I stumbled into my first teaching job by accident. I had been working at a camp for years and one summer day the year before graduating a person who had been bringing his kids there for years walked up to me and asked me if I wanted a job for the following year. He said he had been watching me for years and thought I would make a great addition to the school system he worked in. This was in 1990. Now I don’t know what it was like in the rest of the country, but teaching jobs around here were getting 600+ applicants. It was impossible to get a job, and I was offered one the summer before my senior year. Pretty cool eh? So while everyone else was worried and sending out applications I just sat back and smiled. Early in the spring of 1991 I called the person I was supposed to contact that would officially interview me and get the ball rolling. I went in and was shuffled to a back cubicle where I sat down, was looked over and offered a job in a new program that combined the “tough” kids, education, and the outdoors–my dream job. Looking back I realize how naive I was. I never realized I was being ushered in through a series of political connections, totally avoiding the normal channels.
The summer came and went, a couple calls in told me to just hold on. A week before school started I was told the program was axed. Tough job market, one week before school….started looking for that miracle opening to appear. While I was preparing my resumes I called the original school system every day asking if a position had opened. Two weeks into school, I was told yes. Little did I know that yes led to me being the first person in my family to go gray. I showed up in what ended up being the toughest middle school in the state by almost any stat you could examine: test scores, crime, or number of parents beaten with 2×4s in the hallways. I walked in to replace another person who was not a teacher, but another town employee who was placed there so that he could continue collecting a salary. I walked in to a place in which I was the white guy. Almost every kid was African American, with a few Hispanic students mixed in. Did I mention I grew up in a town that was, and is still considered and mocked in editorials as the most racist town around? A couple weeks ago I was cleaning out my closet. I went deeper than I had ever gone before. I pulled out some loose sheets of paper out of a box that turned out to be 10 “journal” entries that I kept during my first month of teaching–I had totally forgotten that I had ever had one. What follows is some excerpts from those entries. A reminder to us all that it’s tough to be a beginner. It is even tougher if you are in one of “those schools.” For those of you in private schools, or the suburbs, the pain and agony of the inner city teacher is unfathomable unless you experienced it first hand. You just simply can’t imagine how different it is.
I am not going to go into all the hidden messages about why I am posting things. I think if you have read this blog before, you will pick up on many reasons why these would be posted. I do want to be clear about one reason. Everyone knows a teacher who might do or say things that they disagree with and therefore write-off the teacher as one of “those” teachers. As you read these entries, You will recognize one of “those” teachers. I wasn’t though…I just simply did not know of any alternative methods. If someone had walked up to me offered up an alternative, or if there had been someone I could have reached out to, I wonder how different my first years would have been. I would like to challenge everyone walk up to a first year teacher offer them an alternative way of doing things. It took me ten years to start considering true alternatives to traditional schooling. I didn’t have anyone who could have walked up to me to offer an alternative. If you have the chance, don’t waste it. Someone just like me could be waiting for your advice.
September 12, 1991
Teaching is more difficult than I ever imagined. I’m experiencing failure for one of the first times…everyone that makes the rules for schools should stand in the shoes of a teacher for one day. One girl already mumbled under her breath that she “hates white teachers.” Tomorrow I have to bang on them from the moment they step into the classroom. Tomorrow is my biggest day yet.
September 16, 1991
I have so many big ideas, but I am afraid they won’t listen. They don’t even come close to understanding that if they listen now, we could do great things later. They don’t care. There seems to be nothing in their life to reinforce school….I believe if there was homogeneous grouping I would be able to do so much more, assuming the lower classes were smaller. I feel that if the classes were half the size they are now, I could achieve my goals, but now just worry about discipline. The word I hate is coming back to haunt me. That is my only goal this week, not to teach but to discipline, how sad. The only thing that keeps me going is looking forward to the days off. I can’t wait to see Aimee, I am really in love!
September 17, 1991
I keep asking myself how I will make it through the year. I’m just too fresh, too young, too white. I’m being taken advantage of so much. The damn $^(^% girls are the worst. They are practically oblivious to me. Today I yelled at one girl and she just yelled back. So humiliating…can’t wait for the year to end.
September 19, 1991
Today I’m going home feeling much better. Why? I don’t exactly know. I think every class learned something new. The old saying you only remember the last thing is true. Two kids stayed for detention and we did some school stuff and they learned. Then we played some “educational” basketball. They asked to come back for detention tomorrow. I have no luck!!
