More faces, more poverty

First of all, I want to be clear that I understand poverty crosses over into many, many lives.  I live in an affluent town. A town with a food pantry that is routinely emptied.  People in this town are foreclosed upon, bankrupt, lose homes to tax liens.But what I know is the environment in which I work. Last week we had to serve lunch in the classroom because the cafe-gym-atorium was being used for a play.  I had 22 students in attendance that day. Twenty-one qualified for free lunch.  One child qualified for reduced lunch. Zero pay full cost. What's the poverty percentage for that 21 of 22? Ninety-five percent. If you've never seen the income requirements for free and reduced lunch click here.Poverty and the trauma that results in families is a complicated thing. I am not an expert, I am an observer. And from what I observe some very vulnerable beings, 9 year olds, thrive - or try to thrive - under some very appalling conditions.Ruby Payne has written an exemplary book, A Framework for Understanding Poverty. I read it over and over to try to get a handle on the cultural differences, the hidden rules of poverty, of the middle-class, of wealthy people. Each time I do, I uncover something more to think about, some way I can be more effective, more understanding of the challenges facing my students - 95 percent of whom are well below the poverty level.It is a book I recommend to educational colleagues. Understanding is power.

Faces of Poverty

If you look, if you don't avert your eyes, you can see the effects of poverty and trauma on a person.One of "my" parents happened to come to the classroom this week so I could confirm she was indeed the parent of one of my students. This was so that the student could be released early to her; the parent was not carrying a picture id.On first glance, she looks older than me. Her shoulders and body frame seem stooped, she shuffles somewhat. This day, however, as we chatted, I noticed her face. Her skin does not sag as mine does now, her eyes lack wrinkles; those wrinkles are reserved for worry spots - the brow, her forehead.She carries the weight of her family's problems: her husband has been in a nasty public hospital since before Christmas. Her children are her world, all four of them - she lost a fifth child a few years ago to illness. The family's new apartment, an apartment they recently found after living in a shelter, was recently the scene of a Keystone Cops-style criminal gun chase. To hear my student tell the story the police chased a suspect right through the front door and out the back with guns drawn.Honestly, I don't know how this woman holds herself together. The daily barrage of trying to survive in such a hostile environment would do more than make me look older. She must be one of the most resilient of spirits that I have ever met!And she is a face to remember. A face of poverty in our land of plenty.

It's the Vocabulary, Part 2

I marvel at the quickness with which second language learners pick up on the structure of English. Most of my kids give new constructs a try without too much fear of seeming like they don't know what they're doing.  As an aside -- and as an Italian/French language" studier", I wish I could be more like them. Maybe then I would actually start to learn another language.Putting the constructs aside, however, the great big deterrent for kids is vocabulary and idiomatic expressions. Even in children's literature. Case in point, this month's Response to Literature was based on the story "City Green" by Dyanne DiSalvo-Ryan. One of the major characters, Old Man Hammer,  transforms throughout the course of the story and we ask the students to respond to how that character changed.Problem number 1: the character's name. Most of my kids were familiar with the term "Hammer" but had absolutely no idea that Hammer could be someone's last name. And why would they? Once we finally got past the fact that a hammer could be a tool and someone's name, we had to deal with the expression "hard as nails". Wait a minute! Nails are things you glue on to your fingers, right? Or something you hammer to hang up a picture? What does being as hard as a nail have to do with some old guy?Here's just one place where students with another language background struggle. Now layer on a high-stakes reading test which uses grade level texts similar to "City Green". And take away the vocabulary and language support provided by the teacher. Seems to me that the playing field is already seriously unlevelled. My students will have to jump over the hurdle of vocabulary before they can even show that they can respond to a text with the same level of finesse that their native English-speaking counterparts do.I'm thinking of this as I prepared another grade level mentor text that I want to use to revisit inferencing this coming week.  The book's title alone, "Tight Times" will probably cause some confusion. The vocabulary support, the explanations of idiomatics will be there so that we can focus on inferencing a plot with which most of these students will have copious familiarity: losing jobs and living frugally.The students will be able to access the comprehension skill, they will be able to apply it to another similar text ("Gettin' Through Thursday"). And we will troubleshoot the vocabulary and idiomatic expressions to assist them. Test scores don't tell the whole story, particularly when so much vocabulary presents such a significant impediment.

There is nothing like a snow day!

