Complacency Makes Me Cringe

 Complacency has been on my mind this week because of the number of times I have interacted with complacent people or heard mention of it by others, and it makes me cringe. As any English teacher would do,  I looked up the word in the dictionary for more careful consideration of what I would write about it.  Cambridge Dictionaries Online defines complacency as "a feeling of calm satisfaction with your own abilities or situation that prevents you from trying harder."

When I started this post several hours ago, it started as a rant about complacency in the workplace, but as I continued to muse on the topic, I realized I had to discuss the more serious issues of complacency we heard this week at the 50th Anniversary of the March on Washington and the celebration of Martin Luther King, Jr's iconic "I Have a Dream" speech.  (a speech I always enjoyed reading and analyzing with my students)

All across twitter on Wednesday we saw people share their own #Ihaveadream ideas, and many people in education shared dreams of learning opportunities for all, learning opportunities based on more innovative ideas, opportunities to never stop learning.  So, when I also encountered numerous statements indicative of an attidude of complacency, I cringed.

"That innovation stuff just isn't me; I'm more of a traditional gal."
 So, listen, I have nothing against tradition.  In fact, there are many traditions I respect and some for which I feel nostalgic, especially in relation to classic literature, art, and music.  Believe me, I enjoy my share of the classics.  However,  I cringe when I encounter people who refuse to consider a new approach anything--learning, teaching, creating presentations.  I've even heard--"I've been teaching over a decade; I know how to lecture and teach writing" or "I earned a degree in this field years ago, so I know how to plan for a presentation."  As if presentation styles haven't changed in twenty years?  Seriously?

Consider the person who says--"I can't work too hard because I'm a single parent, and my child requires my attention."  To not even try harder is unacceptable to me; it makes the rest of us have to work even harder, and even if we enjoy what we do, it's cringe worthy to be associated (by default) with a lack of effort.  I work in the field of education, so all adults should be modeling for students the diligence, determination, persistence, and hard work we expect of children and teens.

Forever glued in my mind is a statement of a former co-worker who rarely did any work outside work hours.   "I don't have much work to do at home, but I do carry the problems of students home in my heart."  To be sure, complacency or perceived laziness or lack of interest is a downer at work, and it even hinders the organization for which you work.

Nonetheless, there are other even more serious reasons to avoid complacency.  Consider what we heard this week from President Obama at the 50th Anniversary of the March on Washington.  "They did not die in vain, Their victory was great.  But we would dishonor those heroes as well to suggest that the work of this nation is somehow complete.  The arc of the moral universe may bend towards justice, but it doesn't bend on its own.  To secure the gains this country has made requires constant vigilance, not complacency."

at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial April 2013

Indeed, there is much work to be accomplished in this world--in our lifetime.  For the sake of equality for all people, for the sake of children who deserve an opportunity to learn, for the sake of those who have gone before us.  We must not be complacent in efforts to make a difference.

Seeing The Leader in Me in Action

Last week I was invited to visit with two elementary schools in our district.  Anytime I have the opportunity to visit a school, I think my job is the best.  What was unique about this particular visit was the focus on seeing how "The Leader in Me" schools operate. 

We visited classrooms where students greeted us by standing, holding their arms out wide and announcing "Welcome to Ms. _____'s class.  We are the class of 2024."  What an incredible way to start from their earliest years believing and acting on the fact that all students will graduate from high school.

As a former high school teacher, I can imagine the students I taught over the years who could have benefited from instilling in their heads the idea that they would indeed graduate. Helping them believe and act upon this important fact throughout their K-12 schooling, instead of focusing on trying to survive the last four years of high school would have been a much more positive approach for those who struggled.

We saw The Leader in Me curriculum being taught in several different ways.  In one classroom, the students were echo reading from The Leader in Me student booklets for second grade.  The lesson on the day we visited was about Habit 1--Be Proactive.  Students echo read with the teacher and talked with their partner about their circles of control.  Seeing these young students discuss what they could and could not control in their lives was impressive because it's easy to see how learning the 7 habits can benefit them throughout their entire lives.

As a mom I am always using similar language with my sons when we discuss appropriate attitudes and behavior.  Even though my ten year old's elementary school is not a Leader in Me school, I was impressed when he brought home a note from his teacher to him and she commented on his leadership abilities.  He was so proud of that simple handwritten note--he displayed it in a card stand.  Imagine how much more powerful his leadership abilities might be if his school also utilized The Leader in Me curriculum.

In another classroom, we saw The Leader in Me curriculum embedded within literacy instruction to ensure students were still mastering the Common Core Standards as required in our state. 

