Reflections from the Finish Line

Yesterday was a hard day; it was my last day in the Baltimore County Public Schools. After two very difficult years, I have decided to give up public school teaching (at least for now) in order to pursue a PhD in Education.

As anyone who has been a schoolteacher knows, it requires a lot of energy just to make it to the end of the year; the stings felt on the worst days often seems stronger than the rewards felt on the best days. But once the finish line is crossed, one remembers the rewards a bit more than the lows; one remembers the lives one touched (and those one were touched by) more than the headaches, tears, and anger.

What I can say, now that I’ve had time to reflect, is that teaching irrevocably changed me…I think for the better. I have much more confidence in my ability to deal with difficult situations than I did before. I have much more strength than I did before. And, yes, I have developed a newfound ability to be stern (while remaining a degree of calm) in the face of challenges. In short: being a teacher toughened me, but in a good way.

And what took me most by suprise is the recurring thought I’ve had over the last few days that I will really miss my life as a public educator. On the average and bad days, I assumed that there was no way I could ever miss it at all! How could one actually miss a job where one felt futile more than one felt productive, where one seemingly struggled uphill daily for so little gain, where the emotional costs seemed to outweigh the benefits at every turn?

Maybe hindsight is always rosier than the view from the trenches, but I did not realize how much I actually got used to all of these things, probably because I got used to them so gradually. There was no precise moment where I said, “Now, I am comfortable in my life and persona as a teacher,” but looking back on it, I can say exactly that. It must have happened, but it happened over two years rather than in one instant.

One of the teachers I said goodbye to yesterday said to me something like this: “Now, go off and do bigger and better things.” Once she realized what she said, she corrected herself; “Well, I don’t know about that; what we do is pretty big and pretty remarkable. You know what I mean, though.”

I could only agree with her. While it might not feel like it at the time, my reflection from the finish line is that teaching IS pretty big and wonderful.

Discipline, Education, and the Concept of Moral Hazard

The term "moral hazard" has been bandied about lately as a term of economics and the question of whether the government should be "bailing out" failing companies. As an economic term, "moral hazard" means the hazard that comes from insulating an entity form failure and the conseuqences of it. "Running the risk of moral hazard" is the idea that a risk we take in insulating others from failure is that they will never learn from their mistakes and may take as big or bigger risks in the future.

While the term has been used in economics, I think it is high time we apply it to the world of educational psychology. More directly, we educators should remain cognizant that every time we "keep students from failing" by artificially insulating them from the consequences of negative actions, we are ensuring that they do not learn from mistakes. In other words, if the best way to learn from mistakes is to realize that they are mistakes, then interfering with the experience of consequences of mistakes means interfering with the best feedback mechanism one has.

Many times in my career as a teacher have I argued this position and many times, unfortunately, I have lost the argument. In a previous post, I referred to one such incident: me and several other teachers brokered a deal with a senior in danger of failing that if he does x and y, we would see to it that he could pass. Repeatedly, he broke the deal. Repeatedly, the other teachers (without me) rebroekered the deal - all to ensure that he could pass despite having broken the agreement on which his success depended.

Many other times, I have seen the risk of moral hazard come into play when teachers explain rules and cosnequences to students only to, when push came to shove, chafe and allow students to break said rules without undergoing the consequences.

Why do we teachers allow and evene encourage such moral hazards to occur?

I believe that, just as in the current economic situation, it is hard to "hold the line" and enforce consequences when the consequences are severe. It is all well and good to say that companies that are irresponsible shall be allowed to go bankrupt, but it is painful to sit by and watch this happen. Thus, the government ends up caving in and taking the emotionally easy way out by not letting companies go under and people go unemployed.