Okay, while I don't like to have to make them up, we needed this snow day. Every school year needs one.  And this one is a lollapolloza. The weather dudes predicted it way in advance. And while no one believed them (the last 2 snowstorms were duds), they stuck to their forecasts.Our current superintendent of schools comes from the Canadian Maritimes. It snows there. Lots. So over the last couple of years, we have come to expect to have to go to school when it's snowing. Because it's New England. It snows. Get over it.You can imagine my delight - and surprise - when the school department's communication system robo-called last night with the new that there would be no school today. Even though over 500 eastern MA school systems had already called school, I didn't expect to learn whether or not I'd be going in until the morning. Whoo-hoo! Bring out the french toast!And the actual snow fall? I'm looking at about 24 inches on my patio table right now. This time the weather dudes were correct. Good for them! No matter how much of a pain in the behind the clean up will be, there is nothing like a snow day to make us all feel like kids again.

Responding to bullies

I don't like being blindsided any more than anyone else. So this week when our school social worker relayed to me that one of my student's parents said her child was being bullied, I was taken aback. As a Responsive Classroom, we continually work on appropriate social interactions. As part of the Making Meaning program, a large piece of instructional time goes in to socially acceptable ways to agree or disagree, to dialogue with peers.Nevertheless, the parent's concern was laid out and, as is required by law in Massachusetts, we address such concerns seriously. We are revisiting bullying this week.I usually begin discussions of bullying by trying to figure out if students can define what bullying is and what it is not. It was amazing to me that sometimes kids think when a peer tells them to "shut up" that they feel they have been bullied. In the past, I've handled such events in the classroom with discussion between the involved students which ends with a plan the students themselves concoct for more polite interaction. But now, once the student or parent of the victim has raised the topic of bullying, there are formal procedures and documentation that need completion. What was at one time simple, has become complex. Which is what happens when we try to legislate every aspect of human behavior, isn't it?So this coming week, I will once again assist my students in defining what bullying is (for my third graders: repeated times that someone (or a group) makes you feel unsafe or uncomfortable). We will read age-appropriate literature like The Recess Queen as a jumping off point. We will role model. We will talk. And we will write, because sometimes my kids feel safer when they don't have to say the words out loud.I was thinking of all of this as I watched the shootings in Tuscon, Arizona unfold yesterday afternoon. Are we, the adults in our society modeling socially acceptable ways to agree or disagree when we get so incensed about another point of view that we can no longer listen to what is being said? What kind of a model for civilized discourse is in our own adult interaction - political or otherwise - when we can't even  agree to disagree without threatening? Frankly, the Sheriff in Pima County, Clarence Dupnik, has it right.It is something to ponder.

Overheard in the hallway

They make me laugh some times.In all seriousness, one of my students asked me "Mrs. Bisson, is a hellno bad?"What? And my little friend repeated the question patiently.Now this student who came to us last year from Gambia, speaks with a heavily African influenced accent.Perhaps I'm not hearing her? So I asked her to repeat and she did. Verbatim.Still no comprehension on my part. I looked at her peers who were equally serious and intent on finding the answer: "Is a hellno bad?"Exasperated and in all sincerity, one of them looked right at me and spoke slowly and clearly enunciating each syllable (for the aged and decrepit?):"You know, a hell no. Is that a bad word?"And then it dawned on me. I confessed I had heard some people use those words (guilty) and while the words are not "bad", polite people don't use them in polite company -- like a school.Oh, they make me laugh some times.

Redirection

It came to me as a sleep-filled message.One of my current charges is a real behavioral headache. This child has witnessed more trauma than anyone should, let alone anyone who is just 9 years old. And, as you might expect, the child has many behavioral tics that get in the way of his -- and everyone else's learning.Even when he has taken medication, prescribed for ADHD and PTSD after behavior modification just didn't seem to be the answer, he has difficulty knowing boundaries and behaving within our classroom norms and ground rules. If one student gets some attention from me he immediately seeks the same. He is an intelligent student, one for whom mastering third grade standards is not a problem.  Yet this need for validation  is exhausting for both of us -- for him, to constantly feel the need to find validation from his teacher.With just two days left until the school year begins again, I have started churning what I can do for my students to redirect them, to make our classroom engaging. For this student, I already felt the dread and pressure of continual interruptions for me to drop everything and give attention - something that needs to be resisted. And the answer came to me: with firmness and consistency, teach the student to self-reflect, to look at his own work and decide for himself if it is his best.If I can do this, and I must succeed to really be this child's teacher, he will take with him wherever he goes. We all need to learn self-reflection; we need to look at what we've accomplished and decide for ourselves if it is or is not our best effort. And isn't that a lesson far more important than anything else I can give him? 