Sunday 22, 1991
Went to the Red Sox/Yankee game up at Fenway. It was th e best game I ever saw, except I couldn’t pay attention because all I was thinking about was school.
September 23, 1991
Today I am leaving practically stress free and whistling. It’s true you can’t smile until Christmas. 4th and 7th period is getting better. They’re the only classes I have gotten anything out of yet. Someday I hope I’ll be great, but right now I am just an average Joe. Now I am off to sign my first contract ever.
September 24, 1991
Today is not a stress free day. Everyday is a bigger war. The 7th graders are better but I have to crack down on the 8th graders. Tomorrow are the mastery tests and out of control. I really have to crack down on the 8th grade. I’m getting angrier and angrier so it’ll be easier hopefully!
September 25, 1991
Another day bites the dust!! Today I’m going home feeling alright. I’m finally starting to realize I have to be mean to start to do anything with the kids. I loved being mean today, because then I felt much better. The kids stayed quiet and everything goes alright. I gotta get a mean streak. I have to start getting respect. 169 days left!!
September 26, 1991
Today is great, because tomorrow is Friday.
September 27, 1991
“Fear cannot be without hope, nor hope without fear.”
November 24, 2009
I really wish now that I had continued writing that first year. As I look back I can’t even imagine having written those words. I spent ten years at that school and left with a truck load of guilt. When I left I was in many ways a master of behavior management, but still a first year teacher when it came to planning engaging lesson. The very “worst” kid in my current school would have been the valedictorian at my old school. I have now realized that I did what it took to survive. My lessons were laced with behavior management tricks and treats. I planned everything with discipline in mind. After leaving that school I actually had space and time to actually think. Things were actually so stressful at my old school that I stopped reading because it reminded me of work. After switching jobs I started to read again. I started to think. My imagination came back. I started to dream.
Most readers of this blog are also dreamers. You are probably a progressive teacher. You are probably one heck of an asset to your system but might feel alone. Just remember that one of those teachers that you..we…write off as being a person who doesn’t want to change could be someone just like me. Someone one who is just lost. Someone who is just desperate to talk to someone, who is just like you.
I was out yesterday and happened to end up sitting next to five six graders. They were talking about all the typical things that sixth graders would talk about and then they shifted to a serious discussion about their teachers. I have to say before describing their conversation that all of my teachers sensors said that this was a great bunch of kids, the kind you would want in your class. Also when the conversation shifted to school they were being serious, they were not trying to insult their teachers. At first I was just listening, but then had to take out and pen and paper to write down some quotes(might be a few words off but they are pretty close).
“I made one line crocked and she took off points. It didn’t change the meaning and no one else on the world would have cared.”
“I put one extra space in between the answers and she took off points.”
“I got a ‘B’ on my spelling test. He asked me what I thought. I thought a B was pretty good but I said ‘I think I should work harder.’ “
“Even when we do great on work and work hard they find something to mark wrong so you can feel bad about yourself.”
“They always make sure they they find something on your paper that they take off points so that they can say ‘I taught them something.’”
They went on and on and eventually just started laughing at all the actions of their teachers. What started to take shape were not the lessons they learned from their teacher’s comments, words, actions, or assignments, but how they learned to play the system to keep them off their back. Even when the teacher thought they were learning, it was just them giving the teacher what they wanted to keep their grade up and the negative comments at bay.
Well of course I started to think about what my students were saying about me as they got together over the weekend. Yes, of course they talk about me when they get together. I am definitely more interesting than Lady GaGA. Then my mind shifted to what would I want them to say. What kind of class experience would I want them to be describing?
What are your kids saying about you? Put five of them into a room and what do they say about the time they spend with you? If you are middle/high school they spend about 170 hours a year with you. What impression are those hours leaving? If you are an elementary teacher, or a homeschooler, they spend a whole lot more.
I have some homework homelearning for you. Find an image that best depicts the experience you want your kids to have. You could interpret that as meaning your personal children, future kids, or current students. So whether you are a college professor, a homeschooler, a 3rd grade teacher, an online educator, or even if you don’t have any children yet I would love for you to contribute. If you are a student choose an image that depicts how you would like your education to be. Just click on the link and follow the directions.
