Category Archives: Current Affairs

Hello/Good-by

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Current Affairs, Distance Learning, Elementary, Life in the Classroom, Online Teaching, Parent Involvment

This week we celebrated fifth grade graduation. We had a drive-through event at the office building for our 100% on-line school. At the top of the driveway families turned in laptops and all the curriculum materials.

Then, with music playing and the bubble machine blowing, cars drove down the hill to the cheering teachers. We passed out balloons filled with confetti, bags of treats, and wristbands that read “I 100% survived 100% online school!”

For each student we also handed out a graduation certificate. One line read, “You have successfully completed fifth grade.” I read that with each student and told them, “You are officially done with school. You don’t need to log into the system anymore.” That announcement led to a happy dance every time, the child in the car, me outside. “Freedom!” “Escape!” (in Finding Nemo fashion). “Hallelujah!”

Some students had their picture taken at the “Oh, the Places You’ll Go!” photo backdrop. Some said no thanks.

There were lots of smiles and even a few hugs.

I also spoke to every parent. Each time I said, “You did a great job.” The most common, instant reaction was physical. Shoulders fell. Heads dropped. Then the parent would say, “I thought I wasn’t doing well at all.” “I thought I was messing up.” “I thought I was failing.”

“No!” I said. “You were amazing! And you made it through this year. You did an awesome job.”

They straightened up then and starting talking about how hard it was.

“Yes. It was hard for everyone. I can’t imagine how you did it—

  • you, with three other kids at home.”
  • you, with a new baby.”
  • you, with your husband deployed.”

Side note here—I had been telling parents all year what a terrific job they were doing. On that last day of school it was clear that they read my notes as general and applying to  everyone else. Not to them. Individually, they each felt they were not doing well at all. Clearly, even phone calls hadn’t worked. All my encouragement during the year went nowhere. It wasn’t until I saw them face-to-face and spoke to them one-on-one that they actually believed me. Sigh.

Graduation was a thoroughly weird experience for all of us. It was the first time all year we got to see each other outside of Zoom. How strange was it? I didn’t recognize one of the other fifth grade teachers when I saw her in 3-D! She and I had met for PLCs nearly every day all year, but she looked different when she wasn’t flat.

One of the best things I heard that day was from one student’s mom who said it felt like I had reached through the computer and touched them. I told her it was mutual—we made a real connection in spite of the distance learning.

The other best thing was from a student who wrote in a card about how much she learned this year and added, “This year could have been so awful, but you made it close to wonderful!”

You know, I’ll take that. Close to wonderful is about the best I could hope for this year.

My take-away from all of this is that we must keep encouraging each other.

Encourage literally means put courage in.

  • Put courage in students.
  • Put courage in parents.
  • Put courage in each other as teachers and staff.

Courage comes from cour, which means heart.

Discourage literally means to rip the heart out of someone.

Our job is to put heart in. So let me start.

It was a ridiculously hard year. You maybe felt like you were failing. You maybe felt like you couldn’t do it. You maybe felt like you were never going to make it.

But look at you. You are here!

And you learned things. Like how to persevere. Like how to stay engaged with people even when you can’t be with them physically. Like how to use more and more and more technology. (Right???)

And you  made it.

You all did a great job this year.

An Immigrant Story

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Current Affairs, Education, Elementary, Equity, High School, Middle School, Social Issues, Uncategorized | , , , , , , , ,

I moved to the United States in the late 90’s during a wave of Slavic immigration to Washington State. The Soviet Union fell apart and the Eastern European countries under communist control were (and still are) filled with corruption as a result of the socialist dictatorship, offering few opportunities for economic advancement. In Ukraine people today buy test scores and degrees, bribe doctors to receive care despite having nationalized healthcare, and pay off the mafia to operate businesses. Last year my cousin was killed over two dollars. No wonder my parents decided to abandon everything they knew to seek new opportunities in the United States. Like thousands of other Slavs, my family moved to Washington State with nothing to their name.

You’re probably wondering how my personal story relates to school and school policy. For the past few years my district promoted trainings in diversity and equity, challenging staff members to examine their thinking and biases. The trainings coupled with personal experiences and anecdotes from other Slavic teachers and students made me realize that these trainings are often approached from a solely Americanized perspective often not accounting for the immigrant experience.

