To Do The Impossible

Can our students all be geniouses?

2011-10-23T12:01:00.000-07:00

I discovered this great video on education on YouTube while looking for the cartoon that follows. I've seen others by this group RSA. It's a look at education - why, for whom, etc. - and creativity. Are we educating creativity out of our students?

Here's the cartoon I saw on Facebook. I can't figure out what the original is.

We're theoretically supposed to be providing diversified teaching, but it's hard with a classroom filled to the window-sills. But politicians evidently don't want students to be creative.

Why do we have to learn this stuff?

2011-08-25T22:28:00.000-07:00

I once had a student who knew exactly how long 5 cm was. A teacher had had each student find 5 centimeters somewhere on their hands. Connecting up to prior knowledge?
2 cm is a good deal more than half an inch, though, more than 3/4 inch. I think they need more practice working with rulers!
Here's another reason to learn math.
American Chopper vs The Metric System:
(another reason to learn the metric system)

Math is Reasoning and Sense Making

2011-08-04T16:52:00.000-07:00

When I was a "pupil" in elementary school, we had a subject called "arithmetic." We learned to add, subtract, multiply, do fractions, percentages and convert from inches to rods, and similar activities. Sometime we had word problems. For some reason, this subject interested me. Or maybe it was science that interested me, and science needs math.
In high school we had 2 years of Algebra, Plane, Solid and Analytic Geometry and then Trigonometry, which I looked forward to, because Dad was an engineer and loved to survey things, which involved trig. None of this was called mathematics, as far as I can remember. That was something I would learn in college.
College came, along with math. Suddenly I was expected to understand very abstract thinking, which I had no training for. It took me a week to understand the necessary predecessor of Calculus: Limits, which is hard to comprehend, now that I know what they are. I expect we were given the definition in all its glory,

DEFINITION: The statement has the following precise definition.
Given any real number , there exists another real number so that
if , then .
(Source:
http://www.math.ucdavis.edu/~kouba/CalcOneDIRECTORY/preciselimdirectory/PreciseLimit.html)

Now there are all sorts of ways to ensure that limits and other math concepts make sense, for example this new tool in the NCTM Illuminations collection of lesson plans and activities: Illuminations: Interactive Calculus Tool. Why are teachers still befuddling their students with definitions and procedures to be memorized instead of helping them reason their way to a point where math actually can make sense?
There are far more students taking Algebra and Geometry now than when I went to school. I guess we were somehow motivated to learn it because it was required for college, and those who took it were planning to go to college (about 40% of my suburban high school class. Far fewer from the inner city high school.)
Research has shown that all (i.e. most) students can learn Algebra and Geometry, and many schools are now requiring the 4 years of math in high school that we "college prep" students had back in the late 50's. But I don't think they are motivated in the same way we were.
The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) has been on to this for many years (even before I went to school.) In his closing words at the summer Institute on Reasoning and Sense Making, NCTM 's president Michael Shaughnessy offered several quotes about using reasoning in math instruction, that went back to 1830, which he included in the latest edition of the NCTM newsletter Summing Up:as Reasoning and Sense Making—Expanding Our NCTM Initiative. For example

Continued emphasis must be placed on the development of processes and principles in the solution of concrete problems, rather than on the acquisition of mere facility or skill in manipulation. The excessive emphasis now commonly placed on manipulation is one of the many obstacles to intelligent progress.
—MAA, Reorganization of Mathematics in Secondary Education, 1923

and

Students should be encouraged to question, experiment, estimate, explore, and suggest explanations. Problem solving, which is essentially a creative activity, cannot be built exclusively on routines, recipes, and formulas.
—An Agenda for Action, NCTM, 1980, p. 4

Why was I not learning "the development of processes and principles" back in the 50's? Why are math teachers still teaching "routines, recipes and formulas"?

The NCTM is trying once again to get teachers to help students learn to reason with math so that it makes sense, with conferences like the one I attended and several series of books to encourage teachers to go beyond their textbooks. That this is important is obvious when you inspect the standard mass-produced textbooks, which thrive on steps, "recipes and formulas," with a picture added every once in a while to try to have it make sense. For example, Glencoe Mathematics, Algebra I (which I just happen to have on hand) introduces Polynomials this way:

Why It's Important
Operations with polynomials...form the foundation for solving equations that involve polynomials[!] In addition, polynomials are used to model many real-word situations. In Lesson 8-6 you will learn how to find the distance that runners on a curved track should be staggered. (This is accompanied by a picture of a track race.)

Fortunately, 45 states and the DC have adopted the Common CoreState Standards. As you can see, most of the Standards for Mathematical Practice in the CCSS explicitly refer to reasoning and sense-making as part of mathematics instruction:

Make sense of problems and persevere in solving them.

Reason abstractly and quantitatively.

Construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others.

Model with mathematics.

Use appropriate tools strategically.

Attend to precision.

Look for and make use of structure.

Look for and express regularity in repeated reasoning.

We can look forward hopefully to future textbooks that take these to heart, and help teachers facilitate students' reasoning, rather than require that students memorize steps and procedures that won't even help them pass the current state tests! In the meantime, I hope that math teachers use the many resources provided by the NCTM, such as these in the Illuminations site and the Focus in High School Mathematics: Reasoning and Sense Making books.
.

Reasoning and Sense Making in Geometry

2011-08-02T19:14:00.000-07:00

I've finally caught my breath after returning from a fantastic 3-day Institute in Orlando about motivating students to learn mathematics through Reasoning and Sense Making (the link goes to a page with handouts from the many presenters.) What a wonderful experience being together with about 700 other math teachers from all over the country (including Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands - but only one other person from my neck-of-the-woods) who are also concerned about the state of math instruction these days.

Funny thing is, there has been concern about the way mathematics has been taught in this country since way back in 1833, when a guy name Colburn wrote about using the Pelozzi method for teaching arithmetic. He complained that arithmetic was all drill and memorization, not reasoning. Sound familiar? The NCTM president Mike Shaughnessy went through a long list of early quotes, including 1923, 1935 and more recently since the '80s. I hope he'll upload his PowerPoint, because I'd love to have those quotes!

I mostly followed the sessions about Geometry, since I couldn't figure out last winter how to get students interested in doing proofs, which is what I think is the fun part of geometry. It turns out that kids are turned off by having to prove the obvious, when we ask them to prove things like vertical angles as congruent.

Michael Battista, in his presentation, The Role of Proof in Geometry, said that proof in Geometry is a caricature, since we are teaching the form of proof, rather than the content. We start too low to teach the method of proof at a point where it just doesn't make any sense to prove things. Kids experience that as busy work, which just doesn't make sense! We should start where it takes some thinking, reasoning, struggling, to figure out how to get from the given to what is to be proved. When the students have figured it out and can explain it - that is when they will be open to learning how to do formal proofs. The proof is just a final written justification of the work they have already done. No mathematician would start writing the proof before having reasoned his way to a solution. We shouldn't expect our students to do so either. Proof is a personal sense making, he said, where we go from saying what is "true" to "why" it is true. We are explaining our reasoning to others. Students move through 5 levels of geometric understanding, he said (known as the van Hiele levels:)

A visual, holistic examination of the shape
A description of the parts and their relationships
The interrelating properties (like vertical angles and the properties of parallel lines)
Conceptual proofs (explaining verbally)
Formal proof.

We have been trying to get students at level 2 to write formal proofs. They need to work with geometric shapes a while to get to level 4. At that point we can introduce formal proofs.

Battista has written a lot about using the software Geometer's Sketchpad to help students reason about geometry so that it makes sense, and has contributed to several books published by the NCTM. The man behind Sketchpad, Michael Serra, honored us with a wonderful collection of Investigations in Geometry from his textbook Discovering Geometry. We had a nice break in all the talk working in groups to figure out a variety of geometric problems. I worked with Origamics problems, developed by Kazuo Haga. (I just ordered the book. What a fun way to work with geometric reasoning!)

Jeffery Wanko provided a fun session, Developing Proof Readiness with New Logic Puzzles. He uploaded his materials to the Institute website, so you can enjoy them, too: Presentation (PDF)and Handout (PDF).We started with puzzles and their solutions, which we studied to figure out the rules. Then we did a big one together (this was a whole roomful of Sudoku addicts, of course,) and worked individually and in pairs to solve some smaller ones. He provide several pages of puzzles, which gave me something to do besides reading on the long plane trip back home! He recommended the Japanese puzzle magazine, Nikoli.com. Students can become ready for writing formal proofs through talking about puzzles like these with each other, getting to at least levels 3 and 4 listed above.

All that confirmed my previous experience that geometry is fun. I hope I can inspire my students the same way!

I will try to find time to write more about my experiences at the Institute in another blog. Besides swimming every day,of course, the most valuable part of the Institute was the many discussions with teachers from all over the country with many different school experiences.

Memory and Sense Making

2011-07-25T08:54:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday I am off to Orlando to participate in the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics Summer Institute for High School Teachers on Reasoning and Sense Making. I am looking forward to being with a group of teachers who really want their students to understand mathematics. Too often during teacher training I ran across teachers who were more of the "drill and kill" school.

With my experience with myself, my own children (now successful adults,) and the children and young people I have taught, kids don't learn because you force them to memorize something or give them drills to do whatever time and again until it sinks in. Kids learn because they are curious about something and want to find out about it. If they have a reason to learn something that means something to them (and I doubt "to get into college" or "because it's in the standards" are reason enough for most students,) they will want to learn it, and will dig into a topic until it is theirs. They might even ask someone for the answer - or help to find the answer.

I read a short article yesterday about some research that implies that people don't remember as well as they used to because now they can just Google stuff to get answers they don't have to remember. Evidently some people were tested on how well they remembered things (probably a list of unrelated facts) and some were given the opportunity to enter them on a computer. That last group, of course, forgot them immediately. But that doesn't prove the thesis that we remember differently now. The author of the article pointed out that Socrates was just as worried that the new-fangled techniques of writing would ruin people's ability to memorize things - which is probably true, of course. I write things down so that I can go on to investigate other things. In a sense, the written word is an extension of our long-term memory.

During my teacher ed classes I came upon several references comparing the brain to a computer. You know, data comes into short-term memory, but it has to be connected to other information to be transferred to long-term memory. If we just give students facts, or formulas, or steps to solve problems, they may remember them long enough for the unit test, but if they don't have a way to connect those data with something else - something that makes sense to them, and they want to know about - that data we tried to stuff into their heads probably won't be around for the final, or state exams - or life.

I remember a newspaper opinion piece written by a teacher years ago in Denmark, who claimed that a teacher's job is not to fill in the holes in students' brains, but to create the holes in the brains, so that students would go around looking for what they could put into them. Learning, he said, is making holes, not filling them in. Those holes are what students create while they are making sense of their world. And the holes will never get filled. They will be dug deeper, with lots of side channels that connect up with other holes.

This was illustrated beautifully in a very moving film we saw on Saturday, Buck, which is about a guy who spends 9 months out of the year telling people how to train their horses (not break them) at clinics all around the country. Buck likes to say he's not helping people with horse-trouble, he's helping horses with people-trouble.

I kept thinking that he was talking about classroom "management," where teachers are figuring out how to train their students and need help with "student-trouble" while in reality, it's the students (who have to be there, just like the horses had no choice in the matter) who have "teacher-trouble." The movie was about the best movie on education I have seen. I kept wishing I had a notebook, so I could write down all his words of wisdom. So I bought the book that became the movie The Faraway Horses, in hopes that some of those bits of wisdom are stored there.

One of the most telling episodes in the movie was a woman who told about how Buck had changed the way she trained her horse for dressage. Evidently in the bad old days, horses were trained to get into various unnatural positions by harnessing them with torture instruments (there were examples shown in the film.) Finally the horse gave in and did as required to avoid the pain and humiliation of the harness. But the woman had participated in a sheep-herding clinic with Buck, and discovered that all those unusual positions came naturally to a horse when he was using them to herd sheep. The horse found a connection where he needed to be in that position. And then during dressage, he easily moved in the position (probably fondly remembering the weekend herding sheep.)

Are our students being difficult because they don't want to be harnessed to a school desk when it doesn't make sense to them to be there? Are we trying to break them rather than helping them make sense of what we think they should know?

At the NCTM institute, we have each selected a different area to concentrate in, which for me will be Geometry, which I think was my favorite math subject in high school. I taught some Geometry this past year, taking over from another teacher. It was very difficult teaching students to do the proofs of geometry, which is what I liked best, and which is what geometry is all about. I hope that the Institute will help me see how to present geometry so it makes sense to them. Of course it's easy enough to make sense when you're talking about things that can be represented physically, like area and volume, circles and cylinders. But the abstract high-order thinking of proofs seems to have been distracted by low-level memorization of theorems.

I expect to be a better teacher after the Institute - but it is only one of many ways I am trying to make sense of my job as a teacher.

Addendum

While reading this afternoon I happened upon a note that is so pertinent to this, that I am quoting it here:

When reviewing radioactivity for this book, I was reminded that too often in science resources, authors explain what happens without really explaining why it happens. If you can only describe occurrences,then you really don't understand what's going on, and you end up only memorizing what happens. If you can figure out a mechanism for the occurrences, though, then you can build a lasting understanding of what's going on. Even though scientists often can only describe what happens when they first encounter a phenomenon, the ultimate goal is a mechanism for the phenomenon and the resultant understanding. You can compare this to mathematics, in which there are rules to follow. Only when you understand the reasoning behind the rules do you understand math.

William C. Robertson, in More Chemistry Basics, p 109 (my italics)

The wisdom of experience

2011-07-23T14:37:00.000-07:00

I've been having a few talks with friends about the difficulties of getting a job now that I have my credential. Although I have had a few interviews, someone else (younger) seems to get the job each time. I have been charitable and figured that the younger person is probably more qualified than I am. Perhaps she majored in a subject that I have "only" learned through enormous amounts of reading, discussion, email exchanges and a few courses. Perhaps she has more science teaching experience. Perhaps she has actual science laboratory work experience. I can't beat that.

But recently one of my young fellow students got a job for which I felt I was the more qualified. I was teaching the subjects this last spring to students very much like the ones at this particular school, and had selected the same chemistry book that is being used there. I read incessantly about science pedagogy and love going to professional development courses.

As I was teaching this spring, I tentatively introduced the "when I was your age, we didn't have calculators/ computers/ know about DNA..." comment to see how the kids reacted. It turns out they loved it. They also loved that I could be teaching and suddenly come up with some example from my past that just fit the topic perfectly. I have close to 50 years of life experience more than my young fellow students that has not been spent knitting (at least not most of the time.) I taught, I started an environmentally based business, using a lot of chemistry, was a technical writer, learning how to explain things clearly. In fact, most of my career has been about motivating people (to learn German grammar, to treat our world respectfully and sustainably, to use some piece of software efficiently...) Some of my other older new-teacher friends have been engineers, lawyers, economists, business owners - all with fantastic stories to tell.

In the really old days, the elder members of a tribe were called upon as teachers of the young, because people recognized their wisdom. Elderly people in some cultures were revered greatly for their wisdom. In others they were considered doddering fools - maybe because they couldn't hear well, or see well, so they couldn't hear the question properly, or negotiate their surroundings agilely - or maybe they were senile (although I doubt they got old enough for Alzheimer's back then, although they might have gotten mercury or lead or antimony poisoning.)

People my age are often of good health and mind, and they aren't going to take time off to have babies or have to pick up a sick child from school. They may have older parents who need some help, or a spouse who needs surgery. But my spouse cooks all the meals when I'm working!

I've been told about a principal who said that he didn't think an "old fogeys" (like me) would hang around very long - like more than 5 years. Statistics show that young people, unfortunately don't either. I figure I'll teach until I don't like it any more, or until my health deteriorates. Who knows how long that will be. (I sure don't like the idea of sitting around knitting and reading books the rest of my life!) Another told a colleague that she was not going to hire any more baby-boomers (for some unknown reason.)

Of course there are a lot of teachers even younger than I am who no longer enjoy teaching and do not renew their skills and content knowledge. Some of them aren't very far out of college, in fact.

