WAITING FOR SUPERMAN - A second look at this landmark film in the Betsy DeVos era

When I first saw WAITING FOR SUPERMAN several years ago, I was initially blown away by the power of the filmmaking.  It was by far the most authorative film on education to that date--maybe even still to this day.  The second time I saw it with a friend, who was also a teacher and former filmmaker (birds of a feather...).  However, she looked past the emotional journey within the film, and instead, saw it as being anti-public education right from the start.  She focused particularly on the anti-union parts of the film.  And while that strand of the film is definitely evident, it's not the only story within the film.

The part of the film that settles on the lottery element demonstrates the inherent problem within the privatization/voucher debate.  If all parents were given a voucher to use at any school of their choice, at some point all of the "good" schools would reach their peak levels.  Then what?  Where will the rest of the remaining students turn when the "good" schools reach capacity?  What types of students will likely be left behind with few real options once the voucher program is put in place?  That's when we as a nation will be right back where we are now:  trying to figure out how to educate those that come from the poorest neighborhoods in America.  That voucher will not put every child in a "good" school simply because there are not enough "good" schools to educate every student in America.  If it were, we'd settle this issue right now.

Watching the film again today, the thought of how to educate the poor stood out like a bull in a china shop.  Assuming the advocates of privatization know that it is not a panacea for all (not even most) as well, what is their real goal?  The idea of vouchers may sound good on its face, particularly to poor parents in struggling schools, but as as a matter of policy, how would it benefit all students rather than just a few?  That is, public education definitely has its problems, and may need a complete overhaul in design, but privatization is most certainly not the savior that Ms. DeVos is selling it as.  


http://www.takepart.com/waiting-for-superman/ 

Technology in Classrooms

One-to-one has been a big topic in education for a few years now.  When I worked in a Title 1 school, I always longed for more technology in my classroom. We had two classroom computers in the room and I got to be one of the few teachers with five kindles for classroom use. This was huge! Now, I am at a school that is one-to-one. So, it should be a dream right?!

I have found that at my current school a common theme is lots of resources with little resources. Yes, we have one-to-one technology but we have had no training on how to use that effectively in the classroom.

On my own time, I have been looking into the best ways to have a one-to-one classroom and best practices to use in the room.

I definitely see the advantages of being one-to-one. It allows for more differentiation in the classroom. I am able to really customize each of my students’ learning. The technology allows me to be more of a facilitator role in the classroom. I also love that I am able to teach my students about online language and having online interactions. Because this is going to be the venue in which students communicate more often, I love that we can talk about the ethics behind speaking with respect to our classmates.

While there are many advantages, there are also evident disadvantages. Honestly, I think elementary students are too young to have laptops of their own for school use. They are not mature enough to understand the boundaries of using it only for school. It is very difficult to monitor 24 student computers at one time. While I want to believe that every single student uses their computer for their schoolwork 100% of their school day, I am also realistic and know this is not reality.

My experience this year has lead me to believe that technology can most definitely be a helping resource while given the proper training and boundaries.

Do any of you work at a one-to-one school? What are your thoughts?

Some helpful articles on one-to-one classrooms:

https://www.weareteachers.com/10-rules-for-a-successful-one-to-one-classroom/

https://www.edutopia.org/discussion/what-research-says-about-11

Bill O'Riley "Proves" Private Schools are Better

This blog is in response to this clip:
--->   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ryJT7Z-bsg8

As a teacher, people love to show me controversial videos surrounding the topic of education (especially pubic education).

My father who's very fond of the idea of vouchers, and sending all students to private and charter schools, was thrilled to show me this video, and claimed it "proved" private schools are more effective than public schools.

I thought it was very interesting that we could watch the same video and come to such different conclusions. As an educator, it's important for us to be aware that many are not familiar with the common challenges we face daily.

There are a couple of concerns I had with this clip.

 1) It assumes that the woman could not have become successful staying at her public school. O'Rilley references two cases where private schools perform better than public schools. Because his guess did not know he would be using that argument, seemed unprepared. O'Rilley even accuses him of ignoring facts. When you research the effectiveness of vouchers, however, there are MANY more cases where the vouchers where ineffective or barely effective.

http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/843861

https://www.brookings.edu/research/on-negative-effects-of-vouchers/

https://journalistsresource.org/studies/society/education/school-vouchers-choice-student-achievement

http://www.nea.org/home/16970.htm

In fact, it took me some digging to find an article that references any success seen with school vouchers. This made me uncomfortable. I know anyone who found the statistics used in this interview had to intentionally ignore and the majority of articles in effort to prove a point instead of trying to get an accurate picture of the state of education. The way his facts were presented was very misleading, to force the idea that it is a fact that private schools are better.

2) It doesn't account for any variables. I would have liked to hear more about the environment she was in with her grandparents in contrast to her experience with her negligent parents. This has much more of an effect on students than even a teacher could. Many students also go through a phase where they are rebellious.

