Hat tip to you, Mr. Churchill

"No matter how beautiful the strategy, one must occasionally look at the results." -Winston Churchill

So I have begun to read "The Global Achievement Gap" by Tony Wagner.  Some of my same questions and frustrations are beginning to come back to the front of my mind.  First, why is it that we are willing to have a political class stand in the way of what everyone essentially agrees are what we need to teach students to be successful in the world of the future?  What I mean is that colleges and businesses alike agree that we need to be teaching students to be thinkers, to be problem-solvers, to be able to work collaboratively, and to be able to be flexible.  However, the political class essentially pushes all of those things OUT of the system by implementing huge amounts of standardized testing that results in bad teaching that results in the exact OPPOSITE of what we claim we want.

How do we turn a ship like this around?  And it gets even more complicated.  For example, all 50 states require students to complete courses in Advanced Math (Algebra, Geometry, Calculus, etc.) in order to graduate high school.  They do this because 95%+ of colleges require this for admission.  But if you actually look at the math that most people do in their adult lives it involves computation, statistics, and probability.  But statistics and probability aren't even really taught in most high schools and are very rarely required in college majors.  Colleges say that students are unprepared for math in college but then require courses that don't ask students to learn the type of mathematical thinking THEY want!  How messed up is that?!?!  And there is no research to link success in Algebra to success in college or life - all the statistics show are correlations, not causations.  But most students and/or people wouldn't know the difference because that is statistics - and they never had to learn it!  Of course, if some of the esteemed members of the House and Senate had taken statistics, they would probably know that having a goal of 100% of students "passing" is statistically unreasonable as well.

It just seems to me that so many people agree about what it is we want our students to know and be able to do, but we continue to have a system that is testing, and therefore mandating, the complete opposite.  These are some of those instances where it is mind-boggling to me that so many people refuse to look at results - they only want to talk about how they THINK their strategy is going to do something to make a difference (see the Churchill quote above).  Whether it does or not is meaningless.  If, in fact, it does the exact opposite of the intent, who cares?

I'm blessed to be working in a small school system where we can actually try to do something to course correct this problem, but we are still saddled with the ridiculous expectations by the state and NCLB.  It isn't that teacher accountability isn't important.  It is that we are holding teachers and students accountable to the wrong standards.  It is such a huge problem, I don't know how you could ever reasonably expect to make a dent in it.  I'll leave that to others for now, while I keep trying to help my school figure it out on our micro-level.  Until we can get schools out of the hands of people who are only looking for headlines and are trapped in a revolving door of elections, I don't see how we can really expect to move forward from this.  It still amazes me that we have a bunch of people who spend most of their lives OUT of the classroom (if they were ever in it to begin with) making the decisions about what should be going on INSIDE the classroom.  It becomes clearer and clearer that most politicians see teaching as a job and not a profession.

I'm not sure if all this makes sense.  My brain has so much swimming around in it, I don't know which way is up right now.  I'm mostly venting and trying to get it all out on paper so that I can try to figure out what I really think.

Professional Development vs Being a Teacher

As I continue to read and think about curriculum and how it relates to gifted students I continue to go round and round in my head.  First, I agree that curriculum is important, but reading through the textbook and some of other readings we have been provided, one is left to wonder who these people are talking to.  I just cannot fathom that anyone has the time to think about curriculum as much as these readings imply.  Of course, I can tell the difference in my own room when I have fully thought through something than when it was more on a whim.  For example, the literature circles I am running right now seem to me to be ineffective because I don’t feel I put the time into thinking through exactly what I wanted to achieve.  This also left me with little or no assessment for them.  Really, I am mad at myself about this because I feel like I have wasted the opportunity that I have with this group of students.  I have so many really deep thinkers, and rather than help them go really deep, I short-changed them because I have been so focused on other things.  But that is always the pull, right?  I mean where do we draw the line between investing in the future and worrying about the kids in front of us now?  I have spent a lot of time this semester and this year working on things for this class and the other gifted class and on top of that have been working through things related to our new building project (if that ever goes anywhere), trying to help a new team figure everything out, being in charge of the fundraising and the trip for the patrols, cooperative learning trainings, working with the preinterns in my room, and more, and have therefore not spent the time I should have on working through what I want to do for the students who I see every day.  I have relied on my previous experience and knowledge and my own ability to think quickly on my feet to get me through it.  I feel like I have done a huge disservice to these kids and I really hope and pray there isn’t any lasting damage.

