First Experiences of Teaching (Kiran Bir Sethi TED Talk & Teach Like A Champion Connection)

     "Teachers get summers off, they are working until 3:00 and then they get to go home to their children, all the while collecting benefits.  They have got it made those teachers."  All arguments my dad made to me when I was 17 years old picking a forever career to apply to college for.  While he had a point, I didn't really care about that stuff, it was nice, but not what made me decide to do it.  I wanted to make a difference.  I was a great student.  I never struggled in school.  My parents supported my many adventures and whims.  I knew that I was going to be able to teach school that it would be easy.  What a shock when I arrived at Gilbert Elementary in Augusta, ME as a long term substitute.  

     The teacher had left mid year to take another position in the district.  The principal warned me of the difficulty of the student combinations in the classroom.   The previous teachers words, "Good luck," with a snide tone haunted my dreams the week approaching the day I would finally have my very own classroom.  To say that I had mixed emotions is an understatement.

     Overlooking the playground my first day on duty, I was in shock as I watched a girl playing jumprope with her friends.  She had a lip ring and was about to be in my fifth grade classroom. Early on, the practice fire drill started a brawl in the back of my classroom.  The tension and hostility between students was such that moving 5 feet to the back of a classroom was a challenge for them.  On another occasion, one student refused work and crawled under the front table.  A student held up the sign saying, "We want Miss ___ back!"   I was in over my head.  Under prepared, emotionally, and physically exhausted so I called my dad crying.  I didn't think I would ever teach another year.  He did not remind me of the summers off, or of the benefits, or that I  would get out at 3:oo, what he did was remind me why I started teaching.  I wanted to make a difference.  

     In order to do that, holding high expectations was key, and never backing down.  I did a lot of collaborating that first half year, as well as taking advantage of every possible professional development there was.  I got together with a fourth grade teacher and she gave me the best behavior plan which reminds me of the principals Kiran Bir Sethi talks about in her TED talk.  She gave me 6 guiding behaviors to encourage students to say, "i can".  Self directed learning, collaborative working, involved citizen, effective communicator, quality producer, and versatile thinker.  Those simple 6 behavior principals paired with positive reinforcement I learned from the book, "Teach like a Champion" made the students empowered to say, "i can".  When the students were done testing me, and were able to trust that I wasn't going away, we were able to finish the year with great successes.  Misconceptions exist about teaching, and therefore it is easy to blame teachers for the struggles of schools. 

As a side note:  Another connection I had to Kiran Bir Sethi's TED talk happened this year.  Three of my students were having trouble making friends, and getting homework done.  They were more attracted to negative attention than positive.  Perhaps confused about what the difference between positive and negative attention looked like.  The students who were doing homework and exerting positive behaviors confessed to me in the mornings that they loved positive attention.   They got to go up in front of the class and say, "I am ____ and I love positive attention."  Just doing that simple thing, convinced 2/3 to start bringing in their homework, and look for ways to attract better attention.  They started to realize that they could do it!

My Inspiration to Teach-- SHARE YOURS!

This week as I was preparing myself for this I was wondering what it could be that I could share with all of you.   I wanted something positive and inspiring.  I was thinking maybe a short poem, quote, song lyric, or even a Shakespearian sonnet.  I looked online and asked friends.  What I came up with was a bunch of cheesy quotes and poems some good, most really bad.   Most overused words like hope, success, aspirations, determination, dreams all words meaningless unless you know how to live life exemplifying them.  This is my journey to becoming a teacher, I hope you will share yours.

A teacher provides the knowledge to live successfully.  Teacher’s invoke hope when all other hope is exhausted.  Dreams are planted in the minds of students across America five days a week eight hours a day.  The job of a teacher is to convey that your experiences tell about who you are and who you can become.  Life will be full of overused words however teachers have the power of inspiring action that fuels our society. 

I then realized that what I could share with you is an educator who taught me how to turn the meaningless words in society into life altering action.  Other than my family my biggest mentor was my third and fourth grade teacher Mrs. Guptill.  She is the woman who taught me that the sun is more than five miles away.  

More than just facts she encouraged my imagination, and individuality she explained to me that sticking up for my beliefs, despite stubborn obstacles, makes me a responsible citizen.  She taught me how to count money denominations yet instilled in me that being a genuine and caring person will get me more than money ever could.

Another lesson that I learned from Mrs. Guptill, which has changed my life thus far, is how much of an impact a teacher has.  From her example I knew I wanted to join the profession of teaching.  I wanted to make more than money; I wanted to make an impact. 

