From the title of the post, it should be obvious that I don't believe in making New Year's Resolutions. I'm certain I've mentioned it in previous years, but I've never really explained why. It isn't because I don't believe in self-improvement. Quite the opposite. It's because I do.
Reason 1: New Year's Isn't Real
I know it bothers some people when I say this, but New Year's isn't real. There is no religious or culturally significant event that we mark on December 31st. It astounds me that once a year, we throw huge parties that celebrate nothing happening. The people that are offended by this statement usually tell me how it is the only holiday that everyone on earth celebrates. That makes it sillier. The entire world has agreed that there is something to celebrate when there is not. Yes, the earth has successfully made a lap around the sun, but that is no more true on December 31 than it is on February 3 or September 9. The fact that the calendar used to begin on April 1 proves that this is a completely arbitrary date. Therefore, making resolutions in celebration of this non-event is silly.
Reason 2: You are Knowingly Lying to Yourself
Starting on December 26th, all the morning shows start talking about resolutions and give tips on how to keep them for a little longer than you have before. Articles start popping up on social media about why resolutions are so hard to keep. Go the gym January 3, and you will find triple the number of people as if you visit on February 20. I actually heard someone on the radio two days ago say, "Resolutions are meant to be broken." While finding that statement bothersome, I also recognized that she's right. People who make resolutions aren't actually operating with a belief that they will keep them. They know that the average resolution is broken by the third week of January, so they congratulate themselves if they actually make until the beginning of February.
Reason 3: Self-Improvement Should Happen All Year
When you identify a problem in yourself, start taking steps to fix that day. Whether the recognition comes June 4 or October 12, immediately is the time to stop doing that bad habit or start doing a new one. Putting it off until the new year is proof that you don't really want to address it. If you actually wanted to lose weight, stop smoking, curse less, or save money, you would. You would do it at the time you identified that there was a problem.
Self-improvement matters, and it matters too much to wait until the "new year" and make resolutions you have no intention of keeping.
Saturday, December 30, 2017
Monday, December 18, 2017
Reading for the Joy of Reading
When I was a child, I was a voracious reader. I read everything I could get my hands on. If there wasn't a book around, I'd read a cereal box. I didn't care; I just loved reading. I stopped reading Sweet Valley High books somewhere around #118. Books that were assigned at school were great. Books I chose myself were better. I recognized the value of books I ended up hating, like Great Expectations and Lord of the Flies, because there is a difference between appreciating and enjoying.
What makes a child love to read? As with all things, there are multitudes of nature and nurture theories. Most of those can be debunked as sole explanations when looking at siblings. I think it is probably, like most things, a combination of multiple things in a child's life - parents, home, siblings, school, friends, and personality.
I do believe the research backs up one thing, however, that could break a child's love of reading. If you want your child to remain a reader, don't tell them not to read the things they love. You can give them additional worthy choices without taking other choices away. As I said earlier, I read 118 Sweet Valley High books. Am I little embarrassed by this as a 41-year-old woman? Sure. They are formulaic and silly, and it took me way too long to figure that out. However, if somewhere along the way, someone had said to me, "Don't read that silly nonsense," it likely would not have been replaced by literature. It likely would not have been replaced at all. Instead, I had some wonderful teachers who said, "You like to read? That's great. Have you tried reading this?" Then, they recommended some wonderful books. While I was reading Sweet Valley High, I was also reading CS Lewis, Francis Schaeffer, and a crazy long book called Nicholas and Alexandra, all in the 7th and 8th grades and all at the recommendation of teachers who inspired more reading rather than less.
If your child likes comic books and graphic novels, that is awesome. Google which ones are the best. You may not know that there are graphic versions of everything from The Metamorphosis to Sense and Sensibility (see this list from Goodreads). If the story captures them, one day, your child may reach out and read the literary versions, but even if they don't, they now have absorbed a classic story they wouldn't have if someone had told them not to read it. If you want to expand their reading to higher levels, look for a book on Amazon, and then see what recommendations it has. Your local librarian, whether at school or in a public library, lives to recommend books. Go in and say, "My child likes X-Men. I'd like him to read something at a higher level. Can you recommend?" That librarian will be thrilled to give you a dozen recommendations of books with similar themes across a wide variety of levels. As I tell my students, they have a Master's degree in recommending stuff. The way to get them reading better things is to expand their options, not decrease them. Please expand and raise your child's awareness of better books by providing them with more options. Please do not tell a child that their tastes are wrong just because they are young.
I write this because I have spent the past three days sitting in a classroom with students who are finishing their midterms at different times. In each class, about 75% of my students have a book under their chair. As soon as they turn in their exam, they pick up where they left off in the books they chose to bring with them. From Harry Potter to Wonder to the latest John Green novel, my kids are reading, not books they have been assigned, but books they have chosen. I even saw someone reading the Collected Works of HP Lovecraft a few days ago. Lovecraft, for heaven's sake. I didn't even know he existed until I was an adult. GRACE students are readers, and I believe it is because most of their teachers are readers. I try to remember that much of my middle school reading was because a teacher I liked told me about a book they liked. I tell them what I read over the summer. When I see them reading a school book that I also read, I tell them my memories of reading it. When they have a Shakespear play in hand, I tell them about my favorites, which are Julius Ceasar and Othello. When we, as teachers, tell them about our favorite books, they see that reading isn't just something to do for assignments. They see that we speak of reading with joy, not dread. Hopefully, they see that we are never too old to read for the joy of it.
Stop unrecommending books (I'm pretty certain that isn't a word, but Grammarly is letting me get away with it). Recommend them.
What makes a child love to read? As with all things, there are multitudes of nature and nurture theories. Most of those can be debunked as sole explanations when looking at siblings. I think it is probably, like most things, a combination of multiple things in a child's life - parents, home, siblings, school, friends, and personality.
I do believe the research backs up one thing, however, that could break a child's love of reading. If you want your child to remain a reader, don't tell them not to read the things they love. You can give them additional worthy choices without taking other choices away. As I said earlier, I read 118 Sweet Valley High books. Am I little embarrassed by this as a 41-year-old woman? Sure. They are formulaic and silly, and it took me way too long to figure that out. However, if somewhere along the way, someone had said to me, "Don't read that silly nonsense," it likely would not have been replaced by literature. It likely would not have been replaced at all. Instead, I had some wonderful teachers who said, "You like to read? That's great. Have you tried reading this?" Then, they recommended some wonderful books. While I was reading Sweet Valley High, I was also reading CS Lewis, Francis Schaeffer, and a crazy long book called Nicholas and Alexandra, all in the 7th and 8th grades and all at the recommendation of teachers who inspired more reading rather than less.
If your child likes comic books and graphic novels, that is awesome. Google which ones are the best. You may not know that there are graphic versions of everything from The Metamorphosis to Sense and Sensibility (see this list from Goodreads). If the story captures them, one day, your child may reach out and read the literary versions, but even if they don't, they now have absorbed a classic story they wouldn't have if someone had told them not to read it. If you want to expand their reading to higher levels, look for a book on Amazon, and then see what recommendations it has. Your local librarian, whether at school or in a public library, lives to recommend books. Go in and say, "My child likes X-Men. I'd like him to read something at a higher level. Can you recommend?" That librarian will be thrilled to give you a dozen recommendations of books with similar themes across a wide variety of levels. As I tell my students, they have a Master's degree in recommending stuff. The way to get them reading better things is to expand their options, not decrease them. Please expand and raise your child's awareness of better books by providing them with more options. Please do not tell a child that their tastes are wrong just because they are young.
I write this because I have spent the past three days sitting in a classroom with students who are finishing their midterms at different times. In each class, about 75% of my students have a book under their chair. As soon as they turn in their exam, they pick up where they left off in the books they chose to bring with them. From Harry Potter to Wonder to the latest John Green novel, my kids are reading, not books they have been assigned, but books they have chosen. I even saw someone reading the Collected Works of HP Lovecraft a few days ago. Lovecraft, for heaven's sake. I didn't even know he existed until I was an adult. GRACE students are readers, and I believe it is because most of their teachers are readers. I try to remember that much of my middle school reading was because a teacher I liked told me about a book they liked. I tell them what I read over the summer. When I see them reading a school book that I also read, I tell them my memories of reading it. When they have a Shakespear play in hand, I tell them about my favorites, which are Julius Ceasar and Othello. When we, as teachers, tell them about our favorite books, they see that reading isn't just something to do for assignments. They see that we speak of reading with joy, not dread. Hopefully, they see that we are never too old to read for the joy of it.
Stop unrecommending books (I'm pretty certain that isn't a word, but Grammarly is letting me get away with it). Recommend them.
Wednesday, December 13, 2017
Exams - Change Your Outlook
When exam time approaches, teachers and students alike tend to view it rather negatively. At best, we view it as a necessary evil. At worst, we view it as torture on the level of being punched in the face repeatedly for a couple of weeks. Neither of these perspectives nor the spectrum between them provides for quality learning or joy.
In my classes, we read a little Scripture at the beginning of each period. Right now, we are reading through the book of Mark because it is my favorite Gospel. Yesterday, we read the passage in which Jesus tells us that the most important command is to "love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength." I've been a Christian for 36 years, so this is not the first time I've studied this verse, but because I was reading it to a class, it struck me as related to academic pursuits more than it usually does.
Scholarship is an act of worship. Whether you are studying science, math, history, English, foreign language, or anything else, you are studying God's work. He speaks through His creation, and when you study it to the best of your abilities, you honor Him. Changing your view of the work He has put before you will make you learn it better, but it will also give you more joy in the learning.
Christian teachers, please do not present exams or any kind of work to your students as drudgery. They see what you model, and if you work with a poor attitude, they will too. Present exams as a sacrifice to the Lord. They will find meaning in it when they do.
In my classes, we read a little Scripture at the beginning of each period. Right now, we are reading through the book of Mark because it is my favorite Gospel. Yesterday, we read the passage in which Jesus tells us that the most important command is to "love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength." I've been a Christian for 36 years, so this is not the first time I've studied this verse, but because I was reading it to a class, it struck me as related to academic pursuits more than it usually does.
Scholarship is an act of worship. Whether you are studying science, math, history, English, foreign language, or anything else, you are studying God's work. He speaks through His creation, and when you study it to the best of your abilities, you honor Him. Changing your view of the work He has put before you will make you learn it better, but it will also give you more joy in the learning.
Christian teachers, please do not present exams or any kind of work to your students as drudgery. They see what you model, and if you work with a poor attitude, they will too. Present exams as a sacrifice to the Lord. They will find meaning in it when they do.
Saturday, December 9, 2017
Priorities
If you are a regular reader of this blog, you may have noticed that I had not yet posted this week. Normally, I post on Monday or Tuesday. This was a particularly busy week. Christmas is, of course, busy for everyone.
For secondary teachers, it is also exam time. Our exams were due last week. Once we got approval for them, we make the key and copy them because they are due to our special needs team soon. It was also Christmas concert time. Our school has an exceptional fine arts program, so we have two concerts, one for chorus and band and the other for dance, theater, and strings. For my students to properly prepare for exams, I need to get everything graded and back to them for study use. And, of course, you still have all the regular duties that you always have. These aren't complaints. It's just an exceptionally busy time of year.
This brings me to the point of this post. It may not be possible to get everything done that you want to during a week like this. That means, it is important to prioritize your to do list. Some items matter more because they have due dates, and some matter more because they are very important. Some of the tasks can wait. In this particular week, writing my blog post was the thing that could wait.
If you are a teacher, taking ten minutes to make a list and number in order of priority is well worth your time. Giving yourself a break on the last items helps too.
For secondary teachers, it is also exam time. Our exams were due last week. Once we got approval for them, we make the key and copy them because they are due to our special needs team soon. It was also Christmas concert time. Our school has an exceptional fine arts program, so we have two concerts, one for chorus and band and the other for dance, theater, and strings. For my students to properly prepare for exams, I need to get everything graded and back to them for study use. And, of course, you still have all the regular duties that you always have. These aren't complaints. It's just an exceptionally busy time of year.
This brings me to the point of this post. It may not be possible to get everything done that you want to during a week like this. That means, it is important to prioritize your to do list. Some items matter more because they have due dates, and some matter more because they are very important. Some of the tasks can wait. In this particular week, writing my blog post was the thing that could wait.