1-Click on an empty slide to the left.
2-Click on Insert—>then image
3-Select the image from your computer or the url
4-Flickr images need to be saved and uploaded
5-Place any personal information you would like under the image
6-Click save and close
A couple of weeks ago I wrote a post about the power of words. It focused on the fact that the words that teachers use in a classroom can have the power to lift a student up, or tear them down. After writing the post I continued to think about the words teachers use, not their effect, but why they are chosen in the first place. Why do teachers label kids with certain words? Why does a teacher chose to label a kid a jerk? Why does a teacher label a student lazy? Why does a teacher label a kid unfocused, rude, disrespectful, terrible, or “doesn’t work up to their potential?”
I realized early in my career that teachers actually have the same students each year. After the first month or so all the students get shuffled into the roles of the previous year’s students and they receive their name. You have probably met some of them. There was Joe “Lazy,” Kathleen “Doesn’t want to work up to her potential,” Frank “Rude,” Mary “Her parents don’t even care,” Harold “Doesn’t care about anything,” Nicole “I waste my time with her,” Jerry “Never asks questions,” Helen “Doesn’t come back for extra help,” Greg “Never focused,” Melissa “Doesn’t Study,” and Carey “Needs to pay more attention.”
Those labels take the pressure off teachers. Why is Greg failing? It is because he is never focused. Why does Mary not pass in any homework? It’s because her parents don’t care. See how easy it is! If you give each kid a label and a reason for their actions you remove responsibility from the teacher to figure it out and place it on the student. There is no need to continue wondering what is going on and why the kid is having problems. Greg would simply do better in class if he just focused. After labeling we perceive all of their actions as coming from that label.
We fear uncertainty. Labels prevent uncertainty by predicting results. Label a kid a jerk and that is what he is, no need to figure him out—it is certain what the problem is. No need to figure out why the kid is doing what they are doing. No need to try and figure out how to help the kid. They are just a jerk.
Labeling a kid also changes our reaction to their actions. When we label a kid we place our emotional baggage into the label and into our treatment of the kid. We react to everything based on past experiences that we have had. It is nearly impossible to not do this unless you stop, and realize that is what you are doing. We interpret the students’ actions as being done to us. If a student doesn’t hand in work the teacher says “He did not do MY work.” If a kid says that a class is boring it is “He told me that MY class was boring.” Teachers take the actions of the students personally, their words and actions hit on the baggage that we carry with us that was packed by our parents, our teachers, and our previous life experiences.
It’s easy to overreact when we interpret every event as done to us. And then afterwards, when we think about the action or re-tell the event it is just as good as experiencing it again. The same emotions boil up again, the same hormones are sent raging through our body. Research has shown that imagining an event is just as good as experiencing it in person. When a kid does something to you that you find offensive, how many times do you replay it in your head before the next day? By the time you see the kid 24 hours later it is like they stabbed you in the heart 100 times over because your brain has gone through the same process when you imagined it as when it actually happened. We have placed so much meaning into the words they have used that we no longer possess the ability to look at the action clearly and make an objective decision. We replay actions over and over in our head, feeding some need for us to be right and them to be wrong. We not only assign meaning to the words based on our emotional reaction, but also we need to make us victorious in the end—we must be right they must be wrong. We need to stop and not react to our reaction, but to the actual words and the person before us.
Not only does our baggage influence our reaction to a past event, but it also makes us predict the future. Think about what type of kids you hung out with when you were a teenager…I bet that you have no problem with kids you teach right now that would be considered part of that crowd. Think about the kids in high school that drove you crazy, and I bet you have problems connecting with that type of current student. Personal note—without identifying the group, there was one type of student that I never connected with for my first 12ish years of teaching. I then realized it was because of my past baggage with this “type” of student. Since then it has never been an issue. Come on…if you weren’t a metal head growing up, when a kid comes in on the first day with a Slayer shirt it’s hard to not have any preconceived notions about how they will behave and perform in your class.
The reality is that most teachers were good little students from good little homes. They sat up tall in their chairs, did all their homework, were respectful to adults, followed the rules, and played the game of school very well. When they come across a kid who doesn’t it is so hard to see that kid’s perspective. It is hard to for their mind to grasp why a kid does not “do well” in school. In those cases teachers rely on something that they can grasp to make sense out of the student’s behavior…label the kid with words.
