Possibility Overload

I am almost finished with the semester and will be student teaching in January.  This is what I have been waiting for all semester – the chance to actually apply everything I have learned in college and to get experience.  I am still very excited for that opportunity, but I am also a little worried.  When I finish student teaching in May, I will be an actual teacher with my own classroom and my own students.  And at this moment, that scares me.

I have learned so much about teaching, especially this past semester in my education classes and my methods class.  For the most part, I feel ready to teach.  But I am overwhelmed by all the possibilities of what I could do in my classroom.  In just this semester alone, I have learned a lot about workshop style classrooms, inquiry-based learning, project-based learning, and teaching for social justice classrooms.

I used to like the workshop style classroom and that is how I planned on teaching for a long time.  But when I learned about the other styles, I started to wonder if a workshop style classroom is really what I want.  I still really like the idea of a workshop classroom, but I also really like some aspects of all the other styles.  I could combine aspects of each, but would that be too much for the students?  I don’t want them to feel as overwhelmed as I do.

I also worry about how I will teach and meet the Common Core standards.  I never thought much about the standards, but after meeting with my cooperating teacher for next semester, I wonder if I should have learned more about them.  I wish I could have taken a class that explained all the standards and exactly what they mean for teachers and students.

In our methods class, we’ve talked some about the standards.  I’ve learned that as long as students are doing authentic work, they will meet the standards and be able to pass the tests. This seems simple enough and actually makes more sense to me than other methods I have heard about.  I have just learned so many different ways for students to learn authentically that I’m not sure which way is best.

So as I end this semester and prepare to start the next one, I hope to learn more about what works best for students.  Hopefully once I have some real classroom experience, the possibilities won’t be as overwhelming as they are now.  I’m excited to start my work with students and apply everything I’ve learned this semester.  I hope that next semester is as great as this one.

My NCTE Surprise

When I found out that Nancie Atwell was presenting at NCTE, I knew that was one session I was not going to miss.  I learned at the first session, though, that rooms filled quickly, which meant that I had to make a sacrifice. I would get to Nancie Atwell’s scheduled room 90 minutes early to make sure I had a seat.  That meant that I would be missing a session with Penny Kittle and Kelly Gallagher, which was unfortunate, but I was set on seeing Nancie Atwell.

Instead of sitting in the hall like I had originally planned, I decided to go to the session that was in the room Nancie Atwell would be presenting in.  This session was called Students’ Metacognitive Regulation and the Common Core, which didn’t sound interesting at all.

I had planned to just sit in the back and catch up on my tweeting for the conference, so I only half-listened to what the presenters were saying.  But what they said quickly caught my attention.  They were discussing what to do with the students who don’t succeed in school.  The ones who don’t seem to do well and, more often than not, end up dropping out and maybe later getting their GED.  These were students that we had talked about in our Methods class and that I have personally worried about.

So I put down my iPad and took out my notebook.  Giving the presenters my full attention, I learned a lot about how to help these students succeed in school.  Did you know that students who get their GED tend to be smarter than students who get the traditional diploma?  They are, but they lack the will to persist and delay gratification.  They lack grit, which the presenters defined as perseverance and the passion for long-term goals.  Students with grit do better in school.

Teachers need to help students who lack grit.  They need to teach those students how to self-assess, self-reflect, set goals, and direct their learning, which is all part of the process of metacognition.  Metacognition can help students monitor their learning and take control of it.  Students already make decisions that affect their learning, but they don’t realize it.  Recognizing this is the first step for students to take charge of their learning.

The students that lack grit will not do this on their own; the teacher needs to show them how and hold them accountable. Simply have students set a goal at the beginning of class and then complete a self-evaluation at the end of class.  Have them think metacognitively about what they will be learning that day.  Have students ask themselves what do I already know and what do I need to learn.

Have students think about everything they do in the classroom. Give students the control.  When writing, have them reflect on how they evaluate good writing.  Have them analyze feedback, both good and bad.  Have them identify trends in their own writing.

