Seeing Things from the Other Side, Part II: On Being a Linguistic Minority

Waterfall at El Parque Nacionál in Uruapan

I have loved the Spanish language, and the culture and people of Latin America, almost since the very first day I walked into Ms. Britton's Spanish classroom on the first day of ninth grade. As little by little I grew in my ability to communicate in Spanish, I marveled at the idea that an entire world--hundreds of millions of paths of communication--were being opened to me. Until that time, there had existed an invisible and seemingly impermeable barrier between myself and the majority of the human race: now, it seemed I had the opportunity to chip away at a slight sliver in that barrier.

I listened carefully; I spoke with native speakers whenever possible; I practiced the language to the point that I'm sure I drove friends and family to the point of exasperation. I learned to place the tip of my tongue ever so slightly between my teeth when pronouncing "t" and "d"; I learned to ever-so-gently bounce the tip of my tongue off the roof of my mouth in pronouncing the single "r", and struggled (as I still do, sometimes,) to properly pronounce the double "r". I studied the grammar, I looked up vocabulary words, I began reading books in Spanish, and listening to Spanish-language radio stations. But I went even further: I learned to love the food of Mexico that was so readily available in my Southern California hometown, built friendships with and learned to love the culture of classmates and fellow Church-members of Latino and Chicano heritage, and I took great joy in the multitude of human connections I saw opening before me.

So it was that when, several years later, I began teaching, I had a special place in my heart for "English language learners," those students for whom English is not their first language--and especially for those students whose native language was Spanish. I did what I felt I could to connect with them, to support them, to help ease the cultural and linguistic transition. I thought that my knowledge of Spanish, and my experience in learning a second language, would help me to relate to them in some small way.

Now, after spending nearly a month in Uruapan, Mexico, I am starting to realize how little I understood (and how little I still understand) the emotional, psychological, and social experience of being a linguistic minority, especially in an academic setting.

The realization first hit me as I was attending a professional development workshop taught by my host on using collaborative games in the classroom. Even though my Spanish comprehension is decent, and I understood most of the main ideas of the workshop, there were still lapses in communication and moments in which I felt isolated because of my language. And, I had a new sympathy for those students who consistently shy away from participating in class when the instructor called on me (without warning) to comment on the activity we had just participated in. I understood what he was saying, I knew what I wanted to say, and I was even relatively sure I could find most of the words I needed to say it in Spanish. Somehow, though, in this room full of people for whom Spanish is not just a means of communication, but an integral part of their cultural and interpersonal identity, I felt like an interloper--somehow unqualified to try to express my thoughts in their language. This was different from speaking to a group of native Spanish speakers in California, or even casual one-on-one conversation with my host or my students; it was a formal, institutional setting in which Spanish was the accepted, expected form of communication. I did the best I could to express myself anyway, and I think I was successful, but I came away with a new understanding of the anxiety that comes with using a language other than one's own in such a setting.

I have also learned how easy it is to make unfounded assumptions about the intelligence of those who speak another language. I've always tried to remember, when working with students who are just learning English, that it isn't necessarily understanding they lack, but the vocabulary to express that understanding in a way I am able to understand. I think of myself as an intelligent, well-educated person, and I am working with some very intelligent, well-educated people here in Mexico--my host, for example, has two Master's Degrees, as well as a Medical Doctorate. While all of the people I have met have been incredibly kind, and have welcomed me with open arms, it is interesting how sometimes certain people seem to assume I lack much understanding of anything other than English--the subject I am teaching while I'm here. Of course it's not surprising--when I ask what must seem to them like an obvious question, I'm sure it is difficult to remember that I understand the underlying concept, it's the linguistic or cultural clothing the concept wears that needs explaining.

For example--recently, I took note, with some puzzlement, that many people here in Uruapan refer to this region as being a part of Central America. Now, while it's true that schools in the United States could probably do better in teaching geography, I definitely remember learning my continents. As I was taught, Canada, The United States, and Mexico comprised the North American Continental Plate, the nations of Central America (from Guatemala to Panama) sit on the Caribbean Plate, and the nations of South America (from Colombia and Venezuela Southward) sit on the South American Continental Plate. Thus, Mexico is the southern-most part of North America, as shown here. When I asked someone why they called this Central America, and what they defined as Central America, I had explained to me the existence of the equator, of latitude and longitude lines, and of the particular latitude lines that constitute the boundaries of the tropics. When I mentioned that we define the boundaries of North, Central, and South America a bit differently, I was told that "you North Americans are wrong, because you don't study geography." Rather than recognizing a linguistic and cultural difference, he assumed that my problem was simply a lack of knowledge or understanding--even attributing that lack of knowledge to an entire nation.

It may sound like a small issue, and it was, but I think it illustrates the larger barrier that still seems to exist as I try to understand and too be understood. The experience gave me pause--made me wonder how often I have unwittingly done the same thing to educated, intelligent individuals who happen to clothe their thoughts and understandings in a language other than my own.

It is frustrating, sometimes, as we struggle to understand each other, and as we wonder if we are really being understood--if the words into which we translate our thoughts really convey the sentiments we want to express. Even between to people who ostensibly speak the same language, such difficulties exist--how much more between those whose native languages separate them from one another. Language is indeed a fascinating phenomenon--so integral to our identities, yet so elusive to our understanding; both a bridge and a barrier; the journey I started in ninth grade continues, as I seek a more authentic connection with a wider portion of humanity.

Also, to be fair, only a few of my interactions here have been of the nature of the above described interchange; rather, for the most part I have been amazed and enthralled at the opportunities I have had, through the medium of the Spanish language, to connect with and understand facets of the human experience otherwise unavailable to me--hearing from a local perspective the struggles of the P'urhépecha--the people indigenous to Michoacán, or the first-hand account of an older gentleman who remembers the eruption of the Volcano of Paricutín in 1943 that destroyed two villages but somehow avoided the crucifix in the local church, not to mention the rich friendships I have already begun to build across linguistic and cultural boundaries. I am continually amazed at the doors language opens, and yet still I long for the time when I will see as I am seen, and know as I am known.

The Forgotten Dialect Of The Heart 

by Jack Gilbert

How astonishing it is that language can almost mean,
and frightening that it does not quite. Love, we say,
God, we say, Rome and Michiko, we write, and the words
get it all wrong. We say bread and it means according
to which nation. French has no word for home,
and we have no word for strict pleasure. A people
in northern India is dying out because their ancient
tongue has no words for endearment. I dream of lost
vocabularies that might express some of what
we no longer can. Maybe the Etruscan texts would
finally explain why the couples on their tombs
are smiling. And maybe not. When the thousands
of mysterious Sumerian tablets were translated,
they seemed to be business records. But what if they
are poems or psalms? My joy is the same as twelve
Ethiopian goats standing silent in the morning light.
O Lord, thou art slabs of salt and ingots of copper,
as grand as ripe barley lithe under the wind's labor.
Her breasts are six white oxen loaded with bolts
of long-fibered Egyptian cotton. My love is a hundred
pitchers of honey. Shiploads of thuya are what
my body wants to say to your body. Giraffes are this
desire in the dark. Perhaps the spiral Minoan script
is not a language but a map. What we feel most has
no name but amber, archers, cinnamon, horses, and birds.

