Ryan Bolland’s Neighborhood

I'm having a hard time coming up with things to say that I haven't already. A person who incessantly self-reflects, I think the strings have pretty much wadded up on themselves by now, and I can't pull out a strand of profound beauty to display here.

Even in my second year, 'successful' is not an adjective that I would use to describe my teaching practice. 'Effective' is the more contextually appropriate word, but neither can this be absolutely claimed. Teaching continues to be trying, strengthening, humbling, often rewarding, but 'successful' is something that it is not.   For this reason, I look for the measurable gains in my individual students reading and writing ability in order to glimpse even the smallest semblance of success.  

In the interest of privacy, I'll call my student Mariah.  I received Mariah as a 15 year old 7th grade student who been absent for over a month of school the previous year during which time she was reported as a 'missing child'  for having allegedly ran off with an older man.  While, I am always of the belief that it is best to dismiss a student's past behavior history and receive them with new hope and new expectations it is more often than not that the student isn't far removed from their past which moreover informs the present, the student standing right there in front of you today.  When Mariah would verbally and  physically ( attempt to grab my hair) without any reservation or thought as to what might be the consequences, I realized that she had been shoved face to face with the crudeness of life and in comparsion, I was of no consequence whatsoever.

Although I consistently documented her behavior, administered her consequences, contacted her mother, and followed every other established protocol for following this behavior- I will not pretend to be at all responsible for her eventual turn-around.  Rarely, does a student wake up one day, have an epiphany, and commit to changing their ways. This , however, is exactly how it seemed to happen to Mariah.  It was the week of her birthday that I remember this sudden change in disposition, work habits, social interaction, ect.  Perhaps, the sobering anticipation of her turning 16 inspired this change, but whatever it was, the moment that I noticed even her most subtle effort to comply and respect, I acknowledged it, thank her, and indirectly prompted her to reflect on the difference between her current and former behavior.  The day of Mariah's birthday, I handed her a birthday/ thank you card that specifically acknowledged what I had noticed, what I had always believed she was capable of, and my conviction of how she would continue to succeed in the future.  Mariah received this not with the timid embarrassment of most students who are  acknowledged for doing the 'right thing', but with glowing pride.   From that day forward, she continued to be a model student and channel her aggression, defensiveness, and hurt into the stimulus for emotion-filled, poignant free-writing. It gets even better...

Mariah loves to write, and she loves being complimented on her writing even more. This was not mere flattery, however, as I reserved my praise for those pieces that were truly exemplary.  There was one poem, in particular, that was truly captivating and I truly believed that if entered in a contest or literary magazine, would be published. Jade was ecstatic at even the possibility of entering the contest and agreed to continue working with me to get it ready for publishing.  The next few afternoons that we spent together, exchanging both verbal and written words, serve as one of the highlights of this past year, and moreover my lifetime.  This in and of itself would have been a success, but it gets better... I mailed in her poem that Friday and three weeks later we were informed that Mariah received an honorble mention and a spot in the next issue!  It didn't matter that she didn't 'win,'  receive any monetary award, or even place.  The mere mention of her name and presentation of her poem in a magazine was enought to leave Mariah with an unabated glow that painted her face for the next three weeks.  This in and of itself was infinitely rewarding so that when Mariah's guardian-(aunt) came to personally thank me- it was no longer conceivable as to how I should be thanked, becuase truly, this was my privilege for which I have the utmost gratitude.

Although I am not completely new to the teaching profession, I often feel similar to first-year teachers since I am in my first year at KIPP Delta in Helena, Arkansas. In certain ways (easy and plentiful access to resources, myriad intelligent and hard-working colleagues, high expectations on student behavior and academic output) KIPP is very different from the school I taught at the past two years in Belzoni, Mississippi. In other respects (socioeconomic and racial demographics, general lack of student motivation, administrative acquiescence to parents) it is quite similar to my previous school. In reflecting on this first semester, three major realizations that I have encountered come to mind. I will reflect on each briefly:

1) KIPP students are no different from other students.

