Was The Olive Garden Open On Thanksgiving?

Autumn is a beautiful little second grade girl in my school.  She's the type of kid that you almost need to seek out when you're having a shitty day because she reminds you how awesome it is to work with kids, and even with all the bureaucratic morons making decisions, the testaholics, and Common Core nonsense, it's ultimately a very special privilege to be an educator.

Every time I pass Autumn in the hall, she comes over and gives me a big hug.  She doesn't scream and act obnoxious like many little girls who want to give hugs to teachers, just a beautiful smile and a warm genuine hug.

The Monday following the Thanksgiving break, Autumn approached me for a morning hug just like any other day.  As I hugged her back I said, "Good morning! How was you Thanksgiving Sweetie?"

"GREAT!" she said with a giant smile, "But I had a ton of diarrhea."

Oh.  Um,...

 

Wait? Teachers Don't Suck After All?

There is a story on page 6 of the October 30th issue of Education Week.  To clarify, page six is NOT the front page, and Education Weekly (while a fine publication) is NOT The Washington Post, New York, Times, or the Chicago Tribune.  This story, by Catherine Gewertz, indicates that most U.S. states are outperforming the global average in Math and Science.  Really?!  

Teachers, particularly in public schools, have been beaten up and degraded for years for the alleged repeated failures of their efforts.  The calls for higher standards can be heard from sea to shining sea, particularly from political windsocks (terrific news for those who sell tests, test preps, newly aligned textbooks, workbooks, and software to fearful districts...).  The results are terrible moral issues, teachers leaving the field in droves, and of course tougher standards. 

We are literally and needlessly torturing some children with these new standards.  Yet, now there is a report that 28 states are actually outperforming the mighty Finland in math.  According to the article, U.S. public schools collectively outperformed England, Australia, Italy, New Zealand, Sweden, Norway, and the United Arab Emirates among others. 

The data used are predictive statistics applied to the 2011 TIMSS test for 8th graders.  Look, I get it.  Data can be twisted and manipulated to tell you anything you want, but let's also acknowledge that this truth applies both ways.  Nowhere is data more abused than in education when it is published or distributed without any qualifications or understanding accompanying it.      

There are some states that measured poorly, and certainly room for growth for all of our great states (isn't there always?).  Obviously we're going with the stick over the carrot on that one.   

These statistics are particularly impressive when considering that the United States takes all children. Students are not tracked into certain future career paths at early ages.  No one is told they can't come to school based on ability or income.  Patrick B. at my school has been kicked out of class 4 times today already, and 7 times total this week.  If he gets himself straightened out, there's not reason he couldn't become a lawyer, or a doctor, or, um, a teacher.  Not in China he couldn't though.  

It's frustrating that our profession is abused by twisted statistics and repeatedly put down (thank Governor Christie).  Sweeping, poorly thought out, reforms are often the result of the panic set forth by misunderstood data and sensationalized headlines.  The truth most likely lies somewhere in the middle.

Reform doesn't have to be an ugly word.  Schools, teachers, and administrators can all evolve and get better.  But change is a slow process.  Results shouldn't be expected immediately, yet we move to the next reform before we figure the current one out half the time.  These reforms should be guided by experts from the field- not politicians and business leaders.  Reforms should match the needs of the local area and not be totally identical because the needs certainly aren't.

I unfortunately cannot fix the whole media.  But from my little corner of the Interweb, allow me to publicly celebrate educators, and the fact that a new report shows that we don't all totally suck.  Hooray.    

These Questions Need Some Teeth!

Perhaps I'm being too dramatic and reactionary here, but a recent experience has really pissed me off.  While in a training, the presenter passed out what they claimed was a Smarter Balance sample question for writing.  The prompt asked, 3rd graders, to "write two to four paragraphs describing and comparing different tooth traditions.'

What the hell is a 'tooth tradition?!'  These ridiculous tests have the potential to have significant impact on the children to who take them, and the teachers who bust their asses to better them.  Peoples entire careers can be affect by these test results and this is how they assess?!  Tooth traditions?!

Students of affluent backgrounds already generally do fine on these tests.  It's often children of impovershed backgrounds that struggle.  So why are we stacking the deck against them with questions like this?

Several years back we had a boy who was having such severe tooth pain that another teacher and I drove him to a free dental clinic.  He was in 4th grade and had never been to a dentists.  He had teeth that were literally rotting in his head, were infected, and that need to be pulled immediately.  Is that the kind of 'tradition' the test writers are after?

