Author Archives: mcashing

More than I can chew, swallow, and digest properly…

Posted on by
Reply

I’ve always had a problem figuring out the breaking point of my to-do list.  I seem to thrive when every second of my day is planned working on some project or another, even to the point that I almost feel guilty taking some time for myself to relax.

The same can be said for my new position.  Sure, I was optimistic – I’m a Bill’s fan, I’m built that way.  Sure, I can take on the behavioral kids that need a break from every-day classroom life.  Sure, I can help to teach this kid math – after all, that’s what I’m certified in.  Sure, I can help this kid pass the regents in January, no problem (even though I haven’t even looked at that Regents since I took it).  Sure, I can take on this kid’s problems, and this kid’s problems, and so on and so on. ….wait.  You want me to teach what that period?  But I’m already teaching 2 other subjects that period, and only one of the 3 is something I’m certified in.  But what choice do I have?  I’ve already said yes so many times, how can I possibly start saying no?

I looked up a past post to see what I thought of all of this back in September, when I allowed myself time for reflection and contemplation, and before I got too dizzy to see straight:

“The ALC will temporarily house students that have had behavioral issues in the school, but this center will be a working classroom.  Students will receive academic support for class assignments that need to be done.  In turn, teachers who recommend a student to attend the ALC will provide appropriate assignments for those students to work on while at the ALC.   Students will also receive behavioral support in the forms of Conflict Resolution and Character Education.  Hopefully, this will take a more proactive approach and help the students to own their learning experiences and academic future.” – written on Sept. 9, 2010

The reality of the situation that I have let slowly spiral out of control is that I do not have time to focus on Conflict Resolution and Character Education with my behavioral students.  I cannot fully meet their needs by giving them the attention they’re craving, and what most likely got them in my room in the first place.  But they aren’t the only students this system is cheating.  My instructional students are not getting my full attention.   Even if I had no behavioral students assigned to me on any given day, there are 2 periods in which I am teaching 3 different subjects each.  Five of these 6 subjects I give grades for.  How is that fair to any of these students, who were each assigned to me with the idea that I would be able to give them individualized attention.

I have found myself in a hole that I helped create, and that I don’t even know when it got so deep.

This post is not my cry for help.  This post is not my way of blaming anyone for how things got this way.  This post is merely my way of thinking through the situation.  Of course if anyone has any suggestions or comments, please let me know and I will put them into consideration.  I just ask please for no “I told you so”s.  I already know.

Homework in the Context of the New Family – Ch. 2

Posted on by
1

This chapter focuses on the varying differences of parent values and teacher values.  Parents can range from the belief of “more homework is always better” to “there are better things than more homework.”  Teachers need to be aware of these varying views, and be respectful of the wishes of the parents.  At the same time, it is impossible to please everyone.

Gone are the days in which everyone in the community shared the same values, making things predictable.  Now, people need to fear the legal ramifications of holding students to a moral standard that may not align with how the students were raised.

One example of differing priorities that is present on pages 32 and 33 reminds me of several students in Franklinville.  They are responsible for helping out at home after school.  When a school district mandated after school time to improve student grades, something that is similar to what we do, one parent complained of having to pay for a babysitter.  As we continue to explore ways to help failing students, we need to keep in mind the parents’ values.

Since it is impossible for a school to demand homework on families, some teachers have found ways to be flexible: assigning work weekly or monthly, or even handing out a course syllabus (p. 34).

The variety of parents starts with parents who think helping their children with homework is not in their job description.  At the other end of the spectrum we have parents that do their child’s homework to ensure good grades.  As teachers, we need to be more aware of the level of difficulty for each student.  The ideal, obviously, would be work that students could do on their own, without relying on the help of their parents.

On page 38, we see that homework is one of the leading causes of drop-outs.  “The inability to keep up with homework was a critical factor in the decision of lower-class students to drop out of school.”  The reality in Franklinville is that the majority of the demographic is of lower-class.  There is little draw for a middle-class family to come to (and stay in) Franklinville.  I believe that homework is a major factor for a few of our students who have dropped out, or are at risk for dropping out, even this year.  I have been analyzing the Warning and Ineligible Lists for the year, and many of the names on there are people that have dropped out or that I am concerned for.

Parallel to the change in dictatorial parent relations, there was a change from dictatorial school relations.  Schools and teachers used to be accepted as the experts on education, and parents saw schools as an institution that needed their support – simply because the school demanded it.  Now, in a consumer-driven world, schools are viewed as a service that owes something to the parents, instead of the other way around.  Schools that are in a lower tax-base area, and therefore do not have the funds to support themselves, no longer have the support of the parents as well.

