Thoughts on the Framework for K-12 Science Education

I've been looking at the Framework for Science Education since it was published online last week. I like that it's not just the science ideas but also speaks to how we should go about taking those ideas and making them into standards.

This section in particular (ch. 12, Guidance for Standards Developers, p. 221) stood out for me:
"That is, for a given core idea at a given grade level, standards developers should include guidance not only about what needs to be taught but also about what does not need to be taught in order for students to achieve the standard. By delimiting what is included in a given topic in a particular grade band or grade level, boundary statements provide insights into the expected curriculum and thus aid in its development by others."

This is such a powerful statement. So much of what plagues science education deals with getting caught up in the little details. Not that details aren't important, but we want to avoid continuing to make science about memorizing facts when it is really a PROCESS and a way of thinking. Yes, kids should know the key ideas and explanations of real-life phenomena (why do we look the way we do? why do we have seasons? Why do some places have earthquakes and others don't?), but it is SO easy to get caught up in minutiae and lose track of the bigger picture...especially when one considers standardized multiple choice tests.

This issue came up at the Science Instructional Leadership Team meeting this summer. We were utilizing the STeLLA science storyline program to come up with main learning goals for an investigation in the FOSS module, and there was a distinct division between some of the groups. My group had focused on the idea of food webs and feeding relationships, determining that the introduction to Mono Lake (in part 1 of the investigation) was a hook for the next few investigations and thus not central to the main learning goal. Another group disagreed, and - rather than using the standards and the big idea (food webs/energy flow) for which the Mono Lake ecosystem was merely a vehicle - they had gotten caught up in the defining characteristics of the Mono Lake ecosystem. Do students need to know about the salinity of Mono Lake in order to diagram a food web and to understand the feeding relationships that it encompasses? No, they don't. And yet these teachers - with the best intentions, I am sure - had gotten distracted by those details.

I think it goes back to what we learned at PEAK as well. As teachers, we need to prioritize. Start with the standards/the core ideas in science, then break that down into learning goals and unit objectives, then break that down into your lesson objectives. Once you have all those many objectives, you need to determine which are "essential" for understanding the core ideas, which are "important" for understanding, and which are "nice to know." Sure, it would be nice for my sixth graders to understand salinity and the effect it can have on ecosystems, but it's not essential....especially as we don't even live in a region where that's an environmental issue.

Puzzle Pieces

So I always mean to be better about blogging here, as this is a much better venue for going on about teaching than at my personal blog where my friends are far more interested in my thoughts on Captain America: The First Avenger than in the newest strategy that I'm trying.

At the moment, we've got just over two weeks before the kids come back, and it seems that the summer has just flown by. Of course, I imagine that has something to do with the two week-long conferences I attended (PEAK Learning Institute in Vail, Colorado, and the GE Foundation's Developing Futures NASA/NSTA Math-Science Integration Conference in Cocoa Beach, Florida) and the Berwick Buddy trip to Maine (also a week). It's left me with a lot of amazing ideas, but now I have to fit all the pieces together. CARE for Kids, PEAK, the 5 E's, BSCS's Science Storylines (from a district science leadership training), and several other things all need to fit into a seamless whole.

I have managed to edit my Understanding by Design Unit Template (backwards planning all the way, y'all), type up a PEAK topic planner, and merge my CIF lesson planner with a PEAK lesson planner. The last of which was the most difficult, though honestly even that wasn't as difficult as I thought it might be. I realized that all the sprinkles, showers, and drips (more on that below) fit in as transitions between the pieces of the lesson that belonged in the CIF lesson. The PEAK soak is the same as the CIF-for-science guided practice. The one awkward spot is where I have a section that could be Making Meaning (i.e. Explain) OR a sprinkle/shower/drip transition, but I suppose that really would vary just based on whether you had a lab-type explore activity that day, which would definitely require a making meaning section to the lesson, or whether you had been working on something that might not need that component. I honestly think I will tend far more to the making meaning portion of that choice, but I am hoping to be more creative with my strategies there than I have been in years past. I'd like to utilize various discussion and notebooking strategies there, as well as some PEAK engage learning strategies.

At this point, I suppose I should outline the whole PEAK water metaphor, which was a key focus in this conference that is just totally mindset-changing. The gist of it revolves around the necessity of exposing kids to content multiple times, as research has shown over and over that they need 28 or 41 or more exposures to really retain and deeply understand content (I'm sure we are ALL familiar with the never learning or crammed-for-test-and-then-forgot learning that goes on in classrooms across the country). In order to do that - to achieve what PEAK calls 28/3 (28 exposures over 3 weeks) - you need to use both pre-instruction and post-instruction. The pre-instruction primes the kids for the main content instruction, while the post-instruction reinforces the information and helps deepen their understanding. The terms are as follows (exposure is deeper each time):

Cloud - this involves having content posters up at least a few weeks ahead
Sprinkle - ex: point out posters & have kids discuss what they notice, choral repetition from visuals, brainstorming around big ideas
Shower - deeper than sprinkle, ex: content songs, choral repetition of important content, and various other strategies where kids become familiar with the basic foundational ideas for the future unit
Soak - this is the actual unit of focused instruction (this is where labs and the like would fall for science)
drip, Drip, DRIP - post-instruction of increasing depth where you intentionally revisit a topic at deeper and broader levels (they call this incremental development)...this includes a great variety of active learning, notebooking, and reflective strategies, among other things

I don't think I've really encompassed how amazing the idea is, as the training just totally opens your eyes and changes how you think about planning, but I think I've got the basics at least. I am not diving all the way into the deepest levels of planning using the PEAK ideas, as it is a bit much to do the first year, particularly with the FOSS and STC modules to juggle as well.

I think I will post more about my ideas for implementation later this weekend. I am trying to pare down my ideas so that it will be realistic. There are a great many techniques I want to try, as well as different strategies and tools, but I also need to ensure that I don't overwhelm myself. The idea is to pick just a few things to try and make sure you get down well, so I want to prioritize. Luckily, there are some things I had already started with last school year, as one of the teachers I work with had shared some of the ideas with me, so those just need to be tweaked a bit, and then I can pick out the new (to me) things that I want to implement.