The students that I work with in Helena are very similar to my students from Belzoni. If often feel like Helena belongs on the other side of the Mississippi River somewhere deep in Quitman or maybe Leflore County. It would closely resemble other large Delta towns like Greenwood, Clarksdale, and Indianola. Prior to moving to Helena I thought that the students at KIPP were better off socioeconomically than average Delta kids or that they had more committed parents than normal. I found that my students have no silver spoon in their mouth and few doting soccer moms in their house. Students misbehave just as much at KIPP as they do at other public schools. What has actually been even more surprising is the heightened level to which a number of students misbehave as they seem to attempt to either get expelled or get their parents to take them out of KIPP due to our high behavioral and academic expectations.

2) KIPP entails a major commitment on the part of teachers.

The commitment that KIPP teachers make to their students begins early. In looking at my Gmail Inbox, I count over 50 emails sent between myself and KIPP administrators and fellow teachers between the first week of June when I accepted their offer of employment and the last week of July when we began our professional development/orientation. This is in addition to (at least) weekly phone call check-ins while at home in New Jersey that my school director (principal, essentially) and I had regarding my assignments. Yup, assignments. With due dates, criteria and all. On my first day of professional development I had a beautiful new cell phone waiting for me at work. This phone is with all the time and the number goes out all over to colleagues, parents, students, and anyone else who would like to contact KIPP Delta's 7th grade math teacher and debate team coach.

My work day usually begins at 5:30 and I'm usually at school sometime between 6 and 6:30 a.m. I'm rarely the first (or second or third) teacher there. Prep periods are scant and I'm one of the lucky few teachers with a morning AND afternoon one. Multiple teachers have NO PREP PERIOD. I'm also fortunate in that I only teach one core subject. Other teachers teach two (i.e. math and science or English and social studies) and some teach two strands of a core subject in the same classroom (i.e. algebra to 20 kids on the right side of a classroom and geometry to 10 kids on the left side...simultaneously). Although the regular school day ends at 4 p.m. (recently shortened from 5 p.m.) most teachers are expected to do an hour of an extracurricular activity and/or an hour of tutoring in their subject area each evening. Thus, my work day usually ends at 5 p.m. due to daily math tutoring and on Tuesdays and Thursdays it ends at 6 p.m. due to my coaching the debate team. I'm usually home about an hour after my work day ends...although I live only a few minutes' drive from my school. Saturday school occurs bi-weekly throughout most of the school year and a three-week long summer school is mandated as well.   

3) KIPP is the most innovative educational environment I have ever been a part of.

If you are psycho about teaching (and yes, essentially all MTCers fit into this category...at least all of those who last a year) then you will fit right in at KIPP. Far too often I felt that I was working much harder than my colleagues at my previous school. I would literally be laughed at for grading papers (even EXAMS). I was often the first teacher there and the last to leave. Students complained that my class was harder than their others. And on and on and on.... At KIPP, more or less all teaches are crazy, hard-working beasts. Almost everyone on the faculty is 20-something or barely in their 30's and from all corners of the nation. Together we are part of an amazing educational experiment that allows us to choose our own books and curricular material, teach using innovative instructional strategies, change the schedule on a daily basis as necessary (need an extra half hour for math? Just send a text to the phone of the ELA teacher), and sometimes even kidnap kids to get them to achieve at the very highest levels possible (ask me for stories). Where else could you have a school director mandate that teachers jump on a table in the cafeteria in front of the entire student body and sing and dance on cue or enter a classroom where intense pre-algebra instruction is occurring and mandate that every student smile at him while telling the teacher to hold up the arms of students who refuse to smile so they can be tickled into submission (both have happened to me this semester)? Anything but ordinary. Simply extraordinary.The movement is moving.   