In addition to visiting classrooms, we had an opportunity to talk with parents of students in the two schools.  They shared with us their satisfaction with the program, and they talked to us about how they use the same language the students are learning about leadership at school at home as part of the schools' family involvement approach.  It's always great to hear from fellow parents who are not working in schools themselves because sometimes I feel my perspective might be skewed because I work in education.

By far my favorite part of the day was the panel discussion with students.  They shared their leadership notebooks and talked with us about personal and academic goal setting, and they told us what they liked about The Leader in Me.  They also responded very articulately to a series of questions from all the adults in the room.  Their confidence and poise was amazing!  The students see the benefit of what they are learning and the way The Leader in Me is transforming their school and the way adults in their schools interact with them.  A fourth grader shared--"Kids have a lot to offer and until The Leader in Me, people never really cared to ask us."


 Cheers to my two sons on their first day of school 2013-2014 with great hopes that their leardership skills continue to shine.

 Lexington Kentucky USA

First day of 5th grade

First day of 7th grade

10 for 10: Picture Books an English Teacher Enjoys with Her Sons

This morning while browsing twitter within minutes of waking (according to #twitterrevolution I am not alone in this behavior), I noticed in my feed #pb10for10 and decided to take a look.  Here's what I learned:  Mandy @ Enjoy-EmbraceLearning and Cathy @ Reflect & Refine sponsor a Picture Book 10 for 10 book jog each August.

I couldn't resist.  So here I am on Saturday morning posting my own 10for10 post.  Theme:  10 pictures books an English/Arts & Humanities Teacher enjoys sharing with her sons.  I like these books for a myriad of reasons—for the exposure to authors, music, artists, beautiful words and language, and most importantly because they became not only my favorites, but between my two sons (now ages 10 & 12) these became their favorites as well.

1.   Henry Builds a Cabin  by D. B. Johnson

My English teacher self couldn’t resist sharing this book with my sons.  Thanks to D.B. Johnson, my sons have a full awareness of who Henry David Thoreau is and why I think his work is important.  There is also available--Henry Climbs a Mountain and Henry Hikes to Fitchburg.  We've read them all, but the boys like the dimensions of Thoreau's cabin in this one.

2.  Library Mouse by Daniel Kirk

As library mouse hides away in a school library writing his own books for each genre, this is an excellent tale reminding us that we are all writers.  This is another message I wanted my sons to hear to encourage them to enjoy writing and know that they are capable.  (Right now neither of them prefer writing because most of their writing experiences at school have been spent practicing for the state writing test)

3.  John Coltrane’s Giant Steps remixed by Chris Raschka

Illustrations, words, and style all portray improv—this book is a great way to learn about jazz improvisation.

4.  Slowly, Slowly, Slowly said the Sloth by Eric Carle

From an early age, my oldest child has enjoyed science and nature, and since we enjoyed other Eric Carle books, this one became a delight to us because of the beautiful language and vocabulary.  At the end of the book, the sloth finally replies to the onslaught of attacks from other animals who accuse him of being lazy.  “It is true that I am slow, quiet, and boring.  I am lackadaisical, I dawdle, and I dillydally.  I am also unflappable, languid, stoic, impassive, sluggish, lethargic, placid, calm, mellow…”

5.  Old Cricket by Lisa Wheeler

"Old Cricket woke up feeling, cranky, crotchety, and cantankerous, so when his missus asked him to ready the roof for winter, he came up with a clever plan."  We loved the opening lines as well words the old cricket uses instead of curse words of today.  Plus, it’s a great tale about how the cricket tried many excuses to get out of work but really just needed to dig-in and prepare the roof for winter.

6.  Lego Star Wars The Visual Dictionary

This one became a favorite for my youngest son because of his interest in building and creating with Legos, and his love of all things Star Wars.  I have to admit, it took a while for me to enjoy this book, but after reading it again and again with my son, I couldn’t help myself.  Plus, this book became a great example to me of why we can’t base all our reading decisions for students on Lexile level.  This Lexile level for this book is much higher than my son’s Level, yet he can read the book because it’s a perfect match for him as a reader.

7.  The Cat in the Hat by Dr. Seuss

We definitely have this one memorized and can recite it in its entirety.  Who doesn’t love this one?

8.  Masterpieces Up Close:  Western Painting from the 14th to 20th Centuries

With flip open tabs and close-up shots of sections of each painting, this book became a great one for teaching my boys about masterpieces of Western visual art.

9.  The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein

What I love about this one?  My ten and twelve year old will still let me read it to them periodically and they love the story.

