Author Archives: Mark Gardner

TPEP: New Student Growth Rubrics

Posted by on
Uncategorized | , , , ,

We’re almost a decade into the “new” teacher evaluation program (TPEP), and this year OSPI has introduced a change that I think has the potential to shift the model closer to its intention: promoting improvement of teacher growth and practice.

Of course, the middle of a pandemic is a rough time to add yet a potentially non-essential change to systems and policies…or it is precisely the perfect time. That’s not what I’m interested in debating.

For background: State law requires that “student growth” be considered in a teacher’s evaluation. To assess a teacher’s impact on student growth, one or more of five universal rubrics are used to evaluate their impact on student growth (it is “one or more,” because it depends on where the teacher is in their evaluation cycle… it is less complicated than I’m making it sound).

To really simplify it: Teachers are assessed on the growth goals they set for subgroups of students or for whole rosters of students. We often refer to this as the “inputs,” or the elements we as professionals have control over (writing goals, choosing assessments, etc.). To be proficient for “whole roster” goals, our work must match this description:

Continue reading →

Teaching is Political

Posted by on
Current Affairs, Education, Education Policy, Social Issues | , ,

Recently, as a response to widespread use of The 1619 Project, a New York Times Magazine feature exploring the often untold realities of America’s long history of policies and practices endorsing and even promoting enslaving fellow humans, President Trump announced the establishment of the 1776 Commission, a federal focus on “patriotic education” which, it seems, will not address the negative or troubling realities of our country’s past.

Image Source: AP via PBS NewsHour

I am not afraid to show my bias against this commission. I’ve read some of the criticism of The 1619 Project. Some is valid, some is overwrought. None is sufficient to warrant our country’s ignoring of the fact of enslavement and the observable, measurable, identifiable historical ripple effect it had right up to this very second.

A good history (or literature) teacher will encourage students to interrogate what isn’t being said, whose side isn’t being shared, whose voice isn’t being elevated. What is absent is telling, always. What we choose not to teach is as political a choice as what we choose to teach. And to take it further, the deliberate omission of the truth is a much a lie as is the truth’s deliberate revision.

Continue reading →

Virtual Teaching… from where?

Posted by on
Current Affairs, Education Policy, Life in the Classroom | , ,

As we ready ourselves to start a new school year unlike any other in our history, many districts in our state are once again embroiled in debates about teachers-as-workers and the rights and protections we deserve.

A sticking point in many places strikes me as fundamentally confusing: Whether instructional staff should conduct distance learning or virtual teaching from their physical classrooms or whether they should be permitted the flexibility to do so from off site.

I gotta be honest: This feels like a no-brainer. If students are learning remotely, why should teachers not have the flexibility to do their work from the environment they feel is best for their and their family’s health and safety? Personally, I have decided that I will probably be heading into my classroom unless I’m told I cannot. My preference, though, isn’t shared by others. And those others have valid reasons for not wanting to leave the relative safety of their homes…and even if we as a society seem to have forgotten that we are in the midst of a global pandemic, my colleagues’ valid concerns are literally matters of life-or-death.

My biggest problems with the debate have to do with the reasons being given as to why teachers should report to their classrooms for virtual teaching. None of these reasons, to me, outweigh the personal health and safety of a teacher or a teacher’s family: If our work can be done effectively from a safe environment, why not? (Sadly, local news sources like to stir the pot on this issue, with at least three local outlets in the Portland/Vancouver area doing the old “hey viewer, what do YOU think?” about where and how I and my colleagues ought to do our jobs.) From district leaders, policymakers, parents and the public, I’ve noticed four common arguments for requiring teachers to teach virtually from an empty classroom:

Common Reason #1 for Requiring Teachers to Report to School for Virtual Teaching: The employer has the right to verify that the work they are paying teachers to do is actually getting done. Okay, on the surface, I don’t disagree. How did this happen in face-to-face learning? Admin drop-ins and observations? Stacks of student work or student art on the walls? Student and parent feedback? These, or something analogous, can and will happen in a virtual setting. In fact, a virtual setting inherently creates mountains more potential artifacts that a teacher is “putting in the work.” From last spring, I have hours and hours of videos, mountains of virtual folders of work still in my Google Drive, and electronic data trails far more enduring than much of what was produced by my face-to-face teaching (where there would be whole class periods that might go by filled with interactions, discussions, probing questions, and coaching conversations: none of which necessarily produce any immediately tangible evidence that these ever even happened).

