Wednesday, June 21, 2006
The Finish Line
Today was my last day at Underwood High. A lot to write about, but very little time. Needless to say, a day of mixed emotions culminating with a tremendous sigh of relief.
More detailed reflections forthcoming.
For now...I'm off for a night on the town!
Today was my last day at Underwood High. A lot to write about, but very little time. Needless to say, a day of mixed emotions culminating with a tremendous sigh of relief.
More detailed reflections forthcoming.
For now...I'm off for a night on the town!
Tuesday, June 20, 2006
The Visible Ben
Invisibility can be a beautiful thing. There have been many times during my teaching career when I enjoyed being able to sit back and watch how things worked in my school without being an active participant. If students knew I were observing them carefully with the intent of recording their behavior later in a public forum, I strongly doubt I would have very much content for this blog at all. The same principle applies to my school's administrators, who generally continue to act in an incompetent fashion unless they get called out for it. And this discounts all of the times I have had the disquieting experience of encountering students outside of school, at a movie theater, restaurant, or during an evening out with friends, and longingly wished that my chosen web-moniker actually conveyed a measure of immunity from their perceptions. Yep, if I had to pick a superpower...invisibility would be right near the top of the list.
But as Ellison's most famous protagonist suggested, invisibility also carries with it a few drawbacks. Avoiding scrutiny can allow for a measure of freedom, but it also prevents one from fully integrating into a social system. For example, during my time at Underwood, my primary focus when I was in the classroom was on teaching. I considered my primary role to be an educator, not a friend, and consequently I ignored most of my students' attempts to pry into my personal life. This was not always a flat out refusal. Frequently, I parried their questions with a well-timed quip or an exaggerated falsehood. When asked how old I was, for example, I typically said I was seventy and that a lifetime of working with chemicals had kept me looking young. Yes, I drive a green Lamborghini Diablo. Yes, I really do have a laboratory in my basement. And yes, I'll be around next year.
Ok, that last one wasn't so much hyperbole as a blatant lie. I've known for quite some time that this would be my last year at Underwood, but as the summer drew nearer, I found myself torn as to how best to broach the subject. I asked a few different people for advice. Some said that the best way to handle situations like this was to be open from the get-go and explain my plans and the rationale behind them in an honest and candid fashion. Others suggested saying nothing. After all, why should it make a difference what happens after this year? They wouldn't be my students next year anyway!
Ultimately, I went with the latter option. I felt like revealing my plan to depart would only bring up a wide array of uncomfortable questions...or reasonable questions with uncomfortable answers. Questions like "Why are you abandoning us?" or "Don't you like us?" and of course, "If you do like us...then why are you abandoning us?!?" For someone who prefers to maintain a level of distance between the students, such inquiries could be rather awkward, not to mention the fact that they could further disrupt my already chaotic classroom near the end of the year. So I adhered to silence and invisibility once again, and the end of the year drew closer.
Today was the last day I would ever have to deal with students. Yet again, the school couldn't determine exactly how the schedule was going to work for the day, so I ended up seeing approximately half of my chemistry students first period before walking down to the gym for two and a half hours until the principal felt like handing out report cards. After finishing two cryptograms and a crossword puzzle, it was back to homerooms to pass out final grades. As I had no homeroom, I went upstairs to the honors program main office to see how my top chemistry students final reactions...an invisible observer, as always. Their grades were good, so generally they were pretty happy. They hovered around each other, swarming around and calculating their GPAs. Then one of them asked me if I would be teaching physics next year.
Now they've posed this one to me before, and every time I've evaded the question. But these are my good kids. My honors students. The ones who actually have cared about what I had to teach them and did well in my class. And this was my last chance to tell the truth.
So I told them the truth. I admitted that I would be going to graduate school next year and that I would no longer be around next year. Some of my freshmen from last year, who expected to have me next year as their chemistry teacher were also in the room.
Their reactions startled me...jaded, cynical, invisible Ben. They seemed genuinely disappointed that I would be leaving. A few of them may have suspected that I was leaving thanks to a few blabbermouthed members of the faculty, but this was the first real confirmation. While they didn't cry, a few of them seemed just on the verge. One student told me that I was her favorite teacher and that she fully expected to be in my class next year. (Never mind that when asked who her favorite teacher was when she was honor student of the month, she had said "all of them," it's the thought that counts!) Some of the students asked for pictures. Most of them asked for my e-mail address so they could contact me about college recommendations.
This rather touching display took me by surprise. Teachers in today's schools, and especially where I teach, get so little respect on the whole, that this sudden outpouring of praise and friendship was a shock to the system! After all the years of secrecy, sarcasm, and solitude, the connections I formed with these students, the ones I had tried to distance myself from...they were real, and not just something I might write about here, or for an ed. school paper, but to my students. Only on that penultimate day at Underwood High School did my students confirm that I had left a lasting impact, that I didn't just stay up late every night lesson planning for nothing, and that I would in fact be remembered and remembered positively as one of the better science teachers...hell, one of the better teachers they ever had. Even if I didn't reach all of them, or even most of them, at least I had done some good.
That single moment, right before noon that Tuesday confirmed once and for all that I was not invisible to my students, and despite all my previous doubts on the subject, I really could not have been happier.