10.  Hush Little Baby by Sylvia Long

I end with this one because my ten year old still asks me to sing this version of the song to him at night when he goes to sleep.  This natural and beautiful adaptation of the old lullaby has been part of our nighttime routine for twelve years (My oldest is twelve).  Once the boys heard the original version of the song and commented that it was incorrect.  Though my twelve year old no longer asks me to sing him to sleep on a nightly basis, my ten year old is still cool with it and asks me to sing this song to him right before he nods off.  (Sshh:  He would be embarrassed if he knew I’m telling you—if I’ve been out of town for work or if he’s sick—the twelve year old has asked for the song within the last year).

Six Tips for Facilitating Workgroups

People assume educators know how to facilitate teacher teams or workgroups with other adults, but my experience tells me we all have something to learn about facilitating work with our adult peers.


1)  Listen.  Just like students tell us when we are not reaching them, our adult peers let us know when a workgroup or team is not functioning effectively.  If we listen and respond to the needs of the group, we are more likely to accomplish our goals.  This might mean we have to adjust our own style and approach to meet the needs of the team/work group we are facilitating.  This doesn't mean we are losing track of who we are as an individual, but it does mean we are creating an environment conducive to learning and achieving our common goals.

2)  Set Goals.  We establish objectives and goals in classrooms, right?  We should also establish goals for how teams working together.  The goals should be established as a team and posted with the norms for the group.

3)  Establish Norms.  This one was hard for me to understand when I first started facilitating groups because I'm of the mind that everyone should just be nice and play fair!  Experience has shown me norms help ensure a team functions effectively toward

Mount St. Helen's 2013

achieving the stated goals.  (Sports teams have rules and procedures for a similar reason, right?  And, what about emergency teams who deal with volcanoes erupting?  They have protocols, too.  Side Note:  In 1980 when Mount St. Helen's erupted, protocols and procedures were what ensured rescue workers could save lives)  When groups are learning to work together, some even need to have the norms posted on the wall with protocols for what to do if someone in the group is not adhering to a norm.

4)  Use Protocols.  Speaking of emergency management teams, in education--we could learn from protocols that provide step-by-step approaches to a particular aspect of the work.  For example, teachers have become accustomed to using protocols for examining

student work.  Protocols can also be used for designing units of study or for sharing ideas.  Depending upon a particular group, more formal or less formal protocols might be needed.  It's a good idea to have a few protocols ready when facilitating a group anyway (e.g., a tuning protocol is almost essential).

5)  Reflect.  Educators who facilitate PD or other workgroup events are usually pretty good about distributing evaluations at the end of the day or end of the session, but how often do we debrief and reflect together following those individual reflection minutes?  Reflecting in a debriefing sort of format allows the good, the bad, and the ugly to be addressed immediately with decisions made as a group about how to change the working session for the next time. 

6)  Revise.  Educators are queens and kings of revision.  It's what we do in our quest to ensure learning meets the needs of students.  As a facilitator we must also think about learning from the reflection and debriefing time and revising.  Sometimes we can't wait until the end of a session--(just like we can't always wait until the end of a class period) some situations call for immediate revision.  This will be facilitated more naturally if we are following the first tip on this list--listening.

What do you think?  What am I missing from this list of tips for facilitation?  Do you have any resources to add to my list of favorites below?

Some of my favorite resources on facilitation and/or protocols.

Coalition of Essential Schools.
http://www.essentialschools.org/resources/250

All Things PLC
http://www.allthingsplc.info/

Taking a Leap

I am someone who talks of stepping out of comfort zones to innovate and try new things, but I am also someone who talks this talk but hesitates to take action for fear of failure. Well, I have decided to step out--to take a leap--and to risk failure.

Late this spring I was offered an opportunity to be part of a brand new organization with a mission in which I believe and a hope to transform education in my state.  The risks here are those related to any new organization just beginning, funding and effective leadership. As a non-profit organization, we will be raising funds continually to keep the organization alive and thriving to support the work of innovative teachers and schools in our state.  We will be working with the Board to establish a strategic plan and vision whereby we measure success based on real results.

I could have remained in the local school system where I was enjoying my work with literacy curriculum, instruction, and assessment in secondary schools and where I served as a literacy specialist and resource teacher leader for 12 middle schools, 5 high schools, and numerous programs.  However, had I remained in this position I would have remained in a place of comfort and stability and would not have been walking my talk of the importance of stepping out and taking risks for the sake of creating fresh learning experiences for students. 

My hopes and plans for my new adventure are that 

1) I will learn

2) I will lead

3) I will contribute 

and will do all of the above with the same passion and commitment I have always had for teaching and learning.

