So, CATE (the California Association of Teachers of English) just came to an end.  The hotel was lovely.  All ran smoothly.  We were greeted with smiles aplenty, and everything ran on time.  Sheridan Blau, Kelly Gallagher, Carol Booth Olson, Taylor Mali, Jim Burke.  They all presented there.

But despite it all, CATE is clearly a conference (along with others) that is struggling for breath amidst budget cuts.(...)
Read the rest of The Death of Teacher Conferences or I Can’t Believe I Miss My Canvas Bag (479 words)

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2009. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: achievement gap, blog, cate, collaboration, Curriculum, curriculum design, curriculum development, fundraising, podcasting, professional development, technology, test, test prep, TLN, Writers Project

Feed enhanced by Better Feed from Ozh

So you know when you get your group of kids on the first day, there are those who immediately set off your alarms?  Well, that definitely happened to me on my first day.

I have a student who clearly needs help.  His peers are weary of him already and his confrontational style seems not as intentional as inherent.  The startling comments and “seething anger”, as his last year’s teacher put it only three weeks into the school year, seem uncontrollable.  This same teacher recorded that he asked if her windows were bullet proof.  I wasn’t, of course, given this information up front.  I had to seek it out. 

His first quickwrite of this year centered on cussing out his last teachers and cranking them nightly on the phone.  His pride in his violent video games is apparent.  

Like children with Asperger’s (of which he has not been tested to date), he seems unaware of cues or the goings on around him: calling out with inappropriate comments, walking in front of me while I talk to the class, handing me items while I’m in the middle of instruction.  Annoying, yes, but harmless.  

He also will not make eye contact (could be cultural, but this seems different than others of his ethnicity and nationality) and walks robotically, stiffly, without movement in his shoulders.  Strangely enough, and I’m clearly not a diagnostician (though I play one on TV), the few students in my career who have had symptoms like this seem to also come with apparent sinus problems.  His eyes are puffy with nasal issues, he is sniffy, and I can’t help but wonder if there is a connection.

So I approached the counselors who know me as a real student advocate and as a teacher with a somewhat effective antenna.  I don’t send kids to the office.  I handle my own discipline issues, which are few.  So when I come in, they listen.  The afternoon after the first day of school I walked in and said, “So, what’s up with X?”  They pretty much flopped the file onto the desk, a file the size of our Language of Literature book.(...)
Read the rest of Should a free education be unconditional? (363 words)

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2008. | Permalink | 9 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: 100% accountability, 2008, achievement gap, aspergers, blog, collaboration, Curriculum, differentiation, Ed Tech, education, education policy, ELA, employment, free, fundraising, Joanne Jacobs, k-12, k12, learning, metacognition, performance pay, special ed, teaching, technology, test, Title I

Feed enhanced by Better Feed from Ozh

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2008. | Permalink | 5 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: 2008, achievement gap, assessments, blog, collaboration, computers, credential, critical thinking, CUE, Curriculum, curriculum design, curriculum development, differentiation, digital immigrants, digital natives, Ed Tech, education, education policy, ELA, equity, integration, internet literacy, jobs, k-12, k12, Language Arts, learning, matthew needleman, middle school, professional development, research, technology, test, test prep, Think Aloud, Title I, UCI, writing

Feed enhanced by Better Feed from Ozh

However, it does come from good intentions.  The fact is that failing students who do chip away at their work cannot earn an increase in their grade if we don’t massage the current system.  Without positive ends, why would they struggle through the means?

I commented as follows:(...)
Read the rest of D is the New F for North Carolina (464 words)

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2008. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: 100% accountability, 2008, achievement gap, assessments, attendance, credential, education policy, ELA, homework, k-12, k12, learning, life long learners, middle school, PI, teaching, test, test prep, Title I

Feed enhanced by Better Feed from Ozh

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2008. | Permalink | 2 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: assessments, audit, budget, collaboration, credential, Curriculum, Dave Saba, Ed Tech, education, education policy, ELA, embezzlement, employment, induction, jobs, k-12, k12, Language Arts, merit pay, middle school, school accountability, school funding, teaching, technology, test, Title I

Feed enhanced by Better Feed from Ozh