Vaccinated and It Feels SO Good!

Want schools open? Vaccinate all teachers now! 

It's official! I got my first dose of the COVID vaccine! 

It is unreasonable to expect unvaccinated teachers to teach in person with students.  The risk is too high, especially for us mature teachers or those of us with family members who have compromising health conditions.  

Transmission rates among kids is low - but they're not in classrooms by themselves, are they? And they are riding the bus, going through the lunch line, working with paraprofessionals - they are close to adults who may be vulnerable to infection.

And even with masks and social distancing rules, it is impossible to keep kids 6 feet apart all day...and just try and help a student without getting close to them.  A good teacher simply cannot stand 6 feet from a student and shout instructions.  I sure can't do it.

I've been back in the classroom with students in a hybrid model this year.  We started in September, but closed buildings and went to distance learning when the infection rates got high before Thanksgiving. In February we returned again to hybrid and we'll be face-to-face four days a week starting later in March.  

We start with all the kids before I get my second dose, and that has me worried. Many of us will be teaching before the vaccine - if we we were lucky enough to get it - is fully effective.

I'm grateful that our district partnered with the county to get staff vaccinated, and is still doing so.  I'm also grateful they ensured we could go and get the shots when they were available, no matter the time of day. 

Safety of staff and students has to be the top priority in order for schools to reopen and remain open.  Vaccinating every adult that works with kids in the school system will help make this a reality.

Check out my story here: Education Gets a Shot in the Arm

Let's Hear It for Role Models!

Congratulations !

President-elect Joe Biden and Vice-president-elect Kamala Harris! 

My daughters, granddaughters and I watched Joe Biden and Kamala Harris accept the election results on Saturday evening November 7, 2020. We shared their joy and I was SO glad when it dawned on me that I could point to both Biden and Harris as role models for my granddaughters.

I haven't written about the Trump Presidency on this blog.  I just couldn't.  It is difficult to understand how such an unqualified and quite vulgar human being ascended to the highest office in our land. It is painful to comprehend the damage he has done to this country, how much division he is responsible for, and how many people have been hurt by his rhetoric and his policies.  

At the time of this writing, over 240,000 people have died of COVID. That's 240,000 empty chairs around the table and 240,000 holes in their loved ones' hearts.

Trump was not my president, and it says a lot that he never even tried to be. He never reached out to voters who cast their ballots for Hillary Clinton in 2016.  I could not wish him to succeed because his success meant that my daughter could lose her health insurance, my cousin's marriage could be invalidated, and families of immigrant children I teach could be torn apart.

So much has been written to disparage Hillary Clinton's 2016 candidacy - but frankly - I admired her and was proud to vote for her. 

But the bottom line for me has always been this:  

When faced with those two choices in back in 2016, enough people in swing states to make it possible for Trump to win the Electoral Collage (though not the popular vote - nearly 3 million more Americans voted for Clinton). They voted for the man who spent years promulgating the lie that President Obama was not born in this country, mocked a disabled person for sport, bragged about using his celebrity status to sexually assault women, spoke in truly gross terms about his own daughters, defrauded well-meaning people out of their savings with a fake university, used crass nicknames like a child when referring to his political opponents and still impulsively tweets in the middle of the night like a marshmallow-eater.  And this list is not exhaustive by any means.

I've felt so demoralized and disheartened by the Trump presidency for the past four years.  As a woman I was outraged.  As a mother of daughters I was outraged.  As the daughter of an immigrant I was outraged.  As someone who loves nature I was outraged.  But as an educator, as a teacher of children, I was just sick.  Heartsick. I could not point to the president of the United States as a role model for the children in my classroom.  I could not say, "Be like him", because I didn't want them to be like him.  He embodied everything we teach our children NOT to be.

