teaching

Lost At Sea

She sits there, black marker in her left hand, pencil in her right, switching from one to the other like a pendulum, clocked to the rhythm of her observant teacher’s sustained looks in her general direction. Days after an extended conversation with her teacher about the merits of putting in her effort, weeks after a summer her teacher hoped might give her a little time to reflect and grow, months after an incident or two that have never really left her or any of the people involved, and approximately a year after her teacher first met this promising young lady, she’s as disinterested and disengaged as any one student the teacher’s ever taught.

He naturally blames himself. And he has every right to.

At some point, he, like everyone else whose had to confront any student far beyond their natural reach, had to come to a disappointing conclusion: one can’t reach every single child.

I came to that realization sometime my second year when the very students who I needed to reach out to had every and any excuse to excuse themselves from my class. As in most public schools across the nation, sometimes the only way to keep the student in the school is to set a much lower standard for them in hopes they catch up with the rest of the students.

Sometimes they do, and I can’t dispute that. However, some often don’t.

And you’re left wondering a few things about a school’s culture after that finally gets through to you. How detrimental is having that one student who blatantly disregards the school culture help out the rest of the students? Conversely, how much does the student care for your rules when he or she has more existential problems, ones that a free lunch can’t remedy? How much of a hit to your pride can you take when every impassioned speech, well-written lesson plan, perfect seating plan, referral for discipline and / or counseling, cross-meeting with parent / guardian / dean / fellow teachers, triumphant teacher movie viewing, and trials of multiple approaches only works for that period?

If it works at all.

Folks, I’m not saying we should completely give up hope. The 300 or so of you reading this now know I fight as hard as I humanly can. I’ve often take the ones under my wing that others consider untouchable and done a relatively good job in said situations (which is why I often get the difficult classes). I also know that much of the deliberations we go through, worrying about whether a student will eventually come around, don’t often materialize into much because oftentimes, it’s not about me or you. It’s not about whether the student is lazy, inconsiderate, raised badly, etc. The same formula that works on a similar student once may not work the next time. Even more so, you may not actually be the teacher that works for that student.

In other words, we’re human. We err. Bigtime.

Standing there as that teacher who’s slowly seeing his student crumble, I have a hard time scrambling for ideas to fully engage her since I know more than I often should. So what do I do? I continue the lesson, and keep the same standards for every child as I should. Somewhere in there, I hope she can purposely slip herself into the lesson.

Mr. Vilson, who knows he’ll learn something from Pedro Noguera tomorrow.

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Soldier Gives Child Materials

Here’s my best attempt at putting a positive spin on a topic that’s probably irked anyone who’s had to help facilitate the growth of fellow colleagues or teachers who see the odds and punch a hole through that proverbial glass ceiling. While I’m trying to figure out the nuances of being the math coach of my school, my mentality’s still in the classroom, because I still teach a class. For my 30 students, I’d do practically anything to ensure that they’ve learned the material, including stepping away from the “required” curriculum in favor of making sure that the NYS standards were learned. It doesn’t mean I’m doing a ton of chalk and talk, but sometimes the book doesn’t have all the answers.

And that’s where I take issue with the “issue” of materials. When I first signed up for teaching in NYC, I understood a few things:

1) The students were not going to necessarily come in with the motivation to do well in school.

2) The school I’m working in may not necessarily have supportive staff.

3) I may not have all the materials I need all laid out for me.

Later on, that last statement became, “I don’t need to strictly use one set of materials.” Certainly, I think using worksheets and overheads all the time doesn’t lend itself to good teaching, much like using the given textbook also doesn’t help either. A good teacher knows how to balance the materials, and we all strive to create that equal balance. With that said, if I’m ever deficient in one for reasons that are beyond me, you know I’m definitely going to have resources from other ends. I’ll be well-prepared and I won’t wait until some administrator comes into my room to tell me what it is I need to have and why I don’t have it if I’m not ready.

In this day and age, the recipe’s being laid out for many urban public school principals to fail in the hopes of breaking up the schools and infusing more charter schools into these buildings that aren’t meant for 2-3 different schools in the same building. The economy’s made it easier to set forth this agenda because principals already had a tight budget, but funds have decreased by incremental percentages. That naturally has to do with less materials for teachers and students alike.

Yet, at the end of the day, we don’t teach to the curriculum. We don’t teach to workshops. We don’t teach to books. We shouldn’t be teaching to the tests (even when some of us do). We teach to the standards, and we should teach using those resources as arms of a multi-pronged attack on learning these standards. If we’re using just one source, that’s very limited, and if we see our whole careers dependent on one source, mandated or not, then we’ll lose the essence of what it means to really teach.