If you are a teacher, taking ten minutes to make a list and number in order of priority is well worth your time. Giving yourself a break on the last items helps too.
Sunday, November 26, 2017
More Complex Than a Tweet
I have refrained, until now, from commenting in any way on the #metoo fad, largely because it is just that, an internet fad. Like any other internet fad, the desire to participate in a fad clouds the real purpose and dilutes any effect it could have. People who didn't care before it became a fad are unlikely to care about it later. Case and point: I know a lot of people who poured buckets of ice water over their head, and not one of them can tell you the current state of ALS research. This issue requires a depth of thought, endurance, compassion, legal action, and honest reflection. These are not qualities we find in a fad.
Sexual harassment is a thorny and complex issue that cannot be addressed in a tweet, and it deserves more than a two-word hashtag. In my attempt to process it, I have had many thoughts. What you see below is my attempt to deal with those thoughts. Many of them are incomplete, some may be contradictory as I attempt to sort them out in my own mind, and they are listed in no particular order.
1. This is clearly a widespread problem. When you look at the diversity of people who have been accused and their accusers, the case cannot be made that this is a one-sided, agenda-driven issue. Roy Moore and John Conyers fall into this bucket with Harvey Weinstein and Al Franken (and let's not forget, this list started with Bill Cosby a few years ago and now includes Charlie Rose). Some people are excusing everyone on their side of the political spectrum while vilifying those on the other side. This is the worst kind of moral relativism. It's wrong no matter who is doing it.
2. Everyone has a right to due process. The reflex to invoke innocent until proven guilty is tricky. It is an important legal concept when we are talking about convicting someone of a crime, but it is being applied in a non-legal context. The accused has a right to due process, but so does the accuser. Those who are touting "innocent until proven guilty" on Twitter don't have a problem assuming the victims are guilty until proven innocent. If you are going to be intellectually honest, you can't default to believing the accused or the accuser. Credibility needs to be assessed.
3. All accusations are not created equal. I am not a fan of Al Franken (well, okay, I liked him on SNL), but it is concerning when his actions are put in the same category with child molestation. They are not the same. They are both wrong, but they would be treated quite differently in a court of law. Part of the problem with the hashtag is that it made all stories equal. Some women have suffered greatly while others have felt uncomfortable that someone they didn't like flirted with them. In the hashtag world, these women have the same story and get the same number of hearts and comments. The hashtag may show how widespread the problem is, but it only shows how wide. If women told the actual stories, we would see how deep this problem is for some.
4. All forms of sexual harassment are wrong - physical, visual, and verbal. One of the reasons I am finally blogging about this was a conversation that happened at Thanksgiving. A man at the table said he couldn't believe there was a man who was being accused of only gestures. "I mean this is just too far," he said. "He didn't even touch anyone." I just sort of stared at him because I couldn't figure out how to respond. Would he really be okay with it if his wife went to work, and a co-worker made lewd gestures at her? I don't think so; I think he would want that man killed. This applies to words as well. I punish students for making "69" jokes, and I wouldn't want a co-worker making them either. If we don't draw a line until there is physical contact, you are looking to create a very hostile work environment (and not just for women).
5. Sexual harassment training is a stupid solution. No one who is doing this would stop if they sat through a seminar. They aren't ignorant; they are immoral.
6. It's not all men. It's not all women. Not all men are guilty of harassment. Some men are clumsy flirters; some are socially awkward. Many men are professional and supportive of their female colleagues. Most are just trying to live their lives. It's not all men. It's also not all women. One of the problems I have had from the beginning of this discussion is the implication (and at times outright statement) that ALL women have experienced harassment. It's simply not true. There is no hashtag for #notme, and there won't be one, but maybe there should be. Maybe some women should start sharing their stories of supportive men in their lives and show what right treatment looks like. Too many women have experienced horrific treatment, but lumping all stories together is wrong. Advancing the belief that all women have been victims of all men creates a predator v. prey environment. I don't think anyone wants that.
I don't know that I have put all of my thoughts into words very well, but I do think we can see that they won't fit into 280 characters. If you are going to reflect well, yours won't either.
Sexual harassment is a thorny and complex issue that cannot be addressed in a tweet, and it deserves more than a two-word hashtag. In my attempt to process it, I have had many thoughts. What you see below is my attempt to deal with those thoughts. Many of them are incomplete, some may be contradictory as I attempt to sort them out in my own mind, and they are listed in no particular order.
1. This is clearly a widespread problem. When you look at the diversity of people who have been accused and their accusers, the case cannot be made that this is a one-sided, agenda-driven issue. Roy Moore and John Conyers fall into this bucket with Harvey Weinstein and Al Franken (and let's not forget, this list started with Bill Cosby a few years ago and now includes Charlie Rose). Some people are excusing everyone on their side of the political spectrum while vilifying those on the other side. This is the worst kind of moral relativism. It's wrong no matter who is doing it.
2. Everyone has a right to due process. The reflex to invoke innocent until proven guilty is tricky. It is an important legal concept when we are talking about convicting someone of a crime, but it is being applied in a non-legal context. The accused has a right to due process, but so does the accuser. Those who are touting "innocent until proven guilty" on Twitter don't have a problem assuming the victims are guilty until proven innocent. If you are going to be intellectually honest, you can't default to believing the accused or the accuser. Credibility needs to be assessed.
3. All accusations are not created equal. I am not a fan of Al Franken (well, okay, I liked him on SNL), but it is concerning when his actions are put in the same category with child molestation. They are not the same. They are both wrong, but they would be treated quite differently in a court of law. Part of the problem with the hashtag is that it made all stories equal. Some women have suffered greatly while others have felt uncomfortable that someone they didn't like flirted with them. In the hashtag world, these women have the same story and get the same number of hearts and comments. The hashtag may show how widespread the problem is, but it only shows how wide. If women told the actual stories, we would see how deep this problem is for some.
4. All forms of sexual harassment are wrong - physical, visual, and verbal. One of the reasons I am finally blogging about this was a conversation that happened at Thanksgiving. A man at the table said he couldn't believe there was a man who was being accused of only gestures. "I mean this is just too far," he said. "He didn't even touch anyone." I just sort of stared at him because I couldn't figure out how to respond. Would he really be okay with it if his wife went to work, and a co-worker made lewd gestures at her? I don't think so; I think he would want that man killed. This applies to words as well. I punish students for making "69" jokes, and I wouldn't want a co-worker making them either. If we don't draw a line until there is physical contact, you are looking to create a very hostile work environment (and not just for women).
5. Sexual harassment training is a stupid solution. No one who is doing this would stop if they sat through a seminar. They aren't ignorant; they are immoral.
6. It's not all men. It's not all women. Not all men are guilty of harassment. Some men are clumsy flirters; some are socially awkward. Many men are professional and supportive of their female colleagues. Most are just trying to live their lives. It's not all men. It's also not all women. One of the problems I have had from the beginning of this discussion is the implication (and at times outright statement) that ALL women have experienced harassment. It's simply not true. There is no hashtag for #notme, and there won't be one, but maybe there should be. Maybe some women should start sharing their stories of supportive men in their lives and show what right treatment looks like. Too many women have experienced horrific treatment, but lumping all stories together is wrong. Advancing the belief that all women have been victims of all men creates a predator v. prey environment. I don't think anyone wants that.
I don't know that I have put all of my thoughts into words very well, but I do think we can see that they won't fit into 280 characters. If you are going to reflect well, yours won't either.
Tuesday, November 14, 2017
The Ministry of Normal
If your student has an emotional problem, relationship problem, or drug problem, I am probably not the teacher they talk to about it. There's usually another teacher for that, the teacher who has students in their room during lunch or for hours after school. It's not that I can't or won't listen. I am open to discussing these issues with any student. I am not, however, the teacher that they come to. Instead, I have the ministry of normal.
When I have had difficulties, I often found solace in going to work, grading papers, and planning lessons. Days off were often the hardest times because that was when I had too much time to think. Doing normal things was the most comfortable (and, therefore, comforting) activity. When you are having a difficult time in your personal life, one of the best things for you can be to have some part of your life where you don't think about that problem. It reminds you that the issue does not encompass your entire life.
In my nineteen years of teaching, I have taught through gun threats, September 11, the death of former students, the heartbreak of unrequited love, the diagnoses of colleagues, and many other traumas for both students and myself. During these times, I have, of course, acknowledged the problem and told my students that I am available to them for whatever they needed; but then I taught them the same lesson I would have on any other day. I assigned homework (although I probably accepted it late from those who needed time to deal). When I had a student who was crying so hard she couldn't breathe, I asked her to tell me about her pet snake. Years after a shooter threat (during my second year teaching), several former students told me that they felt safest while they were in my class that day. Many of their other teachers had cried through the day or talked to them about it the whole time. I had gone in and said, "There is a plan. I will tell you what it is if we need it." and then kept my eye on the windows and doors while I taught. My students told me that they felt confident that I had a plan and that I was keeping an eye out but were glad they didn't have to be the ones to think about it. (This is a little comical when I think about the fact that I was 23, and my 16-year-old students were putting their confidence in me.)
Helping a student through a moment of need doesn't always have to look like a counseling session. Sometimes, it can just look like a regular day.
When I have had difficulties, I often found solace in going to work, grading papers, and planning lessons. Days off were often the hardest times because that was when I had too much time to think. Doing normal things was the most comfortable (and, therefore, comforting) activity. When you are having a difficult time in your personal life, one of the best things for you can be to have some part of your life where you don't think about that problem. It reminds you that the issue does not encompass your entire life.
In my nineteen years of teaching, I have taught through gun threats, September 11, the death of former students, the heartbreak of unrequited love, the diagnoses of colleagues, and many other traumas for both students and myself. During these times, I have, of course, acknowledged the problem and told my students that I am available to them for whatever they needed; but then I taught them the same lesson I would have on any other day. I assigned homework (although I probably accepted it late from those who needed time to deal). When I had a student who was crying so hard she couldn't breathe, I asked her to tell me about her pet snake. Years after a shooter threat (during my second year teaching), several former students told me that they felt safest while they were in my class that day. Many of their other teachers had cried through the day or talked to them about it the whole time. I had gone in and said, "There is a plan. I will tell you what it is if we need it." and then kept my eye on the windows and doors while I taught. My students told me that they felt confident that I had a plan and that I was keeping an eye out but were glad they didn't have to be the ones to think about it. (This is a little comical when I think about the fact that I was 23, and my 16-year-old students were putting their confidence in me.)
Helping a student through a moment of need doesn't always have to look like a counseling session. Sometimes, it can just look like a regular day.
Monday, November 6, 2017
Communication - My Favorite Paradox
Teachers spend much of their time these days talking about innovation. We attend workshops and conference that are specifically geared toward teaching kids to innovate. We spend a lot of time talking about the jobs our students will face. More specifically, we talk about how we don't know what kind of jobs our students will face, so we need to teach them to innovate in an ever-changing world. We construct projects now that are less about content than they are about the process of engineering or research. We talk about these things so much that we forget most of the rest of the world is not having this conversation. They don't sit down every Monday at work and discuss how their kids should engage in innovation-based learning. We forget that when they see the new and amazing project assignment Johnny comes home with, they don't know what objectives we have in mind. We forget that they weren't sitting at our desks with us when we created it. They see something that doesn't look like anything they did when they were in school, and that is frightening because they don't know how to help with it. Because this is 2017, they pick up their phone or laptop and send an e-mail to the teacher to question the project.
As teachers, we complain a lot about this type of parent communication. It feels like a lack of trust, so we take it personally. We feel like our professional judgment is being questioned, but it is really only because we have forgotten to communicate our thinking to them. We could eliminate MOST (not all) parent e-mails of this type if we remembered this simple paradox:
"The more e-mails I send, the fewer e-mails I get."
It sounds crazy, I know, but I promise that it works. I've been doing this my entire career because I began teaching just as e-mail was becoming a tool for this type of communication. I don't send home communication about every worksheet or lab we do, but I absolutely send emails about assignments that aren't like the ones we saw in school (or even like the ones we did just ten years ago). When our juniors started using Twitter to have book chats about the literature they were reading, the teacher sent home a detailed description of how Twitter was chosen for this activity. When our history teacher, English teacher, and I collaborated on Story Corp last year, I sent an e-mail to our 8th-grade parents, explaining what Story Corp was and why were assigning it as a group and what each of us planned to do as a follow-up. I got exactly three e-mails in response to this. Two were questions about who their student could interview; one was concern that the person they were interviewing wouldn't want to be on the internet. If I had not sent that e-mail and the student had come home, saying, "Mom, I have to interview Grandpa over Thanksgiving for English, History, and Science," I think all three of us would have gotten a lot of questions.
