Year 1

This will be a short post, but I do want to officially restart this blog. 

I have taken a job as a part time sixth and seventh grade reading teacher in Baltimore County Public Schools at Old Court Middle School officially early today.  Today I signed my contract with BCPS and made the job I have worked for just over two weeks official. 

I start curriculum tomorrow with both grades.  This is continue to be a crazy ride.  I can already tell this is going to be one of the toughest years in which I will have to grow and keep adapting to keep up with my students and colleagues, but it is a challenge I welcome and am prepared to commit to finishing. 

Again I will try to do some post about events which have already occurred.  My year will be told semi-In medias res.

Enjoy ~

Foreign Language, Gym, and ESOL as necessary parts of a school whole

11/21/11

As part of the Johns Hopkins University School of Education partnership with NAF, the interns get a close working relationship with observation and practice with one mentor/lead teacher but also shadow many employees from all across the school so as to have a complete view of what is necessary to run a school in general.  Today, I observed the Foreign Language, Gym, and English for Speakers of Other Languages (or ESOL/ESL) and I will list my impressions below.  All of these classes are outside of the typical core curriculum. Two, foreign language and gym, are electives and ESOL is a supplementary class built to reinforce and encourage students who do not have as strong of a background in English.

Mr. Barnes, the French instructor in NAF high school, runs a strict and very engaging class.  I visited his class first period.  Although it was early, which usually means lower attendance, the room was over half full at the beginning of the period.  Students who came in late mostly joined right into the conversation of the class.  Mr. Barnes began with a drill which he displayed for the class on a board at the front.  He used the techniques of "No Opt Out" and "Cold Calling" to engage his students.  He had a very high expectation for pronunciation which he almost turned into a joke with his humorous mood.  He spoke mostly in French and when a student made a mistake, he demanded the phrase or word be repeated correctly.  If it was a bigger problem, he had the entire class join into the repetition.  He also set expectations and encouraged students before giving an activity, which let them know what to expect and reinforced the fact that they could complete it.  He had a great line which I couldn't help but write down: "Empty wagons make a lot of noise."  With this line, he told his students, if you don't know anything, you will have a lot to say and disturb my class.  With this line and every other behavior, Mr. Barnes demanded attention, participation, and effort.  He even had/has me learning a bit of French asking "comment êtes-vous?"

Next up was Mr. Hines, coach of multiple NAF sports and the Gym teacher.  The class built on skills taught in earlier classes (scaffolding) to prepare the students for the fun activity, Knockout!, which they were then able to take part in with all their content practice.  Immediately upon entering the gym, I remember being surprised by how many students did not change.  Why was this?  Did they forget clothes to change into?  Did they not have the right clothes?  Did they not like the unit (basketball)?  Was there any real consequence for not participating?  When Mr. Hines arrived, one student got a stiff reprimand.  This student was on the basketball team.  After another day of not changing his clothes, Mr. Hines announced the student would not be able to go to practice until he changed (his clothes and his behavior) and participated in gym class.  I viewed this as a great approach.  I am all for extra curricular clubs or sports and believe they are necessary for students to fully reach their potential and fully understand themselves.  However, I also believe it is ridiculous for a student to fail a class ever, but especially when in an extra curricular club or sport. When I was in high school, the cross country team never had a problem with grades, but later I joined the wrestling team, which was fraught with academic problems.

Finally, came Ms. Suniewick's class for ESOL, ELL, and ESL students.  The classroom was one which immersed students in words.  Most every object around the classroom had been labeled with its English name.  This having an immediate identification of everyday objects is so important in learning a language. This approach is useful for any subject, though.  Students need to be immersed in a separate world which has been completely devoted to the subject.  If the class is Post-WWII America, every decoration in the room should point towards that topic.  If the course is Algebra, there should be examples of Algebra being used throughout the room.  The teacher just adds to this even more.  Which is why the teacher should be completely invested in their subject and in their content, all the better to underline its importance.  This can be taken a step further with another big technique which Ms. Suniewick used: relating content to student's experience.  How does Engineering, Technology, Law, and Biology relate to a student's life?  Making those connections is key to engaging the student in the classroom.

There will be more shadowing to come.

