Listen, Learn, Share

Staying a step ahead of evolution

2011-06-30T09:24:00.000-04:00

Lest the title of this post cause the reader to get sidetracked concerning issues of science vs. religion, I assure you these thoughts have nothing to do with either. These thoughts were prompted by a tweet from someone (whom I cannot remember or locate at the moment) which said something to the effect of we don't know how to plan for innovation, selling televisions, and this article about the abolishment of cursive writing in the state of Indiana.

Planning for innovation - some companies do it well. Google is probably the flagship organization in this area. There are others and you can read about them in The Future of Management by Gary Hamel. It's worth the read if this post stirs you in any way.

Selling televisions - I work part time for a major electronic retailer in the home theater department. I was helping a customer pick out a television the other day when she said, "I want to buy something that will keep up with all the technology and advancements for the next ten years." To which I responded, "That's impossible. Technology and innovation do not work that way." I then explained using concrete examples of what has happened just in the last eighteen months in the home theater industry.

Abolishing cursive - This is one I've almost come full circle on. I'm currently sitting at about 270 degrees. For you trig people that would be three-halfs pi, but I digress. We currently home school both our children. My wife and I spent a lot of time debating whether we should teach cursive to our children. In the interest of marital bliss, I gave her the deciding vote and she voted yes. No biggie. I kept my thoughts to myself about how no one uses it anymore; it's a relic left over from the days of reducing ink smears when writing with a goose feather; in fifteen years nothing will be written by hand, it will only appear in the air as you type on your holographic keyboard, etc.

The article quotes Andee Anderson of the Indiana University Northwest Urban Teacher Education Program as saying teachers haven’t had the time to teach cursive writing for some time because it’s not a top priority. As a result students’ handwriting is atrocious. Man, I can concur with that last one. I teach in North Carolina and I could have sworn that my students were writing in Sanskrit or Hindi this past year. My humanities teammate instituted the Handwriting Rescue program for these students. Part of the motivation was also because some research had shown that because students had not learned the skills of forming letters properly that seemingly unrelated areas of their brains were not properly developed and therefore they were deficient in other areas like critical thinking, problem solving, etc. I was sold because I was witnessing the latter skill deficiencies.

Such interconnectedness fit nicely into what I would tell my students on a frequent basis. We know now that the brain is fairly plastic. During the preschool and adolescent years, neural pathways get created and pruned depending on how the brain itself is used. Research has shown (sorry, didn't have time to look it up) that students in China think differently than students in the US partly because they use a pictographic handwriting system. It creates different pathways in their brains and therefore potentially different skill sets. And let's not forget this iconic article Is Google Making Us Stupid?.

I promise, this is nearing a conclusion. From a pedagogical and curriculum development perspective, how do we factor all this in? "Research-based" is the buzz word. Marzano is the point man here. He has gone as far as to say that use of such methods will cause an increase in student achievement. Justin Baeder has written an excellent critique of those claims here. Let's assume that the claims are true. Living by such methods only makes us guilty of getting what we always got because of doing what we've always done. If our teaching methods and by extension our assessment methods are based in the past, how are we planning for innovation? How are we allowing for the brain to develop new skills? Has the quest for the "science" of teaching really become a religion of devotion to a particular philosophy?

In other words, how do we teach the students of today for the world of tomorrow?

Spending a year offline - part 1

2011-06-20T12:41:00.000-04:00

This past school year has been very interesting for me. I spent most of it offline. I don't mean just absent from Facebook and Twitter, the latter having been my preferred place of residence. I mean almost completely offline. I blogged maybe twice during that time. I only participated in two or three #edchats. I rarely even checked my personal email. I think the bulk of my online activity was Googling for map directions or Christmas gift ideas.

What happened? The short version is this:

I had to take a part time job to make ends meet. I made the decision to spend my little free time with my family instead of on a computer because I knew I would never get off otherwise.
My access to technology at school dramatically changed.

I went from having five desktops in my classroom to one, and that one worked REALLY slowly.
The laptop carts were in constant use. This was in theory a good thing for all the students.
My own personal technology died on me - my LCD projector, my netbook, and my homemade IWB. All purchased with my own money. If you want to know why I didn't repair it, see #1.

So the past ten months provided an opportunity to gain a new perspective on things. First, the immediate consequences. I felt really disconnected. I am amazed at how strongly I felt about the relationships with my online acquaintances. Besides all the nuggets of wisdom I used to glean everyday, I enjoyed the social interaction. I missed the convos that would happen during #edchat or when other hot topics would pop up. I missed trying to keep up with all the feeds in my Google reader and then sharing all that I had learned. I missed our own local edcamp and the opportunity for F2F interactions as well.

Second, it totally changed the way I taught. When my personal equipment failed, gone was the opportunity to stop whatever we were doing as a class and search for an answer or connect with another class for input. I had to come up with new ways to make sure that I was creating learning opportunities that challenged all my students on all levels of Blooms and did so in meaningful ways, not just for the sake of work completion. I found myself slipping more and more into not only out of vogue techniques, but less effective ones as well. It was hard and I felt bad for my students many days.

I don't know if anyone cares about Part 1, much less any future installments I might write about. But I am an extremely introspective individual (some have called me a "frowny faced introvert"), so more will come. I did learn a lot as a result of this year and some of it is worth sharing. Thanks for helping me weed through it.

Today was great day. . .

2011-02-08T21:01:00.000-05:00

Today was a great day in the classroom. In fact, the last two weeks have just been awesome. This year I am teaching 7th grade and I have one section each of general math, pre-algebra, and algebra 1. And for the record, I am at least 1 month behind in getting everything on the standard course of study (SCOS) covered in time for Testivus and its annual celebration of end of grade testing.

Why am I behind? I'm glad you asked. I'm behind because we have spend so much time just learning and making connections. I took more time than was recommended on a few key concepts to ensure that my students really understood what they were doing. The last two weeks have been so great because we have spent that time going BEYOND the SCOS and exploring other connections. Today I was just giddy with excitement as I watched all the little light bulbs flicker above everyone's heads. I then shared why I was so excited. Do my kids think I'm weird? Definitely, but that was a foregone conclusion without today's behavior. Did I demonstrate to them a passion and excitement for learning? Most definitely/. Did some of them experience that for themselves? I gotta say yes.

Today was a great day.

What I learned about grading by working retail

2011-02-08T20:52:00.000-05:00

It's been a really long time since I've blogged or tweeted, like almost six months. Thanks to both of you who missed me. Part of the reason is I've been working a second part time job for a major electronics retailer. State budget cuts and frozen salaries combined with a continually rising cost of living have made this a necessity.

Like any retailer, the holidays are a major source of revenue. In my particular department, we make somewhere in the neighborhood of two-thirds of our annual revenue between Thanksgiving and Christmas. Black Friday is a big deal for us. I sold a lot of stuff that day.

I am not paid on commission but my personal sales are tracked. On Black Friday, each person in the department had an assigned goal of approximately $30,000 in sales. Keep in mind I'm not selling cars but consumer electronics. That's a pretty high goal. On the following Monday I checked our tracking system to see my totals. To be honest I was pretty excited to see just how much I sold. Due to a glitch in programming, not all the data was properly assigned. In my own estimation I knew I had exceeded the goals for all three days of Black Friday weekend, but nothing was there to show it. I was bummed. Despite knowing I do not receive any commission or special recognition for my individual sales, I wanted to know. Then I had one of those "oh great wise one share your wisdom with me" moments of clarity - this is how my students feel about grades.

This is my second year using a standards based grading system. Assignments receive a score between 1 and 4, depending on the level of mastery they have shown. At the end of the grading period I conference with each student and we assign a similar score for their overall progress. I then convert this to a typical 100 point based grade to satisfy local requirements. I tracked with my students from 6th grade to 7th so this system is nothing new. However, this year I'm teaching math, a tested subject. The kids don't really care about grades but their parents do. Every time I send home a progress report with ones, twos, threes, and fours I have to answer the question, "What's my child's grade?" These numbers are important because so many people measure everything by them.

So, what exactly did I learn about grading from working retail?

despite the lofty ideals of working /learning for the sake of simply doing so, we all want to see some fruit for our efforts
when you are being assessed on your work/learning, everyone wants it to be a meaningful assessment. Don't just give me a set of exercises to do, connect them to something. Do they really assess my learning OR my ability to recreate rote tasks?

The task for me now is to find a way to address and apply both of these lessons. What suggestions do you have?

Stop the Bus!

2010-09-28T10:33:00.001-04:00

After reading Joe Bower's post on covering the curriculum, I find myself conjuring up images of Eddie Murphy and his stand up routine where he talked about chasing the ice cream truck, screaming "ICE CREAM!" at the top of his lungs. Only I'm yelling "STOP THE BUS!" and I'm the bus driver. Not quite six weeks into the school year, and I have to figure out what I'm going to do about my route.

You see, clearly, a large portion of my students have failed to learn some key concepts. With such a large number, the obvious answer is to reteach it. But how many times? Do I stop the bus or simply slow it down and leave the door open, hoping the kids will be able to jump on with minimal injury? How do I use RtI? Can it be the back up transportation plan or just an excuse I use to not stop the bus?

My heart says stop the bus. My brain says stop the bus. At least part of my brain does. The other part sees the standard course of study mandated by the state. That same part of my brain sees learning goals like the one prompting this post and thinks they SHOULD HAVE been learned before this year anyway. Do I keep 80% of the kids from their destination because 20% are too slow? How do I drive several different busses at once?

It really is a no-brainer - the bus HAS to be stopped. But it is SOOOOO much easier to say than do.

Embracing Uncertainty, part 1

2010-08-04T20:52:00.002-04:00

In The Future of Management, author Gary Hamel argues that one of the reasons leading companies and corporations fall to the back of the pack is not so much the incompetence of its leaders but the "frantically accelerating pace of change" (p42) that is to blame. They will eventually adapt, but only after it is too late and they have fallen behind. This idea triggered an "A-HA!" for me regarding our current educational system. Now I realize this is not a new insight - others have called attention to it before ("Shift Happens" among others). My a-ha was more in the form of "most of my colleagues are ill equipped to handle the rate of change, regardless of any other philosophical beliefs they may have." I began to feel a burden that perhaps is now part of my responsibility to assist them in this area.

Since graduating from college twenty years ago, I have worked in what I believe are the two industries that rank first and second on the "resistant to change" scale - the church and education. I won't deal with church issues here - I have another seriously neglected blog for those matters. Just because our environments are averse to change does not mean change won't come a knockin'. In fact, the rapid rate of change hits every year with a new set of directions and I keep hearing, "So much has changed. Can't we just keep something the same for more than a year?"

I asked for help identifying resources that might help teachers deal with this rapid pace of change.

anyone out there blogged or read anything re: helping tchrs adapt to rapid speed of change in society? looking for thoughts besides my ownWed Aug 04 03:37:46 via TweetDeckmatt guthrie
mattguthrie

(I'm still looking for input by the way!) I was eventually directed here, an interview with Alexandra Michel and Stanton Wortham. The first two clips are the best, though I would recommend them all. Be sure to check them out.

It's ironic how, according to Michel and Wortham, all the methods we employ to minimize change actually work to minimize our ability to deal with even minor change. Curriculum is standardardized. Assessments are standardized. Lesson plans and PLC's are becoming standardized to the point that you can actually purchase scripted lessons. This trend weakens our skills as educators. It causes us to create students who are no longer learners (processors of information) but regurgitators of facts.

So, back to my initial question - how do we help our colleagues deal with this rapid rate of change? If Michel and Wortham are correct, we need to embrace uncertainty. We need to remove the routines from our classrooms and our schools. Am I advocating chaos? Maybe, but only to a small degree. You should see my sock drawer.