I was enticed to teach by an organization called EnCorps Teachers, who are recruiting experienced people to teach science, math and engineering. I have spent 2 1/2 years studying and practicing to become a good teacher, and run up a bill of close to $60,000 at a private school of education. I'm not quitting any time soon! And neither are my other older fellow students. We have a lot to share and we enjoy kids. We want to give a little back.

Summer Reading

2011-07-22T17:28:00.000-07:00

I've had lots of time to read this summer (also to knit and to swim.) I thought someone might be interested in the great books I've found.I am a member of a number of email lists which have asked about summer reading ideas, and I jumped at the chance when I read about books that seemed useful.

For new teachers (like me!)

One of the best books I found about classroom management is K. Cushman's Fires in the Bathroom, which is advice by high school students for new well-meaning teachers, who don't always get it right.
Learning Outside The Lines: Two Ivy League Students with Learning Disabilities and ADHD Give You the Tools for Academic Success and Educational Revolution is a completely different book - written by 2 students with ADHD who finally figured out how to get their life together to graduate from college. It is a real eye-opener for teachers.
Along the same line is one of the books that is waiting for me: Fair Isn't Always Equal, which I am looking forward to reading.
I was taking a class this summer about teaching students who are gifted and/or have a learning disability. One of the books I read for my paper was When Gifted Kids Don't Have All the Answers: How to Meet Their Social and Emotional Needs. It helped explain a lot about the problems low achieving but smart kids are having in school.
Since I just got myself a Kindle, I decided to read a couple of books on it. The Accidental Teacher by Eric Mandel tells his story of trying to teach English with no credential and little support. Teaching Outside the Box: How to Grab Your Students By Their Brains by LouAnne Johnson.
Unfortunately most of these books are by English teachers, which is often a different kind of teaching. (I guess English teachers like to write more than math teachers!) So I am very happy to have found Coach G's Teaching Tips, since he is a math teacher.

More books!

I've also been reading about chemistry, biology, physics and math, so I guess there will be at least one more summer reading blog coming up.

Credentialed Teacher!

2011-07-21T09:11:00.000-07:00

Hurrah! I received this email today:

Congratulations, the Commission on Teacher Credentialing issued you the following document on 7/20/2011

Preliminary Single Subject Teaching Credential ...
Issuance Date: 07/18/2011 Expiration Date: 08/01/2016
Authorized Subjects:
Mathematics (Examination), Science: Biological Sciences (Examination), Science: Chemistry (Examination), Science: Physics (Examination)

This has taken me since December 2008, when I took the first test, and has been a struggle to get the required field work, since there were so few open jobs. All of this has been documented here in my blog.

But I still am looking for the job where I will be facilitating students' learning and understanding. Same job market.

Process Oriented Guided Inquiry Learning (POGIL)

2011-07-16T19:21:00.001-07:00

I spent a fascinating 3 days this week on the University of Redlands campus this week learning about Process Oriented Guided Inquiry Learning (POGIL), a relatively new way to teach science (and other subjects) where students in 3-4 person cooperative learning groups figure out the concepts they are to learn using directed work sheets, rather than a teacher-based PowerPoint lecture. Those who have used the system report dramatic improvements in student learning, and particular, in student retention.

The system was initially used in chemistry classes at Franklin and Marshall College in Lancaster, PA, where several of the boys from my high school graduating class in York, PA, got their training as engineers. Because of the great results, the idea spread to many other colleges and universities, where it has been used successfully in a variety of college courses. The original copied "activities" have now been published as work books, that the college students buy. High school teachers soon discovered the method and started using the college materials in AP classes. This started the High School POGIL Initiative (HSYPI) . You can find sample lessons in both biology and chemistry through that link. Very inexpensive workbooks for these subjects will be available in January (unfortunately.)

A POGIL lesson is carried out in 3-4 student groups, where each student has a role: Manager, PR (the only group member who may ask the teacher questions,) Recorder, Quality Control (consensus builder,) and possibly Process Analyst (who looks at the group's dynamics.) These groups are often kept together for a longer period of time, as they learn to work together.

A POGIL lesson is based on the Learning Cycle: Exploration, Concept Invention/Term Introduction, and Application, which all refer to a model, which can be a diagram, a demonstration or even a video.

Exploration involves very direct questions to the model, to make sure the students understand the details of the model. These might include questions as basic, "What does the dotted line represent," but go on to more detailed understanding of the model.
Concept Invention helps students derive the concept to be learned in the lesson based on their exploration.
Term Introduction gives students a name for the concept. Up to this point, they are exploring and thinking about connections. They may already have invented a term for the concept, but this step introduces the term in a new question.
Application gives the students an opportunity to use the new concepts and terms in a broader, often more open-ended question.
The Learning Cycle may start again in the same activity with a new Model, Exploration, Concept Invention and Application.

The students learning is guided by a worksheet with the model and questions that start as Direct in the Exploration phase, then Convergent (using the material gleaned from the direct questions to the model - which have a correct answer) in both the Concept Invention and Application phases, and then the open-ended Divergent questions for more advanced applications. Divergent questions go further, and do not have a correct answer (although there may be incorrect answers!)

As you can see, this is a sort of guided discovery learning. There are also labs created according to this system. In particular, POGIL labs are used for exploration and content invention. They come before any lecture on a topic, rather than afterwards.

You can find a few worksheets on the website. Unfortunately the many activities that have been developed in Bio and Chem for high school will not be available until January. At least the workbooks then will be very affordable. (The current college workbooks cost about $35.)

A lot of teachers are creating lessons for their own use, and sharing them on the site, and elsewhere. The main way to create your own lessons is to turn the book lesson around. Start with the examples as models. Then turn the introductory material into concept invention and term introduction questions. But easiest for a beginner of course is to find existing materials. I googled POGIL and found several sites where teachers have made their lesson activities available.

As soon as I find out what I will be teaching (which depends, of course, on which school hires me to teach which subject that I soon have a credential for: Math, Bio, Chem or Physics) I will be working on finding or creating appropriate POGIL lessons. From what I can see, the students are active all the time, so there is little time for them to cause classroom management issues. Even the smart kids will be working well in their groups (for which there are always a few extension questions.)

In a couple weeks I'll be off to Orlando to learn more about Reasoning and Sense-making in math, which is a less structured concept with the same aim - to facilitate the students' owning their learning, so they have little need to memorize factoids that don't necessarily make sense.

Discovery Learning

2011-07-10T18:05:00.000-07:00

Comics were great on science education today.
Even the New York Times was in on it with a A solution for saving the space program

Doonsbury on teaching biology in Texas

2011-07-10T17:54:00.000-07:00

Doonesbury was great today.

Summer Vacation?

2011-07-08T16:23:00.000-07:00

There are those who envy teachers their long summer "vacation." I am using mine to

Apply for jobs
Finish the last course for my credential, including a research paper
Attend two different summer institutes, one on teaching science and one on teaching math
Read many books and journals to provide more background for teaching science and math, particularly historical information and pedagogical strategies
Read a couple of novels
Swim
Share the cooking with my husband, who did ALL the cooking last spring!

On my NSTA chemistry list, there has been a discussion about how to tackle those envious acquaintances. One person (K Gorski) wrote this:

Before you can address the "summers off" thing, people have to understand the commitment during the school year. When I served as one of the '07-'08 Albert Einstein Distinguished Educator Fellows in DC, we were asked by our supervisors (program directors and managers of many of the federal agencies) to give a presentation that was a "shop floor perspective." Some of my colleagues came up with an analogy that was brilliant - we had virtually every individual with their jaws dropped, and saying omg I never thought about it like that.... we have continued to use it, with the appropriate tweak for the audience - and it seems to be successful.

We told them:
Imagine that it is Monday, and you have 6 meetings, back to back. You are organizing and leading each meeting and must prepare the visuals and handouts. Assume you'll have about 30 people in each one.
If they say you teach multiple sections of the same class; note that it's really a different meeting because they have a slightly different focus and you need to prepare for that focus.
On Tuesday, it's the same thing: 6 different meetings, back to back and you are in charge. Same for Wednesday, Thursday, Friday.
At each meeting, the participants will turn in their proposals/plans/what have you that you must read, review, and comment on before the next day.
During your lunch hour (and if you are lucky enough to have a "free" period), you use that time to answer voice mail,email, and other office memos that have come in.
Note that you are expected to keep up with current research in your field (so you can prepare for those meetings).
And that you are on several other committees for which you must attend meetings.
We asked them if they could do all this in a 9-5 workday, and not take work home with them, or work on the weekend. I think we added something about differentiation and special needs. It was very powerful.

As you can see, we did not even broach much of the detail - and it still left our audience amazed at what we do. We never got antagonistic, we never whined or complained, we just said - here's the data in your terms.

There's a great video "What Teachers Make" which should be taken out and shown at least once a year - for yourself if no one else.

The Future of Public Education?

2011-07-06T15:49:00.000-07:00

Cartoon by Steve Breen, San Diego Union Tribune, 7-3-11, seen in today's Daily Bulletin.

What worries me most about teaching is trying to have contact with all 40 students squeezed into a single classroom. There is no room for a computer area, no room for a group to go off by themselves. No way to have the whole class standing at the whiteboard doing problems.

And how do I know when a student is having a really bad day if he's sitting with his head down, or being particularly disruptive? I want all of my students to have the opportunity to learn, and there will be 200 different versions of high school students in my classes.

I am very willing to differentiate my teaching, but how do you know who needs what when you have 200 students?

Learning Math

2011-06-30T16:26:00.000-07:00

I am doing a "review of literature" for my very last paper for my MA, which is supposed to be about teaching math to gifted students - or those who have learning difficulties, like Dyscalculia, which I'd never heard about before.
I am getting very tired of review of literature, because almost every promising article or book I look at turns out to have a lot of quotes from other people. So do I have to track down the original, or is it safe to quote the reviewer?

At the same time, I am applying for a job, the reward for all this hard work, and I've already had 3 interviews, which is encouraging. Two of these went well (although I haven't heard back from them yet.)

The third was with the principal of the high school. He asked me how I would teach his 9th and 10th graders Algebra I so they got it (I'm sort of assuming that most have been there at least once before!) so I told him that I've become very interested in Reasoning and Sense-making, which the NCTM is focusing on in many ways, including a summer institute in Orlando I will be attending when this class is done. The principal raised his eye-brows at those words. He seems to believe that kids learn best with the good old-fashioned "drill and kill" that got me dismissed from my student teaching position (when I wouldn't go along with it!) As expected, I was not called back to that school.

One of the articles I've been looking at is How Students Learn: Mathematics in the Classroom from the National Academies Press. I was delighted to read this quote from another source, which corroborates my thinking:

A recent report of the National Research Council, Adding It Up, reviews a broad research base on the teaching and learning of elementary school mathematics. The report argues for an instructional goal of “mathematical proficiency,” a much broader outcome than mastery of procedures. The report argues that five intertwining strands constitute mathematical proficiency:
Conceptual understanding—comprehension of mathematical concepts, operations, and relations
Procedural fluency—skill in carrying out procedures flexibly, accurately, efficiently, and appropriately
Strategic competence—ability to formulate, represent, and solve mathematical problems
Adaptive reasoning—capacity for logical thought, reflection, explanation, and justification
Productive disposition—habitual inclination to see mathematics as sensible, useful, and worthwhile, coupled with a belief in diligence and one’s own efficacy

Note that only one of these mentions "procedures," while the others are about concepts, strategies, adaptive reasoning, and love of math. Not a word about "drill!"

The thing is, a lot of people think that this kind of mathematical thinking is only appropriate for the "gifted" students. The slow ones need drill and kill, evidently, which obviously does kill. These are the students who try and try and try again and don't succeed. Shouldn't we teach them what it's all about, since they don't "get it" through drill alone?

Studies (sorry, I'm not going to look for sources) have proved that students who have been taught to think do better on even multiple choice standardized tests, than students who have memorized all the steps of a procedure. Another quote from the book - observed by John Holt - tells the whole story:

One boy, quite a good student, was working on the problem, “If you have 6 jugs, and you want to put 2/3 of a pint of lemonade into each jug, how much lemonade will you need?” His answer was 18 pints. I said, “How much in each jug?” “Two-thirds of a pint.” I said, “Is that more or less that a pint?” “Less.” I said, “How many jugs are there?” “Six.” I said, “But that [the answer of 18 pints] doesn’t make any sense.” He shrugged his shoulders and said, “Well, that’s the way the system worked out.” Holt argues: “He has long since quit expecting school to make sense. They tell you these facts and rules, and your job is to put them down on paper the way they tell you. Never mind whether they mean anything or not.”

I've been reading that around 50% of gifted students drop out of high school - some figure out other ways to get to college and achieve their potential, others sell hamburgers, or get doped out. We are boring the gifted students with drill and kill, and we aren't helping the weak ones either. Isn't it time for a change?

Connecting with previous knowledge

2011-06-24T18:28:00.000-07:00

One of the major techniques we learn as teacher candidates is to connect new learning to previous knowledge. This is a fantastic example of that!

What are you capable of becoming?

2011-06-19T16:23:00.000-07:00

An article (in Reaching New Horizons: Gifted and Talented Education for Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Students) I am reading for my very last Education class before I get my Preliminary Credential starts with a wonderful quote attributed to the German poet Goethe. I majored in German many years ago, and don't recall it (maybe its being in English, not German, makes it unfamiliar,) but it tells a lot about how I want to teach:

If I accept you as you are, I will make you worse;
however, if I treat you as though you are
what you are capable of becoming,
I help you become that.

Wenn wir, sagtest du, die Menschen nur nehmen, wie sie sind,
so machen wir sie schlechter.
Wenn wir sie behandeln, als wären sie, was sie sein sollten,
so bringen wir sie dahin, wohin sie zu bringen sind.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre

There's a lot of talk in schools about giving students equal opportunity, which no one really knows what entails.
Does it mean equal teacher time, exactly the same books, problems, lectures, papers to write? Does it mean equal opportunity to succeed (or fail?)
On the other hand, what does Goethe mean by accepting "you as you are?" Can we teachers really know who our students are? Maybe he means "as you appear to me," instead.
My final class is about teaching students who are either gifted or have learning difficulties (which could be the same person.) Yesterday we talked out how students who are bilingual often have been tested to be more creative (and more "gifted?") than their mono-lingual peers. There can be many reasons for this, of course. A creative person may have left his country for another to be able to be creative, for example, so bilingualism is a result of his or her creativity. There have also been brain scans that show that bilinguals use their brain differently than others as well, which is one reason some middle class parents are enrolling their children in bilingual classes with students who are learning English as their second language, which appears to be advantageous for all of them.
An article we read yesterday compared the characteristics of creative people with those of bilinguals, which included:

Risk taking
Willingness to confront antagonism, ability to freely reject external limits and rules, and propensity for self-organization.
Perseverance, total absorbtion, focus, discipline, commitment
Curiosity, inquisitiveness
Openness to new experiences, deep emotions and drowth
High intrinsic motivation

However, often we fail to recognize creativity in language learners, because it "doesn't come through" in their second language, which we are using to communicate with them. We are treating them as they are, in Goethe's sense, instead of as they are capable of becoming. (You might be interested in the blog I wrote for another class on language learners a couple of years ago, Negotiated Identity.)
The same can be said for up to half of the gifted students in our classes (which is evidently statistically set at the 5% highest results on some test or other in a school.) Some of the most gifted live in another world, evidently, which does not include paying attention in class - because most of it they have already figured out with their own personal research and experiments. We don't see them as gifted, but rather, difficult.
On the other hand, there is a group of high achievers, who know well what they want to become, and let us know that, so we treat them as if they were actually gifted.
Personal experience, and a comment by a speaker yesterday, indicate that up to 50% of gifted students may drop out of high school and not achieve the potential they would have had if someone had treated them for what they were "capable of becoming."
In our class we are learning strategies that won't take too much of the stressed teacher's time, but can enable the creative and the gifted students not to have to waste time on what they already know, by "compacting the lessons," while challenge them with projects of their own choosing, so they learn the skills that "high achievers" learn - good study habits, the joys of learning, the satisfaction of working hard to do something.
As a high school student, I got easy A's, even in "honors" classes - we didn't have AP back then, but when I got to college I discovered that I didn't have a clue how to really study, so I saw those A's turn into B's and C's, my confidence turned into feelings of inferiority, I avoided some challenges because I was afraid of those C's, and stopped being a risk-taker, which has taken me years to recover.
I want all of my students to succeed, even the creative and gifted ones!

