Deestantz

I took a year off between high school and college and volunteered with the Israeli Scouts, the "Tsofim." The Tsofim have a small staff of adults in a few centralized locations, but for the most part teenagers run the show. They run the daily activities, they plan the camping expeditions, and for one week over the summer they orchestrate a gigantic village for their "tribe" out of rope, long poles, and a lot of youthful creativity.

The teenage Tsofim are big on something they call "deestantz" (distance), their way of widening the small gap between themselves and the scouts they're in charge of. In leadership sessions they discuss ways to maintian the appropriate deestantz, including ways of dressing, speaking, acting, etc.

Deestantz is something I've been thinking about a lot recently with respect to my own students. I've never felt fully comfortable with the idea of creating an artificial barrier between yourself and your students to maintain some sort of authority. Then, for one of my classes I read a tome called The First Year Teacher's Survival Guide by Julia G. Thompson, which has this to say on the subject:

Just as actors create characters when they are at work, you will need to develop a strong image of yourself as a teacher. ... You will realize that when your students are critical of you, they really do not know you at all. They are only reacting to your professional self -- a person who has to set limits and correct mistakes.

My first reaction to this is "really?" I mean, obviously I am not going to reveal everything to my students that I would to my friends, but do I really need to invent a fake self to stay sane?

Is deestantz really necessary?

Will the cap follow me from NY to MN?

Stay tuned.

Midnight musings

It's way past my bedtime but I'm lying awake with a migraine and a leaking bathroom ceiling, so I'll put this question to my readers: Is differentiated instruction unegalitarian?

Our students are in the process of writing their first essay in Global Studies: "What political, economic and social conditions lead to revolutions?" The students have done a lot to prepare to write the essay, and we are beginning to work out outlines. The class for whom I am primarily responsible will be starting their outlines tomorrow by coming up with thesis statements.

I've been having minor discipline problems in that class from kids who are either way ahead of everyone else and bored, or way behind and lost. Writing an essay, I fear, is only going to amplify that problem. So I proposed differentiating: doing a mini-lesson on writing thesis statements, and then breaking out into groups according to level to write thesis statements of varying complexity. The students who need the most help, for instance, might write a thesis such as "There are many conditions that lead to revolutions," while more advanced students might come up with something like "People start revolutions when they feel life is unfair and they have no other way to change it."

I pitched the idea to my cooperating teacher, who responded that he has never grouped kids according to ability level, and sees doing that as "tracking." In his words, shouldn't all the kids have the opportunity to see what thesis statements of varying complexity look like?

I definitely see where he's coming from, and I'm torn. His perspective is egalitarian: it holds all students up to the same standard and provides them all with the same level of support. And don't kids rise to the expectations we hold for them?

I don't know what the answer is, but I thought I'd throw it out to the more experienced teachers among you.

Harry Potter and the BTM

... Bad Teenage Moustache, that is. I've worked with enough adolescent males to recognize one when I see it (who can forget the BTM hero of Final Fours past?). Now Daniel Radcliffe is trying desperately to shake his Harry Potter image by baring it all and sporting a little facial hair.

Civic values

Much has been said about the fact that Americans are more interested in participating in reality TV democracy than in political democracy.

I'd love to participate more in this discussion but brain meltage will only allow me to contribute this: just a minute ago on "Dancing with the Stars," Tom Bergeron just said something along the lines of "our forefathers said we were endowed with certain unalienable rights. Vote for your favorite dancing couple now, and somewhere Thomas Jefferson will be smiling."

This ranks up there with the President's Day commercial for Marshall's that asked "what would the Presidents want you to be doing on President's Day? Go shopping!"

Snag -- can you help?

We've run across a snag in the WWI podcast project: GarageBand. We have no idea how to use it, and were mystified when we tried to figure it out. That means it's going to be that much harder to teach to a whole class of 9th and 10th graders. (Although, in reality, they could probably figure it out faster than we can.)

Has anyone out there used this program? Do you have any tips? Do you think it's user-friendly enough for students?

TV trivia Thursday

After nearly two years of untamed growth, I got my hair cut today in Astor Place. As in,

An Astor Place cut
and she thinks she's Joan of Arc,
something something something,
slut of Washington Square Park.

Ten participation points to anyone who knows where that comes from (without Googling it)!

Technology!

I'm really excited about a project we're planning for an upcoming unit: World War I podcast of soldiers from the field. My cooperating teacher was a bit wary when I first brought it up (I wanted to do a podcast when we were studying Napoleon), but he went to a PD over the weekend with these guys and was convinced we could do it.

The unit question is going to be something like "what was it like to be a soldier during World War I?" What I'm picturing is that students will get together in small groups (of 4?) and choose a nationality to focus on. Then they will do research to learn about what it was like for a soldier. They will have to write a script that will go through a peer critique process. We're going to use Mac laptops and Garage Band to record and edit their voices, and add contemporary music.

Anyone have any experience with this kind of thing? Any suggestions? Possible pitfalls?

On falling on your butt in front of 25 teenagers

It almost happened to me today. Never before have I had the attention of such a high percentage of the class.

Richardson '08

One more reason New Mexico is awesome on education.

From the legislation:

"K-3 plus" is created as a six-year pilot project that extends the school year for kindergarten through third grade by up to two months for participating students and measures the effect of additional time on literacy, numeracy and social skills development. The purpose of K-3 plus is to demonstrate that increased time in kindergarten and the early grades narrows the achievement gap between disadvantaged students and other students and increases cognitive skills and leads to higher test scores for all participants.

Elite it ain't

Erin at the Quick and the Ed posts some very interesting news about Davidson's announcement that its students will no longer need loans to afford tuition. Erin's taking the news with a grain of salt, but I'm taking it with a healthy helping of naive optimism.

...

Incidentally, I picked Davidson (a small college in North Carolina where I spent a summer) to win in the first round. I also picked Penn (my alma mater) to win its first round game, Duke (where my parents met) to advance two rounds, and Wisconsin (my sister's current school) to win it all. Needless to say, my pool hath run dry.

Student teacher discovers the obvious

I learned an important lesson today about NOT CONTINUING CLASS UNTIL ALL STUDENTS HAVE STOPPED TALKING. The lesson was that if I stop talking, the students will stop talking.

Ask not ...

This may be a "you had to be there" kind of moment, but it made me laugh and also remember why I love high schoolers.

The other day I had a group of four students with me for a current events discussion. Each class has one 1-hour period a week devoted to reading and writing about current events, and I use this time to work with a small group to get to know them better and informally assess their reading, writing and discussion skills.

These kids decided to read and discuss this article about new scanners (inelegantly called "backscatters") coming into use in airports. The backscatters use x-rays to see through your clothes to detect any sort of suspicious object hidden on your person.

The kids were 100% against anybody seeing them nude, even if it meant they would be more safe. Borrowing a line from the article, I asked, "But what about terrorists? Aren't you ready to get naked for your country?" Without missing a beat, one ninth grader retorted, "Is my country ready to get naked for me?"

I'm still not sure what exactly her point was, but it was well taken.

Why blog?

This is a first for me -- my Fairy Blogfather, Peter Pappas, has tagged me in a "Five Reasons Why I Blog" meme. I am honored! And I will do my best to reflect on my blogging as ably as my Friday-afternoon oatmeal-like brain will allow.

1. I'm obsessed with sharing news stories. My friends and family, and even casual acquaintances, will corroborate that fact.

2. I'm an introvert, but deep down I really thrive on connecting with other people.

3. It's a little bit transgressive. Especially when I do it at work, which I'm doing right now.

4. "Community" is one of my favorite words.

5. I'm a writer at heart and love clicking on the word "publish."

In the ~3.5 years I've been blogging, I have never stopped to think about why I do it! In the spirit of community, I'm going to go ahead and tag some fellow bloggers who are (or have been) social studies teachers, and who help me to keep on chugging: Leo, He Who Can't, Dan, historyiselementary, and Polski3.

