A couple of weeks ago it was finals week at my school. My English 9 semester final included both skills and content assessments which represented the culmination of the work we'd done for 18 weeks, and included assessments in reading comprehension, literary terms, writing skills, and speaking skills. Overall the class performed quite well.

One portion of the final asked students to use TPCASTT to annotate a poem that was unfamiliar to them, and then compose a one-page analysis of how the shifts (or juxtapositions) in tone or structure within the poem helped to illuminate a central theme or main idea of the poem. 

For that particular part, I had high standards. And sadly, low expectations.

In the weeks leading up to the final, we'd practiced those two skills (poetry annotation and evidence-based written analysis) and the results were underwhelming. In total, if students did what was asked, they wrote a total of eight paragraphs, each one receiving formative feedback from me, to get practice and demonstrate progress toward the final.

Too often, my feedback went unheeded and mistakes were repeated, nuances of the poems missed or written analysis underdeveloped. I fully expected this written portion of the final to drag everyone under.

Of course, as teenagers are wont to do, they surprised me.

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By Tom

If there was any doubt about what education funding in Washington will look like when the legislature finally gets around to complying with the McCleary Decision, that matter has been put to rest.

Steve Litzow, the new chair of the Senate Education Committee, published an op-ed in the Seattle Times this week outlining the ever-popular opinion that education funding should be tied to results. The background for his piece appears to be a study by the Center for American Progress which examined data from school districts all over the country, looking at the correlation between money spent on education and student achievement.

The apparent goal is to be a low-spending, high-achieving school district. An efficient, results-based district. Obviously, this is a goal borrowed from the business world. People who spend money want to see results from that expenditure. People who spend even more money want to see even more results. And while that sort of thinking certainly stands to reason, I think we need to think it through before assuming that this fundamental economic principal is applicable to education.

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Should I be evaluated on the growth my students make during their time with me?

Sure. That's my job, after all: make them leave with stronger skills and deeper knowledge than they had walking in.

The conversation about how student growth will be a part of our evaluations under TPEP continues to evolve and we need to keep paying attention. I personally think that OSPI has actually made some smart decisions (no offense, but how often do you hear people say that kind of thing?) particularly with emphasizing that student growth data must come from the right kind of assessment. As the debate continues to swirl, we need to think about what will and won't work in terms of student growth data that is an accurate reflection of teacher performance.

Here's what will not work for measuring the growth I guide my students to achieve:

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By Kristin

The Washington State Board of Education is asking for citizen input on how they should "measure the performance of Washington K-12 schools."  They want to improve the Washington Acheivement Index, which provides a snapshot of how schools perform on state tests.

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By Kristin

A new bill is going before the legislature this week.  Called the "Third Grade Reading Accountability" bill, it requires that schools implement pretty serious remediation interventions for K-3 students who are not reading at standard.  If they still aren't reading at standard in third grade, they can't go to fourth grade.

Part of me is really excited about this. For a long time I've argued against social promotion. As a high school teacher I often taught children who were still reading at the third grade level and I'd think, "How did they get to tenth grade?"  I think we do a big disservice to children to put them in fourth grade- where explicit decoding instruction isn't typically part of the curriculum- when they can't read. 

But another part of me has learned that holding a child back can be pretty traumatic for the child, and doesn't solve the problem. 

I found a great article that helped me clarify my thoughts.  By the National Association of School Psychologists, it outlines a common sense approach to supporting students who are below standard.  It suggests that neither automatic social promotion or automatic retention make sense.  Instead, "When faced with a recommendation to retain a child, the real task is not to decide to retain or not to retain but, rather, to identify specific intervention strategies to enhance the cognitive and social development of the child and promote his or her learning and success at school."

The article goes on to look at the research.  Basically, while retention shows academic gains the following (repeated) year, after 2-3 years the child does worse, and is eventually 5-11 times more likely to drop out of school.  Probably because without intervention strategies tailored to that child's needs, all the same obstacles are still there that prevented him from reading at standard in third grade.