I think an easy way to begin is really implementing the idea of PLC's and data analysis to their ultimate theoretical ends. Instead of me teaching EVERY math objective to all my classes and my colleagues doing likewise, let's split up the topics. I'll teach linear functions to ALL the classes and Mrs. Jones will teach factoring polynomials, etc. This will require us to alter the sequencing of topics. In fact, we may need a different sequence every year if we let the data decide. It becomes "planned" uncertainty, which is a small step.

Can teachers handle this lack of consistency? Of course they can. They are professionals who are knowledgeable of the content right? Does order matter that much?

I have another way to help teachers embrace uncertainty though it would be quite unpopular with many and unenforceable anyway - forbid the recycling of lesson plans. A better solution would be to report X number of new things you have done during your annual review. Hamel details how Whirlpool Corporation began a five year quest to create a culture of innovation. Part of that process was requiring divisions to report the number of innovations and percentage of income derived from them. Teachers could do this very easily. Instead of making it a burdensome requirement, it could be touted as, "Share with me the awesome new things you tried that you are proud of. How did they turn out?"

I have some ideas about how to change the type of student we are creating. That can be for part 2. For now, I would like to hear your thoughts on this issue and how you are helping your colleagues embrace uncertainty.

A summer of big things - Picking a good hill

2010-07-27T08:57:00.001-04:00

I don't know how other teachers spend their summers, but mine is usually spent teaching summer school so I can get paid. I use my free time to do some official and unofficial PD. Most importantly, I plan for the coming year. I'm a planner and a dreamer, so I can't help it. I don't plan in the sense of developing individual lesson plans. I basically sit around and dream of all the ways I can do it better. I think of crazy schemes and projects I want to try out with my new batch of students. I ~~inudate~~ flood my teammates' inboxes with all my crazy thoughts. Sometimes they respond. Sometimes they just write it off as more maniacal musings.

This summer my biggest "project" was revamping the way I teach math. I will teach three different levels of seventh grade math class this fall and I want to do it differently than I ever have before. I'm tired of the demonstrate the skill, guide their practice of the skill, send them home to independently practice the skill, then quiz them the next day routine of teaching math. I've decided that I will set up some type of center approach with rotations that hinges on an inquiry-based methodology. I have less than a month to get a lot of details sorted out on that one.

Deciding on such an approach has naturally led to the biggest change in how I do things. I experimented with standards based grading last year in science, moving away from the traditional 100 point scale. Implementation of RTI at our school helped set up a favorable environment to do so. Even so, my grading practices remained more similar to the traditional way of doing things than to anything new. This year will be different. I am taking the full Nestea Plunge (pardon the dated and obscure reference) into standards based ~~grading~~ assessment. I will no longer give grades of any type.

I've already written about this on Jason Bedell's blog here so I won't reiterate those boring details. I prefer to use this post to evangelize, speak in fiery tones, and stake my claims. If you read my other post, you will see I lay out the possible opposition. I don't yet know how my principal will respond to such a method. I'd like to think that he will love it based on our previous conversations. The more I think about it, the more I want to talk about it with my colleagues. Most of my colleagues will never go for such a scheme. They still operate from an "everything has to be grade-kids have to learn responsibility-all these retakes without penalty isn't fair-we're preparing them for the real world" and so on mindset.

But this has become a Damascus Road experience for me. Why have I never seen the light of this before? Why have I feared trying this? Is this not the only true way to assess (or "grade" if you must) a student's learning? Is this not what education is supposed to be about?

Lest I begin sounding self-righteous and pompous in my newly enlightened state, I assure you it is not my intent. But nothing else makes sense to me. There will be barriers and they must be overcome if this is the right thing to do. Technological and software constraints are trivial - those are easy to work around. The real barriers are the ideological ones. The rebel and revolutionary in me anticipates, maybe even longs for, a fight. But I have picked a hill for this year. It is on this hill that I am willing to die this year.

It's a story, of a . . . .

2010-07-23T10:23:00.000-04:00

Raise your hand if you immediately began singing the theme to The Brady Bunch. If you haven't already, you will now. I came across this post at the Cooperative Catalyst and the need to share our success stories. Our little success stories. Not our "Teacher in Shining Armor" stories where we helped every kid who was four grade levels behind in math build their own manned space ship to the moon. Those little stories that another teacher will appreciate.

After twenty years of doing this, I have been able to collect a few stories of small success. And when I say "small" I mean small. This is my latest story. It's a story about a boy we'll call "Paul". When you first meet Paul, you see the dark graphic tee and the "I don't care" swagger. If you look really closely, you see a kid who is extremely intelligent, quick to make connections to everything he is learning, but even quicker to hide this fact from those around him - teacher and student. The easiest thing to see is Paul's lack of impulse control that manifests itself in saying whatever comes to his mind at that moment. And even though what he says is usually true, it also usually said in an inappropriate manner or at an inappropriate time (usually both). Oh, and don't ever try to bully Paul. That means don't stand over him and try to exert your authority. Don't embarrass him in front of his peers. And if you are another student, you better back up your words with action cause you will pay for them.

Paul walked into our school as a sixth grader who had already repeated fifth grade. He was described as a problem child who had extreme difficulty reading. He was projected by his previous teachers to score a low 2 on his end of grade test. (Three is passing.) And here is where the story ceases to become my story, but my team's story. We recognized the other side of Paul early on. We would not except less than his best. No fuss. No fighting. No arguments. Just go back and redo it. We all know you can do better. By third quarter, Paul was acing all his language arts assessments. He was finding his own story in the poetry of others. He even softened and told us, his teachers, his own story of an abusive, drug-addicted environment. He told us of his felt need to protect his mother and little sister.

In one month, Paul will walk back into our school. My team was given the privilege of moving up to the seventh grade and getting about 85% of our kids back, including Paul. We have scheduled Paul for advanced language arts and advanced math. He's still going to say some inappropriate things. He is still going to need to be reminded of how smart he really is and that it's okay to succeed. But he will be back. Best of all, he wants to be back. And honestly, there is nothing small about that story.

"How'd you get your kids to do that?"

2010-07-13T11:18:00.000-04:00

That was the question asked of me yesterday at the end of the school day. Another teacher and I were just chitchatting about our days. The conversation began with her asking, "How was your day?" To which I replied, "It was awesome. I'm done. I don't have to teach anymore." (We have two weeks left, approx half of a semester). I continued, "I have the students teaching now. I told them they have taken all this before. They already know it. It was time to step up." To which she asked our title question today.

I was surprised at her disbelief. Her response was, "My kids are too retarded for that." With that she left the room. So how did I get my kids to do this? And for the record, they are doing an AWESOME job. Their peers are being assessed just as if I had been doing the teaching and they are doing well. It all began on day 1 when I told them that none of them were stupid. Most of them were repeating the class in summer school because of poor work ethic, personality clashes with the teachers, and a bunch of other reasons that had nothing to do with their intellectual or academic abilities. They have been required to synthesize and analyze their knowledge everyday and intelligently write about it. They have taken part in two other inquiry based projects already this summer. This was the logical next step. Getting to do this was actually pretty easy. They can probably do even more.

Blind Side Tomatoes - Providing Student Support

2010-07-12T22:28:00.000-04:00

One of my tomato plants has a problem. It's a good problem to have - it's growing too big. I put a "cage" approximately two feet in diameter made out of fencing wire around each of my tomato plants. The cage provides support for the plants as they grow larger and begin bearing fruit. The plant in question has already produced two tomatoes weighing one pound each. On average, its fruit weighs about ten ounces. The problem for this plant is its branches have grown over the top of the cage and continue to get longer. Right now it's not a problem. In a couple of weeks when that branch has anywhere from two to five pounds of beautiful orange-red tomato flesh hanging from it, those branches will be drooping over the edge, possibly breaking. I'm trying to figure out now how I'm going to provide support for the plant.

A few weeks ago I finished reading The Blind Side: Evolution of the Game by Michael Lewis. The movie was great, but it doesn't come close to conveying how much support the Tuoys provided for Michael Oher. If you don't know the basis of the movie and its true story, click here for a synopsis. In the book, Leigh Anne Tuoy said her goal was to provide as much support for Michael as possible so that he, a gifted young black athlete from the worst part of Memphis and with virtually no education, could navigate and succeed in the academic AND white world of privilege. Forget for a moment, if you can, that all of this was motivated by the selfless love of this family. The list of support measures is endless - tutoring, constant dialogue with his teachers, coaches, and recruiters; financial intervention, social skill intervention . . .

One of my favorite supports was the realization by Leigh Anne that Michael had more than his physical prowess going for him at left tackle. In middle school, he had scored in the ninetieth percentile on "protective instincts". Could there be a better skill for the player most responsible for protecting the quarterback? To me, that's just an amazing example of helping a student identify his strengths and then use them for his success.

The start of the school year is just over a month away. I'm very excited about this year because I am looping with a majority of my students from last.year. Last year was so successful on many different levels, in part because of the new support mechanisms we put into place. Like many schools, we began implementing RTI. Another support was a reading remediation program called Language! Before, that program was only used with our lowest exceptional children students. We realized it had many benefits for our low performing students in the regular classroom. The results were amazing in terms of their end of grade testing scores AND their overall performance in the classroom.

These are great measures, but we can't stop there. A lot of these students need 1:1 mentoring. Where are we going to find to enough mentors? The home situations of many of these kids is unsupportive. How will we as a school step in and fill the gap? How will we empower the family to provide that support themselves? How can we assist a middle school student to say no to pressures and cultural norms that glorify gang membership and denigrate academic success, regardless of your ability? As a school we must become Leigh Anne Tuoy. We must find whatever resources available to provide the support. Creative partnerships must be forged. A new way of thinking must be inculcated that breaks out of all the old patterns of doing things when they were designed to serve the average-already-going-to-succeed student. And yes, we probably need to prepare ourselves to do a little more work. These kids are going to bear so much awesome fruit if we do.

Ed Reform? How? An #edchat response

2010-07-06T22:06:00.001-04:00

For those people who like to call #edchat an echo chamber or a shallow attempt at real change or too fast to accomplish anything or all the above, tonight will hopefully change that perception. The topic for the hour was "What actions are needed to move the education reform movement from conversation to action? Are educators up to the challenge?" I think educators ARE up to the challenge. Not all of them but not every citizen is up to political involvement and action either. I'd argue that educators, at least the ones in my PLN, have a much higher percentage of ready, willing, and able people than the general populace. There are some that are not and the reasons are as varied as the number of people. That's okay.

So for those of us who are ready for the challenge, here is my two cent opinion on how to get it done.

1) We have to decide what "reform" means. As usual, tonight's chat had at least three concurrent streams. One dealt with policy and law-making issues. Another dealt with tech integration. And another focused on pedagogical changes. Some may think the three are so intertwined that they cannot be separated. I'd argue against that. These issues are better addressed in separate spheres of varying sizes. Pedagogy cannot be successfully "reformed" on a national level. You cannot mandate PBL or any other current acronym as the method of choice. However, you can advocate for its implementation within your building and see successful results.

Likewise with tech integration. This is probably a district wide issue. Districts control the filters. Districts create the price lists of approved vendors. Districts sign the contracts and divvy out the money for technology purchases.

Finally, there are big issues, really big issues that have to be addressed on state and national levels. These are issues like mandatory standardized testing used to rank and sort schools, teachers, and students. These are issues like NCLB and RttT. Change, or reform if you prefer, can only happen at that level because these have become legislative issues.