Still Boyz, not quite Men

Now that I'm an adult working with kids, I've had an interesting realization about my youth: I bet the reason Bar and Bat Mitzvah DJ's never failed to play Boyz II Men's "I'll Make Love to You" was that they were amused watching pre-teens' discomfort as they tried to negotiate slow dancing with the opposite sex and trying to ignore the lyrics.

Ninth grade humor

Also, does anyone know how to correctly pronounce "Sans-Culottes"? We've been pronouncing it "sahn COO-lo," which gives our Spanish-speaking students a little giggle.

How do you do it?

Kelly Vaughan has this to say about the decreased tolerance for student shenanigans that comes with being hungry. It reminds me of something I've been meaning to ask all the teachers out there:

Is it normal to be totally STARVING and EXHAUSTED by noon when teaching? Will this get better once I've been at it longer? Should I be worried that I have some sort of wasting disease? And what do people do to combat hunger and fatigue (other than eating students' lunches and taking illicit drugs)?

Dreaming in Minnesota

Yesterday I went to a rally for the Minnesota DREAM Act, a bill that would give undocumented high school students who attended high school for three years in Minnesota to pay resident tuition at state colleges and universities here and be eligible for scholarships. From what I can tell, the bill has a lot of support in the state legislature, but Gov. Pawlenty has threatened to veto it. His argument: undocumented kids shouldn't have rights that residents of other states don't have. It's an incredibly disingenuous argument - these kids live in Minnesota, and they didn't choose to come to the U.S., they came with their parents. Plus, denying immigrants access to college almost guarantees that the brighter undocumented kids will be denied higher paying jobs, a twisted logic that helps anti-immigrant politicans continue to justify claims that immigrants don't contribute to society.

Anyway, the 700 or so high school students that attended the rally and meetings with state legislators were awesome. A group of students ran the rally and training, and I went around with five 9-10 graders to talk to two legislators from rural Minnesota. One of the kids was an immigrant (legal) and the rest were white Americans. Even though they didn't know any immigrants that wouldn't be able to go to college, it was amazing to see how passionate they were about the cause. They actually convinced one the legislators to support the bill (he was new and hadn't heard much about it), and the Republican (undecided) also really listened and took the kids seriously. It made me really hopeful about the Dream Act - how can you tell a group of kids that you don't want to provide opportunities to all students, regardless of how they came to this country. I know it's a very small piece of reform that has a lot of bipartisan support (and it still hasn't passed at the federal level, although a number of states have), but there was so much energy among both immigrant and non-immigrant students that has the potential to spawn a real movement for change.

Get a job

The school of bloggers might have found a place to live in Minneapolis! It even has a garden:



Now I just have to find a job ...

Speaking of which, I took the LAST and the CST yesterday. Having heard very negative things about the New York certification exams, I was pleasantly surprised by how much they seemed to focus on critical thinking and general understanding rather than knowledge of obscure facts.

Still, I found myself guessing a lot on the CST on topics ranging from the Gulf Stream to Reagan's Contra policy. I lucked out with the essay topic, which had to do with Lincoln, the Civil War, and slavery (which I just taught).

Meanwhile, I'm working on an online teaching portfolio. In the interest of preserving my anonymity I won't link to it here, but if you already know who I am, I would LOVE any sort of feedback. Email me at theschoolofblog AT gmail DOT com and I'll send you the link. Thanks!

The knights who say NAEP

Has cramming facts into my brain (such as the definitions of tundra and taiga) for the past week made me a little loopy, or did Beth from the AFT just endorse Core Knowledge?

Meanwhile, I have not had the chance to look too closely at the NAEP data, but I can believe that high schoolers' reading levels are comparatively low. However, I don't think the correct response to "today's students aren't reading as well as students in our parents' day" is "let's go back to teaching the way our parents were taught."

50 degrees + sunny + February break ...

= I am in such a good mood right now!

Even the fact that I've been spending my free time this week studying for my 8 a.m. content specialty test (aka, what the hell is a Visigoth?) on Saturday hasn't dampened my mood.

Blogroll updated

It's been a really long time coming, but I have finally updated the blogroll. Thanks for keeping us company up there on the sidebar!

Homophobia and defensive teaching

The other day, in the middle of class, one male student called another a "faggot." I gave him the evilest eye I have, and he seemed genuinely shocked and confused by my reaction.

On another day during advisory, my cooperating teacher split the class into two teams and had them do the trust-building game where you have to get every member of your team standing on a small platform at once. One team was an even mix of girls and guys, but the other team was almost all male. While the first team succeeded by grabbing onto each other and carrying each other on piggyback, the second team refused to do anything like that because it was "too gay." (They lost.) I asked my CT later why he didn't say anything at the time, and he said, rightly I now think, that it's an issue that requires a much bigger conversation.

So in light of all these incidents, I've found myself engaging recently in "defensive teaching" when it comes to this issue. In our current events class I intentionally excluded articles on gay sheep and John Amaechi. I just didn't want to, or know how to, respond to the homophobic comments which would certainly come up.

Yesterday, we had a big debate over whether to use this image when talking about the causes of the French Revolution:



One teacher felt that the kids would not be able to handle it; they'd be hooting and hollering so much that they'd miss the point of the image. Another felt that they'd certainly remember this image and therefore the concept.

I'm leaning toward not including it, just because I don't know how to handle their certain homophobia. But by not including it, I'm denying them something I believe has educational value, and also the opportunity to deal with this issue.

But is my CT right? Is it impossible to let students know that it is simply NOT OKAY to say some of the things they routinely say in class about homosexuality without having a major conversation? And in the meantime, should we just avoid it at all costs? What hope do I have of changing kids' minds when this is an acceptable Super Bowl ad?

Has anyone had any success with this?

On just an ordinary day like today

I have to give a shout out to this post (via this post) on a day like today, when, fortunately, we had ample heat and no leaking radiators, but unfortunately, the doorknob fell off the door, locking us in the classroom.

Overheard in Global Studies

• One student [after taking a sip of other student's Starbucks bottled beverage]: That tastes nasty!
• Other student: It's mocha. White people drink it.

And ...

• Question: What did you find interesting about today's lesson [about the Bill of Rights]?
• Student: I plead the first.

More on the v-word

Utah is channeling the spirit of Milton Friedman, who was, I believe, the one who said "a [voucher] program for the poor is a poor program." It will be interesting to see what happens there.

From the Onion

Teacher's Leave Of Absence Shrouded In Legend
February 9, 2007 Issue 43•06

MOBILE, AL—Students at Adams Middle School have been feverishly speculating about the true circumstances surrounding seventh grade history teacher Mr. Benson's unannounced second-semester leave of absence—now approaching one month—raising the mysterious disappearance well into the status of legend among the student body at large.

Read on.

Meanwhile, this is what Chris is probably doing right now.

Common sense

Today I learned a very important lesson on SCAFFOLDING: It's not just a buzz word, it's actually a very important thing to do.

Moving on in our revolutions unit, today we had the kids look at quotes from Tom Paine's "Common Sense" and relate them to Enlightenment ideas such as natural rights, the idea that government should be limited, and the idea that all men are created equal. It sounds pretty philosophical but the kids actually got a good grounding in Enlightenment ideas last semester.

However, plain-spoken as old Tom thought he was being, the quotes went way over our Monday-groggied students' heads. Here were some of the quotes we used:

"Society in every state is a blessing, but government even in its best state is but a necessary evil"

"Mankind being originally equals in the order of creation, the equality could only be destroyed by some subsequent circumstance [later event]."

"The exalting [raising] one man so greatly above the rest cannot be justified on the equal rights of nature."

