I haven't commented in a while. I've been enjoying an unexpected week off. Because of unpaid furlough days, LAUSD like many districts just closed the schools for this whole week of Thanksgiving. It's been a salvation for me. Last week I experienced the "Perfect Storm" of obligations that left me staggering towards Friday.
I had a big housewarming party on Sunday Nov 14, so I was getting ready for that the whole week before. The party was a big success, but I should have been getting my grades ready since they were due Weds Nov 17. That realization hit me on Monday, along with the need to finish grading the written part of the periodic assessment and teach a class at National University Monday and Wednesday night. Whew! This is what made the week of Nov 15 the perfect storm of obligation, so I didn't sleep much and stumbled across the grading finish line a day late, on Thursday--just in time to collapse into this vacation week.
I know this sounds like more whining, so I want to counteract that with another burst of enthusiasm for the MyAccess online writing program. I had the laptop carts in my room for a couple of weeks, and the boys have been working on their essays every day. The more I use this program the more I like it. It leads the boys to correct errors in their writing and then gives them instant feedback in the form of a numerical score. As they make corrections or add more content, they see their score go up.
A high level of competitiveness is cited as one of the characteristics of the male brain (at least most of them), and one day last week some of the boys were actually competing out loud to see who could get the highest rating on their compositions. They even called out their scores in excitement as they made changes to improve their essays. That really sold me. I realized that this program had generated the elusive "intrinsic motivation," since the students wanted to improve their writing for its own sake.
Even if I graded in detail everything they wrote every night (something I have never been able to manage and few teachers do) I couldn't match the instant feedback they get from this program. They may groan when they see all of the spelling and other errors highlighted in their writing, but they can get to work and correct them one by one. That is what good writing requires--patient re-examination of what you've written in the form of correction, expansion, revision.
There's still plenty of work for the teacher in this program. The more generic recommendations about description, structure, and style will always require the teacher to illuminate and elaborate. This program doesn't replace the teacher as much as amplify what the teacher can accomplish. It is the best example I have encountered of how technology can make the teacher much more effective. I look forward to using it throughout the rest of the year.
Time for another little detour. I recently saw the movie "Unstoppable" with Denzel Washington and Chris Pine. It's about a runaway train in Pennsylvania that is carrying a load of toxic chemicals and threatens mass destruction in a highly populated area. It's thrilling from beginning to end. The human characters, especially Washington as a veteran train engineer, are well done, but the train itself is the star--menacing, implacable, inexorable.
Afterward it occurred to me that this runaway train was a profound metaphor (I am an English teacher after all!) for the state of American capitalism--out of control, threatening to destroy millions of people, highly toxic, and driven by greed and arrogance. Without giving away the ending, suffice it to say that the golf-playing CEO who is more concerned about the stock price than the potential human suffering DOES NOT save the day. Anyway, I highly recommend it.
Friday, November 26, 2010
Thursday, November 11, 2010
Seventh grade lives 1
I've spent so much time complaining about the behavior of these boys that I don't think I have adequately conveyed how charming and likable they are. I'd like to share a couple of brief glimpses into their lives. Today a small group of students ended up in my room at lunch. They were all good students, and small boys. They just wanted to use the computers. I asked them why they didn't want to go outside for lunch. One of them, an especially small and very soft spoken boy, said something like, "There's too much going on out there at lunch. There are mean kids and bullies and we'd rather be in here." Hard to argue with that.
Later in the day another boy was talking to his friends in an intense way. Other boys really like this boy because he's funny and clever and outspoken, although that can make him a little disruptive in class. He said that he had a big problem--a claim supported by his friends--and would like to tell me about it. While we were walking out to play basketball during advisory period, he said that his father had been picked up the night before and was going to be deported. One of his friends walking with us said that had happened to him once too. I said that must be really terrible and that I was sorry to hear it.
We didn't talk much more since he wanted to play basketball, but I was left with a sad feeling. I have a hard time imagining just how terrible it must be at age 12 to have your father snatched away from you all of a sudden. It seems that any decent version of "family values" would allow for fathers to stay with their sons. This incident definitely puts a human face on the increasingly shrill calls to deport increasing numbers of people, many of them fathers who are needed by their sons.
As I get to know these boys, I expect to hear more stories about their lives. I'm glad I'm not so obsessed with controlling their behavior that I don't stop to listen to their individual voices. Vignettes like these surely lie at the heart of the teaching experience. They are probably the reason we put up with the impossible work load and time requirements of the job.
Later in the day another boy was talking to his friends in an intense way. Other boys really like this boy because he's funny and clever and outspoken, although that can make him a little disruptive in class. He said that he had a big problem--a claim supported by his friends--and would like to tell me about it. While we were walking out to play basketball during advisory period, he said that his father had been picked up the night before and was going to be deported. One of his friends walking with us said that had happened to him once too. I said that must be really terrible and that I was sorry to hear it.
