For many students it is hard to picture a teacher having a life outside of the classroom and when a student runs into a teacher at the supermarket buying a case of beer for their Superbowl party, time seems to stop and their mind explodes. However, as teachers we are very aware that our students have a life outside of school time that includes sports, clubs, studying, family issues, and jobs. Although we know that students have other things to do other than homework after school, sometimes as teachers we don't know what our students are actually doing outside of class. This is an important issue because how do we connect to our students if we don't even know what interests them aside from which class they like to complain the most about? This is where ice breakers come into play and where "spying" on your students outside of your classroom is a good idea.
When I refer to "spying" on students I mean watch how they interact in the hallways when they are not being forced to sit in a chair and pay attention. Who do they hang out with? Do they linger in the hallway often? Do they rush to classes? Are they pushing the same kid everyday? Are they loud and smiling or solemn? By observing the students in this position we can note a lot about their behavior when not being watched by a teacher.
Icebreakers are the types of games that teachers normally play with students so that the class can get to know them better. These games are essential in my opinion because in a normal class time, the students are learning about the subject at hand not realizing common connections and making friends. Although some teachers are not worried about students making connections, connections make the class feel more comfortable with each other and allow for more open-minded conversations. Some examples of icebreakers include the human knot and two truths and a lie. The human knot is when the group intertwines their hands and arms and then have to untangle themselves. Two truths and a lie is when each student writes down two interesting facts about themselves and one lie, then they read them aloud to the class and the class has to decide together which of the three statements is a lie. The icebreaker that I did with the 7th and 8th graders had two parts. Part one was that everyone had five minutes to write down five interesting facts about themselves. Once they were done the students are instructed to wad up their paper with their name and facts on it and throw the papers around the room for exactly one minute to mix up their papers well. After a minute students are expected to stop and pick up a wad of paper off the floor and sit back down in their seats. For part two, students will then go up one by one and introduce the person to the class by reading their interesting facts aloud and allowing two follow up questions from their peers. In order to let the students get to know the teacher better, I also threw my facts into the mix and had a student introduce me as their student teacher.
By doing these two activities the first week of classes, I found that a lot of students have commonalities:
-They love horror movies and about 80% of every class agreed they wanted to watch the new PG-13 movie called "The Visit". I know this because as soon as I asked who liked scary movies the entire class exploded with talks about their favorites and how bad they all wanted to see the new possessed grandparents movie. Also, they really liked the "Insidious" movies.... questionable but okay.
-They love sports: mainly soccer, football, and dance.
-Most students enjoy listening to hip-hop and rap. Keep in mind that these students mentioned listening to J-Cole and 2Chainz both of who use sex, drugs, and sometimes guns as a common song theme. I'm hoping that my 12-14 year old students do not know what "Planes" by J-Cole actually means when he says, "ain't nobody gonna see you on your knees in your Prada's".
-A surprising amount of students enjoy anime themed shows and books, which I didn't even know was a big following until now.
-The biggest similarity was that every student had a diverse background. Many were Latinos, Jamaican, Italian, Arabic, Asian, Chilean, and different branches of Native American. This is a similarity and a difference in itself.
Even though these commonalities seem trivial, for the most part people just need that one "in" to spark up a conversation with someone else, especially preteens who are awkward as hell and are super sensitive. That is a whole other blog post though....
Besides the movies and sports, these students bring other issues into the classroom, not just their likes and dislikes. Just from being here one week I have already heard four students tell me they were adopted, about a dozen mention that they can't afford new school shoes and it's a waste of money (even though they need them for their school uniform), and have been informed of at least five students who are recovering from behavior issues founded from their home lives. These students don't leave their home issues at the front door, they are carried on their backs all day and may prohibit them from having a full educational experience. Regardless of the student, each one has their own lives and their lives outside of the classroom are just as important as their lives in the class.
The lesson learned from this post is that students are expected to be students while in the classroom but teachers need to be sensitive of the differences and lives of the students outside of school.
Monday, September 14, 2015
The Difference Between Grades and Grades and the Correlation
Grades are considered the epitome of school success; if you have good grades, you were successful in school and the opposite is true for bad grades.
Grades are also the main deterrent for behavioral norms: the lower the grade the more the students are willing to please and the higher the grades the less engaged they appear in class. At least from my experience this seems to be the general correlation aside from high school where the opposite is true. Freshman, typically 9th graders, tend to act out more than upperclassmen. Once again this is not always the case but just from my general observations.