3) He undermines the success and experiences of his guest. He brushed off the statement that his guest made about also being the first to go to college and attending a public school. I didn't understand why his experience was less relevant than hers as they were both anecdotal.

4) Credit is misplaced, perpetuating imbalances accountability. No one seems to mention the fact that private schools get to choose which students are qualified to attend. In addition to choosing successful students, private schools can mandate parental involvement. I was offered a position at a private school before I found my first teaching job. The school would have had no behavior problems, I would have a tremendous amount of freedom to plan whatever lessons I wanted, I could plan the field trips, have an ideal class size, and communicate with parents who were very helpful, grateful, and generous. This came with a cost. First, I would be paid a lot less (over $10,000 less then the position I was offered in a public school). I also felt like I would be interchangeable, and helping students who didn't really need help. I believe public and private teachers would agree that the teachers in private schools have no interest in dealing with the issues that come with teaching inner city children. In contrast, the veteran teacher across the hall from me sees impressive amounts of growth in his students every year without no willingness from students or support from parents.

Private school teachers have the luxury of buying into the theory "you can bring a horse to water, but you can't make him drink". In the public sector, parents, communities, and society as a whole expects unwilling parents and students to be dragged to success and have their faces shoved in it.

Can we vote to give parents or students any accountability?

Use of Data for Decision Making

 

This year my school got a new assistant principal. With a new administrator that typically means change. This AP brought in a heavy focus on data. I work in a high performing school that has always valued the use of data, but never analyzed it to the extent it has been this year. In GCPS, we take quarterly district assessment in all subject areas in grades 1-5. Usually teachers are responsible for measuring their student growth and itemizing the test by standards to find strengths and weaknesses of students. In addition to this, we have common assessments in reading and math. For every test, teachers are required to record the results on a spreadsheet indicating which multiple choice questions are correct or incorrect and then analyzing the short answer/extended response questions with a rubric. Then teachers have to keep up with their daily formative and other summative assessments they may have. I am finding that we are emphasizing the use of data, but are we truly looking at it in a means to change instruction for student achievement? In my opinion, instead of just being presented with the data points at a PD session, teachers should be trained on how to effectively use data. What good is all this data, if it is not resulting in any difference of delivery of instruction?

Some suggestions made by Sun, Johnson & Przybylski (2016) were:

• Setting goals and communicating clear expectations for data use
• Fostering data-driven knowledge and instructional practices sharing
• Creating a purpose for data-driven decision making through emphasizing improvements in student achievement and a vision of best practices for students (Sun, Johnson & Przybylski, 2016)
• Developing instructional strategies based on data
• Developing leadership teams for assessment and data analysis
• Establishing a structure and making time for teachers to collaborate
• Requesting that teachers develop professional goals related to student achievement goals
• Communicate with parents and the school communities on using data

References: Jingping, S., Johnson, B., & Przybylski, R. (2016). Leading with Data: An Increasingly Important Feature of School Leadership. International Studies In Educational Administration (Commonwealth Council For Educational Administration & Management (CCEAM)), 44(3), 93-128.

 

Proposed Budget Cuts & the Impact on Afterschool Programs

 “City Year says Trump’s proposed cuts would devastate popular school programs” read a headline published today in the Boston Globe. When I read about the proposed budget cuts that were revealed last week, I was pretty horrified by the amount of quality programming that is seemingly close to no longer existing. Articles in the Atlantic and the New York Times point to some of the major aspects of the proposed cuts, but as an AmeriCorps alumna myself, I was really struck by that potential loss in particular.

Part of the proposed budget calls for the elimination of the Corporation for National and Community Service, which includes the AmeriCorps program. That program provides millions in funding to City Year and various other programs that work across the nation. In the city of Boston, there are 265 City Year volunteers at nearly two-dozen schools that reach over 10,000 students, and there are over 1,400 national service members overall in over 320 locations. The reach of this work is significant.

City Year in particular has had a noteworthy impact on student gains. The program serves over 200,000 students in 28 cities nationwide, and students coached by City Year volunteers in Boston saw increases in average daily attendance rates with most students seeing increases in reading and math assessments as well. Though 45’s administration argues that it aims to defund programs that don’t work with these budget cuts, there’s data that indicates otherwise. For the president’s budget chief to scoff at funding for afterschool programs because there’s no “demonstrable evidence” that they work is quite honestly just wrong. Citizen Schools, another AmeriCorps program that serves Boston, says its program adds the equivalent of three additional months of learning. It’s unreasonable to say that these programs are not helping our students.

As aspiring educational leaders, we need to be rallying behind AmeriCorps programs like City Year and Citizen Schools. The work they are doing is truly putting students at the forefront and the gains that students are subsequently making benefits students and schools alike.

