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Top 10: How to Take Control of Your Teaching

heather — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 07:00:00 +0000

Occasionally, I repost this article so that new readers can find it more easily. Based on some very enthusiastic feedback, it has since morphed into a book proposal called The Top Secret New Teachers Handbook. I’ll share more as it evolves…

I’ve been developing this Top 10 list of ways to take control of your teaching even in the face of, well, teaching. It’s an advice list on how to encourage respect, and, if necessary, how to demand it as a means to make sure you aren’t being taken for granted.

Let’s face it, if you are feeling appreciated, you will be happier in this difficult job. Consequently, your students will be happier, and quite frankly, if they are happier, they will be more successful. After all, an unhappy teacher’s room has the smog of misery in it, and for a student, it hovers like a stench that affects their own victories. And while it benefits a school to keep its teachers happy, it is a teacher’s responsibility to demand those things that make this challenging job better than tolerable.

I think that finding those tricks or strategies to keep in your pocket is important in any career; but in education you need them even more so. Otherwise, the day-to-day duties of the job will eventually grind your enthusiasm to a halt and it won’t just be you who is affected, your students will be affected as well.

I will be expanding on each of these over time, but in a nutshell, here’s my TOP 10:

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“Hit a Jew” Day. Um, er…

heather — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 22:41:05 +0000

I’m not sure what one can say about this latest story. AP reports that a number of students at a St Louis middle school are facing suspension for a spirit day gone awry. But how “Hug a Friend Day” de-evolved into “Hit a Jew Day” is beyond me. (...)
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Post tags: character, Character Education, critical thinking, diversity, Ed Tech, integration, life long learners, new teachers, reform, school accountability, student safe, technology, Title I, tolerence, writing

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UCI Writers Project

heather — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 23:02:11 +0000

“Oh, you must be so excited to summer break.”

“Must be nice being a teacher, summer break and all.”

Don’t you just hate it when civilians assume that just because your students are at camp, you are too? Once of the things I do love, however, is that summer is a time to hone our skills, become better at our craft, and focus on our own professional growth.

I got into the UCI Writers’ Project this year. I’d been invited to apply in the past but had to say no, thank you for two years in a row. The first year, I just couldn’t afford to not work summer school. The second time I gave birth to Ben. So now, here I am, and while I couldn’t afford to not work summer school again, the fact is I felt that I couldn’t afford to not be in a pool of such gifted people. I needed my brain to be a spa this summer, albeit a really intensive, energy-draining spa. In fact, it’s more like a gym. And we all know that going to the gym massages your body in forward-movement, the way attending UCI will massage my neurons.

I’m nervous. I’m excited. And I’m hoping that I can live up to the pool of educators that I will be associating with. The list of speakers is phenomenal. The selected teachers all range in skills, age, and grade levels.

So, as I close up shop for the school year, plan Ben’s Traveltown birthday party, and get ready for the in-laws coming into town, I am also preparing for my Voice unit presentation that I will be presenting on the first week.

It starts on Monday and I am really looking forward to being a student again. My posts may be fewer and farther between this July, but I will update when I can.

Have a great and rejuvenating summer vacation.

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Post tags: achievement gap, critical thinking, Curriculum, curriculum design, curriculum development, education, k-12, k12, professional development, reform, teaching, technology, UCI, Writers Project, writing

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NCLB? How ’bout B-studentsLB

heather — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 13:14:36 +0000

I’ve been reading a lot of headlines lately about NCLB leaving out the over-achievers and potential leaders in our schools. Joanne Jacobs mentions it in her article, “What About the Smart Kids?” and the NYTimes and the Common Core blog both have touched on this latest Fordham report that claims that the achievement gap is closing, but from the bottom up.

Nobody can deny that this is happening, but there is also another symptom of NCLB that has slowly passed like a plague of yore over our schools, the disappearance of electives from the schedules of the middle-ground students. (...)
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Post tags: 100% accountability, 2008, achievement gap, blog, competition, credential, critical thinking, education, education policy, ELA, electives, equity, fundraising, integration, Joanne Jacobs, k-12, k12, middle school, NCLB, New York Times, ny times, reform, teaching, Title I

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Teacher Observations: Principals vs. the Union

heather — Sat, 24 May 2008 22:40:03 +0000

Teacher Magazine has an article today about Idaho’s progress in developing a standardized teacher evaluation that could be a stepping stone for developing an acceptable pay-for-performance legislature. The article didn’t get me thinking so must about the concept of a standardized teacher evaluation that might be more effective then our current process. I mean, let’s face it, what’s the controversy? We all know it should be a better process.