President Obama was a model of integrity and leadership.  He was a role model of a loving and faithful husband and father, obviously delighting in time spent with Michelle and their daughters.  Their joy in each other was palpable. He always took the high ground in the face of unprecedented and overt racism and hatred by some Americans, blatant disrespect for the office he was elected to and total obstruction by the Republican leadership from the moment he was elected.  President Obama was a leader to be proud of who gave hope to young people, especially young people of color.  And he was so cool, and so full of grace.

I am sure that some people I know who voted for Trump may be racist, bigoted and homophobic.  Even if others who voted for him are not, their vote for him signified that they were okay with putting a man in office who is all that and more... misogynistic, xenophobic and a narcissistic bully.  

As a woman and a mother, and the daughter of an immigrant, I do not understand how any woman or mother or any immigrant, or anyone, frankly, voted for him.

But to my mind, the very worst thing is that some people who identify as Christian voted for him.  They somehow looked past all the truly vile and gross stuff, the public affairs, the three marriages, the porn stars, the use of crass language in public, the mocking of a disabled man, the vulgar talk about women, the anti-immigration policies that are a clear example of what Jesus would not do, and yet they chose this man as their leader.

I hope that we can put these four years past us now.  

Joe Biden has said on multiple occasions that he wants to be president for ALL Americans, not just the ones who voted for him. He has known great tragedy and great love in his life.  He shows joy in his family and his work.  He is compassionate, humble and is indeed a role model.

Kamala Harris is the first woman elected to be vice-president. She's broken that glass ceiling! As a woman of color and a career woman she is a role model for America's young women.

I am looking forward to day to day normalcy.  

I'm weary of the daily outrage and the use of the term "unprecedented" that typically described the latest outrage that would have marked the end of a career in normal times.

I have hope that the new president and president-elect will lead our country with dignity and humility. I'm looking forward to noon on January 20, 2021!

The Struggle is the Point

While my kids were growing up our family had a boat. Nothing fancy, a decent Lund with an outboard motor.  The girls enjoyed fishing with their dad and we all enjoyed tubing.

When I was growing up my family did not have a boat.  We were not into water sports of any kind except for occasional summer trips to a beach on the lake my mom grew up on - not a water sport kind of lake though, a smaller lake more for fishing and duck hunting in most places.

But when we had a boat I REALLY wanted to learn how to water ski. And I tried.  Year after year.  I could not get my butt out of the water.  I face planted and skis flew in all directions.  Dad could water ski (and drop one to slalom), and at least one of my young daughters could too.  But despite trying, not me.

I refused to give up.  I persisted.  I'm not sure who to give the credit to, but I'm pretty sure someone who'd seen me struggling told me to try getting going first and then stand up.  I'd been trying to stand up as soon as the boat pulled away, and when I did, I face-planted into the water.

But one day I was ready.  I crouched and squatted while the boat accelerated.  I felt the skis moving over the water and I was moving with them.  I slowly straightened my legs and came to a loose-kneed stand.  The boat sped forward, and I sped forward too, still standing!  I did it! I was water skiing!

OK, so that picture is not me.  But In my mind, that's what I felt like the day I got up on water skis!  I felt triumphant.  I felt like I could do anything!  Now, that might be an exaggeration, but I'd conquered this thing I'd been struggling to do - I stood up - I water skied!

Most of the time, struggling is not fun.  But as educators we know that struggling is an essential part of the learning process.  How can we help our learners to embrace the struggle and understand how important it is?

When I was in school, many things were easy for me.  I loved to read and reading and writing came easy to me.  Math did not.  One high school teacher (may she rest in peace...?) gave me a D in Algebra and told me, "Honey, some girls just can't do math."    I thought, "Well, that explains it!"  But it didn't feel good to hear.  And it was not only demoralizing, it was a lie.  What I needed was someone to help me believe in myself and then provide the kind of instruction that would help me build my math skills and learn how to learn in the process.  Someone who would help me understand the concept of...

Growth Mindset?  You bet!  I didn't have one and I sorely needed one. I was defeated by the struggle. I didn't understand that the struggle was the point, and in struggling (with appropriate scaffolding), I could learn and thrive.

