Innagication

I’m not dead.  I have just been a bit busy.

This week is CAS week at our school. CAS is a component of the IB.  It stands for Creativity, Action, and Service. All week the students did not have regular classes and, instead participated in one of various offered activities. My son, James, went on a different hike around Hong Kong each day.  My daughter, Abigail, is making a movie.  Other students planned a Great Race around Hong Kong, based on The Amazing Race television show, and others went sailing.

I supervised a group of students that I organized back in October. A rock band.  Have you seen School of Rock….yeah, like that (but I don’t play with them).

Five kids, most of which had taken lessons on their instrument (even the vocalist) but never played in a group.  One girl came along to the interest meeting and stepped up to learn bass guitar…she had never played any guitar or bass before, she just wanted to be a part of it and we didn’t have a bass player.

They practiced, with my supervision and guidance, for an hour after school once a week while school was in session to prepare for their first gig: a 20 minute set at a school assembly. It was good. I was proud of them

In January a new term of Cocurricular Activies (CCAs) started. The last two hours of school on Wednesdays are spent doing CCAs. Some kids go swimming, some do cooking, some play “non-traditional sports” (like laser tag). Since Jamuary, we rock.  They have played twice more for their peers since starting the CCA.

This week they were joined by another student who, due to schedule conflicts, had not yet worked with them.  He, too, has individual experience but has never played in a band.  All day Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday the six of them met in my math-classroom-turned-jam-space polishing old songs and developing new ones. Today, Thursday, they played an hour-long set for an entire elementary school. It was awesome. I am very, very proud of them.

[This is cross posted to the blog for the MYP workshop in which I am currently enrolled]

My teaching has always been guided by a set of principles.  When I first started, the guiding principles were

• All kids can learn
• Math doesn’t suck, I know it but kids need to be convinced
• School should not be the experience that I hated

These principles aligned very well with those that guided my principal… which is probably why I got the job.  I was new and had some growing to do.  That growth was, thankfully guided by my principal. My department heads had a hand, no doubt, but they took their lead from our principal.  My lessons were very different than traditional math lessons, students did as much, if not more, talking than I did…and most of my lessons ended frantically because the students and I had lost track of time.  Not that this wasn’t effective…I had some pretty tout-able results.

When I changed schools, I had a new principal….who was very…different from my previous principal… but she was the boss, so I had to adjust my teaching to make sure she was happy.  For that period of time I was guided by these same basic principles, but they were joined by

• the teacher in the room is there for a reason
• the math classroom model has worked well for decades

My lessons, for the most part, ended on time for that year.

After that principal left, I worked for another principal, who was, yet again, different from my previous principal.  He, like me, did not particularly enjoy his math lessons growing up and so the last principle added to my list was, thankfully, removed.  Other than that, I was guided by his perspective of someone who did not particularly enjoy math as a subject, but saw, and often testified about the profound importance of it across the school and in life afterward.  My mind was opened to the idea of cross-curricular work and I adopted a more holistic view of curriculum planning and delivery.  I partnered with colleagues in other departments and attempted some trans-disciplinary units….with some success.  So, to my list I added

• who students are and become (including how they see the world) is more important than my content area’s concepts and skills.

Now I work for another principal… who has her own principles.  So far, I don’t see my list changing too much.  We are in the process of becoming an MYP authorized school, so my principal is very aware of the IBMYP guiding principles and how they impact my teaching.  I think that my inherent principles align nicely with the IBMYP guiding principles… which pleases my principal, I think.  It isn’t a coincidence that the most recently added to my list was developed while at an IB World School, as it is the most MYP-esque.

In the end, as teachers, we are responsible to ourselves, yes, but to our principals, especially.  It is their school…. they have the ultimate responsibility to make the learning environment follow their vision.  As Chris Lehmann has pointed out on his blog, Practical Theory, “the values [held by] an administrator will be reflected in the values teachers manifest when they work with the kids.”

Recently, I received a link to the article, What Teachers Really Want to Tell Parents. At first, I like (I’m certain) plenty of other teachers, felt myself saying, “Yeah, that’s right!”
…but then…
I thought about the times that my students’ perspective of situations in my classroom was different than mine.
I thought about the likelihood that those perspectives were more accurate at least some of the time.
I thought about the fact that reality, for anyone, is merely their perception of reality.
I thought about my own children.

And then…
I wondered if the author of the article has any children of his own.
I wondered if he has ever had to be the unwelcome advocate for his kids or someone else’s.

Parents have the responsibility, and therefore the right, to be a bit bothersome when they feel it is what is best for their kids. Parents are, sometimes, the only people looking out for their kids. In my opinion, that includes all of the behaviors the author whines (yes, whines) about.