2) Politics CANNOT be removed from the equations. If it makes you feel better, think of it as relationship building. Let's look at the scenarios above and see how this would play out. For school level reform, who are the stakeholders, powerbrokers, and decision makers for the particular issue at hand? Maybe the element that needs changing is something as simple as the attitudinal climate. At my school, we had a lot of naysayers. At least it seemed that way. They put down any idea because it was someone else's idea. There were a lot of teachers who seemed more concerned about how miserable they could make student lives than they were in creating a positive student-centered learning environment. Our principal was pulling his hair out, trying to get them to change. I asked him who the positive, forward thinking people were. I gathered those people together and we began to talk amongst ourselves. We realized there were more of us than we thought. We began to talk to others. There is still a slightly negative climate at school, but it is less acceptable. Other people are stepping up and saying this isn't the way it should be. It's all happening because relationships are being leveraged and built.

If you're trying to change pedagogy in your building, share success stories with your PLC or bring a positive conversation to the teacher's lounge for a change. Talk about how much the students enjoyed it, how much they learned, and when/how you plan to do it again. Do this enough and others will soon try it. I watched it happen all last year. I even changed some of what I was doing because of other people's success stories.

District level changes are a little tougher. You might find some like-minded colleagues at another school. They might be able to network through a third school. Soon you can a diverse group from a broad range of schools that demonstrates the wide support the issue has. Does your district have any type of teacher advisory council? Is there anyone from your school who takes issues to the district.

If we look at the technology issue as an example, who pulls the strings? Do you have a connection with the district level administrator? If not, is there someone on the next level? If your only relationship is with your school's technology person, how well connected is he or she? In my case, I made a point to attend several district sponsored technology workshops last summer. One reason was it enabled me to meet all the lead technology staff. They do not have the power to make some of the changes I'd like, but they have the ear of those who do. Several times throughout the school year they were happy to help me get small changes made. I gunning for some bigger ones this year.

One last district level technology suggestion. Push to make your class a pilot project. Get parents to sign off on anything that's social media related. Show examples of other places that have had success with whatever tech you're pushing for. Get good records and at the end of the year show off everything you have done, even the things that flopped. Just be sure to demonstrate what you learned through that failure and how you adapted to make the next time more successful.

I have absolutely no personal stories to share on how I helped bring about reform on a state or national level. I think the same principals apply though. Just do what citizens do when they want zoning changed, lotteries brought in, new and improved "bans" established. Write your representatives. Write them again. Get someone else to write them. Find a group that writing and calling them. A teacher on my hallway is a local rep for one of the professional organizations. She was invited to speak to the legislature this spring. They know her face and name now. I'm gonna call her. Anthony Cody and Teachers Letter to Obama on Facebook is another great example. Or maybe you simply are the one who is able to start the big ball rolling.

3) Finally, reform is not just about stopping something. It's about advocating for something else. What is the alternative you want to see put into place? Don't come to the table without a solution. Anyone can point out problems. We don't need more of that. We need viable answers.

So now, what change are you going to help bring about? Who are you going to enlist to help you do it?

Independence and Public Education

2010-07-03T14:58:00.002-04:00

As our little community Fourth of July Parade wrapped up today, I began to think about the place of democracy and independence in public education. In particular, I was thinking about all of this in the context of these words:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. (emphasis added)

Before anyone panics, I'm not saying we should storm the Bastilles of district offices. I am thinking aloud about what such a declaration as the one above means for our role in public education. The Founding Fathers did not take this Declaration lightly. It was no easy vote to break off. They were unsure of what it would take to establish a sovereign nation from the ground up and they knew it. But they finally reached the tipping point where they deemed no other course available.

How should all this play out in the public education arena? What actions need to be taken, not just by teachers or unions, but by parents and students? At what point do we collectively say that this system which has supposedly been established for our good is no longer serving that purpose, peaceably or otherwise? There are only so many changes and tweaks we can make on small scales within our individual classrooms or even schools.

Perhaps serious consideration needs to be taken with regard to the large scale at which we are trying to implement standardization. Another sticking point for the Founders was the notion of being the UNITED States versus a collection of independent states. Should there be national standards or even state standards? Should teacher licensing be standardized? Is it possible to identify a set of standards of any type that should be included in every school everywhere? Or, as part of our declaration do we assert the need for every local context to determine and design what is best for the community it serves?

I've got no real answers or even suggestions. Just a bunch of questions. I hope somebody will ask them with me.

Providing equal access - #edchat 6/29/2010

2010-06-29T23:34:00.000-04:00

Tonight's #edchat asked the question "How do we ensure those without privilege have equal access to quality education?". Interestingly, we dealt with a very similar, but more specific topic on 5/4/2010 - "How can we ensure that all students have equal access to technology?". What's interesting is that one of the main threads running through tonight's discussion was specifically about technology.

Some of the comments that I reasonate with are:

Russ Goerend - "Access to the Internet = access to quality education"

Tim Furman - "access to books would go a long to help an impoverished child"

Mary Beth Hertz - "Equal access means that all students have the opportunity to learn from a teacher who is a lifelong learner and dedicated to his or her students"

I'm sure there were others, but I had to cut out early due to guests arriving at my home. Looking back over the archive, I found this statement that probably best sums up my feelings.

Ms. Bethea "As long as the underlying system is broken, there will always be inequality in education regardless of access."

If we can fix the system, we will address the other comments and so many others. I going to try an avoid sounding like a broken record in this post. Instead I'll point you to my vision for how school school should look in order to speak directly to these issues.

First of all, I think "equal access" goes beyond access to technology. I take tonight's question at face value - how do we ensure equal access quality education, which is a much bigger issue. I do think access to technology helps. Access to technology and the web opens up access to a wide array of resources not available otherwise. As I said earlier tonight, we can rearrange our budgets so that money being spent on textbooks can be spent on technology. If the technology is integrated throughout the school, throughout the day, lack of access at home is not as big a factor as it once was. Proper internet access opens the doors to open sourcing education.

Some of tonight's discussion dealt with the socioeconomic factors that are associated with access. Being an idealist, I want to assume that the teachers of John Doe Impoverished Neighborhood School are just as good as the ones at Charles Moneybags Suburban Gated Community School. I want to ideally assume that teachers will receive (and seek on their own) the necessary professional development to help them be quality teachers. So don't comment on either of these issues. They are for another time. This is about a broken system.

By the way, I've taught at both schools and it is certainly is "easier" at the latter. However, that can only go far in terms of providing excuse in unequal access. As Will Richardson said earlier last week, you may not have caused the problem but now you own so do something about it. We cannot control the environment from which our students come, at least not in a free state. But there are lots of things we can do to deal with that environment - free and reduced lunch, parent outreach, parent engagement, before/after school programs, etc.

In order for any of this work, we have to change the system. We can't just tweak it. It needs serious overhaul. I'm not saying that all textbooks are bad. I am saying we need to seriously take at look at the money we are spending on those books. What would be the net effect of using technology to provide the same (or better I would argue) access? We have to look seriously at things like testing. We must stop playing the role of cash cow for testing services and developers. We must fight the conventional (yet contrary to what people actually in the know and in the trenches say) wisdom regarding the validity of these tests.

We have to change what we measure and how we measure it. If equal access means something different from equal treatment, why are we using the same metric for everyone? Throw out promotion schedules and report cards. Provide access to a guaranteed success at accomplishing learning goals without a stigma regarding how long it takes. Providing equal access is not that hard. But it requires changing the system, and that's really not that hard either.

Curriculum - Part 2 of "Does it really matter?"

2010-06-29T14:30:00.000-04:00

Please, please, please comment on this post if you disagree or agree in any way. This post is a work in progress as I process my thoughts on important issues like curriculum. As I mentioned in part of "Does it really matter?" I am teaching earth science this summer. I hate to admit this, but I can't think of a single good reason for kids to take this class. When I examine the standard course of study (SCOS), there is not a single item that will ever be used again in their lives unless they enter a very specific career.

So on the first day, I'm looking at the class of students who are repeating the course and I'm trying to find an answer to the unasked question, "When am I EVER going to use this?" There is always the standard answer of you will develop thinking skills that will used in other areas of your but honestly, that's a load of manure. Don't get me wrong. I'm all about learning something for the sake of learning it. I love talking rocks, minerals, soil, weather, plate tectonics, etc. and how all these things are intricately linked together in systemic ways. I teach with enthusiasm and passion about how cool all the connections are. I look for real world, current events to illustrate each concept. And students enjoy my class. . . . because I'm entertaining.

I know it is a bit idealistic to ask repeaters, especially those with historic problems in school, to suddenly become passionate about all this. I don't expect them too. I see my four and half this summer as an attempt to plant a seed, light a spark, redirect the ship only a single degree in order to avoid disaster . . .

All of this leads me to some serious thoughts about the place of curriculum. Why have we dictated the courses a student must pass in order to earn a high school diploma? What is the process whereby we determined A, B, and C must be mastered in order to move from middle to high school?

Here in NC, our State Board of Education has adopted a new set of guidelines for freshmen who entered high school this past year. It's called the "Future Ready Core". Besides requiring earth/environmental science, students must pass algebra 1 and 2, geometry, and a fourth math that is tailored to their post high school paths. Excuse me for a moment, but as a math teacher, why would I require a future plumber or diesel mechanic (who make very good money by the way and are still much in need) need algebra 2? What math do they they take next in the sequence?

I realize that my post is losing its coherency to singular topic because I'm beginning to move into rant mode. So I'll wrap it up with a few questions that will perhaps frame it all for me.
- What is the purpose of school?
- Which is more important, content or skills?
- Why are trying to force everyone onto a college track?
- If high school is supposed to preparation for real life, shouldn't there be a little more freedom in the requirements?

Again, I state my plea. Please comment because I'm really wondering if it matters.

Does it really matter?

2010-06-29T10:16:00.001-04:00

Teaching summer school this year has caused me to ask that question over and over again. I have twelve 9th graders who need to pass my class, earth science, so they can be tenth graders next year. They've all had it before. A few I know because they went to my middle school. One of these students is here because of chronic absenteeism - just like in middle school. Another is here because she attended SIX different high schools in one year! That student has even more problems going on in her personal life that make earth science the last thing on her list of important things. More than a few are really here because they were discipline problems in the classroom. They weren't paying attention. They disrupted others. They missed class time. And when they semester ended and they were on the bubble - the bubble was popped from underneath them. Perhaps what bothers me the most are the two or three who are behind at least three grade levels in their reading and writing skills. Were they passed along? Were they written off? Why are they potential tenth graders and this hasn't been addressed?

So now, I have four and a half weeks to instill a love for something they probably hate. Honestly, that doesn't matter. My mission for the next four and half weeks is to help these kids be successful in life, whether they can repeat the theory of plate tectonics or not. That's what matters.

Let's just do what we're already doing

2010-06-26T23:06:00.002-04:00

This afternoon, Greg Couros asked this question on Twitter

If standardized tests are not the best for data for schools, what data can we use? I would love to hear your thoughts.

gcouros

I've wondered this same thing many times myself. I can even think of a few (very few) good reasons for standardized tests, but that's a hill I'll die on later. My response to Greg was simply to use standards based grading and evaluate student portfolios. Let me give you a real life example from right here in good ol' North Carolina where portfolios are used as the "unofficial" trump of all of our end of grade, standardized testing.

Here in NC, we administer end of grade (EOG) tests for third through eight grades. Many of the mainstream, college prep courses in high school have end of course (EOC) tests as well. We also have what are called "gateway" grades - third, fifth, and eighth. If you do not pass your EOG's for this grade, you are given five hours of remediation and a retake. Incidentally, my district has determined to really make sure students are ready and have made EVERY year a gateway year. If after the retake you still do not pass, then you have the option to go through the waiver process. A waiver committee hears the case presented by the teacher and sometimes the parent on why the student should have the EOG standard waived so that he or she can advance to next grade.

