Understanding By Design in Fieldwork

Since this was a shortened week due to Veteran's Day and Elections, I thought it might be a good idea to spend the majority of today in other content areas. While I spent the opening block with Mr. D's AP US History class, I spent the rest of the day shuttling between a Physics class (Mr. E) and a Discrete Mathematics class (Ms. T). In short, today was interesting. As opposed to having a subject where there isn't always a cut and dry correct answer, math and physics largely cut out that gray area. There is a distinctly measurable result and both teachers seemed to be looking for that specifically. More importantly though, there was an important emphasis on the process of what they were doing. Both teachers were very procedural in their approach. That is; they opened the class with an introductory Do Now problem, scaffolded the mathematical processes, made sure the students were reasoning correctly and finally gave them a formative assessment with 1-3 questions based on the material they went over in class. In both classes, these assessments were exit slips.

Both teachers were into what they were doing and seemingly got the majority of students into it, as well. However, I noticed that the procedure they both used in their classrooms had almost become rote. These were good practices they were doing but both classes (outside of the content) were nearly mirror images of each other. Now, to be fair -- I haven't seen this process used throughout a whole year and I don't know if students react positively or negatively to it in the long run. I think it's also important to note that the content was presented very well and the students seemed caught up in their work. However, many years ago I used to watch a lot of Law & Order. Procedure, no matter how compelling the content is sometimes can get played out. I think it's important to be conscious of how we can make our teaching dynamic and not use a procedure as a crutch instead of a guide.

To be clear, I'm not saying that Mr. E and Ms. T used the process as a crutch. They both seemed like very intelligent, very conscientious teachers that got the best out of students on a day many of their classmates were already taking off. Their effort is admirable. However, it reminds me that in designing  my own lessons, I can't find comfort in sticking within set guidelines. The diagnostic questions of UbD mentioned in my previous post and the needs of my students need to be a guide. While procedure can be helpful, I think it can only take one so far. Especially in social studies.

Understanding By Design & a Kind of Mission Statement

I realize that we reviewed this topic for practical reasons but I feel it's important to comment on this since I've been thinking about designing my own lessons for students at MHS for the past few days. I know that we cannot plan lessons arbitrarily or assess students for rote learning or what we just think they should know. There's a distinct need to understand what it is you want students to know, find the process of getting there and make sure they know it. I feel that I've had this process drilled into me fairly well at this point and while I definitely have a conceptual grasp of UbD, I still have yet to really have a functional understanding of the process in making a real live lesson plan and seeing its effects firsthand. This seems like a much harder process and one I will only understand through practice, usage and reflection.

That said, this week's class helped distill a few thoughts for me and I think the overarching questions are an important diagnostic to have for ourselves while we design our own lesson and unit plans. Throughout the editing and planning process, we can always go back and be able to ask ourselves those questions. In fact, I've written them down on a desktop sticky note so I can always have them to check on. As important as it is for us to design our own diagnostics for students, we need these diagnostics for ourselves, as well. In proving ourselves to be dynamic within ourselves and toward our students' strengths, self-diagnostics are something that should always be considered while designing a useful lesson plan.

So how do we determine what's useful in social studies? This question kind of gets to the heart of what I think about when I think about social studies and teaching history and social studies as a chosen profession. Why is this important and what do we need to know about it? The simple answer for me is because I have always been interested in it. I get excited about the stories of people who came before us because to me it fills in small parts of a proverbial jigsaw puzzle. To go further, I feel that history education in particular helps inform us about the world around us and what our potential roles can be in this world. It is not only information for the sake of information but knowledge that can be useful about humanity, institutions and essentially why the world is the way it is. I think it's important to understand that nothing is prescribed and that history is not some sort of teleological process or chain of inevitable events. History and the social sciences can inform students that their decisions matter and that they are part of something larger than themselves. So which side of that process do we want to be on? Social studies can help students develop reasoning, research, writing and analytical skills, of course. Those are all incredibly important. However, having an understanding of the world and our place within it is extremely powerful and can act as a positive force in our society.

This is what I'd like my students to eventually understand and articulate in their own way. This may be just a haphazard mission statement for teaching history but I think it's at least partially adequate in having behind my own lesson designs. This is something I'll be working on for awhile, I think but it's as good a place to start as any.

Testing in Fieldwork

Post for 11/3

Unfortunately today was another test day for US II students in Mr. D's class. This time, however, was not nearly as contentious or difficult as my previous experience at MHS. Apparently, students seemed to get the message from their last day. Many kids still had headphones in, playing music I could hear from across the room but I guess there are some battles that just can't be won if nothing is done to enforce it.