For those of you who are or are becoming a teacher I say good for you.  Don’t let anyone deter you from a profession that is underfunded, underappreciated, and underestimated.   You are more than an evaluation sheet or test score.  Your future and might I add the future of your students is also much more than a state budget liability. 

The purpose of this post is to show the vast support teachers across our community have.  Today we can demonstrate that with comments below about a teacher that positively influenced your life.  Thank you for posting your support below for teachers like Mrs. Guptill and also thank you for caring about all students whom good teaching can influence.

Who Me? Yes You. Couldn't Be! Then WHO?

Public education is failing, or at least that is what you would think in Maine.  "If you want a good education go to private schools. If you can’t afford it, tough luck.” Paul LePage, the governor of Maine, described in a talk at York County Community College.  As a teacher and long time advocate for students and schools, I am hurt, but does he have a point?  Are "WE" failing?  Who is included in this "WE"?  Are the teachers and teacher preparation programs in the state of Maine failing?  Could it be the standards?  Are parents to blame? Do the policy makers need to stand up and take the blame?  Are the kids just lazier today?  The blame sure does get passed around in news and with political figures.  Who or what is failing and how can it be remedied?  Who stole the cookies from the cookie jar?

THE TEACHERS stole the cookies from the cookie jar!

If anyone here is to blame, it must be the teachers.  They have the students after all for 7/8 hours each day in their secluded classrooms.  The problem as Jacobs points out is that teachers are secluded.  Teacher's today do not have say many times about curriculum because they are either to teach to a test, or encourage creativity.  There is hardly room for both as suggested by the Elementary Education: Current Trends article.  Administrators are many times concerned that time for collaboration is code for time off which is simply not the case.  A student that has moved from 4 places in the school year can likely not be taught as well as a student who has been in the classroom year round.    Students that are not coming in with homework done, or studying multiplication facts will not have the same sort of practice or opportunity as a student who does.  A teacher with 10 student in their class will be able to devote more time per child than a teacher with 21 students in their class.  There are ultimately some ineffective teachers, however, with the pay, competition for jobs, and morale of being a teacher today, the job is done out of passion not ignorance or lack of ability.


THE STANDARDS took the cookies from the cookie jar!

I had a major "Ah ha" moment when reading Heidi Hayes Jacobs book Curriculum 21 book when she said at the very beginning, "A prevailing myth is that the standards movement exists to prepare students for their future.  I wonder which particular standards movement we are talking about?...  The disparities between states on the number of standards, the actual standards themselves, and the graduation testing requirements are so vast as to be startling... To be blunt, some tates have lower standards than others."  She is saying that before the Common Core Standards, it has been impossible to compare schools because the curriculum has been inconsistent.  And yet, our policy makers have been comparing schools to other schools, our state to other states, our country to other countries.  It all goes back to the fact that you can't compare apples and oranges.  I would like to add to her point. Just as the the standards are different so are the students. Students all have different needs when it comes to standards, and students need support at home to be successful.

THE STUDENTS took the cookies  from the cookie jar!

It must be those lazy students!  Are students the culprit to a failing US educational system?  Students are complex individuals who have challenges as diverse, if not more diverse, than adults.  From the obvious factor of ability, mental stability, parental support,  interactions with peers, to the less obvious factors such as how their day went, the life of an elementary student trying to find their way in the world can be hectic and unpredictable!  If you were to give the same exact curriculum to the most talented teacher in the world in a class of 21, the outcome would be different every time.  There is no way to make education a factory where the students are "perfect" products who all meet the standard as a result of a hard working teacher.  It is really hard to get someone who is use to the mantra hard work= success to understand that, which is the mantra the country is founded upon.  I think that as a teacher one of the hardest things you have to accept year 1 is that you can't change the lives of everyone in your class.  When applying to jobs and writing scholarship essays in college that is what people wanted to hear.  But, there is too much out of your control to change the lives of every student who walks into your classroom. Not everyone will end up meeting the standards.  The question then becomes is it the parents, the fault of the teacher or the faulty standards?  There are these tests to determine if students are meeting the standards.  Which is great, if the standards apply to that student. Otherwise, the tests are degrading and unnecessary.  The students diversities ultimately stem from the parental differences.  Oh, I got it,

THE PARENTS stole the cookies from the cookie jar!