This goes beyond projects. It is common for my 8th-grade students to tank their second test with me. It is when the questions start requiring more analysis and less memorization. Students who are accustomed to getting As in science often earn a C+ on that one. Students who have typically gotten Cs without a lot of studying will find their grade below failing. As you can imagine, this creates a stir at home that would flood my inbox if I weren't proactive about it. After I have graded this test but before I enter the grades in RenWeb, I send an e-mail to all the parents of that grade. I tell them that this is normal and why it happens. I tell them not to panic yet because it takes time to adjust to this new skill. I tell them that I do not give extra credit because that covers up the problem without solving it. I have saved the text of this e-mail in a document so that all I have to do is copy, paste, and edit it. The responses I get to this e-mail are usually thankful for the heads-up. It is amazing how the number of e-mails changes as well as their tone.
I know it seems like a paradox that putting some time into your e-mails will save you time on your e-mails, but if you try it, it will quickly become your favorite paradox.
Tuesday, October 31, 2017
Personifying the Elements
There are a lot of ways to teach the elements. If you type chemical elements into youtube, there are over 641 thousand results. Google shows 102 thousand news stories, almost 1.5 million books, and countless images. As I have mentioned in this blog before, I did the same element project for years. Each student built a model of the atom for a certain element and then wrote a paper (or podcast or webpage, depending on the year) about that element. Last year, I tried replacing it with a nuclear energy project, but it didn't have the effect I had hoped for. I was ready to do it again with some tweaks, but my co-conspirator, Kellie, had a better idea.
I was skeptical at first. She came to me after last year's collaboration on the Mars paper and said, "I have an idea for another paper your kids can write." My half-joking response was that I only grade one paper per year. Then she said, "What if they have to make a case for an element as "the best element?" Oh, that's interesting. I may have to grade a second paper. When talking about it with our tech coach, she said, "How is anyone going to make a case for anything besides carbon or oxygen?" Hmm, that's a thought. How were we going to do that? Kellie said, "What if it is running for President, and they have to talk about the strengths that would make it a good candidate? There are a lot of qualities that might make a good candidate." Now, we were really onto something. There's a lot of talk in education right now about doing things that cannot be googled, and both we and our principal agreed this was a way to do that.
I don't teach English, but I assume there are a lot of ways to teach personification. If I remember correctly, I learned it in a poetry unit. I think a tree was talking or something. I never thought about it existing outside a poetic context, but this collaboration allowed kids to apply personification to science, especially when we decided it should be a speech instead of a paper. Students actually spoke AS the element (or a spokesperson for the element). The described its strengths (noble gasses have stability, bonding means working well with others, etc.) and accomplishments (hydrogen being the fuel of stars, sodium keeping you hydrated). I even had someone make a case that radon could be a means of population control. We gave our students the option of doing their speech on video if doing it live was too intimidating. If you would like to see the results of that work, here's the playlist of their work.
I have enjoyed a lot of collaborations, but this one may be my favorite. Kids learned the properties of elements in an interesting way. They learned personification. They overcame their fear of public speaking. We have management tweaks to make for future years, but this was a great project.
Next week, I start a new collaboration, this time with history, a video project about inventions and their impact on culture.
I was skeptical at first. She came to me after last year's collaboration on the Mars paper and said, "I have an idea for another paper your kids can write." My half-joking response was that I only grade one paper per year. Then she said, "What if they have to make a case for an element as "the best element?" Oh, that's interesting. I may have to grade a second paper. When talking about it with our tech coach, she said, "How is anyone going to make a case for anything besides carbon or oxygen?" Hmm, that's a thought. How were we going to do that? Kellie said, "What if it is running for President, and they have to talk about the strengths that would make it a good candidate? There are a lot of qualities that might make a good candidate." Now, we were really onto something. There's a lot of talk in education right now about doing things that cannot be googled, and both we and our principal agreed this was a way to do that.
I don't teach English, but I assume there are a lot of ways to teach personification. If I remember correctly, I learned it in a poetry unit. I think a tree was talking or something. I never thought about it existing outside a poetic context, but this collaboration allowed kids to apply personification to science, especially when we decided it should be a speech instead of a paper. Students actually spoke AS the element (or a spokesperson for the element). The described its strengths (noble gasses have stability, bonding means working well with others, etc.) and accomplishments (hydrogen being the fuel of stars, sodium keeping you hydrated). I even had someone make a case that radon could be a means of population control. We gave our students the option of doing their speech on video if doing it live was too intimidating. If you would like to see the results of that work, here's the playlist of their work.I have enjoyed a lot of collaborations, but this one may be my favorite. Kids learned the properties of elements in an interesting way. They learned personification. They overcame their fear of public speaking. We have management tweaks to make for future years, but this was a great project.
Next week, I start a new collaboration, this time with history, a video project about inventions and their impact on culture.
Sunday, October 22, 2017
Humility - The Lost Virtue - Part 2
After last week's post, it occurred to me that I really only scratched the surface. I stopped at the 80's, and that was only the beginning of the end when it comes to teaching humility. I never thought I would look back on the "everybody gets a trophy days" as only the first step, but that is only because I didn't have enough imagination to know what smartphones would do to our view of the world and our view of how the world views us.
I'm not anti-technology. As you know, I have a blog. I work in a school that has a one-to-one program, and I am fully invested in the benefits of that. I have often said that there is no way I could go back to teaching without every student having a computer in front of them. I can do low or no tech days, but I could never go back to a year of teaching in which I am the only person in the room with a computer.
I am not anti-technology. I am, however, anti-dependence. It makes me crazy that everywhere I go, I see kids and adults alike staring at rectangles. Kids are actually better at interacting with each other while using their rectangles than adults are, but I still have concerns that we have subjected them to a massive sociological experiment. Ask a teenager if you can look at the pictures on their phone, and you will find a thousand selfies. Go to their social media, and you will find out where all those selfies went. An event hasn't actually happened, it seems, if we don't document that we were there for it and post it for all the world to see. A picture of fireworks isn't enough. We must be standing in front of the fireworks. When we stand in front of the majesty that is the Grand Canyon, we are still thinking about ourselves. I know that even back in the film days, people took photos of themselves in front of tourist attractions, but it was one or two photos, usually of the whole family, not a hundred photos of a duck-faced, good-side, downward-angled, Snapchat-filtered, posed, etc. . . I'm pretty sure Narcissus would find us vain. He only looked at his own reflection; he didn't insist that others look at him as well.
Smartphones have also distorted our sense of time. It never takes longer than two seconds to get the answer to a question, watch a video we want to watch, or text a friend. And when we do text, if it takes long than three seconds for the three dots to turn into an answer, we get angry that the person hasn't responded immediately. We say things like, "Why does she even have a phone if she isn't going to answer?" This infects other parts of our lives as we impatiently tap our foot next to the microwave, forgetting that it used to take hours to make a meal. This impatience with time is about our pride, revealing our belief that we should get what we want instantly.
The day of my last post, I had an interaction that reinforced the weird relationship even our most humble students have with their social media. Our art teacher is having our students participate in the global Kindness Rocks Project. Because social media can be a place for good, people all over the world are decorating rocks with uplifting images or messages and hiding them with a hashtag so that you can let the world know you have found it and are either keeping it or hiding it again with a clue to where you have hidden it. This should be a fun and low-stress school project. As our art teacher was explaining it to a small group of students, one of them said, "This will ruin my Instagram, so I don't want to put it there." To be fair, I am not on Instagram, so maybe the problem is with my ignorance, but I can't help wondering how a person's Instagram can be ruined by one picture. Other students understood her concern about messing up the design and colors. Another teacher, who is friends with this student on Instagram looked at her feed and said that it was all artsy selfies in front of sunsets. She talked about making a separate account just for this project, but she decided to use her mom's twitter account instead. I've never imagined this kind of conversation. Basically, what she was saying was that this picture would be off-brand, and we can't have that. The idea that her design would be ruined and that she would be embarrassed if she posted one photo that doesn't fit with her image is surely a sign of the pride social media has embedded in us.
Our overinflation of our online image also magnifies our sense of our own influence online. The rise of "slactivism," from ice buckets to hashtags to the "me too" fad, reveals our belief that we are making a difference by doing nothing. When a disaster happens, we change our profile picture to a certain color to show our solidarity. That's it. The people of Puerto Rico can eat or drink our red, white, and blue profile picture; but we feel good about ourselves because we "raised awareness," as though that is an end. While our ancestors, only a generation ago, marched on Washington to show their support for Civil Rights, we plop down a hashtag and feel proud of how "woke" we are. This is pride, and we should take a good hard look at how little we do that has actual value.
This can be fixed, but like everything else, we must do it intentionally. We must stop and reflect on our actions. We must model humility for our kids instead of complaining that they don't have any. We must recognize our place before God, as bearers of the Imago Dei who have been damaged by sin, and place our sins, including our pride, at the Cross.
I'm not anti-technology. As you know, I have a blog. I work in a school that has a one-to-one program, and I am fully invested in the benefits of that. I have often said that there is no way I could go back to teaching without every student having a computer in front of them. I can do low or no tech days, but I could never go back to a year of teaching in which I am the only person in the room with a computer.
I am not anti-technology. I am, however, anti-dependence. It makes me crazy that everywhere I go, I see kids and adults alike staring at rectangles. Kids are actually better at interacting with each other while using their rectangles than adults are, but I still have concerns that we have subjected them to a massive sociological experiment. Ask a teenager if you can look at the pictures on their phone, and you will find a thousand selfies. Go to their social media, and you will find out where all those selfies went. An event hasn't actually happened, it seems, if we don't document that we were there for it and post it for all the world to see. A picture of fireworks isn't enough. We must be standing in front of the fireworks. When we stand in front of the majesty that is the Grand Canyon, we are still thinking about ourselves. I know that even back in the film days, people took photos of themselves in front of tourist attractions, but it was one or two photos, usually of the whole family, not a hundred photos of a duck-faced, good-side, downward-angled, Snapchat-filtered, posed, etc. . . I'm pretty sure Narcissus would find us vain. He only looked at his own reflection; he didn't insist that others look at him as well.
Smartphones have also distorted our sense of time. It never takes longer than two seconds to get the answer to a question, watch a video we want to watch, or text a friend. And when we do text, if it takes long than three seconds for the three dots to turn into an answer, we get angry that the person hasn't responded immediately. We say things like, "Why does she even have a phone if she isn't going to answer?" This infects other parts of our lives as we impatiently tap our foot next to the microwave, forgetting that it used to take hours to make a meal. This impatience with time is about our pride, revealing our belief that we should get what we want instantly.
The day of my last post, I had an interaction that reinforced the weird relationship even our most humble students have with their social media. Our art teacher is having our students participate in the global Kindness Rocks Project. Because social media can be a place for good, people all over the world are decorating rocks with uplifting images or messages and hiding them with a hashtag so that you can let the world know you have found it and are either keeping it or hiding it again with a clue to where you have hidden it. This should be a fun and low-stress school project. As our art teacher was explaining it to a small group of students, one of them said, "This will ruin my Instagram, so I don't want to put it there." To be fair, I am not on Instagram, so maybe the problem is with my ignorance, but I can't help wondering how a person's Instagram can be ruined by one picture. Other students understood her concern about messing up the design and colors. Another teacher, who is friends with this student on Instagram looked at her feed and said that it was all artsy selfies in front of sunsets. She talked about making a separate account just for this project, but she decided to use her mom's twitter account instead. I've never imagined this kind of conversation. Basically, what she was saying was that this picture would be off-brand, and we can't have that. The idea that her design would be ruined and that she would be embarrassed if she posted one photo that doesn't fit with her image is surely a sign of the pride social media has embedded in us.