In the same way, teachers allow such moral hazard becasue, as teachers, we generally do not like to hurt kids. We want to see kids happy, and we do not enjoy seeing kids fail. Unfortunately, we do not often realize that while this is a noble feeling, we often do more harm than good by protecting students form the consequences of their actions, and in the process, interfering with the feedback mechanism of natural consequences. She who places her hand on the stove and gets burned will not do it again. She who places her hand on the stove and is repeatedly saved from such an experience (by having their hand yanked away from the stove, etc) will never, or very slowly, learn that the stove burns. But as no one wishes to see a child get hurt, we protect them and unknowlingly slow down their learning process.

I have learned - and this will sound strange - to find a small (very small) bit of accomplishment in allowing students to fail of their own accord. I see it as a learning opportunity for the student. Of course, I don't actively want students to fail and do not try to make them fail; on the contrary, I want to do everything in my power to see them succeed SHORT OF PROTECTING THEM FROM DESERVED CONSEQUENCES. If this sounds strange, let me illustrate with an example.

One particular student of mine did just about everything wrong in the second and third marking period. He showed up late, talked back, did not do work, disrupted class, etc. I talked with him many times and warned him that he was heading for a failing grade. When his third quarter grade showed up as an "E," he did everyhing he could to try and convince me to change it...to no avail. I explained to him that that was the consequence of his actions and that if he wanted to avoid failing the class, he must improve in quarter four. I would not change his grade or offer him any special benefit of the doubt.

From then on, he has improved greatly. He has been much better in class and is now earning a "B." I tell him as frequently as I can that I am proud of his change in behavior, and when asked what accounts for this new and improved showing, he simply tells me that he knows that acting up will result in a failing grade.

So, there you have it. Fairness means helping children succeed while holding to the rules when they don't. The minute one allows the rules to be overlooked and protecting kids from consequences of their actions, one is running the same "moral hazard" risk the economists talk about: we run the risk of interfering with people's ability to learn from, and correct, their mistakes.

Why Don't Students Like School (A review of Willinham's fantastic new book)

A new book by cognitive psychologist Daniel Willingham has come out entitled Why Don't Students LIke School? I am generally skeptical of books claiming to take the latest brain/mind research and apply it to education primarily because of the "brain based ways of learning" fad promulgated by motivational speaker Eric Jensen (and preached unquestionably in professional developments). I picked this kone up, though, primarily due to a blurb on the back of the book by education theorist ED Hirsch, who I very strongly admire. Surely, any book Hirsch reccomends is at least worth a shot.

I was right. This book is fabulous in its 'back to basics' approach. Willingham's main point seems to be that the best way to increase a child's ability is repitition, repitition, repitition. By increasing the number of facts a child can recall automatically, one increases the amount of 'free space' a child has available to think. [ex.: (3+4) - (2-1) is a lot easier when one can recall the math facts automatically.]

Anyway, I strongly, strongly reccomend this book to all concerned with education theory. I hope this book gets used within the schools, but suspect that Jensen will be the continued drug of choice, as his theory manages, unlike Willinham's, to confirm all the constructivist impulses that educators have been in love with for the last 20 years.

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If you are a teacher, like myself, you have doubtless been inundated by advice about teaching to multiple intelligences, active (rather than passive) learning, teaching students to think rather than memorize facts, etc. If so, then you can't afford to pass up this book, which will provide a very helpful guide as to why some of these well-intentioned ideas are wrong, and what it means for you as a teacher.

Dan Willingham's Why Don't Students Like School? is a book applying findings of cognitive psychology to the world of education. Sound a lot like Eric Jensen and his wildly popular book Teaching With the Brain in Mind? Well, unlike Jensen - who educators hear a lot about - Willingham is a PhD in cognitive psychology (while Jensen, who has a bachelors in English, is "working towards" a PhD from an online university, while making his real living as a motivational speaker). Long and short: Willingham is the real deal and I move to suggest that this book infinitely deserves more popularity amongst educators than anything Jensen has written.

Willingham's basic theme is that, despite everything you've heard, nothing works to increase student ability like factual learning and practice. In fact, one of his first ideas is to point out that what seperates the excellent student (or adult) from those performing less well is their ability to recall facts. The more facts you know about your subject, the more you can understand your subject because of significantly less energy spent on fact recall or retention. With facts learned to automaticity, more time can be spent on higher-order concept learning, and once that becomes automatic....etc.