Chimaobi Amutah
EDSE  647
Book Review

Is Bill Cosby Right?: Or Has The Black Middle Class Lost Its Mind?
by Michael Eric Dyson

    Each year in cities and towns large and small throughout the United States races for municipal office seem to boil down to two dominant, pervasive, and recurrent political issues: public safety and public education. Crime and education are so important to citizens because they concern not only the voters themselves but, most often, their invaluably precious children. Whether one looks at statistics outlining arrest and incarceration rates or dropout and literacy rates, the racial group doing the worst across the board is Blacks. Myriad theories have been put forth as to why this is the case and a plethora of articles and books have been published based on formal, scientific research as well as informal observation and reflection. In the book Is Bill Cosby Right?: Or Has The Black Middle Class Lost Its Mind? by venerable Georgetown University professor of sociology and cultural commentator Michael Eric Dyson, Dyson reflects on Bill Cosby’s take on why the community that he is a part of seems to fare so poorly in this society.
    The book’s antecedents lie in a highly controversial speech that Bill Cosby delivered in May 2004 after receiving an award at a commemoration event paying homage to the historic Brown v. Board Supreme Court decision of 1954. In his speech, Cosby decried the state of Black youth today who speak improper English, fervently pursue careers as athletes and rappers, and lack the basic self-discipline and motivation to make anything of themselves, their families, and their communities. Cosby’s comments sparked a firestorm of responses, most critically from other Blacks who felt as though Cosby’s age, wealth, and fame have left him out of touch with the current youth of the Black community and thus disqualifies him from making such generalized and hyper-critical statements. Michael Eric Dyson was one such critic who has made a point of combatting Cosby’s harsh rhetoric.
    In his book, Dyson, in true social scientist form, makes the case that extrinsic issues are more to blame for the myriad issues facing urban Black youth of today than a lack of quality parenting as Cosby professes. Dyson points to still-present and documented institutional racism that accounts for police arresting and charging Blacks at rates much higher than other racial groups as well as prosecutors seeking trial and incarceration more often than plea bargaining and judges issuing lengthier prison stays for Blacks. Dyson places Cosby in the same tradition as other elitist Blacks throughout U.S. history who were heavily critical of Blacks who they felt embarrassed the race, particularly in front of Whites--the “Afristocrats” as Dyson cleverly deems them. He makes these points all the more personal with regards to Bill Cosby by pointing to Cosby’s own struggles as a parent such as fathering a daughter out of wedlock and having another daughter publicly struggle with overcoming a drug addiction.
    This book is highly pertinent to the work that we as educators do, particularly at my current school. The KIPP network of charter schools in general and KIPP Delta in particular prides itself on working in rough inner-city and rural communities with majority-Black and Latino students from low-income backgrounds. One of the hallmarks of KIPP is discipline and the lengths to which we go to have our students speak, sit, walk, and even read with proper etiquette is amazing. Visitors to our school from local farming groups to the Governor of Arkansas remark at how amazingly well-behaved, courteous, and well-spoken our students are. This behavior seems to fly in the face of their preconceived notion that our students would be the type of students that Bill Cosby lambasted so passionately back in 2004. Our poor, Black students are expected to be loud, speak improperly, get into fights, and not have high standardized test scores. Far too often, students internalize these expectations and they morph into self-fulfilling prophecies. Thus, Dyson is correct in saying that low-quality parenting is not the predominant factor contributing to the state of Black youth today. Sadly, a lack of exposure to their own possibilities and a dearth of self-esteem are more deserve a greater share of the blame.

  Sir Ken Robinson defines creativity as “the process of having original ideas that create value”. He reiterates that it is a process and not a random act of inspiration, and that it needs to prove its worth. He points out that creativity is not the opposite to formality – instead a mixture of discipline and space to innovate are required. Robinson contends that “creativity is as important as literacy and should be treated as such.” Our schools are currently designed, like he said, in a hierarchy, in which specific skills, namely math and languages, are valued over others.
 Sir Robinson mentioned a couple reasons why having this hierarchy is ridiculous:

• The purpose of education shouldn't be to get into college.