Article: Do We Need a Hero?

This article was in Teacher Magazine. It really articulated an issue I've always had with movies about teachers (as much as I usually enjoy inspirational films), especially Freedom Writers. They ignore the reality of most school systems in favor of cliches (bright new teacher triumphs in spite of all the lazy/stubborn/prejudiced long-term teachers). Plus they're not often sustainable - Erin Gruwell only taught in public schools for four years, after all.

Article below (and online here):

Do We Need Another Hero?

By Patrick Ledesma

You’ve seen them: the education movies about a driven principal who goes to a school to shake things up. Some teachers and parents are portrayed as resistant, but thanks to his charisma and force, the principal endures and makes changes. People eventually buy into the new culture and test scores improve.

If the movie was anything like Lean on Me with Morgan Freeman, the test results would be announced in some dramatic fashion in front of a large, energetic, and supportive crowd of students with the small group of detractors watching quietly from the sidelines. When it’s learned that the test scores have shot through the roof, just about everyone cheers, and it’s a happy ending as the music plays and credits roll.

Unfortunately, real life is never as conclusive. There's always another side to the story—although sometimes it has less immediate appeal.

On July 6, The Washington Post published two interesting articles about education reform. The front page piece, originally published under the headline “Sousa’s Middle March of Progress,” portrayed Principal Dwan Jordon’s “hands-on, data driven tack (as) transforming a D.C. school but also ruffling feathers.” Another piece in the editorial section highlighted the significant role played by Michelle Rhee, Chancellor of D.C. Public Schools, in the D.C. mayoral race. The piece argued that the upcoming election could be about her “100 miles an hour, the children can’t wait” approach to school reform, characterized by “school closings, teacher layoffs, spending decisions, and principal reassignments,” versus the approach of a mayoral opponent who favors a more cautious and sensitive strategy that emphasizes “community collaboration and buy in.”

Ultimately, we learn, the mayoral race will be about opponents with a “different sense of urgency in reform.” This ongoing story unfolds, according to this editorial, in the context of a city with a long history of troubles with officials who lack the political will to implement and sustain school improvements. Contrast that with the Time magazine cover in December 2008 that featured Rhee with a big broom, ready to sweep the D.C. schools clean—and her quote featured in the Waiting for Superman trailer: “You wake up every morning and you know that kids are getting a really crappy education right now.”

Leading Change

In a movie like Lean on Me, the audience hopes for the principal to be successful. Morgan Freeman just has that voice and aura that’s too powerful to resist (even if he is condescending and rude to the educators in the film). From the point of view of most people in the audience, the improvements in student achievement validate the “reform can’t wait” urgency and negate any ill effects caused by the ruffling of teacher feathers.

The Post story about Sousa Middle School echoes movies like Lean on Me. The article describes how Principal Jordon fired many of his staff, micromanaged classroom teaching, handpicked teacher replacements, and emphasized the rigid use of test data for instructional planning. Like in the movie, test scores rose. Unlike the movie, the story isn’t over.

Critics of Jordon’s leadership style continue to highlight the high turnover of teachers and a feeling of “humiliation” the reporter describes this way:

If students are improving at Sousa, teachers from Jordon's first year—almost none of whom kept their jobs this year—seem almost traumatized. One teacher accustomed to getting good evaluations said she felt "humiliated" by Jordon's constant scrutiny. Others said they'd come in at 5 a.m., trying to meet his demands, but still left school in tears.

Critics of Jordan's approach would argue that lasting change only results from consensus building and the development of organizational capacity. They could cite school leadership experts like Michael Fullan and describe the importance of relationships, knowledge building within an organization, and establishment of a learning culture. As Fullan argues in his book Leading in a Culture of Change:

Charismatic leaders inadvertently often do more harm than good because, at best, they provide episodic improvement followed by frustrated or despondent dependency. Superhuman leaders also do us another disservice: They are role models who can never be emulated by large numbers. Deep and sustained reform depends on many of us, not just on the very few who are destined to be extraordinary.

Critics of Jordan's style would also emphasize the importance of treating teachers as professionals whose expertise and energies would be required for steady and sustained improvement in all areas of learning, not just what’s measured on the tests. Recently, Post education writer Jay Matthews, in a column titled “Hero or Bully?,” commented on Mr. Jordon’s assertive tactics, noting that “his second year scores, soon to be released, better be good, or any powerful enemies he makes will have more than enough witnesses for their case against him.”

There are other interesting factors that could be discussed in connection with the Sousa Middle School's recent success—specifically, the school’s new renovation and very low student-to-teacher ratio (56 adults for 230 students). What if the renovation and additional resources had been carried out in concert with a consensus building approach? What if the previous faculty had received more professional development and guidance? Would these school-strengthening efforts be enough to produce results similar to those being hailed by the “reform can’t wait” proponents? More importantly, would the change last?

There are other unknowns. What if Mr. Jordon gets promoted and leaves Sousa? Will the success go with him, or, will the improvements endure since he largely handpicked staff who share his philosophy?

Powerful Stories and Numbers

Whatever might have been done or might happen in the future, one thing is certain, and it’s something educators need to understand in the public debate. The “reform can’t wait” movement has powerful stories involving emotional charismatic leaders who save kids. They have the “hard numbers” that test data provide to justify their bold actions. It’s a simple, direct, convincing story that is compelling and easy to understand and doesn’t require supporters to have any knowledge of education pedagogy, statistics, leadership philosophy, or policy. Results are more immediate, and don’t require years of building consensus while resistant or “burned out teachers” decide if they want to get on board. And the cultural references—like Morgan Freeman’s charisma, documentaries about charters, or Michelle Rhee’s magazine cover stare-down—are easily at hand.

From the public’s perspective, for better or worse, the expectation for story-telling has been set. Educators and policymakers who argue for the slower consensus-building approach will need equally convincing stories to sway the public. They will need to publicize or create movies of real examples of schools where change occurred internally, within a school, with the same staff, demonstrating that test scores increased and the improvement lasted. Some compelling examples like this would advance the discussions on how to improve schools.

