Kindred’s blog

Algebra 2 thus far has reviewed Algebra 1, learning to describe with pencil and paper (and usually no calculator) the various properties of lines, quadratics, and absolute value.  We have approached perhaps two or three objectives from the state Algebra 2 framework.

Lines are an Algebra I topic; they do not appear in the Algebra II framework.  Still, any Algebra II course should cover them, as a springboard to more complex sorts of functions.

I hear we have a blog assignment due tonight, although I haven't checked my email in weeks.  Something about our community (supportive administration, friendly teachers, polite and often hardworking students), what we need to do better (everything, especially talking less and being better organized and clearer in explanations and expectations), and something else.  

The most useful thing about summer school (and there were many) was that we had no access to technology - except for an overhead.  I thought learning to use a smart board might have been important, and I thought that writing worksheets by hand every day would have little relevance to my teaching experience during the school year.  Ben Guest had more foresight.

The topics were well chosen, both for their overall gravity and for how they relate to the Teacher Corps.

I've decided to write about Shanika's topic - the prison system - and Kelly's - teen pregnancy.  Each topic connects viscerally to the gravity of our mission as educators of underserved teenagers and to the vicarious emotional struggle that will accompany this mission. 

Most of all, I would have liked Shanika to have mentioned the term "Community Justice."  I would like to believe that she may have come across this term in her research.  I suspect she didn't.

Here I'll mention that "Community Justice" doesn't even have its own wikipedia article, but you can check out this study by the DOJ: 

http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/bja/182437.pdf

I expect Community Justice to overtake Criminal Justice one day as the prevailing law enforcement paradigm in this country - or else I resign to the vision of a perpetual revolving door.  This paradigm concerns the structure within the so-called correctional system.  It concerns what goes on within those walls.  It concerns the culture of correction, or the mimicry thereof. 

A separate, and equally important, paradigm concerns the correctional superstructure, which extends beyond the prison walls to every man woman, or child who ever has been or ever will be locked up.  This superstructure also includes law enforcement, legislators, and businessmen.  And teachers.  Within a generation, addressing educational inequity will address the increasing number of first-time offenders and the accompanying fact that children with an incarcerated parent are much more likely to enter the system themselves than those without.  In fact, improving public education - and in particular addressing educational inequity - is likely to be the first and best way of reversing the penitentiary system's current downward spiral.
 
Still, we should return to the structure of the so-called correctional system itself.  We should rethink what it means to "pay one's debt to society."  In the current system, a Mississippi's inmate's only positive, constructive contribution flows through the Prison Industrial Complex (which I was happy to see Shanika mention; I was also fascinated that in Mississippi a single corporation has gained monopoly control of the industry!).  In fact, most criminals owe their debt not so much to society at large (not to mention an exploitive corporation) but to a small collection of individuals - the victims.

Community Justice begins with the victim - someone who suffered as a direct or indirect result of the offender's deeds.  What does the victim need to make things right?  Often this is difficult.  Often this takes time.  In the end, it usually comes down to some sort of reconciliation. 

Reconciliation.  This is how one can pay one's debt to society.  This is how one can earn public forgiveness.

Ultimately, reconciliation must motivate the system.  One day, reconciliation must drive the vision.  Today, reconciliation must enter the conversation.  The catch phrase for this radical philosophy is "Community Justice."

In my opinion, the best way for our society to progress - both statistically/practically and polemically/discursively -  on the problem of unwanted pregnancies and the generally violent resolutions thereof would be to de-emphasize the controversy over policy (ideally by riviving our comatose practice of Federalism) and to empower individual and community compassion and initiative.  The top-down approach should be to enable the solution to thrive from the bottom up - by caring for one another. 

Everyone in the Teacher Corps will have pregnant students, we've been told.  I've never helped care for a pregnant woman (or girl) before.  In my thusly uninformed view, you've got two people to care for, so you should be doubly helpful, doubly compassionate, doubly patient, and (especially as a man) more than doubly humble.

Last year I noticed that Angela reserved a remote corner of the classroom for her pregnant students; it seemed to provide them a calmer, more peaceful learning environment.  I would guess that it minimized potential distractions as well, such as when I let them go to the restroom.  This is my classroom management/procedural take on teenage pregnancy.  This is least important.  The caring is most important.

I met a man the other day who was probably about 75 years old.  He taught for one year.  He couldn't reach his students, he said, except for one or two.   One student was named Marylyn.  One day after school she came to his room in tears.  She was pregnant.  She didn't want to tell her parents.  He calmed her down and said that people who love us can surprise us sometimes, especially parents, especially when we put all our chips on the table.  Then he took her to the Guidance Counselor, who he knew was good.  She told Marylyn the same thing.

Five or ten years later, he saw Marylyn in downtown Columbus, leading a trail of small children out a door.  Marylyn thanked him.  She told him he was right.  She told him her dad had taken a second job to support her through school.  Now Marylyn had a degree and a job in early childhood education.

Much less excruciating.

I talk way, way, way, way, way, way too much.  I AM BORING!! My students deserve more praise for not falling asleep.  I need to shut up!

Far too little independent work time, mostly because I talk an absurd amount.