While that may sound mundane, think of how many times you as a teacher have heard the idea of "rote memorization" and "regurgitation of fact" denegrated. Of course, Willingham is not advocating the strawman position that teachers do nothing but drill, drill, drill and enforce memorization of text passages. (No one actually holds that position!) What he reminds us, though, is that the critical thinking we hear so much about teaching our kids simply CANNOT happen without giving kids the requisite background info that must be employed to think critically. (One cannot critically reflect on whether the revolutionary war was justified without some big factual understanding of Colonial American and Empirial Britian, for example.)

Another big idea in educaiton that Willingham works to dispel is the idea that we all have different learning styles - auditory, visual, kinesthetic, etc. Cognitive science, in fact, has shown the opposite: with minor variation, we all learn very similarly. While I may have a better memory for visual phemonena than you (who may be better at remembering sounds), we remember IDEAS not through the media in which they were delivered, but by...thinking about them. When memorizing words and definitions, we are not being asked to memorize sounds or visuals, but ideas, and the fact that I am an auditory or visual learner does nothing to predict what presentation method will help me memorize the best. (The amount I studied, of course, will.)

I don't want to give the impression that Willingham's book is about bashing education icons and maxims. It is not It is a book for teachers designed to bring up ideas we may not have thought about, and to suggest how to apply these ideas to our classrooms. Each chapter is focused around a question ("Is Drilling Worth It?" "Why is it So Hard for Students to Understand Abstract Ideas?") and gives a detailed, but engaging, answer. At the end of each chapter, the author makes several concrete suggestions for how the answer can shape how we teach as well as reccomendations for further readings.

All in all, this is one of the single best education books I have read, and cannot wait to share it with fellow educators. As mentioned, I sincerely hope that this book becomes as widely devoured as those by Eric Jensen and Howard Gardner. Willingham offers a valuable and very constructive counterpoint, especially to Jensen's "brain based ways of learning."

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Anyone looking for more can visit Willingham's website, where there are plenty of good articles and videos.

Show Up, and Get a B - Another way k-12 does not prepare for the real world

I have recently come across an interesting article documenting a sad trend in college students increasing sense of entitlement. According to the article, professors and administrators are noticing an increasing sense amongst students that they are entitled to certain grades, and an increasing aversion to earning, rather than getting, grades.

The article makes some interesting points but I think it misdiagnoses the problem at lesat a little bit. As a k-12 educator, I think that this sense of entitlement in college students comes from the disjunct between the k-12 schools indirect teaching of entitlement and the college's continued emphasis on earning, rather than being entitled to, academic success. Like it or not, k-12 schools ARE leaving kids unprepared for college by getting them used to the idea that all children will be successful and that effort, rather than product, will be rewarded. Unfortunately, the real world doesn't work that way, leaving those students unprepared for the large paradigm shif that will doubtless come their way.

“I tell my classes that if they just do what they are supposed to do and meet the standard requirements, that they will earn a C,” he said. “That is the default grade. They see the default grade as an A.”

Why do the students think this way? As a teacher, I have seen many teachers TELL students that the default grade IS an A, and that one works to maintain, rather than earn, the high marks. I just dealt with a student yesterday who relayed that her teacher told her exactly this (and I have seen countless other teachers do this).

Of course, mathematically, this is quite untrue. The default grade at the beginning of each quarter is a 0%. If the first assignment is worth 100 points, and the student does half of the assignment, the grade becomes a 50% F. If they do the entire assignment, of course, their grade is a 100% A. From there, the grade can change based on the number of points per assignment and the relative weighting of the assignments, but in no way is the default grade ACTUALLY an A (despite what we tell students).

