Stuck on an Escalator?

I have been thinking a lot over the past few months about how we can think about education differently and be more innovative in our teaching.  When I think about how we sometimes approach our job and life in general it reminds me the video below.

 

 

How often do we get stuck in rut where we continue to look at things the same way.  Do we get stuck on an escalator?  Do we get stuck looking at only one way of approaching various situations?  How can we better problem solve the issues that we inevitably face? 

 

 

At UT Elementary School, we are challenging our teachers to devote one day of instructional planning time a week to researching and learning about something that they feel passionately about.  The only requirement is that it has to help them become a more effective teacher.  They should learn about aspects of their instruction that they would like to improve and find ways to be creative and innovative in making it happen in their classrooms.  At the end of the year, the teachers will share what they have learned with their PLC groups.  As we begin to devote time to becoming innovative and creative, hopefully we can begin to find ways to get off the escalator and move forward with our students.

Teacher Burnout

Can you feel it teachers?  October has hit, and the stress levels are definitely on a different level.  The novelty of the school year you the teacher are long gone for most students.  Meetings, curriculum, grades, parent conferences, report cards, etc. are piling up.  It is easy to start feeling like you need to do more, you aren't measuring up to what you need to do, or that it is just too hard.  Right at this time of year, it is common for teachers to start to feel overwhelmed and, well, DONE!  Past done! Burnt!  I offer 3 suggestions to all teachers who are starting to feel the weight of October bearing down on them.

1. Invest time every week in meaningful hobby.  It is easy as a teacher to come home exhausted from a long day of work and just want to lay down and go to sleep.  It is important though to have a release from the worries that you carry with you from the classroom.  Some good hobbies are things like: exercise, reading (non educational reading), golf, video games, music, whatever helps you relax.  For me I set the goal that I will spend time on one of my non educational hobbies at least 3 times a week.  It helps keep me relaxed and alleviates a lot of my worry.

2. Focus on developing a strong home, work balance.  I was recently watching "Freedom Writers" for the first time, and while there were a lot of things I liked about the movie, there was one major problem that I had with the movie.  At one point, the husband of the main character leaves her because she didn't have time to work on her relationship with him because she spent all of her time either working with her students or working part time jobs to raise money for her students.  The movie made the husband out to be a villain since he couldn't handle the lack of balance in her life.  The problem I have with this is it perpetuates this mentality that in order to be a good teacher, you have be willing to devote everything to your profession.  This teacher is held up as the example or model of what a teacher who really cares about his or her students should look like.  You devote your entire life to your profession.  The problem with that is it isn't sustainable nor is it healthy.  It might work for a couple of years, but soon, teachers will reach a point where they are too tired.  Having a quality home, life balance will help keep the stress levels in a manageable range.  Family members often provide the support and understanding that few others can give.  To keep a balanced family life, teachers should, set a time limit on how late they will stay everyday.  Even if the lesson plans aren't quite finished or those tests aren't completely graded, setting a time limit on your work makes sure that you get home in a reasonable time so you can be with your family.  Another suggestion is to devote one night a week to exclusively spend time with your family in the evening.  Setting scheduled times to devote time to family keeps it a priority in an already busy life. 

3.  Structure your day to use your time more efficiently while you are at work.  Time management strategies can alleviate much of the stress that teachers begin to feel starting in October.  As teachers make the most of their time during the work day, stressing over unfinished projects or finishing grading papers at home instead of spending time with friends and family can be avoided as teachers structure their planning and preparation time to maximize the work done with the time they have.  There are various time management tools to help structure what needs done.  My personal favorite is using my Outlook Calendar and keeping a list of projects in Outlook where I can order them by the most important to the least important.  This helps me focus on what are the highest priorities on my to do list and what projects I can wait to do a little later.  Spending time on the most important things, keeps everything running as it should.