During A-block, the kids were totally lost. We wised up during B-block and did a little pre-reading activity before getting into the complicated language. When we do this lesson with C-block tomorrow, we're going to try a strategy I learned in my literacy class last semester: "Syntax Surgery" (you can find a good description somewhere in here). Basically, you put up a piece of difficult text on an overhead transparency and "think aloud," using a marker to model rearranging syntax and isolating the important nouns and verbs, while the kids copy what you do. Once they get the idea, they can try it on their own.

School of rock

Have you ever noticed that when you’re working with kids, you’re suddenly propelled back to the time when you were their age? My best friend from high school – the one who was probably most influential in my life at the time, the one I skipped school with, drove maniacally with, went prom dress shopping with; in short, was a teen with – just got in touch after many years to tell me she’s engaged.

The fact that she got in touch through the Facebook, which was not even a twinkle in anyone’s eye when I was in high school (which wasn’t that long ago, really), was a real mindf**k (as my high school self would have said).

I knew about the wooden teeth, but ...

I have to agree with He Who Can't that it's a good thing I teach Global.

The revolution begins

Is it racist to call somebody white? For our first lesson in our revolutions unit, we wanted to make sure kids understood what the word means – not just the definition, but all its historical connotations. We passed out a bunch of images and had them discuss whether or not each one was “revolutionary.” Some images we showed them:












When they got to this one, I heard a lot of confused/uncomfortable murmuring:



What I kept hearing was, “it’s a bunch of white people,” followed by “you can’t write that, that’s racist.” Is it racist simply to point out that they are white? One kid said “writing down that it’s a bunch of white people is just like saying a bunch of black n-----s.”

The students’ confusion came from their surprise at seeing white people protesting for free speech – a freedom they did not realize was ever denied to white people. (This photo actually comes from the student Free Speech Movement in the early ‘60s.) But their discomfort came from being asked to write what they noticed about the photo, and not wanting to state the obvious.

I feel like if I want to understand how my kids think about race, it's important to understand why they were so uncomfortable with that, but I don't.

Love lost

There's not much to say about Spitzer's budget that others (namely The Chalkboard) haven't already said, but my own little two cents are "you lost me at the v-word."

Sorry Mr. Spitzer, but vouchers (in the form of tuition tax credits) are a deal breaker for me. You are no longer my favorite new governor.

Tuition tax credits are particularly odious because they follow the Jeannie Allen-ish logic that people who send their kids to private school are paying "double" for their kids' education -- once for tuition and once when they pay their property taxes. The problem with this logic is that it suggests that rather than being a public good that benefits everyone in society equally, whether you send children there or not, public school is a service that you should only have to pay for if you use. I would almost prefer a straight-up voucher program than tuition tax credits.

Prediction: gleeful editorial from the NY Sun tomorrow.

UPDATE: Not quite the rapture I was anticipating, but here's the blurb on vouchers from the NY Sun editorial:

It's all frustrating to friends of real reform, the more so because there is so much admirable in the budget the governor is going to be trying now to get through the same Assembly he has just alienated. The most important, by our lights, is the point of principle he has crossed with his proposal for what can be called a voucher concept that would offer a $1,000 tax deduction to parents who pay tuition at "public and nonpublic schools." It's modest, but it's a start.

Business and schools, part 72

More on this story to come. Basically, it's unclear at this point how the closing of a major Williamsburg fixture, a Pfizer plant, will affect the charter school that has been its major beneficiary.

This is why HCZ rocks

I love this!

In a second-floor classroom, Charles and Camilla watched the Harlem Children’s Zone theater troupe run through a scene from “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” the play it performed at the National Black Theater last month. Fittingly, it was the play-within-a-play sequence, in which the six “rude mechanicals,” or laborers, perform “Pyramus and Thisbe” for Theseus and Hippolyta, the royal couple.

The actors, who mostly ranged in age from 12 to 14, performed in modern-day workmen’s uniforms, but held close to the original dialogue. The prince and duchess sat with their hands clasped in their laps, her legs primly pressed together, his stretching wide of his shoulders and pointing wider still, horseman that he is.

Whee

Anybody recognize this little ditty?

I am a wonder, I am a whee
I am known as Peabody
What am I like? Just look and see
Then you'll know me, Peabody

If so, please email and let me know what it's from. It has something to do with a puppet, a record, kindergarten, and the 80s, but Google is failing me on this one.

UPDATE: Google eventually did lead me here, where I found this very apt description of the puppet I'm remembering:

I think it was something to do with the Peabody Reading Scheme and another puppet called Peamoonie(?) He was the one that looked like Hitler in a baseball cap, had a magic wand and an awful song which, embarrassingly, I can still remember!

UPDATE II: Further obsessive Googling (have I mentioned that there is actual work that I should be doing?) revealed that his name was actually "P. Mooney," that he is part of a language program that is still in use, and that he looks something like the dude on the left below, although the puppet from my memory is a lot more like the puppet described above, with a much more bulbous head.

So many hours down the YouTube

Instead of boning up on revolutions or studying for my upcoming CST like I should be doing, I've been spending the morning watching YouTube clips of Misha. Justification: Clips like this one (subtitled "video of misha before he deported to the USA") could be useful when teaching about the Cold War:



At the very least, it could be useful in teaching the difference between the words "deported" and "defected."

It is officially ...

… way, WAY colder in NYC today than it is in Minneapolis.

Or, as Chris put it, “30 degrees? Warm! I’m going to go for a jog.”

Meanwhile, I am wearing so many layers I’d feel comfortable taking part in any game of strip poker, even with this guy.

UPDATE: The natural balance has been restored, and all is right with the world. Speaking of restoring the natural balance, there's a great article by Michael Pollan in the NYT Magazine.

A lot more gore, a lot less verbinski

A science teacher in Washington has been disciplined for planning to show "An Inconvenient Truth" to her seventh grade class without following the appropriate protocol for "'controversial'" material, according to an article that Chris sent me today.

Teachers, let me take this opportunity that you can get a free copy of "An Inconvenient Truth" by clicking here.

(By the way, if you don't recognize the subject of this post, you should definitely click here.)

stuff.

I’m always interested in the search terms people use to find this site. (The most common being “Amadou Ly,” the undocumented kid Chris wrote about here; the phrase “college isn’t for everyone;” and the phrase “Dawn breaks over Marblehead.”)

The cutest one so far, though, has to be “stuff i should know for the english regents,” searched today at 11:08 a.m. Given that the second session of the English Regents exam is being given TODAY starting at 1:15, I have to say I admire the degree of this kid’s blasé-ness.

Can you imagine if they'd done that to Rod Paige?

I was too busy getting the solfege mixed up during my first choral rehearsal last night to watch the SOTU address, but my buddy Erin makes a crucial disambiguation about the coverage of the address over at the Quick and the Ed.

Tell me all your secrets

I'm giving my students a questionnaire tomorrow. Never used this before, so let me know what you think ...

To help me get to know you better, and ultimately to teach you better, please answer these questions as best you can. If there is a question you do not feel comfortable answering, feel free to leave it blank.

1) What is your favorite subject in school?

2) What is your best subject?

3) Have you ever traveled outside of the state or country? If so, where?

4) Do you speak another language? If so, which one? How well do you speak it?

5) Do you work after school or during the summer? If so, where?

6) What’s something you can do better than most people can? (i.e., playing guitar, soccer, listening to friends)

7) If you had a choice, would you rather:

• Take a test
• Write an essay
• Create a skit
• Give an oral presentation
• Make some sort of visual (poster, brochure, etc.)

8) I learn the most when

• The teacher talks and I take notes
• I read and take notes
• I discuss information with other people
• I have to do something with the information

9) Which question do you find most interesting:

• Does money make the world go round?
• Why are there “winners” and “losers” in history?
• What is “civilization?”

10) Have you ever been doing something and had the feeling that you were so energized and focused, you lost track of time? If so, what were you doing?

