The path...

As I read through Pathways to the Common Core I realize just how simple yet complex everything really is. "The adoption of the Common Core suggests that America's image of what it means to be educated will change." (pg. 10) This is a very exciting yet terrifying idea if we really think about it. We talk about and criticize and debate our education system all the time, now we are debating what it actually means to be educated.

We say our focus is on our students and throughout my reading I continued to see evidence of this. One thing that really squared my thinking was "The CCSS emphasize that every student needs to be given access to this work. Students with IEPs still need to be taught to question an author's bias, to argue for a claim, to synthesize information across texts." (pg. 12) I often feel as though our students with IEPs are given this label of not having to do as much work or having to learn the same material as those students who do not have IEPs which is extremely bothersome to me. It is our job as teachers to make sure we are providing all of our students opportunities to be successful in the real world, not just those that are mainstream. "Its no longer okay to provide the vast majority of America's children with a fill-in-the-blank, answer-the-questions, read-the-paragraph curriculum that equips them to take their place on the assembly line." (pg. 9) I really appreciate this because I have heard so many teachers make excuses for students, or teach lessons that are simply easier for them to plan and manage, but where do our students and their future come into play? We aren't growing CEO's, investors, inventors, or even educators by simply asking for one worded, black and white answers. Pathways to the Common Core talks about the necessary steps we as teachers or educators need to take in order to ensure we are headed the right direction for our students. "The first thing we want to stress to anyone who is interested in standards-based reform is that the Common Core is, above all, a call for accelerating students' literacy development. The most important message centers on lifting he level of student achievement, not on course coverage and compliance." (pg. 14) The Common Core requires us to decompose standards and teach in a way that makes sense and is engaging to our students. It is not asking us to simply have them regurgitate different information. It is giving our students the ability to actually read a text, decompose the meaning behind it, teach it to someone else and have a conversation about the meaning and reason behind the literature. As a math and science teacher I sometimes, although am not proud of this, find myself wondering why I need to know all of the reading and ELA information now. However, after reading this book I realize that it is just as important for me as a science teacher to understand the Reading Common Core standards as it is for the Reading teacher to understand them. "Because reading will no longer be the domain solely of ELA teachers, as it has been in most schools, science and social studies teachers will need to participate in professional development on reading instruction." (pg 30) I know that I try to incorporate reading when possible throughout my science lessons, and I definitely do a better job of incorporating writing throughout my science lessons through hypothesis, observations, etc, but it is difficult to find a good balance between reading and experiments in a subject area where students can benefit so much from hands on learning yet class time is constantly being cut. I realized as I was reading this quote "You will also want to think about ways to infuse a lot more information reading into all of your content-area classes." (pg 93) that this is going to be the best way for me to help incorporate literature into my science or math block. giving my students an opportunity to read further and deeper into topics we have not had time to discuss in depth in class will be a great way for them to meet both standards. I need to remember that "...kids are reading non-fiction to figure out what to do with their lives." (pg. 91) and my job as their teacher is to help guide them and open opportunities for them to do so.

As I continue to think forward about the different things I want to incorporate within my teaching and my classroom I realize that although I put a lot of emphasis on learning and inquiry and hands-on projects, I feel as though my goal is still for them to "memorize" something for the test. When I read "This work is not about reading to be entertained. Nor is it about reading to memorize. It is about reading to think." (pg 101) I realized that this is what my mindset should be and this is the type of learning I need to be sure I am expressing to my students. My students need to understand, and I need to explain to them, that we are here to think.

