Hey all–It’s already weird not seeing you everyday! But I have to admit, it’s been great to finally get out of Dewey Hall/in front of my computer writing papers and get some fresh air. As many of you know, I left on a month-long road trip on June 25th. In case any of you are interested, I just wanted to share the link to my other blog so you can check out what I’m up to.
Hope to see you all soon!
As promised in Failure and Success, I am going to formulate my educational philosophy in this entry. And what more appropriate time to do so than in the last blog entry for EDU448? So here goes nothing!
The first tenet of my philosophy is that an effective classroom must have a strong sense of community. The importance of this cannot be understated. Students need to feel safe, welcome, and wanted in their classroom. They need to be comfortable enough to take a risk. They need to know that if they make a mistake, no one will look down on them. In my opinion, it is extremely difficult to have a well-functioning classroom where these needs are not being met. In fact, I would even argue that inclusion and differentiation are all but impossible without a sense of community. Inclusion and differentiation can really only be done well in an environment where students support one another and look after each other. Therefore, it is up to the teacher to foster a sense of community so that students will help each other succeed.
Second, I believe that science must be learned via inquiry. I could cite a whole bunch of research here, but I’d rather talk about my experience with inquiry. When inquiry is done well, students can immediately see the value in what they are doing because it provides them with the opportunity to experience genuine discovery. Though it takes longer than other modes of instruction, I would argue that other modes of instruction often fail to reach students to begin with. I’d spend a week on a 75% success rate over two days on a 25% success rate any day. Inquiry also allows students to make their own meaning before they put words to it, which is a much more effective way to learn. In general, inquiry is just a much more intimate and hands-on way to learn science.
Finally, I believe that technology is an essential component of the science classroom. The reasons for this are numerous. First of all, science and technology are closely related, which allows for great discussions about how they are similar and how they are different. Second, technology allows students to observe phenomena in ways that would either be impossible or too time-consuming in the past. Third, real scientists use technology all the time, so the use of technology is important for the development of students’ scientific identities. Lastly, technology is nearly everywhere in world, and it is important for work, play, and life in general. Students typically enjoy working with technology, so bringing into the classroom is a way for them to get excited about what they are doing and to gain value experience working with real scientific instruments.
So, in short, my philosophy can be summarized into three words: community, inquiry, and technology. I look forward to putting my philosophy into practice in the fall!
I know that we haven’t officially reached the end of our program just yet, but I thought this would be an appropriate time to say thanks to all of those who have played a role in our development over the last year. But before I do so, let me share a quick story that goes along with what I have to say.
As many of you know, Wednesday was Teacher Recruitment Day. I did not participate in TRD USA (though I heard El Paso Central was handing out $6,000 signing bonuses to those willing to relocate), but I did get the chance to sit down for two interviews with local recruiters–one from Rush-Henrietta and one from Fairport. First let me say that this was one of the only times I’ve ever been so confident for an interview, and I have to thank Warner for that. But I’ll come back to that later. The point of me mentioning TRD specifically has to do with the gentleman I interviewed with from Fairport. As we were going through the interview and I finished up my response to a classroom management question, he said to me “Wow, that’s a great answer. You know, I’ve met with a few other Warner students today, and they have all provided excellent responses to this question. Someone must be teaching a great classroom management class over there.” Well, you can probably guess what I said in return. “Actually, we don’t take a class that specifically focuses on classroom management. It’s woven throughout all of our coursework.” Needless to say, he was very impressed by this, so I thought it would be nice to share.
Getting back to my original point, I am really grateful for all of the hard work that you–our fearless GRS leaders–have done on our behalf. I think I speak for the cohort when I say that even amidst all of our own struggles with the workload, and the occasional work/life imbalance, we are grateful for the fact that we are extremely well-prepared to tackle the challenges ahead of us. Just from my brief experiences with those in the teaching profession outside of the cohort, I can tell that we impact people by the way we think, the way we interview, the way we reflect, and the way we teach. I am confident that we will have a positive impact on the teaching profession. Even in this tough job market, I believe that we stand out amongst our peers enough that as positions open up, we will be the first to fill them. For this, and many other things, we should all be very grateful.
Failure and success. Loaded terms, if there ever were any
I want to talk about failure and success in this entry because I believe that they are central to learning and teaching. And I’m not talking about As and Fs. I’m talking about how students perceive failure and success.