But it did get me thinking about an incident that happened last year at my school where the union was brought in to protect a teacher from being observed beyond the allowed contracted hours after complaints had been waged against the teacher. (...)
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Post tags: credential, cta, data, education, employment, firing, k-12, k12, merit pay, new teachers, performance pay, reform, tenure, union

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Don’t Knock the Less Experienced Teacher

heather — Fri, 23 May 2008 17:41:59 +0000

Look, we all know the statistics. Many of the hardest-to-teach classes are being taught by the least experienced teachers. According to Education Week, a study was recently conducted in Philadeliphia evaluating 9th graders, “the make-or-break year for many students on the path to dropping out of school” which found that “students are more likely than their upper-grade peers to be taught by inexperienced, uncertified teachers.”

While I understand the argument, I also know that these young teachers have an advantage that I will not have years down the line: energy.

When I was in my early years of teaching in my mid-twenties, I was hired to teach at an inner city school. It was, in fact, the under-funded alternative school for those students kicked out of the other schools. We had broken glass in the halls, police tape from the weekend still strewn over the kindergarten yard come Monday, and no textbooks. A classic Michelle Pfieffer/Hilary Swank/Morgan Freeman movie in the making.

I actually jumped into the deep end of the pool, and there wasn’t any filter, so there was moss on the top and calcium deposits coming from the cracks in the bottom, but it was there that I learned to swim. (...)
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Post tags: 100% accountability, 2008, achievement gap, ASCD Brief, ascd community, btsa, budget, Careers, character, collaboration, credential, curriculum development, education, employment, failing, firing, free, induction, integration, jobs, k-12, k12, Language Arts, learning, life long learners, merit pay, middle school, NCLB, new teachers, peer teaching, performance pay, PI, Proficiency, reform, school accountability, school funding, student safe, Title I

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Career Sampling: Dave Saba comment

heather — Sat, 05 Apr 2008 04:41:21 +0000

So, I commented on Dave Saba’s American Board site but I wasn’t sure if it posted so I thought I’d post it here. In response to his article about the number of different jobs the average 18-40 will hold in a lifetime and how it will impact education, I said the following:

“Well, the MTV generation has all grown up. Actually, you might even hear people blame the variety-style Sesame Street for 20s and 30s-somethings’ fickle ambition. But I think it also has to do with a very healthy dose of entitlement. If this new wave of teachers comes into the profession with the attitude of “you’ll get my good work for a fair price”, it can only bode well for those who are more hunkered down for the long-run in teaching. Too many people are intimidated by change in this profession and have lost their fight. This new generation embraces change and the glory of rolling its dice. If we can entice them to remain in teaching long enough with the incentives of higher-pay, I say, let these “career samplers” roll in and leave a wake of reform in the process.”

And Saba believes, as many do, that this issue will get worse. I guess my feeling is this: perhaps we should embrace it. (...)
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Post tags: American Board, Careers, Dave Saba, education, Excellence, reform, teaching

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“If a child can’t learn the way we teach…”

heather — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 05:08:40 +0000

“If a child can’t learn the way we teach, maybe we should teach the way they learn.”
- Ignacio Estrada

What’s our goal? Everybody say it with me: to teach students.

Unfortunately, there are many teachers who end that statement with, “…in the way I was taught.” Gosh, wouldn’t life be easier if we could all do things as we once did them, in the way that was familiar and comfortable? How easy teaching would be if we could all ignore what we know about the science of how our brains work, ignore the data supporting using student-centered classrooms, multi-modalities, collaboration, formative assessments, reflection, and differentiation. If only we could teach how we were taught. Sigh. Wouldn’t life be grand?

Let’s flash back to the teaching of yesteryear. Because if we go back to how we were taught, then surely the teachers who taught us wish they could return to how they were taught. Heck, since we’re already time traveling, let’s just head back to the teachers who taught the teachers of our teachers…
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Post tags: arthur rackham, david shannon, education, howard, howard pyle, ignacio estrada, kate greenaway, maurice sendak, mo willems, reform, teaching

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