Looking - again

2011-06-09T17:30:00.000-07:00

Our school year ended early, which has given me time for all those things I didn't have time for before: an on-line statistics class, my last class at CGU - and our first trip back to Denmark in 7 years, which had to be squeezed in between 2 CGU Saturday sessions.

Even though I probably could have continued with a part-time position where I was, I decided that the commute was impossible. After all I'm teaching now instead of retiring. I want to enjoy teaching, not wasting all my time sitting in my car!

Because of the last position, I will be able to qualify in Math and Science. In fact I'm really looking for jobs in continuation high schools, or other alternative schools, where there is a better chance of working closely with the students. I have always felt my greatest triumphs as a teacher when a student has regained his/her curiosity about school. Some of those kids are in fact quite gifted, but got left out somewhere, and gave up.

One of my special tutoring students told me he did great in math until 8th grade, when he began running with the wrong crowd. Then he discovered he'd missed out on so much that he couldn't find his way. He was very disappointed that I wouldn't be returning, since he said that I was the only teacher who had figured out how to help him learn.

My science classes were the really exciting part of this past semester, since I had not taken the official science pedagogy courses at CGU - just summer extension courses at UC Riverside. It was fun figuring out how to present the standards material to the students so they enjoyed it and wanted to learn. I had a lot of help from fellow NSTA email list participants, who suggested books, experiments, provided PowerPoints, etc.

Right now I of course don't know what I'll be teaching in the Fall. It's hard to prepare for the unknown. But I continue to read and take courses, above and beyond CGU. I hope it will be a position with both math and science - and students who really need me to guide their learning!

I tricked them into enjoying chem lab

2011-04-25T11:51:00.000-07:00

At my school we are experimenting with a "third trimester" after fairly early state testing in the beginning of April. Since many of our students need to catch up on papers and other work, the plan is to use this time for them to finish papers and do other catch up work.
For example, I have 2 seniors who really needed the chemistry class that got converted to "Integrated Science I" about when I started, so I meet with them about 4 hours a week going through the text book and exercises they should be working on independently. And then they join about 10 others who have "Science Enrichment" to do some real chem labs (except that we barely have any equipment. I just bought 10 inexpensive lab goggles to replace the cheap swim goggles they were using.)

But the 10 students felt duped that they had to have more chemistry, since they didn't have much say in the matter. So when they arrived in the first lab class last week they were mad.

Although they did enjoy getting into the disposable lab coats we save from lab to lab, they refused to read the 2 pages of lab prior to doing it, and wouldn't create the data table they needed.

But I tricked them. The lab was on purifying "foul water" (coffee grinds, garlic, veggie oil and salt.) So I took the jar of water, taking the top off so they could smell it, and everyone turned around, read the first lab section, created the table and got to work.

I had them come up table by table to ask for the materials they would need (mostly with apparatus I created myself) and sent them back to read if they didn't ask for the right things.

So they ended up reading, writing data in the table, discussing chemistry, and being amazed when they dropped activated charcoal capsules into their mixture for the last step, and discovering that the room no longer smelled like garlic. Most were very good answering the questions, being very realistic about the lack of proper chemical equipment.

I find it distressing that kids have lost the curiosity to want to learn. Some prefer sitting around doing nothing, or chatting with friends about nothing in particular, or doodling (we've had quite an outbreak of male organs this spring) than using their brains a bit to figure things out.

Students tell me I'm not teaching them anything if I ask them to read, or discuss something in groups. When I try to draw on prior knowledge or extend what they've learned to something they know, they say "but you haven't taught us that!"

They apparently think that "teaching" is presenting a PowerPoint, which they are expected to copy into their notes - and then forget!

I hope the students at our school, most of whom couldn't manage at the regular public high school, are the exception. Otherwise I fear for our future when these kids who have lost their imagination - and their ability to follow directions, or read or write their own thoughts - become the adults who are to lead this country on!

Last weeks of the semester

2011-04-17T20:10:00.000-07:00

My charter school has decided to do alternative teaching the last 4 weeks of school after the California State testing.
We are doing blocks of 1 1/2 hours, instead of 1 hour, some twice a week, some every day. There is a lot of remedial work for kids who need it, as well as classes to prepare students for what comes ahead.
My biology class is working on group projects to fill out this PREZI:

I took the Reproductive System because I figured their parents wouldn't want them working on that.
I have 2 seniors working to get credit for chemistry with lab, and the rest of the class just 2 hours Wednesdays for labs, where we will be working on writing good lab reports.
And then I have an Algebra I remedial group who will all be retaking it next year. I'm working with using patterns and other representations for functions. They meet every day, so it has to be entertaining.
And a group of 9th graders are learning geometry using patty paper (the paper you put between hamburger patties) which is translucent, so they can see lines drawn on it. We should be able to get through most of the important concepts superficially but hands-on in this time, and end with a little origami, so they will be ready for the "real thing" in the fall.
And this week we're celebrating Earth Day Friday afternoon. I will have 4 groups about 45 minutes each doing alternative energy. I've ordered models of a windmill, solar panels, and a fuel cell, which I hope we'll be able to use then. As well as making pin-wheels out of the comics and ads from today's paper, using pencils as the sticks.
I'm enjoying the planning. The kids were skeptical last week that learning could be fun, but I think they're getting the idea. It's frustrating when they put on their "try me" attitude when I'm trying to do something interesting. In one class (the last period,) I asked each student if they wanted to learn, and placed them up front. The one student who didn't sat in the back, and after a while asked for a piece of patty paper anyway.

"Survivor" goes to school

2011-03-19T07:25:00.000-07:00

Have you heard about the next planned "Survivor" show?

Three businessmen and three businesswomen will be dropped in elementary school classrooms for one school year.

Setting

Each business person will be provided with a copy of his/her school district's curriculum and a class of 20-25 students.
Each class will have a minimum of five learning-disabled children, three with A.D.H.D., one gifted child, and two who speak limited English. Three students will be labeled with severe behavior problems.

Challenges

Each business person must complete lesson plans at least three days in advance, with annotations for curriculum objectives and modify, organize, or create their materials accordingly.
They will be required to teach students, handle misconduct, implement technology, document attendance, write referrals, correct homework, make bulletin boards, compute grades, complete report cards, document benchmarks, communicate with parents, and arrange parent conferences.
They must stand in their doorway between class changes to monitor the hallways.
In addition, each month they will complete fire drills, tornado drills, and [Code Red] drills for shooting attacks.
They must attend workshops, faculty meetings, PTA meetings, and curriculum development meetings.
They must also tutor students who are behind and strive to get their two non-English speaking children proficient enough to take the SOLS tests.
If they are sick or having a bad day, they must not let it show.
Each day they must incorporate reading, writing, math, science, and social studies into the program.
They must maintain discipline and provide an educationally stimulating environment to motivate students at all times.
If all students do not wish to cooperate, work, or learn, the teacher will be held responsible.

Privileges

The business people will only have access to the public golf course on the weekends, but with their new salary, they will not be able to afford it.
There will be no access to vendors who want to take them to lunch, and lunch in the school cafeteria will be limited to thirty minutes, which is not counted as part of their work day.
The business people will be permitted to use a student restroom, as long as another survival candidate can supervise their class.
If the copier is operable, they may make copies of necessary materials before, or after, school. However, they cannot surpass their monthly limit of copies.
The business people must continually advance their education, at their expense, and on their own time.

Reward for the winner

The winner of this Season of Survivor will be allowed to return to his/her job.

(I didn't write this! It's from an email to a teacher list I participate in.)

Coming Up For Air

2011-03-06T08:28:00.000-08:00

The past five weeks have been very hard, but I think I have had some small successes, and I can see light at the end of the tunnel!

I have had to figure out what to teach in these last few weeks before the State tests so that the students would do as well as possible under the difficult circumstances.

Evolution was one of the topics I had to cover, so I got a lot of help from a science list-serve I joined and jumped right in. They took tests for the unit on Friday, and I was pleased to see far more passing grades than "incompletes" (D or F) which has not been the case for earlier tests on subjects where I had to assume that they had learned at least something in the 6 months before I came. But now there are only 3 weeks to go, with spring break in between. For Biology we have Ecology, which I would have love to spend lots of time on, and we're going to end up pretty much going through the book. The last topic on the human nervous and endocrine system we may have to leave out entirely, or else give it just 3 days. Sorry, students. Next year will go better!

The students in Integrated Science yesterday were so hyper about it's being Friday that we didn't have time for the lab on the thermodynamics of changing state (ice melting.) I've moved it to tomorrow, when my adviser is coming for the next-to-last time. However they're getting better at converting between Fand C temperatures, and have a vague understanding of Kelvin, so there has been some progress. If only we had more time! I don't think we'll be able to get to the endo- and exothermic reactions I had planned, because we have so much to review in the next 3 weeks.

The other challenge has been getting students back to wanting to learn science after so many months of inadequate teaching. The grade-book shows A+ after A+ for all students, as they got grades for completing simple tasks rather than for learning. It has been a shock for them that (some of) their grades are so bad. So far only one student has asked what she can do to get grades up. Certainly not with extra credit. I told her to restudy everything, and then she'd be allowed to retake the tests.

When I started at the school I was surprise about the "redirects" and "detentions" given out. We can send students to the "annex" when they disturb the class too much. There they are kept busy by an excellently supportive aide. Some students just can't sit still or keep their mouths closed while I'm talking. Not that they want to be disruptive (for most, anyway) but I can't teach and the others can't learn, so I learning to take more advantage of the aide's help. I was used to having to solve all classroom management problems in my own classroom before. But then the students at this school, for a large part, are those who could not thrive in regular public school, so the conditions are different. I am really pleased about how supportive the staff is for the students with many problems. There are many options to help them succeed.

My colleagues are very understanding of the situation I have been placed in, and even given me a slightly lighter load, since I don't have any electives until after the State tests. They tell me again and again that they aren't expecting fantastic scores from my students because of the previous teaching.

Two weeks down and running strong (and tired!)

2011-02-10T22:43:00.000-08:00

I feel very comfortable about my new job. My colleagues are very supportive, and happy to have a teacher who can teach biology, chemistry and math. (The French didn't really materialize, thank goodness!)

I love having very small classes so I can work with each student individually when they need it. The 2 remedial math classes have about 6 students each, which is what the students need to be succesful. I am letting 3 students work ahead on their own in Algebra I, so they may be able to catch up with the rest of the class. Others are just filling in the holes in their math knowledge from too many years thinking they couldn't do math. I love the challenge of helping them understand what math is all about. We've been working on the substitution method for solving 2 equations. Today the light went on for one of the students and his face just shone! It has been a very difficult concept for them!

I'm constantly amazed at how much I know about the science subjects. I've not only studied for tests, but lived a whole long life being interested in science and soaking up so much about it that I can use to entice and motivate the students. But they are still new subjects for me, so I have to study the topics thoroughly to present them well. I finally got the electronic gradebook up-to-date with both attendance and quizzes. There's so much to do in the beginning! And I know the names of more than half my students (since there aren't that many) but that is a bit problem for me. Some of the students need so much help and attention, others act bored. Others escape from a difficult home-life. And still others just couldn't make it in big high school classrooms.

All that takes time, of course, on top of nearly 2 hours daily travel time partly through the lovely Cajon Pass. (The time and direction I drive is with very acceptable traffic. I had a couple of foggy days in December, and gusty winds that blew over some tall, lightly loaded trucks. But the wind doesn't bother my little Insight and I keep as far from the trucks as possible.)

This shows the southern end of the Cajon Pass.
and no, I did not take the picture! I'm down on the ground!

Real Life Choices

2011-01-30T11:38:00.000-08:00


Non Sequitur Comic Strip by Ed Wiley 01/31/2011

This cartoon by Ed Wiley really struck a note with me.
I will be starting my new teaching job tomorrow, and I will post this on the wall to remind my students that they (not just I) have work to do so they are prepared to make their "Real Life Choices."

I will be teaching 2 small sections of Biology, 1 of Integrated Science, with about 4 students working independently in Chemistry, 1 with about 10 students who are falling behind in Algebra I, a math remediation class for seniors who haven't passed the math of the California HS Exit Exam ... and working with a new student who was completing French II in her old school (since I used to teach German, and used to know French!)

I expect my days will be varied and interesting, and hope I can motivate the students to make the right choices!

High School Science and Math Teacher

2011-01-26T18:51:00.000-08:00

I seem to have a new title now. I am no longer "just" a math teacher. On Monday I will be teaching Biology, Integrated Math, with some few students trying to do Chemistry, Algebra I and CAHSEE prep for students who haven't passed the state graduation requirement in math.

My new school is a tiny charter school, so my classes have fewer than 20 kids per class, and some closer to 10. It is also in an unusual setting, the former kitchen of a defunct Italian restaurant up in the high desert in Hesperia (which people from Los Angeles got by on their way to Las Vegas.) The school has been around for more than 10 years, although the high school is relatively new.

That means that the room isn't really set up well for fancy chemical experiments, so we will be using things like lemon juice, vinegar and baking soda. I think most of the books are gifts from other schools who have gone on to a new textbook. I will have to pick and choose between lessons and materials.

We are also in a rush, because unfortunate circumstances mean that the time up to now has not been used as efficiently as I would have hoped. I will try to introduce the students to as much of the curriculum as possible, but I would rather go into depth than "cover" everything superficially. I hope they will learn those things well.

Many of our students have learning disabilities and have not done well in the large impersonal classes of public school. I know that many of them are actually quite smart, and maybe have been lazy because they have been bored. I just finished reading a book called "Teaching Gifted Kids in the Regular Classroom," which has inspired me with some great strategies. I will be trying several, and report back here how they go.

Greening chemistry in the classroom

2011-01-14T08:39:00.000-08:00

As if learning all this math wasn't enough, I've applied for a job where I would be teaching chemistry part-time, which seems like an ideal way to start out teaching! Since I am very interested in sustainability, and most everything "green" and I remembered reading about "green chemistry" when I was studying for the qualifying exam, I checked out my links again.

The EPA has a whole section on Green Chemistry, from which their are links to the American Chemical Society's website section of Green Chemistry, with the slogan "Chemistry for Life." There are lot lot of resources on Green Chemistry for various age groups, including high school. In fact they have been publishing Chemistry textbooks called Chemistry and the Community for high school and Chemistry in Context for college (which I had bought earlier, so I'm reading it now along with the math.) There is also an inexpensive magazine for high school students called ChemMatters, with extensive teacher's guides.

Learn something new every day. That's a great motto!

What we learn to do we learn by doing

2011-01-14T08:20:00.000-08:00

The title was attributed to Aristotle in today's Daily Ray of Hope from the Sierra Club, which included the photo shown here.I'm not quite sure what the duck is learning, but it's nice to have an illustration.

It's strange that so many math teachers think "doing" means doing drills, rather than doing something to make the math they are learning make sense, as in "doing math."

I've been having a lovely time reading lots of books published by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, particulary their series, Focus on Reasoning and Sense-making, the Navigation series, to help incorporate the new Core Standards in lessons, maybe using textbooks that don't really get the concept of reasoning, and the new series, Developing Essential Understanding.

Reading these has led me on to other discoveries of my own, since they often use math that I haven't used very often, like polar coordinates, matrices or graph theory.

I'm enjoying my little break here learning about learning. But I hope I soon have students with whom I can practice what I've learned (learn teaching by teaching!)

Why I don't give up

2011-01-13T13:10:00.000-08:00

Several well-meaning friends have asked me why I don't just give up. Why don't I find a job tutoring and stick with that? Or volunteer, or do something completely different?

First of all, I started all this because I wanted a meaningful way to be active, and I felt that I could help fill up a tiny gap in the need for math and science teachers. I love math, and thought that I could extend my love to inspire students to enjoy it as well.

Then there is the resources aspect to not giving up. I've invested a lot of money, time, effort, interest and even passion - in my graduate school education, as well as numerous other courses, seminars and conventions. I've bought - and read - almost every book the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics offers on Reasoning and Sense-making and other topics I deemed useful for the subjects I've been teaching.