Common Reason #2 is closely related: Last spring there were many teachers working triple duty to do their job well, while others for whatever reason (lack of skill or lack of will) skated by doing much less. In theory, getting every teacher in the building will help with that, since supposedly the administration will have nothing else to do but diligently oversee everyone’s work (sarcasm). This is a classic case of creating policy for all in order to attempt to force the fringes toward different behavior. This is also, however, exceptionally poor leadership. Are there teachers not doing as much as they should? Such a population exists in every profession and also existed in teaching before the world flipped upside down. Rather than create policy that constricts the many, it makes more sense to exert instructional and managerial leadership to remediate the few. Just as it is a disservice to my ready learners for me to engage in sweeping classroom micromanagement to forcibly compel compliance from reluctant learners, it makes no sense to adopt blanket personnel policy for all when what really needs to happen are tough, uncomfortable supervisory conversations with the few who may be shirking their responsibilities.

Common Reason #3: It will make the transition to eventual hybrid or face to face learning easier. Okay: How? I’ve yet to hear a convincing follow-up answer to this. I am concerned about how I can facilitate my students’ eventual transition, but I can handle relocating my own work if needed. The small number of teachers who can’t handle that? Again, like above, that’s a small group and is a management/supervisory issue.

Common Reason #4, the least persuasive: It is bad optics to have teachers working from home. I get that we are public schools. I also understand that the public will have strong opinions about anything and everything teachers do. But again: How many people are we really talking about? No matter what teachers do, ever, there will always be a faction of the public outraged and ready to take it to the supe’s office. Now would be a great time for our leaders to smile and nod at those complainers, and then consider policy that serves the physical and mental health of the employees…those same employees being charged with scaffolding up the physical and mental health of our students. (It is perpetually disheartening to see, nationwide, school systems that refuse to treat employees with the same essential care and humanity they expect those employees to provide for students.)

As the s-word starts to bubble up for various reasons in school districts across the nation, when it comes to where we teach virtually from it feels like we (labor) are fighting a fight we should not have to. Has anyone out there heard valid, compelling reasons why teachers should not have the flexibility to teach from wherever they feel safest during distance learning? Despite what it might seem from this screed, I’m open to having my mind changed.

August: Four Things I Need to Remember

Posted by on
Current Affairs, Education, Life in the Classroom, Social Issues | , ,

Normally, I could move through August a little bit on auto-pilot: get the room set up, check the rosters, re-tool and update the curriculum, plan to fold in the lessons learned from the previous year, maybe build a new unit or two based on my most recent reading or learning.

Like many schools in Washington, my district is starting up in September fully virtual/distance learning, a difficult decision and one I personally support both as an educator and as a parent. For that reason, auto-pilot is a no-go. This is hands-on navigation through a hurricane. In a mountain range. At night. With no GPS and glitchy radar. And there are murder hornets in the cockpit.

I cannot plan in a vacuum: the pandemic, the protests, the politics, these are all realities that I understand will impact what I do as the outside world pushes into my classroom unlike ever before. This August, I’m focusing on a few things I need to remember as I welcome students, virtually, into our learning environment:

Pages: 1 2

“Political Speech”

Posted by on
Uncategorized

It is abhorrent that openly stating “Black Lives Matter” in your classroom or with your students could get you disciplined or your license revoked.

Teachers and the education system are part of the problem that perpetuates not only systemic racism in public institutions but also the individual racism of American citizens. One of the hopes I have about the current outrage over the murder of George Floyd is that our school systems will start to see that saying “Black Lives Matter” is not a political statement. It is the philosophy every school and educator should adopt and promote.

However, some educators do fear being “too political.” That fear, to this point, has been justified as there are examples where teachers have not been supported when deviating from approved curriculum to address supposedly “political” issues. The Washington ACLU has this site I’ve referred to often both for my own self-check and to support fellow teachers. From the link:

School districts have the authority to control course content and teaching methods. You are generally considered to speak for the school district when you are in your classroom. Therefore, your speech in the classroom does not have much First Amendment protection.  This can be a murky area, however. Some courts have ruled that schools cannot discipline teachers for sharing words or concepts that are controversial as long as the school has no legitimate interest in restricting that speech and the speech is related to the curriculum. In general, you should exercise caution so as not to give the appearance that you are advocating a particular religious or political view in the classroom.

