Breathe Through The Pain

Last week I found myself continuously singing, "This Little Light of Mine." (If you are unfamiliar: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/This_Little_Light_of_Mine). This was my way of breathing through the unmeasurable emotional pain that I was feeling. Coincidentally on Friday I was in a yoga class and the teacher told us that the first mantra many of us learned was "This Little Light of Mine," then as we closed class instead of doing the usual Om chant we sang "This Little Light of Mine."

At some point during one of my many yoga classes this summer we were lying in frog pose, which if you don't know yoga it is a pose that really stretches your hips in a way that is sometimes painful. The teacher told us to breathe through the pain. This is a common thought in yoga, as you are taught to keep a steady breath throughout your practice, no matter the strain or pain that you feel.

I have been working with this philosophy all year, and its made me a different teacher. When things bother me in my classroom I breathe in and out, silently chanting "let " as I breathe in "go" as I breathe out. Its given me a whole new presence among my students and opened me up for a lot more room to care about the things that really matter.

One of the reasons I sang "This Little Light of Mine" this week was because I wanted to really ignite my inner light. As a Quaker I believe that there is that of God in everyone, so this belief is embodied in my inner light. I think that the yogi breath can contribute to ignite this light as well, which is why it works to breathe through the pain. If you are not spiritual, or do not believe in this inner light, you ultimately believe that every person possesses some kind of inner strength so I would suggest breathe through the pain to find that strength.

I must ignite all of these in this time of great tragedy. I am going to be taking very deep breaths, singing to myself, and focus in on my inner light in order to find strength.

Namaste

Today in yoga the teacher said that Namaste means "the light in me to the light in you." This may not be the exact meaning but the idea is that you are bowing to the people around you and their inner light, or souls. A few days ago, my friend Hannah reminded me of a pre meal grace that I made up in elementary school, "There is a light in you, there is a light in me, there is a light in everybody." Hannah is using this quote to drive her personal essays to law school, to say the least I am flattered, but Hannah and I both know that this grace is about more than the words themselves. Just as in yoga, when we say "namaste" at the end of class we know that it is more then just celebrating our souls together. In both of these sayings, the essential element is that there is a community of people who celebrate each other, these sayings are just a way to remind us to say it verbally.

As a teacher, I think about community a lot. I remember back to my experience at institute, where my friend Lexy and I created the "Master Learners Kitchen" in order to create a community of learners for our students in the Mississippi Delta. I now work daily to build a sense of community for my students. I went to observe in my old 6th grade classrooms last week, and thought about the community there, the constant celebration of students as individuals. In college I had multiple communities that helped me develop as an individual, and I have a community of friends who do the same for me today.

I studied the sociology of education in school, and thought a lot about the communities that are developed in public schools. In every paper I wrote, or research project that I did my thesis always seemed to come back to the importance of a school's culture in transforming a school. I work in a school that is in the process of transformation. We focus heavily on assessment, management, professional development, etc., but we rarely talk about community. We rarely stop and metaphorically say "namaste" to each other. Teachers, children, administrators, counselors, secretaries, etc. are rarely celebrated for the light inside of each of them. When I began Teach For America I was set on making a difference and I think through yoga and my Quaker values I've found the way that I personally can transform my school. I am going to say "namaste" to my children hourly, to other teachers daily, and to my administrators at least once a week. I hope through modeling this behavior I can influence others to do the same.

So I will start with all of you, my friends, family, and coworkers who read my blog, "Namaste!"

Coleman Report in the Modern Era

The following post is inspired by this article (it is admittedly long, but worth the read):

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/04/technology/technology-in-schools-faces-questions-on-value.html?pagewanted=6&_r=1&hp

Before I begin I am going to warn you that this is one of those posts that is more about sociology than my students, but I threw in a picture at the end to amuse you, and there will be a back to school post soon.

I've been looking for inspiration since my last post and finally here it is! This article questions the effectiveness of technology in the classroom, mostly as a result of one school district that has spent a significant amount of money to have increased technology in all of the classrooms there. As test results came in this summer it was time for districts to really consider what is going on in their classrooms that is effective and what is not. Unfortunately the tech heavy school district did not raise test scores since the implementation of laptops/smartboards/projectors/etc. As I read I could not help but think back to all of my sociology of education classes to one of the most cited reports in the history of American education: The Coleman Report. In brief, The Coleman Report found that increased spending in America's schools did not actually result in increased high academic achievement. So to sum it up school funding ≠ increased student achievement. Now the report was hundreds of pages long so it said a lot more than that, but at the time this was really BIG news to people because the thought was always more spending = high achievement. After reading this article I couldn't help but think, "well we've proven Coleman's hypothesis right again."

