidence in who I am as a teacher, transformer and person.  Like the incumbent who claims to be running as an "outsider" because he doesn't want to be labeled as belonging to the "establishment," I am now part of a system that has transformed me into a cog. 

Where and how does this transformation take place? Life happens.  A freshman teacher is accused of wrong, defends herself and must navigate the waters alone. Second guessing herself at every turn, she makes strides, but receives no real guidance.  As the years progress, she continues to battle issues of doubt and low self-esteem, all the while trying to understand and implement the "latest and greatest" trends in the district.  Enter a new curriculum which calls for strict adherence and what remains of any form of ingenuity and creativity gets crammed into the narrow confines of pacing and specified patterns of learning. Finally, add in a dose of objective evaluation which easily mutates into subjectivity in the right hands and -- presto -- you have a veteran teacher.

So where am I now.  Surely I could have used a dose of culturally relevant pedagogy in my own shaping. But it's too late for that.  I must come out on the other side as a seeker of change.  That's where the journey began for me and my husband, wanting to make a difference.  Indeed, that's the goal for both teacher and student -- to "challenge the status quo." I forgot that such an undertaking is tantamount to declaring war and in war there are casualties, winners and losers.  

So it's been a 20 year war that I am recovering from, but still fighting in.  Who said change was easy? Who said transformers don't get knocked down and pushed about?  Effort, resilience, stick-to-it-tiveness are all required for those who seek to make a difference.

The question is "Am I still a seeker?"  Absolutely! I haven't endured such intense personal and professional battles as an educator just to raise the white flag and march off the battlefield with upraised arms in surrender. I'm all in.  If Ladson-Billings delineates three components of culturally relevant pedagogy, I'll certainly add that to my planning.

Ugly Monday

Mondays can be ugly!  Dragging into the school building after a weekend crammed with car appointments, food shopping, date-nite dining out, activities and church, my Monday looked startling ugly.  Energy was no where to be found and smiles had to be coerced -- from the teacher.

In spite of the unpleasantness of this day, I was focused long enough to teach the skill of summarizing. Oh, it was a frightful process, but a process nonetheless. 

I demonstrated summarizing the reading (from last week).  I walked through the steps using the ELMO for the visual learners.  I then asked them to walk through the steps with a partner using 1 of last week's readings.  The horror!  Truly too much time had lapsed between reading and summarizing for a 13 year old brain (not to mention absentees).  I switched gears and stepped through the process with them again.

Things perked up when we engaged in reading/listening to text today.  I again set them about the task of summarizing -- "Name It," "Verb It," "Big Picture It."  Create jot dot points of the main ideas. They shared (under great coercion) with partners. They shared with the whole class.  I used their ideas as points of emphasis.  I could see what they did and did not get.  I made corrections on the spot. I sent them home with the task of writing out the summary.

Ugly Monday transformed into Productive Monday.  I'm still dragging -- tomato soup and Triscuits don't quite boost the energy as I thought they would -- but I'm getting my work done.

Growth from Chaos

I do not like disorder! I do not like situations that seem out of my control.  I do not like disorganization and have spent over a decade trying to be more organized.  Yup -- that's how important it is to me.

Teachers encounter all of these things at some point in their career.  So why am I a teacher? 

With every challenge comes an opportunity for growth.  The field of teaching is abloom with such luscious opportunities.

It was another day of research and a productive one.  On lap tops students found articles on their topics, recorded the MLA citation (thank you easybib.com), and took notes. While students were engaged in research, I held one on one conferences about missing work and grades.

Were there moments of disorder?  Yes.  Were there times things seemed out of my control? Uh.... Yes.  Did I want to shift gears and switch to something more predictable and orderly?  Oh, Yeah! But what good would that have done?  What do we learn by playing it safe as teachers?  

As the saying goes, "Nothing ventured, nothing gained" -- thank you Mr. Franklin.  So what did I gain today.