One topic that seems to come up over and over again at my school is training or lack there of. As a new teacher I realize that I am entering into the Common Core probably at a good time because other than my personal education I have never known anything different. One problem that I personally have, and one that seems to be a problem for several colleagues, is the idea of training so we as teachers can ensure we are doing our very best for our students. The book discusses how now more than ever our education systems are low on money and having budget cuts however it also states that "The only expense is that of providing teachers with the professional development and the teaching resources they need to become knowledgeable in this area." (pg. 16) I realize that training takes money and time and that this is not a cheap affair however I personally believe that teachers would feel way more comfortable and would be much more likely to cooperate in certain criteria, if they felt as though they were informed and trained on what they should or shouldn't be doing. This goes into the whole idea of time as well. We as teachers have so many demands placed on us with such large classes that it often times for me feels like I am trying to cram everything in at once. Maybe this is where part of the idea of memorization comes into play that I mentioned earlier. I really was able to get a better sense for what a day should look like through the standards of the Common Core. Time is a necessity. We can't expect our students to obtain this information through osmosis overnight. "...when students are actually taught writing and given opportunities to write an hour a day within a writing workshop, their skills develop in a very visible fashion." (pg. 17) Reading this really helped to point me in the right direction of what is important and what can wait. When I read that "Students in the classrooms of more effective teachers read ten times as much as students in classrooms of less effective teachers." (pg. 51) I again realized where the importance in my classroom should reside even though I am a STEM teacher. As I think about what matters to me and what concerns me in my school I realize that I need to first focus on what I can control and what I need to change. "If you are going to take important steps to radically improve your students' experiences in information reading, you will probably need to start by owning the problems in our classroom and your school - and frankly, our hunch is the problems are serious." (pg 88) This book really has pointed me in the right direction for several unanswered questions.

I still have a few questions though that certain parts of the book really brought to life for me. One of my biggest questions or complaints I guess, is the expectation that some teacher somewhere will catch a student up. Or on the other hand, I don't have time to worry about this specific student this year so next year's teacher can catch him up. I am a firm believer in the idea that every teacher is responsible for doing their very best to teach their grade levels expectations to every student. I have a very hard time understanding why school systems are passing students onto the next grade when they aren't on grade level and haven't even been doing the work. In my opinion you are in a sense harming that child's education even more because you are now placing them somewhere that is way over their head and making it even more difficult for them to feel in control of things. "The CCSS design is also one of the strongest features of the standards because it sends a message loud an clear: Growth takes time; it can't be the job of a fourth-grade teacher, or the tenth-grade teacher, to be sure students reach the expectations for that grade level." (pg. 11) I completely agree that growth takes time and that we can't measure this overnight. I also completely agree that it takes time and practice for students to really grasp and understand a concept. However, I do think that each grade level teacher has a responsibility to teach and expose their students to those standards and that they should not assume that another teacher somewhere will fill in the gap for them. I found it interesting when I read "when you and your school make the decisions about a way to teach students, you are also thinking about a way to recruit and retain teachers." (pg 74) This makes sense to me but shouldn't we be concerned more about the students and how our teaching styles and decisions will ultimately be effecting them and their education and their future? "Kids don't just need good classrooms, they need good schools." (pg.73) and it is our job as educators to ensure we are helping each other form these good schools but how do we make this happen if we aren't all on the same page?

Pedagogy of the Oppressed - what comes next?

As I think back to my experience as an educator and what it means to be either the oppressed or the oppressor inside the education system, I realize that Freire has made me really reflect and think about what I actually witness on a daily basis. The idea of cultural schizophrenia is real. Who am I, or who do I want to be? Better yet, who do others think I am and why? I think these questions have really begun to surface a lot as I come near the end of my MAT and TFA commitment. Am I someone who wants to stay in the classroom, do I see myself now as a teacher who can separate herself from being an oppressor of the students? Am I being responsive? Am I allowing my students to be themselves and express themselves in a way that feels comfortable, or am I oppressing them and forcing them to be and act a way that is more comfortable for me? I think at times I still struggle and juggle the line of  who I am and who I want to be as well as how others may view me and my role either as a teacher or in society as a whole. 

I have definitely felt a pressure to assimilate myself to going back and forth between this life as a teacher and the life I knew before. I do feel as though my worlds are still separate enough that I have had to really think about what it means to assimilate myself. You have this pressure to assimilate to the world around you regardless if it makes sense to you or not. I think about this a lot in my classroom. I find myself often times being the oppressor to my students, assuming and thinking that they need to be like me and do things like me in order to be successful. I like to think it is because I want nothing but the best for them, but I need to realize that allowing them to be themselves, yet providing them with multiple opportunities, is ultimately going to lead them to success.  I forget that there is more than one path to success, and I need to allow my students to be themselves in order for them to feel successful.