11) Rank the following from 1-5 (1 being most interesting to you, 5 being the least)

• Women’s history
• Sports history
• History of music
• Art history
• History of social classes

12) Anything else I should know about you?

You say you want a ...

Also: I have about a week and a half to learn all there is to know about revolutions before I start teaching them. I checked out Hobsbawm's Age of Revolution this morning from the library, but I'm a little intimidated by him. Anyone have any other suggested reading material?

My thanks, with liberty, equality, and that other thing, to you all.

Rock and roll high school

Just finished the first week of my high school student teaching placement, and after 11 hours of sleep, I'm finally well-rested enough to post about it.

My cooperating teacher teaches three sections of mixed ninth and tenth grade Global Studies. I've never heard of doing it that way before, and it's too early for me to have any opinion on it, but it's certainly interesting: This year's ninth and tenth graders will take Global 3 and 4, and next year when they're sophomores the ninth graders will take Global 1 and 2 with the younger kids.

After Regents are over, I'll be taking over one section, team-teaching the second, and helping out with the third. This is a portfolio school, so the kids just have to take the English Regents and have vacation the rest of the time while the teachers have meetings, PD and parent-teacher conferences.

It's pretty good timing for a vacation -- apparently there has been a rash of fights recently between kids from one part of town and kids from another. Obviously that's not good news, but the way the school handled it is: they completely rescheduled classes on Friday, making room for a 45-minute advisory period at the beginning of the day during which each class talked about how they can contribute to a better school environment. It sounds hokey, but at least the way my cooperating teacher did it, it had a really positive, democratic vibe.

I think I'm going to learn a lot this semester, both from having my own class and from observing my cooperating teacher, a transplant from L.A. who has a great rapport with students.

Quandary

Let's just say, for the sake of argument, that the scandal-embroiled brother of a highly unpopular and conservative major political figure made a surprise visit to the school for which it is your job to do the publicity.

Do you publicize this event?

Taking note

The Winter 06-07 edition of the Philadelphia Public School Notebook is a really wonderful examination of the issue of parent involvement. The Notebook examines parent involvement from all angles, from charter schools to Bill Cosby.

The best part of this Notebook is an article written by two members of the Philadelphia Student Union -- an awesome organization that was a vocal opponent of the 2002 school privatization. The students surveyed and interviewed parents, analyzed their data, and presented recommendations.

Also check out this blurb on Scrabble – one of the School of Bloggers’ favorite pastimes. (Have I mentioned that I have a sister who is a nationally ranked Scrabble player?)

Merit pay

I may have missed it, but did any bloggers have anything interesting to say about this study? Or is it too bogus to blog about?

Sad day

Chris is on his way back to Minnesota right now, via Akron, OH and Atlanta, GA, and I am on my way back to the grind, via working on MLK day and starting my new student teaching placement tomorrow. I'm psyched about it, but I haven't yet met my cooperating teacher and I only have half a voice.

Meanwhile, here's a little MLK day video from your friendly local history teacher-to-be.



UPDATE: It isn't just 8th graders who think Martin Luther King Jr. freed the slaves. Apparently a good chunk of college kids think so too.

It was officially ...

... colder in NYC today than it was in Minneapolis.

Which came first?

We’ve talked a lot on this blog about the relationship between the health care crisis and education, the idea that the fate of the two entities are inextricably linked, and the idea that universal health care could assuage so many of the problems in public education – from the achievement gap to labor-management relations.

A recent issue brief from the Alliance for Excellent Education makes the corollary argument: lower drop-out rates, and you will solve the health insurance crisis.

More middle school

I kept meaning to post on this NYTimes op-ed piece from a while back about hyper-sexual middle school girls. To be honest, the dancing doesn't really bother me that much, and it just seems like more in the continuing saga of adults being offended by kids' dance moves dating back to Elvis. (I have fond memories of a high school pep rally being suddenly dismissed after the step team "simulated intercourse" on the half court line.)

What really shocked me, though, were the t-shirts that girls would come in wearing that said things like,

"Trust me, I'm legal"

or

"I'm even cuter online"

Needless to say, these t-shirts were teeny-tiny. It's one thing to put yourself out there as a sexual being. It's another to put yourself out there as a willing victim of an adult sexual predator. These t-shirts were most likely designed to be tongue-in-cheek, but I doubt most eighth graders really get it.

Or am I just another Elvis-basher?

Things you can do when you don't have to work

The School of Bloggers took a field trip yesterday to the new exhibit at the New York Historical Society on Slavery and the Civil War in N.Y.C. I was kicking myself the whole time that I didn’t take the eighth graders there – the whole exhibit was about how N.Y.C. profited from slavery, and one of our big questions in our slavery unit was “who profited from slavery?”

I learned a lot in particular about how much New York businesspeople benefited from cotton – something like 38 cents of every dollar on financing, trading and insuring. We did a whole lesson on “the journey of cotton,” and the kids would totally get the idea that these New Yorkers were, in some way, complicit in slavery.

Another thing the exhibit did well was connecting slavery to the treatment of American Indians in the south. Much of the land that became available for cotton farming came from expelled Cherokee and Chickasaw. We didn’t spend any time on that at all, but it would have been a good connection to make.

One last thing I thought was cool about the exhibit was an analysis of the tactics used by abolitionists. In the spring, the eighth graders will be studying 20th century social movements, and that would be another great connection to make. Abolitionists, the exhibit pointed out, used empathy to rally support, and tapped into religious organizations. Reminds me of Cesar Chavez, as well as more recent movements to organize farm workers.

Bottom line: bummed about not organizing a field trip with the kids, but totally psyched about this exhibit. Go see it!

He Said

I've been thinking a lot about my eighth graders from last year during my first year in grad school. Even though it was probably the most frustrating year of my life, it was also one of the most rewarding. Amid all the chaos (and there certainly was a lot of it at my former school), I had a lot of wonderful kids that tried really hard to do the best they could in school. So whenever I read articles like this one in the Times, I immediately become skeptical of all the focus on middle school. While I recognize a lot of the distractions that middle school kids have to deal with mentioned in the article and I agree that they certainly have a negative impact on learning, the narrow focus obscures the larger problems. As one kid says in the article, they are not adequately prepared to succeed in middle school. I think this is a big, if not the biggest, reason so many kids in my after-school program (in 6th, 7th and 8th grade) were doing so poorly in middle school. They were so far behind that it is not realistically possible for them to catch up and then do well on the tests. This wasn't entirely the fault of the middle school or their hormones. Even though a lot of them got discouraged after continually not understanding what was going on, we had a number of kids that put in a lot of extra effort to raise their test scores.

But the point of talking about middle school "solutions" is about getting them ready to do well in high school, not just about test scores. I think there are a lot of things that could have improved the environment in my former school (a 9am start time would be a great start) that would have helped my 8th graders learn and get better prepared for 9th grade, but I don't see how any solutions that start in middle school are going to resolve the larger problems in a school system that starts leaving kids behind long before they get there. I keep thinking about a Dominican kid who had been stuck in ESL classes for years because nobody recognized or did anything about his learning disability. He worked harder than almost anyone and was one of the most charming kids I’ve ever met, but he had never really learned how to read and this of course limited everything he did in middle school. He passed 8^th grade somehow, but I’m not too optimistic about his chances in high school. Even if he makes it, it’s not realistic to expect most kids to overcome so many obstacless.

She said

Very interesting article in the NYTimes, the first in a series on middle school. The big question: how do you educate kids who are still, in many ways, children, but who are beginning to deal with really grown up problems?

In one of my classes last semester we talked a lot about how school systems tend to treat middle schoolers as either big elementary students or little high schoolers. But they really are a totally different beast. And a friendly beast. Before I started my last student teaching placement (at a school which, incidentally, is mentioned in the NYTimes article), I was sure I was going to hate middle school. But now I'm thinking I may actually want to end up teaching in one.

