Presence & Professionalism in Fieldwork

Post for 10/26

Today was a huge improvement over last week, which leads me to suspect that most students shockingly don't like tests. I'm still surprised about how many students handled it in acting out but I've already spoken to that at length in previous posts. Today was interesting because I got to see Mr. D model a different type of collaborative exercise that was adapted for each class and level students were at. Essentially, students were required to do some adaptation of the following assignment; read, describe and interpret primary source documents chosen from a Volume of primary source documents from a series called 'History in a Box' that Mr. D called a 'Document Scramble.' As an aside, this seems like an incredibly useful tool for compiling and organizing different types of documents for use in class. Depending on which level class it was, students were required to read all the documents or a select few. In addition, some documents like photographs, song lyrics or political cartoons were assigned to IEP or ELL students. Towards the end of class, students were required to provide their interpretation of the documents based on their own background information from previous classes and from other context clues provided by Mr. D and myself through class. As a Demonstration of Learning, students had to hand in what Mr. D calls his ESP (Economic, Social, Political) charts where students have to identify issues raised by the documents as being in one or a combination of these categories.

By having students read, describe and interpret primary source documentation, Mr. D was in my mind essentially modeling good research techniques but doing so in a collaborative and scaffolded atmosphere. Students were presented with documents instead of searching them out themselves but were then asked to take a position on the documents and defend them to the rest of the class and Mr. D. This technique worked the best when students had been required to read all the documents since it was easier for other classmates to chime in to agree or disagree with another student's interpretation.

I thought that this was overall a good activity but was lacking in an area I think is kind of important to history education. What I found in helping students with questions was that they didn't seem to have a basic understanding of the timeline or context of the era they were studying. I understand that this is a tricky area where an inexperienced teacher can get caught in quicksand but I think a good activity added to the lesson would be the creation of a timeline of primary source documents as a DoL activity. Not only to show the occasional instance of causality but to ask students about how things might have been different in leading up to the American Revolution or US involvement in WWI. This might have helped scaffold the DoL activity/homework assignment since it was an Open Ended Question asking students to take a position on how events could have been different and how Americans experienced WWI differently across culture, class, race or wartime role.

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Midway through the morning, the History Department met for a PLC (not sure about the abbreviation) meeting with Ms. B. Much was made about an upcoming visit by the Federal Government and the visibility of objectives and Demonstration of Learning activities on the board or elsewhere. Apparently, during the last Administrative inspection into classrooms, 4 teachers within the department did not have the DoL on the board clearly and the next 10 minutes were dedicated to a discussion on why DoL's are important but not why they needed to be on the board. I think it should be explicit to students that they have assigned work but I'm not sure about why that much was made about labeling work specifically as a DoL. Furthermore, the Department was informed that Student Engagement is gauged at Low-Medium at MHS. When Ms. B asked for suggestions for changes, no one spoke up but some later mentioned cell phones were a growing and seemingly unstoppable problem. Some suggestions Ms. B made were to increase expectations in the classroom, increase scaffolds or to implement a Token Economy in the classroom. The first two seemed obvious to me but I was slightly perplexed by the Token Economy suggestion. Unless it's used to teach something like the fiat system, inflation or exchange rates it seems to me like something that's just a gimmick that doesn't add the kind of value that it could.

This meeting was really informative about how MHS reflects on their own pedagogy throughout the school year. I think it's important that meetings like this happen but I wonder about its efficacy when some of the criticisms seemed arbitrary at best to those in the meeting. For me as a novice, the presentation was well noted and gave me something to think about for my own efficacy.

Mr. D has given me a date and a subject to present as a lesson as he thinks the students are finally getting comfortable with my presence in the classroom. I get to teach about the Roaring 20's and Harlem Renaissance. Very excited!