The National Governors Association released a draft of the proposed common core standards yesterday. You can find it here. I'm OK with standards. I like having a good idea what it is that my students should know, regardless of whether or not they are at a place where they can know. It gives me something to shoot for. Something to gauge their understanding against.
But, I'm worried for my own sake. As I read through these standards this was my train of thought: "These seem pretty decent. They seem to reflect the work that we're currently doing in my classroom. I could easily organize my curriculum around these. I think the other teachers I work with could easily organize their curriculum around these. Hey, maybe if we're all teaching these same standards we could do more sharing. Heck, if everyone's doing the same thing, maybe they could create a national text book to go along with the national standards. And if every student is doing the exact same thing, from the exact same book, maybe we could just get one really good teacher on the tv and have them do all the lectures."
Of course I know that every student is an individual and the role of a teacher is to adapt the curriculum to be as successful as possible for each of their individual students, but if they all need to learn the same things...maybe...just maybe...I wonder how much they would pay that one television teacher.
I don't think it's a big secret that I have an attitude problem.
I spent a short amount of time as a cadet at the United States Air Force Academy. I did push-ups, pull-ups, sit-ups, screamed, yelled, ran, and even pissed in my pants trying to be a good follower. One of the few things I remember from the Academy is one line on my basic training performance evaluation: Attitude problem.
I've tried to keep it in check for the last two and a half years, as I'm in the one silly little profession that grants tenure after three years. I've done pretty well according to my own standards, but people say stupid stuff, people do stupid stuff, people ask me to do stupid stuff, and then my mouth says stupid stuff.
Let me clarify: In general I don't respect my elders. I do believe that they have a lot of life experience and a lot of good things to say. I don't believe they are right. They usually know that I don't think that they are right. Attitude problem.
Let me clarify: My school has created a new reading group program. Students signed up for books to read, were assigned a group according to those books, and were told to read with their group for 40 minutes a day. Sounds great to me. I love to read. Half of my reading group skipped class today. Their parents excused them. The school has no recourse. The students have no consequences.
Let me clarify: Students at my school are not allowed to wear their hats backwards, because it is a sign of gang behavior. Gangsters wear their hats forwards with a flat bill still adorned with the sticker that came on it. So do my students. The principal wears a bolo tie.
That's enough. I think I can be at peace and go to bed now.
As one of my good friends often says, writing is thinking. I'll not explain, google it if you want to know more. My point, instead, is this: I haven't had any time to write and haven't had any time to think.
I set up this blog in the summer when I had a little extra time. My intention was to help drive my thinking about educational technology as I went through the school year. All of that intention was blown away within the first week of school. Before the students even showed up.
There is too much going on here at our high school. Too many directions. Too many agendas. Too many solutions. Every teacher seems to agree on this fact, but that doesn't seem to matter.
The good news is that I haven't heard talk of technology or twenty-first century skills all year. Or wait, isn't that the bad news?
The first day of school is over. I'm holding on to optimism for at least a couple more days. I am tired.
I don't know how anyone can teach without having the students active and involved. Today was a day of me standing in front of the class, telling them things they need to know. I think I need to find a different way to do it next year. I know that there is no way I could stand in front and tell the students what they need to know all semester long. I need them to take an active part in their learning. I need them to bear a little of the burden. Tomorrow I'll start giving them the opportunity.
The staff at Evanston High School has spent the last two days (and much of the last year) studying project based learning (PBL) with the Buck Institute for Education. I'm sure that you've all heard of PBL, so I won't waste time explaining what it is. I do, however, want to take a second to note a couple of my likes and concerns.
First, I like the authenticity in learning that PBL provides for. Students are able to learn and produce in the same way that professionals in the field do. They are able to encounter problems and dilemmas not found in traditional curriculum and be forced to work through those problems. Their final audience is someone other than the teacher. I really think that these things will help get students engaged in what they are doing and away from "playing school."
I also really like that PBL encourages failure. Not failure in the way that we think about it in traditional education. There is no lack of learning. No lack of ability of effort. There is only a product that turned out differently than the student expected it to, and as long as the student understands why the failure happened, then the failure becomes one of the most teachable moments for students and they are not punished for it. If you haven't seen Honda's video "Failure: The Secret to Success," take a minute and check it out here. I love encouraging my students to fail!
I do have some concerns about PBL. They're not necessarily concerns with the approach itself, but rather the execution of that approach. What I see as I look over many of the projects being proposed is that the project does more to take the student away from the intended content, rather that reinforcing and adding to that content.
As a literature teacher, I'm especially wary of how PBL is being used to teach novels. Many of the projects seem to focus on the theme of a novel and strive to develop that theme further. Personally, my goal is not to teach the theme of a novel, because I want students to understand that theme. I don't teach "To Kill a Mockingbird," because I think students need to understand racial equality or traits of character (however, if I were teaching racial equality or character, I think "Mockingbird" would be a great tool to help teach that). I teach the methods, devices, and style by which Harper Lee came to create a novel that effectively illustrates her intended theme and I teach how to recognize what that theme is.
I may approach the teaching of literature differently than others and they may disagree greatly with the last statement that I just made. There is a good chance that I am wrong.
Overall, I'm excited for the PBL approach to education. Now, to incorporate the 30 other things that they're stressing in our district right now...
Get some, got some, good, huah!
-something we said back in my Air Force days-
Ten days ago I completed a 111 mile bike race. I didn't win. I didn't even go very fast. But, I did finish. Nobody paid me to do the race and I don't think anyone judged me or scored my performance (at least I hope not). I had no reason at all to do the race, other than I wanted to do the race.
This, I think, is what we call intrinsic motivation: doing something because you like doing that thing. I see it occassionally in my photography classes. There are students who love to take pictures and the will go out and take pictures regardless of what I assign. I see it in my English classes. Students with their noses buried in books. Occasional poets in the making writing from cover to cover in their spiral notebooks. Performers entertaining the class at the wrong time. Artists doodling when I'm lecturing. Etc.
One of my biggest goals this year is to somehow influence students to want to do what I want them to do. Not for the grade. Not for the experience. Not to prepare for college. Just to do it.
I'm just trying to remember the last time someone made me want to do something that I didn't want to do, and how they did it.