 Are parents to blame for not supporting children.  After all, students go home to do homework and practice skills from the day.  They are being taught at home more often than they are at school.  It is my opinion that the majority of teaching and learning of a student will be encouraged by the parent.  In my experiences, I did not have the best teachers every single year.  I was not the smartest person.  I had support of my parents, telling me that no matter what, I was going to be successful.  That failing wasn't an option.  In my classroom this is the approach I use.  When reading the article about schools around the world, I appreciated the Japanese model for its parental involvement and building of a community around learners.

THE POLICY MAKERS stole the cookies from the cookie jar!

Should we be looking at policy makers for the answers to education reform?  Does giving schools grades motivate them, especially with a governor who doesn't appreciate Maine schools.  If as a teacher I told a student that there is nothing good about them (Paul Lepage with the quote in the introduction about schools) and that they were failing (the grading system created under his administration) I would /should get fired.  Not only would it be inappropriate, but this is never an approach that I would use in the classroom because it just wouldn't work as a motivator.  Students don't want to hear they are failing and that they are worthless just as teacher and schools don't want to hear they are failing and worthless. It will not solve the problem at hand.  

 It is a reality that the schools, teachers, and students get the majority of the blame in this epic match of finger pointing.  Stop the finger pointing.  Stop bashing the hard work of students, schools, and teacher and instead stand up and make positive collaborative change.  As Loundsbery and Vars state in The Future of Middle Level Education: Optimistic and Pessimistic View, "Resolving conflict demands and and expectations of various stakeholders is a never ending challenge."  but one that needs to be addressed.  I urge law makers, students, and parents to work together with schools.  Actually go into a school and see for yourself the struggles facing schools, students, teachers.  Weigh in with an educated, up to date viewpoint.  

Questions On My Mind About School Districts In Maine

     After researching so many different types of schools and trying to decipher it all, I was really curious to know about other districts and how you all feel about educational political topics that are going on in your districts.  I have included a link to a voicethread that has questions about the important educational political issues in the state of Maine currently.  I hope to get a few either voice, text, or video comments describing your experiences with the issues at hand. It is a respectful forum that supports only professional responses and values all appropriate viewpoints. If you don't have a voicethread account, or would rather respond on this blog, I have typed the questions below.

https://voicethread.com/share/5736008/  

COMMON CORE

1.  How comfortable are you with implementing the common core standards?

2.  How prepared is your district's curriculum with the common core standards?

3.  What is your opinion about the common core?

PROFICIENCY BASED INSTRUCTION

4.  How has proficiency based instruction/grading effected your students?

5.  How has proficiency based instruction/grading effected your classroom?

6.  Has your district encouraged proficiency based instruction/grading, if so, how?

SMARTER BALANCED TESTING

7.  Did your school decide to pilot the smarter balanced testing?  If so, how did it go?

8.  What do you think of the smarter balanced test?  Discuss potential positives and potential challenges surrounding this test.

TEACHER EVALUATION

9.  What would you like to see for teacher evaluation?

10.  How is your district deciding on teacher evaluation?

SCHOOL MODELS (not on the voicethread yet)

11.  What is your feeling about charter schools?  Discuss potential benefits and challenges facing Maine charter schools.

12.  What school model would you support the most?

13.  How do you feel about virtual schools?  Are there some schools that could be virtual and others that could not?

Teaching- The Art of Selling Cars

Week 1:  Blog 1

As I was reading Chapter's 1 & 2 of the book Curriculum 21:  Essential Education for a Changing World Edited by Heidi Hayes Jacobs for my graduate class, I wrote quite a few notes about assessment.  One note I wrote that got me thinking was, "Assessment drives instruction and content."  Being the literal person I am, and being a lover of figurative language, I thought more about the note I had written, and it made me develop a metaphor with cars and education.  My thoughts that follow are all about the metaphor sparked by this weeks reading.  It still could use some developing, but I think I'm on to something.

Teaching-  The Art of Selling Cars

Imagine going to buy a car.  The process starts before you even know you are going to buy with the quirky television commercials, incessant flyers, and radio advertisements claiming that there is no better deal to be had than by that company.  Anyone who went to business school knows that part of the 4 P's of Sale Price, Product, Place, Promotion (we'll return to this later) is advertising.  Advertising is an annoying but necessary tactic for the dealerships to promote product.  Anyway, the day comes when you have squeezed every mile out of that "hooptie" you've had since high school, and are finally going to commit to buying a new/used car.  Cash in hand, you approach the dealership, carefully avoiding hitting the 100,000 dollar cars parked when the dreaded sales people dressed in their fancy suits, and uppity attitudes start to circle you like vultures.  Your adrenaline is at the max, and you palms sweat because you know that whatever price you pay will put you in debt for the next 3 years or so.  Finding that just right car, for the just right price is a hard job to face.  Now the feeling of buying a car can be a trying time because the salesmen are intimidating, and the day requires patience, energy, persistence, and at time disappointment.  This feeling of buying a car is for some students the feeling they get going to school.