A Time to Take Stock

I am not a big fan of New Year's resolutions. In fact, most years, I just blow them off -- why does one day signify the starting point for change more than any other?During this vacation - yet another perk of working in a school system is the week off between Christmas and New Year's Day - I've begun to read Eat, Pray, Love. Even after finishing just half of it, I'm finding a real connection to this book. Although much older than the author, I've felt the same, wanted to search for the same inner peace.During last month of school, both student and professional demands made for a very stress-filled and difficult time.  If you're in education, you know what I'm talking about and if you're not, you'd probably not understand it anyway, so I won't waste energy on a list. Less is more. Worrying, wondering how we'll meet our financial obligations. Adjusting to life as a almost-retiree (5 more years!). All of it has taken a toll.Yet, when I look back on 2010, while I am "done" with it, I still feel fortunate. Just breathing is a victory. There have been moments when the opposite seemed a desirable alternative. So I celebrate that I am here and I get another opportunity to set things right.What kinds of resolutions do I hope and pray for? For one, I want to be less OCD about my professional life. This week, I've awakened several mornings at the late hour of 7 am to find that there actually can be daylight. In place of leaving my house at 6 am, would the world be any less well off if I left at 7?What to do with that "extra" hour in the morning? I keep reading about the effects of  sleep deprivation - which has been a way of life for about 5 years now. Maybe I'll just sleep. Or meditate. Or do something entirely selfish like read a book or listen to music. Or exercise.But maybe I'll just sleep. That's a place to start.  

Thanks But No Thanks

It happened that I was sitting at my desk during my lunch, reading the local newspaper, when I spotted an article about new ethics requirements for teachers who receive gifts from students. How ironic that this discovery was on the day before our Holiday break -- and that 5 students had given me a Christmas present that very day!The new regs seem like a knee jerk reaction to some larger issue, and far removed from the tokens that kids bring to their teachers. It's not as if the students I have from families with limited monetary resources are buying me a day at the spa. The geniuses behind this regulation  can make all the noise they want about "bribery" and undue influence as evidenced by a present for teacher. If a good grade or college recommendation can be "bought" with a $25 Dunkin Donuts card, image what $250 could buy.  Valedictorian?So this morning, in addition to handwriting thank-you notes -- because THAT's the polite and accepted social norm  I want to model for my kids -- I dug through the mass.gov website and found the form I need to complete. I'm including the link here for anyone else teaching in the Commonwealth's public schools (hmmm, do Charter School teachers need to do this too?).Despite my appeal for no gifts (I have a treasured collection of notes from students),  some parents and students still give gifts at certain points in the year,  Christmas being one of those times. I dread Valentine's Day -- I'll have to refile this form for every cardboard box of candy a student brings.So here's what I've needed to declare in order to disclose "the appearance of a conflict of interest" (I kid you not, this is the title on the form!):

• 2 packages of Ferrero Rocher chocolates
• 1 Country Apple bath set
• 1 Cherry Blossom bath set (hmmmm, are the kids trying to tell me something?)
• 1 dozen butter cookies in a ziplock baggie
• a 2009-2010 calendar (priceless!)
• hand lotion and a jar candle
• handmade eggrolls to share with the class and 1 chocolate homemade cupcake

I might add that, in the spirit of not allowing presents to impact my professional decisions, I did complete a behavior report on one of the gift-givers after the students aimed a pencil at another student in the classroom (missed!) and used inappropriately foul language.Good grief!