We didn't talk much more since he wanted to play basketball, but I was left with a sad feeling. I have a hard time imagining just how terrible it must be at age 12 to have your father snatched away from you all of a sudden. It seems that any decent version of "family values" would allow for fathers to stay with their sons. This incident definitely puts a human face on the increasingly shrill calls to deport increasing numbers of people, many of them fathers who are needed by their sons.
As I get to know these boys, I expect to hear more stories about their lives. I'm glad I'm not so obsessed with controlling their behavior that I don't stop to listen to their individual voices. Vignettes like these surely lie at the heart of the teaching experience. They are probably the reason we put up with the impossible work load and time requirements of the job.
Internet to the rescue!
I have finally brought the boys to the internet for both reading and writing. Over the past few days they have taken a reading test to prepare them for the Accelerated Reader program in which they will read books at an appropriate level and take tests about the books on line. One advantage to this is that students can select books they are interested in, and the program will test them on their reading. I can assign them to complete a certain number of books on their own outside of class. This encourages independent reading, a good thing, although it sacrifices the group interaction about a shared reading experience.
They have also started on MyAccess. This is an online program which assists them in rewriting their assignments and keeps their work in an online portfolio. Rewriting is of course the downfall of most people who have to write something, both adults and children. My students are willing to write every day, but they never think about editing and rewriting. For me to get them to rewrite would mean correcting mountains of work every day, and that is not feasible. So this online program has a variety of devices to help them rewrite and improve their compositions. It gives them a score so they can measure their improvement as they follow the various suggestions from the program. I can monitor everything they write and add my own comments and suggestions. It's a fairly sophisticated program, but it still will take a lot of teaching to get them to use it effectively.
I feel good about getting them started on these programs, and the boys were relatively cooperative in the effort. There wasn't as much of a management challenge as I expected. There's a lot of logistical stuff to get through in issuing laptops to everyone, getting them (boys and computers) all booted up, logged in, and ready to go, but there's also something about using the computer that focuses them. I think this is the nature of the device, although they can also be distracting since there are always games to play. Plus, this is how we all write now. Many of my readers may remember the old system of handwritten drafts, with all their marginalia and cross-outs and arrows to move text around. But who writes like that any more? I wouldn't want to. Why should these boys use an antiquated technique for writing? So the last few days have gone pretty well, and I'm feeling just tired not exhausted.
They have also started on MyAccess. This is an online program which assists them in rewriting their assignments and keeps their work in an online portfolio. Rewriting is of course the downfall of most people who have to write something, both adults and children. My students are willing to write every day, but they never think about editing and rewriting. For me to get them to rewrite would mean correcting mountains of work every day, and that is not feasible. So this online program has a variety of devices to help them rewrite and improve their compositions. It gives them a score so they can measure their improvement as they follow the various suggestions from the program. I can monitor everything they write and add my own comments and suggestions. It's a fairly sophisticated program, but it still will take a lot of teaching to get them to use it effectively.
I feel good about getting them started on these programs, and the boys were relatively cooperative in the effort. There wasn't as much of a management challenge as I expected. There's a lot of logistical stuff to get through in issuing laptops to everyone, getting them (boys and computers) all booted up, logged in, and ready to go, but there's also something about using the computer that focuses them. I think this is the nature of the device, although they can also be distracting since there are always games to play. Plus, this is how we all write now. Many of my readers may remember the old system of handwritten drafts, with all their marginalia and cross-outs and arrows to move text around. But who writes like that any more? I wouldn't want to. Why should these boys use an antiquated technique for writing? So the last few days have gone pretty well, and I'm feeling just tired not exhausted.
Friday, November 5, 2010
SOS! Ship going down! SOS!
Well Gentle Reader, today was...how can I put it...a catastrophe! I think that's the mot juste, but I might also say disaster, debacle, massacre, etc. Every period was a crisis, except advisory when we went out to play basketball. (These boys have no physical education on Wed and Fri. There's lots of research on the beneficial impact of physical exercise on learning, and this flaw in the block schedule is unfortunate. To compensate, we often take them out for informal playing on those days.)
Second period had too much going on in the aftermath of the periodic assessment (some had finished, some hadn't, some were doing an alternate test, some making up work, etc.). The result was disjointed and disorderly. Fourth period resisted working until the very end when they managed to listen to a few speeches. Sixth period was just noisy for 90 minutes. Then I had a bunch come back for detention, adding 10 minutes to my day.
When the last student left, I sat at my desk, literally vibrating from the adrenalin that coursed through my veins....
Now the vibrating has stopped. I'm just sitting quietly listening to All Things Considered, beginning to contemplate the preparations I need to make for Monday....
Which are considerable....
Since I'm finally bringing in the computer carts....
To get the students into the Accelerated Reader system....
And into the online editing program called MyAccess....
Which I have high hopes for.
Deep breaths.
Ahhhhhhhhhhh.
More later.
Second period had too much going on in the aftermath of the periodic assessment (some had finished, some hadn't, some were doing an alternate test, some making up work, etc.). The result was disjointed and disorderly. Fourth period resisted working until the very end when they managed to listen to a few speeches. Sixth period was just noisy for 90 minutes. Then I had a bunch come back for detention, adding 10 minutes to my day.