“Words reduce reality to something the human mind can grasp.”
Eckhart Tolle
Yesterday I made my first presentation to a group of teachers. I led a session about integrating technology into the Social Studies Classroom at the Connecticut Council of Social Studies Annual Conference. I left very excited, not about my presentation, but about how much I learned about presenting this topic to adults. If it takes 10,000 hours to become an expert in something, I have 9,999 more presentations before I become an expert in making this presentation. What is amazing is even though I have been teaching 13 year olds for 20 years, this presentation still made me feel like I was up in front of a class of kids for the very first time. The clock was not my friend. I realized that the first part of my plans that were suppose to last 5 minutes, was taking 20. At the 45 minute mark I realized that there was no way I was getting to what I considered the best part and the “highlights” of session. I also wish I had given out some kind of quick feed back form—right now the only thing in my head is what I thought went good and bad, which might be totally opposite of what the audience thought.
I would like to encourage everyone to consider sharing their passion at an upcoming conference. If you hadn’t noticed, there seems to be fewer and fewer classroom (or ex-classroom) teachers presenting—or has it always been this way and I am just starting to notice. Too many teachers tend to be afraid to share what they are great at doing, and that fear shaped my presentation. Last June Karenne Sylvester left a comment on one of my posts that stuck out for me: “All too often we spend ages thinking about the ways we’re not good enough without thinking of all the ways we shine.” So true. I ended up sticking to a more “nuts-and-bolts” presentation on tools rather than the powerful work my kids have done with them. By the time I relaxed and realized what I was doing there were five minutes left and I actually said “Do you mind if I brag about something great that my kids do.”
I have a few more proposals in for conferences this year. I really wish I had had the courage years ago to submit proposals. I would have many more hours under my belt on my way to becoming an expert. Even if my other three get accepted, I will still have 9,996 more presentations to go
Sticks and stones will break may break my bones,
But words will never hurt me.
What kind of lunatic wrote that? I have had broken bones, lost lots of blood, received lots of stitches, and have received many black eyes. I can’t remember the story behind half of them. The cuts have healed, the bones have healed, and the scars have faded. I have been hurt by words. The scars from those words are just as painful today as they were the day they were said to me.
Sticks and stones may break bones, but bones heal, words can leave permanent damage.
My 11 year old daughter came home with a spelling test Monday to be signed—all tests have to be signed, even if it is a 100. On this test she received an “A” and under the grade was a note from the teacher that read “Your handwriting is terrible. It must improve or I will give you extra homework.” Terrible?!! If you want a kid to improve do you call them terrible? If my daughter’s friend was to give a presentation in class would a kid be able to stand up and say “that was terrible!” There are so many ways to motivate children to change their habits. Why do so many teachers use mean words? My daughter is the type of kid that would do anything if a teacher asks. Why not lean over her shoulder and whisper “ You are doing awesome on your spelling tests, but if you can just write a little neater it would really help me be able to read your answers.” Instead she feels terrible because she has been labeled terrible.
The words that are chosen by a teacher carry so much meaning and power. I think we all forget just how much power we have. When a kid falls down in class and forgets homework, does poorly on a test, or even is the biggest thorn in our side, we have a choice to use words that beat them down or lift them up. Great teachers do not focus on beating kids down and putting them in their “place.” Great teachers lift kids up with their words and reveal to students that they can do what they previously thought was impossible. They find a way to give their kids wings.
Until the eagle’s children discovered their wings there was no purpose for their lives.
David McNally
Last night we had a conference with my other daughter’s teacher. My wife mentioned that my daughter was a bit tired of being stuck in the same class again with some…ummm…rambunctious kids. The teacher talked about how she is taking a positive approach with dealing with these kids. She is not using a marble jar or a system of punishing rules. She is trying some positive management schemes that impacts the individuals and not the entire class, and that slowly their behavior is shaping up and changing. What I noticed, and I might totally be wrong here, is that her voice and body posture changed while telling us this–almost like she was bashful about going against the educational gods by not simply laying down the law, being strict, and using all those mean words to show them who was boss. She is in a school in which class wide punishments for single kids actions are common, and as I stated previously, mean words are used to change behavior.