Now back to curriculum, how am I really supposed to put this much time and effort into my curriculum?  What I really mean by that is how am I supposed to do that and then also put that much time and effort into also differentiating it effectively for my gifted students?  I feel like I have some pretty decent mechanisms for differentiation of curriculum in place, but these are more general and only focus on micro-differentiation, not really a well thought out process of differentiation within a unit.  I think part of it that I don’t really do units in the same way as many other teachers.  Very rarely do I have a unit that is less than six weeks.  Reading through these texts, it seems like many people have “mini-units” that they teach.  Also, I am REALLY bad at assessment.  By this I mean formal, end of unit assessment.  I am pretty good at on-going assessment and judging where my students are, but when it comes to follow through in the end, I am always lacking – except with these big units where we have a rubric.  But then I struggle with assessment anyway.  My big question at the end is “What do we do with this information?”  What I mean is, we do this big project or we have some final grade – do we do anything with that to inform instruction?  If not, why are we doing it?  Is it merely to say, yes you can do it and no you can’t?  Where do we take it from there?  And what part do the kids play in creating how they are assessed?  Or should they?  Some of these bigger questions are the ones that haunt me and make me want to go back and just say never mind, I’ll just use the prepackaged stuff or do something else with my life.  I am just very frustrated right now at where I am and what I am doing.  I feel like I need someone to help me with direction.  Even this reflection is frustrating because I feel like I am working into what my problem is but I don’t really have any clue where to start for a solution.

Customer Service

Do we really serve our customers or do we serve ourselves?....hmmmm  See if you can figure out how that question connects to my thoughts below.

Should we even have gifted classes?

This is the question that we handled tonight in class.  Really when it comes down to it, what is the right answer when it comes to gifted services?  Like so many things in life, I don’t think there is one right answer.  But it seems to be that what we have done in this county is to pretty much put all of our eggs in the “acceleration” model.  Even though we like to call it enrichment, most of what is happening is acceleration.  My big question with that is whether or not the students actually understand what they are being accelerated through.  For example, in my ten years in fifth grade, I know that most students I encounter at the beginning of the year have no clue what area is.  They know that A = l X w, but they have no idea what it actually means.  My concern with a lot of the acceleration is that we are pushing our students through a curriculum without actually making sure that the students know what they are learning.

Whenever I hear about someone saying “we are finishing such and such a book” I have a deep down feeling that I am talking to someone who isn’t really teaching students – rather, they are someone who is more worried about covering curriculum.  I feel like I keep circling this same idea again and again and again.  It comes down to teaching kids not curriculum.  I think SO many people agree with this, but when it comes to changing what they are actually doing, they back off of their assertions and claim that THEY really are looking at the kids – it is all those OTHER teachers who are too focused on curriculum (I don’t pretend that this isn’t me sometimes, too).  I think if we change the way we serve all kids, then how we serve gifted students will also change.  I think that a HUGE part of this comes down to choice.  Yes it takes some courage and creativity to make sure that the standards are met, but we don’t have to march through some pre-packaged curriculum to do it.

Why is there so much bad teaching going on?  Is it that we are too tired, too overworked, don’t know any better, think that our way is the best way, need control, a combination of all of this?  Why do teachers feel like they have to have control of everything?  Why do we treat our students in ways that we would NEVER accept being treated – or at least the same way that we complain about being treated?  I think a lot of these questions come back to the central question at the top of this entry – what is the best way to serve gifted students?  Until we start really holding each other accountable about how we serve ALL students, how we serve gifted students can’t really be changed.  But for the record, I don’t believe that a pull out program that creates social stress is a good way to serve kids.  But we can’t leave them in regular education classrooms with no support either.  We need better teaching – everywhere.  I also believe that there are some profoundly gifted students that do need more services that ANY regular education setting can truly serve.  But for most gifted students, the right kind of team-teaching model with true differentiation all across the board can (I believe) meet their needs.