More to come from Chris, who worked with middle schoolers at a very different school from the one where I was teaching, and still learned to love the beast.

Resolved

I will take Ed at the AFT up on his suggested resolution for me, especially now that I have a couple of weeks until my next student teaching placement starts! I will be teaching at a small high school in Manhattan. Sad to leave the eighth graders, but I'm excited for high school. I'm also resolving Chris to write more, even though he is a busy grad student. He had really interesting things to say about school districts in Minnesota ...

Happy new year everyone!

In the post-11/7 world ...

... things are starting to look up.

More thoughts

I have only just now read this NYSUT report on NY charter schools (and I still haven't read this), but I have to concur that their methodology is truly bizarre. I can vouch for a couple of the schools on that list and tell you that the "comparison" school is not comparable. I am mentally throwing this report into the already large pile of studies about charter schools, both pro- and anti-, that are untrustworthy and bogus.

Early morning thoughts

Too tired to really do this justice right now, but this meeting of "experts" on education, including Rod Paige, Richard Riley, and Joel Klein, is an interesting new data point in the ongoing story of the role of business in shaping American education, and the ongoing struggle to define the purpose of American education. Expect responses from business leaders. Compare to G.H.W. Bush's America 2000 plan and the response of business leaders to it.

Fairy Blogmother?

Is this new pre-K blogger Mrs. Peter Pappas? (Hat tip: The Quick and the Ed)

You-know-what going to you-know-where?

Looks like a deal may not be reached over you-know-what (in The Chalkboard's words) before Pataki leaves.

An important challenge or just too hard?

How do you know when something is just too hard for a kid?

This week the 8th graders are doing independent projects on the Civil War, doing nonfiction reading in order to answer questions that they chose. I ended up going with these questions:

Why did Lincoln free the slaves?
Was Lincoln "the great emancipator"?
Did the South have a chance?
What was it like to be a soldier?
What was the role of women in the war?
What was the role of African Americans in the war?

One kid, a kid I really like whose IEP says he has ADD, picked "Did the South have a chance?" Even though he was one of the kids we identified as needing a more straightforward question, I let him go with that question because he seemed really interested in it.

Yesterday he was reading a really cool Cobblestone article about submarines in the Civil War, but when I went over to him he was feeling really frustrated. He wasn't alone -- many kids felt overwhelmed by the task and confused about how to use the readings to answer the questions.

Anyway, with this kid, A.J., I could tell he was interested in the topic but felt like it was too hard. I said something like, "you know, A.J., this is a really tough question, but I think you can handle it." At first he protested, saying he wanted to switch to an easier question, but I persuaded him against it. I started asking him some scaffolding questions, like "what would it mean if the South had a chance?" He came up right away with, "they would have a better army, they would have more people, they would have more land," etc. He totally got the question. I said, "what about generals?" He said he didn't know. So I gave him an article about Civil War generals to read. He seemed better.

Today when we were working on the project again, he said "can you give me a different article? I'm switching over to 'what was it like to be a soldier.'" I felt defeated because 1) he still wanted to take the easy way out, and 2) he now expected me to choose the reading for him, which was contrary to the whole point of the exercise. I told him, "A.J., I know this is difficult for you and that you're feeling frustrated. But I wouldn't have encouraged you to do this if I didn't think you could." I reminded him of all the smart things he said yesterday. He seemed encouraged and grudgingly started work again on his original question.

I do believe he can do it, but he will probably have a much more difficult task than most of the other students. Is that fair? Am I wrong to keep pushing him toward that, when kids with much more experience with this kind of thing are getting away with easier questions? And what if I'm wrong and he can't do it? What kind of effect will that have on his confidence?

Maybe if the mice spent more time in class ...

The AFT, my alma mater, has a new initiative on building conditions. New York City has a famously old stock of school buildings, and I've heard of some pretty nasty conditions that are, shall we say, not conducive to student concentration. A new report by the AFT exposes facilities problems around the country and how they affect teaching and learning.

The building in which I am doing my student teaching is one of these big, old buildings, but it is in relatively good condition. Its only real quirk is a large community of rodents. (Like the kind that inhabits most NYC schools.) I haven't actually seen any myself, but I've heard they can be seen scampering through the halls like confused sixth graders, and I have certainly seen ample evidence of their existence. The seventh grade science teacher has taken to catching the mice and keeping them as classroom pets. How does she catch the little dudes? "These mice are slow and dumb," she says.

Other than the mice, the school doesn't have problems like ceilings falling in or mushrooms growing in the corners. An active parent body makes sure things are pretty well kept up, and once a year the parents have a "work day" in which they do things like build benches and bookcases in classrooms. Adequate facilities, however, does not necessarily translate into high student achievement -- at least as measured by state tests. Word on the street is that the school might not make AYP based on last year's scores. Of course, as the AFT will also tell you, and they are right, barely any schools will be making AYP for very long.

AYP aside, I do believe the students at this school are getting a great education, one that is not hampered by distracting facilities problems.

Kids.

Juan is one of my favorite kids in the class. When I first got there, he was one of a handful of children for whom it was a challenge for me to find something to really like about them. His behavior in the beginning of the year tended to be disruptive and a little bit mean toward a tablemate who had recently immigrated from Georgia.

After a while, however, I realized that these behaviors were his way of doing anything in his power to avoid writing. He HATES writing! I also realized that underneath it all he is a truly sensitive and nice kid. One day Juan walked into class and it was as if he was a different kid -- his attitude toward school was that radically different. He still asks to go to the bathroom anytime it's time to write, but as soon as I tell him 'no' he sits down and really tries.

Yesterday, as part of an ELA test bootcamp strategy, one of my cooperating teachers was having students practice listening comprehension strategies on a read-aloud. The story was a really sad one about a kid whose mom leaves her and the imaginary friend she invents to help deal with it. At the end of the story, one kid looked up and noticed Juan wiping his eyes. Seconds later the entire class was having uncontrollable laughing fits at Juan's expense -- not in a mean way, just out of sheer shock. They didn't blame him for crying, but of all the kids in the class, Juan was definitely not the one you'd expect to do it. One kid was working so hard to contain his laughter that he looked like he was about to throw up, until the teacher made him leave the room. Juan took it well. I wanted to go up and hug him, but of course that would have made it worse.

But it still warms my heart to think about it. And it makes me really appreciate the truly excellent job my cooperating teachers have done in creating not just an atmosphere in which kids can get emotionally that involved in a read-aloud, but also one in which students care enough about each other, and about the work that's going on in class, to let something like that slide. It gives me something to aspire to.

With a first name like this ...

... you are destined to work with children.

Sometimes things are just too seminal to read

Nearly all my friends and relations have sent me Sundays NYT Magazine article about schools, and I still haven't read it. Eduwonk sums it up here. The Chalkboard goes into a little more detail here. Someday I'll get around to reading it but for now I'm frantically trying to read The Cold War and the Color Line for my curriculum class, and every edition of Cobblestone relating to the Civil War that I can get my hands on.

Calling all fairy blogparents

So, now that the slavery unit is over I'm working on planning the next unit, which is going to be on the Civil War. We're going to spend three 45-minute lessons on it next week, and I was having a hard time deciding what I thought the most important things are that students should take away from such a short unit. So my solution was not to decide -- I'll let them choose from among a list of questions relating to the Civil War, and then divide them into mixed-ability groups, and each group will have to come up with an answer to their question by the end of the week with evidence to back up their answer.

The unit coincides with the ELA unit on nonfiction reading, so their responses to their questions will come from nonfiction texts on various topics and reading levels. At the end of the week each group will present its answer and evidence to the class.