Without this alternate storytelling, the public may not find teacher accounts of feeling humiliated or unprofessionally treated very compelling. That’s unfortunate, because lost along these hardened battle lines are hard working and dedicated educators who strive daily to make a difference. But in the public debate, they get lumped together with the resistant, burnt out, or ineffective teachers.

So does the public portrayal of urgency for school reform trump teachers’ defense of professionalism? Maybe the answer depends on which character you identify with in the movie.

Patrick Ledesma is a school based technology specialist and Special Education Department Chair with Fairfax County Public Schools. He is a National Board-certified teacher and a doctoral student at George Mason University, where he is focusing on teacher education, technology, and education policy. He has been a member of the Teacher Leaders Network since 2003.

Equity Activity

I found this on another blog. A teacher was using it as an example to explain the difference between equity and equality. Full credit given to the blog author, one Lara David.

She says:

There's this activity I do in my class. All the students sit in a circle, and I ask everyone to take off his or her left shoe and throw it into a pile in the center. Once the shoes are all piled up, I begin re-distributing them, one to each student, completely at random. Then I tell everyone to put on the new shoes. And inevitably, there begin the complaints.

"This isn't my shoe!"

"It's too big!"

"It's too small!"

"This doesn't fit me!"

Whatever the specific complaints are, very few students are actually happy with their newly mismatched pair of shoes. "What's wrong?" I ask. "I did everything fairly. You all have two shoes - one for your right foot and one for your left."

"But Miss David," they say, "they aren't the correct shoes!"

"Oh," I say. "You want the shoes that are best for each of you individually? Not just any shoe I find?"

"Yes!" they all say.

"But," I say, with furrowed brow, "that doesn't seem fair. I wanted to treat you all EQUALLY." I point to a boy with somewhat large feet, and a nearby girl with smallish feet. "He'll have more shoe than you will," I note. And without a doubt, someone unknowingly gets right to the heart of the issue:

"It doesn't matter who has more shoe, Miss David. It matters that we all have the right shoes for us."

And THAT, my friends, is the difference between equity and equality. Equality means everyone gets exactly the same outcome - two shoes - without regard to individual differences - large or small feet, for example. Equity means everyone gets the same quality of outcome - shoes that fit their individual needs.

Wal-Mart Kids

Every year in late fall/early winter I send out an email requesting help for my students. Each winter, from our population of 80% low-income students, we choose students from every team to take on a shopping spree. These are our neediest students, those who come to school every day in the same pair of uniform clothes, who wear a rope to hold up a pair of pants three sizes too big because they have nothing else, who don't have gloves and hats to wear when winter comes. They shiver in the classroom without sweatshirts and get soaked in rainstorms because they don't have umbrellas or raincoats. I have girls with last year's too small shirts and boys with pant legs too short as they shoot up in height. One day V told me she loves purses and dressing pretty, but everyday she comes in a grubby white polo shirt too large for her and pants sagging down, both of which were passed down from her older brother. Oh, the indignity for a middle school girl – a BOY's hand-me-downs! (And no purse.)

The school is filled with students like V, who would love to look nice but whose parents can't even afford to pay for food, utilities, and rent, leaving many kids dependent on free breakfast and lunch since that might be all they get to eat that day and moving from apartment to apartment when their parents can't afford to stay in one place.

Despite this, the students have the great ability to be compassionate and accepting. They step out of the way when a kid in a wheelchair comes down the hall or fight over who gets to help them. They don't even look twice when one of the autistic students starts squealing or banging on a table, even if they're right there at the table with them. How many of us could say we would do the same?

Last year the generosity of all of you allowed me to raise $2214.16 in addition to the $1000 raised by the rest of the school; you all provided twice what the rest of the community brought in! I will be forever thankful for this. This meant that Brandon, who came to our attention at the last minute, was able to be added to our list the week before our shopping trip. All 3 of his younger siblings were Angel Tree children through the Salvation Army, but he had been rejected as "too old." Eighth grade, 13-years-old, and too old for a Christmas present. Thanks to you, though, he was able to get a gift beyond his wildest dreams. He had been teaching himself how to play guitar from a library book, practicing the finger movements with nothing in his hands. That early December morning he cast a longing gaze at a $90 guitar; even the teacher with him didn't believe we could afford it. But with that extra money from you, we could. When Brandon was told he could get the guitar, he couldn't contain his excitement and began jumping up and down, crying in excitement. His parents did the same when he walked past the cashier and said, "Mom! Dad! Guess what I got?" Tears and hugs over an inexpensive guitar from Wal-Mart.

I know finances might be tighter than normal this year, but I think the holiday season is a time to remember that there are those who have ALWAYS been a lot less fortunate than us (and still are). If you can spare even a dollar, send the money to my kids. Cash or a check; American, Canadian, or Australian dollars, pounds, euros, whatever - we can use your money. Checks can be made out to Lassiter Middle School, and any funds can be sent to me (Ms. Rachel Davis) courtesy of:
Lassiter Middle School
8200 Candleworth Drive
Louisville, KY 40214

Write in the note on your check or in a note in the envelope that the funds are for the "Wal-Mart Kids." My kids - Lassiter's kids - need your help. (I also accept donations via PayPal to racheldavis7 [at] gmail [dot] com.) Tell your family, tell your friends, tell whoever you want. Give them my name and the school address (give them the story and this whole email if you want). My kids need your help. Money will be accepted until the shopping spree on December 13th.

Please, please, please help my kids. Can't you imagine just how amazing it will be for these poverty-stricken kids to be able to just go into a store and buy whatever they need and also things that they just want?

Such. A. Procrastinator.