Sorry  - this entry was a little bit of a rant.  I don’t believe that the situation is as dire as one might surmise from above.  But there are times when I just feel the need to rant a little about what I see going on around me (and admittedly sometimes in my own room).  I’m really excited about working in a place where we will soon have an organizational paradigm that will help continue our ability to ACTUALLY differentiate rather than just talking about it.

What are we DOING?!?!?!?!?

I am curious about gifted students’ abilities to “take risks” and also their “impatience” as identified in an article I read for my Nature and Needs class.  I definitely see the phenomenon that many of the gifted students I have taught over the years don’t want to take risks because the grade they earn is more important than the learning they are doing.  I think this is the biggest black mark on what we have done in the education profession.  If we are in any way responsible for students forgoing learning in order to get a better grade, than we have not only failed the students, we have failed our mission.  I can’t really even express how mad that makes me.  Here we are taking our “best and brightest” (although I dislike that phrasing) and reducing them into competition machines.  They don’t care at all about the learning; all they care about is seeing an ‘A’ at the end – WHAT A DISGRACE!!!!  How do we combat this?  The quickest thing that I can think of is to get rid of grades.  Just like with aging school buildings full of “cells and bells” our grading system is something we are comfortable with that doesn’t actually accomplish the purpose for which it was designed.  Most parents and students that I know have no idea what a ‘C’ really means, they just don’t want one.  A grade of ‘C’ was designed to be average – which by definition should be where most people fall.  But we hardly ever give one – and if we do it is equating with failure.  In the end, wouldn’t it be much more effective to actually communicate with parents about what their child can do and where they are struggling instead of just giving them a letter?  I think this would greatly improve the ability of gifted students to stop looking at what they have to do “to get an ‘A’” and start looking what they want to learn.

I’m also curious about impatience.  I notice that a lot in my gifted students.  They expect to always see the answer right away.  I wonder if this is natural to a gifted learner or if this is a learned response because they have only ever been exposed to material that is below their ability and therefore they have never had to puzzle out anything.  I’ve not done any research on this, but I infer that it is more a learned behavior.  And I think that we as teachers perpetuate this by saying things like “the gifted kids will figure it out on their own”.  If they can do that, then you haven’t given them the right material.  Again, this comes from lack of time to plan and lack of resources.  I think this is recognized (at least at PK), but the state doesn’t give adequate resources for teachers to deal with this.  For example, I am kind of bummed that I have such a great group to “experiment with,” if you will, and I haven’t really had the time to design a project to truly push them.  I feel like I want to design something that would include them coming up with part of the rubric.  But I’m so busy trying to do everything else that is on my plate, I don’t have the adequate time to really do it.  On top of that, I think it should be done with other teachers.  But this can’t just be three teachers sitting down and talking about what they want to do separately in their own classrooms.  It needs to be a truly collaborative affair.  I don’t know how you make that happen in our current environment.  One more reason to be excited about our new building.