In my classroom we often talk about what it means to stand up for yourself and make a difference. I try to empower my students to “do something about it” rather than just accepting it as fact. Freire states on page 69, “It is essential for the oppressed to realize that when they accept the struggle for humanization they also accept, from that moment, their total responsibility for the struggle. They must realize that they are fighting not merely for freedom from hunger, but for . . . freedom to create and to construct, to wonder and to venture.” This idea that if the oppressed allow themselves to be the oppressed, if we as teachers allow ourselves to make excuses as to why we can’t help our students or why our students aren’t performing where we think they should, we are allowing ourselves and our students to be oppressed by the system.

I believe that structure and order are important, especially in the classroom, but I also think that students need a place to discover who they are, where their dreams can take them, and what learning is in a way that makes sense to them. I am not the teacher that requires you to be crisscross applesauce in your seat, but I do require you to be engaged and involved in the lesson. I have, on more than one occasion, had administrators come in my room and yell at my students because they were either standing instead of sitting, or sitting on the floor, or sitting with legs in their chairs. Whatever the description, it was clearly the opposite of “standard and normal”. This situation always makes me question myself as a teacher as well as the administration. Who is in the right? Why is one way better than another, or is it?

I realize the importance of allowing our student to think and create on their own. It is amazing to me how students after several years of being “oppressed” simply assume that the teacher will just tell them the answer and completely give up any idea of thinking for themselves. These are not the strong, empowered, future CEO students we want to help empower in our classrooms. This has really been evident to me as we continue to work on our group projects. When I told my students they had an opportunity to stand up for anything they believed in and to make a difference they were ecstatic. Then when they realized they were actually going to do something about it and actually try to make a change, they froze. They didn't know what that meant other than to respond to a writing prompt. Several of them are still struggling with the idea of what to do, it is as though they are waiting for me to tell them to call the local animal shelter and as to come volunteer - they have been "oppressed" and assume and expect that they will be told exactly what to do, the idea of being creative and thinking for themselves has proven to be extremely challenging for them in this particular circumstance. I wonder though, if our students are feeling as though they are being oppressed by the constant direction they are being given in school. How do students feel when they are constantly told to be seated, do this, read that, study this? Are we as teachers giving them the opportunity to empower themselves, or are we as teacher simply oppressing them in hopes they will assimilate to be the types of students we expect? The idea behind my class project is to help my students realize their rights and to empower them to make a difference, I am so glad that I have chosen to work with them in this way because it is clear based on my observations that they need the opportunity to have the right and freedom to do something they want, something that matters to them, and not something that matters to someone else. 

Critical Inquiry Framework connections

When reading over the UN Rights of a Child I realized what kind of power a document like this could have for my students. I feel as though they are frequently told that they don’t have rights and that their rights are to simply follow directions. I can’t wait to share this document with my students as a part of our project to really inspire them and to help them feel empowered as individuals. Although I mentioned this to them as we were starting the project I definitely did not do it justice. I talk to my students all the time about how lucky they are that they have the right to come to school every day and learn but I don’t know that it has really resonated with them that this is actually a right of theirs, not just their teacher sprouting off crazy things.

I also really enjoyed reading Poverty, Peace and Action. As I read through it I realized that it resembled a lot of what I am trying to do for my project and it also made me realize that there are a lot of things I should be including to help invest my students and make this meaningful and more authentic for my students. Being a math and science teacher I sometimes forget the power of a book (yes I know this is horrible but we are just so focused on creating and experimenting). I am so excited to incorporate different literatures, both fiction and non-fiction into this project for my students. I think this will be a great opportunity to really bridge some different standards as well as mix things up a bit for them in class, which I think is always a good thing.  

Latinos for involvement in family education brought about several great points that also resonated with me as I think about my progress with my action research project. Several of my students are doing their projects based around specific things in our community and are focusing on things in the community that really matter to them. I actually have two groups of students who are focusing on helping other students with medical issues in the community and how they can help raise awareness for them and help fund research for their illnesses. My students realized the importance of being involved in the community and want to be involved in their community.

It’s Not Easy Being Flat reminds me of the importance of really explaining and helping my students digest what their rights are and why it is important to value and understand their rights. Although I briefly talked about the UN Rights of a Child before we started our projects I realize that I did not do them justice and that it is really important for my students to sit down and think about them and talk about them and discuss the meaning behind them. I want my students to use these rights as a way of empowerment, something that means something to them, something they can be proud of!