She and every teacher should realize that what you do to one kid you do to the entire class. Saying mean words to one kid, is just like infecting the entire class. It shows the class that being mean, sarcastic, putting them in their place, or yelling is an acceptable form of behavior, and it should not surprise us that the students in those rooms often get in trouble for doing and saying the same things that the teachers have said to them. Using words to lift students, lifts the entire class. Being kind even while “disciplining” a kid reminds the entire class to be kind even when they are dealing with the knuckleheads in this world. In my daughter’s class it might take 10 months to get the kids “under control” but my daughter will have learned that love is more powerful than being mean. You can actually change negative behaviors by being kind, loving, and yes…even by being fun.
I wonder if mean words come from giving work that is not authentic… With authentic work, the lesson learned comes from the results. Miss a meeting and your client doesn’t hire you. Hand in paper work for a grant late and you don’t get the money. Repair cars incorrectly and the shop asks you to leave. Don’t make correct change as a cashier and the difference is taken from your pay. If you do something wrong in school for an assignment that in reality does not mean anything, do teachers feel the need to tech you a lesson with their words? Or do the words come from a place that is angry not because of the students actions but because of the teachers inability to control the actions?
I have noticed that by the time kids get to me they have already been “taught” who they are, how they should act, what they will be. Not blantantly, but in a subliminal way. The “smart” kids are encouraged to go onward and upward, the “troubled” kids, whether behavior or academic, are told do “this” or else–they are stuck in a constant struggle with someone who is trying to control them. The troubled kids have stopped believing in themselves, have stopped believing that they can use their wings to fly, and that they do have a purpose in this world. We spend a lot of time putting them down. We should be spending our time lifting them up and teaching them to spread their wings and fly.
The next time you have the have the opportunity to speak to a kid about that annoying behavior they have, whether it’s talking in class, not putting their name on their paper, chewing gum, or even being a bully…try using words that lift them up, instead of words that put them down. In the end you want them to fly with the eagles, instead of scratching down with the chickens
A man once found an eagle’s egg and put it in the nest of a barnyard hen. The eagle hatched and grew up with the rest of a brood of chicks and though he didn’t look at all the same. He scratched the earth for worms and bugs and played the chicken’s games. The eagle clucked and cackled, he made a chicken’s sound; He thrashed his wings, but only flew some two feet off the ground. That’s high as chickens fly, the eagle had been told. The years passed and one day when the eagle was quite old. He saw something magnificent flying very high and making great majestic circles up there in the sky. He’d never seen the likes of it. “What’s that?” he asked in awe, while he watched in wonder at the grace and power he saw. “Why that’s an eagle,” someone said, “He belongs up there, it’s clear. Just as we, since we are chickens, belong earthbound down here.” The old eagle just accepted that, most everybody does. And he lived and died a chicken, for that’s what he thought he was.
I write many of my blog posts while watching my daughters’ Karate class. When it’s my turn to take them to Karate I bring my laptop, write it, and post when I get home…although some days I come home with nothing. There are other posts that I start writing at home, do some pre-planning, add to at school, re-read, change, edit, delete, write again, etc. Those might be written over a two week period and I actually try to make them “my best.”
This summer it became very clear that the posts I took my time on and “tried” to do my best were the “least popular” as determined by the number of comments, hits, and re-tweets. The posts that I jammed out in 30 minutes in a fit, didn’t think about planning or revising…or barely proof reading get the glory(keep in mind glory for a bitty blogger like me would be 100 hits in a day and ten comments!!). The posts that I thought I was putting my heart and soul into and invest large amounts of time went no where (see one post below-do you know how much time that one took!!!). The posts that I thought were horrible become the most popular…hmmmm…
So I am sitting here at Karate and have been staring at a blank screen for 30 minutes—I resisted the urge of using one of the planned out topics on the paper in my pocket that I carry around. I feel no urge to write. I could take one of those topics and write. Nothing would be flowing out, it would be a highly planned, edited and revised post, and it would go nowhere.
I wonder how this plays out in my classroom. Many times the units I spend the most amount of time planning just flop, and the units that are spontaneous or the planned units that suddenly change mid course are the most successful. The work that the kids do that is the best is always based on spontaneous ideas, not the ones that are slowly shaped over time, edited and revised. It seems as though sudden light bulb moments create an energy within them that carries through to the end. Slowly developing an idea keeps the energy at an even pace that never seems to quite peak to excitement or greatness. I should add that I consider the light bulb moments are the ideas and products that result in changing kids. I am past the point in my career in which high grades and having the kids learn new skills and knowledge denotes a successful unit. I am looking for units and ideas that reveal to a student that they can do what they previously thought was impossible.