Today, students were taking a CRT exam. This is, according to Mr. D, a departmental benchmark test to make sure that all teachers are on the same proverbial page. Every class in US II has to take the test and results are reported to the department. This week's CRT test was about immigration in the US at the end of the 19^th-century and beginning of the 20^th. The test is all written and all document based. Students were given a group of quotes, articles, photos and political cartoons that were supposed to be used as evidence throughout their document based question essay. The main essay was worth 80 points and was set up through a set of 10 scaffolding short-answer questions that were worth 2 points each.

I think the purpose behind the CRT is interesting since it seems to exhibit what the school and district deem to be high priorities. To keep from belaboring the point, I really think that they seem to get it because these tests are built to gauge skills, not just content knowledge or the recitation of rote facts. Of course, the content knowledge and what students learn in class can really help them discern context clues and base their writing on a strong background in facts and historical information. However, if the students have the skills to take these tests, the information provided in the documents and the specific goals of the DBQ alone could be enough information to finish the test adequately. In short, the department is testing for skills of reading, writing, interpretation of context clues, argument and citation of sources. As I've mentioned before, the purpose of knowledge for the sake of knowledge is inadequate and as much as I'd love all my students to be Jeopardy champions, those skills are not realistic or useful to teach. I can understand frustrations behind pushing for departmental homogeneity at the expense of an individual teacher's plans but I think the goal behind the CRT as an exercise is admirable.

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In addition, today was a success in administrative terms, as well. On my first day, Mr. D explained to me that this was not a good year for him to have a student teacher in his class for a plethora of reasons. I understood his reasoning at the time but figured I would take the opportunity to learn what I could from MHS, while I could. As the weeks passed, I became disappointed about this setup since I had come to really respect Mr. D and admire his work and organization in the classroom. In short, I felt I could learn a lot from him throughout the year. So today I got some good news. Mr. D took me aside this morning and explained that he had reconsidered over the past few weeks and asked me if I would be interested in staying on at MHS and in his classroom for student teaching. Between my good working relationship with Mr. D and growing comfort with a lot of the students, I was really excited. Good news!

Liberal Education & Teaching

Post for 11/1

There are a few things that were mentioned in class today that got me thinking a lot about teaching as a chosen profession and what I need to do to be successful in it. We discussed the day-to-day schedule of a teacher and frankly, I like it. I know myself well enough to know that I always work best under pressure and with a lot to do. Having a full slate every day with an hour or two to myself is actually ideal for me. I don't know why but even when I was in high school and was lifting at 5AM for football, school from 7:30-2:30, football or track practice after school and homework afterwards I was always the best kind of exhausted and really productive. Looking at a schedule like that as if my life is laid out for me is slightly disconcerting but I know I'll be at my best in that kind of situation. If teaching were only the visible work of teaching, my day would be over by 3PM and frankly, I wouldn't know what to do with myself with all that time.

Another thing that struck me in class today was the reminder of having students create their own expectations. This still kind of puts me in panic mode even as a graduate student because I've become so used to having top-down instruction. Talking about it again today really seemed to resonate with me though. If students create a percentage of their own stakes in the class then it not only provides a lesson in responsibility but takes some of that top-down agency away from the instructor. As long as one is OK with giving up that sort of power then it seems like it could be beneficial to the classroom environment as a whole. What's important to determine though is where your criteria and expectations end and where the students' begin. There's definitely a balance to keep in mind but that's related to the rigidity we spoke about earlier this afternoon. That said, I think there will be some non-negotiables (subject to change, of course!) in my future classroom. Respect towards others (especially while speaking), high achievement and improvement and, most importantly, no damn cell phones. They are beyond a pet peeve for me at this point as they immediately signal to the other person that you are more engaged in another conversation at the moment. See Rule 1 about respect towards others. I might be wrong on this one and I may be corrected by some of my colleagues but I really don't think I am.

Finally, I was struck by something R mentioned in class today about liberal education being the capital to enter the world of power. I had never really thought about it that way. As a student who went to a small liberal arts college with a very large, very competitive and very challenging engineering program, my majors of History and English were always belittled by many of my friends and classmates. “You just don't get it,” they seemed to say. “It's extremely hard, very complex and I'll graduate with a SKILL. Will your skills translate to getting a job?” I'm sure I could have easily lived up to their criteria if I had chosen to go into law like much of my class or study Biochemistry and go to Medical school like my academically perfect roommate of 4 years and best friend of 8 years now. I didn't though, I studied History because it was what appealed to me. At the beginning it was just an intuitive feeling about knowledge for the sake of knowledge and I only later justified my degree with an articulated answer about why studying history is important and why others should know about it too (this is a long answer I'll reserve for another blog post).