And we're off!

It is hard to believe we are a month into our second semester of our second year - time flies!

I really feel as though I focused a lot this month on critical inquiry learning and enthusiasm about showing what my students have learned. I was excited to see the accomplishments they have made and I was excited to see them proud of themselves for the accomplishments they have made. I really want to continue on this path moving forward because I think it sets the right kind of tone and it embraces the type of learning I want to occur in my classroom. The inquisitive, excited, hands on ah ha moments that really make learning fun for my students. I also realized that there are some attitudes that need to be addressed in the class in order  for me to keep my sanity and for my students to feel as though they have a voice in the room. I want to make sure that I am giving them this opportunity which is why I am excited about my note drop box where students will have the opportunity to write what’s on their mind – whatever it is – and then hopefully we can address it as a whole. I am also looking forward to continuing to build connections with my students so that I can understand them individually better.

I think that I am going to continue to keep doing the type of teaching/learning that has been working well and I also think that I am trying to put a few ideas in place that will really help my students feel as though they are being heard and they do have a voice and that I do care about them individually. When I have lessons that are engaging and matter to the students it is amazing the type of day we as a class can have. I realize that the more I work with them and the more we build relationships as a class the better things ultimately will be. 

As much as I hate to admit it I have done a lot of thinking after reading Friere. I also try to constantly think back to our math and science courses about the ways to teach hands on learning in math and science and what that looks like and means for our students. I also feel as though I am slowly starting to put everything together and am personally starting to have that ah ha moment where I realize everything I have been trying to do and what is actually happening in my classroom. That by no means I am doing things perfectly even a fraction of the time but I at least am starting to feel like I may belong here.

I think it really all comes down to knowing and understanding your students and what works for them and what doesn’t. It is partly a trial and error  game that we have to play but I know and see the importance of it which is why I don’t want to give up. I just need to continue getting to know my students and what matters to them. Once I know what matters to them I can make sure I incorporate that into the lessons and my management and ultimately that is my end goal. I am anxious to see how our last few months together go. 

Who are you?

Who are you? I feel like this is a question that we may ask ourselves as teachers a lot. Who are we? What are we doing? I know personally I do a lot of thinking about who I want to be and what type of teacher or daughter or fiance I want to be, but it is easy to focus on who you want to be and forget who your students want to be, better yet, who they are. I realize that over the past month I have really been doing a lot of work on trying to really dig deeper into who my students are and who their parents are. Relationships have been a topic of conversation to say the least in my classroom this year, relationships between me and my students, relationships between my students and each other, and relationships between me and my student's parents. it is amazing what a difference a meaningful, knowledgeable relationship can have.  I have really noticed a difference with my students this past month - those who I have really taken the time to know have come a long way, those who I am still struggling with I realize that there is still something major I am missing and it all comes back to - who are you? 

I realize as I look back over this past month that I focused a lot on relationships both with my students and with their parents. I was able to really build stronger relationships with both parents and students of my class. I feel as though I was really able to make some strong headway with certain parents that things were previously not going well with and I was able to celebrate making major breakthroughs with certain students that have been really struggling with throughout the year.  Being able to break though and have multiple successful days with Jamari is a huge success for me, as well as really feeling as though parent relationships and involvement is taking a positive turn rather than a negative, accusatory turn.  I also really focused on working with my students and meeting them where they needed to be met rather than trying to force something on them that I knew in the end wouldn’t work anyway.  I feel as though I was really able to see what was working and what was not working and create a plan that worked for my students.

I feel as though I have gotten much better at becoming a responsive teacher and really trying to stick with trying new things and working on things until a solution is found rather than just simply giving up. Again this comes back to me seriously asking the question - who are you? I am also really happy that these parent relationships that I have been trying to foster and grow are finally coming around. I realize that things do not happen overnight and that it takes time for things to change.

Our action research class has really allowed me to focus in on what my students needs are and think about different ways to go about bringing my students and my student’s parents to a more positive place. Our class with Dr. K last spring has also helped me because it has given me the opportunity to really see behind the scenes with my student’s parents and realize that culture plays a big part in the classroom and what my students experience outside the four walls of my classroom greatly impacts how they are within the four wall of my classroom.