Banana Trees in Patuán, 

My Teaching Space for the Summer

Seeing Things from the Other Side

As a history teacher, naturally I'm always intrigued by an opportunity to view social interactions from multiple angles and various points of view. As a teacher in a primarily Chicano and Latino community, the idea of teaching in Mexico has also long held significant attraction for me. So it should come as no surprise that I now find myself in Uruapan, Michoacán, Mexico for the summer, teaching an English Course from primary and secondary English teachers here, as a volunteer with the program "Sueños Compartidos."

I have been in Mexico for nearly two weeks now, and in Uruapan for about a week and a half. Aside from the breathtaking central Mexican countryside, the unparalleled gustatory opportunities, and the plethora of Colonial-Era historic sites (all of which have been remarkable), I have found the experience so far not only rewarding but surprisingly eye-opening. The program with which I volunteer partners with PROBEM (Programa Binacional de Educación Migrante) here in Michoacán--a division of the Department of Education tasked with meeting the needs of students who have returned to Michoacán after living in the United States for an extended period of time. Thus, the needs of these students as they make an sometimes difficult--and often unexpected--cultural transition, has provided a rich topic of discussion in my English class.

I never really imagined, as I worked to make my lessons accessible to English language learners and to make sure my classroom was a welcoming, inclusive environment for students of all cultural backgrounds, that teachers down here in Michoacán, on the other side of what has become a sort of migratory loop, were dealing with many of the same issues in reverse--supporting students who, upon returning from the United States, have limited academic skills in Spanish even though they may have done well in school in the United States--supporting the development of academic language, helping them integrate into what is, to them, a foreign school system, instilling in them a new set of social and cultural expectations, and so forth--not to mention the administrative obstacles that come with trying to transfer school records from one nation's school system to that of another.

Coming to understand this reality has not only created a sense of common bond with my counterparts here in Mexico, but has also caused me to re-evaluate the philosophy which underlies my support of migrant students in my own classroom. I have always tried to honor the diverse contributions my students bring to the classroom with them, whatever their background; I work especially hard to help students who do not see themselves as "American" to see that they can indeed become a part of the American mosaic without having to let go of their own cultural identity. However, as I reflect on the discussions I have had with teachers here, I realize that perhaps my task is a bit broader.than that. Generally, when a student from Mexico returns there, I have little or no warning; it doesn't occur with great frequency, but it does occur. I see now that, beyond helping students to find their place in the American mosaic, there is much I can do to help foster skills in dealing with novel situations, variety of culture, and differing expectations, that will help them to be more successful wherever they may find themselves.

I didn't realize until now that any kind of movement or effort existed to facilitate any kind of transnational collaboration in an effort to support these students in their transitions--and I get to sense that there is more happening on the Mexican side than on the United States side--but I want to be a part of it. My priority is that these students learn, and that they be prepared for a successful future. That is something I have in common with these teachers, and I feel like there is a lot more we can do to support each other in supporting the kids.

The Building Blocks of Historical Thinking

My most fundamental goals as an 8th grade United States history teacher do not include that my students should memorize the names and parties of all the presidents of the United States, or that they be able to rattle of the dates and locations of all the major Civil War battles, or any other such laundry-list of information. Not that I'm opposed to students accumulating historical date; indeed, they will doubtless find such data quite useful a few short months from now as they take the California Standards Test in History/Social Science.

Rather, my primary goal as a history teacher is to cultivate within my students a certain mode of thinking--historical thinking. In other words, thinking about history, and, on a larger scale, all the information they consume, in the thoughtful and critical way historians do--to understand that all historical narratives are created within a social, cultural, and political context, for some overt or tacit purpose; to comprehend that the way we perceive the world in 2011 is not how the world was perceived in 1911, 1811, or 1711; to see that the set of narratives we call "history" is not something passively transmitted to us by the past, but rather actively constructed in the present.

All this toward the dual ends of being more responsible consumers of information and more compassionate participants in the diverse world in which they live. As Sam Wineburg articulates in his article "Historical Thinking and Other Unnatural Acts" (Phi Delta Kappan December 2010/January 2011 92 (4): 81-94):

"Mature historical knowing teaches us to .... go beyond our own image, to go beyond our brief life, and to go beyond the fleeting moment in human history into which we've been born. History educates ("leads outward" in the Latin) in the deepest sense. Of the subjects in the secular curriculum, it does the best in teaching us those virtues once reserved for theology -- the virtue of humility in the face of limits to our knowledge and the virtue of awe in the face of the expanse of human history."

(For a more thorough, and quite eye-opening, discussion of the nature of historical thinking, I recommend Dr. Wineburg's book of the same title as the above-cited article, available here).

Such lofty aspirations inspired me as I left my credential program--and they still do--but as I embarked on my first teaching assignment, teaching Ancient Civilizations to sixth graders in a district where test scores have historically been lower than the State of California would like, and in which English is, for most students, a second language, I realized just how lofty these aspirations were.

My students, in general, were so unaccustomed to being asked to think in this way about history--especially about historical topics as removed from their lives in time, culture, and geography as Ancient Egypt and Classical Rome. They entered my classroom expecting a "fill-in-the-blank" sort of social studies class. Even the following year, as I began teaching U.S. history to eighth graders, I found so many of them simply wanting to know "the right answer" so they could write it down and be done with it. Sam Wineburg was absolutely right, it turned out, when he described historical thinking as an "unnatural act." My students were so unaccustomed to being asked to think about identifying and evaluating sources, contextualizing historical information, and constructing their own historical narratives, that most of my efforts that first year seemed to yield little more than confusion and frustration--for both me and the students. For a time, I even all but abandoned my efforts to teach historical thinking, and resigned myself to the tedious textbook-and-workbook curriculum provided by the district. And I was miserable.


It wasn't until the summer after my second year, as I worked for the National History Education Clearinghouse searching out curricula that would foster historical thinking skills in students of all ages, that I realized my mistake: I was focusing too much on where I wanted my students to be, and paying too little attention to where they were. I needed to break this complex and often counterintuitive process of historical thinking into its elemental building blocks, and then introduce those building blocks one or two at a time, rather than all at once. 