Our overinflation of our online image also magnifies our sense of our own influence online. The rise of "slactivism," from ice buckets to hashtags to the "me too" fad, reveals our belief that we are making a difference by doing nothing. When a disaster happens, we change our profile picture to a certain color to show our solidarity. That's it. The people of Puerto Rico can eat or drink our red, white, and blue profile picture; but we feel good about ourselves because we "raised awareness," as though that is an end. While our ancestors, only a generation ago, marched on Washington to show their support for Civil Rights, we plop down a hashtag and feel proud of how "woke" we are. This is pride, and we should take a good hard look at how little we do that has actual value.This can be fixed, but like everything else, we must do it intentionally. We must stop and reflect on our actions. We must model humility for our kids instead of complaining that they don't have any. We must recognize our place before God, as bearers of the Imago Dei who have been damaged by sin, and place our sins, including our pride, at the Cross.
Monday, October 16, 2017
Humility - The Lost Virtue
Yes, you heard that correctly. That was a man bragging about how humble he is - "More humble," in fact, "than you could understand." If you needed further proof that our understanding of humility has been lost, this had to be it.
Humility is an important virtue. Jesus had it, and he was the one person with the right not to have it. Scripture advises humility from beginning to end. Moses and Aaron admonished Pharaoh for his lack of humility before God in the book of Exodus, and I Peter 5:6 commands to humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God. In early America, Ben Franklin listed humility among the thirteen most important virtues (We'll ignore, for now, the fact that he didn't practice it himself). Humility was taught both in school and at home. Children who were braggarts were admonished by teachers and parents alike.
This is not to say that no one recognized their own value. David Hume, who died in 1776 encouraged us to recognize those qualities that did indeed deserve recognition. He said, "Though an overweening conceit of our own merit be vicious and disagreeable, nothing can be more laudable than to have a value for ourselves, where we really have qualities that are valuable.... it is certain that nothing is more useful to us, in the conduct of life, than a due degree of pride, which makes us sensible of our own merit, and gives us a confidence and assurance in all our projects and enterprises." While I disagree with him on the degree of importance he places on it, I do agree that a recognition of one's own skills is the first step to exercising them. There is a reasonable ground to be found between thinking we are absolutely worthless and believing ourselves to be great simply for existing. That ground comes in recognizing the gifts that were given to us by God for just that, gifts of God. William James, a psychologist of the 1890's seems to have struck a secular version of balance by defining self-esteem as the ratio of success to pretension. More on this later.
(But, for a hilarious look at how this goes wrong, click here.)
The 1960's caused the swing of many pendulums, and this was one of them. Breaking away from parents and their rules comes with a necessary belief in the ruling of ourselves. The "psychology for normals" movement meant even well-adjusted people were being marinated in the ideas of Maslow, Coopersmith, and Braden. Then, those people became parents. We truly saw the death of humility in the 1980's. These people who had been soaked in the psychology of self-esteem were now told to instill that in their children. California lawmakers decided that the cause of crime and most social ills would be solved if children were taught they were amazing. There was even a taxpayer-funded self-esteem task force.
Despite the fact that no research study (and there were many) ever showed self-esteem to be helpful in reducing social ills, and no research study ever showed low self-esteem to be a risk factor, we went on acting as though the opposite were true. There is even one study that indicates those with high self-esteem are a greater risk to society than those with low self-esteem, but we carry on with telling our kids that they are perfect for no other reason than they were born.
Here's a great breakdown on the history and the studies.
Somewhere along this path, we deemed our kids worthy of worship. If you think I am overstating this, go online and make a statement about your child that is anything short of pure, unadulterated praise; and watch what happens. You will be vilified instantly because you aren't bowing down to the idol of parenthood. There will be a religious fervor to the response of people for a reason; they don't worship God and therefore see themselves, their children, or you in the proper light. Rather than seeing human beings who carry the Imago Dei (image of God) but who are fallen and in need of redemption, our culture views children as god themselves. I have seen many mothers on facebook call their firstborn children "the one who made me a mother." He isn't the one who made you a mother; God did that. The child is the object of the action, not the actor.
You may have a great kid, but he is a lousy god. He isn't equipped to handle the pressure of your worship, which is one of the reasons we have so many kids with anxiety issues. They know they can't be the god you want them to be, and it makes them crazy trying to live up to that. This brings me back to William James. In calling self-esteem a ratio of success to pretension, he gave us two ways to affect it, increase your success or decrease your view of your own potential. This is going to seem to many like I am saying to lower your expectations to make yourself feel better. I guess I am in a way, but not as a cop out. Rather, recognizing our lack of diety will balance the ratio. It will, perhaps, makes us recognize the need for a savior. It will, perhaps, make us stop trying to save ourselves. President Trump obviously needs this, but he isn't the only one who does.
Tuesday, October 10, 2017
For Love Not For Money
This isn't the post you think. It's not about how teachers don't do our jobs for money. Although true, it's not what I want to address here. Keep reading.
If you are a science teacher, you probably responded with excitement when you heard that the seventh row of the periodic table was finally filled with the confirmation of the synthesis of Nihonium, Moscovium, Tennessine, and Oganesson. You may have then been psyched to go order an up to date periodic table for your wall. A year and a half later, you still cannot find that table. It took almost a year before the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) officially voted on the names, and for some reason, the scientific supply companies still have not produced up to date tables. I wanted my students to have fully up to date table for two reasons. 1. They should see current science because we are able to communicate quickly in the 21st century. 2. I wouldn't have to address the holding places anymore. (No, Jimmy, Uuq is not an element symbol. It's a holding place for one they haven't made yet.) They have driven me crazy for years.
In the absence of ones I could buy, I went looking for ones I could print (following fair use guidelines, of course). There are few up to date table that have the information I want them to have. There are periodic tables with way too much, and there are periodic tables with way too little. When you teach 8th-grade, you want that goldilocks table, where the amount of information is just right. I did what any good teacher with at least some computer skills would do. I took a free use periodic table that didn't have enough information on it, and I modified it. You will find it at the bottom of this post. Tada! My students now have an up to date table with atomic symbol, name, atomic number, atomic mass, and oxidation numbers. That's all they need in 8th-grade because I'm not teaching them quantum mechanics.
As I sat in a faculty meeting with my freshly printed periodic tables, a colleague uttered words that make me recoil - "You should sell that." There are a lot of reasons why it is nutty to think that I would sell the periodic table, having only combined the research of others; but that isn't the reason it makes me crazy. I've been hearing this about everything I make for my classroom. I wrote a textbook for my own use and to benefit my students, and the first question anyone asks is, "Are you going to sell it?" Again, there are a lot of reasons why I couldn't even if I wanted to, but that's not what makes me crazy.
What makes me crazy is the assumption that everything we do must be done for monetary gain. I modified a periodic table because I love my students and want them to have the right information (and because I love that I don't have to address the doggone holding places). I wrote a book because I love my students and want them to have a usable book. I designed a review game because I love the way my students respond when they get to do something they aren't used to. Teachers bring our passion and love and talent to our classrooms out of love. Please stop trying to turn it into monetary gain.
If you teach middle school (or even high school) science and want this periodic table, here it is the screen shot.
Here's the full-size version.
If you are a science teacher, you probably responded with excitement when you heard that the seventh row of the periodic table was finally filled with the confirmation of the synthesis of Nihonium, Moscovium, Tennessine, and Oganesson. You may have then been psyched to go order an up to date periodic table for your wall. A year and a half later, you still cannot find that table. It took almost a year before the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) officially voted on the names, and for some reason, the scientific supply companies still have not produced up to date tables. I wanted my students to have fully up to date table for two reasons. 1. They should see current science because we are able to communicate quickly in the 21st century. 2. I wouldn't have to address the holding places anymore. (No, Jimmy, Uuq is not an element symbol. It's a holding place for one they haven't made yet.) They have driven me crazy for years.
In the absence of ones I could buy, I went looking for ones I could print (following fair use guidelines, of course). There are few up to date table that have the information I want them to have. There are periodic tables with way too much, and there are periodic tables with way too little. When you teach 8th-grade, you want that goldilocks table, where the amount of information is just right. I did what any good teacher with at least some computer skills would do. I took a free use periodic table that didn't have enough information on it, and I modified it. You will find it at the bottom of this post. Tada! My students now have an up to date table with atomic symbol, name, atomic number, atomic mass, and oxidation numbers. That's all they need in 8th-grade because I'm not teaching them quantum mechanics.
As I sat in a faculty meeting with my freshly printed periodic tables, a colleague uttered words that make me recoil - "You should sell that." There are a lot of reasons why it is nutty to think that I would sell the periodic table, having only combined the research of others; but that isn't the reason it makes me crazy. I've been hearing this about everything I make for my classroom. I wrote a textbook for my own use and to benefit my students, and the first question anyone asks is, "Are you going to sell it?" Again, there are a lot of reasons why I couldn't even if I wanted to, but that's not what makes me crazy.
What makes me crazy is the assumption that everything we do must be done for monetary gain. I modified a periodic table because I love my students and want them to have the right information (and because I love that I don't have to address the doggone holding places). I wrote a book because I love my students and want them to have a usable book. I designed a review game because I love the way my students respond when they get to do something they aren't used to. Teachers bring our passion and love and talent to our classrooms out of love. Please stop trying to turn it into monetary gain.
If you teach middle school (or even high school) science and want this periodic table, here it is the screen shot.
Here's the full-size version.
Monday, October 2, 2017
Six Things to STOP Saying to Students Today
I will never forget this parent conference. A student was failing my class and others. She was in danger of not progressing to the next level. The parent called a meeting of all her daughter's teachers to figure out a plan. During the meeting, she said, "Well, she has an older brother, so she knows that 8th-grade doesn't matter." I sat there hoping that the look on my face didn't reflect the horror in my heart. This woman just told a room full of 8th-grade teachers whose time she had demanded that their jobs didn't matter. I assume she has communicated the same sentiments to her son and daughter. It was all I could do not stand up and say, "Whenever she passes this grade that doesn't matter, I guess we should meet again." Of course, I didn't. As professionals, we rarely get to say the thing we wish we could. I wouldn't even mention it here if the student hadn't left our school a long time ago, and I'm certain neither she nor her mother reads this blog about education.
When you teach 8th-grade, one thing you constantly keep in your mind is that you are training your students for what they will encounter in high school. I assume 5th-grade teachers have this in mind for middle school, and kindergarten teachers have it in mind for 1st grade. There is no time at which a teacher is not preparing students for the next level. We expect this to come with resistance from students, but it should not come with resistance from parents. Yet, adults often communicate resistance to kids, both consciously and unconsciously.
Schooling is one of the few things everyone has in common. Whether public, home, or private, all of us have been to school. We have all progressed from basic reading and arithmetic to complex novel analysis and geometry. We have all gone from the idea that science is a set of terms to the idea that science is an examination of how and why things work. We have all moved from the idea that history is a study of the events in the past to a recognition of how those events affect our present. We all know that we are better and more interesting people because of the things we learned outside of our career path, but we do not communicate that to students.
Here's a short list of things I wish adults would stop saying to students:
1. I never use algebra anyway.
Yes, you do use algebra. You use it every single day of your life. You don't sit down with a pencil and call an unknown x because you have internalized algebra to the point where you don't need to do that anymore. It's no longer algebra as much as it is algebraic thinking. When you figure out if you have enough money in the bank to pay a bill, you are using algebraic thinking. When you figure out which coupon is the better deal for buying a box of cereal, you are using algebraic thinking. When you decide how hard you need to hit the brakes to keep from hitting the car in front of you, you are using algebraic thinking. The part of your brain that was strengthened by taking algebra is essential for modern living, so stop devaluing it with teenagers.
2. When you get to high school is when it matters because it will go on your transcript.
I was guilty of this one when I taught 9th-grade. The idea that your transcript mattered seemed to be a good motivational tool for incoming freshman to take their classes seriously. What I didn't realize was that I undermined my own value by implying their education up to that point had no value. When you underestimate the value of ANY part of a student's education, you teach them to undervalue all of it. Yes, the transcript is an important piece of one possible path in their lives, but so was learning to share in kindergarten. The transcript will be looked at by colleges, but a student's work ethic is what shows up in teacher recommendation letters, regardless of grades. The transcript reflects your performance in classes; it doesn't say what kind of person you are.