And there is another way in which the "default A" is unworkable. As Charles Murray points out in his book Real Education, "C" measn "average" in education parlance, or at least, it used to! It is a statistical truism that half of kids will be at or below average and half of kids will be at or above average. If our grade books were redesigned to allign with how they should look, student grades would create a bell curve where "C" would be the tip. "A" means "excellent" in education parlance, and as such, we are giving out too many "A's" if we are giving them to stduents who are not excellent in their subject. (My estimate would be about 10-15% should be getting "A's").

I think that it stems from their K-12 experiences,” Professor Brower said. “They have become ultra-efficient in test preparation. And this hyper-efficiency has led them to look for a magic formula to get high scores.”

The first half is right; the second is not. In the county in which I teach, for instance, 60% of the overall grade for a class is made up of classwork, and 25% is made up of tests and quizzes. On top of this, classwork is most often graded for completion, rather than accuracy. (Tests are generally the only thing grade for accuracy.) This literally means that a student can do all classwork without understanding the content, bomb every test and quiz, and still walk away with a "D." If she does all homework in addition to classwork, she would recieve a "C," and if she does all classwork and homework while scoring 50% "F's" on all tests and quizzes (still not understanding much of the material), she would recieve a 85% "B". I see it happen all the time where a student has a "C" in a class but does not know anything but the rudimentary skills for the class. This trend is at its worst when that student gets passed to Spanish II (or Algebra II) without mastering the requisite amount of info from the previous class.

My point: this teaches students that effort is to be rewarded above product. While this sounds like a good idea, the article points out that it is not. In essence, we are sending kids from an institution which, for 12 years, has taught them that effort rather than product is what counts and throwing them into a 4 year institution that operates in precisely the opposite way! In a college spanish class, it is rare that homeworks are graded for anything but accuracy (if they are graded at all), and tests constitute the majoity of the grade. Contrast that with the high school spanish class where student classwork and homework is graded on completion and together constitutes 75% of a stduent's grade.

There is another huge problem with what k-12 institutions' inadvertent inflating of grades and putting primacy on effort rather than product: it leads to students who become easily discouraged when they get bad grades.

“I think putting in a lot of effort should merit a high grade,” Mr. Greenwood said. “What else is there really than the effort that you put in?”

“If you put in all the effort you have and get a C, what is the point?” he added. “If someone goes to every class and reads every chapter in the book and does everything the teacher asks of them and more, then they should be getting an A like their effort deserves. If your maximum effort can only be average in a teacher’s mind, then something is wrong.”

What's the point? First, the point is to learn, rather than to earn a grade. (We are not good at teaching this in k-12 either.) Second, it is unrealistic (unless surrounded by k-12 walls) to expect that hard work garauntees a product worthy of a high grade. The real world does not work that way. If two people work just as hard at work and one turns in a better finished product than the other, then the better product will yield higher rewards. In college, one can put in all the work one wants, but if one doesn't understand the subject well enough to pass the test, then one does not deserve to pass the course as if one did understand the subject.

But k-12 works differently. In our zeal towards egalitarianism and a very chimeric belief that all children should have success, we have created a aystem so singley focused on this goal that it is artificially padded. In our desire to see all students experience success, we have made a system that places little emphasis on mastery (an elitist concept, that!) and put it on hard work (which all students are at least capable of). And even then, we treat students who do not work hard as "students with special needs" and offer even more "supports" that do little more than ensure that less effort is required of them (lest they earn an F at something!).

For those who think I am exaggerating this last piece, a previous post the story of a student I work with who simply does not show up to class and does little work. The school, however, has made deal after deal with him that he can pass the year if he does x and y. When he doesn't follow through, they re-instate the deal. When I asked why - why not let him experience the consequences of his actions - the most common response is, "Well, if we do that, he might not graduate, and that would be a shame." In other situations, I have been explicitly told to grade students for effort rather than product, or to use a more relaxed standard when grading certain students.