Seattle, WA (makes me think adventure)

Balancing Work and Play

Three states, three conferences, a new job, a Bob Dylan/Wilco concert, and two family birthday celebrations later, I am blogging again and on the topic of balance in life.  One of my least favorite questions to answer is--how do you find the time to do everything you do?  For me, it's about prioritizing, and what's at the top of the priority list fluctuates from day to day or hour to hour, depending upon what's happening in my life at any particular time.  For the past few weeks, blogging was not at the top of my priority list because I decided to spend more time with family and friends in between traveling for work and seeing sites in the beautiful state of Washington with friends.

view of Mount St. Helens from our hike

I just finished a stint where I worked three jobs.  One full-time job for the local public school system, seven months of free-lance writing for a company wanting explanations and instructional strategies for the common core standards, and finally since April, a part-time educational consultancy position for a new non-profit organization.

While most anyone who knows me well will tell you I enjoy working a lot, most will also tell you I adore my family and work hard to provide for them.  Personally,  I also know I would not want to continue working three jobs at the pace I was working.  I was driven by specific goals and the need for balancing work and family play time.  Initially, I accepted the free-lance writing gig to earn money for a family vacation to Washington, D.C.. Knowing I would have an entire week of play with the most important people in my life kept me motivated.  

After that trip, my drive to finish what I started and to fulfill a commitment kept me going. Writing explanations for the standards allowed me to spend more time understanding and revisiting the standards we use in most of the states in the USA when I work with teachers on designing units of study.

The part-time consultancy position?  How could I resist? The organization encapsulates many of the very priorities I appreciate and desire for public education--a focus on transforming education in our state.  As of July1, I am back to one full-time job with this brand new organization. 

In the coming months, you can expect to see me continue blogging because it's important to me, but I also plan to

Hike more...

Exercise more...

Read more..more..more...

Write more...

Volunteer more...

See more live music...

Attend more cross country meets...

Attend more soccer games...

And, of course, I plan to do all these things with the people who matter most to me.

at the Bob Dylan/Wilco concert

                                             

"I Choose C:" Common Core, Collaboration, and Creativity

The first time I saw this video it was shared by our superintendent with a group of instructional leaders, and you can only imagine how I laughed and also cringed at the reality.  Just like the girl in this video, too many of our students are not ready for life beyond our public schools.  As educators, it's up to us to provide opportunities that move beyond simple multiple choice tests which do not always promote the thinking and reasoning required of us all throughout life.

I have shared this video widely with teachers who feel they are doing all they can to prepare students but also often feel bound by high stakes assessments and other mandates from well-intentioned reform specialists.   Thankfully, LDC performance based tasks ask more of our students than a multiple choice test.  My friend, Sherri, has even mentioned after using LDC to implement the Common Core in her classroom, her students perform better on high stakes multiple choice tests, and they leave her classroom able to create, think, discuss, and perform well for job and/or college interviews.

At a recent  TALK (Teaching Advocates Leading Kentucky) conference, Sherri and I presented a session on using LDC (Literacy Design Collaborative) to implement the Common Core.  Another colleague from Colorado attended the session and asked me to share with our ECET2 Colleague Circle group.  Although flattered, I also realized I wasn't sure how to share the face-to-face conversation with an online audience.  My Colorado colleague suggested I start with anecdotal narrative, so here we go...

Session Goal:  Reflect on effective teaching of Common Core State Standards by delving into practical resources, collaborating with colleagues, and networking through social media. 

We opened the session by playing this video and asking participants to fill in this graphic organizer.  The debriefing following the video set the context for a session focused on Common Core, collaboration, and creativity.  All important topics to Sherri and me.  We both believe rich text-based discussions are one way to promote critical thinking and creativity; therefore, we transitioned into a Paideia Seminar led by Sherri.  We asked volunteers to come to the round table in the center of the room where they quickly made name placards and then read the text we had selected for discussion. The text open for discussion was an excerpt from Malcolm X's autobiography, a section where he writes about learning to read and practicing his writing.  Sherri began by asking each member of the circle to share a most important line from the text and to articulate why it was most important.  In addition to facilitating and mapping the conversation, Sherri stepped out of her role as facilitator to explain logistics of leading a Paideia Seminar in a classroom.  All told, the discussion was shorter than it would be in a classroom since we stopped it to move on to other parts of our session, but the participants seemed to get a feel for why text-based discussion is an integral part of LDC modules.

Because non-print text is also an important part of the Common Core, we transitioned to an analysis of an image of Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X together and surrounded by people.   I shared with the group various strategies for analyzing non-print text, including my favorite process where we move carefully through a few steps.  (Note:  This is by no means the only way to analyze an image.  However, I have found this step by step process is helpful when working with people who have little experience analyzing images.)

Step 1:  Describe and identify everything you see in the image (it works nicely if you cut the image into four quadrants and show one quadrant at a time before displaying the entire image all in one piece).  This step ensures you look carefully and study what's in the image before you begin making interpretations and/or evaluations.