This week, I had perhaps my most successful experience yet in teaching what I believe is one of the most fundamental building blocks of historical (and higher-level) thinking--the ability to acknowledge more than one point of view as reasonable and potentially valid. We've been studying the westward expansion of the United States during the 19th century, and this week we discussed the Mexican War--a hot button issue among my students, the majority of whom are of Mexican heritage. After reading the textbook's description of the war, a section of James K. Polk's speech asking Congress to declare war, and a statement by a group of Mexican leaders published in 1850 condemning the actions of the United States, I was overjoyed to witness a series of  lively, thoughtful discussions among my students over who exactly was to blame for the commencement of hostilities between the two nations in 1846. 


I concluded the week by having my students write (heavily scaffolded) essays in which they articulated the two opposing points of view from the historical sources we read, and then stated their own opinions. As part of the scaffolding for the assignment, I provided topic sentences for both body paragraphs--one supporting each point of view--and required students to select pieces of evidence from the textbook and the primary sources that would support each topic sentence. Below is an example of the resulting essays, probably one of the finest:

As I graded these essays, I felt I was seeing clear evidence of budding historical thinking, but perhaps even more exciting to me was the engagement with which my students approached the entire process. I feel I've seldom seen such engagement in my classroom since I started teaching, and it feels good. 

On Second Chances

Someone in my credentialing program, I don't remember who, once told me that kids were like puppies--remarkably resilient and forgiving. During my first year of teaching, I often thought about how untrue this claim appeared to be, based on my then-limited experience in the classroom. I remember being so frustrated with how unforgiving students seemed to be--no matter how hard I thought I was working to serve them, to help them, to uplift them, they always seemed to focus on (and remember) the most minute of injustices. When I recognized my mistakes and tried to change the classroom culture, my students seemed awfully slow to follow.

Thus, I was understandably apprehensive when I moved from 6th to 8th grade, realizing that I would once again have many of those same students with whom I started my career, and fearing that they would remember in painful detail all of my mistakes and weaknesses. The expectations we bring with us into a situation will often shape that situation more than we realize, and I feared I would return to being the sort of teacher my once-and-former-students expected me to be.

Fortunately, I had learned one vital lesson during the intervening year--how to love my students. Certainly it helps that my students matured between sixth and eighth grade, and that I learned quite a bit about effective classroom management; it also helps that time tempers even unpleasant memories, and familiarity breeds fondness in adolescents. But I still believe that love was and is the key. Last year around March, I came to the realization that I loved nearly all of my students. This year, by the grace of God, I've been given the gift to love all of my students. Even the most obnoxious students I find myself seeing with eyes of compassion, and genuine desire for their success. I no longer secretly wish that just one or two of my students will move, or suddenly be discovered to live just outside the school's attendance boundaries.

That love, a miracle in itself, has brought on a chain-reaction of other little miracles, as I build relationships with students that allow them to trust me, to open up to me. I'm still not convinced they are learning all the historical thinking skills I want them to learn, but I am convinced that because they know I care for them, and because they trust me, they will some how be better people for having been my students. And it feels good to know that. It feels good to have them come to my classroom at lunch or after school, just to visit, or to seek advice. It feels good when J., who said to me at the end of 6th grade "Mr. Douglas, you can barely handle 6th graders--how will you handle 8th graders?" now says to me "You know Mr. Douglas, I think you're doing a pretty good job."

It feels good to be given a second chance, and it only happened because I was willing to give my students a second (third, fourth, fifth...) chance.

My students did this on my birthday a few weeks ago. One of the best gifts I could have received, and something that certainly would not have happened with the same kids two years ago.

Still Here, and Thankful to Have Survived This Long

Ten months have elapsed since my last post, but I am still here--now over a quarter of the way through year three in the classroom. Already, last year seems such a distant memory--a memory that sweetens as it ferments in my mind, and in the minds of my students.

One sweet experience I have enjoyed on several occasion since the beginning of the school year is the visits from last year's eighth graders, now ninth graders looking back fondly on what must seem to them now a much simpler time. One particular visit from the first week of the school year still stands out in my mind:

Juliana was a "tough girl" when she was in my class last year. Heavy eye-shadow and a variety of piercings accompanied a general disdain for authority and a vocabulary that might embarrass a sailor. Fortunately, I had a decent relationship with her, so we rarely went head-to-head (not true for our administrators), but she also rarely took my class very seriously. We parted in June on good terms, but I had grave concerns about her academic future.

Then, one morning in late August, as I was putting some finishing touches on my syllabus, Juliana* appeared in my doorway. She rushed over to my desk, gave me a great big hug, and proceeded to tell me all about her new experiences as a ninth grader at the neighboring high school, where classes had started about two weeks previously.

"You wouldn't believe how much I've changed, Mr. Douglas," she said, "I actually care about school now! If only I could go back and tell my younger self to shape up, I would have had a much better time in middle school." She told me about the classes she loved, and the one teacher she couldn't stand, but was trying very hard to get along with. I was pleased to see some signs of academic and social maturity, and I told her so. Then came a moment I didn't think I'd have this early in my career:

"You know Mr. Douglas," she commented thoughtfully, "you came into my head the other day--I was sitting in math class, having a really bad day--it was 97 degrees outside, my hair was a mess, I didn't have make-up on, and I was bored out of my mind. I took out my cell phone to start texting a friend. As I looked at the phone, I thought 'man, Mr. Douglas should be standing behind me right now.' I put the phone away, and made myself pay attention for the rest of the period." [Last year, we had quite a game of her trying to hide her cell phone while texting, and me catching her on it. Sometimes she won, but usually I did.] That story, the idea of my voice, my memory, keeping a student on the path to success well after she was out of my gradebook, made all of last year's headaches worth it.

Perhaps it sounds trite to those who aren't teachers, and perhaps even to some who are. Those who campaign for better compensation for teachers may not appreciate the unintended consequences of stories like this, and rightly so--warm fuzzy feelings may keep me in the profession, but they won't pay the rent or the gas bill. Regardless of how trite or naive it may seem, I feel good about that experience. Perhaps the greatest part of the reward is the surprise--of all the students I might have expected to come back to, in essence, tell me thank you, this girl would not have been on my short list. But there she was, and I hope she still occasionally hears my voice telling her to put away her phone and pay attention in math class.

*Obviously not her real name.

Crossing Borders

"He doesn't respect us, why should we respect him?"

At least, that's what the school counselor told me the student said. Of course she didn't tell me which student, but I had a pretty good guess; I could hear in my head just the way he might have said it. Coming from this particular student, I knew I had to take this analysis of my teaching with a grain of salt, but still I was surprised--and disappointed--to hear it.