Teachers, as the article’s author notes, are professionals. They are not infallible. They, we, should be kept in check. Otherwise, bad practice and poor outcomes come calling.
As professionals, we should expertly interact with parents, diffusing volatile situations by relating in ways that everyone can understand in the best interest of students. And then, maintaining our professionalism, we should smile, thank the parents for the insights they offered and not discuss the matter with other parties. Or write articles for CNN about it.

It is a shame that teachers are “run off” by parents. The solution is not to tell off the parents or vent about it in the staffroom or quit the profession. The issue is to seek guidance, support and mentoring. Maybe teachers need some customer service training. I know my decade spent as a service industry manager has probably helped me. Maybe teachers need more training in designing classroom environments that are less susceptible to parent concern.

I wonder if this kind of stuff could get into the reform discussions going on these days…

I just completed the Nova Scotia marathon (my first marathon). It started out pretty well and I was pleased with my 5K, 10K, and half-marathon times. Sometime around 15 miles (24K) my right knee started to give me quite a bit of pain. In the end, I finished about 25 minutes later than I think I should have because I had to walk so much. I am happy I finished and mean no disrespect to others that have finished in about the same amount of time, I just think I could have done better.

Reflection upon the run yielded a few parallels with education.

First off the one that resounded most loudly is that every body part has to deliver on race day. It didn’t matter that my heart rate was staying low, my legs (muscularly, speaking) and feet felt good, nothing was chaffing and my breathing was slow and steady. My knee “stopped” delivering. No matter how much I willed other parts of my body to compensate, I couldn’t hold a jog for a kilometer without immense pain. It reminds me of limiting resources that I learned about in a university course called Operations Research. Basically, if memory serves, it doesn’t matter how much of “everything else” you have to get a job done, you can only get as much done as your limiting resource(s) will allow. In education we talk about the “partnership” that exists between parent, student and school. Today’s experience made me realize that each piece has to deliver all year long, year after year. Parents, teachers, students, admin, school board, maintenance teams, bus drivers, TA/EA’s – all the parts – have to deliver at top capacity throughout the entire “race” or, unfortunately, we’ll end the year feeling like we could have done better. How many educators hit the beginning of May with one thought on their minds: summer? The expression, “it is a marathon, not a sprint,” should not be used to excuse apathy throughout the year, but instead invoked to inspire us all to push though the end each year and finish strong.

Another thought that occurred to me is a bit of a cliche. Well, two actually, but it is nice to be reminded. One, plan (plan, plan, plan) ahead and two, expect the unexpected. I have done a good handful of road races of varying distances including half-marathons as well as a ton of training runs. I learned from these runs and used that learning to do all I could to set myself up for a successful marathon. I foresaw chaffing, GI discomfort, weather variation and, of course, cardiovascular and leg endurance. I planned and prepared for all of these. My knees have never given me any trouble, so I didn’t worry too much about them. Murphy’s law, right? Talking to my wife, who happens to be my personal trainer, nutrition coach (check out her blog) and favorite running partner (sorry to those of you that I run with, but it’s true), I probably could have done more weight training, which could have prevented some (if not all) of the pain. I didn’t expect to be running on an angle for, what felt like, a majority of the run. I should have.

Lastly, company (that is, other people around you) counts for something (I think I have blogged about this before, or maybe just drafted about it). The last 5K I met up with a guy who was having trouble as well. He had passed me about 3K back and I had watched him alternate between jogging and walking until I caught back up to him. His knee was bothering him too, which I suspected because I happen to hear him ask about the possibility of switching to the half-marathon event citing his knee as a cause for doubt. We encouraged each other and finished together, extending the amount we could sustain a jog bit-by-bit such that we were able to jog the last kilometer-and-a-half (maybe a bit more). Colleagues in education are important in the same way: we all need encouragement and partnership sometimes. Thanks, Dennis, I couldn’t have finished strong without you. I don’t plan on running another marathon without a partner and I hope to always have someone to at least bounce ideas off of at work.

I just read an article in The Palm Beach Post raising oft asked question of whether or not technology in the classroom is a good thing. More accurately, it explores whether or not it should be a (monetary) priority. I’m pretty sure my perspective on the matter is known. Most of the article was right on target. They focused mainly on two pieces of technology: interactive student response remotes and wireless tablets, both of which I have used in my classes. I really appreciated that the main interviewees were math teachers; we often get forgotten about. Some of the pros and cons of both technologies were acknowledged, all of which I agree with (yes, even the cons).
What struck me enough to write about it was the last two sentences:

“You’re still seeing a human being explain and interpret,” Samore said. “The teacher is still front and center.”

Doh! The big AHA! about using technology in the classroom is it gives the teacher the ability to step out of the spotlight and put each student front and center for the sake of their own learning. They construct knowledge through the research and creation that the technology allows. Even with interactive student response remotes and tablets, students can control the flow of the discussion and do the demonstrating and explaining. Don’t get me wrong: there needs to be an expert in the room (I don’t want to write myself out of a job) – they just don’t need to do all of the talking ‘front and center’.