So to sum up, I think a lot of the issues that gifted kids have are, if not a product of, then at least exacerbated by the school system we have them in.  Pulling them out into another room and making them feel like the upper class isn’t really a way to stretch them and push them to go beyond themselves.  Of course, I think a better system is what will also benefit all learners, not just the gifted ones.  But again, it isn’t that I think giftedness doesn’t exist, it is more that I think we are coming at this whole equation from the wrong direction.  We are thinking about school as 1 teacher with 22 students.  In that paradigm the teacher doesn’t have a whole lot of choice but to teach to the middle because no matter what the state says, one person cannot truly individualize or even “small groupize” to the extent necessary given a 6.5 hour school day, 45 minutes of planning, and on average $40,000 a year (even with an advanced degree).  So we are framing our opinions about giftedness and whether or not we should pull out or differentiate in some other way on this paradigm.  I argue that we should complete re-work our school setting around having more than one teacher in the room.  Despite what you would think, 2 * 22 is not the same as (1 * 22) * 2 [or (1 * 22) * 6 for that matter].  Basically if we give teachers the time, resources, and collaboration needed, I think they can work together to truly differentiate the curriculum and meet all students needs without having to “pull out” anyone.  Not that students won’t know who is “smart” and who struggles.  Of course they will.  Put a group of adults in a room together for 6 hours a day for 5 days and ask them at the end of it who are the “smart” ones and who struggles and they could tell you too.  That isn’t going to change.  But by meeting everyone’s needs within a community, we can start to educate all the students at their level, begin to really concentrate on pushing them beyondtheir current level, and  also educate them about other talents and intelligences that don’t involve math and reading (thank you Dr. Gardner).  If I continue writing at this point, it is going to become more and more fractured than it already is. This started out as a reflection, but I think somewhere it went beyond that! J

Learning Space

So we began work on the new PK Yonge today.  It will be interesting to say the least.  I'm ready to build this thing!   There will definitely be some work to be done, though.  It is a scary thing to envision something that isn't.  It isn't like we are just plopping down a new configuration of an old floor plan.  We are completely redesigning what it means to be at school. 

Of course, none of this is new.  One of the quotes that Prakash (Nair...the lead President of Fielding Nair International) shared with us tonight was from John Dewey - "Schools should not be about preparation for life, the should be about life itself."  I really think this is right on the money.  One of the analogies used was that of a "committed sardine".  Apparently, scientists have done research on how humongous schools of sardines are able to turn so quickly.  What they found is that it is not really all that quick.  There are always some sardines swimming against the rest.  Those around them start to turn.  Eventually, when there is a critical mass, they all turn.  John Dewey was the first sardine to start swimming the other way.  Prakash feels that we are about to hit critical mass where all the sardines are about to turn.

One of the ways he helps people see that they are ready for the change is by showing them what they already believe about life, their own health and well-being, and what we say we want our schools to accomplish.  When we really look at this, it becomes completely obvious that how we design our schools does not accomplish this mission.

One of the other quotes he shared which hit home for me is from David Orr:

The goal of education is not mastery of a subject, but mastery of one's self.

It is a myth that we can adequately restore in life that which we have dismantled in school.

This are the kinds of thoughts I have behind my paradigm in my classroom.  I really want to be teaching these kids what it means to be in the world, not just in school.

It doesn't appear that you can post a youtube video inside of a blog, so I am putting two links to some youtube videos that I think probe a lot of this kind of stuff and really make you think about what we are trying to prepare students for.

Shift Happens - this is a video we watched in a faculty meeting last Spring.  This version has been update.  I think the question at the end is really good.

Students Today - this one came up as a related video when I searched for the other one.  I think it has some other good points.  The two videos are complimentary.

Also, here is the Fielding Nair International website.  You can see the kinds of schools they design.

It's all about control

As I continue to read more and more about giftedness I feel myself thinking more and more about how the kind of things we should be doing for gifted students really is what we should be doing for everyone.  It seems to me that we have created a culture in our education system where being "gifted" is a contest and a label that many use in order to increase their social status as it were.  Of course, I still believe that there is a difference between a gifted child and an average child, but I also believe that what is needed in gifted education is essentially what is needed in all of education - a paradigm shift (as I've mentioned before).  Essentially, if we teach students rather than curriculum, we will in turn be providing the extra stimulation that each gifted child needs.  And if we do it the right way, we can actually form our gifted curriculum around the child, rather than just putting all the gifted kids in the same room for 45 minutes a day and teach them a subject at an advanced pace even if they are not gifted in the same area as the class.

 

This semester promises to be one of an awful lot of growth.  I feel like I am finally starting to figure out how to put words to what I have been thinking about and doing over the past 2-3 years.  I've also noticed this semester that I am getting much better at guiding the pre-interns in my room as they are in their infant teaching stage.  I hope that they are able to really digest the overall world view that I have in for my classroom.

