I do think that the secretary of education made a good point that more is expected of students than ever before, and therefore teachers need to bring more to the table everyday. However, it sounded a lot like the blame-it-all-on-us message I get from my administration everyday. Yes, teacher need to bring there all to the table everyday, but so do our students. Everywhere, not just in schools of education, do we as society need to be screaming failure is not an option because in my school failure is more than an option is the norm. Many of my students do not see the connection between the here and now and there life prospects. While it is my job to help them make that connection, I can only do just that help. Students and teachers alike need to come into the school house with the perspective that this a life or death situation at our hands. The responsibility cannot all rest with the teachers.
Also, in response to her comments about schools of education not preparing teachers for the work that lies a head of them, preparation cannot only do so much. One of the things that I most like about MTC is that it teaches all of us that you don;t know anything until you go out and DO IT! You can sit in a classroom all day and listen to well crafted theories on teaching, but until you get up in front of 30-something students you don't know SQUAT!
Well, what is there to say about my man, Pete Nelson? While Pete's speech was not on the order of President Obama speech about race, Pete's speech spoke to a lot the anxieties and fear about teaching and being apart of the teacher corps that I think about and endure all the time. I think Pete's opening sentiment on the uncertainty in his qualifications to be apart of the teacher and feeling unsettled about his qualifications to teach is something that most of us can relate to. I know for me I was scared out of my mind for my first lesson during the summer and then dumbstruck that someone would trust with a class of my own. yes, I know biology, but what makes me qualified to teach--impart knowledge. Now, I am simply resigned to the fact that I know more than my students about biology and that's enough.
More than just the feeling of insecurity that Pete shared, the story he shared about his experience eulogizing one of his students who died untimely struck me. Besides the obvious heartbreak, I think Pete's point about making a small impact on a child's life was an important point to remember everyday. Sometimes I would rather five gut punches than ight hours of teaching, but, alas, teaching does make a difference as cliches as it might sound.
though i think arne duncan's speech on "teacher colleges" was pretty well-crafted, i don't know if i truly still understand the concept of a teacher's college. before i get into explaining why perhaps the most important thing could be to fund these institutions, i think i need to see if i actually believe in what they are aimed at doing.
No, it doesn’t have to. No matter how constrained a teacher is, I’ve determined that school does not have to be a creativity killer. To apply some ancient, wise words (2 Corinthians 4:8-9): “We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; … struck down, but not destroyed.” In other words, NCLB and the obsessive, accountability-driven administrative directives it begets cannot single-handedly kill creativity in the classroom. Sure, state tests “stigmatize failure,” as Ken Robinson states. Teachers, though, do not have to stigmatize failure.
Take a measure as simple as rewarding students for non-academic feats, for instance. Awarding Student of the Month to the most spirit-lifting comedian in the classroom validates him as much as a good grade. Teacher-initiated rewards address and negate Robinson’s contention that school only the intellectual successes at school are the winners. He contends that “the whole purpose of public education …is to produce university professors. … We shouldn’t hold them up as the highest form of achievement…they live in their heads.” Nay! The purpose of school is to make something productive out of young peoples minds and hours. Sure, there are ugly class wars circling around how those minds and hours are spent. But ideally, school is for producing more productive (emotionally, spiritually, vocationally --- not merely intellectually) members of society. School is where students have training wheels for how to function as adults. It’s a mini-society. I think Robinson would be a huge fan to Rousseau’s anti-social, child-centered vision of education. Unfortunately, as pastoral and sweet as this vision is, it falls short of what humans were created for: to serve and better each other.
No, schools do not “squander” the innate creativity in children wholesale, as Robinson overconfidently asserts. Schools are the environment in which time is set aside for creativity to be required. Without the structure of school, creativity wilts. Robinson is right to point out the paradoxical nature of creativity, such as that we do not mature into creativity, but rather we outgrow it, but he misses this important paradox about it: creativity needs structure just like fire needs oxygen. Without the push and the constraint to fuel creativity, or the probing questions of the teacher, or the small encouraging remarks along the way to the final creative product, a child’s creativity will be stifled. Also, in a school functioning properly, in which reading aloud and extolling reading should be a daily activity, the imagination will find no lack.
