Blind Side Tomatoes - Providing Student Support

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.

My Vision for Education

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.

Assessment Gone out of Control

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?