Weekly blog post 3

Highlight:
I think the highlight of my week is definitely being around students. basically, I am getting to know more students better and sometimes they are surprising and hilarious. Here are a few quotes that made me chuckle:
"onomatopoeia is not a real word, that's probably a type of mexican food."
"I can't do my entry task right now, I have to wash my arm."
"this worksheet is causing me spiritual problems."
And this joke a student felt obligated to tell me:
"where does a boat go when it's sick? To the doc(k)"

But seriously, sometimes students are just great, even when they're crazy. I heard one student saying something about Jewish people, and I instantly walked over to make sure nothing shady was going down. When I asked him what they were talking about, The student asked me if  I had ever seen freedom writers. He told me he was explaining that the part where the students were passing around a picture was just like what hitler did with the Jews, and that it was "totally heart breaking." (stereotype was a vocab word, and he was explains it to his group.) where I heard a piece of a conversation and thought that they were saying something possibly racist, they were actually having a deep and insightful conversation.

Something that made me think differently:
One of the things making my think differently about education this week is seeing how different teachers at the school react to things like the MSP test. The English teacher I work with is doing activities to prep students for the test, one math teacher is giving students two days off to decompress from the test, and the social studies teacher I work with is doing a "fun" enrichment activity, working with underground railroad quilts. I think that all three ideas have their merits, because the kids are stressed and worn down with testing issues right now. I guess my thought is that it's ok to approach issues differently, and sometimes it's ok to give students a break or do something different.

One approach:
One thing I want to use is  the idea as playing music as an incentive during independent work times. The teacher I observe told students if they worked quietly, she'd play the radio for the rest of the period. I think this is a good idea, and the right kind of music can be helpful and soothing while working, as well as a good group incentive. In practice, there were problems with the idea. She allowed the music without the good behavior, which made the class less productive. Also, she was using pandora and playing a random hits station. It played Katy perry and Justin timberlake and I think students were distracted. I think you have to have a way to control the music if you're going to use it. But its a good idea in theory, I think.

Perplexing issues:
one perplexing issue I am having is once again how to balance my desire for more experience and my cooperating teachers plans. I am in a second classroom, and right now I'm still getting used to watching what they're doing and what the social studies teachers methods are. I don't know when or if I am going to be teaching in the class, or if I can help with management when students act out. I am just waiting for further instruction, and it's an awkward place. I like both of my cooperating teachers though, and I think I just need time to adjust to a new and different classroom.

blog 2

Highlight

Personal Highlight: I get to work with a social studies teacher as well as the English teacher now. Yay for principals and things working out!

I think a highlight for this week for me is getting the opportunity to watch students improve. Although I hate the redundancy of the practice tests, I am watching students who couldn’t do certain things last week do it without effort this week. It is interesting to see students progress over the quarter. I know of one student who is also working with a reading strategist outside of the classroom is improving a lot fro when I first met him in 8^th grade to where he is now. So seeing 8^th graders mature and learn, that is a definite highlight.

Something that happened

Something that happened that made me think about education was getting the opportunity to start the class on my own and then teach. My cooperating teacher usually introduces me, but she let me start the class this week and be more in control of the room. In third period, it was bumpy and I had some management issues. In fourth period, as the students trailed in from a math class where they had been rambunctious, apparently, the math teacher wished me “good luck” and had a good natured chuckle. But then fourth period was amazing, they were awesome and on task, and focused for me. So I guess what this made me realize is you can’t have solid expectations with students, whether they be negative or positive. Sometimes students surprise you, and flexibility is job requirement.

One practice or approach

My practice this week is honesty. North Pines students are doing constant MSP practice tests, and sometimes they are given an explanation as to why. So when I worked with third period on Monday, I just gave them the assignment and said “this is what we’re doing.” It did not go smoothly, and I think part of it is the students feel like their time is being wasted. So in fourth period, I started out by saying I knew they were sick of practice tests, and I understood. I then said we wanted them to be comfortable with the test so that next week they would not get stressed out on the actual MSP.

I see my cooperating teacher give her rationale often and address issues. I think it is ok to sympathize with your students and just be honest, but then give your reasons and go through with your curriculum or plans.