When the last student left, I sat at my desk, literally vibrating from the adrenalin that coursed through my veins....
Now the vibrating has stopped. I'm just sitting quietly listening to All Things Considered, beginning to contemplate the preparations I need to make for Monday....
Which are considerable....
Since I'm finally bringing in the computer carts....
To get the students into the Accelerated Reader system....
And into the online editing program called MyAccess....
Which I have high hopes for.
Deep breaths.
Ahhhhhhhhhhh.
More later.
Save us from the "Independent Voters"!
My life at YOKA continues to be an action-packed thrill-ride! I have a lot to tell you about the education of 7th grade boys, but I want to make a brief post about the political scene, particularly about hese "Independent Voters" that we keep hearing about. After all, they just delivered the House of Representatives into the rapacious hands of the American corporate elite. So who are these "Independent Voters"?
First of all, the word "independent" makes them sound noble somehow--free thinking, unfettered, untamed, blah, blah, blah. But what are they really? Consider...two years ago the "Independent Voters," these paradigms of rugged democracy, flocked to vote for Obama, a moderately liberal Democrat, and rejected the party of George Bush that had dragged the country into the worst recession since 1929. Two years later, just last Tuesday, they hurled themselves into voting for all the Republicans who were saying the same things they had said for the eight years before that.
The truth is that these are not "Independent Voters"--rather they are ill-informed, unprincipled, and confused voters. Conservatives and Republicans have clear views and stick with them. Liberals and Democrats the same. But increasingly this country is being controlled by the growing segment of the electorate that is so uninformed and confused that they can switch political beliefs in under a year. These so-called "independents" are really just clueless! Vaguely cranky about their situation, which is very insecure, they don't really understand much about the state of the economy and the nation, so they are prone to swing erratically back and forth based on slogans, rumors, misunderstandings, and lies. To win their fickle votes, committed Democrats and Republicans resort to deceptive and meretricious stratagems in 30 second television commercials. Both parties (even mine) eschew meaningful discourse and seek desperately for yet one more empty slogan based on misrepresentation and oversimplification with which to mesmerize the fabled "Independent Voters."
(If they knew what was happening they would know that Obama cut their taxes, reduced the deficit, and created millions of jobs in an economy that had lost tens of millions under the Reps. But instead of actually knowing anything, they give vent to their insecurities and vapors by careening from liberal to conservative and back again with all the political understanding of pond scum.)
Anyway, they are calling the shots. Thanks to the "independent Voters" we will now have at least two years of political inaction and neglect of the needs of the middle class.
So I propose banning the term "Independent Voters" and calling this particular demographic "Clueless Voters" or "Confused Voters" or even "Ignorant, Self-Indulgent, Shallow Voters." Instead of swooning in awe of their unpredictable and capricious voting natures, we should urge them to go on long trips to far-away places in November.
I've had enough of these "Indepenent Voters." Get a life guys!
First of all, the word "independent" makes them sound noble somehow--free thinking, unfettered, untamed, blah, blah, blah. But what are they really? Consider...two years ago the "Independent Voters," these paradigms of rugged democracy, flocked to vote for Obama, a moderately liberal Democrat, and rejected the party of George Bush that had dragged the country into the worst recession since 1929. Two years later, just last Tuesday, they hurled themselves into voting for all the Republicans who were saying the same things they had said for the eight years before that.
The truth is that these are not "Independent Voters"--rather they are ill-informed, unprincipled, and confused voters. Conservatives and Republicans have clear views and stick with them. Liberals and Democrats the same. But increasingly this country is being controlled by the growing segment of the electorate that is so uninformed and confused that they can switch political beliefs in under a year. These so-called "independents" are really just clueless! Vaguely cranky about their situation, which is very insecure, they don't really understand much about the state of the economy and the nation, so they are prone to swing erratically back and forth based on slogans, rumors, misunderstandings, and lies. To win their fickle votes, committed Democrats and Republicans resort to deceptive and meretricious stratagems in 30 second television commercials. Both parties (even mine) eschew meaningful discourse and seek desperately for yet one more empty slogan based on misrepresentation and oversimplification with which to mesmerize the fabled "Independent Voters."
(If they knew what was happening they would know that Obama cut their taxes, reduced the deficit, and created millions of jobs in an economy that had lost tens of millions under the Reps. But instead of actually knowing anything, they give vent to their insecurities and vapors by careening from liberal to conservative and back again with all the political understanding of pond scum.)
Anyway, they are calling the shots. Thanks to the "independent Voters" we will now have at least two years of political inaction and neglect of the needs of the middle class.
So I propose banning the term "Independent Voters" and calling this particular demographic "Clueless Voters" or "Confused Voters" or even "Ignorant, Self-Indulgent, Shallow Voters." Instead of swooning in awe of their unpredictable and capricious voting natures, we should urge them to go on long trips to far-away places in November.
I've had enough of these "Indepenent Voters." Get a life guys!
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