Washington ACLU

A review of teacher free-speech cases in the Phi Delta Kappan included that the US Supreme Court in 2006 “held that when public employees make statements pursuant to their official duties, the employees are not speaking as citizens for First Amendment purposes; as such, the Constitution does not protect them from employer discipline. For example, when talking to students during classroom instruction, teachers cannot assume their speech is protected. ” Further, the article noted that “the First Amendment does not entitle public school teachers to cover topics or advocate viewpoints that depart from the curriculum adopted by the school board.”

This is why I asked my district leadership to develop a public statement that explicitly supports and defends teachers’ use of proactive antiracism in curriculum implementation and pedagogical choices.

I do not pretend to be an expert on antiracism. The kinds of things I’m thinking about, though, include teacher moves like these below. This is a woefully incomplete and potentially misguided list, of course, but I’m brainstorming…these are also admittedly “secondary” as that is my limited experience. Teachers of other levels or content areas, please share ideas in the comments.

  • In an English or Social Studies class, explicitly instruct about out how white privilege impacts the context in which a text was created, particularly if the author is white.
  • In English or Social Studies, explicitly teach about systemic injustice and racism to help establish context for text; assign work to students that requires them to confront present day evidence of systemic racism.
  • In math or statistics: Use the concept of composition index or disparate impact to teach about percentages as a segment in a data literacy unit.
  • In health or PE, teach how stereotypes about black athletes or that “white men can’t jump” is rooted in both systemic disparities in access to education as well as historic white fragility and fear of any challenge to white social dominance.
  • In art, deliberately explore how visual/performing arts have been used throughout history to express calls for justice, and how the censorship or control of arts (including deliberate propaganda) have been used to reinforce a racial hierarchy.

Teachers have a lot of work to do on ourselves, of course. White teachers in particular need to come to terms with our own privilege and how it manifests in what and how we teach. If our systems are working, every teacher would be able to explain the nuance between “Black Lives Matter” and “All Lives Matter” and how the latter deflects from urgent issues and instead perpetuates injustice. Every teacher would be able describe ways their own race, gender, or socioeconomic privilege manifests (which means deeply understanding that privilege is an observable, documentable, study-able reality, not a political construct). These stances, whether deliberately woven into curriculum or addressed in-the-moment as situations arise, should not be considered political speech, and should receive the explicit support of our employers.

There are individual classrooms where all of this is already happening, of course. Many teachers are doing the good work of antiracism and have been for a long time thanks to the implicit support of their departments, schools, or districts…or their sheer strength of will and character. I’ve spent the last few years striving to shape my classroom practice and content toward overt antiracism. I have a long way to go still, and I make plenty of mistakes.

Now, though, is the perfect moment for districts to make perfectly and unequivocally clear that they will back their antiracist teachers.

Distance Success

Posted by on
Current Affairs, Education, Life in the Classroom | ,

For the vast majority of my students, distance learning has not been working.

Not just my classes, but the concept in general. Many report that their lives outside of school are often unstructured, unfettered, tumultuous, so the routine and predictability (and accountability) of school was what kept their footing. They miss being greeted by the principal and our awesome secretaries every single morning. They miss our one-hallway community where literally everyone knows your name. They even miss my bad dad-jokes. (I added that last one, because I’m just assuming…)

They share with me that it isn’t the content, or the tasks, or the obscure grading expectations, or the fact that they might spend hours staring at a chromebook. It is the loss of the structure of school, both literal and figurative.

While some are adrift, a handful are experiencing an academic transformation. The numbers are small, but there is something about this distance learning thing that is working for them. Let’s take one student, who I’ll call B*. Prior to March 13th, attendance was spotty. When present, B was physically present only. Despite constant attempts to connect, few of us on staff were able to claim we actually had a sustained conversation with them. In the weeks prior to the shutdown, I received two assignments from B. They weren’t defiant, and to be honest their skills (in my classes, at least) did not appear to be deficient in any significant way. B was, and is, an enigma we are continuing to work to unravel.