3. Yeah, I hated (fill in the subject here) when I was your age, too.
We all had subjects we liked less in school than others. There's nothing wrong with communicating that you are a human being. That is not, however, the context in which this is usually said. This usually comes about when a student doesn't want to do their math homework or doesn't want to read their history book. Someone, then affirms their lack of motivation with this statement. If you, as an adult, take a moment to look back on it, I imagine you can now find value in something you didn't see at the time. I wish I had paid better attention in history because I can now see the patterns that got us to where we are today; I couldn't see that as a high school freshman. I spent all of my time in Human Anatomy and Physiology Lab in tears. I was emotionally overwhelmed by the cadaver on the table, but I never learned more in a class than that one (in spite of the C I earned in it). I hated, hated, hated, reading Lord of the Flies, but I can appreciate it now that I see it being played out in culture. When you tell a student you hated a subject and let it rest, you teach them there is only value to things they like. Perhaps, you could augment your statement with what you learned from it even though you didn't like it at the time.
4. If a lot of you missed that question, the teacher must not have taught it correctly.
If you are a parent, you know that you can say something, say it clearly, and say it repeatedly and still have your child look you in the eye and say, "You never told me that." Multiply that by 25, and you might stop suggesting that if students don't know something, it is on the teacher. We do our best to actively engage students, but we cannot learn it for them. I have had tests in which student scores ranged between 3% and 97%. During a review for my last test, every student got a question wrong, which was a great opportunity to talk about how a lot of people being wrong doesn't make it right. Teachers examine our tests after students take them. When a large number of people miss a question, we do go to that question to make sure it is fairly worded, has been taught, and has been properly marked on the key. Then, we go over that question with them in the next class to explain why they were wrong and how they could approach it differently the next time to get it right. We do not automatically throw it out because that teaches our students that it is okay to be wrong if a lot of people are wrong.
5. You shouldn't take that class if it doesn't line up with what job you want.
Every teacher has at least one student who tells us why they shouldn't have to take our class, no matter what that class is. One student, in particular, stands out in my mind. He wanted to be a musician (although I've also heard this statement from future baseball players, politicians, and writers) and just didn't believe he should have to learn chemistry. Most of the time, we approach this from a standpoint of needing a backup plan in case the whole musician thing doesn't pan out, but I don't think that is wise. It is just feeding the idea that education is only valuable if it relates to your job. I said to this student, who I had a good relationship with, "What if the only thing I could talk to you about was chemistry? Would we have the relationship we have?" He replied, "Well, no, I guess we wouldn't." The reason I could have a conversation with this student, or any of my less scientifically inclined students, is because I am a human being with diverse interests. I've learned enough about art and music to hold a reasonable conversation and to be able to learn from someone who knows more than I do on the subject (usually, my students). I read enough to be able to talk about favorite books with students. I loved my general ed classes because, while they weren't applicable to my future career, they were making me a more interesting person. Let's teach our kids to be curious, not to be jaded about anything that isn't in their chosen field.
6. It's only (fill in the grade here). It doesn't matter anyway.
This was the one that started it all - this mom who was communicating to her daughter that it was okay to fail because this year didn't matter. Every day of your life matters. What you do that day matters because you are trading a day of your life for it. Every day, you are in training to become the person you will be tomorrow. I don't believe in preparing for college in kindergarten, but I do believe that kindergartners are capable of preparing for next week during this week. I do believe a third grader is in training for fourth grade. I do believe I am teaching my 8th-graders to become high school freshmen and my seniors to become lifelong learners, whether that is in college or a job or just as people. I am teaching all of them the work ethic that is needed for their current level and preparing them for the work ethic that will be needed at the next level. That student did not suddenly become a motivated, hardworking learner when it "started to count" her freshman year. Because she had been taught that she only had to work if she thought it was necessary, she carried poor work habits and study skills into high school. Even if you think a year doesn't matter, DO NOT let your student hear you say it.
When you teach 8th-grade, one thing you constantly keep in your mind is that you are training your students for what they will encounter in high school. I assume 5th-grade teachers have this in mind for middle school, and kindergarten teachers have it in mind for 1st grade. There is no time at which a teacher is not preparing students for the next level. We expect this to come with resistance from students, but it should not come with resistance from parents. Yet, adults often communicate resistance to kids, both consciously and unconsciously.
Schooling is one of the few things everyone has in common. Whether public, home, or private, all of us have been to school. We have all progressed from basic reading and arithmetic to complex novel analysis and geometry. We have all gone from the idea that science is a set of terms to the idea that science is an examination of how and why things work. We have all moved from the idea that history is a study of the events in the past to a recognition of how those events affect our present. We all know that we are better and more interesting people because of the things we learned outside of our career path, but we do not communicate that to students.
Here's a short list of things I wish adults would stop saying to students:
1. I never use algebra anyway.
Yes, you do use algebra. You use it every single day of your life. You don't sit down with a pencil and call an unknown x because you have internalized algebra to the point where you don't need to do that anymore. It's no longer algebra as much as it is algebraic thinking. When you figure out if you have enough money in the bank to pay a bill, you are using algebraic thinking. When you figure out which coupon is the better deal for buying a box of cereal, you are using algebraic thinking. When you decide how hard you need to hit the brakes to keep from hitting the car in front of you, you are using algebraic thinking. The part of your brain that was strengthened by taking algebra is essential for modern living, so stop devaluing it with teenagers.
2. When you get to high school is when it matters because it will go on your transcript.
I was guilty of this one when I taught 9th-grade. The idea that your transcript mattered seemed to be a good motivational tool for incoming freshman to take their classes seriously. What I didn't realize was that I undermined my own value by implying their education up to that point had no value. When you underestimate the value of ANY part of a student's education, you teach them to undervalue all of it. Yes, the transcript is an important piece of one possible path in their lives, but so was learning to share in kindergarten. The transcript will be looked at by colleges, but a student's work ethic is what shows up in teacher recommendation letters, regardless of grades. The transcript reflects your performance in classes; it doesn't say what kind of person you are.
We all had subjects we liked less in school than others. There's nothing wrong with communicating that you are a human being. That is not, however, the context in which this is usually said. This usually comes about when a student doesn't want to do their math homework or doesn't want to read their history book. Someone, then affirms their lack of motivation with this statement. If you, as an adult, take a moment to look back on it, I imagine you can now find value in something you didn't see at the time. I wish I had paid better attention in history because I can now see the patterns that got us to where we are today; I couldn't see that as a high school freshman. I spent all of my time in Human Anatomy and Physiology Lab in tears. I was emotionally overwhelmed by the cadaver on the table, but I never learned more in a class than that one (in spite of the C I earned in it). I hated, hated, hated, reading Lord of the Flies, but I can appreciate it now that I see it being played out in culture. When you tell a student you hated a subject and let it rest, you teach them there is only value to things they like. Perhaps, you could augment your statement with what you learned from it even though you didn't like it at the time.
If you are a parent, you know that you can say something, say it clearly, and say it repeatedly and still have your child look you in the eye and say, "You never told me that." Multiply that by 25, and you might stop suggesting that if students don't know something, it is on the teacher. We do our best to actively engage students, but we cannot learn it for them. I have had tests in which student scores ranged between 3% and 97%. During a review for my last test, every student got a question wrong, which was a great opportunity to talk about how a lot of people being wrong doesn't make it right. Teachers examine our tests after students take them. When a large number of people miss a question, we do go to that question to make sure it is fairly worded, has been taught, and has been properly marked on the key. Then, we go over that question with them in the next class to explain why they were wrong and how they could approach it differently the next time to get it right. We do not automatically throw it out because that teaches our students that it is okay to be wrong if a lot of people are wrong.
5. You shouldn't take that class if it doesn't line up with what job you want.
Every teacher has at least one student who tells us why they shouldn't have to take our class, no matter what that class is. One student, in particular, stands out in my mind. He wanted to be a musician (although I've also heard this statement from future baseball players, politicians, and writers) and just didn't believe he should have to learn chemistry. Most of the time, we approach this from a standpoint of needing a backup plan in case the whole musician thing doesn't pan out, but I don't think that is wise. It is just feeding the idea that education is only valuable if it relates to your job. I said to this student, who I had a good relationship with, "What if the only thing I could talk to you about was chemistry? Would we have the relationship we have?" He replied, "Well, no, I guess we wouldn't." The reason I could have a conversation with this student, or any of my less scientifically inclined students, is because I am a human being with diverse interests. I've learned enough about art and music to hold a reasonable conversation and to be able to learn from someone who knows more than I do on the subject (usually, my students). I read enough to be able to talk about favorite books with students. I loved my general ed classes because, while they weren't applicable to my future career, they were making me a more interesting person. Let's teach our kids to be curious, not to be jaded about anything that isn't in their chosen field.
6. It's only (fill in the grade here). It doesn't matter anyway.
This was the one that started it all - this mom who was communicating to her daughter that it was okay to fail because this year didn't matter. Every day of your life matters. What you do that day matters because you are trading a day of your life for it. Every day, you are in training to become the person you will be tomorrow. I don't believe in preparing for college in kindergarten, but I do believe that kindergartners are capable of preparing for next week during this week. I do believe a third grader is in training for fourth grade. I do believe I am teaching my 8th-graders to become high school freshmen and my seniors to become lifelong learners, whether that is in college or a job or just as people. I am teaching all of them the work ethic that is needed for their current level and preparing them for the work ethic that will be needed at the next level. That student did not suddenly become a motivated, hardworking learner when it "started to count" her freshman year. Because she had been taught that she only had to work if she thought it was necessary, she carried poor work habits and study skills into high school. Even if you think a year doesn't matter, DO NOT let your student hear you say it.
Monday, September 25, 2017
#gcsinnovates - Part 2 - Innovative Relationships
I have mentioned before that our school has a great position - technology coach. We had one on campus. Then, she moved, and we had her by Google Hangout. Then, she decided to work where she lives, so we added the job of technology coach to our media specialist, Daniel O'Brien. He was actually doing quite a lot of tech coaching before, so this really formalized and added to what he was already doing with us. He has taken the baton and run with it.
Teachers learn from watching each other, so Daniel instituted a Pineapple Chart. Pineapples are a long known symbol of welcome, so when you put your name on the Pineapple Chart, it means anyone is welcome to come observe your class that day. Whether it is technology related or not is up to the individual teacher. I put my name down when my kids were designing aluminum foil boats, a thing that has only a little tech. Another teacher invited us in to see her kids use Google Docs for peer editing of AP Language papers. Another has invited us, both physically and digitally, to observe a Twitter chat she is doing with her students. Our AP Psychology teacher invited us to be sharks in a Shark Tank-style presentation her students did on developmental toys. It has been great observing other teachers, especially those outside my own discipline area. Thanks to Daniel's willingness to manage the chart, we get to see the innovations of our teammates and get ideas for our own classrooms.
Another great thing Daniel has done is send out a weekly tech digital newsletter. It is essentially a vlog. He talks to us about events of the week, reminds us who is on the pineapple chart, and chats about new tools. One of my favorite parts of the newsletter is the point/counterpoint videos he includes. Each week, there is a youtube link to an EdTech related video. The first week was Digital Aristotle, in which the case is made that schools will soon be radically different as each child will follow their own digital path of learning. The next week was a video that countered that one, called This Will Revolutionize Education. In that video, the presenter pointed out how many technologies that statement had been applied to (pretty much all of them) and discussed why technology doesn't change education in quite as extreme a way as we expect. These were great for me to discuss with myself and my friends.
One Friday of each month, Daniel hosts Innovation Pods during our lunch. This is when teachers who have the same grade levels (and therefore, usually the same lunch periods) can sit together and talk cross-curricular projects or brainstorm ideas with him. The first one didn't have a ton of attendance, but those who did attend got some great benefit. I encourage people to come to the next ones. On a different Friday, he set up our new VR Goggles in the library and encouraged us to come learn about them so that we could explore different ideas for their use in our classrooms. That was super fun, and I personally had dozens of ideas, not only for my classroom but ones that I could share with my colleagues as well.
Basically, Daniel is making an effort to give us as many venues as possible to spark as many ideas as possible. Way to go, Daniel.