Then again, if you’re a good teacher who has none of these things, the urgency for materials doesn’t pose as an obstacle, but a means for becoming more (not less) resourceful. This’ll test your material. Right?

Mr. V, who’s posing this more as a thought process, not in absolutes … honest, this time …

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Satchel Paige Rests His Feet

Out of the many needs teachers really have, podiatry is probably the most underrated out of any need teachers really have. Yes, we need professional development, we need to talk deeply about the profession in a cohesive and comprehensive dialogue, and introduce new buzzwords every few years just so we sound up-to-date with the sorts of chicanery available to educators and wannabes alike. But really, we need some podiatrists!

Follow my day: I woke up at 530am, the usual, in the hopes that I can iron, shower, eat breakfast, catch up on the news, and stay awake all before I need to catch 2 trains and get to school before 745am, my safe harbor for personal school effectiveness. In the matter of 3 periods, I’ve watched over every 6th grade student to see if they brought uniforms, got 2 social studies teachers entire book sets, and ran to announce and help with the fire drill. 4th and 5th period comes and I flip one hat and pull out my other in one fell swoop: class is in session. Immediately, I’m handing out my diagnostic for the day, reminding students of how much I trust them and need them to stay the exemplary students for the floor and the building (and no, I don’t have the “gifted and talented class”, whatever that means).

All without having left my feet once.

That’s just a sample of what teachers like me have to do, and in a building where 2 flights of stairs become 1, and where I have to be 1 step ahead of 900 other pairs of feet, it seems daunting. After my class, I realized I loved this thrill. The adrenaline pumping through my veins and … my feet still hurt. I get it; my weight and the intense amount of walking I do from and to the train also don’t help, but more than anything, it’s knowing that we have to stand up even when we’re still scrunching our toes to make sure we can see every student and present our material as effectively as possible. I’m not saying you’re a terrible teacher if you’re not standing up, by the way. I am saying you’re … doing a disservice to the material by not presenting it effectively.

But these are just ramblings of a madman at this point. Podiatrists and practitioners of alternative medicines like acupuncturists just should stand right outside my school, and they’ll do better than any of the bodegas in the corner. I really mean it. And I’m pretty sure almost every other educator might agree with me.

Mr. V, who just won Chris Brogan’s Trust Agents from the LATinos in Social Media (LATISM) Group. Life is good.

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She looks at her paper, rubs her head a little bit, and looks up at me, and says, “6?”

“Yes,” I nod in a bit of a proud moment for one of my holiest redeemers.

This year, in all of my classes, I have students who have a chip on their shoulder and have come out with a significant vengeance against their own struggles and against my well-placed challenges to them. My first class today has a roster full of runaways, victims of sexual abuse, and people who only recently came to the country. This assortment of students who rarely speak English or rarely speak Spanish is probably my hardest class, and I’m often at a loss for what works with them behaviorally. Yet, today, even with my bit of uneasiness about their dispositions, I did the exact opposite of what I’d usually do, and they blazed through my material. They chewed gum, talked to their friends, and had their Sidekicks in their desks, and I still found that 90% of the class had their attentions on me and my instruction. I didn’t get loud once (I never scream, but I have a big voice), and they responded rather well. One student in particular, whose reputation as a ringleader for all kinds of inappropriate behaviors precedes her, has led her group of girls to push for excellence, and that says a lot.

In my ELL class, they’ve all matured so much, they’re no longer considered the “worst” class. I’ve become one of the go-to teachers for the harder kids to teach, and now I see why. The class that was once regarded as the hardest class to teach has become a little more docile, and much more responsive and responsible. They’re the leaders on the floor, and they’re the only kids that consistently put a smile on my face. I literally had to scream “GET OUT!!!” to stop them from making me laugh so hard after school. Yet, they’re getting the work done, and they’re getting the homework done, and they’ve gotten good reviews from all their teachers. It’s like they’re seeking a chance to do well for themselves.

In my advanced class, there’s usually not a problem with academics, except with one girl, who has gone through her own issues in her rather short life. I find it telling how we seek out popularity so thoroughly but when we find it, we’re not fans ourselves. She found some rather dubious distinctions last year around the school, and seems to have decided on a whole different approach to her academics. She’s someone who I struggled with, and the only one who took her to task on some of her transgressions last year. The fights were often public, never disrespectful on my end, but certainly looked like …

… what it might look like when I have my own daughter.

And so it’s with that spirit that I look upon some of my children, my students, my educational confidants, and my captive audience. Whether it’s a battle against their own trepidations, their own insecurities, or their own reputations, they’re fighting and fighting hard, and even I have to play their opponent, they’re certainly winning in my eyes.

“Because when you see the bases are the same and the exponents are different, and we’re multiplying, we can add the exponents.”

Exactly.

jose, whose students reminded him these last two days why he loves his job …

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