I read great blogs about teaching, not least Coach G's Teaching Tips on the Education Week Teacher website. There I just found another blog posting that inspired me: How Teachers Can Build Emotional Resilience by Elena Aguilar. She lists a number of ways that teachers become emotionally resilient:

Have personal values that guide their decision-making. They often feel they were "called" to this profession and a commitment to social justice keeps them in the classroom.
Place a high value on professional development and actively seek it out.
Mentor others.
Take charge and solve problems.
Stay focused on children and their learning.
Do whatever it takes to help children be successful.
Have friends and colleagues who support their work emotionally and intellectually.
Are not wedded to one best way of teaching and are interested in exploring new ideas.
Know when to get involved and when to let go.

I think I do all of these things (except maybe realizing when to let go!) I am particularly flexible about #8, ready and willing to try many different methods (except "drill and kill," which one adviser insisted was the only way to get kids to learn.) Furthermore, Ms. Aguilar says, principals can help their teachers become emotionally resilient.

Trust has been called "the connective tissue that holds improving schools together." Organizational consultant Margaret Wheatley has written beautifully on the impact that having meaningful conversations and listening to each other can have in changing environments. Principals can ensure that these conversations happen. We can’t support each other intellectually (or create Professional Learning Communities) if we don’t trust each other.

At my previous position, we math teachers had no preparation period, and no common time where we could get together to help each other (different lunch breaks.) And the principal was quick to fire rather than support teachers. (The teacher before me managed to find another job and quit before the principal dismissed her - he had already announced her position as open. He also let most of last year's math teachers go since school scores on the state math tests were ridiculously low - more likely because the school expected most learning to happen through projects, where math was ancillary to other projects, than because of the teachers' competence.)

That didn't last long

2011-01-08T10:54:00.000-08:00

My Christmas present from that school was an At Will Employment dismissal. "You don't fit in here," they said.
I think what really happened was that the son of a benefactor was one of the students who did poorly on the tests I gave in the 3 weeks I had before semester grades went in.
My faculty adviser (the principal) only came in to observe one day - the day he had filled my classroom with an absent teacher's students, where the combination of 2 classes was like adding lemon juice to baking soda.
My grad school adviser thought things were going as well as could be expected under the very difficult circumstances, and that I fit in well at the school.
My colleagues were amazed, and the department head wrote me a recommendation.

So, what did I learn?

Be very careful about working in charter schools.
Insist on getting the book immediately, as well as information from the previous teacher about where they've gotten to, and what her plans were (I left that information for the next teacher at this school.)
Since I evidently teach differently than many other teachers - I believe that students have to create their own learning (sense-making,) rather than my presenting them with steps to solve a particular problem - I have to prepare the students for working together to figure things out, and not expect me to give them the answer immediately.
I'll have to work out some initial lesson plans that teach collaborative learning
Talk with colleagues about methods, ideas, resources (I discovered the last week that there were carts with computers. Unfortunately, we did not have a staff room, my lunch was different from the other math teachers, and we math teachers had no prep period.)
As a new teacher, don't take the job if there is no preparation time, mentoring, etc. You're only setting yourself up for failure.

And what am I doing now - besides looking for another job?

I am reading lots of books about how to teach geometry. I discovered that the students were very reluctant to work with proofs, and I didn't know well enough how to engage them in that. I've found fantastic online resources and books, particularly through the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. I hope I get to teach geometry now! All new teachers discover that just because they can solve problems, do proofs, pass the qualifying exam, doesn't mean that the students will be as engaged in the subject as much as they are.

Thankful that I am finally teaching again!

2010-11-24T22:25:00.000-08:00

This is a very good way to start a job. Work one week, then get the next one off!
I'm using the week to get a better picture of my students, make new seating charts so that the weaker students aren't all sitting at the same table, and racking my brain for ways to teach my geometry students how to think "proofs," which only a few are really ready for. Having a non-math-credentialed sub for 2 weeks was not very helpful there.
But I've talked with my colleagues and have some of my own tricks up my sleeve to get their minds more focuses. Among other things, I transferred my Geometer's Sketchpad registration to my school computer, so I can at least demonstrate parallel lines and the like dynamically. I'm considering letting them work with it table by table, since we only have the one computer in the classroom. I also found some great books very inexpensively on the Key Press website. I'm looking forward to trying out Mathercize warm-ups, which are intended to develop students' reasoning and observation skills.

Cajon Pass from the summit

We are supposed to be teaching through projects as well at our charter school. We math teachers only need to provide 2 projects a year. I'm figuring on a project involving slope in my geometry classes. I drive up through the Cajon Pass every day to and from school, which goes up to over 4000 feet on the 15 Freeway. I figured we could divide the pass up into small sections, and use a topographical map to find the y difference, (while the x-distance in the map distance (measured with a string?) Then they can each make a graph of their section, and string them along the whole wall, along with pictures from Google Earth or their own.
So back to grading papers and making new seating charts!
Happy Thanksgiving!

New Teacher!

2010-11-20T12:58:00.000-08:00

I have just completed my first week of teaching in my new job.
The school is a public charter school, located in temporary classrooms while we wait for the powers to be to give the final construction permit to build the permanent school.
But my classroom is large enough for 6 tables big enough for 6 students each, although usually there are no more than 3-4 per table.
Since they had had a substitute for 2 weeks, it took some time to get them to realize that now we are seriously going to be learning math.
I also don't do much direct instruction, but get them going and then learn by trial and error, from each other, and from me as I go around.
In Algebra II they had been working on factoring with the sub, so we worked on that some more and then took on long division of polynomials, which the sub had skipped. There were many errors, because there are so many steps to do to complete a problem, one of which is subtraction, which involves distributing a negative. A couple of students had learned somewhere to place the change sign in a little circle, which I then taught, and the students took to it immediately. (That I said that I had learned it from other students was probably a plus.) But I told them we'd be learning an easier method - synthetic division - the next day, and that was a fantastic success. There were some holdbacks, but most could see that they could work them much faster that way.
But the big success came when I caught a student writing graffiti on the board, and it turned out to be "Math is great!" And yesterday I met the parents of one of my students, who had come home and reported that they had a new math teacher and she was great!
But I'm exhausted after the first week. Probably hardest is standing up all day long!
But I'm beginning to know where the students are in the material, and have vague ideas about who gets things quickly, who is willing to help others, and most importantly, who do I have to get at constantly to get them to do their work.
Classroom management is going relatively well, (except the day my advisor came for a visit in the period after lunch!) They are good kids, many with large and small learning and living problems, but I think they all want to learn. The school did miserably on last year's state math tests (but really well on English and other subjects) so we have double class periods, so kids can do their "homework" in class while they can ask me for help. (Which is good, except that math teachers only get a single prep hour a week!)

First day of school

2010-11-15T21:28:00.000-08:00

Today was my first day of teaching at my new school.
I am dead tired of course, and definitely not used to standing on my feel all day! That I have to get up at 5:30, when I used to be a night-owl, is not fun, but it is lovely driving through the mountains over the Cajon Pass that early in the morning, waiting for the spot where the sun first requires sunglasses!
What was difficult was breaking the habits of students taught by a substitute the past couple of weeks. Getting them do get out books, paper and pencil to do some work.
But I think they're beginning to get that I really expect them to pass, and they have to work to do so!
That's all I can write now. Have to prepare for tomorrow!

The world has more than five choices

2010-11-05T08:13:00.000-07:00

I never used multiple choice tests in Denmark. I think it was the greatest shock when I met the American educational system. Here are some ways to move beyond, and still prepare students for those tests.
In an article I received today in the Education Week Teacher newsletter, Classroom Assessments for a New Century Heather Wolpert-Gawron describes her "quest to move beyond the bubble test."
The world does not present five choices for every problem we meet, nor can everything be solved with standard formulas. If the math we teach is to be useful beyond the test, our students have to learn to think and apply concepts to practical applications. Math may be elegant for mathematicians, but it's a tool for everyone else.
In Denmark I taught languages, not math, but we had enormous freedom about what we taught. There is a certain basis knowledge required at each level, and in the latest standards, every class has to work on a particular "theme," which can be cross-departmental. I have a list of various themes used in math, along with the requirements for a written report. The final exam in Danish schools is two-part: a written (not multiple-choice) test on the basic requirements and an oral exam at the school "censored" by a teacher from another school on the theme. This time is always very inspirational for the censors, because they get new ideas they can use in their own schools.
This is a busy day for me. I will soon be off to my new school to sign the employment contract and discuss my duties - and then participate in the regular Friday Professional Development afternoon with my new colleagues.
After that I'll be off to Palm Springs for the California Math Council's Southern California conference.
(and a concert with the LA Phil on Sunday completes a very busy weekend!)

Persistence Pays Off!

2010-11-04T11:03:00.000-07:00

I was offered a job today! I can start as soon as the finger-printing goes through!
I'll be teaching Algebra II and Geometry in a small rural charter school that has a great emphasis on project learning and professional development. I can't wait to start!
It took 3 or 4 applications to this school to get the job, but I knew it would be the right place for me, so I kept applying!
That of course explains the title. But persistence is an extremely important trait in a teacher. If we want to try something new that is supposedly a good idea, rather than what everyone else is doing, you have to keep at it, trying it in various ways, polishing it off, and don't give up with the first hints of failure.
The same is important when we work with our students. If a student appears to be uninterested in classwork, we have to keep working with him/her to find out why. Maybe there is a vision problem, maybe the student is bored, maybe there are family problems. Most of these can be solved if we persist in finding a solution.

It's Possible!

2010-11-01T07:48:00.000-07:00

I saw Waiting for Superman this weekend. The movie kept telling me. "It is possible!" which is the theme of the accompanying website.The trailer can give you a good idea, but you have to see the movie, if you want to believe that it is possible for all children, when given a chance,to succeed in school.

But they don’t tell enough about HOW and WHAT the good teachers do. Just that those kids aren’t hopeless, and can really do well if the teacher – and the students – persist. Of course all the students whose parents have put their names in lotteries to get into a good charter school are also interested in the success of their children, no matter what their socio-economic status. Two kids had parents with college education, but one was living with a grandmother with minimal education, as did her (new deceased) children; but she didn’t want that to continue to the next generation. So you can’t discount the effects of the parents.

Diane Ravitch published a scathing review of the movie in The Myth of Charter Schools in the most recent New York Review of Books, dated November 11. She keeps wondering why they didn't show public schools that work, well knowing (as is documented in the film) that only a small percentage of charters really do work.)

For many people, these arguments require a willing suspension of disbelief. Most Americans graduated from public schools, and most went from school to college or the workplace without thinking that their school had limited their life chances. There was a time—which now seems distant—when most people assumed that students’ performance in school was largely determined by their own efforts and by the circumstances and support of their family, not by their teachers. There were good teachers and mediocre teachers, even bad teachers, but in the end, most public schools offered ample opportunity for education to those willing to pursue it. The annual Gallup poll about education shows that Americans are overwhelmingly dissatisfied with the quality of the nation’s schools, but 77 percent of public school parents award their own child’s public school a grade of A or B, the highest level of approval since the question was first asked in 1985.

The students left behind in the public schools may have more problems than just teachers alone can handle. But then maybe we should do what we can to make it work, since the message of "Superman" is that it is possible - but maybe harder.
The teachers in these schools believe it can be done (and none of the classrooms had 40 kids in them either.) We need to believe it is possible, believe in our students, and persist in motivating them to believe in themselves.
So despite Diane Ravitch, go see the movie and encourage any teachers or future teachers to see it! And then go to the movie's website or to www.edutopia.org to see how it’s done.
"Superman" is a real tear-jerker at the end, where you wait along with the children you have gotten to know to see if they win the lottery for the school they hope will change their lives. (Only one does, which makes it all the more poignant.)
Among the credits at the end, they wrote text “possible” to 77177 which will get you on a mailing list and a $15 gift certificate to www.donorschoose.org where you give to help teachers purchase equipment for their classrooms (which I have done for 4 different projects, and looking forward to giving my $15.)

Mastering is more than expecting the best

2010-10-27T09:55:00.000-07:00

In his article Fostering Mastery (Huffington Post, October 24,) Terry Newell discusses the delight of seeing students master a difficult skill, in particular a pianist.
As teachers we are expected to help students do their very best in their work, but sometime a student's very best would be real mastery of a subject or skill. In the article he points out that the only areas school place emphasis on mastery is where there are competitions, in sports, music, dance, or whatever - all of which are after school activities.
Of course there are many adults who do their day job just to be able to support their passion, which they aim to master, like an acquaintance who participates in very high stakes gambling, which I guess he figures he has mastered. Others use the subjects they work mastering in their day jobs, often as free-lancers. This could be professional photographers, IT developers, or even those lucky athletes who can make it as professionals.
In order to master something you have to be consumed by it. You practice hours on end, study the skills of others, read books, attend conferences or meets, compete with others in various ways. But that doesn't leave time for school work! Both my brother and my son got consumed by technology which competed with schoolwork and dropped out - although they "dropped in" again when they discovered a way to study their passion without the encumbrance of all the rest!
But life needs mastery in more ways than highly visible competitive activities. When I was teaching English and German in Denmark, I kept reminding my students that they needed to really master the languages, so that they could use them in their careers as fluently and precisely as possible. Many of the students had been abroad and understood why almost right can cause comprehension difficulties. They were motivated to work with their essays and practice conversation so that they would someday be praised for their fluency. That was more important than the grade I gave them (which, of course, was good anyway!)
As math teachers we have to encourage our students to master math. Any deviations from accurate math could cause serious problems in life (by not calculating one's financial situation well enough) or in a career - just think of what would happen if an engineer did imprecise calculations on a bridge, car, or space explorer!
Journalists have to master their skills of research and persuasion.
Is there a way we can motivated students to mastery in our classes?
I once had a mentor teacher who was inspired by words from an Olympic swimmer, about how he mastered his swimming techniques through many hours of drill. Unfortunately the teacher assumed that this could be applied to math students. He missed the most important part of the swimmer's message: motivation. Students have to be motivated to excellence, to mastery. Then they might be interested in drill. But I think they have to figure out for themselves in some way what they will drill. It doesn't help that a teacher says, "this is how you do it, now go drill it for an hour." Teenagers will often do the exact opposite of what you tell them to do, or at least do it unwillingly. We have to lead them to where they want to master the subject on their own with our support and guidance where they need it. There are many things they can figure out on their own. Sometimes they need encouragement to research the particulars they need, so we have to help them learn to be effective researchers, but there are also times when our own knowledge and experience is what they need, and they may be motivated to accept it, if we learn to present it at the right moment.
Let our job be encouraging mastery. Our job is motivation, not dishing out facts, procedures and drills!

Class size does make a difference

2010-10-26T13:13:00.000-07:00

I have been taking a math course to complete the requirements for the MA in Secondary Math Education. I signed up for a course that had a prerequisite that I (and several others in the class) wasn't aware of, but because the class only has about 10 students, the professor realized this problem and used more time than he had planned to cover the prerequite material. He looked at us while he was teaching, and if we had puzzled faces he'd reteach the concept in a different way. We all felt comfortable enough to say, "wait a minute. Where did you get that equation from?"
But despite his help, I discovered I really needed the prerequisite course, and found that I would be allowed to swap the one for the other - after four weeks. The teacher of the new course graciously allowed me to start at that point with homework assignments. But the class is large, with 38 students in a large auditorium. It is very hard to see the board if I'm late and can't sit up front. He talks softly, so he's also hard to hear. He covers what he's writing on the board while he's writing, so we have to rush to copy it when he's through, and his comments about what he's writing don't make sense until we can see it. But the major problem is that he has no way of knowing how hard it is for us to understand, because we are so many, spread out too far. He asks very few questions to check for understanding, and is happy if someone answers correctly.
High school classes are getting up to 40 students these days, admittedly crowded together in smaller classrooms, so no one is so far from the board or the teacher. But it is really difficult to be aware of each student's needs in such a large group.
When I taught in Denmark, the union had negotiated maximum class sizes of 28, which always seemed large. However, we could easily fit those 28 students in a U-shape with a few desks inside, so everyone could see each other and I could easily approach each student. Second and third year classes, they were often much smaller, as the students could specialize to certain interests. I had many classes under 20. There was no problem getting to know each student and ensuring that everyone had a say in classroom discussions.
I am looking forward to having my own classroom, but not to having 5 classes with 40 students each (200 students and their parents to get to know.) Certainly it takes an especially talented teacher to reach all of her many students in today's large classes!

