By Travis

Writing did not come easily to me. In junior high, I would watch my friends energetically write, their pencils dancing away, creating works of great literature, or at least semi-coherent pieces that would garner a passing grade. 

Writing eluded me. I knew what writing was and I was an avid reader, but the power to mold words and phrases into something worthy was beyond me. It was akin to magic.

Science and math were my subjects. I tolerated English because I enjoyed reading. Then in my senior year, my American Literature teacher changed my life.

Mr. Blair was a short man, solidly build. The use of "stout" would fit most welcome on his person. He wore casual clothes as he was also a coach in a variety of sports. Golf shirts and jeans. He did not have the appearance of an amazing teacher. I walked into class on the first day and had him figured out: sports guy who loved worksheets and end of chapter questions. I would nail this semester. 

I left that first day both wrong (totally wrong) and happy at being wrong (a unique endeavor in my early adolescence).

Continue reading →

By Tamara

I will be spending this week setting standards for language
proficiency testing to be measured by WELPA (Washington English Language
Proficiency Assessment) A charge that feels dubious in light of this recent
piece. I don’t want to finish the week feeling like a cog in the assessment-for-profit
machine. So why did I even sign up for this role?

Because this year’s WELPA (it’s first role out since switching
from WLPT II) was a nightmare.
Nightmare as defined by questions and tasks that were not developmentally or
linguistically appropriate for age/time in country or in any way connected with
curricula/skills taught in the classroom. It asked kindergarten to identify syntactical
errors in sentences they were required to read independently (which part of
them being in Kindergarten did the writers miss??). It asked sixth grade to
describe science lab procedures. Which could be ok except lab-based science is
not offered until middle school in my district.

A language assessment with no sense of the stages of
language acquisition or what content is covered when is an invalid measure and
a tremendous waste of tax-payer dollars. So I am going because like Travis, I
want to take control of what I can. I would rather be a part of the process,
knowing I got my voice heard, than feel “done to”.

by Travis

My posts as of late have been somber, critical, and perhaps too much on the glass-half-empty side. I am aware that they have been. I knew they would be.

This dark view on our state’s support of our educational system and the future success of our schools is the result of watching education change over the 15 years of my career.

But enough about school. I gave my kitchen a simple remodel during the first week of April.

Days later, as I was preparing a meal in my kitchen, I recognized the metaphor. This kitchen is my outlook on teaching.

Continue reading →

By Tom

While leafing through a recent copy of The Stanwood-Camano Crab Cracker, looking for something to do in the greater Stanwood metropolitan area, one event caught my eye:

Ready Reader: Preschool Storytime; 9:30AM or 10:30AM at Stanwood Library. Let imaginations run wild with fun books, sing-along songs, and creative activities that prepare young minds for the adventures of reading. Playtime or craft may follow. Ages 3 to 5 years. Caregiver required.

There it was: the Achievement Gap, in all its ugliness, hiding beneath something as sweet and innocuous as a preschool story hour.  But when you think about it, the implications are clear: if you want your child to get ahead – and stay ahead – then you need to get her down to the Stanwood Library on Wednesday mornings. This is what we tell ourselves.

It's certainly what my wife and I told each other. She interrupted her career for ten years and took our children to every story hour, tune-time and kiddy-exercise class in town. And when nothing was scheduled, she read to them or took them to the zoo. Why? For the same reasons you did all those things: she wanted to give our kids every advantage so that they’d be successful in school and beyond.

We talk a good game in this country, but we really don’t want a level playing field. We’d rather play downhill. We want to get ahead and we want our children to get ahead. We don’t want our children to enter school and then learn how to read, we want them to enter school knowing how to read. And if possible, we’d prefer that they enter a school in which everyone knows how to read. That’s the American way. It’s probably the French way, the Mexican way and the Ukrainian way too, for all I know, but it’s definitely the way we do it here.

So we tell young parents to engage their children in all these learning activities. And we tell them that if they do, it will help their children be successful. We also tell them that if they don’t, their children risk becoming unsuccessful. Later on, of course, those prophecies pan out. The Ready Readers get the best grades, go to the best colleges and grow up to get the best jobs, and the kids whose parents couldn’t read the Crab Cracker, or didn’t know where the Stanwood Library was, or simply didn’t have time off on Wednesday mornings fell behind. Just like we said they would.

Continue reading →

By Tamara

I observe my class of seventh graders struggling to complete their persuasive writing assessment. It is quiet enough to hear the ticking of the clock. To an unpracticed eye they are engaged and hard at work. Yet in reality one is more interested in reading student work posted on the wall, another is staring into space (waiting for inspiration or for the clock to run out?). One I caught writing on her ankle. When I said "Really?" her excuse was "I'm not texting!" Me: "No, you're not. You're not writing either."

The assessment was due last Friday. It is now Tuesday. They had three days in class. And the weekend. And last night. We offered a "reward" to the class withthe highest percent of on-time turn ins. They are still not done. Looking for anything to do but write. Sure, they have their topic, their power map (mostly), but they would rather be taking down chairs or rushing to close the door on the noise in the hall. Anything to avoid opening that vein and bleeding onto paper.

Is it frustrating? To no end. But I empathize. I too have been overwhelmed and avoiding writing.