I have prepared waiver portfolios for my own students. I have served on waiver committees for other teachers and schools. Every grade and course has a standard course of study (SCOS) divided up into goals. Among other things the portfolio contains, the most important are sufficient samples of the student's work that demonstrate proficiency for the individual goals within the SCOS. I do not have good solid stats on this, but from what anecdotal evidence I've been able to gather from my colleagues and my own experience, less than five percent, perhaps lower, of the students taken to waiver are actually denied. In every case that I have personally experienced on either side of the waiver table, the decision to waive was justified as "Student has made adequate progress".

Here's what gets me. Every teacher, EVERY teacher, hates the EOG. Every teacher and committee member look for proficiency in individual goals. If this is how it's going to go down anyway, then why don't we start there and save literally billions of dollars each year on tests? If teachers are going to use standards based grading to justify a student's progress, why aren't they already using it on a regular basis throughout the year?

It is true most of the samples submitted show that a student got 80% of the questions right,so some changing still needs to happen there. But why, in the name of all that makes sense, why the heck aren't we doing what we are already doing anyhow?

What every teacher needs

2010-06-22T22:33:00.000-04:00

Tonight's #edchat dealt with the topic of what every first year teacher needed to know before stepping into the classroom. The early discussion centered on more practical experience, more theory, "my program didn't prepare me", and "no program can adequately prepare you". Suddenly the topic of needing a mentor came up and this dominated the discussion for the rest of the hour. The discussion began to take two parallel paths - how a mentor can help a beginning teacher and how everyone should have a mentor.

It is that last path that motivates this post. Every teacher should have a mentor. Or several. Really expand your network and get a PLN. Underlying this need is a prerequisite attitude that must come before having a mentor or PLN will be effective. It is the attitude of having a teachable spirit, seasoned with a desire to continue to learn. If this isn't present, your wasting a lot of people's time, including your own.

Here in North Carolina we have NCCAT. It's free and was set up just for teachers. It was established while I was in college. I could not wait to go there when I became a real live teacher. I was shocked at how all my colleagues, the much more experienced ones, pooh-poohed the idea. I was dismayed at how most of my fellow teachers saw conferences as "vacation days" or even worse, not worth it because of having to make sub-plans. Where was the desire to learn?

I know that for some the desire to learn is there but the pride and fear of appearing incompetent keep them away from new things. So an ancillary (am I using that word correctly - I teach math and science, not English comp) attitude would have to be a willingness to fail or at least look incompetent. I constantly seek the guidance of others, even those that don't like me or I don't like myself, if they know something I don't know. I don't care what anyone thinks - I need to do my job the best I can.

I'm bummed that I'm going to miss out on mentor training this summer. I would love to mentor a beginning teacher. For now, I'll have to do it unofficially. I'm hoping my principal will let me do a workshop for the faculty on developing a PLN this fall. I'm sometimes amazed at how important this is to me. It's not because I think I'm some expert. I guess I've become a PLN evangelist because of how it changed my life.

Every teacher needs to learn and grow. Every teacher needs a PLN.

Japanese Beetles

2010-06-20T17:00:00.003-04:00

Yes, this post is about education, inspired by those annoying little bugs. In the spring I become Matt Guthrie, Suburban Farmer. This year I've finally planted the type of garden I've always wanted, although it's a little small. One day I'd like to have acres to farm, instead of just square feet.

Each year I battle a variety of pests. Japanese beetles return every year to wreak havoc on my plants. They have devastated several of my bean plants. I bought a beetle trap and that has captured quite a few. Problem is it has not captured all of them. Every evening while I'm out watering, I still find quite a few ravaging the tender leaves of my crops. I usually handle them one of two ways. Sometimes I'll capture them by the handful then dump them into the trap. Other times, if there is only one or two, I'll squish them on the spot and spread their remains on the leaves. Like most creatures, japanese beetles don't like to be in the presence of their own dead.

Saturday night as I was dealing with the evening's infestation, I began to see parallels to our efforts in education. So many times we find a sure fired way to solve the problems our students are facing. It might be a remediation effort, a skills diagnostic assessment, an after school program, or a beetle trap. It does a great job meeting the needs of majority of our students. When the program doesn't work for the minority, we have a couple of choices to make. We can watch the minority struggle and just let the beetles not caught by the trap eat your plants, er, I mean write off those students as unreachable. Or we can add a little more attention to the minority, combined with the efforts of the program and help these kids. Think of it as catching the beetles and putting them into the trap by hand.

Sometimes the program has to be abandoned and a different approach taken. Sometimes you have the seize the opportunity to squish an individual beetle or work deliberately in another fashion with a struggling student.

What do you do when the specified method you have to use is a beetle trap the local school district will only pay for beetle traps? Every system and school has it pet program or excitement about the latest idea. Those are great and should be used. But the reality is that it's all about the students. You have to find a way or you'll go without beans. Saving the crop of students is really what it's all about isn't it?

My Vision for Education

2010-06-18T09:45:00.001-04:00

Prompted by Shelly Blake-Plock's post about revolution over at Teach Paperless, I've decided to try give shape to my vision for education. Plus it will keep me from posting a War and Peace size comment on his blog. If I ever get the opportunity to start my own school, it would look something like this: student centered, community driven, project/problem based, and 100% differentiated.

One key element is seeing this vision come to pass is the implementation of an apprenticeship model. Grade levels where EVERY student has to move up at the end of a nine to ten month cycle do not exist. Not to mention the fact that if a student isn't able to move up at the end of the cycle he has to wait another TWELVE months for the opportunity to move up again. Instead of grade levels, students just move to the next topic or skill.

The activities (or lessons if you prefer) would center either on completion of a project or solving a problem that requires the use of the current skills and topics being studied. People, like parents, with real live jobs relating to these issues can serve as mentors, guest speakers, and knowledge resources. Students would be able to choose which problem or project they wish to complete based on their interests.

Gone also are the needs for standardized testing and the various abuses of the proficiency data relating to teacher and school evaluations. Are students growing? Are students moving forward? If not, why? What are the forces outside of school that either hinder or prevent movement? If so, what are the important factors that need to be measured at the moment for that student?

How is such a vision community driven, beyond the use of guest speakers, etc.? Community is built into the school. Students help one another. Collaboration is encouraged, in fact integrated into everything. Projects and solving problems that benefit the community outside of school are the norm. These projects don't have to meet curriculum goals either. They can be done "just because".

Let's do it.

The Sounds of the Season - Testivus Carols

2010-05-18T09:24:00.002-04:00

It's Testivus time again. Or for those of you who are more politically correct, Happy Show What You Know. For me, I prefer to stay the time honored and more sacred name of Testivus.

As we regale in the splendor of this season, enjoy these meager attempts to touch on the true spirit of Testivus as we share Testivus Carols together.

Deck the Halls

Deck the halls with lots of tests
Fa La La La La, La La La La
See the students and teachers stress
Fa La La La La, La La La La
Mul-ti-ple Cho-ice Que-stions
Fa La La, La La La, La La La
Cheat our students of educations
Fa La La La La, La La La La

When the scores come back we'll see
Fa La La La La, La La La La
That no one is better than me
Fa La La La La, La La La La
As we Race to the Top
Fa La La, La La La, La La La
When will the madness stop?
Fa La La La La, La La La La

Here Comes Testivus
(to the tune of Here Comes Santa Claus)

Here comes Testivus! Here comes Testivus!
Right down Testivus Lane
Score based reform and teacher blame
are pulling on the reins
Cash registers ringing, test companies singing
for them it's merry and bright
Why are we so happy to do this
'cause none of this just ain't right

Here comes Testivus! Here comes Testivus!
Right down Testivus Lane
It's got a bag that's filled with tests
for boys and girls again
Critical thinking, creativity
all of that has been nixed
So join your voices and say your prayers
'cause all of this must be fixed

O Wondrous Test
(to the tune of O Holy Night)

O Wondrous Test, whose questions are so probing
You are the one who will show how well I've taught
All of my students, will be marked for life
As either bright or the ones who'll hold us back
A feel of dread the weary teacher has
For yonder breaks the same old failed methods

Fall on your knees
Plead for reform to come
O test designed to show us nothing
O test, o test so badly designed

Long lay the school in test prep centered instruction
because no one wants to seem inadequate
Gone are the days of relevant curriculum
As we strive for the magic number of gold
Students will learn all the factoids that we choose
Instead of real concepts of what they should

Fall on your knees
Plead for reform to come
O test designed to show us nothing
O test, o test so badly designed

Truly we know that there's a better way
To assess what our children really know
We all hate you Test, yet we still bow down
Because we want the government's money
Are we really helping out our country
or are we merely holding ourselves back?

Fall on your knees
Plead for reform to come
O test designed to show us nothing
O test, o test so badly designed

Really? I mean , really?!

2010-04-29T10:29:00.000-04:00

Join me in singing . . . "It's the most wonderful time of the year". Yes, that's right boys and girls, it's high stakes testing time so that all our legislators, talking heads, and other people looking for a false sense of security or superiority can feel better about how things are going. It's the festival of Testivus. To properly celebrate this festive ritual, we, your hard working test taking guides, I mean teachers, are being thoroughly trained so that we don't mess up. One of my favorite rituals associated with this time of the year is going through the testing code of ethics. It's a wonderful piece of holiday folklore that gets retold every year during Testivus. You can read the entire myth here. I would like to highlight my favorite parts.

This part of the myth explains why we celebrate Testivus:

In North Carolina, standardized testing is an integral part of the educational experience of all students. When properly administered and interpreted, test results provide an independent, uniform source of reliable and valid information, which enables:

• students to know the extent to which they have mastered expected knowledge and skills and how they compare to others;

• parents to know if their children are acquiring the knowledge and skills needed to succeed in a highly competitive job market;

• teachers to know if their students have mastered grade-level knowledge and skills in the curriculum and, if not, what weaknesses need to be addressed;

• community leaders and lawmakers to know if students in North Carolina schools are improving their performance over time and how the students compare with students from other states or the nation; and

• citizens to assess the performance of the public schools.

I'm so glad that Testivus enables us to know whether or not our students are acquiring the necessary knowledge and skills. Unfortunately, with the secularization of Testivus, the real meaning has been lost. Our shallow celebrations of Testivus in today's modern era have been reduced to regurgitation of factoids, what some call "content". Real skill assessment has been totally removed from Testivus, as evidenced by legislative actions that have mandated the removal of these "religious" aspects of the holiday.

As part of the ritualistic preparation for Testivus, we, the test-taking guides, must meet all the following ethical guidelines:

Teachers shall provide instruction that meets or exceeds the standard course of study to meet the needs of the specific students in the class. Teachers may help students improve test-taking skills by:

(A) helping students become familiar with test formats using curricular content;

(B) teaching students test-taking strategies and providing practice sessions;

(C) helping students learn ways of preparing to take tests; and

(D) using resource materials such as test questions from test item banks, testlets and linking documents in instruction and test preparation.

Part of the joy in helping students celebrate Testivus is doing all the above. At least it is supposed to be. Unfortunately, I feel like I am violating the sacredness of Testivus when I practice the secular, meaningless, aspects above. In the past I felt like I needed a month of ritual purification after doing such.

Fortunately, the Testivus fun does not have to end when the last test is administered and the last bubble filled in. Christmas has Boxing Day and Testivus has Remediation! In NC, we are required to provide 5 hours of remediation to every student who fails, oops, I mean, only scores a 1 or 2, on the test, then allow them to retake the test. So for those lucky select few, they get to endure 5 hours of intense test taking practice in one shot, not long after finishing one celebration and right before taking part in another. Those who are REALLY lucky get 2 DAYS of remediation if they don't score high enough on both parts (reading AND math).