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Facing 2021

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Current Affairs, Elementary | , ,

I’ve hosted dinner parties in the last couple of weeks with fully vaccinated friends. It’s been delightful to see people again, face to face!

So many of those adults shared stories of how hard this year has been, how much they’ve struggled, how exhausted they are. We’ve talked about the need to rest. To recuperate. To do art and music and get exercise. To stop pushing to get everything done. 

Then I think about the kids returning to—possibly—full time school next year. And two SBA tests. (Lord have mercy! Why couldn’t we just acknowledge that this was a horrifically bad year and drop one test entirely?)

I heard an interview with a psychologist on the news the other day who said we won’t be able to “return to normal.” We will have to transition. It will be a process. It will take time.

Personally, I think we will have to focus on social and emotional learning (SEL) at least as much next fall as we have during remote and hybrid learning. For several reasons, “many students will need increased mental health support as they transition back into a full-time academic environment, and as they struggle to manage grief, anxiety, or other emotional responses to recent events.” We are going to need to monitor students, not just in the first weeks of school, but for months. Our schools will need a response plan in place for the year. We need resources and more resources.

One year I had a student die. I led my students through their grief. We wrote cards to the parents. We attended the memorial service together. We had an assembly. We planted three trees and set a plaque in the garden in memory of their friend.

memorial trees

It was A Big Deal when we changed desks a few weeks later. As everyone cleaned their desks, I cleaned out Kyle’s. When we moved desks, I made sure his was in the mix. No one knew who ended up with his desk.

“Wait, where’s Kyle’s desk?”

“It’s gone,” the kids said.

“Like Kyle’s gone,” someone added.

“Kyle will never be gone,” was the fierce reply.

We read some short stories at the end of the year that elicited yet another highly emotional response and discussion. Kyle had died months earlier.

We are going to have classroom full of students who have lost a family member or a family friend—someone they know. Imagine the compounded grief and the emotional echoes that will reverberate all next year.

I know how long trauma can linger in a classroom. I’ve seen it.

This year I’ve had parents call me, in a twist, worried that their child will be academically behind next year. I’ve said, “No, they won’t. The entire country went through the same pandemic. Everybody’s kids struggled with remote learning and Zoom lessons and connectivity issues. Your child won’t be ‘behind’ because everyone will be set back the same amount.” The parents breathe a sigh of relief.

On the other hand, I’ve had parents tell me that they aren’t pushing their kids to achieve this year. If the kids get their work turned in—eventually—the parents really couldn’t care less about the quality. I tell those parents that I understand. There is a limit to what we (teachers/schools/districts) can expect out of families when everyone is overwhelmed.

I think the very worst thing we could do next fall is walk in the door with the attitude that all our students are months and months behind and we have to get them all caught up in the space of the next nine months. “If we don’t get them caught up next year, we will have failed.” Even worse: “If they don’t get caught up, they will have failed.” “Failure is not an option!” Buckle up, kids, it’s pedal to the metal from the first day of school! 

Adding that level of stress to kids—and their parents—will be a disaster. We don’t need to be in launch mode. We need to be in recovery mode.

Instead of looking at the students who come into my fifth-grade classroom next year as “fifth” graders, I need to look at where they are. I may actually have a class of “fourth” graders, in terms of achievement. I need to start there and work forward at a reasonable pace.

Meanwhile, next year I should do art (therapy), music (therapy), and poetry (therapy). I want kids to journal, sharing their experiences, their stories, and their feelings.

I want them to heal.

According to my husband, who chairs a coworking community group, business people are doing that kind of social-emotional work right now. Adults recognize how important that work is—for adults. Kids are going to need extra SEL support next year too. 

Wednesdays

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Current Affairs, Education, Education Policy, Equity, Life in the Classroom | , , ,

Wednesdays are saving my life right now.

Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays, I deliver in-person instruction for 335 minutes each day (down from 350 minutes per day pre-Covid, mainly because we had to make room for rotating lunch periods, which increased passing time).

During that 335 minutes of face-to-face time, I also work in a varying amount of time to simultaneously zoom with my students who remained fully remote.

During those 335 minutes, I say I “deliver in-person instruction,” but I’m a big believer that the person doing the work is the person doing the learning, which means that I work hard to shift the cognitive load to my students… getting them doing, talking, reading, writing.

To shift that load requires deliberate planning and preparation.