Invisibility can be a beautiful thing. There have been many times during my teaching career when I enjoyed being able to sit back and watch how things worked in my school without being an active participant. If students knew I were observing them carefully with the intent of recording their behavior later in a public forum, I strongly doubt I would have very much content for this blog at all. The same principle applies to my school's administrators, who generally continue to act in an incompetent fashion unless they get called out for it. And this discounts all of the times I have had the disquieting experience of encountering students outside of school, at a movie theater, restaurant, or during an evening out with friends, and longingly wished that my chosen web-moniker actually conveyed a measure of immunity from their perceptions. Yep, if I had to pick a superpower...invisibility would be right near the top of the list.
But as Ellison's most famous protagonist suggested, invisibility also carries with it a few drawbacks. Avoiding scrutiny can allow for a measure of freedom, but it also prevents one from fully integrating into a social system. For example, during my time at Underwood, my primary focus when I was in the classroom was on teaching. I considered my primary role to be an educator, not a friend, and consequently I ignored most of my students' attempts to pry into my personal life. This was not always a flat out refusal. Frequently, I parried their questions with a well-timed quip or an exaggerated falsehood. When asked how old I was, for example, I typically said I was seventy and that a lifetime of working with chemicals had kept me looking young. Yes, I drive a green Lamborghini Diablo. Yes, I really do have a laboratory in my basement. And yes, I'll be around next year.
Ok, that last one wasn't so much hyperbole as a blatant lie. I've known for quite some time that this would be my last year at Underwood, but as the summer drew nearer, I found myself torn as to how best to broach the subject. I asked a few different people for advice. Some said that the best way to handle situations like this was to be open from the get-go and explain my plans and the rationale behind them in an honest and candid fashion. Others suggested saying nothing. After all, why should it make a difference what happens after this year? They wouldn't be my students next year anyway!
Ultimately, I went with the latter option. I felt like revealing my plan to depart would only bring up a wide array of uncomfortable questions...or reasonable questions with uncomfortable answers. Questions like "Why are you abandoning us?" or "Don't you like us?" and of course, "If you do like us...then why are you abandoning us?!?" For someone who prefers to maintain a level of distance between the students, such inquiries could be rather awkward, not to mention the fact that they could further disrupt my already chaotic classroom near the end of the year. So I adhered to silence and invisibility once again, and the end of the year drew closer.
Today was the last day I would ever have to deal with students. Yet again, the school couldn't determine exactly how the schedule was going to work for the day, so I ended up seeing approximately half of my chemistry students first period before walking down to the gym for two and a half hours until the principal felt like handing out report cards. After finishing two cryptograms and a crossword puzzle, it was back to homerooms to pass out final grades. As I had no homeroom, I went upstairs to the honors program main office to see how my top chemistry students final reactions...an invisible observer, as always. Their grades were good, so generally they were pretty happy. They hovered around each other, swarming around and calculating their GPAs. Then one of them asked me if I would be teaching physics next year.
Now they've posed this one to me before, and every time I've evaded the question. But these are my good kids. My honors students. The ones who actually have cared about what I had to teach them and did well in my class. And this was my last chance to tell the truth.
So I told them the truth. I admitted that I would be going to graduate school next year and that I would no longer be around next year. Some of my freshmen from last year, who expected to have me next year as their chemistry teacher were also in the room.
Their reactions startled me...jaded, cynical, invisible Ben. They seemed genuinely disappointed that I would be leaving. A few of them may have suspected that I was leaving thanks to a few blabbermouthed members of the faculty, but this was the first real confirmation. While they didn't cry, a few of them seemed just on the verge. One student told me that I was her favorite teacher and that she fully expected to be in my class next year. (Never mind that when asked who her favorite teacher was when she was honor student of the month, she had said "all of them," it's the thought that counts!) Some of the students asked for pictures. Most of them asked for my e-mail address so they could contact me about college recommendations.
This rather touching display took me by surprise. Teachers in today's schools, and especially where I teach, get so little respect on the whole, that this sudden outpouring of praise and friendship was a shock to the system! After all the years of secrecy, sarcasm, and solitude, the connections I formed with these students, the ones I had tried to distance myself from...they were real, and not just something I might write about here, or for an ed. school paper, but to my students. Only on that penultimate day at Underwood High School did my students confirm that I had left a lasting impact, that I didn't just stay up late every night lesson planning for nothing, and that I would in fact be remembered and remembered positively as one of the better science teachers...hell, one of the better teachers they ever had. Even if I didn't reach all of them, or even most of them, at least I had done some good.
That single moment, right before noon that Tuesday confirmed once and for all that I was not invisible to my students, and despite all my previous doubts on the subject, I really could not have been happier.
Monday, June 19, 2006
The Real Ultimate Science Teacher?
So...you may recall the exciting story from last post explaining how the ninth grade academy hammered out a coverage schedule for the final days of school. While it may not have been a perfect system, the students had basically accepted it by the end of the week and all the teachers seemed to know what their duties entailed.
After all that, I assumed that when I got to school this morning things would just continue as scheduled. Of course I had forgotten 3 things:
1. This was Underwood High School where logic and reason have taken a permanent holiday.
2. It was Monday. Nothing ever goes right on a Monday.
3. The administration, which had been absent most of Friday due to graduation was back! More bureaucracy can only help things run more smoothly, right? (Right?!?)
Don't misunderstand, at first things actually did seem to be proceeding as expected. The students, whose numbers have continued to dwindle, were funneled into the cafeteria as per standard operating procedure. Granted, the staff held them downstairs longer than normal, but otherwise things seemed fine.