This lack of volunteer involvement can be seen in other aspects of society as well.  People no longer feel obligated ot help out at the local church, nursing home, library, or fire department.  Instead, they are looking for involvement that can benefit themselves or their families.  The only students involved in any kind of community service are either mandated by the court, or are seeking to bulk up their resume for college of National Honor Society.

On the other hand – in the minds of veteran teachers and administrators – supportive parents meant parents willing to do whatever a school said without question.  Certainly those days are over.  It may be perhaps that parents are more involved today than they used to be, simply because they are taking a stand as to what their child will or will not participate in during school.

So, how do we proceed?  How do we close the gap between parent expectations and school expectations regarding involvement, especially with homework?  The book gives a few suggestions on pages 46-54.

  1. Get real – We cannot control every aspect of the child’s life.
  2. Resist the temptation to judge – As we all know, whining will get you nowhere; accept what you’re given and welcome the support you do have.  It’s easier to call students (and possibly their parents) lazy than to analyze our own teaching models.
  3. Revise expectations of Parental Support – Schools shouldn’t expect all parents to be involved, yet subconsciously, we do.
  4. Suggest (not mandate) guidelines for the parents’ role in homework – We (as a school district) need to be in constant communication with parents – letting them know what we expect from them at various grade levels.  Parents need to be letting us know when an assignment is too difficult, or the students needed help with something.  This way, when it returns completed, we don’t assume that the child understands the content.  Wording these guidelines can be tricky, so some examples are given on p. 50 in Figure 2.1.
  5. Establish formal methods of parent-teacher communication – There are a few surveys that are available on pages 51-53 that can serve as a tool for parents to communicate to the schools about homework views.  The homework card (Figure 2.2) should be filled out for each individual student.  The Parent Survey (Figure 2.3) would be easy enough to include in beginning of the year paperwork, and be made available to the teachers, so that the parents only have to fill out one each year instead of per child, save for question #1.  There is also a Parent Feedback checklist (Figure 2.4) designed to go along with every assignment.  I would send these out the first week that homework goes out, and then as different styles of homework go out throughout the year.
  6. Set parents’ minds at ease about homework – Parents who have tried communicating with the school and feel that they are not being heard are weary of doing it again.  They see talking to teachers about homework the same as talking to a wall.  We need to collectively reassure them that their child will not be penalized for not completing homework that the students gave their best effort on.
  7. Endorse a set of inalienable homework rights – There is an example of one such Bill of Homework Rights in Figure 2.5 on pg. 55.

We need to work together as a school district and community to figure out how best to handle homework for our students.  It will require patience, respect, and effort from both sides.

The Cult(ure) of Homework – Ch. 1

Posted on by
Reply

Homework has been such an institution in our educational system, it may be difficult to even think of not having it.  However, while our method of education has changed and evolved in the past 150 years, the concept of homework has changed very little.

In the early days of our educational system, one-room school houses were the norm, combining many grade-levels for one teacher, with attendance being even more sporadic than it is now.  Assessment of knowledge consisted of students memorizing facts and reciting them back to the teacher.  To better prepare for these assessments, students would study at home (hence, homework), (p. 3).

Since those early days in the late 1800s, assessment procedures have evolved to include projects, papers, and other more creative things.  While these methods of assessment are better suited for the goals that we have for our students – encouraging higher cognitive activity – these methods are also time consuming.

Unfortunately, teachers have precious few hours of class time for instruction, let alone assessment.  As a result, these time-consuming, elaborate projects get pushed on home time.  Moreover, the projects often need the help of parents to make sure they are done, and done well.  This begs the question: What are we assessing?  Are we assessing how well the students know the material, or how well the parents can help them accomplish something elaborate and beautiful?

There are compelling arguments on either side of the “To (give) Homework or Not To (give) Homework” debate.  For those in favor of homework, their arguments are in bold.  The rebuttals to these arguments will be found directly following them.  These bolded beliefs are straight from the book, and can be found on pages 10-13.

#1 – The role of the school is to extend learning beyond the classroom.

While it may be true that some students do not have the parental support teachers wish to see, does that make it the educator’s responsibility to make up for the supposed lack of parental support?  Do we really want to control every aspect of our students’ lives, giving them no break from school?  I don’t want to put words in my fellow teachers’ mouths, but if people demanded me not to have a break from school EVER, there may be a mutiny on our hands.  Of course, most teachers are so passionate about teaching that they cannot get enough of it, and spend a lot of their free time researching to make their teaching more effective (such as, if you are bothering to read this right now).  But, they CHOSE their profession for their passion.  Students do not have the luxury of choosing their homework.