So, in this most sacred time of the school year, my prayer for you is that your classroom is filled with the joy of Testivus. And for those of you, like me, who find reasonable doubt in the myth of Testivus, join me in saying, "Really? I mean, really?!"

To Grade or Not to Grade - An Open Letter to My Colleagues

2010-03-25T09:13:00.002-04:00

If you were to take of poll of the hot button issues in education, grading practices would easily rank in the top five. If not the top 5 it would definitely make the top ten. We are currently debating grading practices at my school. Among the issues on the table are the zero policy, how to handle retakes, and whether or not we will record a grade on our regular common assessments that are also used to identify students with remediation needs. For the record, I would never give another grade of any type if it were completely up to me. I advocate for an either "you learned it" or "you are in progress" system.

For the last twelve months, I have been soul-searching, researching, and people searching to help me find another way. I have been looking for creative ways to satisfy both sides of the debate (even though there are probably more than two!). Along the way I have read the works of Alfie Kohn, perhaps the most popular anti-grade activist on the planet today. I have read the summary of Black and Wiliam's study Inside the Black Box. I have come across a host of other resources. They all say the same thing - grading inhibits performance, motivation, and quite possibly learning itself.

I have to be honest in my thinking though. Grades in themselves are not bad things. They do provide a measurement of our learning. You can't drive a car if you don't pass the test. You can't perform surgery if you don't pass the test. You can't even coach intercollegiate sports if you don't pass the test. What has created this mess we have today if the way grades have been used. Instead of providing a measurement of learning, grades have become competitive measures, reward (and punishment) systems, and proof that I have memorized a set of facts. This shift is a result of the way behaviorism and "accountability" has permeated our culture.

As I write that last sentence, I am struck with an internal inconsistency that is forcing me to deal with an incomputable dilemma, ala HAL from 2001: A Space Odyssey. I am a staunch cognitive behaviorist. At least I used to be. Perhaps I am slipping into some other primary mode of thinking. Even so, I do believe that we learn certain patterns of behavior based on the negative or positive responses we receive for that behavior. I still believe that such an approach to the classroom has merit, even when it comes to learning.

What if we set our expectations on the basis of whether you have learned or mastered a set of material instead of centering the the approach on the grade you receive? I could provide several anecdotal accounts of where that is working. Given a short amount of time, I can provide research to back it as well. From a behaviorist perspective, you can then condition the student to value learning and maybe even become intrinsically motivated.

The bottom line in this debate is what is best for the kids? We must take an honest look at that answer, considering everything we know to be true about how students learn, how their brains work, and what the data tells us about all of it.

At-Risk: The teacher trying to reach at-risk students

2010-03-16T09:57:00.000-04:00

Tonight on #edchat we will probably be talking about how to reach at-risk students. I'm looking forward to the chat because it is an issue near and dear to me. Reaching at-risk individuals in any arena or context has driven every vocational choice I've ever made. It's especially timely for me personally as I survey my class rosters and identify those five-percent-ers. What I mean by that are those five percent of my students that I just have not been able to connect with or impact in a positve way.

I do a pretty good job forming relationships with my students, always have. It's one of those things that has been integral in getting me hired at the schools where I've taught. When I walk through the lunch room or down the hall, students from all grade levels shout out a hello, even those I've never taught or whose name I don't even know. I'm not trying to paint myself as Mr. Popularity here. I'm just saying I work really hard at building positive relationships because I think they are integral to the learning process.

We have approximately one-third of the school year left. The tension in the relationships with my five-percent-ers is growing. They are becoming more disengaged each day, and not just in my class. They came into the school year as at-risk students and they will leave the same. They have worked hard to maintain that status quo. And it breaks my heart. It wears me out emotionally. It's the kind of thing that causes me to ponder my own effectiveness in the classroom. Yeah, I know. I made a tremendous impact on the other 95% and I shouldn't be dismayed. But I can't forget those other five because I fear no one will care next year.

Hmm. . . . what CAN we do?

2010-03-12T14:48:00.000-05:00

I brand myself as a visionary and a dreamer. It's because I'm an idealist. I like to believe that we can actually do the things the way we should and that the results will be what we hope. That's one of the reasons I am always looking for ways around the system that blocks innovation. That's why I look for ways to see what we CAN do in the face of restrictions. Maybe we cannot adopt all the changes we'd like, but what ones can we implement?

This "what if. . ." post by Jessica Luallen Horton energized to think about my philosophy above even more. I love her post. My comment to her was where do I sign up? This energy fed into other thinking prompted by Joe Bower and this post about grades. So now, one of the things I have to find time for this weekend is finding a way to implement some of these crazy ideas.

Now, what CAN we do?

Building Student PLN's

2010-03-09T21:08:00.000-05:00

Tonight's #edchat was about how social media can/is changing education. Social media's influence has greatly benefitted me. My PLN, built primarily around Twitter, has enabled me to change so much about how I teach. My personal growth over the last year has been exponentially greater than my previous eight years as teacher. Part of my learning has resulted from the sharing I do as well.

What if my students' could build PLN's? How would their learning change? What would be the impact on their education? After tonight's chat, I'm determined to begin that process tomorrow, even if there are only 12 weeks left in the school year.

So how do I get this started? There are some important logistical and legal issues that must be considered. Some I have thought of. Others I need your help on.

Find a service permissible and properly secure for your age group that is accessible on your school network. This includes getting them email addresses.
Find an avatar creation site so kids won't have to use their real pics.
Teach them proper digital citizenship.
Model and demonstrate how a PLN can be used.
Create an IMMEDIATE use for them.

What am I missing? What services would you suggest?

Assessment Gone out of Control

2010-02-16T21:57:00.004-05:00

About a week and half ago I received the following email from a former student:

I have a second grader who came home today with a notice that he is below grade level in math and needs to go to after school tutoring. He is really bright and is already in AIG because he reads on a 5th grade level. Based on what I have seen, he can do math just fine, he is just really slow.

When I told him he was going to have to go to after school help, he cried because he doesn't want to do extra homework. We have friends whose son goes to Kumon for math work, should I look into it? What questions do I need to ask the teacher so that we understand how to help him? Flash cards? I know second grade isn't your thing but do you have some advice?

In short, my recommendations to her were to get more details on this tutoring and how his need was determined. Specifically I advised her to ask to see multiple work samples and ensure that this determination was not based on a singular assessment. Today I received a follow up.

Just thought I would update you. I have spoken with both "L's" teacher and the program coordinator at "L's" school. He is actually doing really well in math with the exception of this one test that they are using to determine the need for intervention. It is a two minute timed test that is scored on how many digits (1 and 2 digit addition and subtraction) they get correct in the time allotted. On all of the other assessments that the teacher has given including word problems, graphing, three digit addition, small fractions, etc he is above the rest of the class.

The school has yet to be able to tell me exactly what they will be covering in the after school tutoring and the teacher informed me that most of the children who were targeted are declining because they are all in similar situations of good math skills but slower than the target on this particular test.

We have picked up flash cards to speed up his addition and subtraction of numbers that he should know right off the bat. I won't know until May if it is paying off but it can't hurt and I can see where he is getting faster as we practice. I think if we work on that he will be fine by 3rd grade. I also can't help but think how I had such a mental block during pre-cal my senior year that I almost failed and then made an A in calculus in college. Sometimes your brain just can't process with everything else going on.

I really appreciate your thoughts both as a teacher and a parent. I'll let you know how he does after the next test in May.

I was appalled at this practice. NCLB, RttT, and all other accountability measures have really driven common sense out of our schools. I asked if I could share this story because I feel it is important for us to discuss. Her response was, "Yes, please share. I think this also should highlight the need for administrators to communicate better with teachers about which students should be identified as needing help before notifying parents so that teachers are prepared for questions. "

So many things to discuss with this one. Where do we start?

The lingering effects of testing & grades

2010-02-12T11:38:00.000-05:00

I'm giving an assessment today to my sixth grade science students. It's a common assessment, developed by all the members of my PLC. We planned the unit according to our state objectives and county pacing guide. The assessment itself is open book and open notes. It's our attempt at emphasizing skill development instead of fact regurgitation. This is only a recently agreed upon approach in our PLC. It's one I've been insisting on and we've all finally come to agree that it is the best approach.

I've been teaching my kids from this perspective the entire year. I've told them from day 1 that I hate grades and would never give another if I didn't have to. I've told them the most important thing for them to learn this year is how to learn, how to ask the right question, how to analyze a situation, how to recognize and evaluate various relationships among data, concepts, etc. All of our class assignments and instructional strategies happen this way.

Yet, every time they take a common assessment, they form a line at my desk, asking "What does this question mean?" or "Is this the right answer?" or "I don't understand what this is asking?" It's not like the assessment is so drastically different from what they've seen before. It's nearly identical! It becomes so frustrating because roughly 80% of their questions are unnecessary because they have not read the directions or they are too worried about a grade.

We have done such a disservice to our children. In our attempts at proving we are doing our jobs we are force feeding tons of content knowledge, giving standardized tests with low level norms established as passing grades, and giving crash diet remediation to allow underachievers to retake our already low expectation tests again. In the process, students have lost the ability to think for themselves. They don't read directions because someone has always told EXACTLY what to do. They are afraid to think because the right answer is too important.

But what about the growing number of classrooms like my own where there is pushback against such culture, where on a daily basis the students thrive in an environment that provides the opportunity to explore and learn and they consistently demonstrate a mastery of not only the content but the development of those higher order thinking, creative, and collaborative skills? We put a mandated common assessment in front of them and they suddenly become different children. It's like Order 66 has been activated and completely new personalities take over, erasing any prior history, training, or allegiance.

It's frustrating because I begin to feel like a failure as a teacher. It's frustrating because it feels like all that we have accomplished as a class has been for naught. It's depressing because you begin to wonder if you will ever help these precious children you've been given to overcome this curse. I don't have a solution. I just need to rant. Anybody else know what I'm talking about?

Access for Everyone

2010-02-08T09:02:00.002-05:00

It's Sunday night and eyes all around the world are focused on the Super Bowl. Quite a few members of my PLN are working steadily on sending out links and resources via Twitter with one eye on the game and providing updates on their favorite commercials. I'm no different, except now I find myself preparing the pre-game show for Tuesday night's #edchat. I regret that class will keep me from participating Tuesday night, but I want to express some of my thoughts now anyway.

One of the topics in this week's #edchat poll is How can we guarantee equitable access and use of technology to ensure tech literacy and to support meaningful learning for all students? In my opinion this issue itself should drive the need for classroom instruction embedded with technology more than the workforce's need for 21st Century workers. Why would I say such a thing? I'm glad you asked. If you do not embed technology in your instruction, many of your students will NEVER, I repeat, NEVER, get exposure to, much less develop skills with, the technology.

Now for a disclaimer. I realize that I may have initially misinterpreted the question. My first reaction was to read this question in terms of economic access in the home setting, i.e. outside of school. Shelly Blake-Plock (aka R. Richard Wojewodzki) has begun quite an interesting conversation about this over at TeachPaperless. That is certainly an issue worth debating, but that's not my task for this post. Upon further reflection, I think the intent of the question relates more to equitable access WITHIN the school, not outside of it. That also is an issue in this day of limited resources.

Regardless of how one interprets the question, I think the answer lies in the notion of embedded instruction. Yes, I'm using that term again. Most of the people who will read this post will agree that the use of technology in the classroom should be transparent, or unseen, because it is a natural part of what happens there. Technology is not just a game day in the lab or special art project on the laptops or our once-a-month-do-something with the iPods. It is used as an appropriate tool for the task at hand. So, how do we make that happen?