As to Robinson’s allusion to Picasso’s quote that we grow out of creativity, neither do I fully agree with this. Older children (teens) can use colors, tweak words, arrange sounds, plan projects and papers and speak more eloquently and purposefully than their younger counterparts. Who has the authority to say that creativity with more direction and eruditeness is somehow weaker than the innocent creativity that streams from a little mind? Classifying creativity in an hierarchy (eerily akin to what NCLB test standards do—classify schools and student achievement) and judging creativity as “the production of something both original and useful” (paraphrase) is rather utilitarian itself. Robinson defines creativity to uptightly, I’m afraid.
The Tunica River Park affords a host of opportunities for people who are seeking to understand the historical importance of the Mississippi River's usage from its beginnings with the Native Americans and conquistadors up through it's present-day significance as a major channel for transporting goods and individuals through the American midwest. In an ideal world my students would be able to visit the park and take advantage of the plethora of exhibits and time periods featured at the museum. However, structuring this time to maximize my students' learning must be undertaken carefully so that my students get the full effect of the academic experience of the Tunica River Park and do not simply view the excursion as pointless field trip.
Some of the before school activities that I could have my students complete are:
1) Completing a KWL chart to document students' knowledge prior to visiting the Tunic River Park
2) Researching the history of the Mississippi River and how it has been used in the past by disparate groups
3) Visiting a local river (i.e. the Yazoo River) and having students read about its historic regional significance
Some of the activities I could have my students complete while they are at the Tunic River Park are:
1) Creating a timeline to document the settling of the area around the Mississippi River
2) Describing the work of major figures who settles or worked along the Mississippi River
3) Formulating a schedule for other groups of students to complete a walking tour of the park on their own visit
Some of the activities I could have my students complete after their visit to the Tunica River Park include:
1) Finishing their KWL chart by filling in five things they learned from their visit to the Tunica River Park
2) Developing a community service project to spread the word throughout the Delta about the river's import
3) Writing a persuasive letter to a member of Congress urging them to allot money for sharing the river's history
When teaching in the districts that MTC places us in, tangible success is often hard to come by. Failure seems to be what is constantly in our face as we think of all the things that our students are doing besides learning, all the places that our students will likely end up besides college, and all the classroom management issues we face that make us want to roll over and call out sick. Every. Single. Day. Still, it's in the little things that teachers anywhere but especially in "critical needs" districts must focus on to maintain drive and focus and continue doing what too many others have deemed highly improbable or flatly impossible for centuries: educating poor Blacks.
In many of these districts MTC teachers teach in standardized tests are seen as foreboding signs of eminent doom and embarrassment. In these places, teaching "to the test" is often resorted to as the means through which educational salvation is reached. Teaching to the test is one thing but when you're in a school environment where, from day one, what's communicated to teachers is that teaching to the test is the ONLY thing, well then you're at KIPP. On some level this is understandable as testing determines so much at charter schools like KIPP from our enrollment to our ability to woo private funders to the very renewal of our charter with the state of Arkansas. However, I cannot help but shake my philosophical belief that I have more important life skills to teach my students than finding equivalent fractions and answering multiple choice items using process of elimination.
In any event, our big state test in Arkansas is called the ACTAAP or the Benchmark Exam. KIPP Delta in Helena has some of the highest test scores in the state at the middle school and high school levels. Last year, 94% of our 7th graders at KIPP Delta scored proficient or advanced on the mathematics Benchmark Exam compared to 66% of 7th graders statewide and only 33% of students in Helena-West Helena's regular public school system. What makes this even more remarkable to many is that our school is 99% Black, 99% free/reduced lunch, and in the heart of dilapidated downtown Helena close by local housing projects, gang territory, drugs, and prostitution. Last year's 7th grade math teacher who got these results was so successful that she has been given the green light to found her own school which will be opening in Blytheville, Arkansas in the fall of 2010 as a new KIPP middle school. She's only a year older than me. The venerable 7th grade math slot was thus available when I applied to KIPP this past spring and who teaches this course with the districtwide spotlight on it now?: me. The Black, hood guy from Harvard with two years of (social studies) teaching experience who's a few credits away from a master's degree in education.