In the bizarre world of k-12 ed, this makes a certain bit of sense to most teachers. Fairness, we are repeatedly told, means giving everyone a tase of success. But as I hope to have pointed out, this egalitarian model does not fit with what kids will experience after high school either in college or the world of work. I shudder to think at how poorly we are preparing students for the merit-based world they will face after high school, where one is not entitled to grades, praise, or raises, no matter how hard one works, and where what matters is product rather than effort.

Why High-School Diplomas Don't Always Mean What They Advertise

Below is an example of why one should not trust a high-school diploma to indicate mastery of much of anything.

Two weeks ago, I was approached by the school social worker to be party to a deal made for a student in danger of failing Algebra 2. A senior, this student was in real danger of not graduating in large part because he skipped much of the second and third quarter. The deal went like this: the student would promise to attend every single Algebra 2 class, attend every single one of my Study Skills classes (where he could recieve tutoring), and once these criteria were filled, the student would be allowed the chance to pass the class. I entered into this agreement with the stipulation that, as this student has had several allowances made for him, this would be his last chance. Miss a class and the deal is void.

The next day, he failed to attend my Study Skills class. Thus, per our agreement, the deal was void. Or so I thought.

Yesterday, when I was off because I had just gotten married, the social worker did what she promised she wouldn't do: she reinstated the deal. When I asked her and the vice principal why, they both told me - this only seems like a tall tale - that we just wanted to get the student through, and it would affect our numbers if we did not. Besides, they said, giving him the piece of paper might allow him to get a job that he couldn't get without the diploma.

So, you heard it here first (or maybe you are already familiar): diplomas often mean little more than that teachers and principals let a student skirt by so as to boost their numbers and pass the buck.

These are the days when I really question why we have diplomas in the first place. If they are not standards based, or if standards are so movable that they are merely inconveniences to be stretched, I am not sure what diplomas are to signify. Surely not academic mastery! That wouuld...gasp...expect something out of students and hold them to expectations. (How dare we!)

Thus, it may be in employers best interests to administer employment tests rather than relying on the fact that an applicant has a high-school diploma. Whether someone has a diploma seems to be little evidence that they can read, write, think, do math, or do little more than be passed along by lazy administrators and teachers.

When Teachers Vent

Occasionally, teachers get together with other teachers - after school in an empty classroom, over drinks at a local "happy hour" - and vent. And once this venting gets going, it is hard to put the breaks on. I am guilty of it, and I don't feel bad about this because most of my teacher friends do it too.

What do we vent about? Generally, we vent about students: how difficult it is to teach this one, the latest story about that one, did you know this other one is in a gang, etc. To the outsider, this might appear a bit like pessimists giving voice to their pessimism, or see it as an example of a bunch of lazy teachers complaining about having to teach.

But, as an insider, I think these venting sessions are necessary. I would be the last to say that teaching is one of the hardest professions there is (maybe it would be if there were fewer days off and perks), but will certainly say freely that teaching is like no other profession out there. Not only is it unique in that our "clients" generally are forced to "buy" our "product" by force, but also because for 9/10ths of our day (save for cafeteria duty and transition between classes), teachers do their job in isolation from any peers whatsoever. In most professions, when things go wrong, one can talk to a coworker or peer in the office. With teaching, there is none of that. At the end of the day, I see many tired, stressed, and dragging adult faces when I leave the building, and I am sure my face looks the same as theirs.

So, naturally when teachers get to talking after school, they let it rip. They were not able to vent all day. When the knucklehead in second period told them to f*** off, she just had to keep her cool for 5 more hours (and try not to get angrier when someone in period 4 followed suit). My story today happened during second period, when a student ran out of my room because I refused to write him a pass, only to have an administrator catch him, bring him back to class, and TELL me to write a pass for him so that he might be appeased. Soon after, my class broke loose, and kids began throwing paper balls into the trash can, cursing up a storm, and generally ignoring anything I had to say (as they had just seen a peer get away with running out of the classroom).

But I had to keep my chin up until the end of the day because, as any teacher knows, when one loses their cool in front of the kids, the kids come at you all the harder triggering a nice downward spiral. But all of this stoicism gets to us.