I realize that things take time and you don’t really get to know someone overnight. I also have to remind myself that people see things from different perspectives and how I am interpreting something may be very different from how someone else is interpreting something. It is these differences that help make us who we are and allow us to be passionate about things in different ways.

I want to really allow freedom with my students – freedom for them to do things that matter to them, freedom to be themselves and the freedom for them to determine what kind of impression they want to leave behind when they move on next year. I want to apply that to working with my student’s parents too to some extent. I want them to be advocates for their child in what their child wants rather than advocates for themselves as parents trying to make a point about something. 

So I ask the question - who are you?

The empowered student

As the year continues to fly by I find myself trying to keep up with what is happening and what areas need to have more focus. Throughout the past month my students have continued to have the opportunity to engaged in activities that they have found meaningful and relevant to their lives and their interests. They have also continued to make connections through math and science to the world that they live in. I have also been able to improve my parent involvement. I have one parent who comes and volunteers in the classroom at least once a week to help me and the students. I have also been working with other parents to finalize their volunteer information with the hopes that we will be able to do a parent involvement day once a month where parents can come in and run small groups with me - this would give them an opportunity to not only see their child in action but also feel like they are playing an integral part in their student's education. I also think it is a great way to help me build relationships with my parents and truly get an understanding of where my students come from and what is important to them. 

Our math classes have really helped me when it comes to the way I teach math and the way I provide learning opportunities for my students in math. I have learned so much from both Ms. Bloxson and Dr. Smith in regards to what activities are actually meaningful, worthwhile tasks rather than repetitive, memorization tasks. I have also used a lot of ideas from our science class this summer with Dr. Jarrett and what it means to make meaningful science tasks and how to help our students understand that they are scientists themselves.

I continue to work on classroom culture. I can honestly say that yes I do think the culture of the classroom has improved since the first 8 weeks but I can also say that I know it is still not where it needs to be. As I reflect back on what might be causing this development to slowly develop I realize that I think a lot of it has to do with my personal relationships with the students as well as our special education teacher. I realize that the culture of my classroom is not going to build itself up over night and that it takes me setting an example in all aspects, not just the convenient ones. I am excited to say that I feel as though that I have started putting new things in place to help with this process. Our new ladies lunch and boys lunch is a time for the guys of the classroom and the ladies of the classroom to come together and interact with one another. It is also based around the idea that you get a special invite to this lunch if you were caught doing the theme of the week. For example, if the theme is helping someone when they are struggling and a teacher catches you doing this deed then you get a special invite. The idea is to help our students foster these ideas and traits with one another. I am hopeful that this will be a good experience and I know from speaking with my students that eating lunch with the teachers is definitely something they want to do!

I have also thought a lot about empowering my students. I want them to feel as though they have a voice and they are an important part of our classroom - this again ties into our classroom culture. I have worked hard to provide my students team building opportunities which I think has really helped my students in their working together skills. We have also started using our recess time as a team building time by playing team sports which is a way for them to really use their team building skills in a positive, non-academic way. From what I have seen so far I think this may have been the secret to success! However the thing I am most excited about is our revamp on classroom jobs. Classroom jobs are always something that I begin at the beginning of the year but do a poor job of keeping up with or really making them meaningful for myself or for the students (yes again consistency is not my strong point). I realized that I was doing a lot of things that I didn't necessarily need to be doing and that if a student was given the opportunity to do them they would really feel empowered and as though they were an integral part of the classroom. There is a big difference between having a job that you feel like doesn't require anything and having a job that you know the class is counting on you for. I am eager to again see how this plays a role in our classroom culture and togetherness. 

I think I have realized that there are some things I can control and there are other things that I cannot control. Realizing what I can and cannot control and then moving forward with those things that I can control has been really helpful in making my highs higher. It has given me the opportunity to really reflect on my lows and be responsive to them in a way that I can control rather than waiting or assuming that things will just change. I am determined to make this year a meaningful and wonderful one!

8 weeks down... where does the time go?