• I'm continually learning to trust the processes that I put in place.  Although students may complain and things feel a bit awkward when doing something for the first time, teachers must allow the processes they set in place to run their full course. Evaluation should come after a system has been tested and tried, not in the middle of the test.
• I'm continually learning that students are human beings with personalities, character traits and a myriad of personal experiences.  This sociaization milieu can be the cause of a plethora of different outcomes and responses. Teachers must simply be flexible; working with human beings requires such.
• I'm continually learning that I don't know it all.  Students are constantly pointing out things I didn't notice when planning a lesson.  I am humbled by their trust in my knowledge and amazed at the depth of their interest in topics.

What an awesome and demanding privilege it is to be a teacher.  The possibilities are endless.

Worn-Out

I'm too worn out to blog today. Research continues. The struggle is on. Expectations are high -- read the article, take notes in your own words, record the MLA citation.

Homework is crucial at this point.  It is impossible to get all work done in class.  Finishing at home will play an important role in the ability to transition to the next marking period.

I have simplified the assignments.  I must remember that 8th graders are 13-14 years old, impulsive, self-focused --at times -- and quite needy.

Having ample energy will help me demonstrate patience which is in demand daily.

HELP!!

Have you ever been in the midst of something you knew was going downhill - fast, yet there was no way to stop the fall?  Day 2 of research.  Ughhhhh . . . I'm beginning to loathe it again. As part of my desire to be cautious and reflective, I created a Research FAQ sheet. I reflected on the questions posed from day 1 - as well as questions I thought students would raise - and developed a one page FAQ sheet on hot-pink paper.  We went over it. I stressed the points that needed to be stressed.  I explained it.  I found examples on the internet to help explain it. I began a group example of reading an article and note taking . . . That's when it all began to crash and burn - not the internet - their brains and my patience. By the end of class, I wanted to shred all documents and start again. We salvaged what we could of the group example and then resorted to organizing student binders and throwing away papers. Wait . . .  did we learn anything?

Okay, so even the worse classes offer some gold nuggets for future reference.  Here are some I found.

• don't explain everything . . . students can only learn so much at a time
• keep it simple . . . focus only on one skill at a time, like note taking
• save some stuff for future educators . . . give students the correct citation format ahead of time, they have 3 more years of school to learn to do it on their own
• keep calm and together even when things are not calm and together
• be willing (and ready) to switch to something else
• find the fun

Research - Yuck!

Thursday, 22 October 2015

Today was the first day of research on the Holocaust and World War II.  I once loathed the idea of teaching research.  I grew from loathing the idea to fearing the process.  Now I proceed with caution and great reflection. There is no easy way to explain to students that they must do ALL of the work. Research assumes there is no direct answer to a question one may have; that is why one has to engage in research.  Depending on student's intellectual maturity, it is difficult for them to grasp the notion that they are creating their own learning objectives and lessons and, in fact, are teaching themselves. What they learn from their research must then be demonstrated in structured written form.  

Wow!  This is exactly why research once frightened me.  The above notions are daunting.  Yet I think a better posture to take is one of acceptance of uncertainty. Research has the potential to travel in a plethora of different directions depending on the researchers' questions and path of inquiry.  There is no clear way to harness this; there is, however, a way to guide the researcher on her journey.  The young researcher can learn from the process of research itself. Here's a bit of what they can learn from the process.

• Summarizing in my own words is a lot harder than just copying directly what I've read
• There exists lots of information on stuff that I don't need and in which I am not interested
• Google does not have an answer for everything
• Wikipedia is demonic and must be avoided at all costs, unless you're absolutely stuck
• School databases SUCK!
• MLA formatting can never be mastered

In addition to these pearls of wisdom, the researcher, hopefully, will learn about their topic.

This Kid is on Fire!

Monday, 19 October 2015

Steve (pseudonym) was on fire today.  He read with great inflection, so much so that comprehension of the text increased.  I told him so.  He asked several questions about the class objective which helped propel the class's learning.  I told him so.  He showed great leadership in behavior and attitude.  I told him so.  It was a good teaching day because of Steve's actions.  I forgot to tell him that. :(

What's Gonna Work? Team Work!