Almost from day one, my sixth period class tested my classroom management skills, my nerves, and my resolve to be more calm and patient in the classroom than I was last year. Once I had an administrator come in and team-teach a lesson with me. For that one day, the class went smoothly, students were on task, and I felt like a lot of learning happened. When the administrator left just before the end of the period, I commented to the class "Ladies and gentlemen, this is excellent! This is just what our class should be like every day." I heard one female student mutter under her breath, "Then you'll have to bring Ms .... in here every day." Not long after the administrator left, the class had degenerated into its usual lack of productivity.

Now, I'm not sure if this student meant the comment as an attack on my classroom management, or as a critique of her peers' inability to respond to anything gentler then the threat of the unpleasant punishments often doled out by this particular administrator. Either way, however, team teaching with an administrator was simply not an option, and neither was allowing the class to continue in its current course. For the sake of my students' academic progress (almost completely stalled) and my own mental health, something had to change. By early December it was abundantly clear taht little, if any, learning was occurring in that class, and I was on the verge of losing my sanity.

So, when we returned to school in January, I solicited the assistance of our school counselor and an "at-risk" counselor we share with a neighboring middle school. We decided to join forces one day a week, divide the class into three small discussion groups, and hold little "group therapy" sessions, in order to tap into what is going on in students' minds, to give them an appropriate forum to make their voices heard, and (hopefully) to start to reshape the culture of the class. We started by giving the students a set of ground rules for appropriate discussion, along with some sentence stems to guide them, and asked them to share their feelings about the class. (Note: if you're a new teacher and are considering trying this, make sure you have very thick skin first). From this first session came the comment that opened this post. For some reason, it stuck with me throughout the following week more than any of the feedback I received from my students that day.

Respect. What did he mean by it? How did he not see that I had it for him and for his classmates--that it is a combination of respect and love that impels me to hold them to such high standards? How could I show respect in a way that he--that they all--would recognize it? We discussed the issue of respect the following week. To my surprise, the same student who made the aforementioned comment about respect had great trouble defining it, or describing how an adult might show it to a young person. They all had trouble defining it--one student, her own words failing her, could do little more than belt out some Arethra Franklin at the top of her lungs when asked to respond to the prompt "What does respect mean to you?" Sure, a few students were able to repeat back what they thought the adults wanted to hear as a definition for respect, but I could tell that, for the most part, we simply weren't speaking the same language.

In a course on adolescent development I took in graduate school, we read a paper describing the social, cultural, and linguistic "borders" students must cross in passing from the world of home and family life to the world of academic life (Davidson, Anne Locke & Patricia Phelan, "Students' Multiple Worlds: An anthropologic approach to understanding students' engagement with school," Advances in Motivation and Achievement, vol. 11, 233-273). The authors discussed how such transitions are difficult, and often resisted, when "the knowledge, skills, and behaviors in one world are more highly valued and rewarded than those in another." As I reflected on this experience with my 6th period students, I thought of the knowledge, skills, and behaviors that are necessary for survival in the complicated world from which they come. So many of them exist in the confluence of a variety of challenging circumstances: immigrants navigating an unfamiliar country and culture, poverty, drugs, violence--what do I know about the giving and receiving of respect in such a world? Moreover, Davidson & Phelan were writing about high school students, who tend to be much further along in establishing a stable sense of identity within the context of the world around them. My students, just entering adolescence, are still trying to understand themselves and the parameters of the multiple worlds through which they must navigate each day. I cannot speak for all of my students, but I know that many of them have not had stable influences in their lives to model respect, responsibility, or compassion. Perhaps my classroom is the first time anyone has asked them to think seriously about these ideas.

I do not know just where these Tuesday afternoon sessions will lead. I can hope that my students will somehow learn to reflect on their own behavior, to see through the eyes of their teacher and of their classmates, to understand the link between their choices and the consequences they recieve. The fulfillment of that hope would be a miracle, and with each passing day I realize just how much both my students and I will need to experience miracles in order to navigate the borders that separate us and finally see one another face to face.

When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.

For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.
-1 Corinthians 13:11-12

Paradigm Shifts

Learning is, essentially, the process of shifting, reshaping, and sometimes utterly revolutionizing our paradigm in order to reconcile our perceptions and experiences with the lens through which we view reality. Admittedly, that is a rough definition of learning, and some may wish to dispute it. That debate can wait for another post; for now, I am more interested in exploring the value of openness to a shifting paradigm in the process of teaching.

Perhaps this is even more true when speaking of a paradigm shift in its more technically accurate sense--certainly a genuine openness to a transformation of one's worldview would facilitate an honest inquiry after knowledge characteristic of such model teachers as Socrates. However, at the moment I am most interested in the smaller paradigm shifts--not really changes in paradigm at all, but changes in the way in which we view individuals and circumstances we encounter, changes that allow us to show greater mercy, greater compassion, to those we serve and those with whom we work.

I feel like I experience this every day in the classroom--or nearly everyday--as I learn more about the lives of my students. I had the experience just this evening, as I was taking some student autobiographies off the wall to make room for other samples of student work. As I looked at the "Snapshot Autobiographies" my students had written in the opening days of the school year, which had been proudly displayed on my wall for some time now, I realized that my initial cursory reading three weeks ago had not been at all sufficient. Or perhaps now that I knew something about my students, I was more prepared to receive information about their pasts. At any rate, I discovered things that had been before my eyes that I had never guessed about my students. I felt, among other things, a new respect for them. Tonight wasn't the first time, either. It seems that in the last three to four weeks, hardly a day has gone by in which I have not learned some story of hardship or suffering in the private life of one of my students--everything from divorce, domestic strife, and legal problems to gang involvement, drugs, and homelessness.

The more I learn about my students as individuals whose lives are so often filled with suffering, the easier it is for me to see myself as a servant rather than as a taskmaster--and that is a paradigm shift that is a key to effective teaching, I believe. This is not to say that I lower my expectations for my students out of pity--far from it; but I am more mindful of how my demands on them must appear, and of which demands are realistic, and which are simply asking too much of that particular student at this particular moment.

I have one student, though, who has seemed to defy this compassion-inducing paradigm shift. A chip on his shoulder from the first day of school, he was sarcastic, disrespectful, filled with negativity, dismissive of school work, cruel to other students--especially those who look, talk, behave, or believe differently from him--and generally unresponsive to my preferred methods of discipline. I wanted to have one of those paradigm shifts in relation to this student; I wanted to understand him better: I went to his other teachers, but found little more than the fact that they had similar problems with him (even teachers from previous years). I checked his permanent record, but learned little from it, other than that he was no stranger to suspension and other forms of school discipline. Finally, another teacher and I met with his parents--and saw him being just as rude and disrespectful to his parents as he was to us. I left the conference disappointed, unsure if we would ever be able to reach this student. Usually, (in my limited experience, anyway) even the most obnoxious students are meek and penitent when suddenly the authority of parents and teachers converge at some point in time and space. Not so with this child, apparently.