And then came the announcement that the old schedule was to be scrapped and students were to proceed to their regular classes. That's right. No more movie room, game room, etc. We now return you to your regularly scheduled half-empty classes. Who cares if the old system worked? SCRAP IT!
When I heard this new agenda from a few other teachers, I nodded my head and simply prepared to accept it. And then the principal got on the intercom. All coverage schedules set up during the previous week were to be in effect, the only alterations were for the district-mandated half day.
At that moment, I scurried off in search of clarity. I asked the head of the academy what was going on, cornering her by the math room in the opposite corner of the second floor from my room. After explaining the situation and the blatant contradictions in directives, I asked her what I should do.
Her response?: I...don't...know...
A few moments later she slammed the locker in frustration.
Eventually, the coverage schedule upon which we had previously agreed was reinstituted and the day wore on as normal. With one exception. A few of my friends in the math department held a little party in honor of my imminent departure. There was delicious pizza provided by an algebra teacher's parents who own a shop in the north end of town, cake provided by the local supermarket complete with an appropriate message scrawled in blue frosting ("We'll miss you Ben!"), and a gift...a certificate, signed by my coworkers, which reads as follows:
Underwood High School
Mathematics Department
Congratulates
THE INVISIBLE BEN
for being the
ULTIMATE SCIENCE TEACHER
2003-2006
It will come as no surprise to long time readers of this blog that despite the assertions of the math department head and a few other colleagues to the contrary, I do not feel particularly deserving of the lofty title of "Ultimate Science Teacher." Setting aside my classroom management issues, the amount of actual critical thinking I was able to integrate into my lessons, the amount of actual hands-on science compared to lecturing/outlining, was relatively paltry. And although I realize that I probably impacted a few students in ways that I will never know, I would imagine that the epitomized science educator would likely have a passing student percentage of greater than 30%.
Still, it would be rude to say such things at a party held in one's honor, and the certificate really was a very nice, heartflet gesture. Everyone likes to feel appreciated, after all. So I thanked them all for going to all the trouble on my behalf and withheld any self-deprecation until I could get to a more private venue. (Which ironically enough could be accessed by any of them, since it is a public blog!) We all wolfed down pizza and soda. Then, it was off to clean up our classrooms before filling out a district survey on school climate. All in all, an interesting Monday, my last as an Underwood teacher.
What daring new adventures lay in store for the Ultimate Science Teacher tomorrow, on his finally school day with actual students in the building? Tune in on Tuesday and find out!
So...you may recall the exciting story from last post explaining how the ninth grade academy hammered out a coverage schedule for the final days of school. While it may not have been a perfect system, the students had basically accepted it by the end of the week and all the teachers seemed to know what their duties entailed.
After all that, I assumed that when I got to school this morning things would just continue as scheduled. Of course I had forgotten 3 things:
1. This was Underwood High School where logic and reason have taken a permanent holiday.
2. It was Monday. Nothing ever goes right on a Monday.
3. The administration, which had been absent most of Friday due to graduation was back! More bureaucracy can only help things run more smoothly, right? (Right?!?)
Don't misunderstand, at first things actually did seem to be proceeding as expected. The students, whose numbers have continued to dwindle, were funneled into the cafeteria as per standard operating procedure. Granted, the staff held them downstairs longer than normal, but otherwise things seemed fine.
And then came the announcement that the old schedule was to be scrapped and students were to proceed to their regular classes. That's right. No more movie room, game room, etc. We now return you to your regularly scheduled half-empty classes. Who cares if the old system worked? SCRAP IT!
When I heard this new agenda from a few other teachers, I nodded my head and simply prepared to accept it. And then the principal got on the intercom. All coverage schedules set up during the previous week were to be in effect, the only alterations were for the district-mandated half day.
At that moment, I scurried off in search of clarity. I asked the head of the academy what was going on, cornering her by the math room in the opposite corner of the second floor from my room. After explaining the situation and the blatant contradictions in directives, I asked her what I should do.
Her response?: I...don't...know...
A few moments later she slammed the locker in frustration.
Eventually, the coverage schedule upon which we had previously agreed was reinstituted and the day wore on as normal. With one exception. A few of my friends in the math department held a little party in honor of my imminent departure. There was delicious pizza provided by an algebra teacher's parents who own a shop in the north end of town, cake provided by the local supermarket complete with an appropriate message scrawled in blue frosting ("We'll miss you Ben!"), and a gift...a certificate, signed by my coworkers, which reads as follows:
Underwood High School
Mathematics Department
Congratulates
THE INVISIBLE BEN
for being the
ULTIMATE SCIENCE TEACHER
2003-2006
It will come as no surprise to long time readers of this blog that despite the assertions of the math department head and a few other colleagues to the contrary, I do not feel particularly deserving of the lofty title of "Ultimate Science Teacher." Setting aside my classroom management issues, the amount of actual critical thinking I was able to integrate into my lessons, the amount of actual hands-on science compared to lecturing/outlining, was relatively paltry. And although I realize that I probably impacted a few students in ways that I will never know, I would imagine that the epitomized science educator would likely have a passing student percentage of greater than 30%.
Still, it would be rude to say such things at a party held in one's honor, and the certificate really was a very nice, heartflet gesture. Everyone likes to feel appreciated, after all. So I thanked them all for going to all the trouble on my behalf and withheld any self-deprecation until I could get to a more private venue. (Which ironically enough could be accessed by any of them, since it is a public blog!) We all wolfed down pizza and soda. Then, it was off to clean up our classrooms before filling out a district survey on school climate. All in all, an interesting Monday, my last as an Underwood teacher.