How are school grades and letter grades connected? Without doing too much scientific research the quickest way to answer this question is to make a personal connection. I remember my least favorite class and my favorite class from every school I've been to including high school. The class I loathed was physics and my favorite was current events. During physics, I tried my damnedest to pay attention and understand what was going on but I could never reach a level of needed engagement to fully activate my true potential in this class. I ended up just passing this class with a C- and I was a student who never received lower than a B grade in any class. Current events on the other hand was so engaging and I actually looked forward to going to that class everyday which is quite rare for a high school student. The entire class was always active in this class through discussions and a Socratic method of teaching that actually grew our minds in a more intellectual and analytical way. Regardless of the enjoyment of the class I still worked hard to make sure I was always on top of my work and debates in the class in order to receive my A- grade. The lesson here is that even though I worked hard in both classes and tried everyday, the level of my engagement in physics was far below that of current events resulting in two whole letter grades lower.
It's day two at SPS and since I am in a classroom that teaches three different history classes: 8th grade American History, 7th grade Western Civ (World History), and current events.Even though the students are still going over introductory information like the syllabus, class expectations, and ice breakers, it is already apparent the difference in grade levels. The eighth graders seem less likely to care about anything other than if they are getting homework from their history class. Seventh graders on the other have less engagement than the sixth graders but seem to care about asking questions more which is a sign of comprehension and a want to understand and do well. If students don't care one way or the other, what's the point of asking questions?
Basically grades have nothing to so with how old a student is, grades have to do with motivation and connections. How does a teacher make an academic connection to students?
To be continued....
Grades are also the main deterrent for behavioral norms: the lower the grade the more the students are willing to please and the higher the grades the less engaged they appear in class. At least from my experience this seems to be the general correlation aside from high school where the opposite is true. Freshman, typically 9th graders, tend to act out more than upperclassmen. Once again this is not always the case but just from my general observations.
How are school grades and letter grades connected? Without doing too much scientific research the quickest way to answer this question is to make a personal connection. I remember my least favorite class and my favorite class from every school I've been to including high school. The class I loathed was physics and my favorite was current events. During physics, I tried my damnedest to pay attention and understand what was going on but I could never reach a level of needed engagement to fully activate my true potential in this class. I ended up just passing this class with a C- and I was a student who never received lower than a B grade in any class. Current events on the other hand was so engaging and I actually looked forward to going to that class everyday which is quite rare for a high school student. The entire class was always active in this class through discussions and a Socratic method of teaching that actually grew our minds in a more intellectual and analytical way. Regardless of the enjoyment of the class I still worked hard to make sure I was always on top of my work and debates in the class in order to receive my A- grade. The lesson here is that even though I worked hard in both classes and tried everyday, the level of my engagement in physics was far below that of current events resulting in two whole letter grades lower.
It's day two at SPS and since I am in a classroom that teaches three different history classes: 8th grade American History, 7th grade Western Civ (World History), and current events.Even though the students are still going over introductory information like the syllabus, class expectations, and ice breakers, it is already apparent the difference in grade levels. The eighth graders seem less likely to care about anything other than if they are getting homework from their history class. Seventh graders on the other have less engagement than the sixth graders but seem to care about asking questions more which is a sign of comprehension and a want to understand and do well. If students don't care one way or the other, what's the point of asking questions?
Basically grades have nothing to so with how old a student is, grades have to do with motivation and connections. How does a teacher make an academic connection to students?
To be continued....
Tuesday, September 8, 2015
A public school gal goes to an NHA charter school.... whoa
As soon as I knew I wanted to student teach downstate through my soon-to-be Alma Mater, Northern Michigan University, I did my research and picked the top three things I needed from a school in order to make myself a better educator. These three things were:
1) Diversity: I went to schools in a good sized town called Brighton, MI my entire 12 years of schooling. While Brighton was a great place to grow up with little to no crime rates, the majority of residents were and still are white. As a high school student with a graduating class shy of 500 peers, I could count the amount of non-white students on both hands; I had less than 10 peers that were racially different than myself. Following up my time at BHS, I went to Northern Michigan University that did have more diversity, however, not by much. Since this is a bad representation of most American cities and schools, I have felt unprepared to be in classrooms that were systematically more diverse.
2) Innovation: As a millennial born in 1992, I have been brought up in a world where technology has overtaken the lives and work places of the world (mostly). I grew up in classrooms with computers and technology greater than an overhead projector and I intend to be in a school that is willing to grow with its students and the world. Every new teachers' nightmare is to be put into a school or classroom with no resources in technology and no innovative ideas to help students grow intellectually and create skills to help with the real world. Not to say that it is impossible to grow students without technology, however, it is a lot easier to engage students who are in tune with the latest iPads of today.
3) In a city larger than Marquette or Brighton: I have only lived in these two places my entire life and they have a lot of similarities such as lack of diversity and size, each about 8,000-10,000 in population. Thus my main focus was the Ann Arbor/ Ypsilanti area which is close enough to where I will be living but large enough to where I knew I would get the experience I desired.
So where did I end up for my student teaching placement? South Pointe Academy in Ypsilanti, MI. This school opened only 4 years ago under National Heritage Academies (NHA) which is a charter school management organization headquartered in Grand Rapids but has 82 schools under their management in 9 different states including Michigan. It is a non-profit public charter school for grades K-8 with 8th grade only being added last year!