Yet in the few days since the conference, I have sensed the slightest hint of change; a suggestion of the early stages of thawing the icy barricade he has built between himself and authority. I want to see him differently--I want to recognize him for who he really is. Perhaps if I wait quietly enough--if I hold very still like one in the woods, watching a doe take those first timid steps into the clearing--he will give me that chance...



...In the meantime, I can comfort myself with these tokens of appreciation from two of my sixth grade students, passed forward to me during zero period this morning:



It's nice to know that some students feel this way about my class, even if the sentiments aren't exactly universal. These students make it that much easier to be patient with those who require the paradigm shifts I spoke of.

Patterns, Ideals, and Expectations: Learning to be at Peace with Myself in the Classroom

Someone once told me that expectations are simply preconceived resentments. I resisted the notion--after all, most human action is based on the expectation of some future result: I would not go to work (much as I love my students) if I did not expect some kind of compensation; I would not save money for the future if I did not expect to have a future; I would be very unlikely to ask a young lady out on a date if I had no expectation of her saying yes. After a year of teaching, however, I have decided that I will accept the proposition with which I opened this post, with a slight modification: unrealistic expectations are simply preconceived resentments. In my case, I too often vacillated last year between resenting my students (not all of them, but certain ones), and resenting myself or my own poor pedagogical practice.

This year, I am learning not to lower my expectations, but to make them more realistic--to realize that for both myself and my students, learning comes in small steps, taken one at a time--as the Biblical prophet Isaiah described it, we learn and grow "precept upon precept, line upon line." Remembering this truth has made it much easier for me to be at peace with myself, and with what is happening in my classroom, during these first weeks of my second year.

The realization came to me as I was leading my 8th graders in the "Islands" game--an activity designed to help develop communication and cooperation skills in small groups. In the game, students distribute a deck of cards with islands on them to each group member. Each island except one has a match somewhere in the deck. The groups task is to find the odd one out without showing or trading any of their individual cards. It is an activity that came out of the Complex Instruction system, developed at Stanford University by Rachel Lotan and Elizabeth Cohen. I had seen the activity work perfectly, providing a wealth of teachable moments, in my course on Teaching in Heterogeneous Classrooms at Stanford, and I wondered why it was not working nearly as well with my 8th graders.

Then I remembered something. I had seen it work so well with a group of graduate students at Stanford who were preparing to become teachers. It was simply silly to think it would happen just the same way with my young 8th graders. What I saw at Stanford was a pattern--an ideal I could strive for in my own practice. My reality will not always conform to the pattern, but the pattern is still essential as a tool against which I can constantly measure my practice as a teacher, hence growing closer and closer to the ideal. I discovered last year that it is far to easy as a teacher to use the pattern as a stick with which to flagellate oneself rather than as a measuring stick with which to monitor progress, slight and slow though it may be.

It would have been easy, at the end of last year, to simply throw out the pattern--to become disillusioned, to tell myself that the academics in the schools of education were out of touch with what things were "really" like in the classroom. But, that would have been unfair to them, to me, and to my students (not to mention being inaccurate, at least in the case of Stanford's School of Education--you would be hard pressed to find a better place for linking theory and research to practice). Instead, I need to remember to return to the pattern often, to see how closely my practice fits, and to enhance my own understanding of the pattern itself. Thus the pattern becomes not a reminder of my failures and shortcomings, but a source of living, growing knowledge--a guide to follow as I slowly, steadily fashion myself into the kind of teacher I know I can be.

Kicking off Round II: Creating the Learning Space

For a variety of reasons, my blog entries during my first year of teaching were sparse at best. In actuality, paucity of posts presents as much commentary on my experience as anything I might have written. While I began last year with the best of intentions, I allowed myself to be carried away by a cacophony of currents pulling me so many directions I could barely catch my breath, let alone keep a detailed chronicle of my experiences in the classroom.

Now, after a summer appreciated more than any summer in my life, I return to the classroom a bit wiser. Realistic expectations do much for preserving ones sanity, and now I think I have a better idea of what to expect of my students, and what to expect of myself. Perhaps most importantly, I'm committed to being at peace with whatever comes. Certainly I'll do all I can, make the most of every opportunity, but then I'll make myself sit back and remember I can't do everything, can't be everywhere, can't solve every student's life problems. In so doing, I'll preserve my physical and mental health much more effectively than I did last year.

Another important lesson I learned last year is the importance of the physical learning space. From the moment they walked through the door, my students were studying, learning, apprehending--not about the ancient civilization I was trying to teach about, so much as about me, what I valued, how I felt about them, and what kind of learning space I had provided for them. Now, I tried to create a welcoming classroom last year, but somehow it fell short:

My "Historical Thinking" Posters Not much color on the walls...

It wasn't bad, but it lacked something--something I couldn't put my finger on until around about mid-April, when a sweet young sixth grader raised her hand and said "Mr. Douglas, why isn't your classroom decorated all fun like Ms. So-and-so's?"

I don't remember exactly what I said to her. Part of me wanted to say "Hey, we're here to work, not to have fun," but that wouldn't fly with a sixth grader, and it's not entirely true anyway. I realized that the appearance of my room sent an array of powerful messages to my students. How, then, could I use the walls to communicate that my classroom is a safe place, a place of learning, a place of engagement, a place in which they are welcome with all of their ideas?

So, as the beginning of the new school year approached, I descended on my room with butcher paper, borders, posters, punch-out letters, and an entire arsenal of staples. Here is the result:

Here is the view as you step through the door (the blank space on the left will be filled with class rules and vocabulary words).


My map corner


Student work will go here .






The back wall, blue and calming (with a reminder to smile posted above the door).





Punch out letters, so useful.


One may not appreciate the full effect of the transformation without seeing my entire room as it was--the picture I provided from last year really isn't sufficient. My former students certainly noticed it; today, as students returned from summer vacation, several students from last year came by to say hello and almost thought they were in the wrong room. One even accused me of caring more for this year's students, as evidenced by the decoration. Not so, I told him--but I do hope that at least some of this year's students recognize that what they see in the learning space I provide is a token of my caring for them.

The Track Meet

My middle school didn't have a track team. Even if it had, I almost certainly would not have joined it; Academic Pentathlon was my preferred extra curricular activity in seventh grade, and I was always among the last to finish the weekly run we had to complete in P.E. every Friday. In high school, I filled the P.E. requirement by taking four years of Marching Band. Though I make sporadic efforts to keep myself fit, I have never been athletically inclined. It was, therefore, quite a surprise to find myself on a bus a few Wednesdays ago on my way to a middle school track meet.