I think the greatest innovation GRACE has isn't really an innovation itself; it's the openness to innovation. It isn't at all unusual for an English teacher and a science teacher to collaborate on a project. If I need to talk through an idea, I have administrators and IT people that I can sit down and brainstorm with. We set aside meeting times specifically for the purpose of discussing innovative ideas that we have. Our students may not know to call it innovation, but they know that we are working together and are not stagnant. Thank you GRACE administration for allowing and encouraging all of this.
Teachers learn from watching each other, so Daniel instituted a Pineapple Chart. Pineapples are a long known symbol of welcome, so when you put your name on the Pineapple Chart, it means anyone is welcome to come observe your class that day. Whether it is technology related or not is up to the individual teacher. I put my name down when my kids were designing aluminum foil boats, a thing that has only a little tech. Another teacher invited us in to see her kids use Google Docs for peer editing of AP Language papers. Another has invited us, both physically and digitally, to observe a Twitter chat she is doing with her students. Our AP Psychology teacher invited us to be sharks in a Shark Tank-style presentation her students did on developmental toys. It has been great observing other teachers, especially those outside my own discipline area. Thanks to Daniel's willingness to manage the chart, we get to see the innovations of our teammates and get ideas for our own classrooms.
Another great thing Daniel has done is send out a weekly tech digital newsletter. It is essentially a vlog. He talks to us about events of the week, reminds us who is on the pineapple chart, and chats about new tools. One of my favorite parts of the newsletter is the point/counterpoint videos he includes. Each week, there is a youtube link to an EdTech related video. The first week was Digital Aristotle, in which the case is made that schools will soon be radically different as each child will follow their own digital path of learning. The next week was a video that countered that one, called This Will Revolutionize Education. In that video, the presenter pointed out how many technologies that statement had been applied to (pretty much all of them) and discussed why technology doesn't change education in quite as extreme a way as we expect. These were great for me to discuss with myself and my friends.
One Friday of each month, Daniel hosts Innovation Pods during our lunch. This is when teachers who have the same grade levels (and therefore, usually the same lunch periods) can sit together and talk cross-curricular projects or brainstorm ideas with him. The first one didn't have a ton of attendance, but those who did attend got some great benefit. I encourage people to come to the next ones. On a different Friday, he set up our new VR Goggles in the library and encouraged us to come learn about them so that we could explore different ideas for their use in our classrooms. That was super fun, and I personally had dozens of ideas, not only for my classroom but ones that I could share with my colleagues as well.
Basically, Daniel is making an effort to give us as many venues as possible to spark as many ideas as possible. Way to go, Daniel.
I think the greatest innovation GRACE has isn't really an innovation itself; it's the openness to innovation. It isn't at all unusual for an English teacher and a science teacher to collaborate on a project. If I need to talk through an idea, I have administrators and IT people that I can sit down and brainstorm with. We set aside meeting times specifically for the purpose of discussing innovative ideas that we have. Our students may not know to call it innovation, but they know that we are working together and are not stagnant. Thank you GRACE administration for allowing and encouraging all of this.
Monday, September 18, 2017
#gcsinnovates - Part 1
According to my computer's dictionary, innovation is the act of making changes to something established, especially by introducing new methods, ideas, or products. Contrary to what we are told at education conferences, educators have been involved in innovation for the past two hundred years. Yes, I've seen the side by side pictures of classrooms that appear to have undergone minimal change, but the photographer in me knows that those pictures show one momentary snapshot of seating. They do not reflect the whole story.
If you walk into a classroom, no matter how traditional the desk setup, you will hear discussions among students and teachers that you would not have heard even ten years ago, much less one hundred years ago. In fact, a person from one hundred years ago might believe you were speaking a different language. The use of youtube as a teaching tool and students creating work rather than simply consuming it was something that couldn't have happened in my own schooling because the tools had not yet been invented. The focus on collaboration that has taken over education is a massive change from what the parents of current students will remember. Schools have definitely changed, and I don't think they are given enough credit for it.
I teach in a one-to-one environment, and my school has been growing in our application of this program for the past six years. We are asked to use technology in our classrooms but not just for the sake of using technology. We are asked to consider what technology makes possible that wasn't possible without it. For example, our students who are reading The Scarlett Letter participate in Twitter chats. The teacher of this class didn't choose Twitter just because she likes Twitter. She chose it because it allows the students to communicate with each other (normal before technology), students in other classes (difficult before technology), teachers across other grades and classes (difficult before technology), and anyone in the world who catches the hashtag (impossible before technology). This is a case in which the use of technology not only improves the lesson but actually makes parts of the lesson completely different than they would have before.
This summer, our faculty all read The Innovator's Mindset by George Cuoros. Despite my irritation with Cuoros' abrasive personality in live workshops, there is much to like in this book. He asks the question, "Would you want to be a learner in your own class?" He poses the challenge to think of yourself as a learner so that students can see your learning process and realize that learning doesn't end when school does. We are asked to think about innovation, not for the sake of innovation, but for what it can bring to your students. Our theater department is putting on a production of Peter Pan this year. We cannot use the traditional cable system to allow our students to fly, so our theater teacher innovated. She asked her students what ideas they had about alternative "flying methods." One of her students is proficient in a program called Blender. He creates incredible works in it and suggested that the students could be scanned, animated, and projected in flight. If she were not courageous, humble, and innovative enough to ask the students, we might not have had the ability to fly our students to Neverland.
One thing that I most appreciate about my school is the recognition that sometimes technology is the best way, and sometimes it only makes sense to use paper and a pencil. Sometimes, an innovation is best, and other times the time-tested way is the best way. We are given freedom in our professional judgment to do what we believe is best for each lesson in our classroom, but we aren't left to figure it out alone. Our media specialists are also technology coaches. Since this post is getting a bit long, I'll talk about how our new technology coach is innovating next week.
If you walk into a classroom, no matter how traditional the desk setup, you will hear discussions among students and teachers that you would not have heard even ten years ago, much less one hundred years ago. In fact, a person from one hundred years ago might believe you were speaking a different language. The use of youtube as a teaching tool and students creating work rather than simply consuming it was something that couldn't have happened in my own schooling because the tools had not yet been invented. The focus on collaboration that has taken over education is a massive change from what the parents of current students will remember. Schools have definitely changed, and I don't think they are given enough credit for it.
I teach in a one-to-one environment, and my school has been growing in our application of this program for the past six years. We are asked to use technology in our classrooms but not just for the sake of using technology. We are asked to consider what technology makes possible that wasn't possible without it. For example, our students who are reading The Scarlett Letter participate in Twitter chats. The teacher of this class didn't choose Twitter just because she likes Twitter. She chose it because it allows the students to communicate with each other (normal before technology), students in other classes (difficult before technology), teachers across other grades and classes (difficult before technology), and anyone in the world who catches the hashtag (impossible before technology). This is a case in which the use of technology not only improves the lesson but actually makes parts of the lesson completely different than they would have before.
This summer, our faculty all read The Innovator's Mindset by George Cuoros. Despite my irritation with Cuoros' abrasive personality in live workshops, there is much to like in this book. He asks the question, "Would you want to be a learner in your own class?" He poses the challenge to think of yourself as a learner so that students can see your learning process and realize that learning doesn't end when school does. We are asked to think about innovation, not for the sake of innovation, but for what it can bring to your students. Our theater department is putting on a production of Peter Pan this year. We cannot use the traditional cable system to allow our students to fly, so our theater teacher innovated. She asked her students what ideas they had about alternative "flying methods." One of her students is proficient in a program called Blender. He creates incredible works in it and suggested that the students could be scanned, animated, and projected in flight. If she were not courageous, humble, and innovative enough to ask the students, we might not have had the ability to fly our students to Neverland.
One thing that I most appreciate about my school is the recognition that sometimes technology is the best way, and sometimes it only makes sense to use paper and a pencil. Sometimes, an innovation is best, and other times the time-tested way is the best way. We are given freedom in our professional judgment to do what we believe is best for each lesson in our classroom, but we aren't left to figure it out alone. Our media specialists are also technology coaches. Since this post is getting a bit long, I'll talk about how our new technology coach is innovating next week.
Monday, September 11, 2017
The Death of Expertise: Part 2 - Social Media v. People Who Actually Know
Eight days ago, I was casually scrolling through my Facebook newsfeed when I saw for the first time that Hurricane Irma would be a category 6 hurricane. I teach science, so I know that there is no such thing as a category 6. Giving my non-sciencey friend the benefit of the doubt, I assume she did not know this. However, I looked at the source of the article and did not find that it came from NOAA or NASA or the National Weather Center or any kind of remotely believable source. This is a smart woman who teaches kids about credibility of sources in research, and she is passing along something from a site with no weather credibility (or arguably no credibility on any topic). Over the course of the next few days, I saw similar articles posted multiple times on both Facebook and Twitter and had people tell it to me in person. When I told them there was no such thing as a category 6, they would reply with, "Yeah, but it's going to the be the same conditions as if there were." This doesn't make sense. It reminds me of when students ask me what UV light WOULD look like IF we could see it. It just doesn't exist that way, so no.
The internet has the power to connect us to so much information - if we take the time to find it. Social media has the power to bring us together with a diverse array of people with perspectives from various cultures, beliefs, and political viewpoints - if we only used it that way. For the first time in the history of the world, we can find out about scientific research from the researcher - if we go past the first page of a Google search.
Sadly, the invention with the power to bring us in contact with a wider variety of people has actually divided us into tribal groups, reading only the articles posted by those we already agree with. Sadly, the powerful tools we have at our disposal have not led to greater connection with experts. We passively consume whatever article our Facebook friends post regardless of source. Chances are, they didn't actually read the article but passed it on based on the headline.
We had already been primed by 24-hour news not to expect experts in our news broadcasts (see last week's post). Then, we started trusting the wisdom of the crowd. (To see how well that worked out, we need only look at the ruined reputations of those men accused by Reddit users who thought they could do police-work in the wake of the Boston Marathon bombing.) As we started getting more and more of our news from our phones, we stopped caring where the information came from. A blogger you follow disagrees with your doctor? Who do you believe? Someone posts a meme about a chemical you've never heard of. Clearly, you can conclude that chemical is dangerous and the people who make it are evil without looking it up. Expert, amateur, and nut are all there, in one place, appearing to have equal value.
When an actual meteorologist replied to my friend's post about the hurricane, people argued with him. Later that week, Raleigh's most famous meteorologist, Greg Fishel, had to take time out of his broadcast to address this. I ask, as I did last week, "Do we really have to slow down for these people?" But even after these experts weighed in, people continued to say to me, "Yeah, but it's the same as what it would be if it did exist." We live in a "Yeah, but" world because we cannot be bothered to find out if we are getting information from people who actually know what they are talking about.
Teachers, there has never been a more important time to teach your students about credibility of sources. Teach them the appropriate place for Wikipedia. Don't allow them to use Answers.whatever.answer.com as sources for research. Teach them how to tell the difference between a credible source and a non-credible one. Model wisdom for them by not sharing everything you read on the internet. When you do share, tell them why you find that source trustworthy.
The internet has the power to connect us to so much information - if we take the time to find it. Social media has the power to bring us together with a diverse array of people with perspectives from various cultures, beliefs, and political viewpoints - if we only used it that way. For the first time in the history of the world, we can find out about scientific research from the researcher - if we go past the first page of a Google search.
Sadly, the invention with the power to bring us in contact with a wider variety of people has actually divided us into tribal groups, reading only the articles posted by those we already agree with. Sadly, the powerful tools we have at our disposal have not led to greater connection with experts. We passively consume whatever article our Facebook friends post regardless of source. Chances are, they didn't actually read the article but passed it on based on the headline.
We had already been primed by 24-hour news not to expect experts in our news broadcasts (see last week's post). Then, we started trusting the wisdom of the crowd. (To see how well that worked out, we need only look at the ruined reputations of those men accused by Reddit users who thought they could do police-work in the wake of the Boston Marathon bombing.) As we started getting more and more of our news from our phones, we stopped caring where the information came from. A blogger you follow disagrees with your doctor? Who do you believe? Someone posts a meme about a chemical you've never heard of. Clearly, you can conclude that chemical is dangerous and the people who make it are evil without looking it up. Expert, amateur, and nut are all there, in one place, appearing to have equal value. When an actual meteorologist replied to my friend's post about the hurricane, people argued with him. Later that week, Raleigh's most famous meteorologist, Greg Fishel, had to take time out of his broadcast to address this. I ask, as I did last week, "Do we really have to slow down for these people?" But even after these experts weighed in, people continued to say to me, "Yeah, but it's the same as what it would be if it did exist." We live in a "Yeah, but" world because we cannot be bothered to find out if we are getting information from people who actually know what they are talking about.