So I wonder…we essentially require the kids to be turned on everyday. To do their best, work to their potential, and be creative. Some days my light bulb is not on, how should I change things when their’s is not. Does the “bulb” come on in cycles? Because of me? Them? Time of day? Should I pay more attention to riding their creative wave? Allow more downtime?
Every year I run a series of experiments as I try new things. Somewhere in this light bulb analogy is an experiment taking shape.
“And only by being a welcome person in your student’s life can you — with all that you have to offer — find a place in their life and gain access to them so you can communicate with them, do your job as a teacher, and enjoy your students as a people.”
“For a small child there is no division between playing and learning; between the things he or she does ‘just for fun’ and things that are ‘educational.’ The child learns while living and any part of living that is enjoyable is also play.”
Penelope Leach
I believe school should be fun. When did learning become such serious business? It seems as though we have forgotten how to play and laugh, smile and maybe even get dirty. How many times a day do you smile to your kids? How many laughs do you share? I noticed when I came to my school that it is rare that a child looks up at me when I pass by them in the hallway…even rarer that they smile and say hello.
“Children engage in such (free) play because they enjoy it–it’s self-directed. They do not play for rewards; they enjoy the doing, not the end result. Once they get bored, they go on to do something else–and continue to learn and grow.”
Sheila G. Flaxman
It takes months before classes loosen up and laugh. Using humor in a class is a valuable skill. It is scientifically proven to increase student achievement. Have you heard about that one person who did his thesis on “Using humor in the classroom?” Yep, that was me. Humor goes hand-in-hand with play. Do you play in your classroom?
“In rare moments of deep play, we can lay aside our sense of self, shed time’s continuum, ignore pain, and sit quietly in the absolute present, watching the world’s ordinary miracles. No mind or heart hobbles. No analyzing or explaining. No questing for logic. No promises. No goals. No relationships. No worry. One is completely open to whatever drama may unfold.”
Diane Ackerman in Deep Play
Laughing and playing allows a class to bond. It allows for shared experiences. And yes, it releases some killer chemicals into your body that make you feel all warm and fuzzy. Somewhere along the line we have come to believe that learning is serious business. That school prepares kids for work. Work is serious. You are supposed to be “serious” and not supposed to laugh while working. Therefore, we should not be laughing and playing in school. Even when we create “fun” projects, it is done with an adult perspective. Adults’ sense of what should be fun for kids has been warped by decades of people telling us to grow up, act more mature, get serious and stop being foolish.
“PLAYING SHOULD BE FUN! In our great eagerness to teach our children we studiously look for ‘educational’ toys, games with built-in lessons, books with a ‘message.’ Often these ‘tools’ are less interesting and stimulating than the child’s natural curiosity and playfulness. Play is by its very nature educational. And it should be pleasurable. When the fun goes out of play, most often so does the learning.”
Joanne E. Oppenheim Kids and Play, ch. 1 (1984)
We spend so much time trying to get them to act and behave like us. Wonder what would happen if just for a day, we acted like them. What a grand and wonderful perspective of the world we would get. Imagine if for a day we dropped all of our adult baggage at the school’s front door and entered with the heart of a child that we all once possessed. We need to forgot many of the random rules that govern what is and is not acceptable. Walk down the hall “flapping our wings,” hop on one foot to get across the hall, and try to juggle the oranges at lunch.
“Innately, children seem to have little true realistic anxiety. They will run along the brink of water, climb on the window sill, play with sharp objects and with fire, in short, do everything that is bound to damage them and to worry those in charge of them, that is wholly the result of education; for they cannot be allowed to make the instructive experiences themselves.”
Sigmund Freud
Somehow we have been taught to scrutinize our every action. We have put limits on our fun, our laughter, our spirit. We have created rules about having fun that include where and when, how and how long, why and with whom. They are self imposed? school imposed? culturally imposed? limitations on our play.
“When we play, we sense no limitations. In fact, when we are playing, we are usually unaware of ourselves. Self-observation goes out the window. We forget all those past lessons of life, forget our potential foolishness, forget ourselves. We immerse ourselves in the act of play. And we become free.”
