Mega Bites and Messages

Innovate – Changing from static learners to collaboration

We have been sitting students in rows, talking at them,  making them memorize.  We talkàthey memorizeèwe test àrepeat.  Areas the students memorized well in became their career, If they were not good at memorizing-off to the manufacturing jobs they were sent. Research and studies for years showed this was not the best way-yet we continue to do more of the same. Teachers were told to do more hands on learning, more projects, more higher level thinking skills, but at the same time prepare the kids for paper and pencil exams, with school funding and their jobs on the line. Incorporate technology into instruction-but make it difficult to teachers to use the technology by locking down the machines, and blocking, blocking, blocking content . While the potential is there for technology to reach students that have been underserved-those resources need to be user friendly for the instructors. We still need those trained teachers in the computer labs to teach and engage both the students and the educators, in technology use. But then there are the yearly budget cuts.  Those who legislate require more and most tests- children’s scores used to measure teachers effectiveness.  We have longer school days, more school days and somehow think more of the same will lead to a different result. We have a new Secretary of Education that thinks more the same is the recipe for success.  Putting all these pieces together it is easy to understand why  teachers become discouraged. They are being asked the equivalent of running and standing still at the same time.

 How many great minds have been wasted because they were perceived as not smart=simply because they learned in a different way? How many students have we lost to boredom? How many great teachers have we lost because they could tolerate the low pay and long hours, but the not the lack of respect for the profession? What happened to  students who got all A’s?  Many struggled to get and keep a job because they lacked the ability to work well with others, and felt entitled to the same special treatment they got in school as the “A” student.  Once in the work world there was no longer a parent to run interference for them, and responsibility fell on their shoulders like a ton of bricks. Since jobs don’t test every week-the expectation was for these graduates to be to apply the skills they learned. Again a huge discontent between what school were teaching and the skills that are needed for success. Everyone can agree that change is needed. Some want to peel off the good students and create a separate system of “Charter” schools-the separate but equal philosophy.

Project based learning challenges students=but also parents who  need a new understanding of assessment.  Universal Design for Learning does stretch every learner but makes it difficult for parents to understand how a student working on what they think of, as an easier project can get an A, while their child got a B+.   I still stand by the notion of giving students choices. I also think that there is way too much emphasis and pressure on grades. The challenge to change really lies in convincing the parents and Politian’s,  who really run the schools that there is a better way. Then getting them to trust the process —HUGE GOALS

Gripes and Brags
Reflecting back as the school comes to a close, it was a mixed bag of wonderful innovation and challenges. In my second year at a new building I have worked hard, challenged myself and my student’s and have been pleased with the results. We have  used C.A.D. (Computer Assisted Design) programs, written digital stories, create slide shows, made movies, created wiki pages, blogged our thoughts  in response to literature, programmed in Scratch, Alice, Squeak, and HTML. Students have review using MS Office, made stop action animations, worked with stop action animation, and explored digital photography.  Over all. a positive experience engaging student learners. While not everyone loved everything, I feel that each student picked up some necessary and essential skills.

 Yet ,as any educator knows classroom management remains an important  part of teaching. What remains as a frustration is the lack of parent understanding in redirected student behavior.  I try to have the students reflect on their behavior, write a note to me explaining why they did what they did. Then having students go home and report that –they did nothing wrong and the teacher doesn’t like them.  It amazes me that parent’s can announce so boldly that “I believe my child and not you” Why would I possibly: pick on a group of children”. It’s not like any of us want to disciple, it is just part of the job. Children have not changed so much= but parents have. The same parent who doesn’t come to conferences- appears weeks later to complain about a B+ on a report card.   We take the advice of doctors, lawyers and even the cable repairman=but not educators. I really do have the best interests of my children in mind-allowing them to get away with bad behavior really does them no good in the end.  Unfortunately most of us only hear from the few parents who complain and not the many that are happy!

So…this year… It was a mixed bag. I take consolation in the two grants I won, the designation as a MI Champion, and the amount of positive feedback I get from my peers on Classroom 2.0, MACUL Space and Twitter. I remind myself that 2 parent complaints out of 408 students isn’t the end of the world.  Social networking has created a community of educators and for the first time we are out there supporting each other and learning we have much in common no where we live or teach. So our hope for change rest on the possibility that together we can do more!