And that is why the after-school venting sessions are so necessary to us. Other teachers are the only ones who understand how we feel, and letting go to them serves as a catharsis. When my colleage tells me her stories about teaching the same student who ran from my class, she is subtly telling me that I am not the only one who is having thsee problems - not the only one feeling like their mind is slowly being lost. And when the two of us complain about how difficult it is to motivate the unmotivated students, we are subtly letting each other know that we are not the only ones who feel like we are banging our heads against the wall with no results.

So, I know that many outsiders view with contempt the vision of teachers griping to eachother about their kids. But these people don't realize how lonely a profession teaching is, and how frustrating it can be both for that reason and for many others. to a teacher like myself, being able to vent to other teachers who understand what it is I am going through is simply better help than talking to a therapist who doesn't.

Nonverbal Communication, Autism, and the Interbrain Problem (Review of Tantam's book on autism)

Autism is one of the most tricky disabilities there is to understand. It is also one of the most prevalent As a special educator, I find autism puzzling and am always interested to try and understand it as a phenomenon. Recently I recieved a complimentary copy of "Can The World Afford Autistic Spectrum Disorder" to review (courtesy of amazon.com). It is a book that offers quite a novel theory about what autistic spectrum disorder is (primarily, the author says, an impairment in ability to pick up on an interpret nonverbal communication). For those not familiar, this view is in direct contrast to the predominant theory that autistic spectrum disorder is marked primarily by the inability to see others as intentional agents and, therefore, understand people as people. Anyone interested in the puzzle of autism should check this book out.

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The title of Digby Tantam's book - Can the Wold Afford Autistic Spectrum Disorder - is a bit of a misnomer. The question only comes up, and is answered in the affirmative, in the book's last chapter. The majority of the book is devoted to a novel theory the author expounds that the primary impairment encompassed by ASD is that of nonverbal communication (rather than, say, mindblindness).

Theorists have debated for the past 10 years (at least) what the main impairment of autism was. Is it trouble with language? Lack of ability to see others as persons with intentions? Lack of ability to process emotions in self and others? The dominant theory, with Simon Baron-Cohen as its progenitor, is that autism is primarily a disorder marked by "mindblindness," or, lack of ability in tke autistic to see others as intentional agents, and hence, be able to "understand" people AS people.

Tantam offers a different, and quite convincing, theory. Tantam suggests that autism is a disorder (sticky term, that) marked first and foremost by difficulty reading non-verbal communication. To use his term, autistics have difficulty with things involving the "interbrain" connection between people. Most of us are born with and have no trouble developing our ability to "read" people and the subtle cues - gaze, body language - that autistics often cannot pick up. He uses a computer analogy; if the interbrain is like the internet (that non-physical connection that we have between each other), then the autistic is the one who cannot log on.

The first two chapters of the book are devoted to illuminating to us neurotypicals how important nonverbal communication is to everyday life (as we often forget because nonverbal communication is so automatic to us). The next few chapters are devoted to outlining and defending the interbrain theory. Tantam finishes off by suggesting some things that autistics and particularly those who care for them can do to help them cope with this lack of ability to access the "interbrain" world of nonverbal signals.

I would suggest that anyone reading this also read Simon Baron-Cohen's book "Mindblindess," which outlines the main theory Tantam is arguing against. To my mind, I think that Tantam's theory, while still quite speculative, is interesting and suspect that mindblindess (inability to see others as intentional actors) and the lack of ability to "access the interbrain" are quite connected. When one cannot appropriately read nonverbal communications, it becomes all the harder to "see what others are thinking." If one has trouble telling that someone is angry (recognizing their arms crossed, their face turn red, and their voice get tense), then it stands to reason that it would be very hard to predict what that person will do. In other words, I suspect that one will not need to choose between Baron-Cohen's theory and Tantam's theory. I suspect that mindblindess and lack of "interbrain ability" are quite related (whether one causes the other or they simply develop in parallel.

