Educational Celebrities

Friday was by far my worst day in the classroom. Worse than even my first day in the classroom. Perhaps I thought that after a week I was so experienced that I was ready to take risks that in reality, as I soon discovered, I was not. But my worst day yet makes for my best story yet:

My 6th grade math class is currently studying a unit on scientific notation. We have learned powers of ten with positive, negative, and zero exponents. We have learned to represent values in scientific notation and numbers written in scientific notation as their values. However for some of the students, this information is review, and I could feel that they were bored. If my students, students who are accustomed to being held to low circumstances because of their race and socioeconomic status, feel as though they are not being challenged and held to high expectations, then I am not doing my job. So, for those students who were bored stiff I attempted to increase the rigor of the lesson by incorporating two-step word problems that involved scientific notation. For example, "In the United States, there are approximately 91,000 species of insects. Ms. Hahn has been bitten by about 25,000 of them! How many species of insects has Ms. Hahn NOT been bitten by? Write your answer in scientific notation." and "Mr. Hasty owns 105,000 ties. If 18,000 of his ties are pink, how many of his ties are NOT pink? Write your answer in scientific notation." Well, it was a disaster.

The morning began with whisperings that Wendy Kopp, CEO and Founder of Teach for America, an organization that she drafted at my age in her senior thesis, was going to be visiting our school for the day. When she arrived, I saw her standing in the hallway with a dark haired man and it was like I was seeing Oprah and Gayle all over again. She observed a few of our curriculum sessions and then disappeared. I breathed a sigh of relief because I had heard that she was going to be observing a few lessons and I was teaching next. I assumed she had left the building. Yet just as I was setting up my materials for the day, in marches Wendy Kopp and her dark-haired companion. I later found out that this man is the Executive Vice President for TFA Institutes all over the country. This man has power, yet lucky for me I had no idea who he was until he had already left. Trailing behind them was my advisor, my collaborative teacher Mr. Hasty, and my mentor teacher. It was quite the audience.

My lesson began smoothly, the students completing the Do Now that begins each day's lesson. Yet because the previous day's lesson had been so simple for so many of them, I attempted to make every aspect of this lesson more rigorous, but without much experience I was unable to find the balance between rigor and feasibility and I overshot. I got so many raised hands about the third question on my Do Now that I finally stopped the class and said, "I have been getting a lot of questions about number 3, so let's go ahead and do that one together on the overhead." I proceeded to begin the problem, and about two steps in I realized that I couldn't even solve it without a calculator. It also involved rounding off the last digit to make it a zero so that it could be converted into scientific notation, a skill which I have not yet taught them. My wet erase marker paused. I tried to keep my cool but in my head I was panicking. I couldn't solve my own math problem, my work was projected hugely on the whiteboard, and Wendy Kopp and company were in the room watching me! I paused and said, "You know what, this one is tricky and I think we should come back to it after we have completed today's lesson! I think even Ms. Hahn needs to practice her scientific notation!" Then I was so flustered that my thinking cap, yes a real thing (see photo below) fell to the ground. I snatched it up and had no time to waste before moving on to our partner work activity. All I could think was Wendy "Oprah" Kopp was in the room, watching me make fun of myself. Luckily my students are lovely and didn't seem to care that I was making such a fool of myself.

We began our whiteboard activity, in which the students work with their partners to solve a problem, write the final answer on their whiteboard, and hold it up into the sky. This was not as smooth as I had hoped with the stream of raised hands causing me to bounce around the room answering questions like, "I can't get the marker off," or "mine is dry." Thankfully during this time, Wendy Kopp and the Dark-Haired-Director left the room. Wendy Kopp even gave me a little nod! I can't ever take a shower again or I might lose her scent!

With only fifteen minutes left of class, I called out, "Ladies and gentleman it is time to move on to our independent work. Please pass your whiteboards to the left while I distribute the assign..." Where was my assignment? I rifled through my papers and found no stack of the assessment that I had spent so long perfecting the night before. I had no time to think or waste. I turned to the students and said, "Please take our your homework, you have five minutes to work on your homework silently while I look for your assessment." Where was my assessment?!?!?!?!?! I had made so many photocopies the night before I know I must have copied it. How could I have been so absent minded? Oh wait I remember how, I haven't slept in two weeks. But I am responsible for administering a daily assessment to track my students' progress. All hope was lost. Wendy was gone, but my advisor and my summer mentor teacher were still watching and typing away. My only friend in the room was Mr. Hasty, helping me search and typing no notes about my wild screw-up.

Sadly, the assessment was no where to be found. I told the confused faces of the students to put away their homework again and I gave them another blank sheet of paper. I threw back up extra practice word problems onto the over head and asked them to complete the problems on their papers. Hands shot into the air.

"Yes?" I asked, knowing this could not be anything good.

"I can't see!" replied one student. No students could even see the problems.

