by Brian

The state has mandated that all students must now pass Algebra and Geometry to graduate from high school. Therefore, many students and parents have decided to forgo taking a Pre-Algebra class, because it will not count as a math credit towards graduation.  The dogma, the unquestionable belief,  that we teachers are sworn to uphold is that all children can learn. 

Yes, they can.  But they need all the knowledge that will allow the new learning to make sense.   So what do you do when a student comes to you and says: "You're wrong, this is too hard"?  

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By Tom

There's a bill moving quickly through the Washington State Senate that could produce some interesting changes in the way teachers are evaluated. As part of a new project called Sounding Board, The Center for Strengthening the Teaching Profession, the host of this blog, asked a group of National Board Certified Teachers a series of questions regarding Senate Bill 6696. The results are out and some of them are pretty interesting.

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By Kristin

I like to poke around on the New York Times website.  Mostly I like to read about food, as in the article I mention in my previous post.  For those of you who also like to read about food – good food, not junk food and obese kids – let me steer you towards this lovely piece on Thomas Keller and the meal he served his father right before his father died.  But my post today is not about barbeque chicken.  It's about books, and how the school libraries of the future may not have as many of them as they do now.

Today as I was poking around during lunch, enjoying the world the internet brings to my face and fingertips, I came across this piece in the New York Times about schools eliminating books in their libraries.  Books are heavy, expensive, and they're quickly outdated when you want them to be meaningful reference materials.  Just because I love books doesn't mean libraries have to be filled with them, right?  Anyway, I get most of my news online.  I'm writing online now.  Online is efficient and free!  Who needs books?

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By Kristin

Two things detoured my walk home when I was in elementary school: the nickel candy bins at the 7-11 and the week's top-forty rack of lyric sheets at the record store.

After school my best friend Diane and I would take the change we'd rounded up from the car floor, dad's dresser and the kitchen junk drawer and hit the 7-11, loading up on candy before heading over to Licorice Pizza to see if Blondie's Rapture had been printed so we could sing along without making stuff up.  These days I can google a song if I want the lyrics and the nickel bins are long gone, but that's not all that's changed.  What I had to sneak off to 7-11 to buy students are now getting at school.  Luckily, the government is getting involved to put an end to it.  We are up against enough trying to help our students reach standard every year without loading their bodies up with sugar at break and lunch.

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by Brian
 

Everyone has their own list of characteristics that great teachers share.  And many subscribe to the opinion of James Starkey, who recently wrote in Education Week that: "As dorky as this sounds, great teaching happens by magic. It isn’t something that can be taught. I’m not even sure that good teaching can be taught."

I guess you'd call that the great teachers are born not made theory.  I do think some people are born to it.  My friend Bonnie started great and has been getting greater for the last 30 years.  But I'm sure she also believes teachers can get better, and maybe good ones can eventually become great.  So who's right?

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By Tom

By the time my third graders graduate from high school, this state will finally have to pay the full price for their education. 

At least that's one way to look at the recent ruling by King County Judge John Erlick on a landmark lawsuit brought by a consortium of parents, local associations, district superintendents and teachers against the state of Washington to make them fully fund education. Glossary in hand, Judge Erilick looked at what the state is currently doing and reread the State Constitution where it says that "it is the paramount duty of the state to make ample provision for the education of all children residing within its borders." He sided with the plaintiffs.

The lawsuit provided the backdrop for legislation passed last year in which lawmakers redefined basic education and pledged to fully fund it by 2018. Erlick recognized this effort, along with the current fiscal crises in which the state finds itself. Nevertheless, he ordered the state to figure out what it costs to educate Washington State's children and then pay it.

But he didn't say when.

So it's unclear what'll happen next.  The state could appeal and hope for a different ruling; one that will get them off the hook. Judge Erlick could acknowledge reality and let the state take its time figuring out how to pay for basic education as it's been redefined. Or he could impose a swifter timeline, ignoring the fact that the state currently can't even pay for basic education under the old definition.

Or somebody really smart could come along, take over Olympia, and figure out how this state should pay for the education it wants with the money it doesn't have.

Call me a cynic, but my money's on 2018. Most of the lawmakers in Olympia today will be long gone by then.

Along with my third graders.

By Tom

Last week the Seattle Times ran an editorial supporting differential pay for math and science teachers. The reasoning goes like this: college graduates who major in math or science can make more money in the private sector than in education. If we offer them a bonus to teach, we'll get more math and science teachers. More math and science teachers will lead to better math and science education.

The editorial went on to chastise WEA President Mary Lindquist for opposing this idea, pointing out that the teachers' union doesn't understand the free market system, and prefers to cling to the ideology "that everyone in the group is paid under the same rules. No favoritism." the private sector apparently embraces the free market system in which hard-to-find human resources command a premium, while dime-a-dozen people command…dimes.

I have three problems with this idea.

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By Kristin

I spent a lot of time today trying to learn a little more about the High School Proficiency Exam (HSPE), the new state assessment that my students have to pass in order to graduate.  I even called our building's test coordinator, but she hasn't "been trained yet" for the HSPE and knows nothing. 

    My own district and the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction in Washington have published nothing but the test schedule and the reassurance that "it's a lot like the WASL," our old state assessment.  "Like" is not good enough.  Running the 800m is a lot like the 400m since they both involve running on a track, but I would prepare my athletes differently for each one.  Running may be running and reading may be reading, but how you're going to be asked to demonstrate mastery affects how you approach the assessment.

    For all I know, my milers will be told on the starting line that they're running the 400.  Are their scores going to accurately reflect their skills?

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 By Tracey

Do you every get emails like this from your principal?

I would like to find time to visit with you and Mr. P (the other 5th grade teacher) about your desire not to send students to the specialist for math interventions. I would like to understand your rationale and to hear your plans for addressing the needs of your students. It is my expectation that when teachers aren’t happy with how things are going, then a team approach to addressing specific concerns makes more sense, especially when it comes to math. By team, I mean the math specialist, math coach, assistant principal and myself.

I got one of these just last week.  In fact, I got this exact email.  I'll admit I was a bit jittery when it first arrived in my inbox.  As I read it again now, I see the professionalism and concerned tone of my principal. I like my principal, and I think we have good rapport.  But the fear of being called down to the principal's office has never quite gone away.  

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by Brian
 

I just finished grading final tests and recording semester grades for my math students.  I've been teaching for 25 years now, and I have a confession to make:  not every kid who got a D from me could really pass the final in Algebra or Geometry.  But what they lacked in ability they made up in effort.  They did every assignment; they corrected every test.  They came in before and after school for extra help. They may not have understood the subject very well, but I guarantee it went through their brain.  My rationale is this:  they're not going to take that D and get into the University of Washington, but they're going to take the credit that goes with it and continue to try to graduate from high school.  I never meant that D to be a guarantee that my students had mastered the curriculum. It meant that their performance was below average, but that they had made a bona fide effort.

But I guess the State Board of Education caught on to me.  

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