• Believe in high standards does not mean education has to be standardized.

• We don't need to reform education -- we need to transform it.

• Creativity is a part of not apart from intelligence.

• We don't grow in to creativity, we get educated out of it.                                                                                                                                                                                                         One of the reasons why an academic hierarchy is ultimately futile is because people cannot accurately assign value to skills that may or may not be valuable in 30, 20, or even 10 years. If we cannot accurately assess what skills children will need for the future- how can we place a value or emphasis on any particular skill now?                                         Sir Robinson further ridiculed the stress we place on children to be right and not make mistakes. Children, and people in general, need to be willing to make mistakes in order to create an innovation. In fact, some of the most well-known products (penicillin, coca-cola, etc) are the results of what was initially a 'mistake.' This all-out rejection of mistakes stifles creativity, perhaps, more than any one factor in our schools and in society.                                                                                                                                                                          
  

By finding new ways to praise children’s efforts and ideas, and less ways to assess them on their mistakes, we will embrace the initiative to rethink the fundamental ways we educate children in the context of their endlessly, vast capabilities.

          There are several points in Arne's Duncan's speech of which I dissent, however the overarching purpose: a plead to realize the urgency through which educational reformation must take place, is immediately and timelessly relevant.

“By almost any standard,” Duncan told a Columbia University audience of students, teachers, and faculty, “many if not most of the nation’s 1,450 schools, colleges and departments of education are doing a mediocre job of preparing teachers for the realities of the 21st century classroom.” While this statement is unequivocally true, Duncan's failure to state what specific component is 'mediocre' renders the potential effectiveness of the statement itself-at best mediocre.  The abstractness of this earlier, 'mediocrity' claim is indicative of the circumlocutory speech that merely calls for, rather than offers a solution. Duncan does, however, reference what he considers 'pristine' models of schools of education. The shared characteristic that contributes to each of these programs' effectiveness is the central emphasis of a practicum or field experience.

To this end, I consider myself blessed to be a part of an equally propitious program- Mississippi Teacher Corps. Being able to immediately introduce the practical components of 'Advanced Methods in English' to my seventh grade class only two days after receiving instruction, both actualizes coursework and prevents instruction from becoming at all theoretical. Taking this course in preparation, rather than in conjunction with teaching would not have rendered the same lucrative advantage.

In especially the 21^st century, teacher roles and responsibilities are ever-more demanding. At a time when teachers are required to not only instruct, but moreover be TST coordinators, committee coordinators, parent-teacher coordinators, behavior incentive activity coordinators, academic and behavior interventionists, as well as psychologists and/or (at times) social workers, not to mention literacy and exceptional education specialists - preparation today needs to require students to teach while receiving training. Preparation should include training in how to differentiate instruction and how to provide advisory services to students. The best training in this type of individualized education is not conceptual, but rather requires the teacher to regularly implement and actualize differentiated instructional practices with each of their students.

Critics of teacher preparation programs say that current teacher-training programs are too heavily steeped in theory and not useful in the classroom. They say that those who teach in schools of education are clueless about how to reach children with dyslexia, attention deficit disorder, Asperger’s syndrome or other learning challenges. To this end, Duncan understands that the only way to evaluate a teacher-training program is to look at how the teachers perform once in the classroom; the only way to do that is to measure how the students are doing.

With so much scrutiny aimed at measuring student performance from kindergarten to high school, many education schools never get around to asking the high-stakes questions about how well teachers are doing in their profession, where they received their training, how much they learned, and what can be improved. Until we start scrutinizing this part of the process, and look at who is teaching the teachers, we’ll never empower students to reach their academic potential and create a workforce that is globally competitive.

though i think arne duncan's speech on "teacher colleges" was pretty well-crafted, i don't know if i truly still understand the concept of a teacher's college.  before i get into explaining why perhaps the most important thing could be to fund these institutions, i think i need to see if i actually believe in what they are aimed at doing.