Conflicts

One conflict I faced was with a student who seems to be having some medical/emotional issues that is somewhat getting ignored in my class. I noticed last Friday, this student told my cooperating teacher that he was having problems with his medication and was off. She didn’t do anything, and he failed the test. Then on Monday, the same student was fine. Today, he was clearly having an “off day” and was working alone in the hallway, but not seeming to focus on anything. I don’t know if my teacher is aware of the issue and I am worried about this student, but am scared to step on her toes by bringing it up.

 

Assessment strategies response article

My article was called “Classroom Assessment Strategies: What do Students At-Risk and Teachers Perceive as Effective and Useful?”

Summary:

This article actually entailed a study where they took surveys at middle schools in Pennsylvania. They surveyed teachers and student to find out what they thought were effective assessment strategies, and then compared what both groups thought were effective versus what was actually being used. Not surprisingly, the methods teachers/students found helpful were not actually being used in a classroom. The article concluded by explaining which practices were supported by research and the need for better assessment practices, especially when working with at risk students. Here are some “highlight” quotes I found useful.

 

“With the focus on standardized tests, it appears that we are leaving classroom assessments and students at-risk of school failure behind.”

 

“Many students are not adept at taking paper and pencil tests yet can demonstrate their knowledge and achievement orally or by constructing a project. Conley (1992) suggested students at-risk demand personalized education and success-based tasks. When giving students choices in the arena of assessment, teachers might be willing to make a validity compromise to enable children to show what they know and are able to do.”

 

“The primary goal of schooling should be to help students learn to be productive members of our society in ways that are challenging, interesting, and meaningful. Assessment should be a significant part of that learning process, not an event to be feared.”

Take Away Ideas:

 
This article had good theory but also had some great “take away” ideas I could use practically. Here were the things teachers in the study rated as “highly effective assessment strategies.” (the students results were virtually the same).

1. Teachers will allow students to make up tests that they have missed.
2. Teachers will provide feedback (tell students how they did) within three days after a test or performance assessment is given.
3. Teachers will give students at least one week's notice before tests and performance assessments are due.
4. Teachers will make sure students understand why their answers on tests or products for performance assessments are incorrect.
5. Teachers will provide opportunities for students to construct portfolios.

I think these are some good ideas. Number one just seems obvious to me. Number two is actually really important and so many times, teachers hand back a test without giving useful feedback. So question 12 was supposed be true and I marked false, but if I never get told why then all I learn is that I don’t know the answer. I think going over test items or essays that are graded with constructive feedback is useful. I guess that goes with number four, but it has to be done soon enough that students remember taking the test.

I do think portfolios are useful for students as well. I think middle school students in particular like the ownership they can have over a product like a portfolio. Tests can be stressful and intimidating, giving students the feeling that the teacher is trying to catch them with a wrong answer at times. Sometimes tests are necessary, useful, and realistically students need to learn how to take them. But if that is the only format for summative assessment, it doesn’t give students variety in their learning or their assessment.

Classroom management Article Response

Article: CELL PHONES: RULE-SETTING, RULE-BREAKING, AND RELATIONSHIPS IN CLASSROOMS

 

CHARLES, ANITA S. "Cell Phones: Rule-Setting, Rule-Breaking, And Relationships In Classrooms." American Secondary Education 40.3 (2012): 4-16. Education Research Complete. Web. 17 Apr. 2013.

 

Summary:

So the article I read was actually about cell phone usage and how different teachers dealt with the problem. I almost went to find a different article that was more targeted about classroom management, but I decided to stick with it because I think it had some really interesting points. So the article did a study in one school in New England where Cell phone usage is prohibited. The study described how different teachers dealt with cell phone usage, noting that younger “cooler teachers” tended to be lenient on the rules (and even break them as well) and older teachers follow stringent consequences. Mostly, the article talked about how this issue illustrates that management is all about relationships and power dynamics. Here are some good quotes, so you get an idea of what was written:

·        “Self directed action, occurs within relations of power; discordant groups of people (such as students and teachers) can often work together to find a consensus.”

·        “”I think 90% of education is probably trust. It’s trust from the educators, but its respect from the students.””