Watching Myself Teach

This post will be another part of me writing, planning, facilitating, and reflecting upon the first high school lesson I delivered.  In this piece, I will reflect on the video recording of my teaching.  I will observe and reflect on Mary Ellen's recording as it occurs chronologically.  The clip can be seen here: http://sharing.theflip.com/session/385045e7ffad0c0d9b10049f03803801/video/124472831

As I pose a question to the class there are two reactions: one of possible avoidance and one of eager excitement to contribute.  Off to my left is a student whose wide eyes shaded by his hand suggest he does not want to answer.  This occurrence suggests I need to work the room a bit more.  More students need to be engaged, not just those who volunteer.  The clip shows me moving around the room pretty well, possibly I could use this mobility to engage students who are reluctant to volunteer.

The eager excitement was the other extreme reaction to the question.  I have written about maintaining current volunteers while encouraging new voices here.  I will continue to use those strategies and explore new ones.  I also need to make sure I survey the entire classroom.  In reviewing the clip, I noticed a student who may have been outside of my range of sight raised his hand.  I should work towards decreasing my blind spots.  This reduction can be helped by my pacing around the room.

Another one of Lemov's glorified techniques is "Right is Right."  Too often teachers accept an answer which is 80% or less completely correct while they supply the rest of the answer.  This technique holds that teachers should push students to the completely correct answer.  I strove for this when I praised students for the evidence they had discovered, but also pushed them to search for deeper connects which specifically answered my question.  I used the phrase, "would anyone like to add to that?"  This congratulated the student who had already contributed yet left the door open for further/deeper answers.

This is the first time I have seen myself teach.  I appreciate how, upon reviewing the clip, I can review my blind spots.  I can also take note of what I believe is going well and what was not successful so as to increase the appearance of the former and dampen the effect of the latter.  Hopefully my next recording will have more interaction and feedback from the students and less blind spots.  If you notice anything which I have not written about, please add your observations and perspective below.

"Mister, you look like..."

I don't know what it is, but my students are all really ready to compare me to other people.  "Oh mister you look like..." "He looks like..."  Here are some examples of celebrities I seem to appear similar to: Dirk Nowitzki, Prince William, that guy from Coldplay (Chris Martin), Napoleon Dynamite, Ken (like Barbie's...friend, the Ken doll), and a Ralph Lauren model.  Some of these comparisons I encourage (the Ralph Lauren one and the Prince William relation especially), others I mock (I dressed as Ken for Halloween), and still others annoy and shock me (Napoleon Dynamite).

I'm sure this is done for many reasons.  The joy and game of the comparison.  The joke which can then be passed from student to student.  But also, as part of it.  I believe there is a connection to a larger world by relating those one sees every day to celebrities from the entertainment sphere.  There is almost a connection to that other world.

The most important part is just to have fun with it.  I think I did this pretty well when a student asked, "can I call you Dirk Nowitzki," to which I replied, "only if I can call you Darko Milicic."

The Right Kind of Crazy

10/25/11

Today a student said something inappropriate and my co-teacher and I had completely different ideas about how to deal with the situation.  As I circulated throughout the classroom, my teacher sat up front getting ready to begin the lesson.  While the students were still coming in, a student was at his seat mumbling.  As I passed him, he said something along the lines, man I do whatever the fuck I want.  Immediately I asked, "what was that?"  He responded, "That wasn't me it was my, eh, twin."

This retort threw me into a bit of a fury.  I know what he said, he knew what he said, yet he wouldn't own up to it.  Saying it at all in class was disrespectful; lying about who said it or what was said added another layer of disrespect to the situation.  I would not stand for such things in the classroom.  There would be respect in the classroom if I had anything to say about it.  I had been told I needed to assert myself more, here was a perfect opportunity, or so I misguidedly thought.

As I drew in a deep breathe with which I would reprimand the youngster, my co-teacher said something which made me stop.  Just as I was about to give the student a lecture he probably wouldn't have listened to, my co-teacher said, "well can you make sure your twin doesn't come back."  Boom.  Mind...blown.  Feeding into this alternate reality the student had created, she corrected the behavior playful.  They both knew what he said was unacceptable.  The student also knew she had heard it.  However, he didn't need a lecture, just a reminder.  Her approach allowed the student to save face and be able to participate for the rest of class without being defensive.  This approach was completely different than the lecture I was about to expound upon which would have had very different ramifications.

There is a certain level of craziness teachers need to have to work in a middle school.  This is probably why there are so few teachers who want to work in middle schools.  While balancing the ridiculous load which middle school teachers take care of, a dash of oddity is the necessary element to working successfully with middle school students.  If I had gone on to give my tirade, I almost assuredly would have gone home with a headache.  Whereas my co-teacher made it a non-issue, steering a wide berth between herself and a headache while tending to the situation at hand.