First, appropriation of funds have to change. Our county took a 90% budget cut this school year in our technology funding because of the state government's own economic woes. That's screwed up thinking. Technology should not be a line item. It should be part of instructional and curricular materials. As a side note, there is rumor we will delay updating and changing the standard course of study because we cannot afford to buy new textbooks. Another example of misguided thinking - textbooks (and their publi$her$) should not drive curriculum changes.

Aaron Eyler has written an excellent post about how we could rework our budgets to begin to bring more technology into the schools. I don't think his proposal is all that crazy. Here are my ideas. This is a pic of a mini laptop cart that was put together by our tech facilitator. Total cost: about $2700. You might could do it cheaper - our district quote sheet is lame. Get one for every class. Quit buying new textbooks every time the standard course of study changes. Find a good solid text with the essentials in it and purchase a classroom set.

Will every class need the same amount of technology? It should need some, even the PE teachers. My friend David Hines uses a wiki with his weight training class. At the risk of sounding elitist or trying to make the rich richer, outfit those who already use the technology first. Tell the others their cart is coming and in the meantime get them trained and get them using it. At a local high school the principal gave an LCD projector to every teacher who took the Intel Teaching Essentials class. Amazingly, he had almost 100% participation.

In terms of training, provide REAL professional development. Don't bring in someone with a cookie cutter approach that demos all the Gee Whiz features of their product. Have real live actual teachers show how things can be embedded (there's that word again). Have math teacher share with math teachers, science teachers with science teachers, etc. Provide a demo at every faculty meeting so teachers can see examples from other content areas and cross pollination can occur.

I go back to the need. One-third of my students do not even own a computer at home. Roughly ten percent were unable to process simple tasks like sign on to their school provided email address, change their passwords, etc. at the beginning of the year. If I (and I mean I- not many others are providing that opportunity) do not provide access to the technology, these students will never touch a computer, or an iPod, or whatever gizmo we use. Whether we like it or not, schools have become the guardian of civilization. We have access to the students. Let's give them access to the tools.

Does curriculum need to go on a diet? A follow-up to #edchat

2010-01-26T22:16:00.000-05:00

As expected, tonight's #edchat was not disappointing as we talked about how to deal with an overloaded curriculum. It was as fast and furious as ever. There are some things I'm sure I missed and probably will miss even after reviewing the archive dozens of times. After trying to pre-load the discussion earlier, I came away with even more questions and ideas tonight. These are the ones that were most impactful to me.

At the risk of sounding like a traitor, sometimes I wonder how many times we as teachers are responsible for our own problems? A lot of discussion centered around teaching standards, not long lists of content. Out of curiosity, I ran the North Carolina Standard Course of Study for sixth grade science through Wordle and was surprised at the results, particularly the prominence of the higher order verbs "analyze" and "evaluate". Of course there is the possibility of the curriculum writers covering themselves to look good. For the sake of argument, let's say that is the case. If the "official" curriculum is stated this way, the teacher now has plenty of freedom on how she or he teaches the course. We just don't do it.

Let's look at a different curriculum such as math. I'm also a math teacher and math always seem to stand as the exception to the possibilities. Math tends to be skilled based, at least for K-8. Doing the same thing as with the science curriculum, the results are dramatically different. It's hard to find the verbs. When you do, they are lower level. Waldo is easier to find than the verb "analyze". Two dynamics are at work here. One, math is just a different beast. Two, maybe it's not as rigorous as we'd like to believe. HOWEVER, I do think that it is possible to weave the goals and strands in such a way as to cover concepts that are demonstrated by all the skills we worry about being on the end of year test.

Another common error we make as teachers is confusing curriculum with the textbook table of contents. Textbooks are even more arbitrary than curriculum is. This fallacy is not as common as it once was because of district imposed pacing guides. Now the pacing guide becomes the curriculum impostor. As someone said tonight, it's interesting that we are told to focus on higher level thinking skills with particular concepts that are given one day on the pacing guide. How one should deal with the pacing guide is a more delicate matter. It is largely dependent on your school and/or district admin. For some the consequences can be quite severe if the pacing guide is not strictly followed. That's a sad indictment on the state of education.

Moving away from condemning ourselves, another very important point was made tonight. Content cannot be thrown out. Even if a conceptual framework is going to drive future curriculum development, then it is still permissible to select particular content to teach those concepts. Someone else noted that there are some important content pieces that are being cut out, perhaps wrongly so. The example given was the Holocaust. Of course, these will always be subjective judgments.

After tonight, I'm not as dismayed about the future as some. Despite what the talking heads and policy makers tell us, I think we can make it work as the folks on the front line. What do you think?

Content vs. Concept or "How do I cover all this stuff?"

2010-01-25T21:58:00.003-05:00

In anticipation of the January 26 edition of #edchat, @paulawhite and I are going to try to preload some thoughts for deeper discussion. I agreed to take on topic #1 in the poll – With an overloaded curriculum, what should be emphasized and what should be eliminated? A few disclaimers ahead of time:
1- There are a lot of people out there much smarter than I on this subject.
2- There are a lot of people out there much more articulate on the subject than I.
3- I'm very opinionated, handicapped by numbers 1 and 2 above.
4- I teach a course that "doesn't matter". More on that later.

Here's where I predict #edchat will go on this subject. Eventually, if not quickly, the subject of end-of-year summative assessments and their knowledge based, level 1 questions will come up. The topic of NCLB, RttT, and all other insufficient (first instance of strong opinion) means of measuring success will get thrown around. We will all protest that these measures “require” us to squeeze in an impossible amount of content to be regurgitated at the end of year. We will all lament not being able to teach thinking skills, how to learn, creativity, etc. or as someone will call them, 21^st Century skills, starting a sidebar argument about that label.

I currently teach a course that “doesn't really matter” - sixth grade science. Here's why it doesn't matter – there is no end of the year test. In North Carolina, there are end of grade tests for fifth and eight grade science, but not sixth. This year, NC temporarily discontinued the eight grade computer skills test because of funding. The scores were not part of NCLB rankings, so money was diverted elsewhere. By the way, this goes to show that we aren't all that concerned about testing what really matters are we? (there's that opinion thing again) Last year when I taught seventh grade math, the stakes were much higher for me, or so it felt. All year my PLC was frustrated because, in our opinion, most of the standard course of study was above where seventh grade students are developmentally.

Before I answer the real question, a few paragraphs heavy on philosophy, opinion, and perspective. After school today my teammates and I were discussing this very issue in the context of whether we are adequately preparing our students for next year, i.e. next year's teachers. As a team, our quarterly assessment scores generally run higher that the rest of our grade level. We have far less behavior problems. Most students who have been predicted to not meet proficient standards (“pass”) on the end of year assessments are performing well above expectations. Our final grades for the grading period are generally higher than the rest of grade level.

The question we tried to answer was, “Are we being too soft or too easy on these kids?” We concluded that we are not. We are rigorous in the content and skills we expect the students to master. We have a shared philosophy regarding grades in that everything is basically seen as a formative assessment. You get to retake an assignment as often as necessary to master the material. We have frequent and immediate remediation on all tasks. NOTE: This does not mean simply re-doing the same exact assignment. In a nutshell, our philosophy as a team is that we believe we should be teaching skills and concepts, not force feeding knowledge.

As we discussed this matter, we had a sudden light bulb moment that enabled us to formulate a hierarchy of what the major focus should be in various grade levels of school. We concluded that we believe that elementary school (K-5) should focus on building prior knowledge and reading. Middle school (6-8) should focus on developing skills such as how to do research, how to learn, how to think, how to work collaboratively, problem solving skills, etc. High school then becomes a place where the focus can be to build specialized areas of content by building on prior knowledge and applying the skills learned in middle school. This might not be original, but it was new to us today.

It became even more apparent why the current system just isn't working. As policy makers complain that we are not preparing students for the current economy and current high school students have tuned out because they don't understand the basics, it has been erroneously concluded that the solution is to push more of the content down to lower grades. Therefore, sixth graders need to start taking Algebra 1, which is false because most of them are not developmentally ready (another opinion but one I think is correct).

So, what does all this have to do with the question of what to emphasize in an already overloaded curriculum? If the division of education foci I propose above has any merit, then the answer will require some tweaking for each level. What I believe is constant across all levels is the need to identify those essential standards and connecting concepts across the standard course of study. As a sixth grade science teacher in North Carolina Public Schools, I don't think it's all that important that a kid be able to classify a sedimentary rock into any particular subgroup of said rocks. However, it is important that a student understand that the earth's surface is in a state of constant change as various geologic forces act together, shaping continents, providing the dynamics necessary to drive the rock cycle, and produce the various minerals and other natural resources we use in a variety of ways. Scott McLeod shares a similar story regarding knowledge of a neuron.

I am a firm believer that understanding of a concept leads to better content retention. I have colleagues who go from steps in a process to grasping the larger concept in their instruction. I tend to work from grasping the larger concept to guiding the students in discovering the steps themselves. Either way will appeal to different groups of individual learners. The common theme is getting to the point of grasping the concept. That conceptual framework provides connections to many more points of content.

Hopefully I have set the stage for a more in-depth discussion of this topic. Before #edchat ever takes place, seeds of thought can begin to germinate. Long after the unofficial time constraint of one hour has passed, this can be a place to debate and flesh out ideas as they surface. I haven't given any specific strategies. That's one place where we can all begin to contribute more, not just in 140 characters on Twitter, coming fast and furious, but in well thought out replies. #Edchat will provoke dozens of other ideas. Let's not lose the possibility to capitalize on those once the hour is done.

The Joy of Learning

2010-01-19T22:14:00.000-05:00

My wife and I are both the oldest children in our respective families. Naturally, we started having kids before our sibs. It's interesting to watch all my nieces go through the stages we have already passed through. Sometimes it's a relief to say, "I'm glad we're through that!" and other times it's "I miss when they were that age." My youngest niece is 7 months old. Her entire life centers around exploring and learning. She is so excited about everything around her. I really do miss that stage of my boys lives. Samantha is learning so much in such a short period of time.

A kindergarten teacher told me today that she chose that grade level because "it's the last fun grade in school." What?! That can't be. Certainly it takes us at least three or four years to beat the enjoyment of school out of them doesn't it? Thinking about my niece made me think about how I could create that type of environment in my classroom. What would it take to foster a "I want to learn and explore everything" attitude in my classroom full of learners? Tonight's #edchat addressed that very thing. How do we best promote student ownership in their learning?

There were a lot of great ideas thrown out. I'm looking forward to trying some of them out. Heck, I'm even looking forward to trying out some of my own ideas :-) That's part of the problem. My friend @kellyhines concluded her participation in tonight's #edchat with this tweet:

Something about tonight's #edchat isn't sitting well with me tonight. We know the what & the how, so why isn't "ownership" happening?

I confess. Ownership isn't happening in my classroom as much as I'd like. Sure, almost all of my kids enjoy my class, even love my class. What kid wouldn't when their teacher is as big a goofball as I? Plus, I'll stop a lesson on a whim or a student prompted question to go off on a tangent and project all the findings on the screen. But where is the ownership?

Last fall I set up all sorts of goals. My classroom was going to be a "learning community". Students would be self-directed, wholly invested learners. It went great for the first quarter. Then I got tired of staying up until 1:00 am every night. All sort of other deadlines hit me. I was negotiating philosophical perspectives with my PLC. All I had time for was the usual. Our first week back from winter break, one of my kids asked, "When are we going to do all the stuff like we used to do?" I was caught red-handed. I was convicted of my own sin.

To answer Kelly's question, it's hard to make it happen every day. Some of us have a lot of bad habits to unlearn and even more good habits to learn. There is the reality of NCLB, RttT, and every other false measure of accountability (editorializing? yep!). There is the pressure we all feel to make the grade. We talk about wanting to dig all the way to the bottom of Bloom's, but something about those pacing guides and standardized testing keeps us from leaving the shallow end of the pool. But we still have to strive for it everyday!