Technology is a hot topic in education, just as it is in the rest of the world. The thing I find the most amusing about this though is that while most top executives carry their Ipads to work, or college students take notes on their laptops in class while they simultaneously wirelessly search the internet, the technology in classrooms is actually pretty archaic. I think that I've noted this in posts before. Let me give you a few examples: the oh-so-coveted smartboard (an enormous piece of equipment that many teachers cannot even use properly that only allows a few students at a time to interact with it manually), my class computers (although I am very grateful for them, are PCs that run on an old server, an older version of word, and are all plugged into the wall), laptop carts (I haven't actually seen one of these at my school, but I've heard they exist and I imagine the technology is far from up to date), and the age-old overhead projector (which is actually being phased out at my school for document cameras, but we have what looks like an overhead projector graveyard in the library right now).

If Coleman found that in 1966 an increased spending on schools was not directly increasing student achievement than what are we doing spending all of this money on technology? Now this is not to say that I do not see the value in educational spending, because believe me I DO, nor is to say that I don't want those Nooks in my classroom this year because I DO, but I just hope that we are figuring out where the right places to spend are. Sociologists frequently harp on the fact that Coleman's report found that it was not so much school spending on resources that effected student outcomes but instead it was about student background and socioeconomic status. If technology is not helping close gaps, then we need to find out what truly is the difference between the experience of a successful high SES student and an unsuccessful low SES student and spend money on filling those gaps. Now we are getting into examining the whole child and what gaps exist between students from different SES levels, and I could go on about this for a long time. I believe that what it comes down to are gaps in cultural capital. Initially, we may have thought that technology fits into the category of cultural capital, but maybe this study says it doesn't. It may just be another resource that is not closing the gaps as Coleman said.

In my next post I will talk about the gaps we are creating/sustaining with cultural capital, how I suggest to avoid creating/sustaining those gaps, and how I plan to address it this year with MY STUDENTS!

A picture to leave you with...an explosion of resources that were not being used by a veteran teacher at my school. Coleman would not support. To my dismay, and eventual amusement this is how I found my classroom about 7 days before school began.

Luckily the cabinets were miraculously emptied before I went to dispose of everything in them.

Hidden Behind the Financial Crisis

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/08/education/08educ.html?_r=1&scp=2&sq=arne%20duncan&st=cse

As I was sitting down to my usual breakfast and paper reading, trying to find something somewhat upbeat to read I came across this article. Hidden on page 10 of the NYtimes I found out about this new piece of legislation that is sure to change accountability standards nationwide.

I know we are in a crisis, but I don't want this to go unnoticed.

Faces of My Students

I officially miss all of my students. After a pretty challenging year I was not sure that this was going to happen, but it hit me over a week ago and I can't quite shake the excitement to see them again and to meet my new students. Over the course of the summer I have gotten texts from a few students, 1 prank phone call, tutored a student, and even ran into one of my students in person. Today I found a note in a pair of pants (that apparently need to be dry cleaned) that said, "Ms. S my favorite teacher "

I knew that teaching was an important step in my career as I fight relentlessly to close the achievement gap, but it was not until this summer that I realized the meaning that it would have for me. As I observe people who work at the district level it seems that each one of them has a story about their past students that informs their daily decision making. I got to experience this first hand as I sat at a luncheon for the Freedom Schools two weeks ago. The summer school students were all at this lunch with tons of big donors and other influential people in the district and halfway through the event the students broke out into this great song

http://youtu.be/cyVzjoj96vs

Aside from the song being moving, especially when sung by disadvantaged students of all ages, I could not help but see my students' faces in the faces of the students before me. My eyes welled up with tears as I watched one student who looked so much like a student of mine from the MS Delta, and then looked over to another student who was a younger version of one of my most challenging students this year. I tried really hard not to embarrass myself in front of all of the influential people (or the students), holding back tears with all of my might. Since this happened it's happened in almost every meeting, interview, or conversation that I get to be a part of. I can't help but put a face to everything that I am doing this summer and it all becomes so much more relevant.