I just read an article here with the headline,

Low-tech classrooms may actually improve students’ math scores
Math skills — Limiting technology early on could help develop basic math skills

As a math teacher and an educational technologist, I was intrigued. I have found that technology has invigorated my math lessons, allowing my students to manipulate and visualize abstract concepts. The big Aha! for me was the sentence,

Although her research uncovered other findings that may account for high Japanese math scores — including highly competent educators, meaningful leading questions and more time for processing — the results also point to the possible benefits of limiting, or outright banning, technology in the classroom.

It doesn’t surprise me that highly competent educators asking meaningful leading questions and providing sufficient processing time are getting good results. Good teachers get good results everywhere – not just Japan.

I wonder if they infused a bit of technology in meaningful ways if their results would be even better? Are our students’ choices good teachers or technology? Can’t there be both?

Sorry about the long post title.

I just read that a UK school has enlisted Indian maths tutors online on BBC News. This could totally integrate with my previous idea of focusing on single classroom, big idea project based learning. When some heavy lifting needs to be done and there isn’t an embedded subject specialist with which to team-teach, something like this could be used to give the kids the differentiated, one-on-one learning experience they need.

Love it!

A big shout-out to The Dalian Maple Leaf School!

I did a whirlwind 24 hour fly-in-to-fly-out-of Dalian in the Liaoning province to facilitate a workshop on the TI-84+ calculator.  It was an amazing 4 hours in which I learned from the participants and truly hope that they learned from me.  I think I first started to get the vibe that it was going well when I offered a break for a second time and was told, “No, we’re good; you can keep going.”  I was having so much fun that I never took a break, though I encouraged those that needed or want to to come and go as they so desired.  There were some that not only never left, but came and chatted with me at the end (which, I think caused some stress to the workshop organizer, who was trying to get me to start moving toward the airport – oops).  I have often heard that teachers can be the worst students.  This particular group of teachers make that extremely hard to believe.  They were engaged, fueling the discussion with their ideas and questions and awesomely collaborative, helping each other here-and-there.

It all really supported something I already knew: It is easy to get excited about personal technology.  It is not only fun to play with and explore and discover, but the fact that it is personal means that it is up to the learner how to go about doing so.

The personal graphing calculator (AKA graphic display calculator or GDC) in math was the original kid on the one-to-one block.  It has all of those cool benefits mentioned above about personal technology in general, not to mention it is tactile, tapping another part of the brain.  I know one has to touch a laptop as well, but the GDC is held in the hands – its different.  If you are a math teacher and just use it for routine calculations and graphing, your students are missing out.  TI has loads of learning activities on their activities exchange that exploit their calculators as a tool to explore.

I’m reminded that laptop/web-based tools are not the be-all-end-all when it comes to using technology in the classroom and just because your school isn’t a one-to-one laptop school doesn’t mean that you can’t embrace technology and integrate in to your teaching-and-learning.  It has a way of capturing an audience and encouraging the mind to do so very much.

On birthdays and Christmas growing up, it didn’t take me long to figure out the coolest of the features of new toys…we can incite the same ‘gotta figure it out’ emotion when we use any technology in the classroom – not just math and not just laptops and calculators.

This was sent to me recently via one of those ‘FW:FW:FW:FW:FW:FW:’ emails.

Back in September of 2005, on the first day of school, Martha Cothren, a social studies school teacher at Robinson High School in Little Rock, did something not to be  forgotten. On the first day of school, with the permission of the school superintendent, the principal and the building supervisor, she removed all of the desks out of her classroom.

When the  first period kids entered the room they discovered that there were  no desks.

‘Ms. Cothren, where’re our desks?’

She  replied, ‘You can’t have a desk until you tell me how you earn the  right to sit at a desk.’

They thought, ‘Well, maybe it’s our  grades.’

‘No,’ she said.

‘Maybe it’s our behavior.’

She told them, ‘No, it’s not even your behavior.’

And so, they came and went, the first period, second period,  third period. Still no desks in the classroom.

By early  afternoon television news crews had started gathering in  Ms.Cothren’s classroom to report about this crazy teacher who had  taken all the desks out of her room.

The final period of the  day came and as the puzzled students found seats on the floor of the  deskless classroom, Martha Cothren said, ‘Throughout the day no one  has been able to tell me just what he/she has done to earn the right  to sit at the desks that are ordinarily found in this classroom. Now  I am going to tell you.’

At this point, Martha Cothren went  over to the door of her classroom and opened it.

Twenty-seven (27) U.S. Veterans, all in uniforms, walked  into that classroom, each one carrying a school desk. The Vets began  placing the school desks in rows, and then they would walk over and  stand alongside the wall. By the time the last soldier had set the  final desk in place those kids started to understand, perhaps for  the first time in their lives, just how the right to sit at those  desks had been earned..