(After the set) I should begin by modeling two or three problems before involving the students.  We only got through two problems (x - 4 = 8 and -8 + x = 5) in the first twenty-five minutes of class.  I helped the students through the first problem and they struggled through the second (largely because it's soo much harder than the first).  All the time, I was blabbering without saying anything.  The notes were too complicated.  Everything was rambling.  I repeated everything I said three times without ever saying it clearly, slowly, and emphatically. 

There was no focus.  There was no flow.

I talked too much during the bell ringer. 
I talked too much during the set.
I talked too much during the notes.
I talked too much during the guided practice.
I talked too much during the independent practice.
I talked too much during the closure.

No exaggeration.

Next time, I will have a more concrete set.  I will model examples alone at first, and then have them try problems that are just like mine (not trickier at all).  My notes will be simpler.  I will speak in complete, uninterrupted sentences.  I will back off completely from addressing the entire class during note copying and independent work.

I have been working on all this in the weeks since the lesson.  Hopefully I've improved somewhat already.  But now I won't be able to help it.  It's visceral.  I was cringing.

Writing too many names on the board can become a great visual joke.
I don't write names on the board because I already write too much on the board.  Today Ben questioned my "keeping track in my head technique."  Admittedly, I'll need to become more systematic if I reach the point of giving out ten warnings and seven writing assignments per period, but for now I'm opting for simplicity in the form of Mental Math.

Don't threaten.  Good advice.  Consequences are potentially tough enough to keep track of themselves (see above).

If students are monsters, they are only reluctant monsters.
This reminds me of a parenting book my Principal had me read this spring: GET OUT OF MY LIFE... but first could you take me and Cheryl to the mall?!?  Teenagers strive for freedom and autonomy, but they still crave safety and structure.

Dressing professionally is a small but important step toward establishing respect.
Proper modeling seems most crucial in establishing a culture of respect in the classroom.  Conor, Annah, and I have been referring to our students by last names in the classroom this summer.  Together with "yes sir" and "no maam," I think that this models respect in the limit we should expect students to strive for.

Decisive answers inspire confidence.
So do correct ones.  See below.

Teachers should be prepared to utter a decisive answer to any question within two seconds.
Sometimes the stakes are high enough that it makes sense to take five seconds to think things over, especially if one amplifies the PEP techniques during this time without the situation changing.  This type of scenario has presented itself more than once during the role-plays, especially since many of these situations are unlike any we've ever considered (this attests to the value of the role plays).  Still, as a rule of thumb, as an ideal, I'm on board with "2 seconds."

The "teacher look" is effective because it is mysterious.  The teacher look says, "There's nothing you can do that I haven't already seen, so don't even bother trying."
I have about a hundred faces and none of them say this, for the simple reason that for me this statement is not true (yet).  There's plenty that students will do that I haven't seen yet.  The more their antics become repetitive, the more my "bored/dismayed/disappointed/unamused" face may evolve into a teacher face.  But as long as some part of me thinks that the disruptive antics are kind of funny, I am likely to wear this on my face some of the time, especially if I'm caught off guard.  I'll still enforce my rules, but I simply cannot have a "teacher face" at this point, if a teacher face is what they say it is.  I will smile at some point in the first month, guaranteed.

:)

Needless confrontation can turn small problems into huge power struggles.  Suppress your reflect to react immediately to every little thing.
This seems to me like the most important and difficult nuance of classroom management.  When to warn/punish out loud versus in private?  When to let something slide and risk lost credibility for your rules?  To punish now or to punish later? When to feign ignorance?  When to remain silent and rely on PEP, before handing out consequences (maybe take time to scribble down names)?

When I exaggerated, the students instantly knew I was bluffing.  Allow yourself room to change directions if a style doesn't work for you.  Don't predetermine the kind of teacher you will become.  If you succeed at convincing student you are one of them, you may lose their respect.  If you find yourself starting to dislike a student, stop.  The finest teachers are consistent.  They are consistently unpredictable.  Kids WANT the teacher to be in charge.  The greatest of all teaching experiences is the "teachable moment."
There may be some minor contradictions here, but I whole-heartedly believe each of these statements.  Somehow combining them into a teacher persona is the most important thing I have left to do before school begins (besides planning the first month's lessons).

All three of these issues have to do with a very simple fact: I'm working way too hard right now, and if I'm still working this hard in September it's going to break.  The way I teach right now is simply unsustainable.  I need to engage my students more deeply, more quickly.  I need to step out of the spotlight.  I need to become more efficient.  I need to talk less.

INFP doesn't sound right.  I think it comes down to what I see as a false dichotomy between reason and intuition.  In mathematics, the two feed off each other.  Alone, they are nothing; together, they can grow.

Computers cannot prove theorems because they have no intuition; they are artless.  This is why, to me, living in the 21st century, my intuition is much more important than my faculties of reason.

But while intuition alone can create conjective and can devise new proof techniques, mathematical artifacts consist of reason alone.  Theorems connect to axioms through layers of conditional statements.  Thus, while intuition drives the process of mathematical thinking, reason justifies the product and in some sense the process as well.

At least, this is the type of feeling that kept going through my mind when I was filling out the survey.  Maybe I'll take the test tomorrow and get a more sensible result.