Anyway, to my success story. In preparation for the end-of-the-year Benchmark Exam we take practice Benchmark Exams every month. We chart the progress of our students and use the practice Benchmark Exams to target particular students and skills for remediation and re-teaching. Results are scrutinized for hours on end at the individual, school, and district levels. It is highly nerve-wrecking to see where your students are at month-by-month and to know that the results will be known almost immediately by your peers and superiors and reflect your quality as a teacher. Lovely. In any event, the first practice Benchmark Exam we took was in late September. We took a second one two weeks ago in late October and although the success or failure of my students on the September exam could largely be attributed to what my students came into 7th grade knowing, my school director was clear in communicating that the October exam's results would be all my own.
Much to my surprise and the surprise of many a colleague, I'm sure, not only did my students' scores increase from the first to the second practice Benchmark Exam but these were the only scores that increased in any grade level, in any subject area at the entire school. Fifth, sixth, and eighth grade math scores went down. Fifth, sixth, seventh, and eighth grade literacy scores went down. Fifth, sixth, seventh, and eight grade reading scores went down. Fifth and seventh grade science scores went down (we don't do sixth and eighth grade science testing). ONLY 7TH GRADE MATH SCORES WENT UP!!! I was elated when I saw the numbers displayed on the dry erase board at our faculty meeting the night we stayed at school until 10 p.m. grading exams and inputting results on our district network for more scrutiny. When looking at the individual students and their performances from the first to the second practice Benchmark Exam, I also noticed that most of the students whose scores increased were taught by me and not by the more experienced and better respected 8th grade math teacher who takes 15 of my 7th graders into his algebra class each day.
That's wassup. Right?
My success, like it took us all a little while to learn, turns up most in the small victories. This success, the one I think has most changed me as a teacher, is a very recent and very small victory, but one I take with me every moment of the day.
Um... I'm a little embarrassed that it is so hard for me to think of a success. Since I can't think of a big success, I will simply list 10 tiny successes:
1. I didn't get cursed out during parent-teacher conferences.
2. I have been kicking cheerleaders that give me attitude off the squad
3. Homecoming was fun!
4. We had two days without students because of homecoming.
5. The school approved my trip to Jackson for the MSTA conference
6. I didn't have to teach two days this week because of the MSTA conference
7. I was in Jackson for two days because of the MSTA conference
8. I got a free textbook at the MSTA conference
9. The school paid for my hotel and meals during my two days at the MSTA conference
10. THE MSTA CONFERENCE!
Seriously, the MSTA conference in Jackson made my week! Nothing is getting easier, but at least a few of my students have commented that my class is their favorite class. One or two of my students even mentioned that I'm the most knowledgeable science teacher they have ever head. On top of that, after my nine-weeks test my failing rate dropped, yay!
The lack of successes more than the successes have changed me as a person and as teacher. To be honest, every day is a little bit demoralizing. I'm far less optimistic and enthusiastic now than I was in August. I look back at my lesson plans from August and they were far more interactive, innovative, and engaging. At this point, I still find myself spending obscene amounts of time lesson planning, but the lessons are getting less and less diverse in style. I have been struck by the reality that I have to get through the rest of my framework by the first week of December. This daunting task has me only spending maybe one or two days a week teaching to every learning style. I find myself spending entirely too much time lecturing and at the board. However, at this point it is the only way to get through the material while managing the behavioral issues in some of my classes.
I couldn't disagree more with Gary Rubinstein's message about high expectations. Unlike Gary who believes that high expectations lead students to be disinterested with the lesson, I think that high expectations are the only way to keep students engaged. Gary is under the misconception that high expectation means lessons at an inappropriate level. Having high expectations of your students does not mean that you don't have a realistic view of their current abilities. While I expect my students to achieve at a level far above what anyone has expected of them, I am cognizant of the fact that my students do not have the foundation for my subject. This fact has nothing to do with my expectations for them, instead this only concerns my expectations for me. Having high expectation of my students, while understanding their current level of subject knowledge, means that I have to achieve at a higher level. I have to remediate every single unit and then find the time to teach my subject's objectives in a way that all the different types of learners, including me SpEd students, can understand.
the conversation with rita bender was pretty...sweet, to say the least. i talk A LOT, most of the time unnecessarily, during our meetings and classes. but with this, i really didn't want to. i wanted to sit back and take it in.