What daring new adventures lay in store for the Ultimate Science Teacher tomorrow, on his finally school day with actual students in the building? Tune in on Tuesday and find out!
Sunday, June 18, 2006
The Lazy, Hazy, Crazy Daze of "Summer"
The final full week of school has come and gone at Underwood High and I should note that it really didn't take long for the administration to realize that their initial edicts to continue instruction until the bitter end didn't hold that much weight. With class sizes rapidly dwindling, the leaders of all the various academies quickly arranged coverage schedules allowing teachers to consolidate their classes.
This proved most effective with the upperclassmen, since seniors no longer were attending regular classes and most sophomores and juniors know better than to show up for the last ten days of school since grades and attendance are closed. The combination of these factors makes it possible for one teacher to cover all of the students in a given academy for a period with relatively little difficulty. This explains why, although it was annoying, I could keep an eye on all the juniors in the honors program first period last Wednesday and then move on three periods later to cover all the juniors in the teacher prep. program.
The problem is that the freshmen are like moths drawn to Underwood's flame. Even though it's hot and potentially painful, they keep getting drawn in...right up until the very last day. Attendance in ninth grade classrooms must have been two to three times as much as those rooms holding sophomores or juniors, and despite their relative inexperience, the ninth graders were all just as aware that no real work was being done! The ninth grade academy attempted to keep up business as usual, but eventually the head of the academy realized that we needed a plan. In our customary ass-backwards way, she informed every ninth grade teacher there would be an assembly last period to hammer out a plan.
I brought down my students at the time I had been directed only to find an empty room. Apparently, there was an announcement a few minutes later...not that anyone mentioned that this, but so be it. When the head of the academy arrived, she explained that there were fewer students showing up the past few days.
"And that's good..." she continued. But there were going to be some changes in the last few days of school to allow teachers to clean up their rooms and finish the rest of the paperwork surrounding the end of the year. (Read: Make our lives easier!) Not that she had actually worked those changes out yet. So teachers, if you could all please go to the back of the room and figure out who is covering the rooms listed on this schedule...
Insanity. Instead of a premade coverage schedule like every other academy, yours truly and a few others stepped up to the plate and determined covereages for the entire ninth grade while the kids just sat there, yammering away! The basic debate was how to divide twenty or so teachers among six rooms with various preassigned themes...for example a math room, an English room, a drama room, and so forth. There were some snags, most notably a few teachers who refused to be involved. One teacher, whose room had been assigned as the "game room", flat out said she would lock her door and not follow the schedule.
But in the end, everyone, at least begrudgingly agreed to the schedule we hammered out in the back of the auditorium. Three or more teachers were assigned to every room, allowing at least one teacher to rotate out for a prep period, lunch, or bathroom break. I took it upon myself to type up the revisions we had made and volunteered to distribute them to all the ninth grade teachers. My thought was that maybe in doing so in a timely, competent fashion, the actual implementation of the schedule the following day would run more smoothly.
Needless to say, my faint flicker of optimism was not rewarded. Another ninth grade meeting the following morning proved disastrous and kids swarmed into the hallways with nary an idea of where to go or what to do. Fortunately, yours truly had taken it upon himself to have a relatively easy assignment. With my LCD projector, laptop, and powered speakers, I converted my room into "the movie room" where 6th season Simpsons episodes ran throughout the day. Kids came and went. At one point, a quick ID check revealed around a half dozen students who were not supposed to be in the room, including a few upperclassmen. (They were quickly removed and suspended until the end of the year. As my principal once said, they were "eliminated.") But, in the end it didn't matter. It was (and is) too late in the year to make a big fuss over this. As long as they didn't block the screen or make too much noise...I was willing to accept a modicum of chaos.
Because this time of year reveals teachers for what they really are at Underwood...glorified babysitters. Education? Ha! As long as those punk kids are in a classroom, that's good enough. The administration will never admit it of course, but that's where things are now. The funny thing is, even though I didn't have to teach a lick of science, just sitting there monitoring the students was as draining as a normal day. The kids remain loud, the room remains hot, and the end of the school year remains just beyond our reach.
Oh well. Only two more days to go with students followed by one day of professional development. Hopefully, it won't be too muggy tomorrow. Or if it is, maybe the kids will stay home. Either way, it's going to be an interesting day.
The final full week of school has come and gone at Underwood High and I should note that it really didn't take long for the administration to realize that their initial edicts to continue instruction until the bitter end didn't hold that much weight. With class sizes rapidly dwindling, the leaders of all the various academies quickly arranged coverage schedules allowing teachers to consolidate their classes.
This proved most effective with the upperclassmen, since seniors no longer were attending regular classes and most sophomores and juniors know better than to show up for the last ten days of school since grades and attendance are closed. The combination of these factors makes it possible for one teacher to cover all of the students in a given academy for a period with relatively little difficulty. This explains why, although it was annoying, I could keep an eye on all the juniors in the honors program first period last Wednesday and then move on three periods later to cover all the juniors in the teacher prep. program.