Conducting book studies to implement change

           This year our school decided to do a book study using the book “Teach Like a Champion” by Doug Lemov. What was great about this book study was that it made everyone on staff speak the same language and reflect on the same issues that present themselves on a daily basis in our classrooms. The book study groups promoted conversations among teachers and school staff that led to the application of new ideas in classrooms and improvement of existing skills. It was a great way to focus on issues related to instructional strategies and also helped to build learning communities in schools. 

            Some of us got more out of this study than others, for sure, but it made us all connect to each other.  The cool thing that came out of it was to see the instructional strategies we were learning in the book being brought to life in classrooms. It was also exciting to hear grade levels discussing strategies they were using or trying in their classrooms. The teachers were able to provide each other with advice based on the readings. The book study really was a great way to build leadership capacity among staff members. I witnessed teachers that are normally quite come out of their shell while discussing strategies they liked from the book. The excitement on their faces when they received feedback and support from their peers was awesome. But the most amazing thing was to see them being leaders on their teams and owning strategies to support their peers. This book study allowed us to have manageable, meaningful relationships within our cohort teams.

            Having a book study allowed us to truly examine what we do and how it works in our daily classroom lives. Obviously, there was a ton of work that went into what we did but the book study definitely helped us gain a firm footing in instructional strategies, one that allowed us to make many big steps forward.

Keeping TAB on Students

Last year a neighboring school worked with our county RtI Specialist to develop more concrete guidelines for the steps we should take when a student is not making sufficient academic progress. They developed a very thorough process that guides teachers through data analysis, brainstorming and team decision making, and tier movement.

Over the summer, the county targeted specific schools that needed extra support with the RtI process and allotted them to hire an intervention specialist. This year I have worked in this role and have been able to help teachers work through the new RtI guidelines. The process is not perfect and there are many things we will change next year but I feel that it has helped us prevent kids from falling through the cracks.

The process starts by teachers meeting weekly as a grade level. The first week of the month teachers pull new data on all of their tier 2 and tier 3 students. The second week, grade level teams works together to analyze the data. During this time they determine if the student is making progress, showing inconsistent progress, or not showing any progress. Student names are turned into me if they have a certain number of data points that fall below the aim line and either show no progress or inconsistent progress. The third week of the month teachers prepare a document for each student concern for our monthly TAB (Teacher Advisory Board) meeting. This document must include student history, services in place, data, and any other information that is necessary. These documents can be very lengthy. The last week of the month we hold our TAB meeting. The TAB team includes our assistant principal, EIP teachers, LEA, ESOL teacher, counselor, speech teacher, intervention specialist and grade level teachers. At these meetings teachers present their student concerns and the team determines next steps.

I am wondering if anyone's school follows a similar process? If so, does it work well for teachers? This year has been a big adjustment because the process does require a lot of time. I think that teachers find the process important because before we lacked direction and support with RtI.

Departmentalizing in the Elementary: Pros and Cons

            Departmentalizing in the elementary schools has become a big topic recently. I have seen schools do this in a variety of ways. I have also heard teachers share both pros and cons to this method of teaching. This year, my school decided to departmentalize in the 4^th and 5^th grade and it has sparked lots of thoughts and conversations among us.

            There are numerous cons that teachers have shared about departmentalizing. First, when you departmentalize, you have less flexibility in your daily schedule (Mulvahill, 2016). This proves to be difficult when teachers may want to spend more time on one subject during the day. Timing is everything with elementary school schedules. Departmentalizing can negatively impact the transition time (Mulvahill, 2016). I notice this when we are switching blocks. We lose valuable minutes in switching and settling back down. Another con is that specializing in just one subject can wear teachers out (Mulvahill, 2016). Personally, I wanted to become an elementary teacher because I love teaching each subject to a group of students. This year, I am only teaching Language Arts and I get bored of the content. I am a math lover so for me, teaching Language Arts all day burns me out. This is not my specialty.

            While there are cons, there are also several pros to departmentalizing in the elementary schools. First, when only teaching one subject, teachers are able to spend more time on their plans and differentiation (Mulvahill, 2016). I certainly do enjoy spending more time on making my lessons the best they can be with maximum differentiation. Another pro to departmentalizing is that teachers feel equal ownership over all of the grade level students (Mulvahill, 2016). I really like that, as a grade level, we all feel responsible for each and every student instead of only one class. I can also see that it prepares students for middle school and the transitions they will be making there.

Lots of people ask me if I would recommend it. I always say that it just depends on the teacher. Personally, I do not prefer departmentalizing because of the loss of classroom community. Because some of my homeroom students have no “blocks” together, their only interactions with this group of students are lunch, recess, specials, and snack time. I still feel that the classroom community is so important in the elementary classrooms.

            Any thoughts on departmentalizing in the elementary schools? Pros? Cons?

References

Mulvahill, E. (2016, June 20). Should Elementary Schools Departmentalize? We Look at the Pros and Cons. In We Are Teachers. Retrieved from https://www.weareteachers.com/should-elementary-schools-deparmentalize-we-look-at-the-pros-and-cons/