A couple years ago one of the principals in my district delivered a Christmas tree to one of our families.  The children cried and hugged him- refusing to let go.  They'd never had a Christmas tree before.  I find it difficult to believe that families that can't support one of the most common American holiday traditions, have an abundance of background knowledge on traditions of teeth.

I'm obviously aware of the tradition of putting a tooth under your pillow and having the Tooth Fairy leave you some money.  But this simply isn't a traditional for all.  Schools and churches collect canned food, toys, mittens, coats, soap, etc., all holiday season because of the volume of families who need them and can not afford them.  It is fair to conclude that many of our families do not have the means to place money under their young childrens pillows when they lose a tooth (or won't if they work nights, are neglectful, or gone from the child's life altogether).

Sure, a great writer could read a couple passages and depending on what knucklehead is scoring the test, probably 'pass' it (I barely know what means anymore).  However, there is no doubt that having a background in having your mommy sneak in and put money under your pillow each time your lose a tooth gives those students a profound edge in succeeding on this question.  

But it's the teachers and schools who are failing the kids right?

He Knows If You've Been Bad Or Good...

My wife and my 1st grader have recently been banging heads about (among other things...) her completing her writing homework.  The other night, as has become par for the course, my daughter sat at the kitchen counter whining about it being too hard while my wife thundered away at her about how she needed to stop moaning and get her work done.  It was then her three year old sister injected, "You better do your homework or else Santa Claus will see you!"

After pausing for a moment, my wife thought to herself, "Hmm, maybe I can use this."  After nodding in agreement she added, "Yeah, and I have Santa's number.  If you don't get working right now, I'm calling him."  Well our sassy little six year old wasn't biting so my bride grabbed her cell phone, called her dad, and pretended to have a very disappointed conversation with the famous fat man from the North Pole.  After concluding her conversation, my wife threw the kid a look as if to say, "I didn't want to do that, but you made me" only to have the child come back with, "Come on mom, that was grandpa you were talking to."  This was starting to backfire.

Now backed into a corner, my wife needed a strong move to save this routine.  "If you don't believe me, I'll call him back and you can talk to him!"  With that she again whipped out her cell phone and began scrawling through her contacts.  She certainly couldn't call her dad back as grandpa's voice would be obvious.  Desparate, she called my buddy Kurt who I went to high school with and now enjoy frequenting local taverns with.

Kurt (5'9'', 160 lbs) doesn't have a creative bone in his body.  What I wouldn't have given to be a fly on the wall when he answered his phone and listened to my wife say, "Hi Santa Claus, Marie won't do her homework, can you please talk to her?" and handed the phone to my daughter (while praying he'd get it and play along).

After a long pause, and no doubt some supressed laughter, my pub mate hacked through a performance that would get you booed off a community theater performance. "Um, (lowering voice), ho-ho-ho, you better do your homework like your mommy says, or else I may not stop at your house this year!"

Sadly, the kid bought the whole thing and immediately completed her writing work.  The three year old of course went crazy and needed to talk to Santa as well thus necessitating my buddy continuing his performance a little longer.  

Hmm, I wonder if a conversation with Santa might help my tier 3 kids at school....

A Journey Of A Thousand Miles Begins With A Single Step....

A colleague of mine has a special education inclusion teaching assistant working at her school that simply put isn't very good.  My experience with TAs is that, like any other position, the talent tends to be hit or miss.  I have worked with some who are better than our certified teachers and others who need their own life IEP.  'Sapphire' definitely fell into the latter.

Shit travels downhill.  In this case, downhill refers to years of experience.  As a result, new teachers always got stuck with Sapphire.  Sapphire simply did not understand any of the basics of her role and too often caused more problems than solutions.  The teachers who got stuck with her often wound up having to babysit her in addition to the kids she was supposed to be helping manage.

As is the case every year, the teacher working with Sapphire quickly discovered her incompetence.  The issues didn't improve with time (they never do) and subtle hints didn't work either.  The teacher talked with the principal about her frustrations and the principal recommended that the teacher explicitly explain what it was that Sapphire needed to be doing in order to best support the classroom.

The next day the teacher explained to Sapphire that she wanted her to be constantly moving around the room making sure students were on task with their work.  "You want me to just walk around all day?"  The teacher, thinking this represented progress told her 'yes.'  She obviously didn't know what 'explicit' meant....