Let me start with a story. I took my first physics course as a junior in high school. I loved it. The course was AP Physics B, and I had an exceptional teacher who made the material both interesting and attainable (at least for me). Though it was hard, I was driven by the notion that I could do it. That I was smart enough to handle it. And the results followed suit. I got an A in the course and a 5 on the AP Test.
Then I took physics in college. The course was PHY 114–it was purely about electricity, magnetism, and modern physics. I had been exposed to all of those topics at the college level in high school, so on the first day of the course I thought it would be a piece of cake. Boy, was I wrong. I was overwhelmed by the lectures, confused by the workshops, and overtaken by a general sense that the material was above me. And these were all concepts I had seen before! Now, mind you I could have put more effort into the course. But something was telling me I would never be smart enough to get it. Therefore, I became driven not by my potential for success, but my instinct to save face and avoid failure. Fortunately, many others followed suit, so there was a large curve on the course. Even with an average midterm grade hovering around 55%, I managed to sneak by with an A- in the course.
Now I’m taking a similar course on electricity and magnetism at MCC. It’s actually above the level of the course at took in college because it is calculus-based. When I started the course (a week late, no less), I thought for sure it would be doozy. But as I sat through the first lecture, and then the second, things started to click. I don’t know what was different from the course I took in college–I hadn’t taken any physics since then–but I was taken by a general sense that I could handle the material. And even though I mess up a lot when I do practice problems, I am driven by the notion that I will eventually get to the right answer. And when I do, there’s no better feeling. I got the only A on the first test in the class.
Now, maybe I’m just weird, but I think this little story illustrates something bigger. It illustrates the importance of motivation. When students think they’re just never going to get it, they’re no longer driven to become achievers. Rather, they simply try to avoid failure. And when people feel they’re doing something just to avoid a negative consequence, they usually don’t get much pleasure out of it. I believe this accounts for much of the culture we see in urban schools. Students just don’t think they can get it.
On the other hand, when students believe that they can do it, that they can handle the material that is thrown at them, it changes everything. When they get that first taste of success, and then the next, and the next, it becomes viral. Then it becomes something even better than success: self-worth. Which simply breeds more success.
Our challenge as teachers is to get our students to know that they can do it. This is important for all teachers, but essential for urban teachers. In my next entry, I will continue with this idea when I present my educational philosophy.
While I was basking in the glorious prelude to summer yesterday, I had a chance to do some casual reflecting on the Warner School program up to this point. The first thing I thought to myself was “Wow, have 11 months really gone by already? Is it really April?” Well, this eventually led me to think back to last May. It’s almost paradoxical how distant and yet recent it seems.
And that’s when the nostalgia hit me like a ton of bricks. I couldn’t believe it. Was I really being nostalgic about one of the most challenging periods of my life?
Why fight it.
For those of you so inclined, here’s a little trip down memory lane that I think you’ll get a kick out of.
Even with this HUGE list, I know I still left a lot out. What a year it has been.
As I was looking for a file on my computer the other day, I ran across some of my old work from high school. I ended spending some time looking through it all, and it was really awesome to see how much I’ve grown. We all really do owe a debt of gratitude to the teachers we’ve had throughout our lives.
Just as I was about to get back on task, I found a poem I had written for AP English in my senior year. It was an “I Am” poem–the type where each line describes a bit about who you are. Being that we talk a lot about identity in the GRS Program, I thought it would make for a great blog entry. So here goes nothing!
I am an urban teacher
I wonder how to focus the energy of my students
I hear the curiosity in their voices
I see their boundless enthusiasm
I want the best for them
I am an urban teacher
I say that they have so much working against them
I feel the weight of their worries
I touch their wounds
I worry about them as the final bell rings
I cry when they come back with more
I am an urban teacher
I understand that people make mistakes
I say that I am just as guilty
I dream of a better time
I try to inspire my students
I hope they realize they have so much going for them
I am an urban teacher
Monday was just “one of those days” for me.
Surprisingly, the madness didn’t start until 2:30pm, long after the kiddies had left the building and gone home. It all began when I went to look for my laptop to finish up my lesson for Tuesday.