Engaging a classroom

2010-10-25T09:56:00.000-07:00

One of the questions I get asked every time during a job interview is what my version of classroom management is. I hate that term, because it leaves the students out of the equation. I manage, you be managed.
As far as I can see, if the students are engaged in meaningful, sense-making learning experiences, a good classroom experience just happens.
I just got a new Teaching Tips from Coach G today, where he provides a couple of suggestions that I had learned previously, but they are worth repeating, since I'm not, unfortunately, practicing them yet. In a tip called Replacing Classroom Chaos with Control, he recommends using "data" to identify problems that have already arisen. This is data from a coach or peer who observes your classroom, or from a video.
Among the solutions are:

Always have some easily understood, but somewhat time-consuming, activity on the board when students come in, so you have time for taking attendance and whatever has to be done in the beginning. Don't give students a chance to get going on something else, but give them the opportunity to be quiet with math for a few minutes in the beginning of class, to get focused on what will be happening during the hour.
Although I want students to learn by doing, in cooperative learning groups, there is still a need for up-front, whole class teaching. I discovered during student teaching that it is extremely important to face the class as much as possible, keeping your eyes moving. That means using overheads, document cameras, or pre-prepared slides or activities on an Electronic White Board, so you don't have your back to the class while you're writing things.
On the other hand, if things are pre-prepared, be sure to give students enough time to read and take notes from what is there. My student teaching master teacher would display on the white board, and then write on the overhead as he was talking about it - although that makes the students look two different places at once.

Other things that I have found helpful or have inspired me:

Equity sticks or cards, one for each student, color-coded by class, so you can keep track of them. Students know that they will be called on. If you replace the cards at the back of the pack, then everyone knows they will be called on. On the other hand, they also figure they won't be called on again. So occasionally shuffle the cards, so students get called on more than once. Cards are great, but I found them clumsy to work with, so popsicle-sticks might be a better solution.
I expect that group boxes of materials are common-place in elementary school, but I think they would be great in high school, too, so you don't have to take time handing out rulers, markers, scissors, etc. to groups. I've bought my boxes, but not having a class, I haven't gotten around to equipping them.
My master teacher in preteaching discovered that we (at least I) kept looking for my markers, equity sticks or whatever, so she gave us all a simple canvas tool belt filled with supplies as a getting started gift. It has not been in use yet, but Coach G suggested the same thing. Don't waste time looking for stuff during class. Make sure that everything you will need is available - either in group boxes or your tool belt, or somewhere else front and center.
Seat students in primarily in cooperative learning groups, but angle the groups so that everyone can see up front. I've observed classes with groups, where some kids had their backs to the board. Either they had to turn around to look at the board (strain on necks) or they just looked in front of them, and missed things. It might be possible to work out a way to quickly move the desks into "looking front" position, and then back to groups.
As Coach G suggests, teach only long enough that you know that at least one person in each group "gets it." Then let the groups figure out themselves how to make sense of it all. And be sure to hold every member of the group responsible for understanding, so the group ensures that everyone gets it.
Of course, while the students are learning in groups, you are working the classroom, trying to position yourself so that you still have an eye on everyone while you work with a group, asking questions, giving tips or leads, but not giving the answer! You have to be ready to move on quickly if need arises.
Some teachers change the groups regularly, so the class gets to know each other - or to avoid conflicts arising in groups. It seems to me that Groups that function well together and learns well should be able to stay together. Disfunctional groups may need help to learn to work together. It takes time to learn to cooperate effectively.

And again, I look forward to the not impossible situation that I will have my own classroom soon to practice what I blog about!

Bilingual children learn even better

2010-10-22T10:32:00.000-07:00

My children are bilingual English and Danish, since their father is Danish. They also speak French, Spanish and German. Their early years were spent in Denmark, where there are many foreign language programs in TV, and usually only children's cartoons were dubbed. So they got used to hearing not only English and Danish, but also Norwegian and Swedish and many other languages. My son used to pretend talk in various languages, with a perfect accent (but few words and no grammar.) Both have grown up to be very smart and culturally very adaptable.
An article in Education Week show that science behind my experience bears out. Science Grows on Acquiring New Language.

“We have this national psyche that we’re not good at languages,” said Marty Abbott, the director of education for the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages in Alexandria, Va. “It’s still perceived as something only smart people can do, and it’s not true; we all learned our first language and we can learn a second one.”

I started wondering if all these monolingual teachers are afraid to let their bilingual students be "better" than they are, since they can do something the teacher can't.
I am always perplexed to meet students who speak another language at home, but have not been encouraged to keep building it to a level of Academic Competence. While I was studying secondary math education at Claremont Graduate University I found that many of my foreign-born fellow students did not know how to talk about Mathematics in their native language. They miss out on the opportunity to approach problem solving with the logic of two different languages. What a waste!

Other studies also suggest that learning multiple languages from early childhood on may provide broader academic benefits, too.
For example, at the science-oriented Ultimate Block Party held in New York City this month, children of different backgrounds played games in which they were required to sort toys either by shape or color, based on a rule indicated by changing flashcards. A child sorting blue and yellow ducks and trucks by shape, say, might suddenly have to switch to sorting them by color. The field games exemplified research findings that bilingual children have greater cognitive flexibility than monolingual children. That is, they can adapt better than monolingual children to changes in rules—What criteria do I use to sort?—and close out mental distractions—It doesn’t matter that some blue items are ducks and some are trucks.

When I get my own math classrooms, I plan to encourage bilingual students to talk math in both English and their native language. Bilingual immersion programs to this very well, but I think that regular classrooms can also encourage this (as long as there are at least 2 students who speak a particular language.) Math concepts are the same, and a lot of the vocabulary is cognate in some languages.
When I lived in Denmark, whenever we teachers had to do book inventory at the end of the year, I found myself starting to count in Danish, "en, to, tre, fire, fem seks, syv, otte, ni, ti....eleven, twelve, thirteen...." I've heard other foreign born adults do the same. But the counting is the same!
Our language is a very important part of our identity. As part of my CGU coursework, I wrote a blog called Negotiated Identity, where I reflect on a book Negotiating Identities: Education for Empowerment in a Diverse Society we read for class, and brought in a lot of other thoughts and material that I discovered as I read.
Students who are born with two languages are extremely lucky! We have to encourage them to become truly bilingual, also in their academic language.

Still looking but teaching a little, too

2010-10-21T12:46:00.000-07:00

Wonder of wonders! I finally started doing a little teaching, or rather tutoring. I have one student in Physics and one in Geometry. Both of them tell stories about teachers who lecture up front and then give homework. The Physics student even had a lab about the recent unit AFTER the unit test. The teacher evidently considers labs to be "activities" to make things a little interesting, not real learning experiences.

The Geometry student flunked Algebra I with one teacher and got an A with the next. Geometry was going the same way before she signed up for a tutor.

As students of education we're taught to differentiate teaching. In order to do that, you have to know who's getting it and who isn't. You can't know that standing in the front of the class and collecting homework once a week, graded by teacher's assistant.

On the other hand, it's a lot to ask of a teacher to know each of 40 students well enough to differentiate. So it's a teacher problem as well as a problem for teachers...and their students.

I've been enjoying Coach G's Teaching Tips on the Teacher Magazine website. On October 5, he told us his secrets for Differentiated Instruction: A Practical Approach, where he writes:

You do, of course, need to provide some whole-group instruction, and you should certainly make it as engaging as possible. But you should also make it as brief as possible. Forget the ideal of every student grasping every lesson. What's more important is that you present key information in a clear, organized way so that students have notes to refer to when the real learning begins--during practice. In fact, in my classroom, where I assigned students to heterogeneous groups for independent (and interdependent) practice, as soon as I was sure at least one student per group grasped a concept, I was ready to move on, since I now had a full complement of assistant coaches.

or how about this great tip from September 27:

Don't Tell Students to Show Their Work--Make Them!
Are you constantly on students to show their work in math (or other) classes, but to no avail? If so, try giving them the answers up front--for class work, homework, even a test or two. Really, what better way to stress the problem-solving process than to limit an activity to that process?! Do this, and you'll really be messing with kids at first--especially if, like many of my students, they care more about getting work done than getting it done right. What are these students to do when the directions for an assignment are, "Show why the given answer is correct," and they can't get it done without getting it done right?

I am just looking for an opportunity to put these great tips to work!

Doing the impossible is harder than I imagined!

2010-08-17T08:36:00.000-07:00

I stopped writing here because this thing about getting a credential has become much more difficult than it was when I got the idea to do so. Neither the school I have studied at Claremont Graduate University, or EncorpsTeachers, who have also been supporting me through all of this past year with workshops, study guides, and good advice, had imagined what school administrators already suspected, that they would be hiring very few teachers. In many districts, classes are being filled up to 40 students, even in Middle School, eliminating the need to hire a new teacher, and making life difficult for both teachers and students at the same time. That means that secondary teachers have to get to know 200 students (and their families) and that classrooms built for 25 have desks squeezed in, with no space for separate activity areas, or a way to even access the walls of the classroom.

In the meantime, however, I have completed all the coursework expected of me, except for one course I'll take this Fall (in Statistics) and a concluding course next summer -- if I manage to find a job to complete the Internship training this year. I am hoping that the new government money will open up a job here or there, which may provide me a job (as well as this year's interns) and make classes a little smaller, so that it will be easier to use more creative methods for students to learn as well.

I also took a series of courses at UC Riverside Extension this summer on Science Education to supplement the Teaching Skills tests in Science (CSET) I've been taking this year to expand what I can teach.

So far I've applied for over 30 jobs this spring. I'm hoping that all the credentialed candidates have landed a position by now, as school is starting, and that schools will be more open to taking an Intern as they discover a need for just one more teacher.

Please wish me luck!

Fix The Schools: Reason Saves Cleveland With Drew Carey, Ep. 2

2010-03-22T20:49:00.001-07:00

Interesting video about rethinking education.

Teaching at last!

2009-12-18T19:11:00.000-08:00

I finally decided that I had to get into a classroom or go crazy, so I accepted the offer from Claremont Graduate School to become an unpaid student teacher instead. They were absolutely amazed that there are still about 6 of us with math credentials who did not land a job.

I am teaching at a good school with a great Master Teacher. I am observing and teaching one class of seniors who need to pass the California HS Exit Exam (CAHSEE) to be able to graduate, plus 3 honors Algebra II classes, which is sort of the opposite end of the spectrum. The teacher also has a class in AP Calculus BC, which I am technically qualified to teach, but I'm learning more just watching him teach!

Obviously the part you can't learn from a book is classroom management. This is much harder here than when I taught high school English and German in Denmark 15-20 years ago.) I don't know if Danish students have become like American students, or if the American students are just so much more immature than Danish students. I had reasonable success back then treating them as young adults; I just happened to know more than they did about certain things. We weren't even allowed to contact parents outside of parent consultation nights. Here it's expected. Admittedly, our students were on average 1-2 years older than in American high schools. Does that make that much difference?

One older teacher who is retiring this year told me that he thought the HS students now act like Middle School kids a generation ago (despite early onset of puberty.) Is it because of parents who coddle kids? (I intimidated something like that in a teacher course and one parent immediately defended her parenting, saying that times were very different now.) I think the difference now is that we hear about every single incident that happens anywhere, so the world seems more dangerous. But I think it is more dangerous if the kids don't learn to stand on their own 2 feet, to take responsibility for their own actions (and learning!) and learn to think for themselves, rather than just think in opposition to adults.

At any rate, I have to learn to wait for 5 very long seconds to get the class quiet. I observed my Master Teacher doing it (after he had timed my "5-seconds" to 2!) 5 seconds is very long! But the kids get the message that you mean it. So I have to learn! I have also switched from writing on the white board (I keep saying "blackboard!") to using the overhead, because then I am facing the students. The Master Teacher uses "Equity Cards" to call on students, which I try to remember to do. I've got to learn their names - a total of about 115 students, not counting the Calculus class! In Denmark I never had more than 100. There is an electronic board in the classroom, which we can use to display PowerPoints, use the document camera, and a lot of fun things I hope I learn. But for the time being, it seems to be best to be facing the students! Once I learn Management, then I can try the fun stuff!

What to do when there aren't any jobs and you really want to teach...

2009-11-11T18:53:00.000-08:00

This has been a really frustrating Fall for me. After making my decision to become a math teacher at a time when everyone said that jobs would fall into my lap, and then discovering that that is definitely not the case, I have found classes at Claremont Graduate University both inspiring and depressing - the last particularly when the speaker refers to "your students," of course. But at this point, there are still about 10 of us in secondary math, who do not yet have an Internship position.

So I have bought most of the new books available from the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics and used copies of a variety of math teaching materials, in particular Core-Plus Mathematics Contemporary Mathematics in Context from Glencoe. I've beeing reading about Sensemaking and learning through Discovery and Problem Solving, which really "make sense" to me as a way to get students interested in what they are learning. Core-Plus, which has units in Algebra, Geometry, Statistics, etc. each year, instead of separate years, looks like a fantastic way to teach math, except that it would be really hard to implement, since any student who switches schools would be lost wherever else they went. That is probably why there are so many used materials on Amazon.

I've also enjoyed the materials I discovered at the website for Geometer's Sketch Pad, which is a fun way to do geometry (and I understand other math subjects.) I found that they have great online resources for their Algebra and Geometry books, including some in Spanish. I also discovered the Prentice Hall Multilingual Handbooks - all available for almost nothing at Amazon. They included glossaries, etc. in a variety of languages, not just Spanish. But evidently Spanish is the only language that districts want to invest in. I just found a letter from a parent complaining about the creative math texts (dating back to 1996.)

I have also been observing classrooms - I'm required to observe 25 hours, including special ed and bilingual classrooms, and I've observed more than that now. What I see is teachers doing direct instruction and students doing work sheets. In some classes, text books are stacked somewhere in the classroom, or the students have a copy at home, but they are not being used. The ones I've looked at with my inexperienced eyes seems really exciting, if you want to teach by discovery and problem solving. But kids are learning how to solve problems on work sheets - and on standardized tests. I understand that there are pacing guides at the schools, that decide, for example, that next week all Algebra I teachers will be teaching solving two equations with graphing or substitution. No need to use a text book for that. No need to discover anything, when you can just do problems. Teachers tell me that the enormous textbooks just have too much material in them - and of course they're too heavy to carry around! So all the thought that went into making them (so they'd fit most any state's standards!) is just gathering dust.

To make myself more "hireable," I just did a quick (one month) review of physics and took the teaching qualification exam, CSET Physics III last Saturday. Now I have to decide whether to take Physics IV, to qualify as a physics teacher, or Science I and II (including biology, chemistry, earth and planetary science as well as physics) to be able to be a General Science teacher. Or maybe I'll just use the physics I've reviewed to provide more "authentic" problenms for my students.

Finally, I've been writing a few lesson plans, which are assignments for this semester at Claremont Graduate University - writing a total of 3 lessons that will benefit English Language Learners (ELLs) or students with other learning issues, like dyslexia or autism. I've written lessons that involve discovery and sense-making, since I'm not in a classroom trying to keep up with the pacing guide to make sure the kids do well on standardized tests. I'm afraid that my idealism will hit the dust when I finally do get into my own classroom.

The world we are preparing our students for...

2009-11-01T12:23:00.001-08:00

Even more reasons to teach our students to think, not just learn formulas and facts, because they may be outdated by the time they want to use them in their careers!

Propaganda or Education?

2009-10-30T15:45:00.000-07:00

I received the following message on Facebook from Friends of the Mountains, which I support for their work against Mountaintop Removal (see my blog Sustainable Rays, for more on this.) But the message here was about a company sponsored field trip and "educational" materials, which are basically propaganda, purporting to demonstrate local history. Now if the Friends of the Mountains come back with educational materials, will Big Coal call that propaganda?
[Added Nov 1: Here are a lot of teacher resources that tell the other side of the story, from I Love Mountains.]