Following Your Bliss

This morning's Boston Globe contained an article about a (former) software engineer who had recently turned teaching yoga full-time.  Struck by similarities to our circumstances, got me thinking about my own career.It is not a secret that recent developments in the field of education are not all that enjoyable for practitioners. We worry if our next false step will lead to public reprimand, or worse. We deal in the complexities of humans, not in the predictability of widgets. Those who think we can easily apply all of the manufacturing or business principles - the very ideas that make for successful businesses - need to consider the human condition more seriously. There are just so many things over which a teacher has control and that is what makes education interesting.In my 20s, I was at turns a bookkeeper and a customer support person. I held a dream of getting an MBA and making my fortune. It was, however, not to be. The software company for which I worked went belly-up leaving me - and many others - without 2 months of pay and with no job. Without the credentials of a B-school graduate, I was left at a crossroad: either accept a secretarial position and start again, or really start again - find what makes you happy.It took several years of introspection to get me to the point where I yielded to the draw education has for me. But, once the decision to return to school was made, I never looked backward. Awkward moments at corporate gatherings aside (at that time, educators were leaving teaching to carve our a career in corporate), a career in education has been for me, the bliss I was seeking.I tried those private sector career moves before I came to teaching. The pundits and politicians can try to erode the enthusiasm and wonder with which I approached teaching from a start now more than 20 years ago. Following the one thing I was meant to do has been a joy a privilege, worth more than the tangible trappings of a more lucrative career.Without regret I have, and continue to follow my bliss.

What the Tour Bus Would Miss....

Junia Yearwood is quickly becoming one of my favorite Boston Globe reads. The article, "If Only Visitors Could See My Students", provides insight into an urban classroom -- and warns of the dangers of believing what one reads or learns via the fifth estate.  So, here is what visitors might miss in my classroom.The quiet girl who transferred in about 2 months ago. Homeless, her family had been living in a local hotel until recently. She is an accomplished reader and is becoming an accomplished writer; a sadness envelopes her most of the day. She write poetry and song lyrics in her native Spanish - and then translates them for all of us to enjoy when she musters the courage to open herself to sharing. In her journal she writes about her father who died suddenly in hospital. If a classmate is in trouble, she is the first to help or provide support. While her mother works the night shift, she watches over a school-age younger brother and 2 twin babies. In her eyes you can see the strain of having to be responsible beyond her chronological years.Engaging and social, nearly always the center of things, the student sitting next cannot read. Oh he tries, but the brain connection between what he sees on paper and what he is able to do disconnects. He has no IEP, yet struggles to read at a beginning grade 1 level. The process for getting him evaluated for special education services may take an entire year of data collection. Meanwhile, he and I do the best we can to make the connections.When he is working with me, he is serious. He wants to learn to read but is terrified his friends will find out that he can't.The next student is a better-than-average third grade student with the potential to be brilliant. He has told me he wants to be a scholar and a scientist. He is a big boy - as wide as he is tall. Though he is often in someone's personal body space, he cannot help himself. Oh how I hope he comes back to visit when he grows to be comfortable with himself! And how I hope he'll hold on to that dream of becoming a scholar and a scientist even when so many temptations surround him that would take him off the path to his goal.Another nearby student exasperates with his absent-mindedness. His brain is working all of the time, though,  and when he expresses an insight into reading, it is mind-blowing. He is convinced he is bad and talks about how his "bad" alter ego needs to take a hike. He is the only student I've ever taught who was convinced he was on Santa's naughty list - and gave detailed reasons why and how he was planning to change the situation. Here is child who is used to people who expect little of him. He hoards food from our breakfast program and from the cafeteria at lunch. Is his family unable to put food on the table? My guess is yes.So many hardworking, complicated students. It is not simply the academics in an urban classroom. As Junia Yearwood points out, a visitor would witness the will of the human spirit to overcome what life has dealt. It is the spirit of my students that inspires, that keeps all of us coming back to work another day.

Where the responsibility lies

Junia Yearwood wrote in an OpEd piece in the Boston Globe this week that it takes a culture that values learning to educate a child. I couldn't agree with this more. What is valued in our culture? I don't believe it is intelligence and learning if pop culture is any indication.What struck me as poignantly true was this quotation found in the middle of the piece:

Blaming us, the teachers, absolves all others of their complicity in the failure to educate our students and relieves them of all responsibility for solving the problem. It’s expedient. Yet until we accept collective responsibility for the problem and for finding a permanent solution, progress will remain an elusive phantom.