When reading, have students establish a purpose for reading.  Have them recognize when their comprehension stops.  Have them ask themselves if they are aware of it and what they do to fix it. Have them reflect and respond to the reading. Make them aware of their comprehension by having them ask how do they know what they know or by responding emotionally to what they just read.

Students who lack grit will not sit quietly at their desks and complete a worksheet or read the text because you told them to.  These students don’t complete boring assignments.  And these students will be in your classroom.  They will either be the ones misbehaving and causing problems or, if they are old enough, they will be the ones that drop out of school completely.

Some teachers may refer to these students as “unreachable” but they’re not.  Our methods teacher told us in class that there are no unreachable students, and this presentation proves that by showing teachers how to reach all students.

I can honestly say that I was surprised by the content of this session and am grateful that I went, even though I had no intention of attending it.  I didn’t attend the Penny Kittle/Kelly Gallagher session, so I don’t know what I missed, but I do know that I didn’t sacrifice as much as I thought.  I learned so much about how to help students succeed in school.  And I also got excellent seats for Nancie Atwell’s session, so I would say this was a win-win situation for me.  Definitely a great surprise.

NCTE 2013 Session: Reinventing the Writing Conference

The Reinventing the Writing Conference session at NCTE 2013 was one of my favorite sessions.  This session focused on how three high school teachers used different approaches to conference with their students.  They all used to do the basic written comments on student papers once they were turned in, but none of the teachers were happy with the results.

They stated that 86% of written comments focus on surface errors and not the actual writing.  To me, fixing or commenting on surface errors is the easiest thing to do.  I could probably do it without even thinking about what I’m doing; just see an error and fix it.  But I know that is not helpful to students.  They knew that, too, which is why they found new methods to provide feedback.

The main focus in the their new feedback methods was based on if their comments/process was helping the writer and not the writing.  Whatever feedback they gave to the student should actually help the student become a better writer and not just make the writing in the paper better.  This can’t be done if the majority of comments focuses on surface errors.  Also, mid-process feedback is key for students to learn and develop writing skills.  Teachers can’t give feedback at the end of the writing process and expect students to learn; writing, like any skill, doesn’t work that way.

The three methods the teachers discussed were face-to-face conferences, digital oral feedback, and Google Docs conferences.  The face-to-face conferences are student led, which is an aspect that I really like, Students are expected to come to each conference prepared and to actually start the discussion.  The teacher does not say anything about the paper until the student explains what he/she wants to discuss.

Because some students find it hard to start the discussion, the teacher provides a conversation starter handout.  The conversation starters are a script that students can follow if they don’t know what to say to start the conference.  During the conference, the teacher only reads the part of the paper that the student wants feedback on.  The teacher and student discuss the section and then the student writes a concrete plan for revision and what to do next.  Each conference should only last for about five minutes.

The digital oral feedback is a method that I plan to use in my classroom.  This method uses a program called Jing, which you can download on your computer for free.  It allows you to take a screenshot or 5 minute screencast of your screen and then send the link to the student.  The verbal feedback is great because students can hear the teacher’s tone of voice and are less likely to misinterpret the meaning.  Also, it takes us about six minutes to write what it takes us one minute to say, so using verbal feedback can shorten the amount of time it takes to grade papers, which is something I’m sure every teacher will appreciate.

Google Docs is another feedback method.  Students write their papers on Google Docs and the teacher can read the paper as the student is writing and provide ongoing feedback.  This method is best used with face-to-face conferences and not as a stand-alone method.

From this session, I really liked the idea of conversation starters for conferences and using Jing for verbal feedback.  Finding time to respond to every student is difficult, but using these methods could make it easier for me as the teacher and hopefully more meaningful to the students.

Providing feedback to students has been something I’ve worried about.  I don’t want to unintentionally provide hurtful feedback, but I also don’t want to critically analyze every word I write on a student’s paper.  If I did, it would take me weeks to evaluate every paper!  But verbal feedback, either face-to-face or through Jing, makes that less of a problem.  I am glad that I was able to attend this session at NCTE.  It was definitely one of the best!