The problem is that the freshmen are like moths drawn to Underwood's flame. Even though it's hot and potentially painful, they keep getting drawn in...right up until the very last day. Attendance in ninth grade classrooms must have been two to three times as much as those rooms holding sophomores or juniors, and despite their relative inexperience, the ninth graders were all just as aware that no real work was being done! The ninth grade academy attempted to keep up business as usual, but eventually the head of the academy realized that we needed a plan. In our customary ass-backwards way, she informed every ninth grade teacher there would be an assembly last period to hammer out a plan.
I brought down my students at the time I had been directed only to find an empty room. Apparently, there was an announcement a few minutes later...not that anyone mentioned that this, but so be it. When the head of the academy arrived, she explained that there were fewer students showing up the past few days.
"And that's good..." she continued. But there were going to be some changes in the last few days of school to allow teachers to clean up their rooms and finish the rest of the paperwork surrounding the end of the year. (Read: Make our lives easier!) Not that she had actually worked those changes out yet. So teachers, if you could all please go to the back of the room and figure out who is covering the rooms listed on this schedule...
Insanity. Instead of a premade coverage schedule like every other academy, yours truly and a few others stepped up to the plate and determined covereages for the entire ninth grade while the kids just sat there, yammering away! The basic debate was how to divide twenty or so teachers among six rooms with various preassigned themes...for example a math room, an English room, a drama room, and so forth. There were some snags, most notably a few teachers who refused to be involved. One teacher, whose room had been assigned as the "game room", flat out said she would lock her door and not follow the schedule.
But in the end, everyone, at least begrudgingly agreed to the schedule we hammered out in the back of the auditorium. Three or more teachers were assigned to every room, allowing at least one teacher to rotate out for a prep period, lunch, or bathroom break. I took it upon myself to type up the revisions we had made and volunteered to distribute them to all the ninth grade teachers. My thought was that maybe in doing so in a timely, competent fashion, the actual implementation of the schedule the following day would run more smoothly.
Needless to say, my faint flicker of optimism was not rewarded. Another ninth grade meeting the following morning proved disastrous and kids swarmed into the hallways with nary an idea of where to go or what to do. Fortunately, yours truly had taken it upon himself to have a relatively easy assignment. With my LCD projector, laptop, and powered speakers, I converted my room into "the movie room" where 6th season Simpsons episodes ran throughout the day. Kids came and went. At one point, a quick ID check revealed around a half dozen students who were not supposed to be in the room, including a few upperclassmen. (They were quickly removed and suspended until the end of the year. As my principal once said, they were "eliminated.") But, in the end it didn't matter. It was (and is) too late in the year to make a big fuss over this. As long as they didn't block the screen or make too much noise...I was willing to accept a modicum of chaos.
Because this time of year reveals teachers for what they really are at Underwood...glorified babysitters. Education? Ha! As long as those punk kids are in a classroom, that's good enough. The administration will never admit it of course, but that's where things are now. The funny thing is, even though I didn't have to teach a lick of science, just sitting there monitoring the students was as draining as a normal day. The kids remain loud, the room remains hot, and the end of the school year remains just beyond our reach.
Oh well. Only two more days to go with students followed by one day of professional development. Hopefully, it won't be too muggy tomorrow. Or if it is, maybe the kids will stay home. Either way, it's going to be an interesting day.
Tuesday, June 13, 2006
Tooth. And. Nail.
So a week and a half or so ago after an epidemic of fighting throughout the school, Ms. Oldman, the principal of Underwood High called all the freshmen into the auditorium after lunch for a lengthy discussion on the importance of taking education seriously. Because I have lunch at a different time than the freshmen (one of the benefits of teaching both juniors and freshmen), I was not present to hear her speak, but a reliable observer tells me that it was a riveting hour, typified by her customary repetition.
"You are here in school to get an education, children," she is reported to have said. "To get an education! But you are fighting your teachers tooth and nail. Tooth. And. Nail."
In between tautologies, she also apparently mentioned how too many Underwood students end up in retail or food service because they refuse to make education a priority. She discussed how foolish it was to fight with another student based merely on the neighborhood in which they live. She reminded the kids that the school year was not over.
And then she made a bold statement, namely that if any students were seriously disrupting classroom instruction during the final weeks of the school year then they could and would be suspended until next September. She even asked teachers in attendance to make a list of disruptive kids who would be booted out by the weekend.
To exhausted teachers at the end of the school year, this was like a gift from above. A few teachers went nuts, listing 15 to 20 kids they wanted suspended. The rest of us selected the worst handful, the terrible tenth of each class, if you will. And slowly but surely, the nutsos and morons began to disappear.
I can understand the delay early on. It can be tricky to compile a list, find a kid who does not want to be found, and tell them that their school year is over. It can be even trickier to keep them from coming to school. But it should be doable.
So when the dean of students tells me if I see a particular student to kick her out, I figure things are working as planned.
But what if that student has family members who work at the school, perhaps in the cafeteria or as a noon-time aid? And what if those relatives decide that this girl, whose profanity, disrespectful behavior to teachers and students, and overall rudeness has been deemed sufficient by multiple teachers to get her kicked out of school until September should not be punished for her actions? Or at the very least they don't feel like babysitting her. And what if these relatives decide to contact the school and complain that it is simply not possible for the school to inflict this punishment...
In a logical world, the student would pay the price for her poor attitude in the classroom and would not be coming back.