Step 2:  Interpret (think about) what you see in the image and provide justification for your interpretations.  For our session, we asked participants to share their interpretations using electronic post-its on a Padlet wall  created for this session.  

Step 3:  Reflect.  We talked about how these interpretations or even quotes from the text we read prior could be used in the essays for the LDC task. 

We wrapped up our session by asking participants to share and network via other online collaboration tools (Linoit.com) and a document in Google Drive that lists websites for tools related to Common Core implementation and also with twitter handles and hashtags for people to follow.

So, Learning to Muse readers--please continue sharing ideas and resources you have for implementing the Common Core or for great teaching strategies that will ensure our students recieve an education focused on critical thinking and creativity.

What I am Learning from Design Thinking

For the past two years, I have had the great privilege of participating in several design thinking workshops as a way to seek solutions to barriers and issues in education.  I have left each workshop feeling invigorated, motivated, and ready to continue pursuing solutions in re-designing public education.

Human-centeredness is essential.  We know this, don’t we?  But do we listen and remember why we do what we do and why we make the decisions we make?  Do we stay focused on the needs of the students?   We can do this by listening and showing empathy for given situations.  In one of the design thinking workshops where I participated, students sat with us as we practiced our listening skills.  Students told us about their own dreams for ensuring girls in their rural school possessed more positive body image.  Together, adults and teens brainstormed ideas for solving the problem the girls identified.  The teens and their principal left the workshop with concrete possibilities after the groups prototyped several of the ideas generated during the brainstorming session.

Facilitation skills make an enormous difference.  In my early years of learning to teach, I wrote my philosophy of teaching and included language such as “I am a facilitator of learning… .”  Over the course of eleven years in the classroom, I fluctuated on a continuum of facilitator__teacher.  The constant was always a focus on maintaining a student-centered classroom (thanks to my teacher preparation program).

Facilitating meetings with adults is only slightly different than facilitating learning with a group of teenagers.  It helps to utilize an inquiry approach and to remember the facilitator shouldn't be seen as the expert, but as someone who is curious about the topic/question of study.  Last week I participated in a design thinking workshop in Chicago, the facilitators possessed excellent facilitation skills as they led a group of educators from Colorado and Kentucky through six workstations where we considered potential barriers to collaboration among teachers across the two states, and then we worked to create possible solutions to

these barriers.  With this topic being so heavy and with a need to end the day with solutions, one might expect that we were exhausted at the end of the day.  On the contrary, we left the downtown Chicago studio feeling invigorated and excited about our next steps for our collaborative project.  The facilitators led the group process, helped us improve our communications, examine barriers, and achieve our outcome of creating a community of practice.

Prototypes are a vital part of the process.  Just like in brainstorming, there are no rules while creating a prototype.  Instead of asking, can I _______?  Ask, how will I______?  This is when we test out our ideas, so we can refine them and improve the process and/or product we are creating.  For our day in Chicago, educators from Colorado and Kentucky were coming together, but before we convened, our facilitators prototyped the process with teachers from the Chicago area.  Then those teachers joined us for the day, bringing new perspectives to our planning.

Collaboration is key.  Maybe this is one of my most favorite parts of design thinking because I have long sought collaborative opportunities in education.  Bringing different perspectives and interdisciplinary approaches to learning enhances the experience for all involved.  Who says educators have to stay within our isolated towers of subject area?  Who says students have to learn one subject at a time?  Design thinking encourages collaboration across disciplines, professions, and demographics, recognizing each individual and promoting listening and equality.

I suspect my foray into design thinking has only just begun because I see it as a way to discover, imagine, create, research, renew, and re-focus public education for the very people it’s intended to serve.

The Grouchy Ladybug & Naysayers

The topic for this post has been coming for several months now as I've been dealing with a couple of naysayers in my world of education.  You know the type?  The ones who find something wrong with everything you suggest or a problem with any idea you pose?  Earlier this year I started reading articles for tips on dealing with naysayers, and I have attempted to apply some of the tips and have thought through many of the suggestions and the implications around the approaches.  Basically, I have spent an enormous amount of energy thinking about how to deal with negativity and naysaying.  Last night, it even crept into my dreams while I slept.  Obviously, it’s time for me to re-think the strategies I've been using to deal with naysaying and negativity.

Peering at the books on our bookshelf in the living room this evening, I noticed an old copy of Eric Carle’s The Grouchy Ladybug and decided to read it for inspiration.  Of course the grouchy ladybug in this story is grouchy because he doesn't want to share, so he travels around the world provoking fights with larger animals and then saying “hey you—want to fight?---oh you’re not big enough…”  This ladybug is in such a bad mood that he picks a fight every hour for an entire day with insects and animals of every size.  At the end of the day, a whale’s tale slaps the ladybug into his proper place, sending him all the way back to the leaf where the story began, where the friendly and cheery ladybug is waiting to share a leaf full of aphids.  The grouchy ladybug eats the aphids shared with him by the friendly ladybug and ends up thanking his cheery counterpart.