Friday, 9 October 2015

Wow!  Had a fun and productive class with the students today.  We practiced working as a team.  This may seem trite, but was so necessary.  I knew it was needed when students were not working together simply because I put them together as a team. Instead of talking to each other about their work, they simply handed each other their work to read.  What a bust!  Where's the engagement in that.  It's not enjoyable for students and even less so to observers.

So I planned to teach accountable talk idea(l)s and then engage in a very simple activity that would involve everyone.  In their new teams, based on personality, observation and skill, students had to think of the names of as many adults in the school or on the bus as possible.  The group naming the most, would get a dollapoly (Monolopy dollar) in their bucket.  Teams could earn or lose additional dollapolies based on the Accountable Talk protocol.  100% engagement.  Students thought long and hard (for about 5 minutes) of names.  This contest continued with teams thinking of adjectives to describe water.  Students monitored their own behavior and others' behavior as well.  It was a dream class.  After total immersion into this activity, there remained just 15 minutes to deliver the actual curriculum objective.  15 minutes was aplenty. Students worked together to develop a universal theme based on the unit readings.  There were multiple.

So much fun!  So much work!  How can this team spirit be maintaind?  Seriously, how?  Hmmmm.....

Trust the Process

Thursday, 15 October 2015

I was nervous today.  I don't know why, but I get that way sometimes.  I did too much thinking about what students would be doing; I'm a chronic over-thinker.  I wanted students to practice stating a central theme based on a quote.  I had a sample answer prepared - provided by the district - and had pre-highlighted key words in the sample.  The class and I read the quote four times and then dug into highlighting key words.  Afterwards we picked apart those words to see how they were used in the text.  This was a lot of thinking for a 3-line quote, but they did it.  After the analysis, I then restated the notes we took and asked "What is the central theme?"  At this point, I should have let them struggle with an answer.  What did I do? I  continued talking, and provided the prepared answer which didn't perfectly fit what we did in class.  One very astute student said, "I wrote something different."  Although I felt really stupid at this point, I was smart enough to write down her statement, which fit our class work perfectly.

So what did I learn?  Trust your students to do the work, especially after putting forth so much analysis effort. Hmmmmm.....

I Planned for Engagement and a Discussion Broke Out

September 2015

An accidental discussion broke out as I asked one student to respond to the reading.  I do plan for discussion but don't always end up with one.  This time I planned for a single response and ended up with a discussion.  There's this fine line, a balancing act if you will, between teaching students to take turns when talking and allowing for an impromptu discussion.  I like the impromptu; yet, as soon as I don't plan for a discussion, the impromptu will probably cease.  Maybe not.

Here is what I learned from the experience.  When a discussion is about to erupt ...

• don't stifle talk but allow a discussion to develop
• intervene only to get students back on topic
• think on your feet by throwing additional, on-topic, open-ended questions into the mix
• invite the quiet to respond

Planning for discussion usually involves setting or reviewing the norms and outlining what will be discussed.  This is so artificial. Adults engaged in every-day discussions don't plan that way.  They simply jump in and go for a swim.  If class norms have already been set and if classroom socialization has been taking place prior to the impromptu discussion, students can just jump in and go for a swim.

Truthfully, it's difficult to find discussion questions that capture the attention of 8th graders and that will lead to a meaningful discussion. Allowing students to take the lead helps the teacher. Hmmmmmm ....

Compliant vs. Combustive

Wednesday, 30 September 2015

My plans didn't quite work as envisioned.  My boys were wound up today.  They just couldn't seem to focus which caused me to get a bit frustrated.  What did I do to trigger their behavior?  I think the lesson was too loose.  When I turned on the ELMO and students began copying work as I worked with them, things were calm.  Calm is not always good.  Sometimes calm is just compliant.  Wound up means there's energy.  I need to figure out how to funnel the energy.

The popsicle sticks worked.  I should say, they forced me to call on different students to make sure I included more than the eager.  Have you ever noticed that even if you call on students who don't raise their hands, you still have to go back to the eager, hand-raising few?  The others are processing, lost or too shy to respond.  Hmmmm.....