Dawn Castagno-Dysart and Bryan Matera, authors of the the article "Learner persistence - the productive struggle", assert that teachers can help students understand that struggling is a natural and expected component of the learning process. It is through struggle that learning happens and growth occurs.

When they go through a struggle and come out the other side of it with new or deeper understanding, or with the ability to do something they hadn't been able to do before, learners experience a sense of accomplishment that validates the struggle itself.

The authors suggest that teachers can use the following strategies to encourage productive struggle (read details in the article):

• Questioning - ask the right questions at the right time
• Encouraging - get learners to embrace the process
• Allowing Time - allow learners time to do the intellectual heavy lifting
• Acknowledging - frame struggle as necessary and productive.

An additional strategy that I found helpful and used with students was to tell them that a task or skill was going to be hard.  That way if they got it right away they could feel good about getting it quickly.  If they didn't get it right away, that's OK because I'd told them it was going to be hard.

I wish teachers had said that to me.  I'd love to go back and ensure that every child I taught understood the concept of growth mindset and knew that struggling is part of learning.  

As teachers we have opportunities every single day to help our learners frame their struggles as opportunities for learning.  We can use strategies that get them to persist and increase their stamina for the struggle, and we can help them believe in themselves.  

The struggle is the point.

Give Me Something To Do

When learners are engaged - when they are doing something with their hands that engages their brains at the same time, they learn and learn deeply.

Check out this article "How Do We Get Middle School Students Excited About Science? Make it Hands On" by Katrina Schwartz.  In is she describes how experiential learning leads to deep conceptual understanding.

This is not new.  Kids love to touch stuff and work with actual things in their hands.  When I first began teaching middle school science nearly two decades ago, we used the FOSS kits.  FOSS stands for "Full Option Science Systems". The kits and lesson guidelines fostered collaborative group work and learning activities based on building conceptual knowledge as well as an understanding of experimental design.  While they were not as inquiry-based as I would have liked, they engaged students and got them DOING science.

Schwartz profiles the Alternative School for Math and Science in Corning, New York.  The school was started when data showed that only half of the area's eighth grade students were meeting standards in math and English.  The school partners with Corning which provides free facility space and funding for financial aid.

Not every school can partner with a big name private sector business.  But every student can benefit from the kind of hands-on, authentic learning experiences, the kind that has brought success for students at ASMS.  

Turning traditional learning on its head, providing experiences that don't lead to a single answer, understanding failure as an expected (and necessary) component of learning and purposefully teaching 21st century skills like collaboration, creativity, communication and critical thinking all blend into an educational experience that sets kids up for success in the real world as well as in school.

Our Wired Children

In the post "Forget Screen Time - Lean In To Parenting Your Wired Child" Jordan Shapiro "came to realize that part of his job as a parent was to help his children make sense of their online experiences and teach them how to uphold enduring values in the new world they are living in."

Teachers are doing this every day.  Rather than fight the losing battle of "no cell phones" in class, many teachers I work with use instructional strategies that encourage students to access Google, YouTube, online texts, or interactive lessons and quiz sites through their phones.  They encourage learners to use the device glued to the end of their arms as a tool for learning as well as for entertainment and social interaction.

Now, do all students have access to smartphones that allow them to use these tools?  How can we educators ensure equitable access?  That's another topic for another day!

Back in the day, we used to pass notes in class hand to hand.  Now students text each other, faces focused on the screen.  Back in the day we stood around in groups and chat, now they follow each other on Instagram and Twitter.  Facebook?  More for the older generation, like me at this point!

A while back (three years ago!) I wrote a post about teaching active learners, those digital natives who were entering our classrooms at a rapid rate.   I wondered what a future world - a world without face-to-face, interpersonal communication would be like.  If you've never watched Wall-E, check it out for it's spot-on social commentary.  