I suspect the negative people I encounter are afraid of change or they don't want to come across as not knowing everything.  But we must admit change is needed in public education to meet the needs of learners.  I push for changes in education and transformation to the usual way of working because I'm not okay with the current situation.  I want new and innovative learning opportunities for kids and for adults, and I'm not okay with hearing people say "that's the way we've always done it" or "if you are around here long enough you will learn that's not the way things work around here" or "that's just the way X school is--you'll never change that!"  

The Grouchy Ladybug story with a happy ending leaves me feeling positive tonight because I know the reasons I push for change in education are for the right reasons, and there will always be naysayers.  I just need to remain cheerful and committed to the process.

Unhappy Captives in Education

My completely amazing wedding anniversary weekend included celebratory memory sharing, dining out in our own city sans children, and hearing live music together like we did when we were twentysomething.   We heard brilliant music, and I was completely struck by this one statement in description of the band, Night Beds, on the music venue’s website—

“…when one is studying engineering in Nashville, and the other remains behind, an unhappy captive of secondary education....”

Night Beds performing in Lexington, KY
May 26, 2013

This statement stayed with me throughout the evening while we watched the five member band play.  I couldn't help but wonder which musician was the unhappy captive because they all looked like they were enjoying themselves as they played music.  The musicians listened, watched, and communicated with one another to create an astonishingly pleasing sound.  

 

It happens that while at this show, we ran into some people we know who have children in our local public school system.  Since they know I’m an educator, they asked me about “the archaic disciplinary system” which punishes children by excluding them from end of the year celebratory events for the smallest offenses.  It’s no wonder these same young elementary school students go on to middle and high school to become unhappy captives of a public school system that wedges free spirited and artistic children into standardized robots.  Why do we insist on making children fit the school system instead of making the school system fit the children?  

Why can’t talent and artistry like we heard at this show be honed in more of our public schools?  Why can't we take the interest kids/teens have in music and use it to help them learn?  Don't get me wrong.  I know it happens, but it's obviously not the norm, nor the experience for the vast majority of kids in our nation.

Musing on National Poetry Month

On this last day of national poetry month, I’m musing about the shared poetry experiences I have had during April.  Even though I enjoy poetry all year long, there is something special about the month of April and the emphasis on the appreciation of poetry that brings people together to enjoy rich language.

Highlights from April

An Opportunity to Share

In the weeks prior to April, I sent an email to all the English department chairs in our district, asking them to share a couple of links related to national poetry month and asking them to share with their colleagues.  I am so glad I did this because all month long teachers have been sharing poems and poetry projects with me based on the work happening in their classrooms.  I heard about poetry slams and writing projects, saw examples of students work, and witnessed teachers smiling in the midst of End of Course Testing.

A Poem Per Day Project

A young high school English teacher from the district has been sharing daily poems performed by students.  He sends a different text and a video file each day.  Seeing the variety of poems students select makes me smile because it’s obvious the teacher provides choice in the project, so it is more meaningful to each student.  This tiny paragraph only hints at the enjoyment I received all month long from watching the students perform.  Unfortuantely, the links were shared through the district’s Sharepoint site and are not available for public viewing. 

A Pulitzer Winning Poet

On the very day one of the students performed a poem by Sharon Olds, one of my all-time favorite poets, Olds won a Pulitzer for Stag’s Leap. I was first introduced to the poetry of Sharon Olds while in college when my English professor handed me a book of her poems because he knew me well enough to know I would enjoy her work.  I have blogged previously about that experience in a post on close reading.  Poetry  (and excellent professors in the English department at Piedmont College = primary reason I learned to read closely).

A New Kentucky Poet Laureate

A former student, Amanda, who is now a friend and mentee sent me  a text message the day Kentucky’s new Poet Laureate, Frank X Walker was inducted for 2013-2014.  She texted to ask if I would be going to the induction ceremony.  Unfortunately, I had other obligations and was unable to go.  I encouraged Amanda to head over from her job in Frankfort to the Capitol Rotunda for the ceremony.  She was glad she made the trek and even sent me a picture she took with her phone and agreed to let me post it here.