It is indeed easy to blame educators for our students' failures. It makes closed minds feel much better because there is someone to blame for the failure of education. Even when the elephant in the room can no longer be ignored, politicians and leaders find it more to their liking to blame the practitioners and look for a quick fix. I am not saying that there aren't areas where education and educators can improve. Of course education is not perfect and neither am I. Nonetheless, the truth is that it is far more easy to blame teachers for all the ills of education when the problems affecting student achievement are far more complicated.How many times do we have to show our children that learning is for nerds and eggheads -- even those terms are a pejorative. What stereotypical imagery do we employ when referring to females who go into mathematics? When our society as a whole changes from treating intelligence and high achievement in learning as something to be valued, we will have made a giant step toward a permanent fix.

No, They're Not Kidding Me

Yesterday during the first of three meetings I attended, we heard the news: next spring third and fourth grade teachers can expect their report card grades to be correlated to student performance on MCAS. And, I suppose, since that's what happened last year, graphs and tables will be created into Powerpoint slide shows identifying each teacher's result. No, they're not kidding.At least with Reading Grades, the selected standard (no, not every standard will be targeted) - Comprehension of Fiction and Nonfiction - makes sense to me. The math standard - Communication, does not. I don't know how students can communicate on grade level when they can't conserve number in counting, don't know what a digit's value is, and still can't add or subtract basic math facts through 18. But, no they are not kidding me.Here's what concerns me about this data collection and what the data means:

• The MCAS test is challenging for any third grader. My understanding -- and I've gotten used to not understanding anything in education -- is that the test includes items beyond grade level expectation.  Won't these items skew the result? And then make my personal report card assessment look inflated?
• The MCAS is a third graders first experience with standardized testing. It is unnerving to a 8- or 9-year old. Won't that also deflate the kids' scores?
• MCAS is a snapshot moment in time (2 days for the Reading test). What if on one or more of those 2 days, the student comes to school upset about something outside of the home (mom and dad were fighting, mom/dad left home, electricity was turned off, we were kicked out of our apartment)? I teach traumatized students and each of these events HAS happened to one or more of my students during MCAS. How will that affect the students' MCAS scores on one or more of those 2 days?

I see my students for 180 days each academic year. I get to know them and about them - sometimes it is too much information. I assign report card grades after looking at many, many assessments - formal and informal, paper and observational. I do my best to provide an opinion of progress representative of how I see the student meeting grade level standards in the classroom -- and I do not base this assessment on a 2-day high-stakes, anxiety ridden test.Someone please tell me where these results are going? What is the agenda here? Is this going to turn in to more fodder for proving I am shiftless and lazy? That I don't know what I am doing? Because this data collection is pretty scary and no, I am not kidding you.

How in the heck did this happen?

I've been confronted with my age ta couple of times this weekend. It was not an altogether pleasant trip down memory lane.Woodstock Then and Now was on the History Channel last night. In the summer of 1969, I was a junior, about to be senior, in high school. A couple of my classmates went to Woodstock - they were legends.  Last night's show featured clips of musicians and attendees (half a million of them!)  and some really great music - overlayed shots from 1969 with flash forwards to current times.  Country Joe looks like a middle-aged software engineer (he's not). The couple who were on the cover of the Woodstock soundtrack  album - yes, album - commented throughout. They look like a nice, middle-aged couple. Respectable. Who knew?In an earlier conversation, I was describing the big deal it was for my sister and me to see the Sound of Music when it debuted. My grandmother had to get box office tickets from the movie theater in Buffalo, NY -- we were visiting her.  Can you imagine? At that point my son told me "You are old!" Well, I guess I am, but I don't feel that old.Life is passing by a lightning speed. When I look in the mirror, I want to see the girl who used to wear electric blue eye shadow and long straight hair -- what is looking back at me is a much older model of that face with much more conservative bows to fashion. No more electric blue for me -- no more fringey tops or bell bottoms either. Maybe that's not such a bad thing.I'd better get cracking on that bucket list!