Transition to distance learning and this same student had nearly the highest rate of engagement of all my students. This is a student listed as homeless, with a history of bouncing from school to school, and with a outside-of-school life that instantly led to worry every time they missed school. When I asked B why distance learning seemed to work, I parsed out three trends in their (short) reply:

Continue reading →

My Hopes for a “New Normal”

Posted by on
Assessment, Current Affairs, Education Policy | , ,

One silver lining: Sometimes it takes the unimaginable to jar loose our imaginations.

When we finally get back to face-to-face education with kids, I have a few changes I hope I’ll see. Some of these are based on my own personal experiences with distance learning, some are broader. I hope to see…

  • Continued curricular flexibility and resources to individualize for kids based on their needs, interests, and situations.
  • The devaluing [elimination…?] of grades and task completion as a means of measurement in favor of teaching and learning rooted in skills and standards.
  • The dismissal of “the way we’ve always done it” as a argument with any merit whatsoever.
  • The recognition that different environments (in-person, virtual, etc.) have strengths and limitations, that these vary from student to student, and that each student can have access to their own “just right” mix.
  • Realization, without question, that quality teaching demands quality preparation, which demands time… and that we revise the teacher work-day to include actual, meaningful, and significant time for preparation, collaboration, and design.

How about you? In what ways do you hope school looks different upon our eventual return?

A Day in the Life of Distance Teaching

Posted by on
Current Affairs, Life in the Classroom

Disclaimer: What follows is not a complaint. It is documentation. I know many have it worse: I recognize that I am beyond lucky to still be employed and receiving a paycheck. But this site is about “where practice meets policy.” What follows is where my practice is given current policy.

At 6:00am, my phone buzzes that the scheduled post on my first-period Google Classroom has gone live. When I check, I also see a few emails from students, time-stamped at 2, 3, or 4am. If it’s a good day, I’ve been up since 5:30, maybe had a cup of coffee, and I’m heading out the door for a run or into the garage for a workout when that notification comes in. The “good” days have not been particularly frequent.

Until March of this year, I never allowed work email notifications on my phone. I had to have a line drawn somewhere, and I have spent the last six years of my career building boundaries brick by brick: work and life needed separation. Those boundaries dissolved when I realized that I needed to be “on” and accessible to my students and my colleagues in some way similar to how we could step across the hall for a quick question or walk to the back of the room for a check-in. I turned on email notifications on my phone after logging in one mid-day and seeing a string of messages from students who had questions that had hung in the ether unanswered.

In my mind, I sensed momentum lost and opportunity missed.

Continue reading →

No Right Answer

Posted by on
Assessment, Current Affairs, Education, Education Policy, Life in the Classroom

It is a classic “damned if you do, damned if you don’t.”

My own three children are in three different buildings in the same school district (one elementary school, one middle school, one high school; all in a different district from where I work). Technically, their teachers have been directed by district admin not to send homework yet.

My elementary schooler’s teacher has done so anyway, with the clear communication that it is optional. She has sent suggested math pages from the workbook, along with video guides. She has also video recorded herself reading aloud to kids. My son is in a Spanish-immersion program, so he is also charged with continuing his online practice program. I’m okay with all of this.

My middle school son was asked by his science teacher to finish up a project about natural disasters that they started before the shutdown. His math teacher has sent e-packets of worksheets. There hasn’t been a clear statement of “optionality” for these. We haven’t heard from his other teachers. I’m okay with all of this.

My high schooler? Radio silence from teachers. I’m okay this, too.

Seattle Public Schools Superintendent Denise Juneau has stated that the largest school district in Washington will not transition to online learning in the immediate future. Meanwhile, the Los Angeles (LAUSD) school system is investing $100 million in making sure kids without online access are provided tech and internet during the shutdown. From one side, Superintendent Juneau is being praised for her pragmatic view of the access divide among Seattle students. The other side is quick to drag her publicly. (I’m not hiding my bias well, am I?)

Continue reading →

Connections, not Lessons

Posted by on
Uncategorized

Take a look at these two data sets. The yellow line represents confirmed cases of COVID-19 outside of Mainland China. What do you notice?

Screen grab from my phone at 5:35pm on Friday, March 20th, from the Johns Hopkins University website.

Astute readers of graphs will notice that both of these graphs represent the exact same data. The top graph uses a linear, uniform scale on the Y (vertical) axis. The bottom one uses a logarithmic scale. Notice the Y axis labels. In the top graph, the yellow line shows a steep and troubling upward trend, accelerating toward the top of the scale. The bottom graph? A casual climb.

Continue reading →