The previous day, I had been sitting in the staff room enjoying lunch with several of my colleagues, including the sixth-grade language arts teacher who also happens to be the track coach. I've discovered that a key to happiness in teaching is remembering that we teachers are all in this together, and thus that it is in our best interest to support each other. So, as the track coach went around the table looking for a volunteer to help out as an official timer at the upcoming track meet, I couldn't say no.

It turned out to be a remarkable experience, the first of several track meets at which I had the privilege of timing this year. I learned something about the value of school spirit, and of having a sense of being a member of a team. I watched our small collection of students wander onto the field, some in old cross-country uniforms, some in their P.E. clothes, take a warm up lap, and do a bit of stretching. Then I saw our rivals, twice as large as us in number at least--all of them wearing smart green, brand new uniforms, clapping and chanting in unison as they spread out across the field to warm up. While the uniforms seemed to be making their first appearance at a track meet, the students certainly were not. They stretched together, chanting in unison as they did so, took a warm up lap, and listened to the direction and encouragement of their coach with a discipline I have not seen in middle school students. I saw in their eyes a certain pride in representing their school; I saw in their stride a determination to win.

Now, don't get me wrong--I was certainly not feeling any disloyalty to my own school. Simply learning what I could from our rivals. We have neither fancy new uniforms nor a full time coach, but certainly we could find a way to instill in our students the same pride in representing our school that I saw in the eyes of our rivals. And perhaps, with any luck, that feeling of pride, of belonging, of ownership, might spread from the track team to the soccer team, and from the soccer team to the whole school. That, more than anything, is what our school desperately needs--something around which the students (and the teachers, for that matter), can rally; something to create a sense of ownership and belonging; something to be proud of.


We certainly have the raw material for it. In spite of their full time coach and fancy uniforms, I took great satisfaction in noting that, at the League Finals, two of our seventh grade boys running the mile beat the fastest runner at our rival school by over ten seconds. Standing on the sideline, cheering them on with a few other teachers and parents, I felt had more meaning than all the lecturing I had done in the classroom that week. It is good to be a member of a team. For the students, and for the teachers. We all need to feel like we belong to something, that we are a part of something, and not that we simply show up each day to fill a desk or stand in front of a class. Track team, Academic Decathlon team, or simply a team of teachers working together, belonging makes all the difference.

Why I'm Still Here, or, Why the Rotten Apple Left on My Desk Doesn't Bother Me

I once seriously considered going to law school instead of becoming a teacher. There were many occasions early this school year that made me wonder if law school would not have been a better option. Though I still have difficult days, my thoughts of leaving the profession are now few and far between; I've even decided to stay at my current school--barring the arrival of a pink slip of paper in my mailbox later this month.

As I explained to my sixth period today, I'm still there because I care about them. Of course I got into teaching because I knew, deep within myself, that it was a part of my purpose--a part of who I am and what I am meant to do--but now I am also teaching because I care about these kids, and I want to see them succeed. If I didn't care, I told my students, I would probably have left sometime in November, and I'd be studying for the LSAT right now. I've recently realized that the challenge never was learning to love my students--it was learning to love them unconditionally, even when they don't seem to appreciate, and even seem to resent, all the work I do for them. I frequently have to remind myself that they are 11 or 12, and I am not--that in fact it is part of my job to help them acquire the social skills that will allow them to navigate the turbulent decade (or two) ahead of them.

I found recently some notes I jotted down in December, intending to post them here. The ideas seem to fit with this post:

December 18, 2008

A few good moments have occurred in the last couple of days, and I have to record them, in the interest of preserving hope for better times ahead.

Yesterday, I met with Felix* and his mother. Felix has typically been the student on the figurative back row, too cool for school, disrespectful, disruptive, mean to other kids, and always with a bad attitude. Whenever I suggested I might need to have a parent conference, he acted like he didn't care. Yesterday, though, I saw a different side of him during the conference with him and his mother. He was still all over the room, but he was behaving more like a hyperactive little boy than like the rebellious pre-adolescent I was accustomed to seeing in first period. He was more humble, teachable. He asked earnest questions about why he has to take medication. After my feeble attempt to break down psychopharmacology into 11-year-old terms, he said "Mr. D., I think the front part of my brain is busted." It felt good to be able to demystify the problem a little bit--to reassure him that he isn't broken or deffective, that his brain simply functions differently. I felt like I made an authentic connection with him, one I hadn't had before.

Today, I gave a mid-unit quiz. Alfredo stayed after class because he hadn't finished yet. In fact, he had barely gotten through the first two questions. I walked him through the quiz, one question at a time. I uncovered some of the difficulties he has when taking tests, and he had a chance to feel success in my classroom. That felt good, too.

And, even better, Joseph made an attempt at doing homework two nights in a row-- a personal record for him. He also managed to complete three quarters of the test. Grading only what he completed, he recieved a B-. I graded it in front of him after school. He said he'd never gotten a grade that high before. He doesn't like to show a lot of excitement about school, but I could tell he was pleased. Perhaps there is hope for me in this profession yet.

Those are the moments that have kept me in the classroom--those glimmers of hope that I can do some good, fueled by the fact that I so badly want to see these kids do well. It can be a challenge to keep that hope in view; even as I retype these notes from last December, I realize that I haven't built on these experiences, or maintained these connections, as I might have. The students still continue to struggle. They continue to act in ways that make it seem as if they didn't care. So when someone left an old, decaying apple on my desk this morning when I wasn't looking, it bothered me for a moment. Then I reminded myself that regardless of what these children do, what the need most is someone who will love and care for them in those moments they seem to deserve it the least. I'm finding that is seldom easy to do, but it's worth the struggle, and worth having to throw away a spoiled piece of fruit once in a while. I just hope whoever did it was clever enough to understand the more subtle irony of giving a rotten apple to the teacher.

Apparently I Need to Articulate More Clearly in the Classroom

This week we began studying the Gupta Empire, and ancient India's golden age. In order to help my students understand the concept of a "golden age," I had them draw pictures illustrating a golden age in an imaginary city or country. One of my students must have mis-heard or mis-understood the term golden age because this is what I received from her the next day:

It's an egg, in case you can't tell. A golden egg.

I made it to Winter Break: A Retrospective on the First Half of the Year

I have many fond memories of the last day of school before the winter break. It seems that in elementary school, we nearly always had a holiday party that day. In middle and high school years, while parties were officially frowned upon, teachers always seemed to find a way to bend that rule and allow some holiday cheer on the last day. I remember having "Secret Santa" gift exchanges with other students in band, and always having candy canes or some other Christmas sweet to share with friends.