BECKLEY, W.Va. -- The Friends of Coal Ladies Auxiliary wrapped up its first Coal in the Classroom program in the Raleigh County public schools with a field trip this week.

Its pro-coal curriculum was piloted at a private elementary school last year.

On Tuesday, Stratton Elementary School's fourth-grade class traveled to the Beckley Exhibition Coal Mine for a firsthand look at an underground mine.

It's the first class in the West Virginia public school system to host the program. With the help of local retired teachers, the curriculum was developed by the Friends of Coal Ladies Auxiliary. Regina Fairchild is the chairwoman.

"We just make it as lighthearted as possible but informative,'' she said. "We just want to educate them about our vital resource in our area and in the United States.''

The program consists of a coloring book that illustrates how coal is mined underground and at surface mines. It also shows how coal is burned for energy we use in electricity. And you can find phrases like "The advantages of coal'' and "Why coal is important,'' as well.

Some environmental groups say the Friends of Coal program doesn't belong in public schools.

Assistant Superintendent of Raleigh County Schools Janet Lilly says they are willing to look at any curriculum from the environmental community.

"We really looked at the curriculum and what they planned to do,'' she said. "We're open to any group that's willing to do the match and present the curriculum, and if there's someone that objects to the curriculum that's out there with the auxiliary, we'd be glad to look at their curriculum, too.''

Raleigh County School Board member Larry Ford says the board also evaluated the fairness of the material.

"We didn't want it to be lopsided,'' he said. "We wanted it to be a generic form of presentations to the kids showing them the history of coal.

"We're not trying to tell them one thing is better than the other. The content standards had to be met as far as their learning is concerned. We're not picking sides, we are here for the education of the students, period.''

Lorelei Scarbro with Coal River Mountain Watch says her organization is working on an elementary school curriculum about alternative energy. She's not sure when it will be finished.

Meanwhile, Coal River Mountain Watch is working with another environmental group called Aurora Lights to produce curriculum for high school and college students across West Virginia, with financial assistance from the West Virginia Humanities Council.

"Journey up Coal River'' includes lesson plans such as "What is mountaintop removal?'' and "Public health impacts of coal mining,'' and includes links to pro-environmental Web sites such as ilovemountains.org, according to Jennifer Osha, founder and president of Aurora Lights.

"What I really wanted to do is for college students to engage in the complexity of this issue and really use their own ideas and what they're interested in to feel to what parts they most want to engage in,'' Osha said. "We also provide them with resources both academic and activist that they can come and learn about what's happening.''

Osha also questioned the fairness of the Friends of Coal curriculum, but Fairchild says it's appropriate for elementary school students.

"Our curriculum is balanced. For heaven sake we're talking to third- and fourth-graders,'' she said. "You're not going to get technical and you're not going to talk numbers.''

(I added the links to the text.)

Value-added evaluations

2009-10-19T09:42:00.000-07:00

I've been following along on the discussions of how to evaluate teachers, and how using kids test scores doesn't show appropriately how well a teacher teaches. After all, disadvantaged students just have so much against them to be able to get good grades, goes the argument, so teachers can't be held responsible for students not doing the work.

But an article in yesterday's LA Times Superintendent spreads the gospel of 'value-added' teacher evaluations proves to me that standardized test scores can be a legitimate way to evaluate teachers. In this case, it isn't the actual scores that are used, but a ratio of individual student's scores over time, which will show students' progress in relationship to themselves. Studies have shown that teachers really do affect students' progress, and that their effect can be measured. If a whole class gets much better Value-added ratios, then the teacher must have had something to do with it. If some improve and some don't, it is probably the students' own effort and not the teacher that makes the difference.

Maybe not surprisingly, the students from underachieving school actually show the most progress (since a tiny improvement is huge related to very little) while good students from privileged schools have a hard time showing much improvement at all, since it is related to a much larger base number.

Personally, I would like to be able to see how my teaching affects my students' improvement. I could use it as a formative assessment that tells me to try harder.

I could see how various students perform to understand in which ways I am successful, and where I need to try different methods.

The concept is vaguely like a grading system I developed years ago for a class in Denmark which could vaguely be compared to a continuation high school here. They only received final test scores for their record, so I was free to give them formative assessments any way I wanted. I invented a system with arrows: up if students did better than usual, down if they had slacked off. Initially, of course, the better students didn't like getting a down arrow while someone who did far less got an up. But gradually they figured it out, and used it to motivate themselves to do even better. At the same time the students at the lower end were not getting F's, but were getting encouraging up arrows. The dyslexic student I started the system for had been given up by previous teachers. But she went from what would have been F's to a final test grade of about C!

Knowing where I'm doing well and where I need improvement would be great. And if it turns out I'm not a good teacher anyway, I don't want to inflict poor teaching on students who deserve better.

However, another article on the same page Judging teachers: Much of what you thought you knew is wrong reviews a few misconceptions about teachers' effectiveness, for example:

Teacher experience matters. Although teachers are generally paid more for years of experience, research suggests that instructors show dramatic improvement in their first few years and then level off. Teachers with 20 years of experience are often no more effective than peers with five years.

Teacher education matters. Schools routinely pay teachers higher salaries for obtaining master's degrees. But several studies have found that educators with advanced degrees do no better than those without (with the possible exception of high school math teachers) - my emphasis.

So maybe if I teach 5-10 years I will be able to encourage, motivate and stimulate my students, and then leave before I get too set in my ways and lose my enthusiasm! Another misconception from the list needs to be taken with a grain of salt - and good sense:

Class size is key. Research suggests that modest changes in class size, such as decreasing it by four or five students, has been shown to have little to no effect on student learning.

Adding a single student or two to 25 might not make a difference, but adding gradually until you get 35 or 40 students will most likely show a great difference over time (which would also be reflected in Value-added scores.) Don't use that as an excuse to push more students into classrooms designed for far fewer students. Teachers need to be able to move about the room, get close to students (proximity is a major element in classroom management!) and there has to be room to move desks into different configurations, for collaborative learning groups, areas for special purposes, etc. A classroom is not a lecture hall!

Arne Duncan plays ball with Stephen Colbert

2009-10-09T19:21:00.000-07:00

The Colbert Report

Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Arne Duncan

www.colbertnation.com

Colbert Report Full Episodes

Political Humor

Michael Moore

Observing special ed classes

2009-10-01T17:59:00.000-07:00

As part of my training to become a secondary math teacher, I have a requirement to visit many different kinds of classes, including special education. Yesterday, I visited a middle school in a neighboring town that had a program with several "self-contained" classes that are attempting to teach the 10 students "functional skills" in reading, writing and math.

The two classes I observed each had 2 very severely handicapped students, 3 of whom could walk, but none could speak or even control looking at us very well. The teachers said that the one who could not walk was actually quite intelligent, so he was outfitted with "yes" and "no" buttons that he could operate my moving his head to the left or right. He did appear to enjoy being part of the class, however. In his class there was some effort to have these students participate in class, including holding their hand to trace letters. But this seemed quite hopeless to me, because they were looking away. One student was mostly confined to a sort of playpen in the classroom, because he was too disruptive in the classroom. Unfortunately his little pen took away valuable space that might have been used as a cozy reading corner like the other class enjoyed. The teacher was frustrated that the time she had to spend with this student, i.e. feeding him, could have been used to work with the more functioning students. I was surprised that he did not have a one-on-one aide, as did several students in the other class.

Otherwise the children were learning to read or at least recognize important signs (like Exit, Men and Women - for restrooms, etc.) They practiced the months and days of the week again and again, and learned to tell time and count. The practiced copying letters and some even got to write cursive.

We participated in a special PE class for them, where they could run, kick, throw and catch a ball and even try to hit with a bat. The students were also expected to do some chores, like wiping off tables and collecting toys and trash at the end of the day, all part of their functional learning.

The one class displayed clearly the daily schedule as well as the state requirements for these children's education.

One student was advanced enough that he started school chorus yesterday, and will be able to go to cooking later on. I understand that when they reach high school age, they will also have special classes, but move from one subject to another, just like their peers. I hope to visit such a class as well.

A couple of these students were autistic, and at least one has considerable intelligence, but barely talks. I expect that I will be seeing some students like him in my high school classroom, which is why we are expected to observe these classrooms.

I asked about how these students are assessed. For one thing, the each have an Independent Educational Plan, which requires annual reevaluation. Otherwise there are standardized tests, the CAPA and the Brigance screens, where the teacher observes and interviews the students to determine their level (not a grade!)

I admire these teachers for their dedication and hard work helping these children become functional adults. One teacher told me how delighted she was with one student who had learned to read during the past year, and the heartbreak with another, who had been kept at home until this year, missing some of the training that might have been able to move him further than he is now.

The Possible's slow fuse is lit by the Imagination.

2009-09-29T12:58:00.000-07:00

The title of this post is a quote I just read in my Daily Ray of Hope email from the Sierra Club.

The gleam of an heroic Act
Such strange illumination
The Possible's slow fuse is lit
By the Imagination.
Emily Dickenson

When I Googled to find the original poem, one of the sources included this rather depressing quote:

But so few have imagination that there are ten thousand fiddlers to one composer.
Charles F. Kettering

But of course imagination is only the light that illuminates all the hard work we have to do to get the impossible to become a reality.

Genius is one percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration.
I never did anything worth doing by accident, nor did any of my inventions come by accident. They came by work.
Thomas Alva Edison

So, what does this mean for me in my search for this "impossible" job teaching high school mathematics? I must admit that I haven't been using my imagination (or producing perspiration) enough. I've been applying for jobs through EdJoin, which supposedly lists all the school jobs in California. But most of the jobs apparently "disappear" (to someone the principal already knew) before the District gets to my application.

In between I admit that I've been moping - as well as reading about the pedagogy I hope to use in my very own classroom, and even writing about my readings and reflections here and in Negotiated Identity. But that doesn't seem to be getting me anywhere.

People were telling me that doing Secondary Math would have principals begging me to teach at their schools! Now that's imagination! So I have to use my imagination to light the work needed to be known in the schools.

At least I have finally pulled myself together to find school contacts for the required minimum 25 hours of observation in a variety of different schools and class types, from kindergarten through high school, including classes for English Language Learners and various special ed students. I guess that is the difficult "perspiration" part of doing the impossible.

Tomorrow will be my first observations - in a middle school special ed class. I plan to report on my experiences here. Years ago, soon after moving to Denmark, I tried to work as a substitute teacher. One of the jobs was in a special ed class, which was devastating (and probably the reason I decided to get a Danish university degree that would qualify me for teaching in high school!) I had absolutely no pedagogical training at the time, and certainly not in special ed! I really admire teachers who can work so well with these kids!

I am also lining up observations at an elementary school that does "Dual Immersion" in Spanish and English with the goal to make the students academically fluent in both languages. This will be a challenge to my Spanish. I'm considering offering to volunteer in math classes there once I've completed the rest of the 25 hours!

How to Remake Education

2009-09-27T13:48:00.000-07:00

The New York Times Magazine today is devoted to education. I have already written about one article on my other active blog: Inner City Boarding School. A short collection of entries called How to Remake Education caught my eye as well, but only one entry really made immediate sense to me. Since it is so short, I quote it in full:

Beyond Testing
The single biggest problem in American education is that no one agrees on why we educate. Faced with this lack of consensus, policy makers define good education as higher test scores. But higher test scores are not a definition of good education. Students can get higher scores in reading and mathematics yet remain completely ignorant of science, the arts, civics, history, literature and foreign languages.

Why do we educate? We educate because we want citizens who are capable of taking responsibility for their lives and for our democracy. We want citizens who understand how their government works, who are knowledgeable about the history of their nation and other nations. We need citizens who are thoroughly educated in science. We need people who can communicate in other languages. We must ensure that every young person has the chance to engage in the arts. [My italics]

But because of our narrow-minded utilitarianism, we have forgotten what good education is.

DIANE RAVITCH
Ravitch is a historian. Her book ‘‘The Death and Life of the Great American School System’’ will be published in February.

Ms Ravitch is participating in an alternating blog with Deborah Meier called Bridging Differences on the Education Week Website, where they are trying to find what they have in common in their otherwise divergent messages about what matters most in education.

One of the other commentators goes on against BA degrees, ranting that they are not worth the paper they are printed on. I think he should read Ms Ravitch little piece - and her coming book - because I don't think he really understands why we educate our children. We are not educating them for that first job they get out of college, but to make them participating citizens in this country and the world.

Another touching story in the magazine is The Lost Student by Michelle Kuo, a Teach for America teacher in the Mississippi Delta for a year.

Making Math Problematical

2009-09-23T14:53:00.000-07:00

Since I don't have a job yet, I've been doing a lot of extra reading about math pedagogy, wishing I had a class to practice things on. The most exciting I've found so far is Teaching Mathematics through Problem Solving, which unfortunately is out of print (but available used from Amazon). There is a version for PreK-6 and one for 6-12. My first attempt to buy it brought me the PreK-6 book, which I read until the 6-12 arrived today, so I have a head-start on the concepts I'll be reading about. But I thought I'd write a little about my ideas about problematizing math before I get into the book.

My father studied mechanical engineering in the 1930's at Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, NJ, which he always felt was an excellent education. He used to tell me that they had not tried to teach him a lot of facts and formulas (which of course would often be out of date before he had a chance to use them) but how to find the facts and derive the formulas. My college physics professor 30 years later also impressed upon us that we shouldn't learn a bunch of formulas, but instead understand the concepts so we could set up the problems without formulas. With a formula you just have to plug in a few numbers and get answers, but if you don't understand what you're doing you have no way to know if the result it reasonable, or if you, for example, used the wrong units.

From the experience of watching my children grow up, I know that they were more willing to accept facts, rules, whatever, if they had discovered them themselves. In fact, I wrote in my "Mission Statement" for a class this summer:

Through experience with my own children, I know that the younger generation does not want to be fed with my knowledge and experience. Young people learn only what they think they need to learn. Furthermore, they want to experience life themselves, not vicariously through their elders. Any other “learning” remains in short-term memory and can rarely be utilized in their explorations of life. I believe that I can best help young people select what to learn by exposing them to own my passion for learning and exploring; I want to encourage them to maintain their childhood curiosity, rather than to suppress it.

I recall that my son usually wanted to do things his own way, even if that way was much more difficult, including climbing up a steep incline instead of taking the stairs. (Of course there were other times when he was feeling lazy that he wanted me to do things for him...)

We get stronger when we do things, we get better at things when we do them often, particularly if we think about how we are doing them. That's how we learn skills. Kids know all about understanding. That's what they spent the first 5 years of their lives doing, mostly without our help, because they had to figure it out on their own. We don't want them to stop trying to understand when they get to school. Skills aren't enough, and can be forgotten. Understanding can be recalled when needed.

Education has had a variety of methods through the years. Socrates had figured out that people needed to figure things out themselves, way back then! But somewhere along the line there's always some know-it-all who figures s/he knows the best way how to do something and wants to save others the difficulty of having to figure it out themselves, or maybe the tragedy of never figuring it out. We all have been know-it-alls at some point or other. (Like when talking with someone who has an opposing view on some topic dear to our heart. Of course they're wrong and we need to make them understand why!) I remember my (then-)husband trying to teach my son how to crawl(!) Why couldn't he figure out how to move one arm forward, not backwards?

I read a really telling example in another book recently about famous environmentalists. One of them as a child had found a couple of caterpillars and followed their life-cycle. After watching the first pupa open to reveal a butterfly struggling to get out, he decided to help the other butterfly, so it didn't have to struggle. But that one never learned how to fly. It was too weak, because it didn't have to struggle.

So by problematizing math, we make students struggle (a little) to figure things out rather than telling them how to do things. We give them a new problem based on knowledge they have already figured out and understood, and let them figure out how to solve it. If different students come up with different methods (resulting in both correct and incorrect answers) we let the students reflect on the methods so that they can decide which ones are most elegant (I love that mathematical term!) are easiest to understand and can be varied to solve other problems, as well as how not to fall into pitfalls that produce the incorrect answer. Then the students can own the methods they understand rather than the steps and skills we present to them. They learn how to understand, rather than formulas to plug numbers into.