Student advocacy has been a big topic in the news lately, or it is "trending" right now. In this article in the NYtimes the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is referenced multiple times as supporting grass-roots advocacy groups and even providing grants to encourage advocacy. I keep finding myself talking about advocacy after reading this article and thinking about how much it would help our school system if we just picked a few students (in my case many more than a few) to advocate for. I feel that if we focus on advocacy and the power that people have, a powerful movement will begin. So get the ball rolling, think of your children/favorite student/cousin/neighbor and start to advocate for him/her/them for a better education, and if they don't need an advocate then I have many students that do, so call me up and I will share a story.

Summer Off?

So you may all be thinking to yourselves, "what do teachers do during the summer?" Well, hopefully I will do a whole lot more blogging! Many teachers take the entire summer off in order to refresh themselves for the new school year, many of my teacher friends will spend the summer traveling, sitting by the pool, and trying out new recipes. I, however, will be spending my summer a little bit differently. I was given an amazing opportunity to work for Charlotte Mecklenburg Schools this summer shadowing a district superintendent. The superintendent who I am working for oversees 49 of the Title 1 elementary schools in the district. I will spend the summer going to meetings with him, and also working on a project that will hopefully have some impact on the district in the future (more on this next post). I started this week after a very nice week off visiting friends and family in Philly and NYC. We work 10 hour work days during the summer so that we have Fridays off! I spent most of my time this week getting to know the staff in the office, and observing how things run.

In addition to work life I also signed up for my yoga studio's summer challenge. If I do 50 classes in the 70 day time period I get 3 months free. I am going to think of it as replacing my crazy equestrian life with yoga. I am really looking forward to this summer challenge, and I am already 4 classes in. I also will be doing a lot of cooking this summer, and exploring my inner vegan. I've been a vegetarian since I was six so I am going to attempt veganism. This is partially motivated by my beautiful sister who will not be able to stay true to her veganism this summer, I am going to try to stick to it for her.

Please stay tuned and keep me motivated to blog throughout the summer. I will not be able to share all details of my internship, but can't wait to start blogging about lessons that I learn! Happy Summer Everyone!

Judgement Day!

Tomorrow my students take their North Carolina reading EOG (end of grade) assessment. We have technically been preparing for this all year. I say "technically", because for a very long time I was very against this frequently debated idea of "teaching to the test." I also have tried very hard this year to create a curriculum that is based on the study of literature and not so much the study of the End of Grade reading EOG. A lot of this was motivated by college discussions when we studied how teaching to the test leads to low student achievement, and boring curriculums, and how limiting it is in a classroom setting. I've learned throughout this year that in reality test preparation needs to happen so that students are given the chance to be successful on the test.

My PD and learning team leader for Teach For America both worked with me to develop a strong plan for test preparation and my students and I have stuck to that plan from spring break until now. I gave students a diagnostic EOG before spring break and then had them grade them when we got back and create mastery plans for themselves based on which objectives they missed. I then created 6 tutoring sessions that were based on different skills that students needed to work on and personally invited students to these (luring them there with snacks of course!). Students followed a rigorous schedule, taking two practice tests a week, a concept quiz, and a number of skills-based warm ups everyday. I never thought that I would spend three weeks on test prep with my students, but it seemed absolutely essential for them to get that review and practice with multiple choice (we've been taking short answer assessments all year long).

I call this post "judgement day" because that is what tomorrow truly is for me. The reading EOG is really the biggest measure of success for me for the year. The goal is for all of my students to ultimately show strong growth on the test from the scores from previous years. We have predicted growth that the students should make based on their past scores, and students who have scored similarly to them in the state. Unfortunately, this test is what tells me if I have helped those students grow. I have already had my year-end teaching evaluation and all of that went fine, but at the end of the day I joined Teach For America to make a difference in students' lives and this test tells me whether or not I made that difference.

I understand that there are plenty of qualitative factors that exemplify the difference that I've made, but quantitatively this test is what matters. I have some pretty bad testing anxiety already, and I am not even taking the test tomorrow! In order to calm my nerves (and my students) we are going to meditate before the test tomorrow. I am bringing a delicious and healthy breakfast for my homeroom (these are the students who I am with for testing). I also purchased bottled water which I am labeling with each student's name and a motivational message to help them get through.

So as you conclude your weekend please hold me and my students in the light tomorrow and wish us luck! In the meantime I will be labeling water bottles and baking.