Salesman--    As a salesman you are committed (in dealerships by commission) to selling cars quickly and for the highest price possible.  As a teacher you are committed (by a labor of love, and contract) to sell curriculum in order to better the lives of children.  A teachers job is to make someone believe that education is worth the price to pay.  That through effort and hard work, you can be whatever you want.  The same principals our nation is infamous for. Teachers can come off as intimidating, and pompous to some families.  As Jacobs says, "Intellects are scoffed at in the United States."  Many who do not support a public education, or teachers, are intimidated by their intellect, and themselves probably didn't have the best salesteacher.  Teaching and selling are two hard jobs that correlate perfectly.

I have been teaching for 2 1/2 years now, and already I have many examples of how teaching is like selling.  Most recently,  I had a student who was impossible to motivate.  After many IEP meetings, one on one conferences between myself and other support staff, he just wasn't buying his education. He was in Project Pride, Special Education, and even in a morning and afternoon check in program.  As for curriculum variation and modification, I know he couldn't have been bored.  I tried traditional methods, plays, slideshows, typing, podcasts, garage band projects, voicethreads, etc.  What this student was lacking was hope for a "good" product.  He was convinced that his life would be nothing but what his parents had.  When I asked what job he wanted to do he replied, "nothing".  An obvious question to follow was, "How are you going to support yourself?"  to which he said, "My grandparents are going to give me $100 a month to support me."  For this student, education was an impossible sell and it was not because I was a bad salesman.  These cases are few and far between, and as depressing as it is, I know that as a teacher, I did what I could to sell his education.  The role of parents as described below, is an essential component to the public education system.

Another good example of how teaching is like selling, is the book Teach Like A Pirate.  In this book, Dave Burgess tells how to engage students in their learning.  Many hooks he gives are all about presentation, and essentially advertising the product of curriculum.  Why students would want to put in the effort/pay the price when maybe they have no promise of a good product a "good" life.  The advertising must come from home and school both.

Buyer--  The buyer is the student.   Students must choose what they are going to buy into.  In the metaphor students do not have cash to buy a car, but their potential and efforts are used to learn new information in order to gain a better life for themselves.

Advertisement-- The advertisement or lack thereof for students getting an education is for the most part parents.  It is impossible for a teacher to sell an education car without the positive support of parents.  The supports of parents are so helpful to the learning of a child.

• Basic Needs Of Children (To Support Maslow's Base In The Hierarchy of Human Needs)
• Parent Home Communication   (Parent Teacher Conferences/ Answering the Phone)
• Hope For A Prosperous Independent Life   (Without Welfare or Parental Support)
• Positive Daily Communication   (Especially About Their Ability, The School & The Teacher)

Cash-- The cash in this scenario is potential and willingness to learn.  In order to acquire education, students need to have some want, interest, and ability.  If these components are not there, then no "car" can be bought.

The Car-- The just right car is a couple things in this metaphor.  First of all, the most obvious is that it represents the product that is trying to be sold.  It is what students put in effort for which is the promise of a "good life".   A life that supports an independent citizen.

The just right car is also the knowledge acquired shown with assessments which drives students lives after the student leaves the teacher's class.  The car is the content which students are willing to put the time and effort into.  Finding the content that sparks such interest should be the goal of classes curriculum.

The just right car can also be curriculum.  Sometimes the car is hard to sell because it's a piece of junk (let's face it, some curriculum can be boring and harder to sell).  Sometimes learning can be a cadillac.  For example, everyone wants to know how to make a rocket out of a film canister and alkaseltzer tablet.  Learning and teaching about CO2 is not going to be hard to sell with a lesson like that.


THE FOUR P's of SALES

PLACE-  The school and home must both be learning environments for the student to be successful.  The school must have high expectations, and be safe.  The home environment must support homework and practice of school topics, as well as be safe.

PROMOTION-  Promoting comes in the act of selling lessons.  It also comes into play for parents to positively promote schools and teachers.

PRICE-  The price is how much effort a student puts into their education.  The price directly correlates to the quality of the product.

PRODUCT-  The product is not only the assessments and information learned, but also the "good" life which is promised to those who are willing to put in the effort.