Teachers, there has never been a more important time to teach your students about credibility of sources. Teach them the appropriate place for Wikipedia. Don't allow them to use Answers.whatever.answer.com as sources for research. Teach them how to tell the difference between a credible source and a non-credible one. Model wisdom for them by not sharing everything you read on the internet. When you do share, tell them why you find that source trustworthy.
Sunday, September 3, 2017
The Death of Expertise: Part 1 - How CNN Ruined the News
I was born in 1976, so I do not have first-hand memories of Walter Cronkite or David Brinkley. I was, however, lucky enough to have a childhood free from 24 hour news. While CNN began in 1980, my family did not have cable until the early 90's, and my first memories of CNN are about the first Iraq war, Operation Desert Storm. I grew up knowing the names of only three national news people, Dan Rather, Peter Jennings, and Tom Brokaw. The evening news came on at 6:30 Eastern after the local news unless there was an event that merited breaking into regular programming.
Even though CNN had been around since 1980, the war of the early 90's really put it on the map because it was the first time people wanted to watch a news story for longer than a few minutes. Throughout the 80's, there were only a handful of cable news channels. Of course, after massive ratings spike during the OJ Simpson trial, there was an explosion of cable news networks, all battling for the eyes of viewers primarily by being the first to break a story. This is what led to the death of expertise.
Go to youtube and watch Walter Cronkite interview politicians or NASA officials. It is striking how different those interviews look from what the shouting matches we watch today. Because he was "the most trusted man in America," he got great guests. Because he came on at 6:30, he had all day to research and learn about the topics on which his expert guests would comment. You see him pose intelligent questions because he had learned enough to know what to ask. He ended news broadcasts with "and that's the way it is" unless he had ended the broadcast with a commentary. This was personal rule of his because he wanted Americans to understand the difference between the news and his personal opinion. This small gesture may not have been world altering, but it reflects an attitude that we do not see today.
Because of 24 hour news coverage, there is great pressure to begin speaking about any bit of news instantaneously and keep talking until the next "newsworthy" event occurs. No time is taken to research the story, and the expert guest is whoever answers the phone and can start speaking immediately. In a way only Aaron Sorkin can satirize, his HBO show the newsroom humorously showed well-meaning producers, scrambling to find a guest, booking a professor from the University of Phoenix to comment on a story about Arizona's immigration law, not realizing the it was an online university having nothing to do with the state of Arizona. The pressure to break a story first and keep people from changing channels creates conditions that no serious news professional can endure. Instead, we have newsmen who act more like referees at a boxing match than honest information brokers. Tom Brokaw and Peter Jennings may not have been Walter Cronkite, but they weren't bringing on two guests to yell at each other until the commercial break. Lest you think of only the people you disagree with here, there is no difference between CNN and Fox News in this regard. Every cable news channel, no matter what their political bent, is guilty of ruining the news in this way.
Perhaps as bad as breakdown in civility, the most far reaching effect of 24 hour news is the death of expertise. As I mentioned earlier, since there isn't time to bring on experts, the news puts up whoever is nearest to a satellite dish. This has conditions us, not only not to expect an expert opinion, but even to question true experts. Our favorite news source said one thing, and we put our trust in them, no matter what an expert in the field may say. At the same time, we are teach our kids that it is important to treat everyone's viewpoint equally (even if it is clearly nuts). Do we really have to slow down for the flat earth people? Do we really have to place the viewpoint of a conspiracy theorist on the same footing as a scientist, a holocaust victim, or an astronaut who walked on the moon? Do we really think that he who shouts loudest wins? Unfortunately, the current answer to those questions is yes.
Next week, I want to address how social networking and smart phones have contributed to this problem, but for now, let me say this. The next generation will face big, important issues. They are issues that require the depth of research that creates experts. Teaching students about credible sources matters now more than it ever has. We need our students to understand that while we should treat all people with respect, we do not have to place equal stock in their opinions. We need to teach them that expertise matters.
Even though CNN had been around since 1980, the war of the early 90's really put it on the map because it was the first time people wanted to watch a news story for longer than a few minutes. Throughout the 80's, there were only a handful of cable news channels. Of course, after massive ratings spike during the OJ Simpson trial, there was an explosion of cable news networks, all battling for the eyes of viewers primarily by being the first to break a story. This is what led to the death of expertise.
Go to youtube and watch Walter Cronkite interview politicians or NASA officials. It is striking how different those interviews look from what the shouting matches we watch today. Because he was "the most trusted man in America," he got great guests. Because he came on at 6:30, he had all day to research and learn about the topics on which his expert guests would comment. You see him pose intelligent questions because he had learned enough to know what to ask. He ended news broadcasts with "and that's the way it is" unless he had ended the broadcast with a commentary. This was personal rule of his because he wanted Americans to understand the difference between the news and his personal opinion. This small gesture may not have been world altering, but it reflects an attitude that we do not see today.
Because of 24 hour news coverage, there is great pressure to begin speaking about any bit of news instantaneously and keep talking until the next "newsworthy" event occurs. No time is taken to research the story, and the expert guest is whoever answers the phone and can start speaking immediately. In a way only Aaron Sorkin can satirize, his HBO show the newsroom humorously showed well-meaning producers, scrambling to find a guest, booking a professor from the University of Phoenix to comment on a story about Arizona's immigration law, not realizing the it was an online university having nothing to do with the state of Arizona. The pressure to break a story first and keep people from changing channels creates conditions that no serious news professional can endure. Instead, we have newsmen who act more like referees at a boxing match than honest information brokers. Tom Brokaw and Peter Jennings may not have been Walter Cronkite, but they weren't bringing on two guests to yell at each other until the commercial break. Lest you think of only the people you disagree with here, there is no difference between CNN and Fox News in this regard. Every cable news channel, no matter what their political bent, is guilty of ruining the news in this way.
Perhaps as bad as breakdown in civility, the most far reaching effect of 24 hour news is the death of expertise. As I mentioned earlier, since there isn't time to bring on experts, the news puts up whoever is nearest to a satellite dish. This has conditions us, not only not to expect an expert opinion, but even to question true experts. Our favorite news source said one thing, and we put our trust in them, no matter what an expert in the field may say. At the same time, we are teach our kids that it is important to treat everyone's viewpoint equally (even if it is clearly nuts). Do we really have to slow down for the flat earth people? Do we really have to place the viewpoint of a conspiracy theorist on the same footing as a scientist, a holocaust victim, or an astronaut who walked on the moon? Do we really think that he who shouts loudest wins? Unfortunately, the current answer to those questions is yes.
Next week, I want to address how social networking and smart phones have contributed to this problem, but for now, let me say this. The next generation will face big, important issues. They are issues that require the depth of research that creates experts. Teaching students about credible sources matters now more than it ever has. We need our students to understand that while we should treat all people with respect, we do not have to place equal stock in their opinions. We need to teach them that expertise matters.
Monday, August 28, 2017
Glitchy Tech - Be the Calm One
It happens every year at the beginning of the year. My students get their computers. I am ready to get them enrolled in my class on our learning management system. I am psyched to get my 8th graders blogs set up and to put my digital textbook on their computers. I have one day in my first few days set aside just for this purpose. And then . . .
Two kids have some weird thing that keeps their computer from opening the book. )Make a note to send him a pdf version while we figure this out.) Halfway through the day, the filter experiences something that causes two of my classes to be unable to set up their blog because they can get to WordPress but can't confirm their e-mail. (Send a help ticket to IT for this.) A student wasn't listening when you gave them the access code to get on the LMS, so he's not getting the information he should be. (Remind him of the code, again. Don't worry, you'll get to remind him again tomorrow.)
Our IT people are AWESOME, and they work hard to make our system run smoothly. No matter how good they are, there are just problems they cannot anticipate. You cannot test 600 computers trying to get to the different websites different teachers use until they try. Students love drama, so they make out like these tech glitches are the end of the world. In their minds, this week of troubleshooting tech will cause them to fail, keep them from getting into college, or getting a job, or getting a house; and they will most surely be living under a bridge - all as a result of this filter issue.
Deep breaths, teachers. You are the adults in the room. Remind them that this happens every year. Remind them how great it is to have this problem when so many in the world have no access to technology at all. Remind them that the IT people are working hard to solve the problem. Remind them that their teachers are not insane people who wish to see them fail and will, of course, adjust the due date of that blog post or have them submit it some other way. One more thing, teachers. Since you know this might happen, have a non-tech backup plan for that day. When the thing doesn't work the way it is supposed to, do the backup plan. Then, you can do all that tech stuff after it is fixed.
Two weeks from now, when everything is running smoothly, no one will remember that there were any tech issues at the beginning of the year (except the tech people); so let's not waste our precious energy worrying about it now.
Two kids have some weird thing that keeps their computer from opening the book. )Make a note to send him a pdf version while we figure this out.) Halfway through the day, the filter experiences something that causes two of my classes to be unable to set up their blog because they can get to WordPress but can't confirm their e-mail. (Send a help ticket to IT for this.) A student wasn't listening when you gave them the access code to get on the LMS, so he's not getting the information he should be. (Remind him of the code, again. Don't worry, you'll get to remind him again tomorrow.)
Our IT people are AWESOME, and they work hard to make our system run smoothly. No matter how good they are, there are just problems they cannot anticipate. You cannot test 600 computers trying to get to the different websites different teachers use until they try. Students love drama, so they make out like these tech glitches are the end of the world. In their minds, this week of troubleshooting tech will cause them to fail, keep them from getting into college, or getting a job, or getting a house; and they will most surely be living under a bridge - all as a result of this filter issue.
Deep breaths, teachers. You are the adults in the room. Remind them that this happens every year. Remind them how great it is to have this problem when so many in the world have no access to technology at all. Remind them that the IT people are working hard to solve the problem. Remind them that their teachers are not insane people who wish to see them fail and will, of course, adjust the due date of that blog post or have them submit it some other way. One more thing, teachers. Since you know this might happen, have a non-tech backup plan for that day. When the thing doesn't work the way it is supposed to, do the backup plan. Then, you can do all that tech stuff after it is fixed.
Two weeks from now, when everything is running smoothly, no one will remember that there were any tech issues at the beginning of the year (except the tech people); so let's not waste our precious energy worrying about it now.
Tuesday, August 22, 2017
Science Teacher's Super Bowl
I know. I know. The last thing you need on August 22 is another post on the eclipse. Following NASA on Twitter means I have read so many posts and articles that I can't keep them all straight. Then, there were the frightened people who kept posting the same article from "an ophthalmologist" (I teach my students if the source is vague, it is suspect. Don't post something where someone hasn't shared their name.) Last night, my feed was filled with photos from the path of totality as well as our local 93%. You've seen everything you can possibly see regarding the moon's path across the sun. That's fine. I'm writing this one for myself.
Our school bought every student a pair of eclipse glasses; we even ordered them back in March before they became solid gold. After spending the first few weeks of school fielding emails about whether we got the right ones, reassuring people that the ancients did not all go blind, and teaching some basic lessons on the cause and frequency of eclipses to my students, the day was finally here. I'm a science teacher, but I'm also a yearbook advisor, so I enlisted the help of other teachers and parents to take shots of the kids in their glasses or with their pinhole arrangements. My camera was solar filtered, so I asked the people who couldn't get the eclipse itself to get the kids watching.
I set out a few minutes early to set up my tripod and camera, expecting to get nothing. Thank goodness, someone suggested bringing out a chair because I would have had difficulty squatting by the tripod over and over. I took about 75 photos in the hour I was outside, but I didn't want my attempts to photograph the event to interfere with having the experience, so in between shots, I leaned back in the chair with my glasses on and enjoyed the eclipse as a human being, thankful that our administration bought glasses for us. The experience was so much more real than the pinhole setup I had in third-grade.