The last few chapters will be the chapters most helpful for caretakers of autistics (like myself). The author suggests that caretakers can help autistics navigate the world of nonverbal communication by acclimating them to it strategically - at once making sure they are not bombarded, but stay connected to others. We can also monitor out own behavior to be as literal and as verbal as possible, making sure that we cut down on the number of nonverbal cues we personally send out.

And as to the question of whether the world can afford autistic spectrum disorder, the author's answer is an unambiguous: "We better." He acknowleges the difficulty in expecting neurotypicals to accommodate themselves to such a large degree to the autistic, but also argues that autistics often have traits that it would be a shame for the world to go about. In the author's own words, "If the future lies more and more in collaboration with machines, then we may need more people with ASD, not less." For all the difficulties (both for autistics and neurotypicals) that ASD can cause, it would be a real shame to deprive ourselves of the unconventionality, originality, and often outstanding intellect and talent often associated with ASD.

Doing All We Can to No Avail

It is crunch time at _____ ________ high. The third quarter is almost over, and everyone (staff, that is) is feeling the squeeze. I forgot how much the end of the third quarter bothered me last year, but now it is all coming back.

Waht makes the third quarter's end so disheartening for me - a special educator - is that this is the time when students who have slacked for three quarters are in danger of officially failing for the year - recieving "E's" for three of four quarters. Of course, they have not offiially failed yet so the question I hear all day every day is: what can we do to make sure they pass?

This question would not bother me - does not bother me - when it is about a student who is trying hard but coming up short. I will help those students as much as possible. The problem is that the large majority of those who we are trying to avoid failure for the third quarter are those who have shown little to no effort. It is hard for me to get up the motivation to help students I truly feel do not deserve to pass, pass. It is one of the most heartbreaking parts of my job.

A colleague of mine was the first to fall victim. He has been asked to "assist" a general educator in a class where many of the seniors are in danger of failing (a class they need to graduate). While looking at the students' "numbers," my colleague noticed that almost all of these students have a 0-10% classwork grade, a 10-20% classwork grade, and very nonexistant test/quiz grades. Long and short, these students are not failing because they try and come up short; if it were that, they would have at least decent classwork and homework grades. Rather, they are failing because they do not take the class, or school, seriously. How would you feel if you were charged with helping kids who do not help themselves and "finding a way" to turn their E into a D? Probably exactly like my colleague feels.

I have a Study Skills class, where students can work and get help on assignments for other classes. Recently, two students have been placed into that class because they are in danger of failing certain classes they cannot afford to fail. Both were put in my class last week; I have yet to see them. They have been cutting class. Perhaps they do not want help? Perhaps they are not serious enough to think help warranted? Nonsense, says my supervisors! Find a way!

In all honesty, this is a main reason I suspect that many teachers quit. Those who were once optimists have their hopes dashed on a daily basis, and those who were pessimists become hardened pessimists. I am well aware of the saying, uttered by plenty of busy body mentors, that we need to "focus on the good ones," and "do only what we can." We "plant seeds," rather than grow trees. I cannot accept that. Does that mean I don't care enough or that I care too much?

At some point, we as a society have to accept the fact that others cannot be held responsible for one's own succses or failure. Yes, teachers CAN inspire unmotivated students to learn, but to make such "cans" a job requirement (we MUST inspire even the most uninspired) gets us away from teaching and makes us cheerleading babysitters who occasionally instruct. At some point, we need to accept the fact that those who do not do enough to pass will fail, and that the worst thing we can do for those students is to send the message that we will catch them when they fall. Sometimes, falling is the only way to let you know how important it is to walk.

Teaching Them to Be Students

Music teachers are not often philosophers. Yet, at a staff meeting yesterday, where the faculty talked about a new curriculum for "freshman seminar," a high school course required of freshman to teach them basic academic skills, a music teacher responded to a question posed to us: What do you think all freshman should be taught?" Her reply got to the core of what was on many of our minds: "we need to teach them how to be students before we can TEACH them anything." She commented that before she can teach a student how to play the oboe, they must be taught how to learn, take and use guidance, attempt success, and not give up if they stumble. These are things that, sadly, many students do not come to high school knowing.