So normally I carry my laptop in my briefcase and leave my briefcase in the far back of the room where students can’t get at it. Recently, however, we have had some changes in the room that caused me to put my briefcase in a different place. I won’t bore you with all of the details, but I will say that my briefcase was more exposed than it normally was.
So as I went to snag my laptop to work on my lesson for Tuesday, I noticed that the pocket of my briefcase was wide open and there was no computer to be found. I immediately felt my insides turn upside-down. Had my laptop been stolen?! The day before my big observation, no less?! I held it together, though, and kept on working.
The next interesting thing happened at 7:40pm in 301 Gavett Hall. Yep–you were all there. Don’t get me wrong, it was a lot of fun! But it certainly added to the madness of the day.
This is where it gets good. So after seminar I went to get a FlipVideo camera from Kim, and then I left to go home. I was driving down Scottsville Rd. when I thought “Hmm, maybe I should get some gas.” So I did.
Don’t worry–the gas station didn’t start on fire and there wasn’t a hold up. I pumped the gas just fine, got back into my car, grabbed the keys from my pocket, put them into the ignition, and…click! The key wouldn’t turn. I tried again. Still nothing. My ignition was stuck. I had no choice but to get a tow.
As I was waiting for the woman on the other end to take me off of hold as she called a tow truck for me, I noticed something. There was a bottle opener on my keychain. Hmm…my keychain doesn’t have a…THESE AREN’T MY KEYS.
So it turned out I had two sets of keys: my own and someone else’s. I immediately canceled the tow and drove to UR because I thought that I grabbed Kim Fluet’s keys while I was signing out a FlipVideo camera. I looked for her on campus for a good 10 minutes when I decided I had to call her. So I called Mike Calzi to get Joe Henderson’s number to get Kim’s number. As I was texting Kim, I realized something else. This set of keys had an “SC” key on it. “SC” as in science, as in East, as in my CT’s keys!
I immediately called Glenna to see if they were hers.
“Hi Glenna, I think I have your keys.”
“You do? Let me check.”
“Yeah. How did you get home tonight?”
“Uhh…I drove.”
“You mean this isn’t your car key?”
“Nope.”
And then it hit me. I borrowed keys off another science teacher to get to the microwave in his room to heat up my lunch! And he lives an hour away! And I don’t have his number.
Well then I got home, and to top it all off, I dropped a big bottle of V8 Splash on the floor. But wait…the cap was on it! Ohhhh but it landed just right and busted the lid. Mess.
I looked at the clock. It was already 10pm. And I still had to finish my lesson for tomorrow.
Don’t worry though. This story has a happy ending.
When I got up to my room I was pleasantly surprised to see my laptop staring right at me. That’s right–no one stole it–I had never packed it in my hurry to get out the door in the morning. Whoops.
As for the other set of keys, the teacher I stole them from had a spare on him, so he was able to drive home from school. And my lesson turned out fine, though I only got about 4 hours of sleep. But all is well.
I guess the moral of this story is this: turn off your autopilot! Sometimes it’s make sense to just turn your noggin off, but other times it can get you into trouble. But it definitely did make for a funny story!
Normally when I sit down to write a blog I have some sort of inspiration. There is usually something I’ve been thinking about, or some sort of theme that I want to focus on. But as I sat down to write this blog entry, I just couldn’t decide on what to write. So, more or less, this blog entry will amount to a stream of consciousness.
Where do I begin? I’ve been thinking a lot about teaching. Sometimes I don’t think I’ll last another minute, and sometimes I hope that I’ll get to teach forever. I think we’ve all come to the consensus as teachers that some days are euphoric, some days are good, some days are bad, and some days are just plain awful.
I don’t know if anything more needs to be said about that. Actually, I do believe that the proportion of those days are closely related to decisions that can be made by the teacher. The real question is this: How long does it take before you have a lot more good days than bad? Based on the attrition rate of urban teachers, I’d have to say that it takes a little while. And a lot of patience. But you know what they say–good things come to those who wait (and work to improve).
I think all of this thought about teaching as a career came from the disillusionment I was feeling yesterday. It was just one of those days when the balance of positive and negative was unusually weighted toward the negative. My CT left the room, and many of my students took it upon themselves to disrupt class. I had to make a number of negative phone calls home. I had class after meeting after class with little downtime. The panel of Warner alumni in Topics was disheartening. There were other things too, but I won’t bore you with them all.