#2 – Intellectual activity is intrinsically more valuable than nonintellectual activity.

While I agree that intellectual activity is important to the growth of a child, I also believe that a child needs to be well-rounded.  They need to grow socially, emotionally, and physically, as well as intellectually.  They need more than just academics to survive as a citizen in this world, and we would be stunting them of this growth if we demanded that they only focused on the academic aspects of schools.  After all, experienced teachers know that a child learns best by doing.  It would then make sense that the best way for them to learn social skills is to participate in social events: play dates, unstructured play time, etc.

#3 – Homework teaches responsibility.

As they argue on page 11, when they say responsibility, they really mean obedience.  We are not teaching responsibility in assigning an hour of homework a night, we are training them to be obedient.  There are better ways to reinforce responsibility, that will be explored in future chapters.

#4 – Lots of homework is a sign of a rigorous curriculum.

In other words, the curriculum is so busy, we cannot possibly teach you everything you need to learn in the classroom, so you must have homework to continue the teaching at home.  I believe homework should be a time for practice, not a time for instruction; but more on that later.  This idea of more homework caters more to the parents than to the students.  Most students see the homework involved with a class or teacher and the more there is, the harder they think the class is.  Students figure this out in September, from the opening week expectations that teachers share.  Some may even be so tuned in that they notice the year before, watching their older friends and their work load.  “Oh, I don’t want Mrs. So-and-so.  She gives a TON of homework!”  Therefore, before they’ve even experienced it for themselves, students have a defeated attitude.  For many of them, it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy.

#5 – Good teachers give homework, good students do their homework.

This statement sums up the other 4 statements.  It is a mentality accepted by all; an unspoken truth.  Non-tenured teachers think it is expected of them by administration, and often times fall into the trap of using homework to extend their instructional time.  Parents have come to expect it because, after all, “that’s how we got through school.”  Students are trained to think it, getting rewards for getting their homework done (good grades, stickers, tickets, etc.), and punished if they’ve forgotten it (bad grades, loss of free time, etc.).

On the whole, I don’t totally disagree with the idea of homework.  I do believe that we can get tunnel-vision and lose sight of the true reasoning behind it.  I believe homework should reinforce what has been already learned in the classroom.  A very wise teacher once told me that she never assigns work that she wouldn’t be willing to do herself.  This has helped to keep me in check over the years.

I write this as I am surrounded by students at an extra-curricular activity.  Any down-time that the students have is devoted to rushing to complete their homework.  I’ve heard a few offer to trade assignments with each other just to get it done.  Students are smarter than we give them credit for, and they too can see there is no value in giving homework just to give homework.

Reflections on Rethinking Homework

Posted on by
1

I have currently started reading a book that I’ve had for some time now, and would like to document my ideas and thoughts about it on this site.  The book is Rethinking Homework: Best Practices That Support Diverse Needs by Cathy Vatterott.  I received this book from a colleague earlier this fall, and am finally creating time to read it and analyze it.

Since this is a borrowed book, I don’t want to write all over it, like I normally would.  So, this is my outlet for organizing my thoughts.  Plus, there is a committee of teachers at my school also reading this book.  I would love to be able to share thoughts with them on it as well.

Please feel free to share your thoughts on homework, and to pick-up your own copy of the book (or borrow it from a friend) – it’s a very thought-provoking read.

Flexibility

Posted on by
Reply

It occurs to me that if a teacher knows what they’re doing, or if they are confident in an upcoming lesson, they may not be the best teacher.  Not to say that a good teacher doesn’t prepare – almost the complete opposite.  For example, if that confident teacher goes into a lesson and 2 minutes after the start is met with a room full of blank stares, not only should their confidence be shot, their lesson needs to be adapted.

A good teacher needs to be flexible; be ready for the unexpected.  If students are not understanding something, it’s the teacher’s job to back up and make sure that everyone is on the same page.  If there’s a snow day during Regents week at the end of the marking period, and you are being observed, and have a training in your room, and a new student, and an RTIC meeting – there’s no way to fully prepare for all of these things at once.  A teacher must be flexible.

I think that might be one of the best things about my job – besides getting to help kids learn – it’s never the same thing every day.  Yes, at times, it can be overwhelming and I am a person who likes to be able to plan for things.  However, over the years, I’ve learned the value of being flexible and rolling with the punches.