So I am always thinking of interesting things to blog about, but the life of a teacher is always so busy that I forget to do so. So here's some highlights of the past while:

1) This past year I ran a buddy program between my students and the students at my alma mater (high school, not college), Berwick Academy. The kids exchanged letters (and mine got the occasional prezzie), and it was a really great experience for all. Since the alma mater is a private school, it was definitely a different crop of kids, and the school credited me with opening a lot of their kids' eyes to the issues that other students (like mine) face in this country. Every summer they do one or more service trips, and they asked if they could do something for us. This coincided perfectly with the need to get work done in our outdoor classroom, as we'd gotten a $10,000 grant from Lowe's (as well as $5000 from our local councilwoman), and we were able to host 10 students from Maine to work with about 8-10 of mine in the outdoor classroom. It was an amazing experience. The students built benches and wagons, a patio, raised garden beds, and a pond, and refurbed the memorial garden we have for teachers, staff, and students that have passed away. I also spent the evenings taking the visiting students around town, introducing them to our fair city of Louisville: the Lakeside Swim Club, Lynn's Paradise Cafe, Glassworks, the Louisville Slugger Museum, Bearno's, Buckhead Mountain Grill (and fried green tomatoes), Falls of the Ohio, and a Louisville Bats game. We even took the visiting students and mine on a canoe trip on the Salt River - the canoes were replicas of the ones Lewis and Clark used, which was pretty cool. We ended up in the local paper both here in Louisville as well as in the local papers back in NH/ME. We even ended up on TV. The buddy program is continuing this year. I hope they'll be able to make it down to us again.

2) I am now sharing a classroom with the Environmental Ed (aka Career Choices) teacher at school. It's an old art room, so we each have our own half. It's actually working pretty well, and I'm really enjoying it. I have room to put the desks in pods, so that the students can easily work in groups of 4, and I've got space to walk about the classroom. I'm learning a lot from observing him - it's interesting to see how someone's class runs every day. This is especially important, as they seem to be grooming me as his replacement. We talk a lot about issues with students, teaching, and environmental education.

3) Environmental education in general is a burgeoning issue for me. I'm taking Introduction to Environmental Education at UofL, and if the EE endorsement gets off the ground I think I'll get my Rank I with EE as the focus. I attended the KAEE conference again this year, and it was great. I got a lot of resources, and it was great to be able to see more of the state. Additionally, it was one of those moment where my eyes were opened about environmental issues. For example, while the vegetables we have obviously came from somewhere, it never occurred to me that there would be wild grapes in Kentucky. They apparently make muskadine wine out of them. Another amazing thing was the ecojustice tour we took around the city - the stories I have to tell. Once I get closer to the writing pieces I have my students do for their state portfolios, I'll elaborate on that further.

I also took a tour of the 21st Century Parks system in development here in easter Jefferson County. Between this non-profit group and the Metro Parks system, they are buying up all the land along Floyds Fork, and they'll be creating this amazing 21st century park. It will include the typical sports fields and the like in the northern half, but it will be more natural in the southern section. They're revitalizing the river, ponds, and wetlands. They will be bringing back sections of old growth forest, as well as potentially including sections so that you can see various stages of succession, as well as what functioning Kentucky farmland looks like. There will be hiking trails, sections of the 100-mile bike loop, and a whole river to canoe. I had no idea that there was that much free land left in Jefferson County, and that it could be that rural. I was so amazed. The whole idea of it is mindblowing, and the knowledge I learned about the local geology, archaelogy, and ecology was just...wow. Wow.

Hopefully I can continue to be more up-to-date, posting more often. We'll see, at least.

The wonders of small class size

Now districts are always trying to say that studies don't conclusively prove that class size makes a difference, but anyone who has struggled to control a full class of students in a room that really isn't big enough and then seen them miraculously change when a few kids are absent/in ISAP and 5 more are in a special reward knows how smaller classes do make a difference. We had 20 kids in AAA on Friday, rewarding them for acheiving the triple threat of good academics (As and Bs), good attitude (all S's), and good attendance. And my 4th period, which is usually loud as anything comes in and sits straight down and there's no more than a low murmur. And the worst, loudest kid is even there! Coming in with all her friends! I was in shock! I was confused! I was ecstatic! They were amazing, and I was so proud of them and really glad I'd happened to bring in dum-dums that day as a reward for the fastest runners in the races we had between measuring shadows the day before (we're studying the Sun-Earth-Moon system at the moment). I really could not believe the difference. Because it wasn't the worst kids missing - it was the best kids. And yet they were still SO much better.

It's the kind of thing that makes me wish I taught at a private school. I covet small class sizes. And large class rooms. An area of desks in the front and lab tables in the back! It would be oh so lovely. I don't even have room to set up the desks in pods. Or rows. Yep, no one considered the size of the classrooms when they ordered the new lab desks for the science classrooms.

Of course, on the other hand, I really do enjoy working with the kids I have. They frustrate me. A lot. But I'd miss working with them if I was gone. It just would not be the same if I were elsewhere. I just wish that I could teach them in a better situation. One where there we had small class sizes, and we had enough room for setting up the tables for easy group work. Where there were enough computers for us to use them without having to book WAY in advance. Where I had more than one computer in my classroom for easy access.

Ah, the dreams of an inner-city public school teacher.

************

In other news, though, there is apparently something written about me in the latest edition of my high school alma mater's magazine, BA Today, or so The Mom says. Inquiring minds want to know. What does it say? And where is my copy? I will be mightily annoyed if it is not in the mailbox come Monday.

Edited to Add (3/26/08): This USA Today article cites several studies that show that "size alone makes small classes better for kids," whether the teacher makes changes in her teaching or not. Of course, it makes more of a difference for high achievers than low achievers. The gap is just so frustrating, and it seems so difficult to bridge it.

Coming to you live from the "EarthForce" environmental conference

An article that makes me hopeful if Hilary Clinton wins the election:

Clinton offers plan to cut child poverty in half in a dozen years

"The package of proposals includes a "comprehensive" early education initiative that starts with nurse's visits for pregnant women, lets children begin the Head Start program earlier and calls for universal pre-kindergarten programs." There's also an initiative to improve child nutrition and access to fresh fruits and vegetables. All of these would do children (and mothers and families in general) a world of good. We have to start early, the earlier the better. And since her plan apparently advocates mostly expanding existing programs, I see it being a lot more feasible than trying to create a whole new infrastructure.

So often with kids it is nigh on impossible to help them because they are so far behind. Yes, it can be done, but it's like putting a tiny bandaid over a gaping wound - it doesn't solve the source of the problem. And to really solve the problem, we have to address how kids start off in life, how they are nurtured even in the womb (the healthier the mother, the healthier the baby, and a healthy mother can also take better care of herself and her child).