But, in everything, I always try to remind myself of the good. I think that’s part of what Haberman calls “emotional stamina.” And when it came right down to it, things weren’t really all the bad. My meeting on Wednesday was refreshing and recharged my belief in reform-based teaching. The weather was nice. And though I was busy, I was still feeling healthy and energetic.
I’ll end with a little story that got me thinking. On the way to my physics class at MCC, I was driving on South Avenue when a car came up alongside of me at an intersection. We both wanted to go straight. I was on the left, and he was on the right. There really weren’t two lanes–there was just enough room on the right for traffic to go by those waiting to make a left turn. Before the light turned green, I decided I would just let him go, rather than teach him a lesson by speeding up past him so I would be in front when the lanes merged. Then at the next intersection, cars were backed up in the left lane at a traffic light in front of a plaza, and someone waiting in line allowed someone coming from the other direction to make a left turn into the plaza. The car that passed me nearly collided with the car making the left turn as he approached the traffic light in the right lane. Had I sped up past the other car, I probably would have been in just the right place to have actually had the accident. And if I sped up and the other car did as well, he might have had the accident. My patience might have saved one of us an accident.
I hope my patience in teaching will yield a similar, favorable result.
NOTE: I wrote this entry on Thursday, and on Friday I had an awesome day of teaching. Teaching really is the ultimate emotional roller coaster!
I’m starting to think I should get a complimentary earth science certification. Between my four and eight-week placements, I have only taught in my main content area (chemistry) for about two weeks! The other ten have been earth science. But I suppose it’s okay–none of us really know what we’ll end up teaching come September. And I imagine that most of us won’t pass up a job just because it’s not on our list of preferred topics.
Anyway, let me get to the point of this entry. On Monday I started my innovative unit. As you might have guessed, the content area is earth science, and the focus of the unit is plate tectonics. I was definitely a little intimidated when I found out that I would be teaching the central theory of geology for my innovative unit, but I’ve actually had a lot of fun doing it so far. Let me explain.
First of all, when I started in Ms. Sears classroom, I wasn’t even sure how I would take to middle school (7th grade). When I entered the Warner School, I had always envisioned myself as a high school teacher. I liked the content, I liked the age, and I liked the idea in general. So when I started teaching middle school at my current placement, I was definitely a little bit unsure of what to expect. Yes, we just had STARS a few months ago, but this was different. This was a classroom setting–not two teachers with six students in an after-school club.
But I’ve surprised myself. Middle school is actually a lot of fun! Sometimes it’s frustrating and sometimes it’s downright exhausting, but middle schoolers have a lot of good energy. It’s just a matter of harnessing it. I can’t claim to be an expert on that yet, but I’m working on it. And fortunately, I can look to my CT for guidance in that arena. She’s very good at managing the middle school classroom.
With Ms. Sears guidance, I have been able to construct and implement what I believe to be a pretty good innovative unit to this point. On Monday we had the students do a pre-assessment to determine what they knew about plate tectonics, and the results really surprised me. Some of the things I expected the students to know they didn’t, and some of the things I didn’t expect them to know they did. So that just goes to show that you really have to challenge your assumptions when it comes to teaching. After the test we also went through the correct answers and started brainstorming answers to the unit essential question: How is the earth changing beneath our feet? (Thanks to Joel for that one)
On Tuesday we started talking about Pangaea and the theory of Continental Drift. To spice it up, we talked a lot about Alfred Wegener, who came up with the theory, and connected the ideas to the recent earthquakes in Haiti and Chile. The students were really interested in hearing about how the material connected to their lives.
Lastly, today we had the students cut out the continents of the earth and construct Pangaea themselves. The cutouts had pictures of the various fossils that provide evidence for Pangaea, which allowed the students to understand the reasoning behind the abstract idea that the world was once all connected. This concept was quite shocking to many students, and many even told me that they were scared that another Pangaea would form in their lifetime. I’m not sure what scared them about that idea, but I assured them that the next Pangaea probably won’t come to existence for another 250 million years.
Tomorrow the plan is to boil molasses and place graham crackers on top to demonstrate convection currents, which are the basis of Plate Tectonics. The students will fill out a P-O-E during the demo, and they should visually be able to see how convection currents in the mantle drive plates to move. I’m looking forward to another fun day at East Foundation Academy!