A Thanksgiving Tale

It's really easy for me to get wrapped around the axel over lack of parental support in a school where poverty is pervasive. I've had 3 teacher assistant team meetings for one child so far this year. The parent never attends and never responds to the meeting invitations. This parent continually writes nasty notes about me, the school, and the classroom. My frustration over no-shows for meetings to remedy this, to conference about the student's progress, or anything else that might involve a little parental effort is only exceeded by the daily interruptions to our afternoon to change a dismissal routine (and I know routine as applied to this student is an oxymoron). This is only 1 story in this classroom.  The other 21 can be just as interesting.Or not. Yesterday offered a glimmer of hope that by inviting parents in, we can forge a working relationship to benefit students.My class has just finished writing our small moment narratives and we put each students' writing into a book which we "published". Yesterday, the half-day before Thanksgiving break, students invited a parent or loved one in to read our inaugural book, to be complimented on their contribution. Knowing some parents may not be able to leave work, I had prepared students whose parent might not be able to come that I, too, had been a working mom -- and offered to be their parent for the celebration.  Being third graders, this of course led to some hilarious moments as classmates considered themselves "brothers" or "sisters" -- if only for an hour.But, back to the topic - getting frustrated with the status quo can lead to lowered expectations. Yesterday, however, helped me to realize that maybe I am focusing on the wrong things.  I met so many parents - sometimes both parents AND a grandparent - who were able to come, to hear their child read their thoughts and writing. One parent offered to help me pass out the apple juice we were offering, another stood in to read with a friend of her own child. And our school administration - Principal, Assistant Principal, and Literacy Specialist - all graciously read with each and every child in the room.The energy, the enthusiasm was right there. It could not be missed. Something special transpired yesterday and not just for the students. On this Thanksgiving Day, I am thankful for the administrators who support me.And I am most thankful for the parents of my students who are willing to share themselves and their child with me.

If life hands you apples, make.... applesauce!

Over the past couple of weeks, we've been investigating the colonial period through our guided reading groups. With my Safety Net 1 group (yes, I have two safety net groups), the texts' readability levels are far beyond instructional level so mainly it looks like a shared reading session.  The book we're reading, the most basic text I could locate, is "Colonial Life", courtesy of my Reading A-Z subscription (BTW, one of the best purchases I've ever made).Yesterday we were reading about breakfast in colonial times. The text has a nice graphic of a table set for breakfast - which included a bowl of apples.Me hopefully leading the students to a comparison: "Do we ever eat fruit at breakfast time?"Student: "No. Never."This exchange happened as the students were consuming their mid-morning snack - items "leftover" from the breakfast bags which included applesauce. The look of incredulity was priceless when I pointed out that applesauce came from, well.... apples! And, according to the food services managers, that is a fruit.As one student observed, "Oh that's why there's a picture of an apple on the lid!" -- the peel back foil covering.Still not believing me, the kids were full of questions as to how apples turn in to applesauce.  And, had I had supplies with me, I would have done just that with them.Somehow, I've got to work more experiential learning into this classroom!

A Reason to Vote

I heard a statistic over the weekend: just short of 60 percent of registered voters will vote in this year's hotly contended elections. That statistic, 60 percent, would be considered an overwhelmingly successful election. But consider this back-story:  the 60 percent is about half of those eligible to vote. That right -- there are adults in this country that don't even register to vote! Mindboggling, isn't it?As inconvenient as getting to polls might be for some (really, couldn't we have a 2-day weekend voting period like some European countries?), I will be standing in line this afternoon after hassling for a parking spot at my local polling place. It is my obligation and my duty to do so.  Why?Women, of course, were not permitted to vote until the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920. I think of this most every Election Day when I waltz in, state my address, and get my own ballot with no problem whatsoever. I marvel at the strength of women of the early 20th century who organized and demanded their rights to vote, their rights to be treated more like human beings than property. I think of my great grandmother, Minnie Palmer Flournoy, whose strength and courage to march with suffragettes makes voting all the more meaningful for me.Minnie Palmer Flournoy was left a widow with 2 children -  a toddler and a baby - after a train accident killed her husband  in the early 1890s. The grief of losing your husband in a place far from your family (at the time, she lived in Albany, NY far from her Missouri relatives) was compounded by the cavalier way the railroad and its lawyers sent her off without any compensation for this tragedy: I have a handwritten response from the railroad's attorney offering no culpability on the railroad's part, but a token "gift" of $500. Minnie eventually moved back to Missouri with her parents and worked throughout her life at jobs women were allowed to do: seamstress and rooming house keeper. From family stories she was by all accounts a strong, smart woman; a woman who raised two successful children on her own.  When women began to demand rights to vote, I imagine she was on board fairly quickly.The movement to gain the vote for women began with a speech by Susan B. Anthony in 1873 and ended with the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920. The years and effort of my forebears to obtain this right does not go unappreciated or unnoticed by me.Today, I'll make my way to my local polling place and proudly remember those women who endured mocking, were castigated and rebuked for standing up for their convictions. And I will vote.