·        “Teachers and students need to see the shift from authoritative teaching roles to democratic negotiation of classroom interaction based on relationships of trust and respect.”  

Response:

I think that there are things I liked and disliked about the article. I like the idea of being reasonable with students and building a relationship of trust. I like the idea of a democratic classroom and students having a voice and feeling empowered. I even like the idea of students being able to have a say in the way rules and procedures are set up. The quotes above are great, and they should be guiding philosophies to have classrooms based on trust, respect, and a common goal.

That being said, at some point, teachers need to have a backbone. I want to make sure that my classroom is efficient and students are not wasting their time. Cell phones, which are one of a million issues related to management, can be a serious distraction and can disrupt a lot of instruction. Talking in class, moving around the room, hitting, yelling, throwing things; these are all issues I notice in my observation classroom (rarely, but they happen). I notice these things happen when teachers get distracted or in group work. I think there are some basic ideas about classroom management that are important. It is good to have a democratic environment, but a classroom is not a democracy.  The teacher has to be in control, and has to do so without being a crazed tyrant. A teacher has to be consistent, because students will push limits to see if they are there.

 

I think the biggest idea is how to get respect from your students. If you have respect, then most issues do not evolve into major issues. The article talked about one teacher who put a box on his desk for cell phones, and if there truly was a pressing issue, students could make a call in the hallway. Although the teacher deviated from the school policy (slightly), he created a fair and respectful approach that made students feel more comfortable. I think slight modifications to make students feel understood and respected are important to make classrooms run smoother. Respect has to be given, not just received. Of course, doing all of these things is a lot harder in practice than it is in theory.

Weekly Blog 1

Highlight

I think for me the highlight of the week was (and I know this is a cheesy teacher answer) was working one on one with students. They were doing a lot of group work and working on reading strategies, so I got to interact a lot with students and ask/answer questions. I got to learn more about some of my students, and some of them surprise you when they really ask deep critical questions or have awesome work skills. I feel like I was helping students because instead of giving them the answers, I made it a point to ask questions until they could come up with the answer themselves. Some students were aggravated and just want you to tell them what to do, but most students really just want to be given the tools to do things on their own.

Something that happened

I think the one thing that made me think differently was my cooperating teachers approach to assessment this week. She is giving the students short stories and worksheets to prepare them for the MSP, and she has done the same type of exercise for almost two weeks now. She is giving it to them until she sees “hundreds across the board.” I am unsure about the approach, because on the one hand I think it is awesome to have high expectations and push your students to try hard and succeed. On the other hand, I don’t know if it is beneficial to just repeat an exercise until students become perfect. I had one student today get a 90% and he said he was “mad at himself” for doing “so bad on the test.” I think there needs to be a balance between high expectations and teaching students that they are a number. I’m not trying to be critical, but I might focus on improvement rather than perfection.

One practice or approach to use

One thing that was really awesome I observed was professional cooperation. There was a science teacher who observed the English classroom I am in for a period. She was trying to learn about how to teach reading strategies to adjust her teaching for the common core state standards. I thought that it was really cool to see the teachers at my school working together and trying to make sure all of the teachers are working together to help the students.

Conflicts

Substitute teachers

So I had my first interaction with a substitute this week; it did not go well. She didn’t realize I was going to be there and subtly asked me to leave. And I got the impression she was subbing because she’d gotten a degree at some point, but clearly did not really care about the students. I don’t want to be negative, but it made me think about how I would manage substitutes in the future, or how I would manage being a substitute in the future. It was frustrating because I lost my four hour day, and now I have to figure out how to make it up.

Testing overkill

I know students have to take the MSP, and my school has really abysmal test scores usually. But we’ve spent two weeks doing repetitive busywork to “prepare” students. I feel like there is a better way, hopefully.

TPA lesson plan response

We have been working with the TPA documents for a while now. I have, of course, things that I love and loathe about the format. In the spirit of positivity, let me talk about my favorite parts of the TPA.