With a setup like this, the questions are going to be what really drives the unit, and I thought I came up with some great questions that kids could approach at different levels. Some of the questions I thought would work:

• Was the Civil War inevitable?
• Was Lincoln "the great emancipator"?
• Did the South have a chance?
• Could the war have happened without women?
• Would the Union have won without African Americans?

My cooperating teachers thought these questions would be above some kids' heads, and suggested I give some kids these tough questions and other kids more straightforward questions, such as:

• What was it like to be a soldier?
• What was it like to be a soldier's family?
• What were some of the important battles of the Civil War?

To me, those kinds of questions are less compelling; it's hard for me to imagine a kid really trying to answer those questions because they really care about finding the answer. But I trust their judgement and realize I'm just going to have to try this out and see how the kids respond.

Anyway, if anyone out there has some good ideas for questions, or some good sources of short nonfiction texts on the Civil War, please let me know!

Reflection

So, the slavery unit is over.

I got my first taste today of what kids are like right before a break ... it was truly bizarre. At some point I looked around and one kid was rocking back and forth in his chair, another was doing something weird with his lips, a third was putting stickers on her tablemate's face, and a fourth was tugging on the braid of the nearest female. (Of course, the latter is a kid whom I've often caught fondling girls' hair ... Ah eighth graders.)

Looking back on the slavery unit, I have mixed feelings. There are some things I'm proud of and some things I know I'll do differently next time. Most of the kids seemed to get a lot out of it. Most, but not all, of them liked having one question that we kept coming back to each lesson (why did slavery exist). In their end-of-unit evaluations, one student wrote this:

I liked the fact that we weren't just explaining that there was slavery and it was so horrible it should have never happened. We actually spoke and thought about how and why did it happen who started it ect.

And I think most of them really came to a deeper understanding of that question over the course of the unit. When we first asked them to respond to the question "why did slavery exist" at the beginning of the unit, a majority of students responded "because white people were lazy" or "because white people were racist." While there is a level of truth to these answers, they reflect the kind of thinking that novice students of history use. Over time their responses became more complex (although I still had one student at the end of the unit say "because white people hated them").

It was a challenge for them and it was definitely a challenge for me! Glad it's over. Now on to the next challenge ...

Fun with documents

Thanks, Peter Pappas, for responding to my last post! I'm exhausted but you have inspired me to post about the lesson I did today with documents. (I found Pappas' blog while trying to figure out how to do this lesson.)

So, the main skill we've been trying to teach in this slavery unit is how to approach primary source documents. I was sort of making it up as I went along, but I started out having them practice asking simple questions of the documents (who created it? when? why?).

So the aim of today's lesson, which was the last lesson in the unit, was "why did slavery end?" First I modeled how to approach the document with this document:












Then they looked at several documents (each kid got a different document according to reading level) including a speech by Frederick Douglass and this one:


Then came the hard part. They got into their social studies groups -- four kids in each mixed-level group, and each kid had a different document -- and had to come up with a topic sentence for a paragraph answering the question "why did slavery end?" I had no idea how they would do with this task. Some groups did really well, and other groups were totally lost. I'm not sure how I would have done it differently to scaffold better for the groups that were having a harder time.

This whole lesson was to prepare them for the final project for the unit. The unit question was "why did slavery exist?" So for the final project, they each have to pick a document (but I ended up giving documents to most kids) and writing an analytic paragraph about what that document teaches them about why slavery existed. On Monday, when the final project is due, they'll all bring in their documents and their paragraphs, and we'll hang them around the room like a gallery that is our class's answer to the unit question. I found some really great documents and I'm excited to see what they do with them, but I'm not sure I have really prepared them to succeed. Some of them will do fine because they are smart, and others might just be lost.

Peter Pappas

So much to write about! I'd like to write about some of the cool things my kids had to say today about slavery, or about the midterm elections, or about midterms in general. But it's 8:30 p.m., I'm at work, and I'd rather go home and poop out.

So instead I thought I'd point you in the direction of a really cool blog I found recently about social studies, literacy, and learning from documents: the blog of a Mr. Peter Pappas. Mr. Pappas, you are my new social studies fairy blogfather.

Unaccountable comments

While planning a discussion-based lesson, I just googled "accountable talk," and a post by Ms. Frizzle came up. It was such a thoughtful discussion/explanation of accountable talk, and so helpful. It also made me so happy to read that Ms. Frizzle, one of my teacher blog-idols, felt intimidated and overwhelmed when she first tried it. I felt inspired and also calmed.

Then I scrolled down to the comments.

Schnurrific

Teachers to Share 'Trade Secrets' for Better Schools
WNYC Newsroom

NEW YORK, NY October 30, 2006 —Schools in New York City and across the country will be able to access tips from successful schools over the Internet. The program will encourage promising charter schools and regular public schools to share their so-called trade secrets says Jon Schnur, chief executive officer of New Leaders for New Schools - which is working with the schools.

SCHNUR: If you're a 4th grade teacher in math in the Bronx, there's no place for you to go to see what are the best 4th grade math teachers in NY and across the country doing? And this initiative will provide a way for you to watch videotape, see lesson plans, best practices from some of the best fourth grade teachers anywhere.

REPORTER: The program will cost $27 million over 5 years, with money from the US Department of Education and private grants. The first round of funds announced today in Brooklyn is directed at charter schools - but other schools will also be included, and they'll be selected next year based on test scores and classroom practices.

UPDATE: What I wanted to say about this earlier, but didn't have time, was that I love this idea. It combines so many great ideas. One, the idea of charter schools (or any schools) sharing what works with other schools. Two, I'm really drawn to the whole video idea. It reminds me of Japanese lesson-study, which I can't wait to try when I become a real teacher. (I've been trying to get my classmates to try it with me now, but they don't share my enthusiasm.)

What we can learn from New Jersey

From NY Times, political pressure to rethink one of the most progressive school funding systems in the country.

I take comfort in knowing that there are adults that know less history than I do

So, I collected the students' social studies notebooks this week (week 2 of our slavery unit), and of course I had one student who wrote about how Martin Luther King, Jr. freed the slaves. (At least he didn't say that MLK Jr. also ended racism, which some of Chris's kids were known to have said last year.)

That MLK Jr. freed the slaves is, apparently, a very common misconception. Why? Chris says: "it shows how poor the teaching on race issues is. Teachers don't really talk about race in the present, and it creates major problems for talking about the past."

I think that's probably true, but I think there's also a simpler explanation. I was watching my tivoed episode of Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip tonight, and at some point two of the main characters go out to see a black stand-up comedian. They think he's so funny and smart that they hire him on the spot as a writer. Here's an approximate paraphrase of one of his jokes:

"I think about African American slaves, and about how we stacked up against other slaves. Look at the pyramids -- those were built by slaves. No one ever told us we could use geometry!

And those slaves, they got Moses. Now, I'm a big fan of the Emancipation Proclamation and all. But they got a burning bush. We got a memo: 'Free at last, free at last, thank God Almighty, we are free at last.'"

What????

This coming from what's supposed to be the pinnacle of network TV show writing. If they think MLK freed the slaves, what chance is there for my kids?

Unions and Charters, part 34

I haven't read this study in full yet (and at the rate I'm going I never will), but the abstract makes it look like good reading. Findings included:

• Each side (often incorrectly) defines the other by views of its most extreme members;
• Moderate members from each group share many of the same ideas about good schooling, but each side thinks the other insists on something that will interfere with quality teaching;
• Even though some large urban districts have viewed chartering as a reform tool, the politics of school districts make them unlikely partners in scale-up;
• Both sides acknowledge the costs of their conflict, but few leaders are willing to take the first step; and
• Thin evidence about the work life of charter school teachers or how unionized charter schools operate exacerbates conflicting beliefs

I don't know too much about the National Charter School Research Project, and its list of funders shows a sort of right wing pedigree (anyone funded by the Walton Family Foundation makes me suspicious. And that includes the organization I work for ...). All that means is that while research like this is really important, the people described in the study on the union side might be unwilling to take something like this seriously until it comes from within the fold. (From here, perhaps.)