Reason #1: I touch the future... I teach

Some years ago -- probably more than 10 now that I think of it -- I was eating my lunch at a MassCUE conference when Grace Corrigan sat down with her tray. That name may or may not mean anything to some, but it was an exceptional thrill for me to sit and chat, however briefly with the mother one of my education heroes, Christa McAuliffe.Sharon Christa McAuliffe may have faded from some memories, but not from mine. When the Challenger explosion happened, I was in the midst of my career rebirth -- the M.Ed. program at University of Lowell -- and my own child was a first grader. I still think of the day Challenger burst into flames to the horror of everyone watching and I'm willing to bet that any child who happened to be watching the event on the television that day, certainly can recall it vividly.While I did not know Christa McAuliffe personally, her choice to train to be the first teacher in space, was a huge impact on me. For me, teaching is not about following what is expected. It is about learning to take chances, to try new things, to have a curiosity about life and parlaying those opportunities into moments of educational euphoria.  It is not about the safety of doing what we've gotten used to; it is being on the edge of disaster or success and not necessarily knowing how things turn out until much later. And for me, that is what Christa McAuliffe inspired in me on day she boarded a space shuttle for what should have been the adventure of a lifetime.So many years later, I try to remember this when experts tell me to be successful I need to do this, that or the other thing. Education, even in the era of unprecedented scrutiny where taking chances on what might work seems tougher and tougher to do, needs to be about trying new things even while being mindful of standards and accountability.Christa McAuliffe's mission ended in a tragedy that those of us on the sidelines can barely appreciate. The loss to her family, her friends, her colleagues, her students had to be immeasurable. But her courage, her insatiable curiosity inspires me to keep on taking chances no matter what the odds.

Life in the pressure cooker

Elementary level teachers notice it. If the moon is full, if there it is a windy day, students seem more than a bit wired.  Are kids hypersensitive?I got to thinking about this idea because my students have seemed just a bit more unfocused than usual. There is no full moon and it hasn't been remarkable windy, so what gives?Actually I feel like the explanation is fairly basic. It is no secret that educators are feeling pressure: pressure to raise test scores, pressure to overcome lack of materials needed for teaching, ever dwindling classroom assistance, pressure to be all to some very needy students.We rush to stay on task ourselves and get annoyed with students who balk at transitions. We rush, rush, rush to get from place to place, from lunch to recess, from the bathroom to our classroom. Is it any wonder that our kids act out, that their behaviors telegraph their resistance?Knowing, or thinking that I know, the root cause for students' misbehavior is one thing. But until we all can get off the hamster wheel, students will balk and we will deal. 

Standing on the shoulders of...

Emily Rooney's Greater Boston panel discussed the connection between a teacher's despondency and suicide and a recent LA Times article which ranked teachers by name. One can argue the stupidity of people who don't understand educational issues and all of the things that impact students. One can argue about the current need to equate education with business practice, i.e. "value added". But what I really don't get is how anyone can think testing in one grade level isn't impacted by what has happened before.Case in point: my current group of students includes 11 students reading at the first grade level. I teach third grade. I am not one of the two special education inclusion classes this year. This group of children is "regular" education, or as I prefer to say, my sped students haven't yet been identified.Where I will start teaching this year is not based on some immovable starting line. Where these students finish may not be at "grade" level.Will they get better? Will they improve as readers and writers? You had better believe that they will. But I am not the second coming and it is statistically doubtful that we can close a gap of 2 years within the 10 months (or 6 until MCAS Reading) we are working together. In other words, my students' learning and my ability to help them move along is based on what they have been able to do before they got to third grade.The class dynamic is quite a challenge even for a teacher with 23+ years experience. Traumas, poverty (2 of my students are living in welfare hotels), custody battles, ELL challenges, indifferent parenting....  this particular group of students, and their classmates in other homerooms are impacted by it all.  I often hear people talking about "last year's second grade"; they don't look wistful in their reminiscence.There's a history here; there's a dynamic with this group that has been present since they first arrived in the building. It spills over into the academics over and over throughout the day, impacting not only that one child's learning, but the other children's as well.What I am trying to say is that no one teacher is responsible for a students' progress. No teacher should be singled out by name in a newspaper article as ineffective. Education is a collaboration. It starts the minute a student steps in to a school. We are standing on the shoulders of what has happened before and we are reaching for the sky.