So I've had to shift my position.  I used to dream of the day our legislature would insist a child couldn't leave third grade without reading at the third grade level.  Now, I think I want that decision, and all the other decisions made to help that child, to be up to the family and the teachers.  I don't want it to be mandated.  Maybe the solution is to do a better job of teaching explicit reading skills after third grade.

What do you think?

By Tom

When we were in college, learning how to be teachers, we
were told that there were two types of assessments: summative and formative. Summative
assessments come at the end of the unit or year. Their purpose is to “summarize”
the learning that did or didn’t happen. You may remember these as “final tests.”

Formative assessments, on the other hand, come during the
course of the unit or school year. Their purpose is to inform students,
teachers and parents on the progress made by each student in regards to the
learning. Ideally, these tests are used by teachers to adjust the pace or
content of instruction; and by students and their parents to adjust the amount
or intensity of effort.

The Seattle School District has recently found itself
embroiled in a controversy over its assessment system. The district uses the
MAP (Measures of Academic Progress) as a formative assessment of math and reading comprehension skills. Their students
take the computer-based tests twice a year and teachers, students and parents
are supposed to use the results as I’ve described above.

This year, however, the teachers at Garfield High voted unanimously
to boycott the MAP. Other teachers around the district followed suit, or at
least sent words of support. Their basic beef with the test is that it isn’t aligned
with their curriculum, rendering it completely useless as a formative
assessment, and therefore a waste of precious instructional time.

I don’t teach in Seattle, and I don’t administer the MAP (my
district uses something similar) so I don’t know exactly how things turned out
this way, but I strongly suspect it has something to do with the fact that secondary
English teachers don’t spend much time on direct instruction of reading comprehension,
compared to their colleagues at the elementary level. The reading MAP,
therefore, wouldn’t give them much feedback on the actual teaching and learning
in their classrooms. Math teachers would find themselves equally frustrated,
since their classes focus on specific math strands.

At this point things have reached a standoff: the teachers
are refusing to administer the tests and the administration has insisted they
do so, reluctantly threatening a ten-day, unpaid suspension for non-compliance.

I have to think that the teachers involved in the conflict
must be asking themselves an important question: “Is this really the hill I
want to die on?” And if it were me, my answer would be “no.”

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By Kristin

My students, struggling readers all, are reading a chapter from Junius Edwards' novel, If We Must Die.  We've studied Claude McKay's poem of the same name so my students felt pretty comfortable with what they would encounter thematically, but when Edwards revealed the story's setting by telling us Will had been wounded in Korea and had been fired for trying to register to vote, my students had a hard time inferring the time or the place. 

We talked about it, figured it out and moved on, but it's more evidence to me that knowing history helps a student's reading as much as the ability to read helps a student learn history.  I'm increasingly concerned at the way history, social studies and civics get pushed to the side to make more time for math and reading.  Eliminating history to give students an extra dose of reading was brought up as a possibility at a recent department meeting.  This is being done for struggling readers at some Seattle schools in an effort to raise reading scores on standardized tests. My colleagues refuse to go this route and as a teacher, historian and parent, I am glad.  Standardized tests are one kind of reading, and not one that lasts for long.  Being able to read and appreciate literature and being an equipped citizen are lifelong skills, and two that I prioritize in my instruction.

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By Tom

I am a reasonably effective fourth grade teacher. I know how
to plan lessons, deliver instruction and grade papers. I can manage a classroom
and hold the attention of students. I can scold.

I have other talents. I can fly-fish, sail a J 24 single-handed
and ski through moguls. I can grill a steak, fry a burger and toast a cheese
sandwich. I can make meat lasagna, chicken curry and turkey enchiladas. I can
blend a daiquiri, shoot tequila and mix a martini. I have made beer.

I can ride a bike from Seattle to Portland in one day. I have run
a marathon. I have climbed Mount Si, Mount Pilchuk and most of Mount Baker. I
have swum laps.