My very first experience with this was when I was in China.  We went with a group called ELIC for a summer, and were told that we would have the same kids for 4 weeks, have our own classroom, and teach conversational English to middle school and high school aged kids.  The group I went with to a small town north of Beijing was twice the size as some of the others, because they expected twice as many students.  When we got there, we discovered the importance of flexibility, and the inevitability of miscommunication.  The school we were housed in had advertised to their students 4 individual weeks, so we did not develop the strong relationships that we were looking forward to.  We did not have the oodles of students that they thought, so many of us had to share a classroom with 2 or 3 others from our team.  And since our school was scraping to get ANY students into our classes, we taught in an age range from 7 to 17 years old.  We needed to be very flexible.  Given all of these unexpected conditions, I would not change ANYTHING about my experience.  It was one of the best summers of my life.  I could still develop relationships with my students, and we taught each other a lot that summer.  Having smaller classes and co-teachers only made me yearn more for that style of teaching.  It was hard, and frustrating at times, but I loved every minute of it.

I guess a good teacher can be confident – confident in their ability to be flexible and knowledgeable enough in the subject matter to take a step back and think about how to better explain things to their students.

Disciplinary Dilemma

Posted on by
Reply

High school students are an interesting specimen.  They are old enough to realize that the work you “make them” do may not apply directly to what they want to do with their lives.  Of course, they don’t know what they want to do with the rest of their lives, so how do they really know whether they’ll need it or not?

Like math for instance: how will they know that they don’t need geometry?  What if they decide they want to be an architect, or contractor, or even a lawyer (proofs)?

High school students also act very similarly to elementary students.  They need to be engaged to stay interested in their work.  They need someone that believes that they can succeed to believe it themselves.  They need tough love and structure to survive, even though they would never admit it.

The dilemma that I have is being tough enough on the people that are assigned in my room so that they will have that tough love and structure that they need to succeed, but to also make a welcoming learning environment, but not so welcoming that people feel they need to get in trouble just to be in here.

ALC Revisited

Posted on by
Reply

It is now nearing the end of November, and I believe I have made a small impact on the lives of a few students here in the Alternative Learning Center.

I’ve only had a few referrals sent to me for behavioral reconstruction: drug use, fighting, insubordination.  And with each of these cases, no matter why they come to me, the main focus is to keep them up-to-speed with their academic work so that when they get back into the classroom, it’s like they never left.

We also spend about a period or 2 a day talking about real-life discussions, usually based around why they might be in my room in the first place.  This is our Character Education time.  For example, with the students that made bad decisions regarding drugs, I found some (corny) videos about teen drug use on Discovery Streaming.  Corny as they may have been, it gave us great discussion points.  There was a part in the video that talked about parents who use drugs, and how it effects their children.  I told them as we started that section that I was not playing it because I thought badly of their parents.  I was playing it because with the teen pregnancy rate on the rise, odds are they’ll be parents before long, and need to consider it from the parent’s point of view, bringing in a whole new discussion topic.

There are also people that get referred to me for academic reasons.  I see several students for help in preparing for the January New York State Regents.  They’ve struck deals with the principal and the teacher for credit recovery (I failed a class, instead of taking it again, I’ll get a crash-course in what I need to pass the Regents, and move on to other things come Spring).  Those are students that I am scheduled to see on a regular basis.  Then there are the students who I get a head’s up about from their teachers, saying that they’re on the verge of failing, and maybe they just need some extra support.  I usually have to hunt those students down in their study halls, because 80% of the time, the students that need help don’t want to ask for it.  Our school also puts out a weekly list of who is failing what classes, and how many.  I have made it my goal to focus on students that are failing 3 or more subjects to help to shorten this list.  Of course, sometimes my schedule is a little full to put my full attention on this dire task.

In all of these situations in which I’m seeing students, first and foremost I try to show them that I care.  Many of the students that come to me have lost hope long ago.  They cannot see the light at the end of the high school tunnel.  Sometimes they need help realizing that the “real-world” will be here before you know it, and there’s at least one person in this world (this school?)  that cares how you enter it.  Sometimes, that can make all the difference.

Teacher quotes

Posted on by
Reply

Here are some notable quotes that I’ve heard myself say from time to time.  Feel free to borrow them with your students:

“Yes, I’m expecting you to think, and you know what?  Your employers will too!”

“I cannot tell you off the top of my head what you will need to know this for later in life.  All I can tell you is that some day, you may regret not taking the time to learn it now.  Plus, you want to graduate, right?  You want to leave and be successful?  Then you need to pass this course, and you need to do this work to pass it.”

“Why do you have to write it out?  Well, I’m not psychic.  I can’t get inside your head.  Writing it out is one way to help me see how you got that answer (what you think about this topic).”