My Experience at NCTE 2013

Our Methods class recently went to the National Council of Teachers of English conference in Boston.  I had such a great time at the conference.  It wads definitely one of the best experiences of my life.  This conference is something that you have to experience for yourself in order to understand how wonderful it is.

I learned so much at this conference – more than I really would have thought possible.  At first I thought the conference would be a lot like school.  After all, I would be spending at least 8 hours sitting and listening to people talk, which is essentially what I do in school.  But I was wrong – it wasn’t like school at all.  There were no assignments that I had to finish.  No expectations that I had to meet.  Nothing specific that I had to learn.  There were hundreds of sessions and I could choose which ones I attended.  I had total freedom in a structured system.  My only complaint is that I did not have enough time to attend all the sessions I wanted to.  The conference lasted three days but I wish it was at least a month.

I attended nine sessions at the NCTE Conference.  Out of those nine, there was only one that I didn’t enjoy.  There were a few sessions times I missed because there was no more space in the room or because I went to the Exhibit Hall.  The very first session was one that I missed.   I spent the first session of NCTE sitting on the floor in a hallway.  Not exactly a great start, but I did learn to show up early to sessions I really wanted to attend, especially if they had big-name presenters.

Most of the sessions I attended were very beneficial.  I learned about how to make grading quicker and easier.  I learned several different strategies for writing conferences and how to make comments more meaningful for students.  I also learned how to help students improve their writing, and this information has completely changed everything I thought I should do as an English teacher.  One session I attended simply so I could get a seat for Nancie Atwell’s presentation.  This session was on Student Metacognition Regulation and was not something that I ever planned to attend.  I have to say, however, that I am glad I did.  I learned a lot from this session and now have new information and strategies to help under-achieving students.

Even more exciting than the great sessions were free books.  Tons of free books!  Even free books signed by the author!  I left the conference with a small suitcase full of books.  My plan for Christmas break is to read at least half of the books I took home from the conference.

Overall, I am very glad that I was able to attend the NCTE conference.  I hope that I have many opportunities in the future to attend the conference.  I would recommend any English teacher or school administrator to attend this conference because there are so many benefits.  I didn’t just learn about teaching writing or reading – I learned about teaching real students.  As teachers and administrators, we will be working with real students every day so we should learn everything we can in order to do our best.

My Grading Policy – Part 2

In Part 1 of this post I explained the different types of grading systems I want to use in my classroom.  In this part of the post I will explain how I actually plan to use those systems to grade student work.  These ideas are mainly for writing assignments.  I still haven’t figured out what to do with reading.

I would start each grading period with pre-determined assignments and point values.  This is probably the only way that backward grading will work.  Students would have to complete a certain number of assignments each grading period.  Some of the assignments would be required of every student; these are the assignments that would show that students have met the standards.  For the remaining assignments, students could choose which ones they want to complete.  The purpose of these assignments would be to give students more choice and control in their learning.

So, for example, students would have to complete ten assignments for the first grading period.  They would be required to write a narrative essay, write an essay about a theme in a book of their choice, read a fiction book of their choice, read a nonfiction text of their choice, and write a summary/response to the fiction and nonfiction texts that uses details/evidence from the text.  Students would then be able to choose the other five assignments they need to complete.  These could include book talks, writing short stories or poetry, writing another narrative, responding to books in a way the student chooses, and other things.

I’m not entirely sure how this will work in practice, but I definitely want a system that gives students more freedom in what they can do in class and helps them succeed.  I would only require ten assignments per grading period, but students would be able to complete as many as they wanted to earn the grade they wanted.

I would use the rubric for every writing assignment students turn in.  Students would receive a traditional percentage and letter grade, but the rubric would provide specific comments and feedback that I think are more meaningful than a number or a letter.