I'm idealistic enough to believe we will see more student ownership of learning. I believe it will happen because the number of us who share our own joy of learning is growing each day. It will happen because there will be enough of them who don't get sucked dry by the system and they will become teachers themselves. They will force shared ownership/leadership in their schools and districts. And I believe I will see it in my day.

A Week of Faves

2010-01-06T22:13:00.002-05:00

Tonight I sorted through about five days worth of links I had tagged as favorites on Twitter. Some I retweeted out immediately. Others, those listed below, I wanted to send out but pose my own take or question for further reflection, inviting discussion on those issues. So, without further ado . . .

The Reflective Teacher: a Taxonomy - These are great ways to reflect upon our practices. How can we ensure that we incorporate such reflection in our practices, PLC's, etc.?
How to Put a Laptop in the Hands of EveryStudent - Are any of us willing to sacrifice to make this a reality? How forceful should administrative policy/direction be to make this happen?
We Have to Model Failure - How many of us really think failure is a good thing? How many of us are willing to admit failure? How many of us are ready to let a student demonstrate they know more than we?
Making Teaching a Profession - Some will be offended or insulted by this article. Once you get over that, reflect on how you implement some of the recommendations even though you are already out and working. I like this suggestion: "the problem he has seen at dozens of programs was that there was 'no connection between the clinical experience and what went on in the university.' Ideally, he said, students 'would teach in the morning, spend the afternoon learning theory connected to what went on that morning, and then preparing for the next day.' ”

A 21st Century Drill/Warmup - An awesome exercise. A great springboard to help us create other similar practices with our students and utilize all the tools out to their fullest.

I liked several others enough to bookmark them on Delicious. Check out the one's I saved today .

2009 - the year in review

2009-12-31T19:57:00.000-05:00

Last year, 2009, was the single most pivotal year of my teaching career. This is my eighth year teaching, spread out over twenty years. The thing that made this particular year so important is the development of my personal learning network, or simply my PLN.

The development of my PLN was part serendipity, part intention. In March, I attended a weeklong workshop on Web 2.0 tools at the NC Center for the Advancement of Teaching (which IMHO is THE most incredible perk available to NC teachers. Go if you get the chance!). My purpose for attending was to learn about all these new tools so I could implement them in my classroom FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE STUDENT. I became a far better teacher, not because I suddenly integrated all this cool technology in my classroom, but because I began using it my personal life. I already used blogs quite regularly, including one I personally maintained. The morning we learned about Twitter, everything changed.

I already had a Twitter id that was collecting digital dust due to its lack of use. I knew it was useless without followers or people to follow. However, I had no idea how to begin forming those lists. One of the people I met in my workshop that week was David Hines, aka @olballcoach. Don't let the fact that he is a J-I-M teacher fool you. He's a great teacher who integrates technology into yes, his P.E. classes. His school is lucky to have him. David's wife, @kellyhines, was already well connected at this point. With a couple of emails, text messages and DM's to Kelly, a few of us had networks of about fifty followers by the end of the day.

My PLN has been an incredible asset to me this year. I've formed relationships with educators from all over the world. I have conversations with people on all levels of administration and the classroom. I have received tips, hints, advice, suggestions, etc. on so many things education related. I have experienced professional sharing and encouragement like never before. I may never teach in the same school with any of my PLN, but I feel like a part of their successes and failures when I hear about them. I have received far more than I ever imagined and definitely more than I have given.

As I look ahead to 2010, I am excited about the possibilities. I know my PLN will continue to be a large part of my professional development. My success will be owed to them in someway I'm sure.

When EVERYTHING goes wrong

2009-11-23T22:20:00.002-05:00

At 11:09 AM this morning I sent out the following tweet:

Today is the type of day that makes you say, "i will never use technology in the classroom again" but I will persevere!

It was only 20 minutes into the second class of the day for me. I had been fortunate enough to find an extended period of time when the school laptop carts were not reserved. I reserved them for seven consecutive school days. Today was day 1. I'm glad I have six more days.

The particular project the kids are working on is what we are calling the "Cool Questions Project". Throughout the year, I have kept a running list of cool questions the kids have asked, most of which I have been unable to answer, either because I myself did not know or we just needed to move on. Occassionally I will push pause on whatever we are doing and do a quick search on the internet to try and find the answer. As a sidenote, sometimes it's best to turn off the projector, otherwise the auto fill feature of Google will list questions like "Why is my poop green?".

Using that list, the kids are each selecting a question of their choice and researching the answer. Once they have completed their research, they will each do a digital presentation. They can choose whatever format they would like - powerpoint, Glog, video, Voki, etc. Since many of my students have no computer access at home at all, I reserved the laptops for an extended period of time.

Day 1 went only a little worse than I had expected. The teacher who used one of the carts before me failed to plug up any of the laptops. Few machines in that cart had a charged battery and two of power cables do not work. I spent the entire 63 minutes of my first class finally getting all my kids id's and pw's straightened out. My second class only went a little better.

Technology issues aside, I began to question the scope of the assignment. Did I assign too much to my little sixth graders? Can they really handle the open endedness and potential enormity of this project? Several issues quickly made themselves apparent. 1) They have no real idea how to do research. 2) They have not yet learned how to read a passage for information and make the necessary inferences. (This is a science class BTW). 3) Despite being given a rubric with benchmark goals and dates, most only see a BIG project, not the small manageable pieces.

So, have I erred once again by failing to properly plan? Did I forget to consider my students' actual developmental stage? Can this thing be salvaged? I believe the answer to all three questions is "Yes". However, I don't think that in regards to planning and considering my students' abilities that I was really not that far off. This project is on track to accomplish everything I hoped it would. The students will get a chance to study something THEY want to study. The students will learn some new research skills. When things go wrong, students are forced to develop problem solving skills. They are excited about doing "a technology project." It's one step closer to that self-paced differentiated classroom I so want to teach.

I think when this is all said and done, if more wrong than right happens, it may turn out to be the best project ever.

Doing something Different(iated) for a change - Part 1

2009-11-15T22:30:00.005-05:00

This post was spawned by a retweet of @edteck sent out by @shannoninottawa. The quote was

A thought...What % of your class time is spent having every kid do the exact same thing?

This seed was further nurtured by an article called "The School of One". The article describes the exact type of classroom I've always wanted to have. If you read the article, you'll find a broad range of responses, both for and against this approach.

Honestly, despite the potential chaos and confusion in the classroom and tons of extra work, I would love to have a classroom where all 30 kids were doing something entirely different every single day. Twenty years ago when I taught high school math, I taught two sections of what was then called Competency Math. These students had not passed the NC Competency test for math. I had 12 to 15 students in each class. Each student worked at his or her own pace until a particular skill was mastered. So why don't I do that now? What's my excuse?

Let me list my excuses first so I can shoot 'em down when I'm done.

I don't have the time. I'd have to come up with all my lesson plans, activities, etc. all at once so my quicker students would have something to do as they speed through.
I can't effectively teach every child that way. Somebody's going to fall through the cracks. The slower kids will probably get all the attention while the smarter kids teach themselves because they are able to anyway while the middle of the road kids get minimal instruction. Or I'll focus on the average kid because there are more of them and the advanced/slower kids will get neglected. Or . . .
I don't have the necessary resources. Sure, I did it 20 years ago, but honestly, it was really a worksheet driven class. Everything is tech driven today. I only have 1 computer in my room. Lab time is hard to come by. Besides, if everyone is doing something different, I cannot necessarily take them all to the lab at one time.

There are probably some other excuses but I'm sure they are some derivative of the above three.

Not everything has to be done at once. It would be nice to have everything all tidied up in a box, ready to pull as we progress through the year. I don't have to teach the entire course like this. I know what the standard course of study is for the year. Look ahead, pick a couple of units far enough in advance. Plan them around this philosophy and see how it goes. Expand the offering each year until you are satisfied.
Move to a student centered/learning driven classroom. Face it. Everything we do as teachers tends to be teacher centered and teacher driven. The emphasis is on how we present things, how we lead activities, how we deliver content. It's not about me - it's about the student. If I focus on the essential standards of my course instead of the myriads of factoids found in the content, all sorts of activities and lessons can be implemented. Give students every opportunity to create their own content so they can demonstrate mastery via evaluation, analysis, and other higher order skills. This will keep ALL students moving and learning.
21st Century does not equal technology. 21st Century skills are skills like collaboration and evaluation, the same sort of skills we taught in the 20th century. True, they are pushed via technology today, but they don't have to be. You use it whenever you can get your hands on it, but come up with the old-fashioned ways all the other times. Check out this article by @kellyhines for more about that.

Okay, so I've eliminated all my excuses for myself. The next step is to actually do it. Part 2 will address that. While we all wait to see what that looks like, what other excuses am I missing? What are valid objections to such an approach? What are possible solutions?

Homework & School Reform

2009-09-27T21:53:00.007-04:00

This is a post that I've been wanting to write for a while. The title combines two things that are not usually discussed together. Usually we talk about homework and school reform as two separate and polarizing issues. My intent is to avoid the polarization while sharing some thoughts about how the two can be related.

Some background info first. This post was initially motivated by an op-ed piece in The Atlantic by David Shenk. This article certainly helps polarize the debate and I will admit that I fall on the side advocated by Shenk. However, it is this quote that stirred my thoughts:

The new thinking is that, instead of piling on onerous, rote assignments, homework, kids ought to be encouraged to use their after school time to explore their own curiosities, read books of their own choice, to play, and to get adequate sleep.

I shared the link to this piece, even highlighting the same quote, with my fellow teachers where I teach. One colleague responded with the following comment:

Problem is... human nature does not always have learning and discovering as our number one desire. Unless that is instilled as a small child through their home life , they in most cases become students who want to do only what they have to to pass or make it in life. If you give a child a choice between discovering something new or developing a skill they have and just "playing around" most will pick the "playing around" if that desire to learn has not been taught to them early in life. Not all children at an early age are "educated" that way to become life long learners. Sad.

A great point. However, I do believe that human nature DOES always want to succeed. The path of least resistance is usually chosen because it is the quickest path to success. That could range from acting as the class clown, refusing to do school work to appear cool, or simply pretending school does not exist so that one is not reminded of his failures.

This is where school reforms comes in. I'm not going to address the political aspects of standardized testing, accountability, merit pay, or any of the other hot issues. There are lot of people out here who can address such things much better than I. I want to talk about reform in terms of a practical solution for the student my colleague has brought to our attention. What if we were able to encourage such a yearn for learning? What if we could get real creative and partner with community groups, afterschool programs, etc. to help facilitate providing access to the resources necessary to satisfy such a yearning (internet, library, etc.)? What if we became part of that after school solution and learned with our students about those interests and discovered they really did learn our content more readily because of its sudden relevance and applicability? If there are not afterschool programs already in place that could help, what community groups can we contact to begin one?

There is always talk about differentiation in instruction. We have students in our classrooms with a wide range of modifications including modified grading and modified assignments. How could we begin applying such a philosophy in the life of the student whose parents are divorced but only one parent really makes sure that homework gets done? Do we get the custody schedule and assign the major projects only on the weekends that parent has the child? What about the student who cannot stay awake in class because he shares a bed with two younger siblings and every night there might be two other siblings in the house? Can we modify his load so that it can be completed everyday in the afterschool program he attends?

You see, I don't think reform lies in the political or administrative machinery. I believe reform lies in reaching those students. Our job is not to teach. Our job is to ensure that students learn. What will it take to accomplish our job? What will we have to reform within ourselves to make it happen?