“I know my voice is annoying, but it sticks in your head, doesn’t it?  If I keep saying what you’re supposed to do over and over again, it’s annoying, but you’re less likely to forget.”

“I know you don’t care, but I do.  And I haven’t given up on you yet.  So please don’t give up on me.”

“I know you hate essays, and so do I.  But they are a necessary evil.  Like I said, I’m not psychic.  And we need to practice in order to get better.  Once you get better at something, they’re not so bad anymore.”

A new look at Classroom Management

Posted on by
Reply

Yesterday, my school had the opportunity to listen to Brian Mendler speak.  It was refreshing, to have a professional development speaker that moved around, and didn’t rely on his powerpoint, and didn’t read to us; that engaged us and made us feel valued, and motivated us.  Well, me at least.

Something that students appreciate from teachers is their honesty.  Brian Mendler showed us that yesterday.  He honestly told us about real situations, his real story.  He honestly told us about how teachers are perceived from students, and we all laughed – because it was true!  And you could tell the nerves he was hitting by the people how were uncomfortably laughing versus people who were out-rightly laughing.  He talked about teachers that were rigid and policies set in stone, and people who got caught in power struggles.  And then he talked about strategies to do instead of the rigid ones that we all learned from our own teachers.

He talked about empowering the students.  Students rarely get a chance to have power, but they will try to get it whether you give it to them or not.  They can either fight for it, or you can give it to them.  And it doesn’t have to be an “I give up” form of teaching (which I’ve also seen in classrooms).  It’s giving students power in a constructive way.  Let them omit a question on the test and replace it with one that they really know the answer to.  Let them ham it up in front of the class for 3 minutes to start the ball rolling (instead of them hamming it up during your lesson).  Talk with them individually – it doesn’t have to be a conversation, you could be giving them positive (or negative) feedback in their ear for only them to hear.  But, make sure you equally give positive feedback to cancel out the negative.

He talked about keeping the kids in the classroom as long as possible.  Now there are some veteran teachers that cringe at this.  But let me explain why it’s important.  Students know that if they bug you enough, you’ll kick them out of their class.  It’s not a punishment for them if you kick them out of math.  And when they inevitably come back, you’ve got an even bigger problem than you started with.  They have all the power and they got it the wrong way.  And you let them have it that way.  So how do you diffuse the situation?  Humor.  So they call you names.  You can take it, you’re the adult, remember?  What do you tell your kids to do in a fight situation?  Walk away.  Try it.  Let them have the last word.  They need it to save face to their friends, and they will have the last word if it’s the last thing they do in your class.

He talked about Multiple Intelligences learning, indirectly – using the gym for teaching graphing, singing songs to learn content in any area, working in groups to work on inter- and intrapersonal personalities.

We shared strategies with each other, and practiced some of the ones he discussed:  4-2-1, group work with roles (leader, writer, presenter, etc.), music stands, green-yellow-red cups, carpet squares – the list goes on forever.

It was refreshing to get back to an idea of teaching because we’re passionate about it, not just because we have to.  I don’t want to be the kind of teacher that counts down the days, months, and even years to retirement.  And I don’t want my kids to have those kinds of teachers either.

Closed Properties

Posted on by
Reply

I just taught a class on closed properties (ex. the set of Natural Numbers is closed under addition).  Unfortunately, not having a lot of time to plan, I just ran through the notes, and way over the kids’ heads.  Upon further thought, I would’ve explained it like this:

A set of numbers is like a classroom.  (this illustration works best for a finite set of numbers)

For example, I have a set {-1, 0, 1}.  Pretend that the {} are little doors into the room.  Now, we’re going to perform all the operations on these numbers.  If we come up with an answer that is still in this room, the doors stayed CLOSED (we didn’t have to open them to find the solution).

Let’s try it:

  • Addition: -1 +1 = 0; -1+ -1 = -2 **-2 wasn’t already in the room, therefore we had to OPEN the door to let it in (not closed!)
  • Subtraction: 0 – -1 = 1; 1-1 = 0; -1 – -1 = 0; 1 – -1 = 2 **2 wasn’t already in the room, therefore we had to OPEN the door to let it in (not closed!)
  • Multiplication: 0 x 0 = 0; 1 x 1 = 1; -1 x -1 = 1; -1 x 0 = 0; 1 x 0 = 0; 1 x -1 = -1 ** because I tried every possible combination of numbers, and my solutions were always already in the room, my door stayed CLOSED
  • Division: 0 / 1 = 0; 1 / 0 = does not exist **this answer obviously isn’t in the room, therefore we had to OPEN the door to let it in (not closed!)