Martha said, ‘You didn’t earn the  right to sit at these desks. These heroes did it for you. They  placed the desks here for you. Now, it’s up to you to sit in them.  It is your responsibility to learn, to be good students, to be good  citizens. They paid the price so that you could have the freedom to  get an education. Don’t ever forget it.’

By the way, this is  a true story.

Please  consider passing this along so others won’t forget that the freedoms  we have in this great country were earned by U. S. Veterans.

——————————————————————————————————————————

OK, so I get it.  I get that students of today’s American high schools need to be reminded that their education shouldn’t be squandered.  But seriously, kids in countries all over the world receive an education…not just in the States.  Forget countries like China and Cuba that aren’t “free” for a minute.  What about Canada or France?  Or even in the UK, that ‘oppressive’ country which the USA fought for freedom?  Students don’t have a right to learn in those countries?  Seriously?  This woman taught Social Studies?  I did a bit of Google-ing and found that, specifically, the class she taught was Military History.  I am guilty of trying to get my students’ attention with grand, flashy demonstrations, but we all should be careful to teach truth, not propaganda.

My grandfather died in WWII.  I never knew him.  My mom finished growing up without her father, which I’m sure has had an impact on me.  My father served in the Navy, as well.  I don’t take Veterans for granted.  I just don’t think that this particular demonstration does our students any service.  This type of domestic-focused propaganda is what sent my son home during his grade 1 year to announce that the United States of America is the only free country in the world.  This was not amusing to my Canadian wife.  At the same time that teachers are teaching national pride, they are teaching ignorance.

Let’s play pretend for a moment: If we didn’t have armed forces in WWII and we were invaded and taken over by the Axis, we, like our contemporaries in Italy, Germany and Japan would have received education in Math, Science, literature, physical fitness/health, and even social studies.  Granted the literature studied would have probably been different, as well as the significant concepts in the social studies classroom, but we Americans would have received an education.  According to the OECD‘s  Education at a Glance 2009 maybe a better one.

So, how did the veterans in Ms. Cothren’s demonstration earn the right for those students to learn?

Education is not a right, it is a responsibility.  It is mandated that school-aged children attend school of some sort in every state.

We are teachers, not propagandists.

Awhile back, I read an article by Steve Reinhart in an NCTM journal, “Never Say Anything an Kid Can Say.” In it, Reihart states, “When I was in front of the class demonstrating and explaining, I was learning a great deal, but many of my students were not! Eventually, I concluded that if my students were to ever really learn mathematics, they would have to do the explaining, and I the listening. . . .”  It is a great article, definitely worth a read, even if you are not a math teacher. In the years since, I have tried to incorporate Reinhart’s ideas in my teaching practices and, at risk of sounding arrogant, have been relatively successful.  Thanks to Kathleen Hart-Abel for making me read it.

I now teach at an international school in China where my students and I do not share a mother-tongue. When we go home and speak to our families, we aren’t all speaking the same language.  Taking me out of the mix, the students don’t all share a mother-tongue either, as they hail from Korea, Taiwan, Germany, Switzerland and France (these are in addition to those from countries that either speak the Queen’s English, American English, or something in between).

Among the classes I teach is MYP Math 4 (Grade 9 integrated math).  Two of the MYP grading criteria are communication and reflection.  This particular year, I have some VERY bright budding mathematicians.  However, as many us do, they struggle with communicating their ideas and reflecting about their work.  Much of this has to do with the fact that they are expected to communicate and reflect in English (the designated language of instruction at our school). Yesterday in class we had this great moment that came from my belief in Reinhart’s ideas.  One of my students who solved a particularly difficult problem volunteered to share her solution with the class.  I have found that chocolate is quite the volunteer motivator.  She copied her work from her notebook on to the board and stood, as is practice in our class, waiting for questions.  And they came!  All of a sudden, we hit a wall.  She couldn’t explain in English. She obviously understood and her solution was beautifully laid out, but she couldn’t explain.  I was sitting there in the class wrestling with the decision to stand up and take over, let her pass the task to a classmate, or make her tough it out.  As is often the case, the solution found me: another student asked me, “Can I ask in [my language]?”  At first I was confused, because the student explaining wasn’t from the other’s home country, but after it was revealed that the explaining student was fluent in two non-English languages, I went for it.

Wow, it was great!  She explained it in both of her non-English languages and there was this “Ah-Ha! moment” throughout the class.  Then the kids that still were confused got an explanation from yet another (bilingual) student who was among the most confused at the beginning of the whole ordeal.  In the end, the “Never Say Anything…” principle held strong.  Just because the kids may not be explaining to me (as none of this occurred in English or Spanish, my two languages of comprehension), they are still getting the experiences of reflection and communication necessary to cement the concepts in their brains.