Sapphire spent the entire morning walking in a large square as if she was in some sort county fair cake walk or a game of Duck-Duck-Goose (no aisles).  At lunch she sat by herself crying.  After lunch she went back to the classroom and continued to bizarre walk slow around the perimeter of the students while the teacher did her thing.

Sapphire was practically hysterical as she left that day.  Finally, someone asked her what was wrong (there's a sucker in every crowd).  "They told me I have do laps all day long!"

And this folks, is the person who is employed and paid to assist closing the gap with our neediest students.  Be afraid.  Be very afraid....

Teacher Success Can't Always Be Measured (Sorry Arne!)

The other day one of our special education students was having a bad morning.  The poor kid has, on top of other things, some emotional challenges which are further compounded by a lousy home life.  The boy was having a melt down and was refusing to come to school.  Mom (who is a loser) simply called him in and told the office he was 'in a bad mood and wouldn't be coming to school.'  One of the school's special education teachers, who has worked hard to form a relationship with this student, called the mom back to insist that he come to school.  When he called he learned that the situation had pretty much moved to crisis.  The kid had wrestled the car keys away from the mom and locked himself in the car (they had left home to go to the grocery store).  The teacher was scheduled to meet with the district's special education director that morning, but without hesitation grabbed another teacher and headed out to help.   They were successful not only in calming the child and getting him to exit the car, but brought him to school where he had a successful day.

That same morning my second language teacher learned that one of her families was having trouble completing the physical portion of their child's school registration because their literacy level in English was poor and causing complications with the paperwork at the clinic.  Again, the teacher changed her morning plans and headed to the clinic to assist the family.  

These kinds of stories happen with regularity inside of schools.  The actions described above appear in no teacher job description anywhere.  Yet, these stories rarely receive the attention they deserve.  These actions won't be measured in any teacher evaluation matrix.  They won't enhance any pay for performance opportunity.  The family in the first tale is so screwed up it's doubtful the effort was even appreciated much by the parent.  Yet, it would be difficult to argue that their actions were not the right choice.  Would anyone suggest that ensuring a child's safety and getting him to school or assisting a second language family at a clinic so a child can register for school were bad practice?   

I'm proud of these teachers.  And I believe it's what all teachers should be doing when children's needs are become bigger than fractions and conclusion statements.  And I worry that the more we test, and the more we tie to the results, the less human we risk becoming in our approaches.  I certainly worry that using student achievement to nearly exclusively measure a teachers competency & worth is both unfair and inaccurate (as hopefully was articulated in the above examples).  

These are stressful times in education thanks (at least in part) to idiot lawmakers.  The right choice isn't always easy but it sure helps you sleep at night.  I hope that the few teachers that take a moment to read this keep doing those truly heroic things for kids- even though law & policy makers haven't figured out how to measure it.  Never forget why you chose the profession.  Even though the parent didn't appreciate my teachers rescuing her kid from a locked car- the kid definitely did....   

Adventures In School Bus Micturition

Our district uniquely houses all bilingual kindergartners at one site.  Once they reach first grade, they 'return' to their attendance school where they continue to receive appropriate second language support.

Occasionally this format causes some issues.  Parents sometimes refuse needed second language support for their children because it is more important to them that they stay with older siblings at the attendance school than receive the language support.

This is currently the case for a little girl at my school who is now in an all English kindergarten room, but speaks zero English.  The mildly ironic thing about the parents refusing services is that our kindergarten program is only half day, so the kid goes home on the bus without her older sibling anyway.

On day three of our new school year, the little girl was trying to tell the bus driver something on her midday trip home.  The driver, who speaks no Spanish, made the deduction that the girls was becoming ill and (while driving) handed back to her the little garbage can normally housed at the front of the bus.  Upon receipt, the little girl proceeded to drop trou and take a nice big piss in the garbage can.  Hey, when you gotta go...

After the office was informed by the bus company, we had a chuckle in the about the situation and all commented that it didn't take long for things to return to 'midseason form' in terms of the everyday adventures of school operations.  But when school ended, the students father showed up.  And he was mad...

Dad spoke a little English, but he was so animated in his anger that we were having a hard time understanding him.  Besides, what exactly was he pissed about?  I mean, they refuse services and then piss in the school bus garbage can.  There are lots of people who should be upset here before this guy.  Right?

Well, it turns out after we settled him down a little that he wasn't particularly upset about any of the events that took place on the bus that afternoon.  He was upset because the bus driver elected to leave the garbage can full of his daughter's piss on his driveway.  He wanted the bus company to send the driver to his house to remove it.  So that's a first.