 

Of course the big question is how does my thinking about "teaching the child" actually come to fruition?    I feel like the way I approach my classroom and my students is very different that I hear described by many other teachers I have talked with.  Not that they don't care or don't know what they are doing.  Simply that they are approaching their task from a different angle and they have different priorities.  But deep down, I believe that, even if there are small differences in approach, what is best for kids is to truly change how we view about what we do.  For example, we can't reasonably hope to graduate independent, critical thinkers who can navigate uncharted territory if we use the entire 13 years that they are in our care controlling their environment, their choices, their movement - even their bathroom usage!  No adult would live that way, so why do we force kids to?  I'm not saying I want a free school, but I have learned that when you give the students more choice and more control you actually have more influence in the room.  I have also learned that by shear force of rule and law, you can have absolute control in a classroom, but when you choose that, then control is all you will have.  I don't want control.  I want to be part of a community.  I want to know my students.  I want them to learn how to take control of their own learning.  Why do we control everything in their lives and make all the hard choices and then complain that they can't make good decisions or think critically?

 

The answer, I believe is that change needs to happen.  But I don't want change for its own sake.  And I don't simply want to go back to the 70s.  But after reading about what many educational reforms in the 1970s and 80s and listening to the teachers that lived through them, it seems that the problem wasn't in the theory of change, it was that the teachers were forced into change that they didn't want and didn't understand.  There was no shift in paradigm, so there was no change in the way education was done.  It just led to people complaining about "the new math", "open classrooms", etc.  So I guess the question is, how do we truly accomplish the paradigm shift, because without that shift, nothing else will happen.

Do I have a choice?

So I've begun work on my Teacher Inquiry Project for this year…How do I engage my  higher-achieving students at a deeper level?  I'm revolving this question around using a Literature Circle format as the students discover the 20th Century.  I've divided the students up into two groups.  The group of boys  have chosen to read Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry by Mildred Taylor focusing on Civil Rights issues, while the girls have chosen to read Out of the Dust by Karen Hesse focusing on The Great Depression and the Dust Bowl.  Both groups were also given the option of picking The Watsons go to Birmingham, 1963.  My hope is that by providing some student choice there will be even greater by in there there was for the Civil War novels.

 

Once again, we will be utilizing the wiki for a response mechanism.  My desire is to have the students take over more and more of the ownership and leadership of the wiki.  My biggest dilemma at this point will be how to assess their usage of it.  I know that I can require a certain number of log-ins, but I also know that by doing so I will most likely just end up having students do the minimum and not really put the depth into it.  I want them to see the wiki as a place where they can not only put their thoughts about the story, but also a place where they can discover others thoughts and respond to those as well.  I'm hoping to create an actual 'Book Club' type of format where they are working collaboratively to puzzle together to construct their own meanings from the literature.  Of course, I will also be logging on in order to probe some of their thinking where needed, but I hope that as it progresses, there will be less and less need of that.

 

I see this fitting in with my larger thoughts at this point by creating or attempting to create a collaborative culture that is centered around the students, their interests, their choices, and their voice.  Rather than me dictating comprehension questions and forcing them to see all of my interpretations, I instead want to encourage them to discover it on their own.  Again, however, I am left with the problem of assessment.  I think some sort of survey and questionnaire is in order as well as some sort of accountability grading.  I think that I may have them be in on creating what the accountability grading might look like and then force them to hold each other to it rather than it only coming from me.  When it comes to actual assessment of what was learned, however, I want to find a way for the students to really be able to assess themselves…that is what it iis all about in the end right?