Even after spending more than a week thinking about how I would like to grade in my classroom, I’m still not confident in what I’ve planned.  Some things seem to work better in my mind than when I try to explain them.  I hope that grading is something that is easier to accomplish when it is actually being done rather than thinking of possible scenarios.  And even though I don’t have every detail planned out, I still know my overall goal and purpose for grading.  I want students to have more choice and freedom and I want them to feel good about the work they have done and I think using backward grading and rubrics is the best way to accomplish that.

The Power of Listening

As a teacher, I’m sure I will do a lot of talking.  I will talk to students, parents, and co-workers every day.  I used to think that as long as I could clearly express myself while speaking, I would be an effective teacher.  As long as students, parents, and co-workers understood what I was saying, then I was doing a good job.  Good speaking skills were the key to good teaching, or so I thought.

I read an article that discussed the common misconception of the importance of speaking well.  Speaking well is not really important.  Listening well is the important skill.  It is only by listening to others that we know what they understand.  In school, knowing what students understand is the whole point.  But if teachers are the ones who are talking all the time, how can students show us what they understand?

Listening seems like such a simple thing to do, but it is, in fact, a challenge.  Really listening to people takes concentration.  Also, when listening, you have to forget about how you are going to respond.  You need to focus only on understanding the other person.

Imagine if all teachers really listened to their students.  There would be such a difference in education today.  I think most students know what they need in school; they know what works for them and what doesn’t, but unless the teachers are listening, they won’t say it.  For students to really learn in school, teachers need to listen to them.  Only then will teachers really know what to teach.

I think many times I overlook the importance of listening.  I’ve been told by others that I am a good listener, but sometimes I think I can be better.  Listening will be something I will focus on when I student teach.  I want to be better at understanding what students need and giving them a chance to explain.  I want to listen so I can learn as much from them as I want them to learn from me.

What I’ve Learned About Writing and Myself

Writing has never been my favorite thing to do, at least not the actual act of writing.  I don’t like thinking of ideas or topics and forming them into sentences and cohesive thoughts.  I also don’t consider myself very creative, so writing fiction and poetry was never something I enjoyed.  I do, however, love editing and revising pieces of writing.  I love changing words around or moving ideas around to change the tone of a piece.  I think I could honestly edit papers all day long, but only if someone else writes them first.

I have never thought of myself as a writer, and as a future English teacher, I’m learning that this is a slight (or possibly a huge) problem.  In my Methods class this semester, we have read books or excerpts from books by various authors.  I’ve mostly read Penny Kittle, Nancie Atwell, and Kelly Gallagher, and they all say the same thing: in order to teach writing well, you have to be a writer yourself.  This has caused quite a bit of stress for me this semester.  I am not a writer.  I will be a bad English teacher because I am not a writer.  Have I made a mistake in my career choice?  Is it too late to do something different?

This has been a major worry for me since August.  I’ve started doubting myself and my abilities.  Today I’ve thought a lot about this.  And I don’t think I’ve made a mistake in choosing to be an English teacher.  I absolutely love to read and I can write, even though it may not be my top priority.  And while I was thinking today, I realized that I actually, kind of, maybe enjoy writing.  I enjoy writing for my blog, and that is real writing.  I don’t have to write fiction or poetry to be a writer, which I think is what I associated writing with before.  I really enjoy writing about educational topics, and that is basically what I write about on my blog.

So I’ve learned that I like sharing my thoughts about certain topics.  There are a ton of things I can write about and actually enjoy the writing.  I’ve also learned that it isn’t writing that I hate; it’s sharing writing that is personal to me that I don’t like.  It can actually be a good thing that writing about personal topics is hard for me.  I’m sure it will be hard for some of my students, too, so this will give us a chance to learn together.  Even though I don’t write about personal topics, I know a lot about writing and how I write.  I know what I struggle with.  I know what makes writing strong and I know about the importance of organization in writing.  I also know that conclusions are the hardest things for me to write.  I always struggle with those, but that will be a good thing to share with my students.