I am going to be completely honest, I have never stepped foot into a charter school. Every public school teacher who has talked about charter schools never mentioned anything positive but rather about taking needed funds from public schools. The only information I know about charter schools comes from Diane Ravitch's books that speak out about the corruption and politics within public schools while arguing the public school system is not failing. In all of my method classes for education at NMU I have never been told about charter schools other than they are normally owned by the non-public. Therefore, it is safe to say that I not only am getting placed into an environment where I do not know anyone but I know absolutely nothing about this school or how it works.
Flash forward to the week before classes at South Pointe begin, Professional Development (PD) for the teachers and administration begin and as a dedicated, extra lost student teacher, I go to two 16 hour non-paid PD's. I cannot stress how long and tiresome these days were; not because they were boring but because there was so much information that I was actively listening for 8 hours straight with only 30 min lunch breaks. The most confusing yet interesting ideas that the NHA schools enforce are:
1) Moral Focus
2) Launches
3) I can statements
4) Social Contracts
5) No cafeteria
6) No busing
7) No recess/outdoor time for 7th or 8th graders
My reactions coming from public schools my entire life basically was shock and awe. How can a school function without a cafeteria? What about buses? What the heck are launches? Is a moral focus the school motto or the ideal school climate? Is a social contract like classroom rules? Is it illegal not to allow kids recess? Do I know anything?
One lesson I learned before classes even began is that I was defiantly not prepared for this experience regardless of the many hours spent inside different classrooms, but an open mind and a lot of questions can go far.
1) Diversity: I went to schools in a good sized town called Brighton, MI my entire 12 years of schooling. While Brighton was a great place to grow up with little to no crime rates, the majority of residents were and still are white. As a high school student with a graduating class shy of 500 peers, I could count the amount of non-white students on both hands; I had less than 10 peers that were racially different than myself. Following up my time at BHS, I went to Northern Michigan University that did have more diversity, however, not by much. Since this is a bad representation of most American cities and schools, I have felt unprepared to be in classrooms that were systematically more diverse.
2) Innovation: As a millennial born in 1992, I have been brought up in a world where technology has overtaken the lives and work places of the world (mostly). I grew up in classrooms with computers and technology greater than an overhead projector and I intend to be in a school that is willing to grow with its students and the world. Every new teachers' nightmare is to be put into a school or classroom with no resources in technology and no innovative ideas to help students grow intellectually and create skills to help with the real world. Not to say that it is impossible to grow students without technology, however, it is a lot easier to engage students who are in tune with the latest iPads of today.
3) In a city larger than Marquette or Brighton: I have only lived in these two places my entire life and they have a lot of similarities such as lack of diversity and size, each about 8,000-10,000 in population. Thus my main focus was the Ann Arbor/ Ypsilanti area which is close enough to where I will be living but large enough to where I knew I would get the experience I desired.
So where did I end up for my student teaching placement? South Pointe Academy in Ypsilanti, MI. This school opened only 4 years ago under National Heritage Academies (NHA) which is a charter school management organization headquartered in Grand Rapids but has 82 schools under their management in 9 different states including Michigan. It is a non-profit public charter school for grades K-8 with 8th grade only being added last year!
I am going to be completely honest, I have never stepped foot into a charter school. Every public school teacher who has talked about charter schools never mentioned anything positive but rather about taking needed funds from public schools. The only information I know about charter schools comes from Diane Ravitch's books that speak out about the corruption and politics within public schools while arguing the public school system is not failing. In all of my method classes for education at NMU I have never been told about charter schools other than they are normally owned by the non-public. Therefore, it is safe to say that I not only am getting placed into an environment where I do not know anyone but I know absolutely nothing about this school or how it works.
Flash forward to the week before classes at South Pointe begin, Professional Development (PD) for the teachers and administration begin and as a dedicated, extra lost student teacher, I go to two 16 hour non-paid PD's. I cannot stress how long and tiresome these days were; not because they were boring but because there was so much information that I was actively listening for 8 hours straight with only 30 min lunch breaks. The most confusing yet interesting ideas that the NHA schools enforce are:
1) Moral Focus
2) Launches
3) I can statements
4) Social Contracts
5) No cafeteria
6) No busing
7) No recess/outdoor time for 7th or 8th graders
My reactions coming from public schools my entire life basically was shock and awe. How can a school function without a cafeteria? What about buses? What the heck are launches? Is a moral focus the school motto or the ideal school climate? Is a social contract like classroom rules? Is it illegal not to allow kids recess? Do I know anything?
One lesson I learned before classes even began is that I was defiantly not prepared for this experience regardless of the many hours spent inside different classrooms, but an open mind and a lot of questions can go far.
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