Imagination

Imagine a school.  That is what I want to do.  I want to imagine a school…not simply build one.  As I read and reflect on what I want to learn about gifted education, I begin to realize how much of an overlap there is with what I feel about progressive education and educational reform - in all facets of education, not just in gifted education.  I continue to find myself in class thinking - this is about all children!  I know that there are specific differences between the needs of gifted learners and their more mainstream counterparts, but when I think about what I feel a true education should look like, I don't know that the process would be that different.  I think that gifted learners and high achievers would definitely spend less time repeating things they already understand, but I think that education in general should be less about a repetitive, mass-production model and more about how people learn and how they begin to learn to think.  That is the difference.  So much of education today is all about teaching kids specific content.  I think we need to stop looking so exclusively at content we want to impart and start thinking about the kind of people we want to produce.  I think this affects the gifted learners the most because I think they are the ones who are the most negatively affected by the current state of affairs.

 

I imagine a school where the students are encouraged to really explore their own passions.  To be given the space, time, and access to really strive to answer their own questions.  I'm not really sure how you set that up in a way that still allows for some mastery of basics to occur.  But I think that the idea of a "liberal arts" education needs to change.  I think that we as a society have decided that everyone should be "well rounded" and therefore should be exposed to all sorts of different things or we won't be whole.  What ends up happening is that most kids check out of school because there is an extreme disconnect between what they care about and what we are teaching them.  Too often, the teacher is so entrenched in their own passions and questions they fail to see that rather than truly educating their students and teaching them how to think, they are simply trying to impart their own knowledge and passions onto the students.  Why do we all need to know the same things?  That doesn't make sense to me.

 

In the realm of gifted education, I feel the same way, even in my fifth grade classroom. Without completely throwing open the door and saying "Learn whatever you want, I don't care if you learn anything at all!" I think that the gifted students in our rooms have a lot going on in their heads.  How can we help them tap that?  At this point I'm pursuing the use of Literature Circles and a wiki to help my high achieving students be able to push beyond just understanding history through non-fiction texts.  My desire is that they will use the wiki to really express their own thoughts about what is going on with the stories but also that they will begin to listen to each other and pushing each other to go deeper.  We'll see how they do, but it is a start. I just think we need to rethink so many things…but it is all still in such an infant state in my mind, I don't even really know how to crystallize my thinking at all. 

 

To top it all off, even though I know we all have to cut our own path through the jungle of life, I constantly have this nagging feeling that I am trying to uncover what others have been doing for decades.  That I'll show up one day and say - "YES! This is what I've been searching towards!" only to find hundreds of people already there looking at me and thinking, "Duh! We've known about this for decades.  Where have you been?"

The Challenge of Passion

So what is more important - the challenge or the passion?  Or are they supposed to meet in some strange but exhilarating way?  As I look forward I'm not sure which direction I'm being pulled.  A part of me wants to see that my passions and interests should carry me and that new challenges, though hard, are supposed to be enjoyable because I'm passionate about it.  However, I don't know that this is necessarily proved true in a biblical sense.  There are definitely plenty of people who did something because that it where God led them, not because they were supremely interested in it.  So how do you tell if you are moving in the right direction.  I have people on one side, people who I know are part of God's plan for my life, that tell me to look at what God has given me.  I've heard on at least 2 different occasions from two different people this year that I should be a principal or do some other sort of administration.  However, I don't really have this desire.  Is this like people who receive the calling to be a priest?  I don't really know.  I do know that I'm interested in how to get the most out of kids - especially gifted and high achieving kids.  I am also seeking to be challenged to go farther in my thinking.  I'm seeking to surround myself with others who are seeking the same thing.  But I find myself in a situation where I feel myself being whittled, not sharpened.  Or am I being sharpened in a different way?  A way that I'm not aware of?  How do you ever really sort all of this stuff out?  At what point do you simply have to pick a theory and move forward?

 

Honestly there is a part of me who looks at this whole situation and says, I only live once.  I need to focus on what can make me the best teacher, the best learner, the best Christian, the best person I can be.  Similar to the whole "Teach to Your Strengths" theory, what really distinguishes the good teachers from the truly great teachers is that the great teachers realize their strengths and work to improve them and capitalize on them.  They don't spend their careers trying to make their weaknesses into strengths.  I sort of feel like that is what I'm being asked to do.

 

Or am I just being a little kid saying "I don’t wanna!"?

 

How do I really make the decision for which direction to take?