At Underwood, I get a phone call from the dean explaining that powers beyond his control have made it necessary to let the girl back into school, reaffirming yet again that there is no consistency in our discipline system. I doubt she will be the only exception. There are so many that our school's discipline office ought to install a revolving door. There is no consistency, there is no consequence, there is no impact. And how do I know this? Well, how's this for empirical evidence? Within five minutes of the student in question's return to my classroom, I had to intervene to prevent a fight. All the classic signs were there, students yelling at each other, getting in each others faces..the profanity-laden taunting and overturned desks. I've seen enough of these, I know the warning signals. The subject of the fight? Apparently there was a misunderstanding as to who was supposed to sit where. This was all it took on a hot day in June to start something...at least so far as those students were concerned.
Fortunately before things could get too serious, my last period class was interrupted by another assembly. But that is a tale for another time.
I told the dean of students later on about the fight that nearly happened. He thanked me, but I doubt anything will come of it. After all, if that girl (or any other student) doesn't like it, she can just complain loudly enough and the school will look the other way. What lessons are these kids getting about the system? What are they really learning at Underwood? How to graph a line? How to write a five paragraph essay? How to balance chemical equations?
No.
They are learning to work the system...how to complain and finagle and bluff their way in life. They are cultivating a sense of entitlement and a disrespect for any rules or regulations that run counter to what they want to do. Kids who are going to summer school for academic subjects are getting A-plusses in manipulating authority figures. Who knows what preparation that will give them for later on in life. Frankly, the thought makes me sick.
In the end, Ms. Oldman was right...they are fighting us. The students are fighting us. Fighting tooth and nail to get what they want when they want and how they want it.
Tooth.
And.
Nail.
And they are winning.
So a week and a half or so ago after an epidemic of fighting throughout the school, Ms. Oldman, the principal of Underwood High called all the freshmen into the auditorium after lunch for a lengthy discussion on the importance of taking education seriously. Because I have lunch at a different time than the freshmen (one of the benefits of teaching both juniors and freshmen), I was not present to hear her speak, but a reliable observer tells me that it was a riveting hour, typified by her customary repetition.
"You are here in school to get an education, children," she is reported to have said. "To get an education! But you are fighting your teachers tooth and nail. Tooth. And. Nail."
In between tautologies, she also apparently mentioned how too many Underwood students end up in retail or food service because they refuse to make education a priority. She discussed how foolish it was to fight with another student based merely on the neighborhood in which they live. She reminded the kids that the school year was not over.
And then she made a bold statement, namely that if any students were seriously disrupting classroom instruction during the final weeks of the school year then they could and would be suspended until next September. She even asked teachers in attendance to make a list of disruptive kids who would be booted out by the weekend.
To exhausted teachers at the end of the school year, this was like a gift from above. A few teachers went nuts, listing 15 to 20 kids they wanted suspended. The rest of us selected the worst handful, the terrible tenth of each class, if you will. And slowly but surely, the nutsos and morons began to disappear.
I can understand the delay early on. It can be tricky to compile a list, find a kid who does not want to be found, and tell them that their school year is over. It can be even trickier to keep them from coming to school. But it should be doable.
So when the dean of students tells me if I see a particular student to kick her out, I figure things are working as planned.
But what if that student has family members who work at the school, perhaps in the cafeteria or as a noon-time aid? And what if those relatives decide that this girl, whose profanity, disrespectful behavior to teachers and students, and overall rudeness has been deemed sufficient by multiple teachers to get her kicked out of school until September should not be punished for her actions? Or at the very least they don't feel like babysitting her. And what if these relatives decide to contact the school and complain that it is simply not possible for the school to inflict this punishment...
In a logical world, the student would pay the price for her poor attitude in the classroom and would not be coming back.
At Underwood, I get a phone call from the dean explaining that powers beyond his control have made it necessary to let the girl back into school, reaffirming yet again that there is no consistency in our discipline system. I doubt she will be the only exception. There are so many that our school's discipline office ought to install a revolving door. There is no consistency, there is no consequence, there is no impact. And how do I know this? Well, how's this for empirical evidence? Within five minutes of the student in question's return to my classroom, I had to intervene to prevent a fight. All the classic signs were there, students yelling at each other, getting in each others faces..the profanity-laden taunting and overturned desks. I've seen enough of these, I know the warning signals. The subject of the fight? Apparently there was a misunderstanding as to who was supposed to sit where. This was all it took on a hot day in June to start something...at least so far as those students were concerned.
Fortunately before things could get too serious, my last period class was interrupted by another assembly. But that is a tale for another time.
I told the dean of students later on about the fight that nearly happened. He thanked me, but I doubt anything will come of it. After all, if that girl (or any other student) doesn't like it, she can just complain loudly enough and the school will look the other way. What lessons are these kids getting about the system? What are they really learning at Underwood? How to graph a line? How to write a five paragraph essay? How to balance chemical equations?
No.
They are learning to work the system...how to complain and finagle and bluff their way in life. They are cultivating a sense of entitlement and a disrespect for any rules or regulations that run counter to what they want to do. Kids who are going to summer school for academic subjects are getting A-plusses in manipulating authority figures. Who knows what preparation that will give them for later on in life. Frankly, the thought makes me sick.
In the end, Ms. Oldman was right...they are fighting us. The students are fighting us. Fighting tooth and nail to get what they want when they want and how they want it.
Tooth.
And.
Nail.
And they are winning.