"I will read them aloud," I answered, knowing that this was beyond saving. I called a few students to the overhead to complete the problems, but they were as lost as my hope. There is no nice way to say it, this lesson had sucked. And Wendy Kopp was there. Watching. Me.

After the lesson, I walked over to my summer mentor teacher. "That was a disaster," I said. She told me not to worry, that it was my first week as a teacher and if the head of the organization had come to watch her she would have done the same thing. I realized I had two choices: I could cry or I could laugh. So I laughed, and now the whole experience seems quite amusing. I must remember that the thing about teaching is there will always be good days and bad days but there will also always be a tomorrow and a new chance to learn.

the fourth day

It is my fourth day in the classroom. My assertive tone is growing stronger but each moment of each lesson I am learning more. I love being in the classroom but after a week of four hours of sleep a night my brain is like an empty box that shuts down at 5 pm and I am constantly redirecting it towards the task at hand: learning how to be a better teacher. I need every day to be better than the day before because the need is great and time is short. I have three more weeks after tomorrow to teach 22 7th grade standards and I still have many short comings. My biggest priority currently is to learn how to test exactly what I am teaching without teaching to the test. Or should I teach to the test, knowing the reality is that the only way that my students will be able to create better lives for themselves is if they can pass state exams to graduate from high school? Numbers are the reality, so how can authentic teaching and the necessity to pass the New York Regents exam be reconciled? Especially if a student is grade levels behind and there is no time?

And there are still things I have not yet grown accustomed to, realities of the lives of my students. Mr. Hasty and I sent a personal interest survey home with each of our students and some of the answers had me roaring in laughter, though perhaps from delirium, and others were scary. Interests, hobbies, and activities were typical of a 6th grader, including, "texting a lot," and "rasing people when I no I can win," and it was incredibly fun to remember what my priorities consisted of when I was at that age. In response to the question, "What are three things you are considering doing after you graduate from high school?" the smallest boy in the classroom wrote simply, "Go to college, party, get a girl." Those certainly are three of the most important things in life. But some of the favorite activities still seemed unexpected, even after all I have learned over the past three weeks. My brightest math student, a student who responded enthusiastically today when I quietly asked her after class if she would like me to start assigning her more difficult homework, answered the prompt of 'What are your interests?' with "I like to kick my stepfather." How often will I hear statements like this? When will it become the norm? What is outside of my locus of control? Will I feel pity for this student and hold her to lower standards? I hope that when I learn this type of information, which I know that I often will, that it will lead me to hold even higher standards so that this student and many others are able to build better lives for themselves someday.

Here is another peek into the classroom of Mr. Hasty and Ms. Hahn:

My love of being in the classroom said, I am counting the hours until tomorrow evening, when I am allowed to sleep and breathe and wear jeans. But now I must work, tomorrow we continue our festival of scientific notation.

Self-Assessments

I have so much to learn that any small accomplishes seem like the footsteps of a mouse in what is only a generally appropriate direction. Although my second day before a classroom as an official teacher smoothly passed, any amount of success was surpassed by a large amount of learning experiences. During my lessons, I felt in control and confident. I stated and upheld my expectations of respect for me, for each other, and for learning and I checked a few middle-school attitudes at the door. They raised their hands and answered my prompts correctly and I for moments I thought I was born for this.

Then I graded my assessments. What seemed smooth sailing was actually information that sailed smoothly over my students' heads. The grades on the daily assessments ranged from 100% to 45%. My class average was 75%, not nearly good enough to reach our overall goal of demonstrating a class average of 80% or above on the assessments for each standard. I had to ask myself, "What am I doing wrong? How can I make this better?" I am not reaching every student that needs to be reached. Every student can learn, so the gap can only rest in my teaching. Yet the beauty of falling short of your goals is the opportunity to pause and ask yourself what went wrong, because tomorrow is always there as a foundation for improvement. Thus my only goal for tomorrow is to view today as a lesson learned.

I learned something else about myself today. I learned that growing up in a school where every student came on the first day with school supplies still in the package was such a part of my school schema that the thought that my students wouldn't have paper never occurred to me. Each year, my mother took me to a store with rows of colored pens and decorated folders and allowed me to choose whichever sparkled pens and sharpened pencils I wished even though our house had millions of uncapped Bics. I certainly took this for granted. Abused it is more accurate. Today, as I lined students up outside of my door and informed them of the procedure for entering the classroom and removing their math materials from their backpacks, I wrongly assumed that they would have them. I should have taken notice when I instructed the students to open their notebooks and begin copying examples that nobody moved. Slowly a hand, and then two hands, and then three hands went into the air. "I need paper," one student said. I looked around and saw that the majority of students had empty tables in front of them.

"How many students need paper?" I asked. Most hands went into the air. "How many of you have something to write with?" Most hands went down.