Lenore Terr in Beyond Love and Work
So I would like to invite all of you to play with the same spirit of your children. Sometimes it is very hard to walk into school with a smile. We teach in buildings in which fun, smiles, and laughter are extinct—and eventually our school days tend to be self-fulfilling prophecies. Remember to bring your own sunshine, smile daily, laugh a little more and teach like you are having a ball.
“For since most of our living is unconscious, play is like matchstrokes in the void, bringing into light the structures we behave by, illuminating for us, however briefly, our deep meanings.”
Why do we have to treat teachers like kids? There is a discussion going on in Twitter about getting teachers to use technology. We have to provide mentors, we have to model, we have to encourage, we have to provide an environment that supports mistakes, we have to encourage them to use the kids, we have to encourage it’s use…Seriously folks!
Around where I live a couple hundred years ago there were farmers everywhere. I am sitting where sheep once grazed. As the 19th Century progressed farming methods changed. Some farmers experimented and used the new methods their neighbors were using. Some read the new journals and books that were being published and used the new methods in a trial and error method. Still others simply experimented on their own and developed new implements and methods on their own. You know what happened to all the rest that refused to change? They disappeared. They had to give up farming because their old methods and outdated crops simply could not turn a profit. It is still happening around me with farms. There are many successful farms, they have embraced new technology but more importantly they have anticipated the needs of their local market and are producing what that market wants and needs. Many small farms are opening in my state. They are being run by a different type of farmer who looks to the future, who learns constantly, who embraces the advantage that technology can give, who uses new marketing tools, who provide their customers with new and unique items, who change with the needs of their customers, farmers who don’t have to be told to change in order to survive–they just get it. They go out and find mentors, work on other folks farms with roles models, read and study new research, and enter the business knowing that they are going to make mistakes and in order to survive they will have to learn and change from them.
Maybe instead of spending so much time cajoling teachers into using technology we should just stop and let nature take its course. Maybe we should just let them disappear. My big ol’ guess is that the same people we are complaining about have problems much bigger than they just don’t integrate tech. Maybe we should just let evolution take its course and they will go extinct and be replaced by a leaner meaner breed of teachers who just “get it” and focus our attention on them. Focus our attention on changing hiring practices. Focus our attention on preservice teachers. What if everyone who wants change became a cooperating teacher and worked with student teachers? What if everyone leading PD volunteered to go into a college class?
Seriously folks, why should we spend so much time changing stubborn teachers. Let them go extinct.
PS-I believe this post represents the first time I have used the word cajole
PSS-This post represents the views of Paul’s alter-ego, the one he would like to be somedays when he is frustrated, not the one that represents him every day at school. While Paul’s alter-ego would like those ol’ stubborn coots to go extinct, Paul’s other ego will continue to help out and offer PD as much as he can. As a matter of fact he has submitted submissions for four workshops just in the last week alone. He believes that even flocks of Dodos should be given a second chance for survival.
About a month ago I was contacted by the publisher of the book Educating Esme. She asked simply if I would mind reading the book by Esme Raji Codell and mention it a blog post. My first thought was that sounds great–a free book and I don’t even have to do a “book review.” What I was most excited about however, was that the book is based on the author’s first year experiences in a very difficult inner city school right around the time I was experiencing my first year teaching at a very difficult inner city school. It was an experience which I had never fully reflected on and I thought that I could write a post about my decade in the “‘ville” and throw in the title of the book to meet my obligation. Last Saturday I sat down to read the book and four hours later I was done. The book was the blog post I have always wanted to write about my experiences. I read words that I have written and spoken, relieved the experiences that made first ten years of teaching a living nightmare, and and at the same time a dream come true. Codell somehow magically wrote a book that did not depress me by making me relieve the experiences, but her words served as motivation to continue doing what I do. Codell reminds us that “You can’t test what sort of teacher someone will be, because testing what someone knows isn’t the same as what someone is able to share.” What she shares is motivation, inspiration, and love of students. No where does she say “do this,” but somehow this became one of only two books in my twenty years of teaching that truly inspired me to keep doing what I do.