Favorite aspects

Differentiated instruction

The section of differentiated instruction is pretty much how I actually learn what differentiated instruction means. In 309, Dr. Phillips mention it a lot but never addressed things like how do we differentiate, what types of issues need to be addressed, how does this big idea impact teaching strategies. The TPA gives specific things to consider: who has IEP or other accommodations, how have different learning styles been addressed, which students will need extra attention? These questions are helpful.

Student voice

I think my original vision of teacher was me lecturing while students listened. But I think student voice is very important because students learn peers and need to feel empowered. It is important to remember the students’ role in learning.

Academic content standards:

I like that the TPA encourages us to be standards based because it makes us accountable as teacher. I want my students to learn something other than how awesome I am, so standards are there to make sure I am working towards teaching them to do something. Hopefully with the common core, students from different schools and backgrounds will have equitable educational opportunities.

Specific requirements/ expectations

Every teacher has told me different things to emphasize. Sometimes the same teacher has told me to different things in the course of a week. I understand I am supposed to answer the list of billions of questions, but it just seems a bit subjective. At what point can I say that question is sufficiently answered? Do I just decide and hope Pearson agrees with me at the end of my fateful graduation project?   

Redundancy

I think that half of the TPA can be condensed. The questions get repetitive and the document is too long. I mean really, you can’t pull out a seven page (at minimum) document in the middle of a lesson and look at it. It is too busy.

Academic standards, content objectives, and Academic language should all be one section in my opinion. If we are really basing our content objectives of the standards, they should be in the same section. It should be here is the standard, here is the corresponding objective, and here are the academic language terms necessary to reach the standard. Instead there are three separate sections and they want you to repeat what you’ve already written to show how these things are related.                                                     

In the future

I think I plan on writing two documents as I student teach. I will write out the TPA because it’s required and I’ve heard Professor Agriss explain several times now that the reflection is worthwhile. And I agree with it, although my inner lazy student would rather take a nap, I actually agree. I think I will actually use a summary sheet of the TPA to discuss lesson plans with my cooperating teacher and for direct planning.  

Context for Learning

 

Middle school

ü      500 students, 31 teachers

ü      In the Spokane Valley

ü      It is an urban middle school

ü       has 50% students on free lunch, and 14% on reduced lunch

Special features

The school has a program called “success academy. Success Academy is a study program that takes place after school.

(here is a brief explanation of success academy,

  http://www.cvsd.org/northpines/success_academy_2.asp)

District requirements:

Like most schools, This ones scheduling is impacted by the MSP.  Also, High School registration and career research units happen in the spring during English class time (for 8^th graders).

The curriculum is influenced by the school district. There are required texts the districts decide upon and they have to be used by the end of the year. But there is no set daily curriculum.

My classroom

Currently, I am only in one classroom. Hopefully within the next two weeks, I will be in two separate classes.

Right now I am observing 8^th grade English Language Arts with my cooperating teacher. I usually observe second and third period, but I have worked with and observed all of the classes since I started there. There is a large range of abilities in the classes, and you can tell the students don’t necessarily have a homogenous set of backgrounds. My cooperating teacher tells me that some of her students have a third grade reading level, and some are at a twelfth grade reading level. When working with students while writing, I observed a variety of writers. Some students struggled just to get words on the page or understand the prompt; other students could put my own writing to shame. There is a large span of abilities in every class. To help students at every level, my cooperating teacher has put students into cooperative learning groups and has the groups set up with mixed abilities. A couple of groups in second period and third period are students with similar abilities because those particular students work very well together.

There are limited resources in the classroom. There is a projector, white boards, and a computer for the teacher. There are five desktop computers in the classroom, which take at least fifteen minutes to boot up(if they do turn on). In the library there are roughly twenty working computers, and these also take a lot of time just to turn on, let alone to be used for research.

North Pines is on a trimester system. It also has six 50 minute periods a day, with no block classrooms.

3^rd period

Third period probably has about half of the students on free or reduced lunch. It is an 8^th grade class. There are twenty males, and females; it is a very lively group. There are no ELL students or gifted students, although there are some students with strong abilities. There are two students with IEP’s; one for ADHD, and one for behavioral and medical issues.

Here's my blog!

My name is Colleen Wells. This is my blog for the Ed course for spring 2013. More things to come!