Unfortunately there are many who think we should be taking the problem out of math, to make it easier some how. (In my practice teaching this summer we never presented a single word problem, much less have the students figure things out themselves. It ended up being a lot more difficult getting them to remember stuff than if we'd taken the time to help them understand.) There are others who think we should make math "fun." But isn't it more fun to figure things out yourself? Isn't it more inspiring. Don't you remember those things better, and can't you use them in other situations?

I just noticed that one of the editors of this book is an author in a new series Core-Plus Mathematics for which I just bought the (relatively inexpensive) teachers' guide,

... a standards-based, four-year integrated series covering the same mathematics concepts students learn in the Algebra 1-Geometry-Algebra 2-Precalculus sequence.
Concepts from algebra, geometry, probability, and statistics are integrated, and the mathematics is developed using context-centered investigations.
Developed by the CORE-Plus Math Project at Western Michigan University with funding from the National Science Foundation (NSF), Core-Plus Mathematics is written for all students to be successful in mathematics.

My mind is already working out ways to used problematical math in the classroom. I hope I have a classroom where I can use my ideas soon!

Waiting with a Passion

2009-09-12T11:09:00.000-07:00

First Passion flower
Originally uploaded by Hornplayer

Many of my friends are teaching their first classes in their own classrooms now. A new math teacher friend in Denmark comes regularly to FaceBook to tell how much she's enjoying her classes, including baking brownies for fellow teachers and playing a student/teacher soccer game (students won, my friend was very sore the next day!)

And I am applying for jobs, and reading and writing homework assignments, most vigorously my blog Negotiated Identity, about helping ELL students negotiate their identity in this new confusing world while trying to get them up to speed in math as well. The research and personal reflection I've done for the blog (as well as the required book) have been very inspiring. I just wish I had students to try everything out with!

I was asked at an interview recently what my passion is. I immediately said "The Environment" and left it at that. The Environment has been my passion for so long (witness my blog Sustainable Rays), so that was an understandable automatic answer.

But I know that this past year has brought me through months of fun studying math, and inspiring classes at CGU as well as preteaching at summer school, getting to work with real students.

I think the best thing that happened all summer was when a student told me "I used to hate math, but now I'm kinda sorta beginning to like it." I think that inspired my new passion.

I want to inspire other kids with my love of math; inspire them to use the thinking, logic and problem-solving skills of math to gain the personal power to discover and achieve their potential, whatever that may be.
Since I have taught English Learners before (in Denmark) and I have been a second language learner myself, my particular passion is to help ELL students become productive and creative members of their new communities and country.

Negotiating identity

2009-08-25T08:15:00.000-07:00

I've started classes at CGU again. We have a lot of reading to do right off, because we're supposed to be teaching classes as Interns (which means getting paid to teach a full class load while studying) ASAP. Unfortunately, I don't have that job yet, so everything I'm learning is still just theory.

For one of my classes I am writing in a new blog, Negotiated Identity, reflecting on one chapter of a book called Negotiating Identities each week until the beginning of October.

The assignment is to create an "Interactive Journal" with my reflections on the book interacting with other readings and real life. I would also really love to interact with YOU in the journal. So please join the blog as a Follower, and tell me about how YOU have had to renegotiate your identity throughout your life, or about how your students are negotiation their own identities to fit in your classroom and school.

We've already proven that we can

2009-08-15T07:32:00.000-07:00

Sharon White responded to the previous blog post:

I so agree with your remark that we (second career teachers) don't need the kind of recognition that young new teachers need because we've had it.
People don't ask us why we "settled" for teaching because we've already made our marks in the 'real world'.
The phrase "those that can - do, those that can't - teach" doesn't apply to us. We've already proven that we can.

We're eager to take on the ancient role of elder mentoring the young.

When I was "preteaching" this summer, one of our duties was taking our students on breaks. I sort of felt like we were herding sheep, but since there were no official breaks, school rules required our herding. In the beginning it was sometimes hard to get them to come when break was over. Once I told them to just think of me as their mother. One kid replied "I never do what my Mom tells me to do." "Then think of me as your Grandma," I said. "Ohhh, that's different," he replied. "I'd never cross my Grammy!" and he came along. I never really had problems with them after that.

Do we mature teachers have the strength to keep going?

2009-08-14T18:39:00.000-07:00

Schools Need Teachers Like Me. I Just Can't Stay wrote Sarah Fine in the August 9 issue of the Washington Post, which I found quoted in The Week magazine:

I quit, said Sarah Fine. After four years of teaching at a public charter school in Washington, D.C., I’m walking away from my students and my profession. Armed with high ideals and an Ivy League education, I became a teacher because I loved the idea of making a difference in young lives in urban school districts.

Teaching was sometimes “exhilarating,” but my best efforts to engage students from troubled families often failed. It was painful trying to reach “students such as Shawna, a 10th-grader who could barely read and had resolved that the best way to deal with me was to curse me out under her breath.” But though I tell people I’m burned out, my reason for leaving goes beyond simple frustration.

I’m tired of giving my all for a profession that is widely viewed as “second-rate,” fit only for people who lack the drive and the intelligence to make it in business, medicine, or law. People like me are constantly asked, Why teach? It’s “nice,’’ but it’s not a real job. Largely because of that attitude, half of all new teachers quit within five years. Now I know why.

People like Sharon White and Lou Groner, whom you can meet in the videos that follow, (and me and some of my classmates at Claremont Graduate University, too!) are going to try to bring our life-long experience to the classroom. I'm hoping that we will be able to bring the ballast of many years experience to help us through the frustrations that ended Sarah Fine's teaching career. We may not teach many more years than the 5 she mentioned, but I do hope that we will be able to catch the students' attention with our life stories and show them that education is worth while. We don't need as much reccognition as Sarah needs, because we've already gotten it.

Building a Kite

2009-08-14T18:23:00.001-07:00

Here's another mature teacher who wants to make a difference.

Back To School

2009-08-14T18:17:00.001-07:00

I met Sharon White at an interview day at Greeen Dot High Schools and then shared a room with her at the EnCorps Teachers bootcamp in June just as my classes at CGU were starting. I am proud to know her, and look forward to working with her when I start to teach.

I think we mature people can use our experience to inspire our students. Sharon's story is particularly impelling to her students. She's been where they are, and come back to help them get away.

2009-08-11T12:36:00.000-07:00

I haven't written here in a long time. Classes at CGU and preteaching were exhilarating as well as exhausting. And since August 1, I've been visiting with family in Maine (see pictures!) But I liked this quote from the Sierra Club Daily Ray of Hope (my best source of quotes.) I thought it said a lot about teaching.

If you want to build a ship,
don't drum up the people to gather wood,
divide the work, and give orders.
Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.

-- Antoine de Saint-Exupery

What should our students yearn for to want to learn Algebra?

Our Math Journal

2009-07-19T09:44:00.000-07:00

My Teaching Methods classmate Bryan and I are doing our final project using teaching statistics to create a variety of teachable products, where the emphasis is on literacy through math. For our "technology" part, I convinced him to make a blog that will serve as the class math journal for the year. (We don't have a class to teach right now, so the entries are fictitious, where we pretend to be the teacher and students.)

The idea is that the students will write about the day's math class in their little math journal, and one student each day will write in the blog instead. And the teacher can write in it too, to explain to the parents what their kids are up to in math class.

We'd also like to demonstrate that the visitor statistics could be used in a statistics problem, but to do that we need some visitor statistics! So please visit Our Math Journal to leave your mark on our counter, and maybe get an idea as well.

Greg Mortenson in Afghanistan

2009-07-19T08:48:00.000-07:00

I usually quote Thomas Friedman in my blog Sustainable Rays about environmental issues, but in today's New York Times he is reporting in Teacher, Can We Leave Now? No, on a trip to Afghanistan to join Greg Mortenson and Adm. Mike Mullen, the U.S. chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, to open a new school for girls in Afghanistan.

Since their previous education had been in the mosque, which would have precluded their desire to become doctors and teachers, this is one of many big steps that Greg Mortenson is providing in Pakistan and Afghanistan. As he says:

“When a girl gets educated here and then becomes a mother, she will be much less likely to let her son become a militant or insurgent,” he added. “And she will have fewer children. When a girl learns how to read and write, one of the first things she does is teach her own mother. The girls will bring home meat and veggies, wrapped in newspapers, and the mother will ask the girl to read the newspaper to her and the mothers will learn about politics and about women who are exploited.”

Admiral Mullen was visiting, because, as Mortenson says, the military finally "gets it." They realize that winning in Afghanistan (and Pakistan for that matter) has to be through building relationships, not imposing power, which is what Mortenson's work has been all about. Friedman concludes that if this is how we're in Afghanistan, then we can't leave yet.

So there you have it. In grand strategic terms, I still don’t know if this Afghan war makes sense anymore. I was dubious before I arrived, and I still am. But when you see two little Afghan girls crouched on the front steps of their new school, clutching tightly with both arms the notebooks handed to them by a U.S. admiral — as if they were their first ,dolls — it’s hard to say: “Let’s just walk away.” Not yet.

I'm wondering why it has to be the military doing this. It should be a big UN humanitarian effort instead involving NGOs and grassroots. But I guess since the Taliban is armed (initially by us) then they have to be kept in check?

Coming back to our own world, how many little girls would clutch a notebook as if it were their first doll? What are we doing wrong when girls think that having a baby is a prerequite for becoming an adult, instead of having a good education? In our classes at Claremont Graduate University, we talk often about "Social Justice," but we have a big job ahead of us not only providing a good education, but even more, motivating the students to want it. These Afghani girls need no motivation.

Education in this country has become more motivation than the three R's. We are trying to teach the students to think as well as to know facts, but they have to be dragged to the trough. "Why do I need to know this?" one of my more directed students asked. "I'm going to cooking school. All we need is to know measurements and ratios, not all this algebra stuff." Another one informed us that she was going to marry a rich man, who, we reminded her, would leave her with four kids and no money, if he was anything like most of the other fathers in her neighborhood.

I just created what I hope qualifies as an "Authentic Assessment" (not test, mind you!) in which students can show that they really understand how to simplify rational expressions with cognitive deepness. It was really difficult to relate those skills to "authentic" real life.

But we are trying to use math to teach thinking, logic, organization, steps to solve a (any) problem. Math is brain exercise, just like the exercises athletes use long before they get out on the field to play a game. But I think it would be delightful to teach students who so eager to learn as those Afghani girls!

What you do makes a difference

2009-07-04T12:06:00.000-07:00

In this wonderful July 4th lull I'm going through ancient emails, like this Daily Ray of Hope from May 28.

Act as if what you do makes a difference.
It does.
-- William James

Quadratic formula

2009-07-03T14:08:00.000-07:00

On Monday I'm teaching the quadratic formula to a bunch of kids who are in summer school because... (various reasons!)

One of my fellow student teachers keeps singing the formula to Pop Goes the Weasel.
I discovere many versions on line, 3 of which I've posted below. These are done by students. I love the rap version!

I have also made a card game to help remember it: I divided the formula up into 7 parts, and put each on a colorful card (shown) and then 4 values each for a, b, and c on other cards, which they can use to write equations and solve them. I'm curious how much time this will take, but I'll report back. They're getting a bit antsy toward the end of the summer session, so I think a more active, hands-on activity might get their attention!

Quadratic Rap

2009-07-03T14:06:00.001-07:00

Quadratic Formula Song

2009-07-03T13:59:00.003-07:00

Singing the quadratic formula

2009-07-03T13:59:00.001-07:00

Don't throw anyone out

2009-06-28T13:26:00.000-07:00

Another wonderful quote from the Daily Ray of Hope:

People, even more than things,
have to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed, and redeemed;
never throw out anyone.

-- Audrey Hepburn

I'm afraid some teachers have been tempted to throw some students out, or the equivalent, just moving them on, even though they haven't managed to teach them what they will need to know in the next grade.

I had a student once (high school English in Denmark) whose teachers had unanimously said she wouldn't be able to manage high school, and wanted her to go out and learn a trade. I quickly figured out that she was dyslexic, but had a fine mind, and could speak English at grade level. So we worked on reading and writing skills, and she ended with a C in the class, after receiving D's and F's all the way through grade school. What were they thinking?

Resilience

2009-06-20T16:12:00.001-07:00

In between finishing off all the writing assignments for my course, I am reading a book that I think will provide me with very useful insight into the minds of our African American students in our classrooms: Through Ebony Eyes: What Teachers Need to Know But Are Afraid to Ask About African American Students, by Gail L. Thompson.

One of the topics she writes about, using her own autobiography, is Resilience. How do some children, with every imaginable condition against them, manage to pull through and get where even a lot of people with "ordinary" backgrounds get.

The LA Times ran an article today about just such a person: She finally has a home: Harvard. The young woman in the story had been homeless most of her life, but she knew she was smart, because she'd tested as a "gifted child" and her mother encouraged her.

As long as she can remember, Khadijah has floated from shelters to motels to armories along the West Coast with her mother. She has attended 12 schools in 12 years; lived out of garbage bags among pimps, prostitutes and drug dealers. Every morning, she upheld her dignity, making sure she didn't smell or look disheveled.

By high school she knew that her gift would help get her out of the squalor she'd grown up in, so she found good mentors, and even a home where she could live the last few years to complete her schooling. And she is already in Cambridge, participating in a special program to help her adjust to the Harvard culture.

I am looking forward to reading another story in the LA Times (in paper format, I hope!) in four years, celebrating her graduation from Harvard. She's just beginning, and it will be extremely hard. But I think Harvard will supply her with all the mentors she needs to get there. I wish her well!

Time

2009-06-18T20:19:00.000-07:00

Another quote from my Daily Ray of Hope:

You can't do anything about the length of your life, but you can do something about its width and depth.
-- Evan Esar

I think I am definitely expanding the width and depth of my life with my math teacher training, but I could sure use more time to expand into these days. For about 4 weeks this summer I am practice teaching summer school Algebra I with 2 other fellow students, with classes from 7:30 and to about 1:15 pm and at least an hour of consultation and planning afterward. (The verdict so far: I really need to understand classroom management better. For some reason I seem to be tolerating a louder level of murmuring, but the kids in the back of the class aren't necessarily being able to follow along.) Add to that 3 hours of classes every night from 4:30 to 7:30 through next Wednesday plus any group work (see The Adolescent Dilemma) for our project (.) The following week week it will be from 3-7 pm. And then we have many books to read, reports to write, a portfolio to create, and a long "ethnography" which starts now with about 25 pages and will continue through the next 3 semesters. In the Fall, we'll be teaching our own classes (have to learn that classroom management before then!) and having Saturday classes.

So time is important. But otherwise, I'm enjoying it, and definitely broadening my experience of this place I now live, math, and the young people who will be our future, but don't really understand that yet.

The Adolescent Dilemma

2009-06-11T21:14:00.000-07:00

We need your opinion!

In my Pre-teaching class at Claremont Graduate University, we have read a book called Adolescents at School, edited by Michael Sadowski. Then we formed groups to do a project around one chapter in the book.

My group took Chapter 2, "Joaquin's Dilemma": Understanding the Link between Racial Identity and School-Related Behaviors".

Part of our project is to get your comments to scenarios on our little blog, The Adolescent Dilemma.

Please click the link and add your comments, and take the small quizzes. We'll report back in a week.

Busy...

2009-06-11T11:07:00.000-07:00

If you wonder where I've been all this time, I've been right here, typing away at homework assignments for my very concentrated class at Claremont Graduate University, whose motto is:

Commitment to Social Justice and Accountability

We have a 3-week course called Teaching & Learning Principles (T/PL) which covers all the basics with thousands of pages of reading assignments, written reading responses, modeling of teaching methods, writing the first part of our "Ethnography" - our MA thesis - which will be about some of our students. But part I is about us. As well as preparing a variety of other deliverables (business word, sorry.)

Among these is a blog The Adolescent Dilemma, which we hope to have live tonight. Please visit it and comment on our questions when you see it. If you Follow it, you'll be able to read all the comments, and recomment as well.