By dealing with the stress of school year, it is important for teachers to remember that not only will they live a happier life by achieving a better balance, but they will also be better teachers.  When you have your personal life in order, you are more able to focus on your students while you are on the job instead of feeling that you are inadequate in other areas.  You will also have the continued energy to keep going throughout your career.  It has been said that it takes a lifetime to master the art of teaching.  If we are working so hard and focusing so much on our teaching that we can only do it for 3 years until we are burnt out, teachers will never have the time even begin master teaching or education.  By working harder on keeping a balanced life, we can keep good teachers in teaching and continue to provide high quality instruction to our students.

Grit, Discipline and Grades

I posted a couple of weeks ago about the importance of students learning to not give up and develop a sense of stickwithitness in order for them to be successful not only in school but also in their professional lives or college.  In reading from Paul Tough's book How Children Succeed and from the work of psychologist Angela Duckworth, some of the traits that have made students successful in school and beyond have been identified.  Angela Duckworth identified the leading trait for success as Grit.  She argues that for students to be successful, they must develop the character trait of grit, of being able to stick with something even when it is hard or unpleasant.  Looking at some of the most successful people in history, Abraham Lincoln, Albert Einstein, Thomas Edison, Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, they all possessed a high level of grit.  They didn't give up even in the face of multiple failures.  We need to help our students develop this grit, this attitude of not giving up no matter what. 

The second part of this post goes along with this idea of grit.  Students in order to be successful much also have discipline.  When I say discipline, I am not talking about what I do with students who are in trouble all day as an Assistant Principal.  I am referencing more to the self control that one needs to develop.  I think of a successful football team and how they play with discipline.  I am not an Alabama football fan, but it is no surprise that Nick Saban's football teams have won 3 out of the last 4 national titles.  His team doesn't make mistakes.  They play disciplined football.  They don't miss assignments or try to make the flashy play.  They do the small and simple things that they need to win.  They play disciplined football.  In order for our students to be successful, they must demonstrate the same level of discipline.  They must be able to work through difficult situation and demonstrate self control.  In Tough's book, Duckworth mentions in her research a study from the 60's called the Marshmallow Experiment.  The Marshmallow Experiment is a research experiment in which researchers put small children through a challenge.  The kids were given a marshmallow but told if they could wait and not eat the marshmallow for 15 minutes, they would be given two marshmallows.  There were some kids that waited and some who didn't.  The research became interesting in that years later, as the researchers followed up with the kids years later, those kids who were able to wait for the second marshmallow in general made higher salaries, graduated from college more quickly, and had better family relationships.  Self Control and Discipline proved to be a key component to being successful not only in school but in life. 

Because of this, I think that character education is very important.  Schools cannot simply teach content and students have to learn more that Reading, Writing and Arithmetic.  If we are to teach life superheroes and prepare our students to be successful in life, they must learn certain character traits that will set them up for success.  Which bring me to my final point.  Grades. I know that in many circumstances, grading policies are not necessarily the most accurate assessment of student learning or student mastery of content.  The interesting thing, however, is grades are the number 1 indicator of how likely a student is to graduate college or not.  SAT and ACT scores are traditionally viewed as more important by universities for admissions and scholarships, but GPA is a far more accurate indicator of student success in college. Why is that?  If ACT and SAT theoretically measure student mastery of content more accurately that GPA which is subjective to the schools and teachers the students have, why is GPA more accurate in assessing student success in colleges?  What do grades measure if they are not measuring learning?  For students to get successful grades, they do not need to have great mastery of the content in many circumstances.  It does however require high levels of grit and self control.  So while I think our grading policies can be changed to better reflect how effectively students are learning content, there is something to be said for students who are disciplined enough to stick with something and not accept anything but a high grade.  I know that this is kind of an old school attitude toward education, but there is something to be said for kids who are willing to stick with difficult tasks and not accept anything less that excellence in their work.  The challenge is for us as educators to teach these important traits to our students beginning at a young age.  It has to be about more than just content.