Monday, June 12, 2006
A Block Headed Scheduling Idea
The last full week of school has arrived at Underwood and everyone is just trying to weather the remaining days with as much good humor as possible. For my part, this is the last full week of my public school teaching career, a thought that leaves me simultaneously nostalgic and relieved. For although I have had a (small) number of excellent students this year, the majority of them are no longer coming to school since final exams concluded last Friday.
I should note, for the record, that my exams were once again multiple choice, open-book, open-note tests, and that despite these benefits, my grades were further curved before inclusion in the gradebook. (The curve I used was recommended by a veteran colleague of mine and consisted of mutliplying the square root of the actual score by 10. This allows for a max. gain of 25%, for a student who scores a 25% will earn a 50%. Students who score higher than that earn a steadily decreasing number of points until a student who scores a 100% earns...a 100%.) And even after all that, the average scores were in the mid-60% range. (If you actually read the last parenthetical, then you would realize that kids were scoring in the 30% range uncurved...)
In any event, the finals are finished and besides a few chemistry extra credit projects being turned in tomorrow, my grade book is basically closed for the year. The kids know it and the teachers know it, but certain members of the administrative team do not. One vice-principal took the math department chair to task because students were not continuing with instruction. But despite her entreaties to have students make their own board games or work on puzzles, teachers are scrambling to just keep what few kids show up contained and in the classroom.
Originally, I had intended to play You Don't Know Jack with the kids for the remainder of the school year. But a colleague of mine suggested that if I played games, then the children, both good or bad, would continue to show up everyday. So today I brought in an episode of one of my favorite television series, Connections, in the hopes of maybe teaching the kids something about the history of science and driving the remainder away. Of course, this has proven less than effective since there's no incentive to pay attention. However, maybe it will drive some of the rotten kids away so that I can play trivia games by the end of the week with only 4-6 kids per class. That would be nice.
There is one group that seems to thrive in the chaos surrounding this time of year, and that is the administrative team. Our principal held a surprise meeting at 8 this morning to announce planned changes to the curriculum and schedule. It seems that the district has decided that literacy is going to be the key that allows us to finally break the cycle of low test scores. Can you believe it? Finally...after all these years. Learning to read is the answer! No news yet on how math scores will benefit, although word problems do involve reading at times!
The scheduling changes are more disheartening. Currently, teachers at Underwood teach 5 classes, each one 60 minutes long for a total of 300 minutes of teaching per day. Unfortunately, since each student has only 6 periods in the day, a chance to earn 6 credits a year, and therefore only 24 credit slots possible during the course of their time as a high school student. But...you need 23.5 credits to graduate. There's no room for error. And what's more due to the highly rigid graduation requirements, passed down from on high, there is almost no room for electives. In total, one or maybe two classes distinguish the rosters of students in the finance academy from those in the health academy, for example.
The suggested solution? Change the schedule to include a block period in the morning, running approximately 80 minutes long, with students switching between two classes on a standardized block schedule. This adds an extra course into the mix, addressing the need for greater variation between academies as well as providing the students with a few extra courses to fail without undermining their graduation requirements. The remainder of the day would consist of five periods, fifty minutes long. The net effect of all this finagling is a twenty minute reduction in total teaching time, allowing school to get out approximately twenty minutes earlier. Unfortunately, whatever benefits the new schedule might create are undermined by the inclusion of mandatory weekly professional development sessions every Friday. Strangely enough, the principal presented these meetings as a viable selling point for the new plan during our morning meeting. I think she has been brainwashed by the research that explains how very crucial such meetings are to our continued success as teachers rather than our firsthand evidence to the contrary.
Regardless of the rationale, it is clear that I am leaving Underwood at just the right time. Despite the good intentions of the people in charge, I fear that very few lasting institutional changes will be effected that will actually improve the school. Neither the district nor the school's leadership has the patience, wherewithal, or finances to make the changes that are actually required (e.g. smaller class sizes, shifting focus away from broad curriculum initiatives in favor of more focused, content-specific approaches, etc.) for a long enough period of time to improve the school's situation. Even if they did, I wonder how many teachers would actually go along with it. The crusty, veteran teachers in particular will be especially hard pressed to put up with what they perceive as heavy-handed, ham-fisted attempts to ram new teaching methods down their experienced throats while newer teachers are still having a hard time devising their own unique set of systems for their classrooms. Either way, there's still the greater question of the students, because what no amount of professional development can resolve is the fact that education is a two-way street...
The last full week of school has arrived at Underwood and everyone is just trying to weather the remaining days with as much good humor as possible. For my part, this is the last full week of my public school teaching career, a thought that leaves me simultaneously nostalgic and relieved. For although I have had a (small) number of excellent students this year, the majority of them are no longer coming to school since final exams concluded last Friday.
I should note, for the record, that my exams were once again multiple choice, open-book, open-note tests, and that despite these benefits, my grades were further curved before inclusion in the gradebook. (The curve I used was recommended by a veteran colleague of mine and consisted of mutliplying the square root of the actual score by 10. This allows for a max. gain of 25%, for a student who scores a 25% will earn a 50%. Students who score higher than that earn a steadily decreasing number of points until a student who scores a 100% earns...a 100%.) And even after all that, the average scores were in the mid-60% range. (If you actually read the last parenthetical, then you would realize that kids were scoring in the 30% range uncurved...)