Always, the last day of school before Christmas was a time of celebration and cheerfulness. Now, mingled with the cheerfulness, I feel a tremendous sense of relief--I made it! While not exactly the half-way point, strictly speaking, I am essentially half way there. The end of August seems a life time ago; I am ready for a moment to pause, catch my breath, and reflect.

In many ways, my introduction to full time teaching has reminded me of an incident on a river-rafting trip I took with some friends last spring. We were on the Upper Tuolumne River, outside of Yosemite--a challenging river with a number of class V rapids for which I was grossly under-prepared. It turned out to be the sort of trip that changes your perspective on life, helps you to focus on the things that really matter, and simply makes you thankful to still be alive. That story, however, is for another occasion. The incident to which I refer occured on the first day of the trip, late in the afternoon, just as the sun was approaching the canyon wall. We had just navigated a particularly treacherous rapid--my companions skillfully paddline around rocks and boulders while I held on for dear life--when our raft ran up vertically against a particularly large rock jutting up out of the river. Instinct and the meager whitewater training I had recieved both drove me to the high side of the boat, hoping to help push it into the water. As the boat rose higher, however, I felt myself tilting backwards. I still remember distinctly that moment of no return, in which I simply had no choice but to let go of the strap to which I held, fall backwards into the seething water, and watch the boat slide down off the rock and over my head. I certainly didn't feel prepared to be out of the boat and in the water--but then I don't think any amount of training would have helped me to really feel prepared. At that point, though, as the turbulent currents pulled me beneath the water's surface, only one thing mattered--somehow getting my nose above the surface of the water so that I could fill my lungs with air. For the moment, I couldn't even think about getting back in the boat. I just needed to breathe.

The first four months of my first year of teaching have felt something like that moment in which I hit the water. If I could just fill my lungs with air one more time, I would be okay. I have wondered, at times, if I would make it back to the surface again, as I have felt the strong currents of student apathy and underachievement, bureaucratic inefficiencies, and my own self-doubt pull me further down. In brief moments, though, I have seen rays of sunlight piercing the troubled waters, and I have a humble resurgence of hope. Perhaps I can do it, after all. Perhaps I can be the sort of teacher I once thought I would be. Now, for a moment, as I rest in a calmer part of the river, perhaps it would be helpful to reflect on those rays of sunlight--those small moments of success that give me hope for my students, and for my own future as the sort of teacher I aspire to be.

My Moments of Success This Year:

• My third period class. This is the one class in which, when they start to get out of hand, all I have to do is stand quietly with arms folded and say quietly "class, I'm disappointed in this behavior; this isn't how my third period class behaves," and I watch them shape up immediately. It's a miracle, and sometimes third period is the only reason I feel motivated to go to work.

• Students who let down their "tough kid" masks in front of me. I have a few kids, mostly boys, who really think they are tough, and who are definitely too cool for school. And yet, there have been moments, usually when I'm keeping them in at lunch or after school, in which they let down their masks, and let me see their real, vulnerable, frightened selves. Then, I can see them as real, fragile human beings just like me, and I feel like maybe there is still something I can do to help them.
  

• Students who learn, in spite of me. My classroom can be a pretty chaotic place sometimes; I still have a lot of kinks to work out in both classroom management and pedagogy. And yet, some of my students still produce stellar work, day after day, and really seem to be learning. Now, perhaps I can't take credit for their success, but at least I'm not getting in the way.

• Students who are like puppies. In so many ways. But what I had in mind was the fact that so many of them, even when I've had to reprimand them the day before, still greet me with a bouncy smile and love to follow me around telling me about their day or asking about the homework when they see me on campus. Fortunately, no puddles on the carpet, yet.
  

• Beauty in imperfection. This comes from advice given by a dear friend who was herself a first year teacher last year. Life, especially in the classroom, is filled with mess, disorder, chaos, and imperfection. But these messes and imperfections leave me room to hope for something better, give me something to strive for as I seek growth an improvement for myself and for my students.
  

Arts, Crafts, and Historical Pedagogy

About the time I was beginning to interview with various school districts last year, the school at which I would eventually teach was in the process of becoming a "Visual and Performing Arts Anchor School." What this means, in short, is that I am expected to incorporate visual and performing arts content standards into my curriculum. For me, as a social science teacher, this means both teaching about the art of the cultures we study, and engaging the students in art projects themselves. The first element of the newly-instituted program I was immediately on board with; looking at a society's art is an excellent way to gain greater insight into the context of the times, and pieces of art can serve as great primary sources.

As far as the second element of the program, I had my reservations. If approached properly, art in the history classroom could be useful. But it seemed all to likely that incorporating art into my curriculum would turn into simply doing "fun" art projects, and sacrificing academic rigor and intellectual challenge for student engagement and entertainment. I knew it wouldn't have to be this way; indeed, this was certainly not the intent of the new program. However, I knew that one of my greates challenges would be to keep this from happening.

During the opening weeks of the school year, I did a few things here and there; we drew some pictures, analyzed some Mesopotamian bas-relief sculptures, but the heavy-duty art began as our unit on Ancient Egypt came to a close. You can see some of the sculpted sarcophagi above. They may look simple enough, but you should have seen the disaster that was my classroom at the end of the day. The custodian walked into my room and just about turned around and walked back out.

Later, we painted them:



















And we made and decorated pyramids to house them. (Thanks, by the way, to those loyal friends who spent a Saturday afternoon helping me cut the pyramids from giant sheets of core board.)





We sponge-painted the outsides with mixtures of brown and yellow paint (historical pedagogy momentarily aside, the mixing of paint was a great art lesson in itself for the students), and decorated the insides with designs inspired by art and hieroglyphs we had seen inside Egyptian tombs.

Now, the critically important question: What was the value, really, of this activity? Is there a chance my students' understanding of Egyptian art, religion, or culture was enhanced by what we did? Certainly they enjoyed it. Students usually apathetic were engaged, and those who are usually my most disruptive were my most helpful, generally speaking. But did they learn anything about historical thinking? Were they really growing and developing their minds in the way they ought to be doing in my classroom, or was this little more than a fun arts and crafts day, a publicly funded summer camp?

Now, don't get me wrong, artistic expression is a valuable part of a student's development as a person. I just hope that the way that I use art in my history classroom is not at odds with what I am trying to teach my students about history.

Confessions of a First Year Teacher in Mid-November

I wish my students knew, when I lose my temper and raise my voice, how disappointed I am in myself. I wish my students knew, when I act like I am fed up with them, how much I long to be that teacher who is always there for them. I wish my students could understand how I want to be patient, meek--how I want to take them by the hand and gently lead them, only I don't always know quite where we are going myself. I hope that, every once in a while, amidst the assignments, the grades, the tried patience, and the lunchtime detentions, that my students catch at least a glimpse of how much I love them and want them to succeed. And I hope they forgive me.