And shifting that load means students produce work which deserves feedback and guidance.

When people criticize teachers’ complaints about our workload, I wonder if the public envisions the old school university prof standing in front of the class lecturing. Let me tell you, lecturing is easy. I’m at the stage of my career where I could lecture your ear off for a ninety minute block no problem, no prep on my part required…just give me a topic and a time limit. Plus, the students are just sitting and “listening” so they aren’t generating work that needs feedback or assessment. Is this what people picture when they imagine the work of a teacher?

Anyone with any knowledge of teaching and learning knows what research confirms: that sort of marathon direct instruction, the endless lecture and notes method, is wildly unsuccessful for the massive majority of learners… especially teenage learners compelled by law to attend as opposed to university students paying top dollar to get their college’s name on a resume.

Good teaching requires preparation, intentional design, and feedback (which is sadly, the easiest to let fall to the wayside when time is tight). When I’m at my best, the ratio is easily 2:1, two minutes of preparation, assessment, and feedback for every one minute of student contact.

Add to the whole mix collaboration with colleagues, communication with families, and email…so many emails…and the finite resource of time quickly is exhausted.

Which is why Wednesdays are saving me right now, and why our current Wednesday routine is one I’m hoping we can continue into our post-COVID transition.

Right now, Wednesdays are full-remote days for our student body. Students are off-campus (except for small group intervention or scheduled appointments with staff), and teachers have created independent learning experiences that students continue to engage with. The pressure here is to ensure that the “homework” we design is effective and advances learning… and considers the varied non-school environments that our students may be learning from.

But Wednesday, sans structured student instruction, enables us to make home contacts, collaborate with peers on instructional design, provide feedback on student work, and build more responsive lessons.

Yes, these are things we’d be doing anyway. But now, there is time to do that work within my work day.

I’m still up at 4 or 5 am to read student work or fine tune the day’s lessons.

I’m still at school most days well after my “work day” is over, and grabbing moments to lesson plan or respond to emails while I cook dinner or help my own offspring with homework.

But Wednesdays are saving me because, for the first time in my career, I at least feel like the system actually considers what my real work is… and is giving me time to do that work at work.

Would I rather my work be doable within my work day, not overflowing into the early mornings and late evenings? Of course.

Wednesdays are a start. We have all this talk about shaking up our system post-COVID. The quality of those moments we spend in front of kids is the direct result of the quality of those moments we spend planning to be in front of kids.

We know our system needs to change, and the systemic and predicable inequities of our students’ experience prove that. System change isn’t just about policies or trainings or different curriculum. How we structure teacher time, in my opinion, is the highest leverage change we can make to our system. Without that change to the fundamental structure of our schools, all the other efforts will be for naught.

Anti-intellectualism in American Schools

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Current Affairs, Education, Equity

How many of you watched The Queen’s Gambit? Lots of hands up? Good.

I had a visceral response to two scenes. In the first, highly-ranked American players from around the country played chess in a high school gym. There are a few people scattered in the stands, some dozing. No reporters. No cheering fans.

In the second scene, a similar group of chess players was in a swanky hotel in Paris. There were reporters and attentive spectators. 

The images stuck with me long after I finished the show. I thought about that American game and how different the place would have looked if it had been a weekend varsity basketball game.

Our nation applauds talents and gifts in sports, building gymnasiums and stadiums, supporting teams with booster clubs and cheerleaders.

America, though, has a strong anti-intellectual streak. It’s been that way all my life, but in my view, it seems to be worsening in recent years. That anti-intellectual bent reaches all the way into our educational system.

Jonathan Plucker, a professor at Johns Hopkins University who focuses on making accelerated education more accessible to disadvantaged students, says, “The ideology is turning against excellence. We are institutionalizing anti-intellectualism, and that has long-term implications for us.”

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Giving Grace around Graduation

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Assessment, Current Affairs, Education Policy, High School | , , ,
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Earlier this month, Governor Inslee signed into law a bill intended to start a chain of events that I’m optimistic will lead straight to the students I teach.

EHB 1121 essentially authorizes the State Board of Education to establish procedures for local schools to grant credit waivers to certain graduation credits on a case-by-case basis for students impacted by events beyond their control.

There are several things I like about this. One, it isn’t limited to this year: it establishes a protocol which can be applied when a student’s education was impacted by local, state, or national emergencies.