This is something else I learned today, but tomorrow I will be prepared. Part of the mission of Teach for America is doing whatever it takes. The fact that the student population of my school does not have school supplies should not keep them from learning, and if doing whatever it takes includes passing out sheets of paper...I say that is a small price to pay.

flying high

My first day was more perfect than I could have even imagined. I carried a clipboard, I wore a lanyard, and not a student spoke when I was speaking. If they had though, I was ready with Reflection Corner. I realize that it is just the very beginning of my adventure and my growth as a teacher, but making it through the first day is a small feat which I am proud to have conquered. The knot in my stomach has finally gone and hopefully does not plan on making a fast return.

And today I learned about my students. Reading and math assessments revealed how much they cherish books. They couldn't wait to tell me how much they loved to read, how long they read each night, and what books were their favorite. Growing up in a house full of books, I am not sure I appreciated them on the same level. Some students tested well above the 7th grade level as 6th graders, and some students didn't come close. Some students got nearly every answer correct on the math pre-assessment, and some answered none. This is where the hard part comes in.

Yet now, with actual daily interactions with the scholars in my classroom, I can to you the small joys I will experience each day. And by small joys I mean hilarious things that students say. Today, we ended class with a name game in which the students were required to say their name and an adjective that describes them that starts with the same letter as their name. My teaching partner, Mr. Andrew Hasty, went first, stating, "My name is Mr. Hasty, and I'm Hasty." He passed on the torch to the first student, who responded, "My name is Dominic, and I'm Dominic." Needless to say, I am looking forward to tomorrow.

Here is a peek into my classroom:

My Think-Aloud hat:

Mr. Hasty and Ms. Hahn:

A glimpse of Bushwick:

Hopefully more successes to follow.

mindsets

They say when it rains it pours. I wonder if the decision to challenge yourself is some kind of signal to the universe to throw every available hardship at you, flying through space and at your head like some kind of meteor at the speed of light. Institute has brought out not only the stress of self-doubt a thousand times over, long hours, sleepless nights, hard efforts, and many tears, but life has thrown its own obstacles into the mix. Corps members are leaving the program around every corner, family members are sick or dying, people are lonely, and relationships are ending. It is the eve of my first day as a teacher, and I am alone but for my hopes for tomorrow. I will meet my students, and the focus on their achievement seems all I have left. As a corps, we are tired, we are nervous, we are hoping that no student is big enough to kick our ass. We have little, but we have determination. Here are the mindsets that will share my bed with me tonight and wake with me tomorrow:

Education transforms lives.

Vision precedes action.

Effective teachers are made, not born.

All students can behave.

The achievement gap is a literacy gap.

I am in the driver's seat of my own development.

The expectations I set for my students will determine the extent of their academic achievement.

If you don't have a plan for your students, they will have a plan for you.

Don't give up. Ever.

dreams

Hold fast to dreams

For if dreams die

Life is a broken-winged bird

That cannot fly.

Hold fast to dreams

For when dreams go

Life is a barren field

Frozen with snow.

by Langston Hughes

No excuses

Monday morning at 8 am I become a teacher. I have spent a sleepless week preparing, a week of training for 14 hours a day, but I am still alive (for those of you who were wondering). In my head I envision the most perfect classroom, flawless classroom management, with an unparalleled bond between teacher and students. I know it will not be this way, but I will hang onto this vision with the highest of expectations for myself, for who am I to preach high self-standards without practice? In accordance with the Teach for America mantra, I would like to consider my goal both ambitious and feasible, yet though it is aligned with the first quality, I realize it is not feasible. I will not be perfect, but I will expect the best of myself in order to attain the best that I can do. As Teach for America has nailed into my skull, great teachers are made and not born. I have become the voice of TFA, using phrases like 'relentless pursuit' in conversation when discussing my mission to set up my single roommates with the available male corps members. I am envisioning my first day, wearing heels that click for intimidation factor, because I teach for America now. And as they say in TFA, my focus is now solely on two things: student achievement and students achievement. And this is why:

"So strong is the link between literacy and being a useful member of society that some states use grade-level reading statistics as a factor in projecting future prison construction."

-Bob Chase, President, National Education Association

The neighborhood in which I will be teaching this summer and in the fall is called Bushwick in Brooklyn, New York, the 7th most impoverished neighborhood in NYC. Residents spend over 50% of their income on rent, a per capita income that already falls well below the poverty line, hovering around 11,000 dollars per year. The area is largely populated with immigrants from Latin America and local industry involves illegal but continued sweat shop conditions. There are high rates of childhood obesity and lead poisoning. 2/3 of the students at the school are performing below grade level proficiency on state exams. The challenges these students face are immense, and the teacher's locus of control is very small outside of the classroom. Inside of the classroom, however, the teacher's focus upon achievement and high expectations is the key to success. Sadly, most teachers do not choose to focus upon student achievement and student achievement and these children are held to such low expectations that they never are able to achieve or break the boundaries that bind them. Teach for America aims to redefine what is possible for these students.

This is the reason I am here, a statement which I remind myself now at least once a minute. In this moment, however, I am so tired that I don't even have the energy to do just that.