I think a main call to action from Shapiro's post is to encourage adults to model effective communication whether it is face-to-face or through a device, and to teach young people how to learn and interact in an online world with a sense of their own personal integrity.  How are we helping them apply the morals and values we are trying to instill in them to what they see, hear and read online?

We have a responsibility to help our kids become critical users and producers of online content.

  

If our own kids and our own students are able to view a YouTube video or Instragram post through the lens of "who paid for it, and what are they trying to sell me?", then we are well on our way to helping them develop those critical thinking skills we keep saying they need. When they are the ones posting original content, is it representative of their learning or their values?  I love to think that it is!

Say My Name

It seems so simple.  Get to know your students and pronounce their names correctly.  

As a child, I had an unusual last name: Montenegro.  Maybe not so unusual anymore since it is a country and once in a while I hear its name mentioned on the news.  My youngest daughter even traveled to Montenegro while in Croatia, just to be able to say she'd been there, and found herself delighted by the countryside.  But for me, as a child, no one else had such a weird name in the affluent, mostly white suburb where my family lived, and many teachers could not pronounce it correctly.  Expect my Spanish teacher, but that figured.

As a teacher I made it a point to learn how to pronounce my students' names correctly, and to ask them what they preferred to be called by me in class.  

It's just respectful, right?

But there are too many stories of children whose beautiful names, lovingly chosen for them by their parents, often imbued with meaning or heritage, are shortened into pronounceable nicknames by teachers whose hearts may be in the right place, but who are actually doing damage.

When I worked at a middle school we had an attendance secretary who was the face of the school for families.  She often had to page students between classes, and she never mispronounced a name twice.  She kept a small spiral notebook at her desk where she wrote out challenging names phonetically: Siobhann = "Shih-vonn", or Mahmoud = "Mach-mood".  What a difference she made to those kids!

By pronouncing their names correctly she showed them respect and honored them.

Cultural competence or culturally and linguistically relevant educational experiences are at the forefront of current educational best practices.  I hope it's not just current, because it should be the standard if we ever hope to achieve equity.  To my mind, one easy way to set the stage for a positive educational experience for students is to learn how to pronounce their names correctly.

Here are a few links to articles on this subject that I've found compelling:

What's in a Name? Minnesota schools strive to say students' names correctly. Minneapolis Star Tribune
Name That Baby! mothering.com
Making name pronunciation a propriety in K12 education. Trumbull, CT
Names Do Matter from Teaching Tolerance

Reading is Good for us!

Of course it is!  

We've known that all along.  Below is a link to  an article I came across that offers even more reasons to read and promote a lifelong love of reading.  I appreciate that they are science-backed!

The 7 Interesting Ways that Reading Makes You Healthier

It pains me to see that the United States ranks 23rd of 30 on the chart of hours spent reading per person per week. We need to change that.

I love to read and although I have an electronic reader (great when traveling), I really enjoy the feel of a book in my hands  I'm more of a savor-er when it comes to reading.  While I can read quickly when I have to, when I'm reading for pleasure I don't read particularly fast.  I pause and imagine, reflect and predict, often getting lost in the descriptions of places and people.

When my daughters were young our house was FULL of books.  Our favorite field trips were to the local library where Miss Chris would lead story time with books, songs, and puppets. Afterward we would pick out books, often audiobooks (cassette tapes!), picture books and eventually beginning readers.  We read together every night for years. I love to remember the sound of their young voices reading.

Before they could read on their own I would tell my girls that being able to read was WONDERFUL.  That when you were able to read you could get lost on your own in a whole new world.  Once when my youngest was about eight or nine years old she was laying on her bed reading quietly.  I came in and sat down and started to talk to her.  

She asked me, "Mom, do you remember when you used to tell us that when we learned to read we could get lost in our own world?  Well, I'm there right now and you're interrupting me!"
Now I have the pleasure of reading to my granddaughters and watching their love of books grow.  I look forward to the time when they can read to me too.