I thought that after teaching in my first school for ten years that I was burned out and finished. My wife had given me a copy of Parker Palmer’s The Courage to Teach three years earlier and after attempting to read it several times, after my tenth year I read it cover to cover one weekend–for some reason something just clicked. That book kept me alive in the classroom, and gave me the courage to change schools and continue teaching. Flash forward ten more years. I have entered another phase of questioning why I do what I do. Recently I have felt as though I am losing the “battle.” I have become very discouraged. Educating Esme is helping me snap out of my funk. When I was reading about her classroom experiences, it made clear that the reason I teach is because of the twenty-five kids infront of me, not to change the system. The “battle” is won when I realize I am “teaching” the right way, not when the entire system shifts to use new methods and tools. Somehow my scope had moved beyond the class, and I needed her book to bring my focus back to my classroom.
So in lieu of a post on my experiences, and instead of an official book review, I would like to go back through the book and leave you with a few of my thoughts and several of the lines that I have notes scribbled next to or have highlighted.
How many of you feel as though every time you have a great idea you should keep it to yourself because the rest of the staff just to destroy it?
“If you give people an idea these days, they just think you are sharing it with them so they can critique it, play devils advocate, and so on. It doesn’t occur to them that they might help or get enthused or at least have the courtesy to get out of your way.”
Most new teachers look at me with shock when I tell them that they don’t have to hear everything, and that you can be loudest when you whisper. Some lessons she gathered from her mentor:
“Ignoring bad behavior as long as you can stand it…How a soft voice can be more effective than a loud voice. Starting out with positive comments to parents before lowering the boom. Waiting patiently for children to answer questions.”
I am trying this tomorrow. What a great symbolic gesture to make at the beginning of class.
“…I collect “troubles in a “trouble basket,” a big green basket into which the children pantomime unburdening their home worries so they can concentrate on school.”
I often fall victim to believing that I am making a difference by pointing out problems and because I am passionate about “change.” I have to remember that unless I have a plan to move forward, I don’t really have a plan.
“In reference to other colleagues: As long as they are freaking out, they feel busy, like they must be doing work. Getting upset is force, but no motion. Unless we are moving the children forward, we aren’t doing any work.”
How can you give kids confidence? Do they know this about you?
“They know I would never let them fail.”
Too often teachers get angry at the kids who say “I don’t care,” or the kids who get angry in class. Negative emotions are met with negative emotions. When I read what I nearly say word-for-word in Cordell’s book it reminded me that love is always going to be more powerful than punishment.
“You can hate me all you want. That’s your prerogative, your choice. But no matter how you feel about me, I will always love you.”
“I am sorry you are angry, but I still love you, and I won’t allow you to fail.”
After ten years in my first school I moved on out to the ‘burbs. The meanest nastiest kid in my new school would have been the valedictorian in my old one. No one could even imagine the difference between the two. I could carry a wallet in my new school. Leave a pen on my desk. Walk out and use the bathroom. And could drive to school with my doors unlocked. My new school was…dare I say…easy. After receiving praise from a principal in a new school she reflected:
“…but I didn’t break up any fights…I didn’t take any children home to hide…I didn’t fear for my life…”
When I left my first school after ten years I felt incredible guilt, and I still have pangs of guilt today ten years later. I want to blame the kids and school for taking away ten years of my life. Every day was painful. Every day brought anguish and sadness. Unless you have taught at one of those hardcore urban schools you cannot even begin to relate to the violence, the bureaucratic mess, crumbling buildings and supplies, rotating administration, no parental involvement, and having to referee fights each week . Looking back, I can now say those kids made me who I am today. While they are responsible my gray hair, they are also responsible for forcing a unique perspective on how kids learn, and the importance of second chances.
“Wrongly I have thought teaching lessened me at times, but now I experience a teacher’s great euphoria, the knowledge like a drug that will keep me: Thirty-one children. Thirty-one chances. Thirty-one futures, our futures. It’s almost psychotic feeling, believing that part of their lives belongs to me. Everything they become, I also become. And everything about me, they helped to create.”
Many teachers reccomend a package of The World is Flat and A Whole New Mind to show teachers how the world is changing and how teachers need to change with it. While the world is changing, the spirit of great teachers remains the same. If you know anyone who needs to have their teacher spirit fed, buy A Courage to Teach, and place on top of it Educating Esme. To repeat a quote Cordell included from Neila Conners, “If you don’t feed the teachers, they will eat the kids.”