Share, Share, Share

2009-08-19T20:42:00.001-04:00

Motivated by Kelly Hines (whom you should follow) and her post on her goals for the new year, I've been thinking about my own. I already had goals, but it's always good to write them down. It's going to be a different type of year for me. Even though this will be my eighth year teaching, I feel like it's my rookie year. Twenty years ago I began teaching high school math. After fifteen years away from the classroom, I came back to my first love last fall. That in itself was an adjustment. This summer my principal asked me to get certified in science and teach 6th grade! And more changes will come next year for me.

I've been blessed to land a position in a school with a progressive minded principal who is willing to let his teachers take risks. I never have to worry about trying to convince him why we should try to implement something new or different that will benefit the students. It's great having lots of technology options. When I left teaching the first time, cutting edge technology was the graphing calculator. But it's not about the technology - just read here and here. It's about how you use the technology. Both are part of my goals and here they are.

1) Learn from Others

2) Provide Plenty of Opportunities for my students, colleagues, and myself to Explore, Inquire, and Create

3) Implement Technology with Good Pedagogy

4) Share, Share, Share

Honestly, when I look at my goals, I really only see two - Share and Implement. I'm excited about the sharing part but it's hard. I came up with what I believe are some cool activities to do this year. It would be so easy to keep them to myself and then say after the fact, "Look at the cool lesson I developed." But, if I'm doing it for the good of my students, shouldn't all students in the school benefit? Shouldn't I want to help my colleagues instead of sitting back and pointing out how they never do stuff like this? So, I shared these ideas with the whole faculty. Now they can all modify my activities to fit their situations. All students will be better off.

I've learned a lot about sharing this year. The other math teacher on my hallway last year was a huge help. She shared her experience, wisdom, and resources with me. My kids were so lucky I had her as a teammate. I began my PLN on Twitter and literally hundreds of people have shared their experience, wisdom, and resources with me. My students will continue to benefit. I look forward to continuing to share back and forth with my PLN.

Sharing is the only way to make positive change. Some people really want to change but have no idea where to start. Remember what it was like to be a first year teacher and you had all those questions? There might be a twenty year veteran who feels the same way about implementing technology in an effective way. Soon your generosity will have others coming to you, asking for help. In the end, students benefit all the way around. And that's what it's all about.

Just Doing My Job

2009-08-13T21:42:00.003-04:00

Last week my family experienced the vacation from hell. We spent several days camping in the mountains near Cherokee, NC. The final two days were spent in Asheville in a hotel and touring the Biltmore Estate. I spent much of the evening in the hotel assisting my wife with her newly sprained foot. At one point I needed to go out and look for some crutches, an ankle brace, etc. to help out with the issue. I asked the desk clerk for directions to several pharmacies. Because we were nearing the end of an exhausting couple of days, I know my face communicated all my feelings. The young man assisting me was quite helpful and very customer service oriented. He sensed my need and went out of his way to print maps and directions, offering any other help he could provide. I was duly impressed and touched by his actions. When I thanked him, he responded by saying, "Just doing my job."

Now I know he meant nothing negative. I'm pretty sure his meaning was, "I'm supposed to do everything I can to help you because you are the customer." I honestly believe he was genuine in his intentions. However, it made me feel less special. It initially made me think he only did it because he had to, despite the other indications that said something else. I immediately thought of myself and all my colleagues who will be returning to work over the next couple of weeks as school resumes. How many times are we guilty of "Just doing my job"?

That phrase can be taken both ways, just as with the hotel clerk. We can be student focused, learning focused, reflective and adaptable because as teachers that's the best way to do our job. Our efforts can be motivated by a sincere concern for the well being of our students. OR we can participate in the principal's latest vision or the superintendent's latest mandate because "it's our job" and we have to. Both ways are correct but one is better.

"Just doing my job" means also seeing my students as people. Yesterday I ran into one of my kids from last year. (I almost never call them "students" - it seems to impersonal for me.) She ran up to me and gave me a big hug. I'm glad that when I did my job for her last year, it meant more than the imparting of mathematical knowledge. I hope that as I do my job this year that a whole 'nother group of kids feel the same way. I firmly believe that the nature of my relationship with my kids has as much influence with their eventual progress as my teaching will. OR we can say, "My job is to be your teacher, not make you like me." Both ways are correct but one is better.

Teachers in my county officially report back to work tomorrow. Let's all go out and do our job.

No Textbooks?! Does it really matter?

2009-07-30T23:47:00.008-04:00

It's been a while since I've posted anything here. I really need to go to bed, but a particular topic with my PLN (Personal Learning Network) on Twitter has kept me up tonight, so I figure I'll post while my own thoughts are fresh. The two posts that have helped stir my thoughts are by @kellyhines on her blog here and by @mbteach on her blog here.

All my teaching life, which goes back twenty plus years in one form or another, though I only have "eight" years of professional experience stretched out over that time, I have searched for a better way. I've always been project, inquiry based, hands-on oriented though I've not always had support for doing it that way. My major goal for my career is to teach the paperless math class that looks nothing like the way I experienced Algebra as a student OR a teacher. I say all of this because for me, just like it's not about the technology, I don't think it's about the textbook either. Textbooks are merely technology that happens to be 500 years old.

Whether you use a chalk board or an interactive white board; a textbook, a netbook, or a Kindle; paper and pencil with a slide rule and log table or graphing calculator, it's about the teaching. To paraphrase a former presidential candidate, "It's the teaching stupid." Are we trying to help students memorize content for testing purposes, or are we teaching them the love of learning, how to problem solve, and how to do it all collaboratively? Are we tapping into their passions and allowing THEM to create content of their own so that learning becomes something they own?

Even though the naysayers don't read my blog, I'll address them anyway. I know, it's always worked before. But let me ask the question, has it really? Or have students just been tolerant of it because they don't see any other options. I quote one of my former students

"I certainly remember with gratitude and recognition all the teachers that were
able to motivate me in some way rather than making the whole process seem like a
burden to get over with as quickly as possible. "

I hope I fall into the fondly remembered group for her.

This post has somewhat turned into a soap box, which was only part of my intent. For the yea-sayers out there, let's keep the conversation with our differing colleagues turned to what's best for the student - good teaching. Let's keep the conversation turned to the benefits of whatever tool or methodologies we use, not the tools themselves. Let's model honest reflection so they can see us change our own practices and prejudices when necessary. Let's focus on what really matters.

BTW, if you did not follow either of the links above, you really need to go back and do so. One will give some good ideas to implement, the other will give you food for thought about content ownership and control.

Must reads

2009-04-23T13:13:00.002-04:00

Here are two articles that anyone who wants to make a difference in students lives should read.

The first one is about making sure methodology doesn't get overshadowed by technology.

The second addresses the faulty assumptions we make when talking about school reform.

As you reflect on these articles, how will they inform or change what you do in the classroom?

Digital Projector Fun

2009-04-14T20:44:00.002-04:00

Looking for ways to integrate technology into your classroom without having to create some complex lesson plan on a technological piece of equipment you are not comfortable with? Here's a list of things you can do with digital projector. There's something for every content area teacher.

More tools for Twitter-ers

2009-04-14T20:37:00.004-04:00

Here's a list of Top 100 Tools for Teachers on Twitter. You find some of these helpful especially if Twitter is blocked at your school (check out EmailTwitter)

If you don't use Twitter and/or just want to know what the heck it is, check out this handbook for teachers.

No homework before middle school?

2009-04-14T20:25:00.003-04:00

Adding to the homework controversy, here's an article that says brain research indicates that homework is not beneficial before middle school. What do you think?

Top Ten Necessities for Education Reform

2009-04-13T21:34:00.004-04:00

Here is a great article, written by a middle school teacher who is also a NEUROLOGIST! In it she gives her top ten necessities for education reform. What I hope that policy makers and teachers who find change hard to implement recognize is the research basis for what she is saying, especially the basis of how the brain itself functions. Shouldn't that guide our methods?

2009-03-29T21:04:00.003-04:00

I came across this post about teachers and Twitter - Nine Great Reasons Why Teachers Need Twitter. It's worth the read if you aren't using it yet.

21st Century Done Wrong

2009-03-26T09:44:00.000-04:00

My previous post brought up the debate of core knowledge versus 21st Century skills. In this post I want to address why I think 21st Century skills emphasis sometimes goes wrong. Much of what takes place in the name of technology integration or 21C skills is actually a mere digitalization of what we already do. Instead of using a white board or overhead projector, we use PowerPoint to present the same notes. Instead of going to library to do research, we check out the laptop carts and let the kids search on the internet. Because we want to be sensitive to the fact that not all students have internet access at home, we "settle" for more shallow results. In the end when students have not reached the milestones we hear 21C is supposed to guarantee, we blame the methods.

As educators, we are constantly bombarded with news reports, university studies, etc. that say we are failing America's students. We are not able to compete in a global economy because we are not keeping pace with other countries in math, science, and technology. We are introduced to all kinds of gadgets and software. After a few hours of an afternoon inservice, we take our best shot at using them in the classroom.

This post is not a criticism of the teachers who give it their best or the administrators who push for implementation. The error occurs when the focus becomes the methodology instead of the content. One of the reasons we fall short in our implementation is we are not doing something that comes naturally. We are digital immigrants and not digital natives. We try to utilize software that we never use personally. When we do not know how something really works, we are not really able to utilize it.

I believe the first step in integrating these resources is to use them personally first. Many (Most)?) of us are not part of the digital generation. We don't think like they do. We try to speak a language we know nothing about. Once you become familiar with a tool, we won't have to try to had to find a way to use it. It will become more natural. We will then be able to focus more on the content (core knowledge) and skills (21st Century) because methodology will take care of itself.

What do you think? Any stories you'd like to share?

21st Century or Core Knowledge? Do we have to choose?

2009-03-25T20:55:00.005-04:00

A member of my Twitter PLN posted a link to this article about the debate between pushing 21st Century skills versus teaching core knowledge. I won't restate the article here. I'll just give my opinion. Opponents of 21C skills are setting up a false dichotomy. It is not an either or proposition. As one of my colleagues said during our discussion of the article today, "You can't do much with knowledge unless you can creatively use it to solve problems and to be creative you need a knowlege foundation."

I don't think anyone who teaches 21C skills has eliminated linear equations, the Louisiana Purchase, or the basics of the human circulatory system. Instead they have taken these topics and used new methods, maybe even expanded the core knowledge of the students because of the critical thinking that may have resulted.

I've got other thoughts that are related, but to keep the post short, I'll post them later. What are your thoughts and experiences on this issue?

Here we go a Jing-ing

2009-03-19T17:02:00.002-04:00

Here's a link to a video screen capture I made today using Jing. Lots of cool classroom apps for this. . .

What are some of the ways you can see to use this?

What's this all about?

2009-03-18T16:05:00.002-04:00

Once again, I've created a blog. I'm hoping this will truly become a place of two way conversation. Along with this blog, I've created a wiki (link to come soon) where all of us can do more than just comment. But please comment here. Don't be afraid to express your thoughts or share your insights.

I want this to be a place where teachers can share ideas with one another. I want students to chime in and help us teachers. I want us teachers to not be afraid to learn from our students. For now the emphasis will be on integrating technology into instruction, especially web 2.0 resources. Here's a link to a wiki set up for a workshop I'm currently attending that will highlight those - nccatwww.pbwiki.com

Join the Conversation

2009-03-18T15:47:00.001-04:00

Welcome to Listen, Learn, Share. My hope is that you will do all three. You’ll find stuff for the teacher and the student in the traditional sense of the words. But if we really open ourselves to listen so we can learn what others have to share, we will all win in the process. Come back often and join the conversation.