The best part of the day, however, was being with and listening to my students. They hovered around, asking questions of me and each other. Since we didn't get blackout darkness, they had some difficulty describing what the sky looked like. To be fair, since it doesn't look like anything else, it is difficult to describe. Among my favorite descriptions were, "It's like a storm is coming, except it's still blue" and "It's like the beginning of that one Harry Potter movie, where he's on the playground." I have e-mails pouring in with photos from our elementary students, who went home to watch it with their parents as well as group shots of kids in the glasses. It's going to be a fun yearbook page, but my memories of enjoying it with my kids cannot be adequately captured.
Our school bought every student a pair of eclipse glasses; we even ordered them back in March before they became solid gold. After spending the first few weeks of school fielding emails about whether we got the right ones, reassuring people that the ancients did not all go blind, and teaching some basic lessons on the cause and frequency of eclipses to my students, the day was finally here. I'm a science teacher, but I'm also a yearbook advisor, so I enlisted the help of other teachers and parents to take shots of the kids in their glasses or with their pinhole arrangements. My camera was solar filtered, so I asked the people who couldn't get the eclipse itself to get the kids watching.
The best part of the day, however, was being with and listening to my students. They hovered around, asking questions of me and each other. Since we didn't get blackout darkness, they had some difficulty describing what the sky looked like. To be fair, since it doesn't look like anything else, it is difficult to describe. Among my favorite descriptions were, "It's like a storm is coming, except it's still blue" and "It's like the beginning of that one Harry Potter movie, where he's on the playground." I have e-mails pouring in with photos from our elementary students, who went home to watch it with their parents as well as group shots of kids in the glasses. It's going to be a fun yearbook page, but my memories of enjoying it with my kids cannot be adequately captured.
Monday, August 14, 2017
Ask The Bigger Question
You may have noticed that life seems to be moving faster than it used to. It's not really. After all, we have the same 24 hours in every day that people always have. It seems like it is moving faster because we are trying to fit more into those 24 hours and fueling them with caffeine. Instead of Walter Cronkite, the most trusted man in America, at 6 pm, we get news all day from multiple sources without regard to their credibility. We want to get so much done that we are actually pursuing whether or not humans can live without sleep.
The relentless speed of input and activity means we rarely slow down long enough to reflect and ask the bigger questions, like how certain events fit into a larger context. Our brains are processing so much data that we have no time to go through the steps of learning (via Architecture of Learning by Kevin Washburn). We are constantly at the Experience level, but as our brains strive to reach Comprehension, a new piece of news comes our way. It is hard for our brains to get to Elaboration and Application. For that reason, we aren't fully integrating these experiences. This cannot be good for the human brain, but we aren't even slowing down long enough to ask that question.
As a result of this constant bombardment without intellectual integration, we revert to our most basic of emotions, self-defense. As an example, an announcement comes over the intercom at school, asking for men to come and help move some chairs. The women in the building immediately react that this was sexist, even though, given a few moments of thought, we know that the people we work for don't view women as weak or less than men. Because we don't take the time to reflect, we react out of surface level emotions. We don't act; we react. Because we live in 2017, we take our reaction to social media. Because we live in a community, our reaction cause other people react as well; and we are soon in a Twitter war. Other people jump on our side or the other side, and it gets out of hand quickly. We say things we wouldn't if we just slowed down long enough to ask the bigger questions.
YIKES! This can't be the way God meant for us to live our lives.
The good news is that we can make it better. It won't be hard, but we will have to do it on purpose. We have to slow down for a few seconds and ask ourselves a few questions. This will keep us from reacting emotionally and, in some cases, keep us from reacting at all.
1. What do I actually know about the situation?
Because of instant video footage, we think we know events. The truth is, we may only know the 30 seconds shown in the video, which the person took after the inciting incident began. We may not know what started the problem, but we are quick to judge that 30 seconds as though we were there. Stop for another 30 seconds and ask yourself what you actually know before you respond.
2. Do I know the character of the people involved?
My reaction to strangers should be different than my reaction to people I know well. If I know that a person is not a sexist or a racist, I don't need to react to their tweet as though sexism or racism is clearly implied. Take 30 seconds to say to yourself (out loud if you need to), "I know they didn't mean to come off that way." Then, if you are still bothered, take a few minutes to go talk to them instead of about them.
3. How will my reaction represent me?
This is big. When we react out of self-defense or anger, we know everything that led up to that emotional moment. Your Facebook friends do not. They are not inside your mind, and to them, you may just look like an over-reacting, crazy person. I assume you would not want to be viewed that way (unless it is the truth about you). One over-reacting tweet may not ruin your reputation, but a series of them will. Take 30 seconds to ask yourself, "Do I want this to be what people think of me?"
4. Does my reaction fit with my worldview?
I am a Christian school teacher, so I spend a lot of my day thinking about worldview. As we take in new information, it is filtered through our worldview. That is why two people looking at the same data can interpret it as pro-creationism or pro-evolution. Both people are reading the same thing different ways. We think less about this, but our reactions should also be filtered through our worldview. If I believe in the Biblical Jesus, my reaction should be Biblical. That doesn't mean it will never be angry (Jesus did drive the money changers out of the Temple with a handmade whip), but I imagine it would be angry less often if I filtered it through a Christlike worldview. I imagine the source of the anger would be less about me than most reactions we put online. It's probably going to take more than 30 seconds to process this one, but it is worth the time.
We are all participating in a large scale, high stakes, sociological experiment. That would be okay if it weren't rewiring our brains and making us reactive creatures. You can step aside and change the parameters of the experiment. Put the phone down for a minute. React later. There's no value in reacting first; there is only value in acting well.
The relentless speed of input and activity means we rarely slow down long enough to reflect and ask the bigger questions, like how certain events fit into a larger context. Our brains are processing so much data that we have no time to go through the steps of learning (via Architecture of Learning by Kevin Washburn). We are constantly at the Experience level, but as our brains strive to reach Comprehension, a new piece of news comes our way. It is hard for our brains to get to Elaboration and Application. For that reason, we aren't fully integrating these experiences. This cannot be good for the human brain, but we aren't even slowing down long enough to ask that question.
As a result of this constant bombardment without intellectual integration, we revert to our most basic of emotions, self-defense. As an example, an announcement comes over the intercom at school, asking for men to come and help move some chairs. The women in the building immediately react that this was sexist, even though, given a few moments of thought, we know that the people we work for don't view women as weak or less than men. Because we don't take the time to reflect, we react out of surface level emotions. We don't act; we react. Because we live in 2017, we take our reaction to social media. Because we live in a community, our reaction cause other people react as well; and we are soon in a Twitter war. Other people jump on our side or the other side, and it gets out of hand quickly. We say things we wouldn't if we just slowed down long enough to ask the bigger questions.
YIKES! This can't be the way God meant for us to live our lives.
The good news is that we can make it better. It won't be hard, but we will have to do it on purpose. We have to slow down for a few seconds and ask ourselves a few questions. This will keep us from reacting emotionally and, in some cases, keep us from reacting at all.
1. What do I actually know about the situation?
Because of instant video footage, we think we know events. The truth is, we may only know the 30 seconds shown in the video, which the person took after the inciting incident began. We may not know what started the problem, but we are quick to judge that 30 seconds as though we were there. Stop for another 30 seconds and ask yourself what you actually know before you respond.
2. Do I know the character of the people involved?
My reaction to strangers should be different than my reaction to people I know well. If I know that a person is not a sexist or a racist, I don't need to react to their tweet as though sexism or racism is clearly implied. Take 30 seconds to say to yourself (out loud if you need to), "I know they didn't mean to come off that way." Then, if you are still bothered, take a few minutes to go talk to them instead of about them.
3. How will my reaction represent me?
This is big. When we react out of self-defense or anger, we know everything that led up to that emotional moment. Your Facebook friends do not. They are not inside your mind, and to them, you may just look like an over-reacting, crazy person. I assume you would not want to be viewed that way (unless it is the truth about you). One over-reacting tweet may not ruin your reputation, but a series of them will. Take 30 seconds to ask yourself, "Do I want this to be what people think of me?"
4. Does my reaction fit with my worldview?
I am a Christian school teacher, so I spend a lot of my day thinking about worldview. As we take in new information, it is filtered through our worldview. That is why two people looking at the same data can interpret it as pro-creationism or pro-evolution. Both people are reading the same thing different ways. We think less about this, but our reactions should also be filtered through our worldview. If I believe in the Biblical Jesus, my reaction should be Biblical. That doesn't mean it will never be angry (Jesus did drive the money changers out of the Temple with a handmade whip), but I imagine it would be angry less often if I filtered it through a Christlike worldview. I imagine the source of the anger would be less about me than most reactions we put online. It's probably going to take more than 30 seconds to process this one, but it is worth the time.
We are all participating in a large scale, high stakes, sociological experiment. That would be okay if it weren't rewiring our brains and making us reactive creatures. You can step aside and change the parameters of the experiment. Put the phone down for a minute. React later. There's no value in reacting first; there is only value in acting well.
Monday, August 7, 2017
Backwards Planning
Our school has summer assignments for teachers. We read a couple of professional development books and do discussion boards. This year, we watched Oscar worthy safety videos (don't touch blood or stand on unstable surfaces, that sort of thing) and do an activity called "Backwards Planning." This is the one thing I have not yet completed. I've thought a lot about it, but I just haven't gotten in down on paper yet.
I casually said to a few people last week, "Isn't that what all teachers do anyway? It only makes sense to figure out what you want to do and then figure out how to get there." Those people looked at me like it was cute that I thought that. Apparently, some teachers just start teaching and see where it goes; I didn't know that.
Whether by training or personality, I have always been that way. The yearbook really couldn't happen if I didn't think that way. You have to see an end and then take the photos or gather the materials it takes to get that result. Our professional development coach tells me that I can do my assignment as a blog post, so here goes.
As a means of learning about rotational motion, I have my students design and 3D print spinning tops. We then hold a contest to see who can spin the longest time. The first time I did this was last year and, while it was fun, I'm not sure how much physics they learned from it. When it comes down to it, I think I presented things in the wrong order. They started designing before learning the concepts behind rotation, so they just did it based on other tops they had seen. To make that better, I'd like to make some adjustments for this year. The questions we were asked to address in our planning are answered below.
I casually said to a few people last week, "Isn't that what all teachers do anyway? It only makes sense to figure out what you want to do and then figure out how to get there." Those people looked at me like it was cute that I thought that. Apparently, some teachers just start teaching and see where it goes; I didn't know that.
Whether by training or personality, I have always been that way. The yearbook really couldn't happen if I didn't think that way. You have to see an end and then take the photos or gather the materials it takes to get that result. Our professional development coach tells me that I can do my assignment as a blog post, so here goes.
As a means of learning about rotational motion, I have my students design and 3D print spinning tops. We then hold a contest to see who can spin the longest time. The first time I did this was last year and, while it was fun, I'm not sure how much physics they learned from it. When it comes down to it, I think I presented things in the wrong order. They started designing before learning the concepts behind rotation, so they just did it based on other tops they had seen. To make that better, I'd like to make some adjustments for this year. The questions we were asked to address in our planning are answered below.
1) What are the desired outcomes?
Answer: Students should be able to explain the relationship between shape, mass, radius, etc. on angular momentum.
2) What evidence shows progress and mastery of the outcome?
Answer: The design of the top will be accompanied by a grid in which students describe the shape, mass, radius, etc. and explain their thinking from a physics standpoint.
3) What activities will effectively get students to the outcome?
Answer: Spend the first day going through the design thinking steps and research online. Spend the next few days designing and refining in the 3D print program and filling out the thinking grid.
4) What is your essential guiding question for the unit?
Answer: What factors influence the angular momentum of a rotating object?
5) Is there an opportunity to connect with another teacher/subject? How could you collaborate to bring your class experiences together?
Answer: While I do that with other challenges, I'm not sure it makes sense here. That said, if our math teachers can think of a way to join in, I'm thrilled to do it.
6) What is the Biblical Integration?
Answer: The creation mandate instructs mankind to subdue the earth. All technology is part of that mandate as we take advantage of the laws of physics and materials from creation to create culture and helpful devices.
7) Add technology last. Where is it appropriate? Where does it provide differentiation?
Answer: We add technology last to make sure we aren't just doing tech for tech's sake. This particular activity benefits from the 3D printer. Although, if a student told me they wanted to carve a top from wood or mold metal rather than design in the 3D design program, I would be thrilled with that - built in differentiation. Their designs also provide differentiation as there is more than one way to be right.
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