I can write a five-paragraph essay. About anything. I can
write a business letter, a friendly letter and a resume. I can write a personal
narrative, a trickster tale or a fable. I can write a haiku.

I can paint a house. I can clean a roof, fix a pipe and
unclog a toilet. I can replace rain gutters, start a lawn from seed and build a
fence. I have replaced a garbage disposal.

I can do all of these things and more; yet I cannot, for the
life of me, support, sustain or even fathom the triple-girl friendship.

Like wet snow on a steep slope or a six-point lead at
halftime, the triple-girl friendship is inherently unstable. It’s asking for
trouble, like a fish tank on a golf course or an old man on ice skates. It is caesium.
It is your first bike ride.

The triple-girl friendship has no memory of its own failure.
It ruined last week’s literature circle, yet honestly believes it can
collaborate on a five-slide Oregon Trail PowerPoint. It cannot. It drove last
month’s chaperone crazy, yet pleads to be together on next month’s field trip.
It will not. The triple girl friendship goes out to recess with three smiles
and a long jump rope. It comes back crying.

The triple-girl friendship defies counseling. It can write
in eloquent cursive exactly what it did wrong and what it will do differently
next time, and then do exactly what it did wrong again. It can recite the
anti-bullying pledge with no sense of irony.

It is late January. There are just about 100 more days of
school. Lord help me.

By Tom

A few months ago I was visiting a friend of mine who teaches
high school English. We were in his classroom and he showed me his grade book. I
noticed that in some of his classes, most of the students were missing most of
their assignments. I asked him about this.

“There’s really not much I can do about it. I assign work,
collect it, grade it and post the scores on-line. Some kids just don’t turn in
their work. Other than giving them an F, there’s not much else I can do, since
some kids simply couldn’t care less about their grades.”

I explained how things work in my classroom. I assign work
and then collect it. If a student doesn’t have it, they do it during recess.
Period. No questions, no yelling, no discussion. Their names go up on the
whiteboard and they come back to the room after lunch to get it done. I’m in
the room anyway, taking care of paperwork, and I don’t mind the company.

And if someone misbehaves or wastes time during the day, I
put a tally next to their name on my clipboard. Each tally mark equals one
minute of lost recess during our second recess, which we have toward the end of
the day.

I use first recess to take care of missing assignments and I
use second recess to take care of misbehavior. And it works beautifully. I have
the best-behaved class in the school with literally no missing assignments.

But then I came across this article in USA
Today. Basically, a bunch of pediatricians want us to leave recess sacred;
don’t make kids do schoolwork when they should be out playing and don’t
withhold recess as a form of punishment.

In other words, don’t do what I do.

I can see their point. Recess is an important time for kids
to blow off steam, get some exercise, mingle, and just “be kids.” For most children,
it’s their favorite time of the day. It certainly was for me, when I was young.

But pediatricians aren’t teachers. They deal with one kid at
a time, for ten or fifteen minutes, with their parents in the room. They’re not
trying make 25 to 30 kids work quietly at something most of them would rather
not do for seven hours a day.

At a certain level, teachers need leverage. For those of us
at the elementary level, recess gives us that. 

What do you think? 

By Kristin    

Goodbye, 2012.  I don't have much luck keeping challenging resolutions, particularly if they involve physical activity. Instead, I've settled into the routine of simply attempting to master the art of seeing the positive.

Last March, my fellow bloggers wrote a series of posts in response to a MetLife Survey that found teacher job satisfaction is down 15% since 2009.  The survey hit me at a funny time, because in my new school – the biggest middle school in Washington State, a place where buckets are in the hallway to catch leaks and my overhead projector was held together with duct tape – I was surrounded by teachers who were positive, who made choices that put kids first, and who were willing to quickly adapt their schedule and their approaches to try new things instead of saying, "What's the point?  We've been here before."  

What was their secret?  How were they so resilient?

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