"Setting Limits in the Classroom"

So it has been awhile since I last posted, but things have continued to be busy as always. It's getting down to crunch time, as there are only about 11 (and a half?) weeks of school left, and my final assignment for my final MAT class is due mid-April (the big assignment is due April 1st, though, the same day as my KTIP portfolio will be assessed).

I've been told that I have shown great improvement. I certainly recognize that things are going FAR FAR better than they did last year, despite the fact that there are still what one might call "problem students." Of course, there are always going to be "problem students." Dealing with them is likely my biggest issue, though not my only one (struggling to find time for student use of technology is another). As such, I am always trying to find better ways to "do" classroom management, and I picked up a book this evening at Barnes & Noble because of that.

The book is Robert J. MacKenzie's Setting Limits in the Classroom (revised): How to Move Beyond the Dance of Discipline in Today's Classrooms. I am two chapters in, and I've come to a bit of a realization. Since starting an action research project on classroom management (specifically student "time on task"), I've realized that I have a bit of a problem with consistency. (I also noted that student placement in the classroom is an issue as well, but that's a topic for another day.) The book has really highlighted for me what this problem is. MacKenzie notes that there are 4 ways teachers deal with teaching rules about behavior:
1) the permissive approach (cajoling students into behavior)
2) the punitive approach (yelling, threatening, shaming, etc.)
3) the mixed approach (cajoles until explodes into punitive)
4) the democratic approach (gives a choice, lets student know of consequence of continued misbehavior, follows through)

As much as I would like to say that I am right there with method 4, that is really not the case. I think I'm more of a method 3. This is likely based off of my own childhood. Of myself, my two sisters, and my younger brother, there were little behavioral problems. I think this leads me to feel (subconsciously?) that it should be pretty easy for the kids to understand that cooperation is what they should do (because it's "the right thing to do"), so I just start off warning them. And maybe it's just easier to warn them than follow through with writing a note or calling parents or what-have-you. Of course, it really isn't easier in the long run, which should have been enough convincing for me (but sometimes you need a little help to realize what you are doing). Anyway, I start of with the cajoling, but - as we all do - I get frustrated that they don't "do the right thing" and start behaving, and that's where the punitive approach (and the yelling et al) come in. As MacKenzie points out, this is not consistent, and it doesn't have good effects with the kids. How can they know what to expect out of you? They either think they can get away with it, or they get angry that they are getting punished when people normally aren't.

I really hope that I can try method 4 and get it to work. It's hard to change those basic habits. If you aren't used to being a certain way, and the students aren't used to it either, it is going to take some effort to make that change and get them to realize that you have. But as a teacher, one has to be willing to change in order to improve your teaching and students' learning. So here's hoping that I can manage to move from the problematic "mixed bag" approach to the (hopefully successful) democratic approach. I just wish I had realized the problem sooner. Sometimes it's hard to see what should be in front of your own face, especially when what you hear from others is that you are improving. But it's never to late to make a change (and I haven't even finished my second year of teaching so it's not that late in the game), so I'm going to do my best to make it now.

Wal-Mart Kids Redux

I have to be at Wal-Mart at 6:45am tomorrow morning (on a Saturday! *makes face*). We'll be taking about 20 kids shopping - there were 5 whose parents said no. I've already talked to some of them about it, and they are excited. We have three(!) siblings from our team and their older brother/sister and two others from our team who had siblings in other grades who were nominated. Plus assorted 7th and 8th graders (a few of mine from last year who are now in 7th...one of whom is the one I mentioned in the original post last year who came to school for a week with a hole in the crotch of his pants) and a few from the other 6th grade team (one of whom I have in reading class). It's going to be really great.

My final total of money I raised was $2215.14!!! This is about three times (!) what I raised last year. Three times! Crazy! Because of this the final total this year was about $3300, and the school has never raised more than $3000 before (and this is with less in-school donations than normal). And, really, it is all because of you guys, your friends, Williams people, and my non-LJ friends and family. I mean, I raised about double what was brought in through other school sources. We will be able to get the kids everything they need, without having to stop at a cap like last year, and we'll be able to get them something that's worth more than $5 for their something special, i.e. an "unnecessary" item.

I just am still amazed by everyone's generosity. This is what the Christmas/holiday season is supposed to be about. Whether it's Christmas, Chanukah or Kwanza, Solstice, harvest or December twenty-fifth, everybody should use the season to come together and work to make the world a better place, whether it's just for one kid or 5 kids or a tribe in Africa or a family in your city or just your spare change. And that's what all y'all did here. Everyone is so impressed with me at school, BUT I COULD NOT HAVE DONE IT WITHOUT ALL OF YOU. I did very little when you think about it - I just extended my hand and asked for some help. I begged and cajoled a little, but it is all of YOU that came through for me here. YOU ALL are the ones that deserve thanks. Whether you donated $10, $50, $100, or $500, or just passed the word onto your friends, you did something really good for some kids who have very little.
I thank you for that from the bottom of my heart. Peace be with you this season, and I extend that into the new year. BECAUSE YOU ALL SO TOTALLY DESERVE IT.

(P.S. One line is so totally stolen from Blues Travellers.

Wal-Mart Kids

I have plans for several topics about which I would like to post, but here is an important one.

They come to us from many backgrounds and many environments, but 80% of them qualify for free and reduced lunch. For some, the only food they get every day is what they eat at school. As I drove a student home one day, she revealed to me that since her step-dad's accident, they had no groceries in the house; they couldn't afford any. They live on what they get at school and donations from her aunt's church.

With so many worries about how to survive, clothing is often not a top priority. The students shiver in class because their parents can't get them sweatshirts. They come to school in the rain without anything to keep them dry and in the winter without hats and gloves or even winter coats. Some come in wearing the same clothes every day no matter how dirty they are, because they have nothing else to wear.