Noteworthy

Check out the fall edition of the Philadelphia Public School Notebook, which is focusing on evaluating how well privatization has worked for Philly's neediest schools.

The Notebook reports that privatization has not had the effect the Philadelphia School Reform Commission intended when it handed the keys to the worst-performing schools over to a handful of private organizations ranging from for-profit (i.e. Edison) to universities:

This summer’s announcement of 2006 results on the PSSA exam and of whether schools met their performance targets for adequate yearly progress reinforced a prior trend. As measured by test scores, the gap is widening between most District schools and the low-performing schools singled out for reform in 2002 that are now under private management.

The percentage of students scoring proficient or better on both reading and math is now 19 points lower in the privately managed schools than the rest of the District’s schools, compared to 16 points in 2002 (see test score gains).

Implications for New York and this story: Bloomy should be keeping a close eye on Philly. It makes total sense, when you think about the mayor as the very model of a modern neoliberal, that he would want to centralize control over schools and then use that control to hand the keys to private companies. But New Yorkers are very savvy about numbers. Will they be as patient as Philadelphians with private companies who don't perform as promised?

Heckuva job, Brownie

Take a look at this story about this group of parents who are in a dither over a test item on the 2006 ELA test.

Legitimate critique of high-stakes testing? Or a bunch of over-involved parents upset about their kids' not succeeding on a test item? You be the judge.

Something to consider: the 8th graders I work with (among whom the very best readers, admittedly, are not reading at grade level) probably could not answer this question. Analyzing character change over time is something they are only now beginning to study.

math scores ...

... are in. more later.

Entreaty

Chris promised that I'd have something interesting to say about this, but my brain is fried. It's 6:30 and I'm still at work, and it's been a really long week.

What's really, really exciting, though, is that we're finally starting to plan our first social studies unit. Here's what I'm thinking -- if you have any suggestions, let me know:

So, the eighth grade social studies teachers decided that they would have a yearlong focus on labor, dividing the year into three long units: slavery, industrialization, and 20th century social movements. My thought was that the "essential question" for the year could be "Why do we work?"

For the slavery unit, that could translate into "What were slaves working for?" This is a question that has a lot of answers -- slaves were obviously working because they were forced to, but on a different level they were also working as part of a bigger economic system. On a different level, some slaves were able to work to save up money to buy their own freedom.

To me, the most important things for students to understand about slavery, when looking at it from a labor perspective, are a) that part of what made slavery so bad was that your labor belonged to someone else; b) that slavery was part of a bigger economy that united the North and the South and also reached across the Atlantic; c) that some of the ways slaves resisted oppression was by denying their labor to the slave masters.

How will we know if students understand these things? At the end of the unit, they will have to complete a project in which they pick one individual who we've discussed in the unit, and answer the question, "what was this person working for?" The final product must include a written piece (maybe a narrative?) and some kind of visual (map, illustration, etc).

Now what I have to do is lay out the structure of the unit -- what exactly will we do to get students to the point that they can complete the final project? A lot of resources and ideas come to mind for use in lessons: the cotton gin (maybe a lesson where students look at graphs comparing the number of slaves used in the south before and after the invention of the cotton gin?); work songs; maps of the triangle trade routes; narratives recalling examples of foot-dragging; looking at black soldiers during the Civil War -- how was their labor different?; auction posters; looking at what whites were saying about labor at the time (I've been reading a lot -- too much -- about yeomen farmers recently).

I would love to hear any feedback, suggestions, resources, etc. you may have. It's the first unit I've ever planned that will actually be carried out by students, so don't hold back, please!

Privatizing NYC Public Schools

Julie will have plenty to say about this article in the NY Times today about the possibility of New York hiring private firms to run a number of public schools in the city. It goes without saying of course, but this is neo-liberalism in fine form. I particularly liked this quote from the DOE:

Kristen Kane, Mr. Klein’s chief of staff, said the department considered the groups crucial to the early success of the new schools. “What happens to that success when there is no more private money?” she asked. “Will there be more private money or will we need to explore other ways to continue this partnership if we believe that is a critical success factor?”

Apparently, private money is the only way to have success in low-performing public schools. I agree that the current situation in NYC isn't serving a lot of poor kids and I'm in favor of new soluations, but the idea that education technocrats with no accountability to the public are going to drastically improve things doesn't add up for me. How can Bloomy be the education mayor while he passes off responsibility for improving schools to private firms?

Radicalism, neoliberalism, and other words I wish I never had to use

Last night I went to a panel put on by NYCoRE, the New York Collective of Radical Educators. The keynote speaker was a CA teacher who, without going into detail about his particular radical educational practice, roused all of us teachers and teachers-to-be into a radical dither.

The teacher, Jeff Duncan-Andrade, talked about how his first three years teaching, each year he would get the "March 15th letter" saying he would "not be invited back next year," and each year in June he would get the "Teacher of the Year" award from the students. He posited that since urban schools are not set up to educate poor and minority children, for teachers to succeed in teaching them, they must fail at their jobs.

He said that for the first 15 years of teaching, he fought the system, and in the 16th year he started his own school -- the East Oakland Community High School. It came home and tried to figure out if it was a charter school, and it doesn't look like it is. I wondered why they would choose not to open such a school as a charter school. Is it just because the charter movement is associated with conservative, free-market, anti-"radical" ideas? Or is there something else?

Any thoughts? Chris has been submerged in reading about neoliberalism with barely enough time to come up for air, and has been talking to me about how charter schools are a good example of neoliberalism. (But so is everything, apparently.)

Test score update

Test scores came out today. NY Daily News got the jump on the story -- article here.

The charter schools I work with did well. But some charter schools did REALLY well -- particularly the KIPP schools and Renaissance. Renaissance doesn't get that much glory, but it's a really great, progressive school. I'm glad it's doing well, and not just because I don't want anyone to get the idea that we all have to KIPP-ify.

D-Day ....

... tomorrow. The ELA scores come out in New York.

I realize now that I'm working in a non-charter public school how insanely much more test scores matter to charter schools than they do to other schools. At the school where I'm student teaching, to the teachers tomorrow's ELA scores just mean they can decide which kids have to stay for an extra 37.5 minutes a day and which ones don't.

At one of the charter schools I work with, however, to the teachers tomorrow's scores literally mean whether or not they have a job next year. (And I do not use the word 'literally' lightly.)

UPDATE: The test scores were not released today. They will be released tomorrow to Albany's finest UPS couriers.

The Results are in

Last night David Yassky lost the Democratic primary to Yvette Clarke in New York's 11th congressional district. I don't know much about Clarke (she had the support of the major unions), but it's too bad that Congress won't have a strong immigrant rights supporter in Yassky (he won my allegiance with his support of translation services for immigrant parents in NYC).

But Minneapolis elected a great candidate last night. Keith Ellison, who will likely become the first Muslim congressperson and the first black person elected to Congress from Minnesota, is a very progressive guy and is great on immigrant rights. He helped push for the passage of the DREAM Act here in Minnesota, which was later pulled at the last minute after the Republican Gov. threatened a vote.

It's 9:30 p.m. ...

... and there are still no returns for the congressional race in the 11th C.D. When I voted this morning, you could hear crickets chirping in the school gym. (You could also hear the crickets chirping outside because it was so freaking early.) But I bet there was a pretty good turnout. I will keep you posted!

Nice Kids

I went to the Twins game on Sunday to watch Santana dismantle the Tigers, and I noticed (another) big difference between kids in Minnesota and in New York City. The Twins had a pre-game run the bases race for two kids, and one kid was way out in front of the other. The mascots kept tripping and knocking him down to let the other kid catch up, so much so that the other kid got to home plate first. But instead of winning the race, the second kid waits for the first kid to get up so they can step on home plate together.