Kelly Gallagher, Penny Kittle, Nancie Atwell, and I’m sure many others, all say that in order to teach writing well, you need to be a writer; you don’t have to be a good writer, but you do have to be a writer.  They say students don’t need to see your polished pieces; sometimes students learn more by seeing you struggle while writing.  Well, my students will definitely see me struggle when I write, but that is okay with me.  I’ve learned that, while writing isn’t always easy, there is always something to write about.  The trick is finding a topic you enjoy and write about that.

My Teacher Mission Statement

I have gone through college knowing that it is important for teachers to have a goal, to have something specific that they want to accomplish by the end of the year.  Also, teachers need to have a reason to teach, a reason that keeps them in the classroom working with students.  For me, it was easy to think of that.  I want to teach because I love working with kids and I want to be a positive influence and role model in their life.  I want to be able to show them how great learning is.  My goal for what I want to accomplish is to teach students about grammar, writing, and reading.  I want them to learn the rules about punctuation, subject-verb agreement, writing effective introductions and conclusions, and other things.  At this point, I think I am on my way to being a great teacher – I have everything planned.

But then I read this article by Grant Wiggins and realized that I am not quite ready to teach.  I have, in fact, not planned everything.  And I really need to work on my teacher mission statement.  Grant Wiggins is not satisfied with a personal teacher mission statement, which is basically all that I have.  He also does not think it is enough for a teacher’s goal to simply cover the material throughout the year.  I also think teachers should do more than cover the material, but I’m not sure the goal I listed above does much more than that.  After reading this article, I learned that there are two specific questions Grant Wiggins believes each mission statement should answer: what is my teaching going to cause in students and how will students be different after learning the content?

I honestly have never thought about these questions when thinking about my teaching.  Now that I have, though, I think they are some of the most important questions I can ask myself as a teacher.  I want what I teach and how I teach to have an effect on students and how they live their lives.  So, trying to answer these questions, I have written a new teacher mission statement based on the information in this article and an article we read last semester in my Adolescent Literature class, “Living a Literate Life” by Douglass Kaufman.

I want students to become powerful adults and citizens by living a literate life.

At the end of the year, I hope that my students have learned the importance of reading and writing in their lives.  No matter what I teach, this is the most important thing any student could learn from me.  I don’t want to just cover the material.  I want whatever we do in class to be meaningful to my students. So even though I will have to meet standards and take time out for standardized testing, I want the majority of my class work to help students learn what a literate life is and they can live it.  Everything I do in my class will be to meet this overall goal, my teacher mission statement for the entire year.

My Classroom Culture

It is so important for teachers to give their students a chance to grow as learners in the classroom, but sometimes teachers don’t know how to do this.  This is something that I want to do in my classroom, but despite all that I’ve learned, I am still not sure how to accomplish this.  I read an article from TeachThought on Twitter this week about how to promote a self-directed classroom culture in the classroom that told me exactly what  I can do.  There is nothing on this list that seems difficult or time-consuming, and many of the ideas are things that I already plan to do in my classroom.  After reading the article, I have much more confidence in my ability to create a classroom culture that will help my students learn.

The first tip for a self-directed classroom culture is to make the classroom a safe place to fail.  Failure is what leads to real learning; without it, learning doesn’t happen.  But most people, including me, are afraid to fail.  This fear of failure is what prevents us from achieving our goals.  I don’t want my students to be limited.  I don’t want them to be afraid to fail.

So one thing I would like to do is to introduce a Weekly FAIL (first attempt in learning) to my classroom.  This would be a lesson that I want to teach about reading or writing or it can be something that a student teaches the class about something they tried in their own reading or writing.  Or maybe I won’t even limit this lesson to reading and writing and let students show others what they are doing to learn something new and how they are failing at first.  My hope is that this activity would help students to overcome the negative connotations of the word fail and learn to accept failure as a part of their learning journey.