In any event, the finals are finished and besides a few chemistry extra credit projects being turned in tomorrow, my grade book is basically closed for the year. The kids know it and the teachers know it, but certain members of the administrative team do not. One vice-principal took the math department chair to task because students were not continuing with instruction. But despite her entreaties to have students make their own board games or work on puzzles, teachers are scrambling to just keep what few kids show up contained and in the classroom.
Originally, I had intended to play You Don't Know Jack with the kids for the remainder of the school year. But a colleague of mine suggested that if I played games, then the children, both good or bad, would continue to show up everyday. So today I brought in an episode of one of my favorite television series, Connections, in the hopes of maybe teaching the kids something about the history of science and driving the remainder away. Of course, this has proven less than effective since there's no incentive to pay attention. However, maybe it will drive some of the rotten kids away so that I can play trivia games by the end of the week with only 4-6 kids per class. That would be nice.
There is one group that seems to thrive in the chaos surrounding this time of year, and that is the administrative team. Our principal held a surprise meeting at 8 this morning to announce planned changes to the curriculum and schedule. It seems that the district has decided that literacy is going to be the key that allows us to finally break the cycle of low test scores. Can you believe it? Finally...after all these years. Learning to read is the answer! No news yet on how math scores will benefit, although word problems do involve reading at times!
The scheduling changes are more disheartening. Currently, teachers at Underwood teach 5 classes, each one 60 minutes long for a total of 300 minutes of teaching per day. Unfortunately, since each student has only 6 periods in the day, a chance to earn 6 credits a year, and therefore only 24 credit slots possible during the course of their time as a high school student. But...you need 23.5 credits to graduate. There's no room for error. And what's more due to the highly rigid graduation requirements, passed down from on high, there is almost no room for electives. In total, one or maybe two classes distinguish the rosters of students in the finance academy from those in the health academy, for example.
The suggested solution? Change the schedule to include a block period in the morning, running approximately 80 minutes long, with students switching between two classes on a standardized block schedule. This adds an extra course into the mix, addressing the need for greater variation between academies as well as providing the students with a few extra courses to fail without undermining their graduation requirements. The remainder of the day would consist of five periods, fifty minutes long. The net effect of all this finagling is a twenty minute reduction in total teaching time, allowing school to get out approximately twenty minutes earlier. Unfortunately, whatever benefits the new schedule might create are undermined by the inclusion of mandatory weekly professional development sessions every Friday. Strangely enough, the principal presented these meetings as a viable selling point for the new plan during our morning meeting. I think she has been brainwashed by the research that explains how very crucial such meetings are to our continued success as teachers rather than our firsthand evidence to the contrary.
Regardless of the rationale, it is clear that I am leaving Underwood at just the right time. Despite the good intentions of the people in charge, I fear that very few lasting institutional changes will be effected that will actually improve the school. Neither the district nor the school's leadership has the patience, wherewithal, or finances to make the changes that are actually required (e.g. smaller class sizes, shifting focus away from broad curriculum initiatives in favor of more focused, content-specific approaches, etc.) for a long enough period of time to improve the school's situation. Even if they did, I wonder how many teachers would actually go along with it. The crusty, veteran teachers in particular will be especially hard pressed to put up with what they perceive as heavy-handed, ham-fisted attempts to ram new teaching methods down their experienced throats while newer teachers are still having a hard time devising their own unique set of systems for their classrooms. Either way, there's still the greater question of the students, because what no amount of professional development can resolve is the fact that education is a two-way street...
Sunday, June 04, 2006
Great Moments in Jazz History
Toaster Boy strikes again, folks. Mere days after being informed of my intelligence being the equivalent of a household appliance, the same student decided to contribute to our in class astronomy discussion by informing me he knew the name of the first person to walk on the moon.
Now during my time at Underwood, I have developed a voice in the back of my head. It warns me not to fall victim to student-related stupidity, and over the years it has helped me out more often than not. But sometimes the students can circumvent this ignorance radar by masking their comments with superficially relevant comments. Such was the case here, so I decided to follow up.
Me: Really? Who was the first person to walk on the moon?
Toaster Boy: Louis Armstrong.
Me (out loud): Well, you're close...but Louis Armstrong was a jazz musician. It was Neil Armstrong. You were half right.
Me (immediate mental reaction): Damn! I should have seen that coming. Why do I so want to believe my students know things? And when will I learn that more often than not, they don't...they just think they do?
Me (thinking about this later): How could he play the trumpet while wearing a space suit? Maybe he'd just sing "What a Wonderful World." That would be pretty sweet.
Toaster Boy strikes again, folks. Mere days after being informed of my intelligence being the equivalent of a household appliance, the same student decided to contribute to our in class astronomy discussion by informing me he knew the name of the first person to walk on the moon.
Now during my time at Underwood, I have developed a voice in the back of my head. It warns me not to fall victim to student-related stupidity, and over the years it has helped me out more often than not. But sometimes the students can circumvent this ignorance radar by masking their comments with superficially relevant comments. Such was the case here, so I decided to follow up.
Me: Really? Who was the first person to walk on the moon?
Toaster Boy: Louis Armstrong.
Me (out loud): Well, you're close...but Louis Armstrong was a jazz musician. It was Neil Armstrong. You were half right.
Me (immediate mental reaction): Damn! I should have seen that coming. Why do I so want to believe my students know things? And when will I learn that more often than not, they don't...they just think they do?
Me (thinking about this later): How could he play the trumpet while wearing a space suit? Maybe he'd just sing "What a Wonderful World." That would be pretty sweet.