Two, this part: School districts may be authorized to “grant individual student emergency waivers from credit and subject area graduation requirements established in RCW 28A.230.090, the graduation pathway requirement established in RCW 28A.655.250, or both” (page 2, lines 7-10 of the law as passed, which you can read here).

That last authorization is key to authentic flexibility. There are a variety of ways that students may have been impacted this year, and the “waivers from credit and subject area” requirements will hopefully give us some leeway. Some kids might have engaged in their art electives because it helped them cope with what was going on in their world, but might have struggled with distance-learning chemistry class. Conversely, another might have thrown themselves into the latter and felt unequipped to engage in the personal vulnerability that might have been plumbed in the former. The language about “credit and subject area” waivers allows us to take either situation into consideration, and not withhold a diploma from a student who was not able to check the box next to that last art or science credit.

While I do believe that the graduation pathways were a positive step forward, I am relieved that they are included in the waiver, since their nascency in policy might have meant that the COVID years would have been their first attempt at full implementation in many districts.

Bigger than all of this, though, is what the need for this bill reveals about our high school graduation credit system as it is.

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Night School For Kindergarteners

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Current Affairs, Distance Learning, Education, Elementary, Equity, Online Teaching, Parent Involvment | , , , , , , , , , ,

Equity is a buzzword in education. We hear it used by staff, administrators, and presenters. Under regular circumstances the practical application of equity seems to fall short of the ideal. During a pandemic, ensuring equity for students when teaching digitally becomes an almost insurmountable challenge. 

This school year my district stepped up to tackle this challenge with an innovative approach: an evening school option for elementary students. 

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Honoring Martin Luther King Jr’s Legacy in 2021

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Current Affairs, Equity, High School, Social Issues, Teacher Leadership | , ,

Honoring Martin Luther King Jr’s Legacy

Every year in January, like most schools across the country, we have an assembly to honor Martin Luther King Jr. 

Students file into the gym and proceed to play with their phones while teachers try, in vain, to give them the “this is important” look. 

Then, February passes with hallway acknowledgements of Black History Month, but come March, posters of Black civil rights leaders and activists are replaced by shamrocks and rainbows. 

Of course, things look more than a little different this year. We are remote teaching, so there won’t be an assembly. The halls are unchanged, still frozen in time from last spring (there is at least one corkboard leprechaun, wrinkled but persistent). 

Though circumstances have forced us to alter these traditions, I also believe that we should rethink how we recognize Martin Luther King Jr. in 2021. The fact that this MLK Day of Service follows a summer of protests for racial justice across our country should not be ignored. 

LEFT: Leaders of a march of about 255 people stare at police officers who stopped the group from marching on city hall in Pritchard, Ala, on June 12, 1968. RIGHT: A protester shows a picture of George Floyd from her phone to a wall of security guards near the White House on June 3, 2020, in Washington, DC. Bettman / Jim Watson/Getty
Code Switch 1968-2020: A Tale Of Two Uprisings
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Your Turn: Priorities?

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Current Affairs, Education Policy | , ,

The Washington State Legislature will reconvene for a regular session on January 11, 2021. As always public education will be a topic for policy discussion.

What should be the education-related priorities for the Washington State Legislature in 2021? Read over the thoughts of a few Stories from School bloggers below, then we’d love to hear from you in the comments: What do YOU think our state officials should focus on in this next session?

Emma-Kate Schaake: Let’s Pause to Reimagine “Normal”

At the risk of sounding too glib, I keep thinking of the (perhaps misattributed) Churchill quote “never let a good crisis go to waste.” While COVID-19 has been undeniably devastating,  I do believe we have an opportunity to reimagine what “normal” looks like. Broad standardization  measures like state testing and Core 24 perhaps had a place in the “before times,” but I wonder what we really need to reinstate. As it stands now, there is simply no room for elective core classes, at least in my discipline, if we want students to graduate on time. Instead of truly honoring different learning styles, we expect students to be traditionally school successful, and if they’re not, they are deemed remedial and they take credit recovery online where the goal is simply passing, not engaging, authentic learning. What if graduating really felt like a personalized accomplishment, not just boxes to check?