This was my second time watching this speech, I originally watched it before I came in this summer. I thought that I understood what Pete was saying in his speech the first time that I watched it, but I now know that I had absolutely no idea what he was saying. Now that I have been in the classroom and have experienced the topics that he is discussing, I now more clearly understand what Pete is saying.

I am glad I watched this a second time because he was able to put into his experience into a 13 minute speech. It is hard to really describe to anyone outside of teaching and outside of the program what we are really going through. One of my favorite things that Pete said during his speech was that this is one profession that working hard does not necessarily define success. The funny thing about that is one would think that you can get by with last minute planning or just making lessons up as they are happening, but the kids read into that so easily. Therefore, you have to take time to plan and to try and make good lessons, even if they are a failure.

Pete also talked about losing a student and how much that incident impacted him, both as a teacher and in his life. This, as morbid as it is, is one of my biggest fears. Almost once a week I think about what would happen if I lost a student. The students and I are becoming more comfortable in one another and they are beginning to confide in me more and more. I do want this, because I had high school teachers there for me to confide in and I want my students to feel free to talk to me without pushing them into opening up. As silly of a concern as it may sound, I am really afraid that I am going to get close with a student and they are going to end up in a drug deal mishap in Memphis on a weekend and become a casualty. I have too many kids that do and sell drugs for something like that not to happen.

I am glad that Pete shared that moment with his class, and thanks to Ben, with the world on youtube. Like Pete mentioned, sometimes I feel like I'd rather be punched in the gut five times than to go to school but I hope that after Thanksgiving I will be energized and ready to teach again. 

Secretary Arne Duncan's article was enlightening but it made me have even more mixed feelings about teaching, I am enthused and worried, proud and ashamed, love and hate my job. Sometimes, as Duncan stated, I do feel like an unsung hero but often I feel like I am not fulfilling expectations, mostly my own.

Duncan writes, “Teaching has never been more difficult, it has never been more important, and the desperate need for more student success has never been so urgent.” When I first began I would have been motivated by this sentence. I would have felt that I could be the one that would teach kids, they would understand everything, and my life would be great. I quickly realized that this was an idealistic way of thinking and it ended up bursting my bubble a bit. I don't really know why I assumed that my students would share my love for reading and they would enjoy every minute of my class. This was apparently a silly assumption because the majority of my students either can't read or those that can hate reading. I think that I am slowly becoming a better motivator in my classroom and the students are SLOWLY starting to change their tune about English. Although, I did have a student ask me, “Ms. Breaux, why do we have to read in here, it has nothing to do with English.”

This comment was discouraging, and I know that I am a first year teacher, but my students should understand why reading is important to English class. Comments like this make me worry that I am not a very good teacher. And again, this makes me have mixed emotions about teaching, especially after reading this article. The Senator points out that “Teaching is one of the few professions that is not just a job or even an adventure—it's a calling. Great teachers strive to help every student unlock their potential and develop the habits of mind that will serve them for a lifetime. They believe that every student has a gift—even when students doubt themselves.” Am I a great teacher? I can easily answer “no” because I am discouraged too easily by the stupidity of students. Is teaching my calling? Everyday I am beginning to believe that it most certainly is not. Do I think that every student has a gift? I can finally answer “yes” to this question. I believe that every person whether it be a bum on a street or a cardiovascular thoracic surgeon has some type of gift. Most of the kids do not have the gift of reading well, but I can see that each and every one of my students are talented in some area or another. I need to be able to harvest these talents and use them to my advantage.

I think that only the great teachers are really able to harvest every students talents and I hope with all of the new teacher positions coming available in the next few years that there will be new teachers who are able to understand and touch every student. Maybe I am not confident because I am still in the first few months of teaching and I have not seen the results that I wanted to see, and I hope over time I am able to become a better teacher with fewer worries.