There was a crazy spirit of un-competitiveness going on all game. One Tiger threw a ball to a little girl in our section early on in the game, but she missed it and it wound up going to another kid. I couldn't believe it when this kid passes up on the chance to take the ball home and gives it back to the girl. The niceness doesn't stop at the Metrodome, which feels kind of like Scandinavia with all the blond people. The kids in my building (mostly Somali and Ethopian kids) are extremely friendly - they hold the elevator door open for everyone, they help me lock my bike up most days, they don't beat up their little brothers. In New York, by the time kids get to middle school they are defensive and while some are friendly, there is a edge of toughness around everyone. I had a few immigrant kids who had just gotten to the US before 8th grade, and I noticed big changes in how they acted by the end of the year (some of their new characteristics were directly attributable to prevailing attitudes in the school, especially on the racial divides between black and Mexican kids, and these kids became very good at looking after themselves). I'm going to try and volunteer in an after-school program with Latino kids here in Minneapolis, so I'll see if my initial impressions of these differences are really there. It just seems like a whole other world.

This ...

... SUCKS.

Preparing Latino Immigrants for School

Interesting article in the NY Times today about the Long Island Children's Museum, which holds programs for immigrant parents and kids to prepare kindergartners for school in the U.S. The population of Latino immigrants is booming in Long Island, and this program seeks to ease the transition into school for both kids and parents. The article focuses primarily on the issue of parent involvement, with a number of advocates arguing that programs like these are necessary to get Spanish-speaking parents involved. From my experiences working with Latino parents of middle schoolers in Queens, having programs for parents in Spanish makes all the difference in terms of parent involvement. My after-school program got a lot more parents to events once we started having bilingual programs, and the primary schools in the area with Spanish-speaking parent coordinators had amazing parent involvement.

It seems to me that programs specifically for new immigrants can be really helpful for parents and kids. The school system is confusing, particularly for parents new to the country. Starting school in a new language is really tough for kids, so any help with the transition should go a long way. Opponents of the program are worried that it isolates immigrant kids:

For all its benefits, some critics have said the program promotes the isolation of Hispanic children. It causes them to cluster together even before they arrive in kindergarten, and so immigrant youngsters unwittingly hold themselves back, said the Rev. Allan B. Ramirez of the Brookville Reformed Church in Glen Head.

Obviously, it's important for immigrant kids to interact with native speakers - it helps them adjust to the U.S. and learn English faster. But I'm not sure I agree with the argument that promoting group identity among Latino kids is a bad thing. I don't know Long Island, but I imagine that immigrant kids there experience some of the same intolerance and anti-immigrant sentiment I witnessed in Queens. Having friends from the same background helps kids deal with these issues, and I also think that immigrant kids learn faster by comparing things they are learning in the U.S. to what they know from back home.

Second day

So, I'm student teaching in an inclusion class, which means that the students are blessed with both a regular teacher and a special ed teacher who are both there part time. I serve as the third adult body in the room, and so I've spent the past two days doing things like signing hall passes, answering questions, and stopping kids from putting tape on each others' backs. These kids have three grownups in the room and they're having the least fun they've ever had in their lives! It's awesome.

The class is a humanities class, which is a model that some middle schools around here use. While in some schools "humanities" means English language arts (ELA) and social studies are blended together, in this school it just means that the same teacher(s) teaches both subjects. Which ultimately means that social studies gets the shaft. (I've been told that our class won't start learning any social studies until at least the end of September.)

In New York, some of the blame (for the shaft) falls on the fact that students and teachers are held accountable for their scores on the ELA test, and that the 8th grade social studies test is a totally meaningless test. It's a no-stakes test. Eighth graders take it in June, so it has absolutely no bearing on what high school they get into. No one ever really looks at it. The state and city don't even bother to publish statewide and citywide averages. (Despite all that I actually do think it's a pretty good test and not a bad thing to spend time preparing kids for.)

I think there's something else to blame as well -- I don't think too many middle school teachers like teaching social studies (particularly if your certification is in ELA). Social studies is boring, kids don't like it, they stop paying attention and it's just harder.

Anyway, despite the fact that I will probably get very little practice actually teaching social studies, I really like the school, the teachers, and the kids. I'm totally exhausted after a day at school and then an evening of class, but I'm not dreading getting up at the crack tomorrow, which I think is a good sign.

Striking Teachers in Bolivia - Part II

A quick update on the teacher's strike in Bolivia - union leaders are beginning a hunger strike today (sorry, Spanish article only) despite continuing negotiations with the government. Teachers are demanding a new education law and the dismissal of the minister of Education (see this previous post for more on the strike). Meanwhile, civic committees and opposition politicians in four departments (similar to states) are going on strike this Friday to protest recent actions in the constituent assembly (specifically when Evo Morales' party pushed through a resolution that would permit a majority of votes to approve any changes during the assembly). Evo's party has an absolute majority of assembly delegates, and opposition members are worried that he will use to push through radical changes to the Bolivian constitution, similar to the law teachers are protesting. No word yet on the reaction of Bolivians to the teacher's strike and the union's stance against the compulsory teaching of indigenous languages. I don't think it will be resolved any time soon, since this current conflict over education policy is a vital part in the construction of a "new" Bolivian national identity (and we'll see how new the identity ends up being), as well as for future relations between indigenous and non-indigenous South Americans.

Back to school

Tomorrow is my first day of middle school. Specifically, eighth grade. I'm nervous -- what am I going to wear?? Will the kids like me? What about the huge zit I can feel brewing on my chin?

I spent all day Thursday and Friday at the school where I will be doing my student teaching -- a very cool non-charter public school of choice in Brooklyn -- absorbing information about the way it works and how the first few days of school will go. Also sitting in on meetings -- lots and lots of meetings. And covering bulletin boards with butcher paper.

It felt a lot like the first day of school -- lots of people around me I didn't know, and I had the awkward feeling of not really knowing what my place was in this bunch.

So stay tuned, I will be sure to keep you posted. Meanwhile I will be reading this like this.

PS, Chris is also going back to school. Have I mentioned he's in Minnesota? And may I brag? He is there with a fellowship from this really awesome program.

Charters and unions part n

Eduwonk guestblogger Steve Barr of Green Dot Public Schools posts about the partnership between Green Dot's charter schools and teachers unions.

Striking Teachers in Bolivia

Strikes are fairly common in Bolivia. When I was in Cochabamba two year ago my host brother had a lot of "vacation" because of extended strikes during year, mostly because the government would periodically stop paying teachers - especially in rural areas, and the urban teachers would strike in solidarity or for other reasons such as not being provided school supplies. But the current strike by the urban teacher's union is much more interesting. Evo Morales' government is trying to make the teaching of indigenous languages compulsory in primary schools (read about various other problems facing Morales in this Washington Post article). From what I've read in the Bolivian papers, the teachers are complaining that such a policy will put non-indigenous students at a disadvantage and that the government didn't consult with the union. The central government started having bilingual instruction (after decades of Spanish-only teaching in indigenous communities) in the mid-1990s, but the idea of teaching non-Indians indigenous languages is likely too much for some Bolivians, particularly the elite sector.

The fight over language instruction is another front in the battle for Bolivia's identity. Last night, a prominent peasant leader from Evo's party was almost killed in a fight over the ongoing constituent assembly, where the question of ethnic identity is a big point of conflict. Evo promised to place more value on indigenous cultures, which obviously got a lot of support during the election in a country where indigenous people make up 60 percent of the population. It will be interesting to see if the teacher's union will have to back down if the people support the new education policy. It's not clear that indigenous people actually support bilingual education, for the same reasons that immigrants in this country don't always support it - parents want their kids to be successful, and learning the language of power quickly is the best way to go about that.