How to teach...

2009-06-11T10:57:00.000-07:00

On the Beach
Originally uploaded by Darrell Wyatt

It's all out there,
floating free,
waiting for you
to pull it down
and anchor it.
-- Ann Bernays

-As used on the Sierra Club Daily Ray of Hope today.

High school kids and the economy

2009-05-19T19:57:00.000-07:00

Watch CBS Videos Online
This video was filmed in high schools near where I live. The students they interview are like the students I hope to be teaching. They have a lot more to worry about than passing an Algebra exam, which is necessary to get their dream, to go to college. But will their family be able to afford to send them to college?

This is part of a series from CBC, called Children of the Recession. You can read the text of the video at: Teens Bring Economic Stress To School: CBS Reports: Psychological Toll That Recession Is Taking On Students Is Expanding Teachers' Roles

After Studying Math

2009-05-17T16:06:00.001-07:00

Studying Math
Originally uploaded by bonbayel

My recent journey through Math started innocently enough when I took Biology 101 last summer. Then I wanted to learn something about Organic Chemistry, so I bought the For Dummies book and workbook for that and a set of molecular building balls, which was lots of fun. Then my husband thought it would be interesting to look at calculus again, so we bought Calculus for Dummies and 2 workbooks. . . .

Yesterday I took the CSET in Calculus, Trig and History of Math, the last of the subject matter tests I'm planning to take to qualify as a teacher. The picture shows most of the books I've bought and devoured for this project. There aren't many For Dummies math books I haven't used!

The ones on the floor are mostly about pedagogy and classroom management, which is the next step to become a teacher. Some are required for my classes that start June. Some just looked interesting.

Last night I started a novel and signed up and played around with FaceBook. Today I rescued our beautiful Lantana bush in the corner of our patio, which had fallen down, and then downloaded pictures I took a couple of weeks ago at our family "ancestral estate" (it was a farm then,) now called Lotusland, in Montecito. The quiet before the next storm!

Frazz

2009-05-10T11:56:00.000-07:00

(You may need to click through to the original to read the text.)

They tell me "Always keep your eyes on the class..."

I love this strip. Frazz is the most intelligent strip about schools that I see. I hope I can be like him - and not Mrs. Olsen!

Talk about experiments! That's what school should also be about!

Studying for the last CSET Exam

2009-05-10T08:59:00.000-07:00

I'm taking the final California Single Subject Examination for Teachers (CSET) - Math III (Trigonometry, Derivative and Integral Calculus, Infinite Series - and the History of Mathematics!) next Saturday. I have been studying for it for about 2 months - since I took the first 2 exams. My last official class in math was in 1963, so there is a lot of knowledge being pulled out of dusty corners of my brain. Because the interesting thing is that I recall most of what I am reviewing. That doesn't mean it's active knowledge, but I at least recognize the concepts.

I love solving Sudoku puzzles, and I play 3 different solitaires at night to relax my brain before sleeping, so I enjoy the puzzle of solving Trig identities and figuring out Integrals, both of which require puzzle solving skills.

What I don't enjoy is formulas. I'd much prefer to be able to figure out the formula myself than memorize it. My physics professor at college showed us how to set up problems using the different units (like gravity is acceleration, measured in feet (or meters) per second per second,) so you know how the problem should be set up from the units. Or if you know the trig function definitions, you don't have to memorize their values. However in a test situation you can't spend all your time deriving things. I am sure that is why I used every minute of the allotted time for the first 2 exams (taken in one sitting.)

I've been using a variety of sources to review the math, since I really do have to learn it from scratch. These have included college math and physics books, nearly the entire series of math for Dummies books, some Cliff's Notes books, a Calculus book for Economics students (which left out the trig functions, but was an excellent start,) some dedicated CSET review books - and a program I found online Ace the CSET, which is not really all you need to "Ace the CSET" - which is only pass or fail anyway, but a good help. Everything has practice exercises and practice tests, usually with great explanations about how to solve them.

However almost all of them have very vital typos. Some times it's a forgotten negative, which sent me to my calculator yesterday to find out that I was right, or another has been typed up from a hand-written script by a person who didn't have a clue what the material was about. This produces such interesting things as "l n(2x) - i.e. one n times 2 x" instead of "ln(2x) - natural log of 2x." At any rate, you can't trust everything you read, and it keeps me on my feet. It is comforting to know that even text-book writers make the same kinds of errors I make, but that doesn't help on a multiple choice test!

Test-taking and teaching

So will my current intense study of math help me as a teacher (besides knowing the materials, of course?) Will I be able to see the pitfalls more easily, or point out good study habits. Of course, my students will not be dedicating 2 months intensively to one subject! But at least I will understand the pressures of taking multiple choice tests!

I have kept my delight in math throughout (which my husband would not entirely agree with, as I've gotten grumpy here toward the end, and when I've hit something that involves what to me seems very tangle logic to understand.) Originally I figured I'd be teaching English to foreign students, which I also did in Denmark, but I wasn't feeling terribly inspired. When I started studying for the CBEST (Basic Educational Skills Test) my mind woke up reviewing for the math section, and I knew that it was math I was intended to teach!

Experiments

2009-04-30T10:48:00.000-07:00

This quote appeared today in the Sierra Club Daily Ray of Hope:

Don't be too timid and squeamish about your actions.
All life is an experiment.
The more experiments you make the better.
-- Ralph Waldo Emerson

I think that curiosity has been a driving power in my live, and although I've been singed a few times, I still have a few lives left. Curiosity is what leads to experimentation. If you get caught in the same rut, you need to experiment with some aspects of what you're doing, even though it might be hard not to be squeamish!

You can start in the kitchen. Try using a cookbook instead of a prepared meal or package mix. And then see what happens if you vary an ingredient.

(I admit that not all ingredients can be experimented with! When I lived in Denmark, and American friend was trying to bake some traditional Danish cookies using a recipe in Danish. She came across a word she didn't know (which happened to be for baking powder) so she substituted a spice for it. Turned into very aromatic rocks!)

My son got sent to what they called the "Observation Clinic" in Danish schools after making a little experiment in science class, which the teacher caught just before it exploded. One of my colleagues figured he'd end up a great scientist! At least he's ended up a very good computer developer with a lot of good ideas.

When I had been teaching English and German in Denmark for about 6 years, I started to think that I knew pretty much what my life would be like the next 25 years or so. That didn't leave much room for experiments - even though being a teacher in Denmark provided a lot more room for experimenting with curriculum than it appears to be possible here. So I quit teaching and have been experimenting with careers ever since: translator, diaper-service owner/manager/designer..., environmental manager, technical writer, web designer, graphic designer - and now back to teaching, but this time Math. Not all of these experiments were financially successful, but every one of them has developed my knowledge and skills in many different ways. Now I am looking at a career that could last another 5-10 years. That seems like a reasonable length for this experiment.

Encourage students to experiment

I think one of the important things a teacher should do is to encourage students to attack problems in their own way. We can be helpful to show them a few different ways to do things, and then let them do it their way after that. Or let them experiment to find their own way to attack a problem.

I'm mostly thinking Math, now, of course, but this fits for many subjects. When I taught languages in Denmark, I usually only had a very short lesson plan for how to deal with the texts we were reading, including a point or two I wanted to get across. But it was wonderful when the student discussion went its own direction, so that they were expressing their own thoughts. I was dismayed when I did some subbing at a different school once, where the students expected me to write the "right" analysis on the blackboard so they could copy it into their notes. I told my students that the best way to get a good grade in my classes was for them to introduce me some new way of looking at a text!

Math exercise

2009-04-19T15:20:00.000-07:00

I thought this was a great way to start a math class!

Jump!

2009-04-18T10:20:00.000-07:00

Fledgeling Originally uploaded by J Gilbert

From time to time I am inspired by the little daily quotes I get from the Sierra Club's Daily Ray of Hope.

This was the quote last Wednesday:

Jump
and you will find out how to unfold your wings as you fall.
-- Ray Bradbury

So I am jumping into teaching a little unsure of myself, but I expect my wings will unfold! At least I am given a long time to get them unfolded through my Internship program (if there are high schools in my area actually hiring by Fall!) I will be observing classes and taking concentrated coursework this summer before I jump, so I hope that they will give me an inkling about how to get those wings out!

By the way, the lovely picture is captioned on the Flickr site as "Just out of the Phoebe nest." But several of the commenters say it is a cowbird, not a phoebe. I sometimes think of myself as something like a cowbird nurtured in a phoebe's nest. I recall happily my grandfather's a pair of cowbird friends, who would come back to his (organic) garden in New Jersey every summer and eat raisins from the arm of his lawn chair.
But I'm not going to analyze that any further!

A Mathematician's Lament

2009-04-15T20:53:00.000-07:00

I just read this lovely book in one sitting and then wrote a review about it on a website I just discovered, called Goodreads, which follows here slightly edited. (Note that all links go to the Goodreads site.)

A Mathematician's Lament: How School Cheats Us Out of Our Most Fascinating and Imaginative Art Form by Paul Lockhart

This brand new book, an expanded essay about why math is taught all wrong in schools, is delightfully short, but a great inspiration while I'm studying for my last CSET Math exam in Trig & Calculus. When I started studying for the CSET a college classmate who has has a long career as a chemist was helping me get my mind around some of the new math concepts. He told me that someone had told him that math was all about definitions. Paul Lockhart couldn't disagree more. It's about solving wonderful, fascinating problems, he says.

The author's thesis is that math is an art - the art of solving problems - and we are teaching the grunt work of math, but not the enjoyment of the art.

He starts with a "Lamentation" about how terrible school math is, as if we were teaching kids to read music notes on paper, without ever letting them listen to, play or compose music. Or an art teacher who teaches color theory and paintbrush techniques so that high school art students can do paint-by-numbers pictures.

He understands that is may be necessary for students to understand the things being taught in school, but he'd prefer it if they figured things out by themselves. The role of the teacher would be to give them the space to discover these things.

But then he concludes with "Exultation" explaining (with a few examples) about how delightful math is. It got me all inspired, since I'm in the process of becoming a math teacher!

I find that math is like a game that needs solving, which fits in to his idea of math as art. The way I have taught before (English and German in Danish high schools) is to get the students figure things out as much as possible. I've rarely had much of a lesson plan, other than the requirements of topics that had to be covered (which was quite free in Denmark.) I don't know possible it will be to teach math (rather than train formulas and definitions) when the students have tests to be taken. But I'm inspired now!

I did a little of the impossible!

2009-04-13T12:41:00.000-07:00

I just got back the unofficial results that I have passed the 2 CSET tests I took in March (qualification exams for teaching Algebra and Geometry in California - and elsewhere.) What a relief! Now I still have one more - in Calculus and Trig - in May, and more than a year of Internship training. But at least now I am qualified to start the training!

I also took the Graduate Record General Exam and scored almost the same on the Verbal and Quantitative parts as I did 44 years ago. I guess at least my mind isn't going downhill. But all the math studying did come in helpful for that exam. It had gotten a little rusty. I'm assuming all this blogging is giving me practice for the essay parts.

I also observed a couple of math teachers at a continuation high school this week. That was quite an experience that I haven't digested yet. I want to visit a few regular schools as well.

Movie classrooms

2009-03-20T12:51:00.000-07:00

We've just watched two very different movies about classrooms.

The 1988 movie Stand and Deliver stars Edward James Olmos playing a (real) high school teacher who'd quit his computer job to teach at the largely Latino Garfield High School in Los Angeles. He manages to turn around math teaching at the high school so that many of his students pass AP Calculus. In the movie this happened in a year, in real life, it took several and was a struggle. In a 2002 article in Reason Stand and Deliver Revisited we can read about what happened when the teacher finally got tired of the odds against him, not because of the students, but because of school bureaucracy, envious colleagues and whatever else can cause a teacher to burn out.

The other is the excellent French movie Entre les murs (The Class in English,) which takes place in a middle school in a very similar location in a present day Paris suburb. Pretty much all the students are either first or second generation immigrants, from a wide variety of countries, mostly north African. Their teacher (the actual author of an autobiographic novel of the same name) does a remarkable job treating his students as people, allowing them to talk and ask questions in his attempts to bring them into mainstream French life, which they know (and he probably does too) is not very realistic. But toward the end we discover that he hasn't really been listening as much as we thought, and he makes a fatal error of judgement to save his skin. He has favorites in the class as well as at least one student, the target of his tragic error, whom he (and maybe the school staff as a whole) has failed. Manola Dargis wrote an excellent review of the movie Learning to Be the Future of France in the New York Times, from which the picture above was borrowed.

Both teachers are working against enormous odds and both ultimately fail because those odds are too high. The French teacher has much more support from his colleagues than the American one, but in the film (at least) the backup support of counselors, tutors and the like is sorely lacking and you are left wondering why they couldn't prevent the ensuing tragedy (of a lost future, not a life.)

I watched both films with a new-found interest in how teachers manage difficult classrooms, and was impressed with both teachers for treating the students much more as fellow human beings than in the stories I've been reading about American classrooms.

For example, I recently received some helpful guidelines about becoming a substitute teacher which were all about this thing called "Classroom Management." It told me to ensure silence and raising hands, to not turn my back on the class, move around to keep my eye on everything the little perps are doing, and pounce before they get me (my exaggeration.)

I didn't need to teach like that when I taught in Denmark. I hope I won't have to here either. I have collected some books to read about this topic, which I will review as I finish them.

Fall Seven Times, Stand Up Eight

2009-03-16T10:28:00.000-07:00

One of my favorite sources for inspiration is the Sierra Club's Daily Ray of Hope email, which led me to the Nelson Mandela quote which inspired this blog, and the Japanese proverb that titles this entry.

Today's quote reminds me about my life in general. I am not quite sure how many projects and careers I have started in my life, all of which have been exciting, interesting, challenging. But they have all either lost their charm or petered out or actually failed. So is math teaching what will keep me on my feet?

My first major career desire was in advanced physics, but I now think I should have become an engineer, like most of the men in my family, back to my grandfathers and up to my son. I think I had two reasons, besides loving physics and math in high school: I wanted to "show" my father that I could do something more esoteric than he did (even though all my genes and inspiration for math and science came from him!) and women just didn't become engineers back then, at least none that I knew. But I got hung up on the theoretical math, and my secondary interest in languages took over, so I switched to German, and did graduate work in linguistics, which at least is a logical science. I remember at the time thinking that majoring in German was just learning a language, but I was cutting myself off from a career I was passionate about.

So my next goal was a university career in linguistics, but during my studies I spent a year in Denmark, married a Dane, brought him back for 3 years to finish my degree, had a child, and then moved to Denmark. Then it became impossible to work with my advisors, so I ended up doing a Danish MA and became a high school teacher in English and German. After about 3 years I became bored, because this was not at all my passion. Linguistics was, science was, and the environment then became my passion.

I left teaching, except for subbing to pay the bills, and tried getting a job in business, which was not as successful as I had hoped. So I started an environmentally-friendly diaper service, which was popular among my customers, but never turned a profit.

Then I studied things like environmental management and graphic design, mostly subsidized by the Danish welfare system, which was convenient. But never found a really appropriate job with that either.

In 2000 I moved back to the States, to California (that's another story!) and ended up a technical writer, which I worked at for about 7 years, until it just petered out last year.

So this time I'm back with one of my passions, math, and hope that I can stay standing up this time!

Doing the Impossible

2009-03-15T21:55:00.000-07:00

Pomegranate sprouting branch,
originally uploaded by bonbayel.

I just took the California CSET Math I and II tests in Algebra and Geometry. These are the qualifying tests to be able to study as an Intern in math for California High Schools. This wouldn't be so unusual I guess if it wasn't that my last math class was in 1963 - more than 45 years ago.

In my other blog, Sustainable Rays, I wrote a short entry about words that Nelson Mandela apparently said:

It always seems impossible until it's done

I think I want to make that my theme as a teacher.

In this blog I will write my thoughts about teaching and learning. Right now it is before teaching in California schools, although I taught English and German in Danish high schools for about 14 years earlier in my career. But I think this will be an entirely different challenge.

I plan to start by observing some classes nearby, and then in June I will start my internship training. I am sure that then I will have much more to write about!