This is an often neglected and integral piece of the educative process: in order that students can learn, they must learn to be students first. In an age where we tell students many grand stories extolling the virtues of challenging authority - from the American founders to Galileo - we neglect to teach them the value of authority and the wisdom to know how and when to accept it.

We live, quite justly, in a classless system, where anyone from anywhere has the civic freedom to move up or down in the world based on their own efforts and a pinch of luck. Because of this, I think, we are inherently distrustful of words like 'authority,' 'wisdom,' and to the ideas that come with them. To accept instruction from those who know better than we hints at the idea that some are "better" than others and that the learner must bow to the teacher.

But just like skepticism in matters of science, while sometimes good, can be taken to the extreme, so can the idea that authority should be rebelled against. In order to learn, students must at some point accept the fact that they do not know all they need to know and must become willing (even grudgingly) to receive information from those in a position of authority.

This is what I think the music teacher means by saying that students must learn to be students before they learn anything. We must teach them the wisdom to know when to challenge authority and when to accept that authority may have something to teach them. They must learn when to have an ego and when to pack it away for the sake of their betterment. They must learn that while "doing their own thing" can be good, they must also do things that are not of their own design or choosing, but are things that BOTH things can benefit them. (One without the other becomes detrimental to well-being.)

These are some of the things students are not coming to us with. Sometimes, it is as if they come to us convinced that they inhabit a universe of one. We, as teachers, must take as our first mission to widen their universe.

Liking Children versus Liking to Teach Children

There is a big difference between liking to teach children and liking children. Many, I think, get into teaching because they posess a like for children rather than a like for teaching children.

I started thinking about this when reflecting on what it is I dislike so much about teaching where I do. After all, I really do like to teach children. I got into teaching as a profession after taking a long-term substitute job at a high school where I worked in the 'resource room,' (where kids go when they need extra assistance with work, or accomodations for their disability). I vividly recall "connecting" with several students - particularly one I suspect was an undiagnosed autistic girl. I spent many hours teaching her physics, and got quite a few compliments on being able to get through to her when most teachers couldn't. I knew then that I wanted to try special education.

So, that I like teaching children is not in dispute. But I have been coming to the realization that, as much as it hurts me to admit it, I don't have the innate love for kids that many teachers do. If my job involved no possibility of teaching, for example, I would find being around kids for 6.5 hours per day too daunting to bear. It is not the kids that get me through, but the teaching of them.

And what makes matters difficult is that, where I teach, teaching is very frustrating and comprises only a small percentage of what "teachers" do. Teachers first have to motivate, then control behavior, and then, get a little teaching done. Kids actively resist us at every turn and are quite fond of defying our attempts to instil things into their brains.

This is why I think teaching where I do is so hard for me, and perhaps, not (as) hard for many others. Many of the teachers really love the kids, and don't mind as much that the kids aren't learning nearly what they should, just as long as they get to interact with them. But for me, who likes teaching kids more than being with kids, it is a source of endless frustration and dejection that the "teaching kids" part is such a small role, while the "handling kids" part takes most of the time.

If you haven't been able to tell by now by my blog entries, I am not a coddler. I do not feel bad when I don't appease kids. I don't have much trouble with trading pain for gain. I suspect, though, that a lot of teachers who like kids more than teaching kids are the opposite: their desire is to encourage over instruct, and enable rather than equip. This has been my particular experience with those who go into elementary education; they are teachers more because they like kids than any drive to teach. Students become "little guys," which is a sign, to me, of an overly motherly approach that sacrifices rigor and high-expectations for happiness and high self-esteem.

I cannot be that way. Alas, I am going on to study for my PhD, where I might teach college students - where classroom management is not the ultimate concern, and where teachers are not expected to baby, but to teach, and students are expected to exercise some independence.

I think I am making the right choice.