Learning or Teaching

My good friend Adam Holman constantly reminds me of a nagging question in education, "If the student isn't learning, then is the teacher teaching?"  It is a fair question.  I feel like many times our focus as educators is lost in the instructing of students and not so much in the learning done by students.  In our day and age of teacher accountability, we are not held accountable for teaching the content to the students but for our students learning the content.  Many times it is difficult for us to enter this paradigm shift.  I know for myself, I would leave campus after a long day of work frustrated that my students didn't understand what I just taught them.  I would look for something or someone to blame (other than myself of course).  When we took benchmarks and the scores weren't as high as they should be, I would be upset.  "We covered this" "I know I taught this" "We talked about this just yesterday"  What I failed to think about was did the students learn it.  How did I know whether the knew it or not?  If they didn't learn it, did I keep teaching without making adjustments? 

Mike Schmoker in his book Focus keys in on the most important teaching strategy that teachers can use in the classroom.  He says that if teachers can do this one simple thing, learning will be accelerated and in 9 months teachers can average more than 2 years of academic growth with their students.  What is the strategy?  Simply checking for understanding of all students.  THAT'S IT! How can it be that simple.  When you think about it however, it is much more complex than that.  There are a multitude of strategies that can be used however to check that all students understand and learn the content throughout the lesson.  Some of my favorite strategies for checking for understanding are: Think Pair Share where I walk around talking to the students as they talk to their partners, Students answering questions using individual white boards, quick writes and exit tickets, Interactive Clickers systems like through CPS, Thumbs up Thumbs down, and Four Corners.  These all gave me the chance to immediately check in with students and see what they learned from the lesson and what they still needed more support in.  What are your favorite strategies for checking for understanding?

To truly support our students, we must understand what they are learning.  We have to give them a chance to show us what they are learning.  If we are just going through lessons and having the kids take notes without regularly and intentionally checking to see what each student has learned in the lesson, we will teach, but the students might not learn.  Does that mean we have taught?

No Quit Attitude

Tomorrow I start a new school year as Assistant Principal at UT Elementary in Austin, TX.  I am excited and nervous for the new year.  The other day I was out running and thinking about the new school year and what kind of impact I hope to have on our students and teachers this year.  While I was running, I hit a stretch with a long uphill road (yes there are some small hills here in Texas).  After about 2 miles straight of running uphill, my legs were pounding and I decided to take a quick walking break.  After about 2 seconds I realized how upset I was with myself for stopping to walk.  I should have toughed it.  The pain wasn't that bad.  I needed to be more mentally tough and push through the pain.  This got me thinking about what it is that we are teaching students.  We work really hard to provide them with as much content knowledge as possible.  Are we equally preparing them with the stickwithitness necessary to be successful in college and beyond?  How are we giving them the skills and confidence necessary to be mentally tough and not give up when it starts to get hard?  I feel like this is something we can improve on as teachers.  How many times do we hear kids say they quit because things just got too hard?  I am excited this year that at UT Elementary, we have integrated Social and Emotional Learning into the curriculum.  This helps provide students with the social and emotional skills necessary to work through difficult situations and provide them with the confidence they need to be successful..  Hopefully we can start a paradigm shift where parents and teachers stop viewing education as simply stuffing kids minds with content knowledge and thinking about how we are building students into successful scholars who enjoy learning and can work through the difficulties that they will inevitably face.

I am writing this blog with the hope of inspiring teachers to rededicate themselves to their students and their schools.  I have found that in my few years in education, many teachers seem to be waiting for some program or intervention to come and save them.  In the culture of accountability, the pressures of that can be difficult for teachers to work under.  Many times as teachers look for the answers they think that if they just had a certain piece of equipment, or intervention, if the students could just have that program everything will be ok.  Some have even created movies about how students and parents are waiting for Superman.  They are waiting for someone to come and save them.  Who is that going to be?  Who are we waiting for?  There is only one person that can be the superhero in the school settings.  The teachers must step up and save their students.  They have the power.  They see them everyday.  They have the data on them.  They know how to motivate them.  They have to find what works with the kids.  No one is coming to the rescue.  Until we as educators realize that we have the power and that we are the only ones capable to changing the lives of our students, we will continue to see the lack of progress in public education.  I believe in public education.  I believe in teachers.  I know that they can work miracles if they put their minds to it.  I do not believe it requires a superhuman effort.  It just requires teachers committing themselves to their students and ensuring they will do what is best for kids. 

So please, will real superheroes please stand up?