What my liberal education did do was give me a vocabulary and a background where I could potentially end up in any of these fields... Well, maybe not engineering but almost anything else! I was bright enough to succeed in the sciences if I chose, I could have done well in business if it interested me. I had the opportunity to enter any of these professions and still have the means to dramatically change professions on the late end of my 20's. It gave me opportunity. Liberal education has currency in the world but we have to make important choices in relation to the power it has. I'm happy with my choice to teach history and social studies but it's clear to me that I need to be aware of the choice that a liberal education presents us with. Knowledge for the sake of knowledge isn't adequate. It's the combination of broad knowledge and choice that makes a liberal education not only adequate but essential.

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!

Presence & Professionalism

Post for 10/25

Class was interesting today as we got to air a lot of the frustrations or new issues our colleagues are experiencing in their respective fieldwork placements. I thought that this was incredibly useful since it was more of a casual atmosphere to relate some concerns and ask questions about them. In addition, it extended into a conversation about what to do in multiple scenarios. How to deal with tense situations, how to defuse conflict and how to react professionally to common problems that might come up in a school atmosphere but rarely in other professional instances. Professionalism as a teacher is a lot more than dressing well, being prepared and showing up on time. It's reflected in the language we use, our tone, our calm and our Presence in general. Professionalism is a reflection of our preparedness and I feel that even if I'm not exactly where I'd like to be in this regard, I'm moving in the right direction.

In addition, we worked on a collaborative project with instant messaging in relation to a particular document. While I thought the end result of the exercise was a good one (a real-time collaborative outline of our reading assignment), I honestly found the instant messaging to be a bit distracting and not very productive. Although it could be viewed as productive anonymity, I didn't know who was saying what so there was little to no accountability. In addition, I couldn't track who said what in the past since the numbers of the writers were constantly changing so the lack of continuity was also confusing. Finally, the pace was too fast for me. I mean, I can balance Gchat conversations, Facebook chats and multiple text messages without many issues but the changing numbers and multiple writers threw me off entirely. However, I think the importance of collaborative work was illustrated overall and that we need to think about innovative ways to get students to collaborate.

Gaps in Knowledge in Fieldwork

Post for 10/20

This week at MHS was a bit more difficult. While everything went fairly well, the plans for the day did not really allow me to observe best practices. In short, today was a testing day for all the US II classes. While the morning started uneventfully enough with Mr. D's AP US History students, the rest of the day was a real challenge for me on a few levels.

First of all, MHS' threshold for behavior is a lot wider than anything I had in my total experience as a student. In elementary, middle, high school and college, I was expected to show up on time, not talk while someone else is talking or taking a test, not eat outside of the cafeteria and most notably not use foul language. So I understand that MHS is a very different place than where I went to school, but some of their policies do not seem to coexist well with what they expect of their students or told them they expect of them. While much has been made of student engagement and active demonstrations of learning, how engaged will a student be if they have a cell phone out in every class or headphones in while taking a test? I wasn't in school that long ago that things have changed that much. I understand distractions better than most people and these are distractions that would completely derail any work I was trying to do in a classroom setting. So between phones, iPods, PSP's and a good number of side conversations; expecting students to sit quietly for a whole period and take a fairly challenging writing test is for me beyond the pale. During a prep period, I expressed my reservations about this school policy to Mr. D. The response was more dismissive than expected but definitely seemed frustrated. After some shrugging and an implication of legal complications outside of his or any other teachers' control – I let it go.

Another interesting aspect of student behavior I noticed came from students during the test itself. In addition to many barely paying attention to the assignment in front of them, several decided to outwardly shirk any responsibility for the test and decided instead to undermine their classmates' attempts at taking their test. Not only was this problematic for me but it infuriated me. Mr. D later explained that the students causing problems just did not study, acted out in response and tried to force their classmates into their same position. While apparently this is a fairly regular occurrence, I hope to dissuade any future students of mine of this type of behavior with swift and severe retribution. While making a choice not to prepare for a test is one thing, trying to distract one's classmates because of a lack of preparation is even worse. Who would have thought I'd find a new pet peeve today?

It seems that despite being given ample preparation time and a very thorough study guide, Mr. D's students just did not want to take a test and did nearly everything they could to undermine, ignore or distract themselves and others from actually taking the test. This made me wonder whether a test like this was actually a fair assessment of what the students learn and how they learn. In my experience with Mr. D, the test was thoughtfully assembled and seemed a good reflection of what his classes learned throughout the unit. However, I wonder if this is where the knowledge gap mentioned previously comes in. Maybe it isn't only a knowledge gap of content, be it timelines, politics or geography. The knowledge gap could also be knowledge of skills or behaviors many of us, myself included, take for granted and simply expect out of a socialized adult or young adult. What's missing in this equation? Socialization and schooling can't be the only solutions but fair assessments shouldn't be the casualties of this situation either. I'm not sure I have an answer to this question but I find it troubling and something to consider in the future.