Gretchen Kruden: Remember our Paramount Duty to All

In Article IX, section 1 of the Washington Constitution states, “It is the paramount duty of the state to make ample provision for the education of all children residing within its borders.” The legislators need to be thinking deeply about the equity issues embedded in the word “all” of this section. We have students who have had little to no educational access for almost nine months running due to a variety of issues beyond the control of schools. This includes families who cannot provide home support in learning, lack of internet connectivity and a movement by some parents to simply not have their children enrolled in school at this time. Perhaps it is time we examine other ways we can structure our school year model to compensate for this loss of learning time as we move forward. 

Mark Gardner: Soon-to-be-Grads Deserve Flexibility

In the short term, we have to develop some clear flexibility for the graduating classes of 2021 and 2022. In a typical high school, the 24-credit mandate already leaves little wiggle room for missteps. While there are certainly silver linings (students for whom remote/hybrid learning is working just fine, or even better than brick and mortar attendance), there are plenty of students for whom this has been a worst case scenario and a confluence of factors beyond their control. I hope the legislature gives a high level of local control around credit flexibility, and easing of testing and pathway requirements.

Lynne Olmos: Invest in the Present and Future of WA Ed

I think legislators can support education in a few ways. First, they need to continue to value teachers. They can do that by maintaining the National Board bonuses and supporting districts with funds to avoid layoffs. This is no time to lose dedicated teachers! They should also focus on equity issues. In particular, technology access, support for English language learners, and special education need to be at the forefront. We absolutely need to deemphasize standardized tests right now. Whatever gets the love of learning back is what we need most, not test prep. Proactive solutions are what we need, not unrealistic demands for educators to solve the whole pandemic crisis (while risking our health, too). Preserve the resources we have; allocate more. Clearly, our public schools have been crucial to the support of our communities during these trying times. Empower them to progressively meet the challenges of the future.

What about you, readers? What do YOU think should be the public ed priorities for the coming lawmaking session? Add a comment below!

The Promise of 2021: The Irreplaceable Educator

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Current Affairs, Distance Learning, Education, Education Policy, Equity, Life in the Classroom, Online Teaching, Social Issues, Teacher Leadership, Uncategorized | , , , , , , ,

Hopefulness is evident in celebrations all over the world. There is such hope that the New Year will bring a return to normal, a return to a less complicated time. Of course, we are more pragmatic than this. We know that the normal we once knew has changed, and we will take many of this year’s complications with us far into the future. That is the truth, and, well, that is how progress happens, too.

As educators, this is significant. Most teachers I speak to relate similar feelings. Their jobs have become so different, practically unrecognizable. “This isn’t what we signed up for,” is the common refrain. I’ve said it, too.

No, it is not what we expected, but it is what we have now. And it is a bit scary. There is a real danger of people leaving the education profession. However, change can be leveraged to solve problems. As educators, let’s unite to do this. Let’s make this next year the year we start a revolution in education.

REVOLUTION. Not renaissance, not pivot, not shift. Let’s flip this system.

This is not to be taken lightly. If we sit quietly and wait for normal, the entrepreneurs out there will convince the public that they can create products for online learning that are better than in-person teaching. They will market these miracles to the masses and this will be touted as ethical and equitable. Anyone with access to the internet can learn. Who needs teachers?

You may think, so what? Let them turn to online systems. But, if this year has taught us anything at all, it is the value of human connection. We teachers may be struggling to realize our value as purveyors of knowledge, but we know our true worth. It is obvious that we are invaluable when we are the ones coaching lonely youngsters through their studies, reminding them of their worth, laughing at their antics during Zoom meetings, and consoling them when their practices and games are canceled. That humanity is irreplaceable.

I treasure every moment of connection with my students these days. And I know that I am a better teacher for seeing the value of it. Because of this, there is no going back to normal for me. I don’t even want it to be the way it was. For me, the lifting of the veil revealed that all students need to feel safe, in control of their learning, and valued by their teachers and by the education system. That is the only way to move forward successfully.

For equity, for ethics, we need systems that honor the value of each individual. In light of this, I am reinventing my practice to put students clearly at the center, giving them more power in the process of choosing the learning they will do. I will involve them in the grading process, and I will work every day to ensure that they understand their worth.

I understand mine. And I know that every educator out there needs to see their worth, too. You are the connection. You are the humanity. You are irreplaceable.

Related Readings (Or, Why Is Lynne All Riled Up?):