A Poem in My Pocket

For the past several years, I have been a faithful participant in National Poem in Your Pocket Day.  This is when my introverted self becomes outspoken and slightly edgy for the day as I walk around asking people what poem they are carrying in their pocket and then telling them (or sharing, if they let me) the poem I am carrying.  This year I carried “The Wound Dresser” by Walt Whitman.  I carried this poem because  1) our family recently returned from Washington DC where we saw a quote from this poem at the entry tothe DuPont Circle Metro  and 2) National Poem in Your Pocket  Day was the day after the Boston Marathon bombing and I had the wounded victims on my mind.

A Poetry Bell Ringer Series

A former colleague shared her daily class warm up for the month.  Students read a poem and used a line from the poem to launch their journal writing for the day.  She provides more specifics on her blog.  In addition to sharing this bell ringer activity, she also encouraged people to utilize the Poetry Foundation’s new poetry app.  I loaded it and love it! Coincidentally, I had lost contact with this colleague because she moved to a new state,  but we reconnected via twitter during the fabulous month of April.

How do you share and enjoy poetry all year long?  Do you do anything special to celebrate poetry in the month of April?  I would love to hear your thoughts and ideas.

The Common Core is Not the Problem, Nor is the Common Core the Solution

Write the spelling words 3-5 times each on Mondays, write them in a sentence on Tuesdays, complete a spelling worksheet on Wednesdays, take a practice test on Thursdays, and a final test on Fridays.  Take a practice on-demand writing assessment once a month in every class.  Read the same book as everyone else in your class, answer questions about the book and write an open response question.  Copy notes from the teacher’s power point, memorize the facts, and respond to multiple choice tests about the facts.   Complete all the even numbered problems in the pre-algebra textbook for homework.

This is not the way to educate our children for what they need in our world now or what they need in the world when they graduate from high school. The common core does not suggest these approaches be utilized nor does it dictate these approaches not be utilized.

So let the naysayers complain about the common core and let the dreamers rejoice for the common core. But understand this—the common core is not the solution nor is it the problem. Students need dynamic and engaging learning experiences every day in their schools. They need to be taught by teachers who are qualified and accomplished and always looking for ways to fine-tune their practice. Students need to engage with principals, assistants, counselors, and deans who honor teachers and give teachers time and support in their quest to reflect upon and improve their practice.

Education news media and social network sites are bombarded by statements from people either loathing or valuing the common core. As a parent of school-aged children, an educator, a community member, and a citizen of the United States, I am here to support teachers and administrators in the implementation of standards which are more rigorous than standards we used previously in our country.  Spending my time and energy to support better practices makes more sense than spending my time and energy complaining about standards which in and of themselves will not improve the educational experience for students, nor will they harm the educational experience for students.  One blogger opposed to the common core states “The future needs passionate, creative, collaborative innovators and entrepreneurs, not compliant, uniform test takers.” I couldn’t agree more, and guess what? The common core does not mandate that we create compliant, uniform test takers.

Misunderstandings and misinformation sometimes lead people to believe the common core demands such practice, but this is simply not the case. Everyone I have met on the state and national level who has been involved with common core implementation agrees that American students need to innovate, collaborate, and create.  Our teachers need this too, which is why many of the same common core advocates promoting common core implementation are also supporting opportunities for teachers to innovate, collaborate, and create the types of learning experiences our students need. Standards alone will not improve the learning experiences for students.  Instead of blaming one group or another, and instead of complaining about what will or will not work, we must work together to provide students the experiences they need.

Why I Pair Poetry with News Articles

Even though I haven’t had my own classroom for several years now, I still find myself thinking about how I might deal with a national news situation if I still worked with teens on a daily basis.  Almost always, I find myself looking for poems to pair with news articles, and more often than not, I look for an angle leading toward thoughts of human compassion.  Since I no longer actually teach these lessons to teens, I modify the lessons planned in my head for use with my sons (now ages 9 and 12).  Once a teacher, always a teacher, I suppose. 

The lesson plan in my head this time relates to a convergence of events, people, ideas, and places--National Poem in Your Pocket Day 2013, Boston Marathon, family trip to Washington DC, poem by Walt Whitman.  I'm pairing news articles about Boston with "The Wound Dresser" by Walt Whitman.



Tomb of the Unknowns

 

It’s disquieting to watch television footage or follow twitter stream with news of bombings or shootings, and it’s especially unsettling to watch and listen when children are involved.  Over the past couple of days while following news related to the explosion at the Boston Marathon, I’ve been encouraged to see many acts of human compassion.  Strangers reaching out to others in distress or injured, websites established for donations for victims, public Facebook pages in honor and support, Google Documents people finder, twitter hashtags such as #prayforboston, and even stories of Boston Marathon runners giving their medals to runners who were unable to finish when the race was shut down after the explosion to protect remaining runners—all excellent reminders of human compassion.