Because of this, every year before winter break, we sponsor a shopping spree for our neediest kids. If you can spare even a dollar, send the money to my kids. Cash or a check; American dollars, Canadian dollars, pounds, euros, whatever - we can use your money. Checks can be made out to Lassiter Middle School, and any funds can be sent to me (Ms. Rachel Davis) courtesy of:
Lassiter Middle School
8200 Candleworth Drive
Louisville, KY 40214

Write in the note on your check or in a note in the envelope that the funds are for the "Wal-Mart Kids." My kids - Lassiter's kids - need your help.
I also accept donations via PayPal to racheldavis7 [at] gmail.com

Tell your family, tell your friends, tell whoever you want. Give them my name and the school address (give them the story and this whole post if you want). My kids need your help. Money will be accepted until the shopping spree on December 8th.

Thoughts on Articles

So I've recently subscribed to ASCD's "SmartBrief," which sends you headlines and links to the "most important" education articles/news every day. I came across 3 different articles today that really made me think.

1) "Teaching Secrets: Organizing Middle Schoolers"

Organization is something I really struggle with. I tend to either be very disorganzed or hyper-organized to ensure that I'm not disorganized. I tried a new system this year to see if it would work better than just using a notebook last year. I asked them all to get binders, and that really fell through since the principal ordered the district-created workbooks (which I had said I didn't want but have actually been insanely convenient so far). A binder and a workbook was just too much to give them every day, as these are REALLY thick workbooks.

It's been a lot easier on me and them with the workbooks, as all the worksheets are already in there in order. Last year they would lose print-outs or would write in the notebook all out of order. Having the pages already in there makes it so much easier for me to grade and really keeps them from losing anything. Of course, getting print-outs in there is annoying - you either staple or tape and it just wastes time. So I ordered some of those 3-clip pocket folders, and I'm hoping to hand those out next week (or the week after, I think) to use for bellwork sheets and other worksheets that we work on. They can place the folder inside the workbook, and they can be collected together every day at the end of class and passed out the next day - I think that should hopefully work well. *crosses fingers*

Anyway, the suggestions in the article I thought were rather helpful, though some were ones I alread utilize.
1)I've fallen through on checking agendas, so I'm going to need to reinforce that soon, especially with the changes in the ECE (special-ed) workings. I'm going to have some new kids in that will REALLY need the organizational help, and so it will be a good chance to hit everybody and figure out who doesn't have an agenda (I think I know one in my homeroom already).
2) I've got the class website and the binder for make-up work, so that's good. It needs some re-emphasis, though, as there are some kids who are just not making up the work. When I collected bellwork sheets yesterday, though, I had several over at the computer at the last minute filling in the missed dates, so that's good - they were using it to get their work done.
3) I like the idea of the IOU board, but I don't have a lot of posting space in my room, and I just don't even know where I'd put something like that. And I just worry that I wouldn't be able to keep up with it. It's something to think on at least, especially for bigger projects (tests and the like).
4) In related news, I DO need to keep up with the table of contents sheet - I need to laminate a piece of poster board and post that to let the kids know what should be completed and where it should be. That will go along with getting them folders, but I think it will have to have 2 Tables of Contents - one for the folder and one for the workbook, which hopefully will not be too confusing for them.

2) "School Boards Debate Sex-Offender Access"

This was an interesting issue. Obviously as a teacher I worry about the safety of my kids - from outsiders, from insiders, from each other, sometimes even from their families. We have the "Stranger Danger" lady come in every year with members of her organization, and she talks to the kids about keeping themselves safe. It's incredibly important. But what about parents and their child's sporting/whatever events. Sex-offenders aren't just child molesters, and what if a person has totally turned their life around? What about how this is punishing the child for their parent's past criminal, horrible act? And then, on the other hand, a voice says in my head "are you freaking kidding me? Letting people around kids that we know can do wrong?" Of course, if that's one's thought - why are they even allowed around their own children? They have to stay away from all children but their own - that just seems really rather hypocritical. Overall, though, it made me think, but I'm really not sure what to think. Do they make exceptions on a case-by-case basis? Or no exceptions? Or all people with their kids? I really don't know.

3) "Creating Readers, Part I"

As a person who continually struggles while teaching reading (I know very little about how to actually teach it, as I'm a science teacher), this was something that just amazed me. 40 books! I don't even know what to say. It's an amazing expectation, and that the lowest any kid had ever read was 22 is even more so. I admire what she's done, and I really wish I could capture even just a little bit of that ability.

I like that she's got a huge classroom library, that she reads aloud books they like, that she gets them to read independently. But I was confused at how she balances out independent reading and shared reading (i.e. the whole class or a group reading one novel). At first it seemed that they only read independently, and then she mentioned "share-reading" where the students read along. So they obviously do both, but I would really love to know the logistics. I'm hoping to get novels so that we all start off the day with independent reading of the same book, but I don't really know how to balance out giving them a chance to read on their own, making sure that we/they can discuss the books (and so are thus at a similar place in the narrative), and modeling reading by reading aloud. How does one manage all 3 without having kids miss portions of the book or get bored because they've heard/read the same section multiple times?

Testing

There are times when I can't believe my kids. In this case, it was in a good way. The district provides core content assessments (CCAs) for every content area, and I gave my first one a week ago on Wednesday. I graded the open response questions, bubbled in their scores, and then ran the sheets through the new scantron (which is an amazing piece of machinery for any teacher). I could not believe the results. I had gone in with the math teacher to promise the kids who scored proficient and distinguished a dress-down day.

I have 101 students that I tested, and 50 of them (50!) scored distinguished. For those of you not in the know, distinguished is the highest kids can score, meaning they are above and beyond what we expect. The push for better testing scores only requires the students to score proficient. And I had 36 students score proficient. I had 13 score apprentice and only 2 score novice (little/no understanding of the concepts). This is a huge, huge difference from my students last year - I was ecstatic on the last CCA last year to get about 15 distinguished. To jump to 50 distinguished students and 36 proficient is just absolutely amazing. I can hardly believe it.

I am just so amazed and proud of my kids. Talk about feeling triumphant.

(The question again is: is it being out of the first year? Is it being better at preparing us to study in class? Is it the modules making them better prepared from last year? Whatever the case, I am just a happy, happy teacher.)

EE Conference

So, as my school is trying to become an environmental education magnet, I was given the opportunity to go to the Kentucky Association of Environmental Educators Conference this Friday and Saturday in Cave City (and by going I am now a member of the organization for the next year). It was an amazing experience, and I can only hope that I am able to go to the conference again next year. I came out of it with a lot of new ideas for my classroom, and I'm really quite excited.

