10,000 Hours to be a Teacher

The article I will be referring to throughout this piece can be found here: http://bruceelkin.hubpages.com/hub/10-000-Hours--The-Awesome-Power-of-Practice

How long does it take to become a master at a given skill?  Days?  Years?  A Lifetime?  Bruce Elkin’s article posits that time-frame to be at 10,000 hours devoted to a specific skill for someone to gain master of it.  He mentions Olympic athletes, authors, and martial artists who each have devoted this much time to achieve the level of mastery they are at currently.  He also claims there is a necessary mindset, the “Growth Mindset,” and necessary attributes to get to the coveted level of mastery: passion, practice, and persistence.  This “Growth Mindset” centers on a person’s drive focusing on growth at all costs, they are not afraid to appear weak or ineffective by admitting their shortcomings.  People with this mindset would rather get the help they need to push their skill to the next level than pretend to know what they are doing until they slowly pick it up on their own.

Geffory Canada, an amazing educator, reformer, and CEO of Harlem Kids Zone, spoke to this point in the documentary Waiting for Superman when he said it takes about five years to make a master teacher.  The first year a novice teacher is putting theory into practice.  The second and third years recent teachers begin to find their routine and couple theory and practice.  By years four and five the emerging teacher can effectively and efficiently run their classroom and be a force for their students.  Looking at the numbers:

180 school days X  4 or 5 hours facilitating a lesson per day = 720/900

5 years of teaching X 720/900 facilitation hours per year = 3600/4500

Added to this are professional development sessions, planning/reflection periods during the day and at home, student teaching (at least a semester ~360/450 hours), and roughly 40 credit hours of undergraduate or graduate courses (and for each credit hour, two hours per week of instruction and two hours per week of practice for 15 week semesters thus 40 X 2 X 2 X15 = 2400 hours).  This also does not include any summer work to enhance a teacher’s practice. 

All put together, even on the low end, there are well over 7,000 hours a teacher puts in from the time he or she enters a credential program until the end of their fifth year.  Probably more time and energy spent by those who have a “Growth Mindset” and pursue their career development with passion, practice, and persistence. 

I believe I have the necessary growth mindset and love surrounding myself with experts who can teach me something about their own practice which I can then incorporate into my own.  However, I believe I need to be much more focused with my practice.  I need to lay out clear, specific goals so I can diligently pursue them.  Elkin suggests four questions or activities necessary to move a novice closer to mastery.  I will attend to these activities in forthcoming posts.  These questions/activities are:

• List three reasons why they thought it is important to think that ability can be developed;

• Bring to mind an area where they had developed an ability, and explain how they made the changes involved;

• Email a hypothetical protégé describing how ability can be developed, and

• Recall examples of when they saw someone else learn to do something they did not think that person could do. And then think about how that learning happened, and what it means.

New Era of Teaching: Reading as Homework

Traditionally, classrooms are where students are given knowledge about various content areas and at home they practice what they have learned.  In theory, this is a great model.  When there is an available expert (the teacher) then the content should be worked through, whereas when there is no guarantee for an expert to be available (after school) then a neophyte should develop and work to internalize what they have already been given.

But what if that content hasn't made a deep enough impact before the student leaves the classroom?  What if they did not comprehend the material for whatever reason?  If a student does not understand the material, homework will only increase their frustration level and discourage their self-esteem further.  For students who are grade levels behind in reading, this is frequently the case.  They may already find being in school frustrating and assigning more homework will extend their time doing something they do not like, which in turn will turn them further away from school. 

There are other negative effects of having homework than those which directly affect the students.  In his article "Boosting Schools' Value Without Spending a Dime," Jay Mathews called for schools to "throw away the expensive take-home textbooks, the boring worksheets" because "eliminating traditional homework...will save paper, reduce textbook losses, and sweeten home life."  Financially, it makes sense for the schools/school districts and for the students.

There is a problem though, parents are unaware of these facts.  Parents are very used to their children having homework.  Working with their child on his or her homework may be the method some parents have for checking their child pays attention at school and comprehends what is happening there.

The dated practice of assigning unhelpful homework in large quantities has such a negative impact, however, there are other ways we as educators can encourage learning while preparing our students for the coming lesson.  Mathews suggest instead of traditional homework "students should be asked instead to read something, maybe with their parents."  Revolutionary.  Go home and read.  My co-teacher subscribes to this train of thought and the students in our class are asked to choose any book they would like from our library of over 2000 books at the back of the room and read for a half hour every day.  Our students' reading ability ranges from third to ninth grade.  The best way to advance one's reading ability is through the practice of reading.  By assigning reading of any book, we can differentiate the reading lesson to keep each student in their own personal challenge zone. 

An elementary school in Gaithersburg has implemented this practice school-wide.  Mathews followed up the "Boosting" article with this piece which looks at how this practice will work at Gaithersburg Elementary.  We see the negative parental reaction, but there is also the hope this will encourage students to be better independent readers.

Here are some other alternative approaches to handing out worksheets or assigning blanket assignments to an entire class drawn from the author and lecturer Alfie Kohn's article "Rethinking Homework."  First, make sure the assignments are effective and the quantity is not overwhelming.  Second, teachers should only assign what they design.  This seemingly goes against the idea of collaboration between high functioning teachers who share lesson plans and assignments.  This collaboration can and should still take place, but they should be adapted to the needs of the particular students.  Speaking of students, third, involve the students in what they believe should be their homework.

Encouraging New Voices without Losing Current Voices

This topic has been buzzing through my mind for awhile now.  I have four to six students per class who will raise their hands to participate pretty much regardless of what information I ask the class to volunteer.  Many of these confident volunteers tend to get the questions right while others are okay with publicly working through a question.  This is great and I am grateful to these students who I know I can always count on to participate and stave off the empty stares.

However, I have this crazy dedication to the other 4/5 of the class who either rarely volunteer or are off task.  To encourage the other students to participate, I have been using a few approaches.  First, I have literally said, "thank you for helping us out so much already, but I would like to hear from someone new."  Half of the time the overzealous students accept this, but increasingly, students who are quick to raise their hand are also quick to disengage when not called upon.  My co-teacher and I have underscored the point that we really appreciate them having answered as much as they did, but we need to make sure everyone understands as well as they do.  We have also highlighted the fact that we will look for another student for this question, but may call on them for another question. 

Still, we have been met with dramatic reactions in which students claim they will not participate and then focus on something else at their desk.  I have also tried a bit of "cold calling," a technique in Lemov's Teach Like a Champion, but have met some resistance to this approach.  This technique is purported to be the best by Lemov so there must be something to it.  I found this video displaying the "cold calling" technique, but this raises more questions, such as why are they standing. 

I want to bring the rest of the class to the participation level of these few instead of unwittingly giving negative reinforcement to the few of those who actively participate.  I welcome all suggestions on better strategies or approaches on how better to do as the title suggests, involve new students without losing the interest/engagement of those who are already raising their hands.