This year for Poem in Your Pocket Day, I am carrying “The Wound Dresser” by Walt Whitman.  It’s a reminder of human compassion carried out by many nurses on a daily basis.  Whitman writes of the suffering in Civil War hospitals and of children longing to hear stories of battle, much like my own nine year old son wanted to hear all about various war battles on our recent trip to Washington D.C..  Instead, of all scenes from battle we read scenes from inside a war hospital as noticed in this excerpt

… On, on I go, (open doors of time! open hospital doors!)
The crush'd head I dress, (poor crazed hand tear not the bandage away,)
The neck of the cavalry-man with the bullet through and through I examine,
Hard the breathing rattles, quite glazed already the eye, yet life struggles hard,
(Come sweet death! be persuaded O beautiful death!
In mercy come quickly.)

From the stump of the arm, the amputated hand,
I undo the clotted lint, remove the slough, wash off the matter and blood,
Back on his pillow the soldier bends with curv'd neck and side falling head,
His eyes are closed, his face is pale, he dares not look on the bloody stump,
And has not yet look'd on it.

I dress a wound in the side, deep, deep,
But a day or two more, for see the frame all wasted and sinking,
And the yellow-blue countenance see.

I dress the perforated shoulder, the foot with the bullet-wound,
Cleanse the one with a gnawing and putrid gangrene, so sickening, so offensive,
While the attendant stands behind aside me holding the tray and pail.

I am faithful, I do not give out,
The fractur'd thigh, the knee, the wound in the abdomen,
These and more I dress with impassive hand, (yet deep in my breast a fire, a burning flame.)

 



Quote from Whitman poem Dupont Circle Metro Station



Thus in silence in dreams' projections,
Returning, resuming, I thread my way through the hospitals,
The hurt and wounded I pacify with soothing hand,
I sit by the restless all the dark night, some are so young,
Some suffer so much, I recall the experience sweet and sad,
(Many a soldier's loving arms about this neck have cross'd and rested,
Many a soldier's kiss dwells on these bearded lips.)

 

As someone who enjoys making connections between events, ideas, people, and places, the poem I carry  connects our recent family trip to Washington D.C., compassion shown at a recent horrific event in Boston, my love for reading poetry and national poem in your pocket day.

What poems do you pair with news events?  What poem are you carrying for Poem in Your Pocket Day 2013?

 

Students Need Opportunities to Learn More than What's on the Test



Note--Arts & Humanties = 5 day rotation--1 day music, 1 day visual art
1 day P.E., 1 day library, 1 day writing

What do you notice about this fourth grade schedule?  Does it look like a schedule similar to that of your children and/or students?  Hopefully not, but I suspect it might.   We live in a school district that promotes the teaching only of subjects which are tested in a particular grade level.  This means my nine year old son who loves history has received little to no social studies formal instruction in his public school.  This is not the fault of the teachers—it’s the fault of a system which prioritizes subjects included in high-stakes testing.   At the elementary level social studies is tested only in fifth grade, so schools adjust what they teach and ignore social studies until that one year.  It doesn’t get much better when it comes to science; students around here only have official science instruction during fourth grade (again, the year it is tested).   My sixth grade son loves science, but he was offered science instruction only one year of his six years in elementary school.  I won’t even start on how limited the opportunities for technology and the arts are as well.  You see, these are the unintended consequences of state and federal mandates for high standardized test scores. 

If I were a pessimist, I might end my post here and tell you I’ve decided to remove my son from public school in search of a better alternative for a more well-rounded education.  However, I am an idealist and a dreamer who has a vision—a vision that we can collaborate to make a difference in the schools in our communities.  In fact, this vision or a similar vision is being enacted in a school district only about forty five minutes away from where we live.  In Danville, Kentucky, leaders of the schools and teachers are implementing project based learning as one way to meet the needs of students beyond what’s on the state standardized tests.  Kudos to this district!  I’m ready to move forward with creating more opportunities like this in my own district as well.  All students deserve the opportunity to learn more than what’s on the state test. 

Tower of books at Ford's Theatre
museum in Washington D.C.

In the mean time my husband and I supplement what our children learn at school with learning at home.  We encourage our children to be responsible and tech savvy citizens; we read content rich non-fiction as well as fiction and poetry.  We also take local and out of state trips (when possible) to promote active learning through experiences.  I feel fortuante that we can work to provide these experiences to our children, so when wearing my mom hat I feel fine about this supplemental approach to education.  However, when wearing my educator hat, I realize not all children have this same luxury of parents who are able or willing to supplement what they learn at school with more well-rounded experiences at home. 

 

 A few changes to our current system could provide more well-rounded learning experiences for all students, and that is my mission and my vision--to support educators striving to provide experiences for all students.  Please share your ideas and suggestions with me.