Friday I went on an all-day off-site session called "Tying the 'ologies Together: A Hands-on Adventure at Mammoth Cave." We actually saw more than just the cave itself, as they took us across the area to three other sites where we were able to see the karst terrain that is geologically connected to the formation of the caves (which happen to be the largest in the world). We were able to see the sinkholes that form from the dissolution of limestone rock, just as the caves do, as well as a spring where water leaves the caves and runs to Echo River and a cross-section of the rock layers (with a few fossils in them!). The caves themselves were amazing - I'd never seen anything like it before. The miles and miles that water has carved out and dissolved away and the different features it leaves behind - wow. As well as the unique creatures that live there - didn't get to see any bats of salamanders, but saw cave crickets and blind (and transluscent) crayfish.

The Saturday sessions were, by and large (well, 2 out of 3), very good as well. The first was put on by a facilitator from Population Connection, where we got a CD full on great activities related to population growth, resources, and consumption. There was a great video that showed population growth across the world throughout world history - it really highlighted the rapid growth since industrialization. We "mined" for chocolate chips in cookies, played an activity that dealt with resource allocation and what happens when people don't consider the needs of others while they consume, and played another activity that dealt with the carrying capacity for environments. Good stuff.

The second was called "The Science Behind Global Warming," which was led by Doug McCoy of the Louisville Zoo (who does a lot else besides working at the zoo, it seems). There were a lot of great little activities that I hope to use with my students during our school's environmental kick-off week next year and possible later on this year as well. I learned more about global warming for myself besides, so that's good.

I of course came away with some books because I am helpless that way. When you add in the delicious food and the concert Friday night by Walkin' Jim Stoltz, it was an exceptional conference (the not so good final session I went to aside).

Overall, I was really pleased to see how many people are commited to improving environmental education - of course, we all struggle to teach our children about all this while trying to deal with the restrictive curriculum and testing we have to do. (I often find myself wanting to expand and include things and then gnash my teeth in frustration as a I cry, "but I don't have the time!") There are some people doing some really amazing things out there, and I hope to learn more from them as time passes. We really need to get our kids engaged and commited, for their own sake, our sake, and the sake of our planet (and the future). Not only that, environmental education engages them so much more and opens the door for better, deeper understanding of concepts. I really hope that I can figure out how to work this all out for my kids.

(And in a final note, as it must be said: I love conferences.)

Praise, Differentiation, the Second Year of Teaching

I am already five weeks into the second year of teaching. Everything that everyone says about the transition from your first to second year is SO true - having that experience, having survived through that trial by fire, having an actual clue about how things work makes it so much better. As does having a good chemistry with your team.

The kids are still surprising me with how well they're doing. There are always those with issues (behavioral or otherwise), but - for the most part - their behavior is far better than a lot of what I dealt with last year. Of course, I have more experience myself, so that makes a huge difference as well. Their academic success continues as well. I think that the use of the modules in 5th grade made a significant impact on their understanding of science and deeper aspects of biology (even though most of them don't know what the word biology means). They have experience with more concepts and also the activities as well.

We reviewed the material for the test like crazy too. The vocabulary (individual, population, community, ecosystem, abiotic) was the focus of every bellwork question and multiple class discussions for the past two and a half weeks. I hammered the words into their skulls, and they practiced practiced practiced them. They matched the words to examples I gave and made their own examples for the words - over and over. They had a lot of time to make those words their own, to attach their own meaning to them.

I definitely put creedence to something I heard this past summer about just how many times it takes for kids, especially kids with parents with little post-high school education, to learn new words (they typically have far smaller vocabularies as well) - the repetition was necessary for a lot of them to understand the concepts. And some STILL don't get it - it wasn't enough repetition for them to hold onto the meaning, especially with the heavier concept attached to it (there are a few where the language barrier is clearly an issue...they have spoken/heard fluency but not reading/writing fluency, and there are specific terms I should be using here but I don't remember them).

Nevertheless, the fact that the average grade was a B was amazing in my eyes (6 questions, 10 points per question, 40 pt base to build on, and partial credit given). They had a far better understanding and far better performance than the average student I had last year. The same mistakes which were so prevalent last year were made by just a few this year. After consulting the answers they gave, I came up with a list of approximately 26 students that I need to confer with on their understanding of the concepts, some of whom only misunderstand one word and some of whom may have been more confused by the presentation of the FOSS module test than the concepts themselves.

I raved about them to our team social studies teacher, as well as the other 6th grade science teacher at school. I raved about them to our team ECE teacher. I would have raved about them to more people, but I just didn't have the time today. I am just so pleased with their performance. And then I was reading What Great Teacher Do Differently (Todd Whitaker) while I was waiting to be seated for dinner tonight, and something occured to me. I raved to everyone EXCEPT for the students themselves. To the students I pointed out issues that most students had and corrected mistakes and misconceptions. Other than a few great/good job comments on the 95s and 100s (and a few scattered "great!"s for particular answers), I did not praise them much. I didn't convey how excited I was about their performance. I raved to everyone but them. Why is that? They're the ones that deserve to hear it the most, you know? And so I plan to let them know how proud I am of ALL of them when I let them actually keep the tests on Tuesday (we went over them, but they had to pass them back as I still have a few that haven't taken their tests yet). That is what good teachers do.

In other news, I am a planning on teaching a differentiated lesson on Wednesday. Now we often learn the same concepts in different ways, but I don't often have different groups performing different tasks, and that is what I hope to do on Wednesday as we finish up with food webs (we/they start with them tomorrow). The module has a really great visual/kinesthetic lesson that we'll be doing Monday - they have cards and arrows that they use to lay out the food web on their desks (upon, thought, we may need to do some rearrangement so they have room for all the cards). However, doing the same food web once is not enough practice for them. Tuesday I'm planning on talking about the different levels of the food webs, as well as discussing the effects of changes/removal/addition of members to the food web.