If anyone else has examples of that touch of oddity which is so necessary especially for middle school teachers, but probably for teachers in general, please comment your anecdotes at the bottom.

take about Tavis who used some bad language
then said "that wasn't me who said that, it was my twin"
and ms karre saying oh well tell him to go away

Game and Challenge Based Learning

Playing games is one of the activities which most stimulates people.  I believe this is because they are at a heightened level of activation.  To play a game (well), participants must understand the rules and know how they can best achieve the end despite opponents or obstacles.  Everyone likes achieving success and winning (Charlie Sheen more than most) so there is also the thrill of anticipation and excitement for a participant of a game.  Whether the motivating factor for gamers is meeting a challenge, working with a collaborative group, or taking part in an exciting - dare I say "epic" to use Jane McGonigal's terminology from her Ted Talk - storyline there is something about games which doesn't always translate to life outside of the game.

I will return to McGonigal later in this post, but first I want to talk about a challenge I had given to my brother and I by my father.  The game was Ping Pong.  We had had a Ping Pong table in the basement, but it didn't get too much use after the initial excitement of getting a new "toy."  Shortly after my father introduced the game and how to play to my brother and I, we degenerated into attacking each other and draining any fun out of the game.  The two of us got so wrapped up in goofing off or attacking each other that the game was not fun at all for any of the three of us.  Luckily Dad had a solution.

In a true game-based learning approach, he designed two challenges for us to complete.  One challenge was an individual while the other was a cooperative challenge.  The first challenge was to bounce the Ping Pong ball 100 times consecutively on a Ping Pong paddle.  The explicit goal was five crisp dollars; the implicit goals however are more interesting to consider, and I haven't considered them until now.  My Dad used this individual challenge as a way for us to have self-motivated discipline which were lacking and would need to harness to productively play the game.  It was also a clearly defined goal (bounce ball 100 times) which could be met with perseverance and practice.  My younger brother completed this before me which got me even more focused on finishing it.  Finally, we both completed the challenge.  Then, in true keeping with excellent teaching techniques (note: my father is not a teacher, he just does some things good teachers could learn from), he stepped up the challenge which now required us to bounce the ball on the paddle while flipping the paddle between each bounce for another 100 times.  Scaffolding!!!!  Quicker this time, we both met this challenge as well.

After completing the individual challenge, we were now ready for the cooperative challenge.  The cooperative challenge was for my brother and I to hit the ping pong ball back and forth across the table ten times each (20 hits total).  We played together getting one to three hits off, but not quite making it up too much past that point at first.  We would either get excited by opportunities to beat each other, or got over-excited and hit the ball too hard.  To keep the fun going, my brother and I wouldn't just hit back and forth on the table, we would play the ball off the wall.  This fun helped push us over into the money zone.  Finally, after a some hours of practice, we had it.  We had a few more trial runs with at least 20 strokes before inviting dad in for the final assessment.  We got it on the first try.  After that, he joined in the game and we all played together.

The same principals my dad applied, were also applied by McGonigal.  She and her team designed ways for players to work on real world problems using all the components of game-based learning.  What she got were some very powerful results.  What if this were applied to the education students receive in the classroom?  What if this kind of learning was a direct pipeline from high school to the job market or more challenging projects in post-secondary study?  The results could be epic.

Variations between High School and Middle School: Misbehavior

In another installment of my series focusing on the similarities and differences between middle school and high school, I bring you my thoughts on misbehavior.  Many misbehavior problems can be solved by engaging students in interesting content.  I talk about motivation in my post titled, "Need for Motivation."  However, I see a many difference in the main off-task behaviors of students in middle school versus students in high school.

In middle school the off-task behaviors seem to be much more active than their high school counterparts.  When off-task, middle school students are apt to get up and move around the classroom.  They are more likely to physically pester their classmates.  In middle school, the trend seems to be more active, physical disturbances.  The work for a teacher of middle school students hoping to correct misbehavior seems to be redirection; taking all the energy and excitement students have and focusing it more on the content.

In high school, the students' off-task behaviors seem to be much more passive and related more towards apathy and inattention.  They are much more likely to sleep in class, much more likely to stare off, or quietly draw or write something unrelated to the content.  The high school students, when off task, seem so disconnected from the work.  For teachers of high school students, the corrective work seems to be in motivation and creating personal connections to the work.

I spoke about motivation here.  If you have any suggestions for redirecting middle school students, helping to motivate high school students, or general thoughts on the subject, please post them below.