Other tips that I like that are similar to each other are give your students a voice and don’t impose limitations.  To me, the first tip is basically saying to let your students choose what they do in the classroom.  This is very important to me personally.  I’ve always loved school and I always completed all assignments because I wanted a good grade, but there were times when I had to write a paper that I either knew nothing about or didn’t care about.  This ended up causing a lot of frustration for me and might even be part of the reason I don’t like to write now.

The second tip about no limits is also great.  The article gives the example of having students write as much as they can on a topic.  I’ve never liked the minimum page or word count; teachers that make it as long as it needs to be were always my favorite.  But I think I will use “write as much as you can” because there are absolutely no limits on that.  “As long as it needs to be” just doesn’t seem to encourage students to push themselves in their writing.

Finally, the tip that I think will be hardest for me to achieve but will help me be a better teacher is to let go of the idea that a student’s success reflects on you.  If I do not get emotionally involved in my students’ success, I will be able to be more supportive of them when they fail and will not be as frustrated if they don’t do as well as I had hoped.

I know this will be hard for me because I like to do well, but I just need to remember that my students are the ones who are learning, not me.  For them to really learn, they need to do it their way, not mine.  Students need to want to learn; if they don’t want that and don’t do the work, then it won’t matter if I am the best teacher or the absolute worst teacher ever.  As long as I do what I know is best for students, then I will be a successful teacher.  And as a successful teacher, I can help my students be successful students but I can’t be successful for them.

This article on classroom culture has so many great tips for teachers and I’ve definitely learned a lot about what I can do in my classroom.  The culture of a classroom has a huge impact on students and learning, and I think many times teachers forget this.   I really want to have a classroom culture that allows students to grow as learners.  I want them to feel empowered in my class and realize that learning is fun.  I want them to know that they can do anything as long as they work hard and try.  I want my classroom culture to help students grow as learners and I want it to be a place of real learning.  My classroom will be a place where the teacher and students work together, fail together, and learn together.  This way, we will all succeed together.

Why I’m Excited for Teaching

I have thought a lot about teaching this semester, probably because I am only taking education classes and will be student teaching in a few months, but it seems like teaching is always on my mind.  Even though I have experienced several frustrations and worries the past several weeks, I have still found many things to get excited about.  Inspired by Kelsey’s posts about why she is excited for Methods class, here is a list of reasons why I am excited for teaching.

1. I am excited to share books with students and get them excited about reading.  I love to read and it is definitely one of my favorite things to do.  I also love recommending and sharing books with my friends.  I love when people ask to borrow a book I have so that they can read it.  Then once they have finished, I love being able to discuss the book with them and share our thoughts.  When I’m a teacher, I will have over 100 students to share books with.  And the best part is that they will also have books to share with me.    This is probably what I am looking forward to the most.
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2. I am also very excited to learn from students.  There are many things that I know already, but there are also many things I don’t know.  I think all students have things to share and teach to others, so I am excited to be able to give students that chance.  I don’t want to simply teach them what I know.  I want to also teach them how to teach people what they know.  And I want to be their first student.
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3. In addition to learning from students, I am excited to get students excited about learning in general.  It seems that as students go through school, some start o lose interest in learning.  I want to be the kind of teacher that does not let students get bored with school.  I wan to show students that learning can be and is fun.  I want to show them how they can learn about things that interest them, even if they may not like what they are learning in their classes.  I want all my students to realize that learning is a life-long habit; it doesn’t stop once they finish school.  But more importantly, learning is not something that should be dreaded.  Students should be excited to learn and I am excited about getting them excited.
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4. Finally, I am excited about having a positive influence on my students.  I know not all students come from good homes or have parents that are involved in their education.  This can have a negative impact on students and their learning.  I want all my students to know that I care about that I believe in them.  Some students may not accept this and it could end up being a year-long struggle, but even if I don’t see a change in the students, that doesn’t mean I didn’t have an effect on them.  I know that what I do as a teacher will impact my students in ways that I will never see, but just knowing that it will happen is enough to make me be the best teacher I can be.