8 weeks down... 28 to go... it amazes me how quickly the school year flies by. It seems like just yesterday I was opening the door to room 366 for the first time getting ready to embark and an adventure I had been tirelessly preparing for all summer. As I reflect back and consider how things went my first year, I realize that I wouldn't be there I am today without the mistakes I made before. That being said, I assumed my second year would be drastically easier, and in some aspects I was correct, in others, not so much. 

Dr. K has talked to us about the importance of culture and connecting with our communities and really involving parents to be a part of that. These are things that although I thought I was doing as I reflect on my fist 8 weeks I realize I could be doing a much better job. Connecting with parents is more than just sending home a nightly email with the homework update, or calling to discuss either positive or negative behavior, it is truly getting to know the child, who they are, where they come from, what is important to them and why is it important to them. Without building a strong classroom culture, you aren't setting anyone up for ultimate success. Culture is everything. If I am able to relate to my students and bring their culture and things that are meaningful to them into the classroom then everything else will fall into place. A strong classroom culture allows us to relate and understand one another as well as see things from different perspectives that may help explain why something is the way it is. Having a strong culture leads to understanding the students and what really engages them or means something to them. There is nothing better than an engaged student during a lesson. Engagement helps with behavior problems, critical thinking, inquiry, involvement, connections, everything that I as a teacher wan for my students. And all that needs to happen to get us there is a strong classroom culture.

I realize that our good times are ones where students are engaged and feel valued as a student in the classroom. They are days that students are able to see themselves as a part of the group and not just another name on the roster. They are able to make sense of what is going on in the room around them because they have an understanding of what the students in the room around them are like. They are making connections with science experiments that go way further than filling in vocabulary words on a worksheet.

I knew that the first year would be one of the hardest things I have ever done. And I was right. I also had high hopes that the second year would be much easier in the sense of I to some extent knew what to expect. I am lucky enough to be teaching the same grade and same subjects with the same co-teacher so all of the hard work and keeping track last year has paid off to some extent. I think what I realize more than anything is that I am able to take what I learned from last year, both in regards to academics and behavior, and apply it this year in an even more strategic way. Last year was all about trying to stay afloat, and not that this year isn’t either, but at least this year I am able to start with what I learned from last year and work from there, I do not have to start from scratch. I am also able to take the wonderful techniques I learned during Dr. Jarrett’s class in regards to inquiry and really apply them in science. My students didn’t learn science last year, they learned key vocabulary words and hypothetical situations. This year my students have already had the opportunity to decompose bananas in the classroom, create ecosystems for animals they discover on the playground while exploring THEIR world, create and link the conceptual ideas around food chains and food webs to their diet and create new humans with animal like adaptations and discuss how their lives would change. They have been able to think critically, use their world around them to make meaningful connections and continue to inquire new ideas that arise as they think through what is currently happening around them. They are being scientists!

 I have learned a lot from all of my classes throughout grad school but our numbers and operations class with Dr. Smith has brought so many things to the forefront for me in regards to mathematics. One of my goals for this year for my students was to make sure they were able to see the connections between the real world and what we do inside our classroom every day. The way  she has helped me look at mathematics and realize that every math problem is simply a story for a student to discover has been amazing. Through the use of real world examples, story problems and a classroom culture built around their interests I have been able to celebrate in the success of strong math lessons this year. Ones that are not students repeating the same type of standard algorithm over and over again but instead ones that they can take outside the classroom and directly apply to their knowledge of the real world. This has been a huge success and celebration throughout the past 8 weeks. 

Throughout the next 28 weeks I am going to continue to work on culture in the classroom. A strong classroom culture does not appear overnight, and it takes consistency from the teacher to help nurture a strong classroom culture. I can be honest in saying that consistency is not always my strong point when it comes to starting or trying new things. I realize though as I look back over my highs and lows that my highs are because culture was evident and my students knew it. On the other hand, my lows were because our classroom culture was weak and I was being inconsistent with my nurturing of things. By keeping on top of our classroom culture and by continuing to nurture it through the next 28 weeks I am confident that everything else will fall into place. I am lucky to have such wonderful, excited, amazing, intelligent students who trust me to help them achieve the goals they have set their mind to, now it is my turn to show them how it is possible.