Last year, about this time, Rachel Lotan, the director of STEP, warned me and the other teacher-candidates in the program about the "November Slump," that time just before the holidays in which new teachers start to wonder why they didn't just go to law school instead. She assured us that the discouragement and questioning of one's career path were normal, and that they would indeed pass. I remember thinking the message had come a bit late for me, as I experienced my November Slump in October.

Oddly enough, the same thing happened to me this year. About the middle of last month, I was beginning to wonder if the sixth grade classroom really was the place for me. It wasn't just that the hours were long, the pay seemingly meager, and the work often thankless; my patience was wearing thinner and thinner, and the ability to apply all the great principles of pedagogy I learned at Stanford was eluding me. My heterogeneous groups were in a sorry state, formative assessments were rare and formative feedback rarer, and I had yet to teach my students how to source a historical document. It seemed my job had become 10% history teacher and 90% classroom manager, and I wasn't nearly as meek or patient a classroom manager as I would like to have been. Too many times, I would lose my patience in the classroom, only to reflect during my commute home on how really it was my fault in that I hadn't made my expectations clear, or hadn't structured the classroom environment in a way that would really facilitate student success. For the first time in years, I allowed myself to question whether teaching was really right for me.

Fortunately, the fit of madness passed, and things started looking up. I began to realize that I needed to forgive myself for being human, and that as I did, so would my students. I revisited some of the classroom management strategies I learned last year, and added a few new ones to my arsenal. A friend and veteran teacher pointed out that spending time teaching sixth graders how good students behave really is just as valuable as (perhaps more valuable than) teaching them about the rise and fall of ancient empires. As I took on this point of view, I found that I resented less the time spent teaching appropriate behavior rather than content, I started to enjoy myself more, and, incidentally, behavior problems decreased.

So, when my sixth period class spiraled out of control today, and I lost my temper with them yet again, it was that much more discouraging. I know better, I know my students know better, and they deserve a teacher who can keep his cool while reminding them that they know better. Later in the day, when I found myself on Stanford campus, I began again to entertain the idea of returning to Stanford for a Ph.D. Of course I couldn't return to graduate school as an escape from the classroom, and I certainly need to spend more time in the classroom before I would have credibility as a Ph.D candidate anyway, but it is a tempting thought. Until that time, I'm fortunate that I have friends who have been teaching a few years longer than I have who remind me that I don't have to be perfect in my first year, or even in my second, third, or fourth years.

A Few Scattered Thoughts

Me: Class, can anyone tell me whose faces we see here on Mt. Rushmore?

Student: Oooo, Oooo, I know Mr. Douglas--George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, and...George Clooney!



I've been remiss in writing recently, but I've had several thoughts in the last few weeks that I want to capture. Here are three reflections on my classroom experiences over the last month or so:

Leaving the Kids with a Sitter

Several weeks ago, I left my students with a substitute teacher for the first time. Now, I don't have any children myself, but I imagine that what I felt upon leaving my students with a sub might not be to dissimilar from what a parent feels upon leaving his child with a baby sitter for the first time. I spent a significant amount of time the day before instructing my students on how to treat the substitute with the proper respect--remembering, of course, what we did to substitute teachers when I was in sixth grade. The day I was out, I spent most of the day worrying about how my students were treating the substitute, but also worrying about how my students might be faring with the substitute: would she follow the instructions I had left? Would she be sensitive to the needs of my English language learners, or to my students with special needs? Would she be mindful of the emotionally sensitive child who is all to often picked on by her classmates? As pleasant as it was to take a brief break, I've decided that I much prefer to be with my students, even when they are difficult and when they try my patience. I also learned that, when I must be out, it's in my interest to find a rather unpleasant substitute--it helps my kids to appreciate me that much more.

Playing "The Game"

In my credentialing program, we often spoke of students learning to play "the game of school"--the set of unwritten, unarticulated rules for success in the public school system. The idea was that knowledge of this "game," with rules written and enforced by the culture of power, could facilitate academic success independent of understanding of content or intellectual ability.

I think I've discovered another game that is played in the classroom. I've noticed an interesting pattern among students I keep after class for disruption. The conversation during class might go something like this:

Me: Travis, we do not throw paper/shoot spitwads/chew gum/listen to ipods in this classroom.
Student: What? Me? But I didn't do anything, I was just sitting here..
Me: No need to be dishonest, I saw what happened, it just needs to stop now.
Student: No, Mr. Douglas, I swear, it wasn't me...

This could go on for several minutes. Some students, I think, would like for it to go on for longer. I stop it by telling them we'll discuss it after class, and this is how the conversation picks up:

Me: Now Travis, tell me honestly, were you throwing paper/shooting spitwads/chewing gum/listening to your ipod during class?
Student [with surprising meekness]: Yes, Mr. Douglas. I'm sorry.

The change in attitude, in demeanor, is surprising, but perhaps even more surprising is the ease with which they admit to wrongdoing when their classmates aren't watching. Now, their classmates all know what they were doing, to be sure, but they won't admit it, won't "lose face" in front of the class. It's almost as if the bell signals a "time out" in the classroom game, when the rules change, and it is somehow less threatening to admit to the teacher that it was, in fact, you who just threw that paper airplane. Or, perhaps its simply that, once the bell has rung, they know the easiest way to get me to release them is to admit guilt, actual or imagined.

If only teachers really did have eyes on the backs of their heads.

Columns and Rows

Last fall, as an assignment for a course in classroom management, I had to sketch my ideal classroom layout, paying attention to such things as where students attention would be focused, how easily all student could see the board, how easily students might transition from whole-class discussion to small groups, and in general what kinds of messages the layout would send about the desired culture of the classroom. It didn't seem like a terribly significant assignment at the time; at any rate, I had minimal control over the physical layout of my classroom as a student teacher because it was not, in fact, my classroom. Now, however, I am awed at just how much time and thought I have put into the physical layout of my classroom. Even before school started, I went through at least three or for iterations of my original "ideal" desk configuration. The one I finally settled on looked something like this:
I hoped it would provide a good compromise between rows and a circle-- a setup that would facilitate class discussion, but would also establish the front of the room as the primary focal point. It only took me a couple of weeks to decide that I really disliked this setup, however. Whichever half of the class I faced, I always had my back to the other half. I've discovered that, with sixth graders, it's best if I can see them all at once, all the time. Now, I have them in groups of four that easily transition into rows if necessary (pictures of this setup are on their way), but I'm beginning to discover some drawbacks to this setup as well. Part of the problem, I think, is that the students simply get to comfortable, so I have to change things up every once in a while to keep them on their toes. So, now, it's back to the drawing board for my classroom layout.