Wednesday will be more practice, and I'm hoping to have them split into two groups (herein lies the differentiation). Using (hopefully) the team ECE teacher, I want to have small-group/one-on-one instruction for the kids who still need more basic practice with the concepts and then have a higher group who have achieved understanding. I recently received two copies of "Into the Forest: Nature's Food Chain Game" from a fellow teacher, and I am hoping to have the higher groups use these games to create their own food webs and then be able to have fun practicing the concepts they've learned. Of course, I am also debating whether the game might be more helpful for those who are struggling with the concepts. This requires further consultation with the team ECE teacher. Regardless of how it all ends up functioning in the end, I'm hoping that it works out for the best for the students. In most classes, I have a pretty large breadth of understanding of key science concepts, so differentiation could be a huge help to solve these issues.

Of course, I'm still not at all sure what to do with the kid who drew a food web for his representation of science image on the first day of school. He obviously understands the concepts, and I can't reall think of how to make food webs higher level. I feel like it's the sort of thing that you either understand or you don't, and he definitely understands. I know how awful it was to be bored in school all the time, and he likes science, so I want to do SOMETHING that will engage him.

Wonderful surprises

So my plan this week and next - along with the other 6th grade science teacher and the MMD teacher also teaching the 6th grade science modules - was to introduce the students to living things. Last year the students had a lot of trouble with differentiating between the "biotic" (living organisms and their products) and the "abiotic" (nonliving things) - one large issue was classifying plants as abiotic. They also had trouble with a lot of the vocabulary.

Using one of the old textbooks (Glencoe's Science Interactions: Course 1) we planned to go into a mini-unit on "what is life." In particular, there's an activity observing seeds and rocks in order to compare and contrast them. The idea is that they look the same/similar, and to get the kids thinking about what seeds do that make them living (that rocks don't). From there we would/will segue into the 6 characteristics of life (has cells, grows/develops, reproduces, uses food/water and produces waste, responds to stimuli, adapts to environment).

So today, after talking about the observations they made of living things, I moved into defining organisms. They all already knew the word. Color me shoked - and I'm serious. While they brainstormed in pairs after that on what characteristics living things have (I didn't use the word characteristics, though perhaps I should have), they were constantly surprising me. They knew vocabulary that I didn't expect them to know - "eliminates gas," "respiration," "cells" - and had a far better understanding of the concepts we'll be learning. I had to explain cells to my students last year in about 10 minutes as we began talking about genetics - these guys already know.

And so I find myself wanting to apologize for not trusting the 5th grade teachers to teach the modules (though I had heard from more experienced teachers that science often fell to the wayside in middle school). Once I realized how much they knew, I tried to ask each class to share a bit about what they'd learned the year before. They had done so much. They have a really good basis for what we'll be working on this year, and I'm really happy about that. It'll mean much more success for them, and so I'm hoping we'll be able to go into more depth with the concepts and that I'll be able to breeze by the simpler stuff and leave time for the more extended projects and more difficult concepts.

I'm already reaping the benefits of the modules, I think. Or at least I hope so. *knocks on wood*

Classroom Photos: August 2007

The far side of the room: some of the student desks (note the buckets for materials: no need to get up and go to the pencil sharpener). The cabinets and the sinks. The tables are so big and the room so small, I had to put the tables right up against the drawers.

View of part of the class: the slanted E and tables against the wall, my environmental ed and lab bulletin boards, my desk, and my Williams banner.

My introduction to me bulletin board. Includes pictures of family and friends, a map that traces my route from NH to KY, and photos from my travels abroad.

Starting Anew

I am hoping to keep pushing on with this blog, even though my classes are through. Therefore, "EDTP 620 Class Blog" has been renamed. I intend to use this blog as a place to reflect on my reading, as well as experiences in and outside of the classroom relevant to teaching. This will hopefully promote self-reflection and best practice.

What makes us and our teaching effective?

While Richard Allington's "Effective Teachers, Effective Instruction," I decided I was going to respond about "managed choice" (p. 278) and the importance of self-reflection (p. 279, #1), but then I read the following line as I finished up the essay:
"We can continue to craft curricular plans that will ensure some students will have to struggle. Or we can craft curricular plans that reduce the struggle for almost all students." (p. 287)

This brought - unsurprisingly - the differentiated instruction conference to mind. This is what good teaching is about. As teachers of our students, we must recognize that they all come into our classrooms at different places, and that they have different prior knowledge and different abilities. We need to find out where they are and who they are in order to figure all this out. We can't teach toward the middle and hope everyone does okay or teach toward the top and say that our high expectations will win out. We need to have the same expectations for all (everyone can and will be able to know, understand, and do x, y, and z), but we need to scaffold them up from wherever they are. Give everyone an equitable fighting chance - they all deserve it.

However, I have to say that I disagree with Allington's wording here. Struggle in the classroom is not an innately bad thing - students can engage more with a topic and learn more about it if they have to struggle with the issues and their depths in order to gain an understanding. However, we must ensure that they have the tools, the abilities, the motivation, and the encouragement to make them capable of winning; we must ensure that they have the self-efficacy to know that they can win the struggle and also have the desire to do so. It's hard to find a balance - when is it too easy? when is it too hard? - when we are trying to differentiate for our different students, but I think that it is vitally necessary.

Writing Strategies

I thought that pairing the writing strategies from Content Area Writing: Every Teacher's Guide with new technology tools was a really effective way to encompass these important issues. All the new things that I've been learning have become rather overwhelming - differentiated instruction at the ASCD conference, technology from EDTP 504 and EDTP 620, reading/writing from EDTP 620, etc. It's so much new and exciting information that a girl can have a little trouble juggling it all.

Recognizing that we can pair these new (to us) strategies and tools together makes utilizing them a lot more feasible; it allows us to start small (the best way to make effective change) and still start off with more than one new idea. Additionally, it allows us to show our kids that these areas can be paired together, that reading and writing go hand-in-hand with technology, that they can go hand-in-hand and make what we do more successful than if we approached them separately.

I think that book trailers work in a similar way. They make a connection between technology and reading, and in this case technology does heighten the reading as it promotes it and can also send a message about reading itself. It opens people's eyes to let them see that we can respond to reading via technology - whether it's through blogging, podcasts, book trailers, you tube reviews, or anything else. The two (reading and technology) are in no way separate.