Opening Day

Well last Thursday we had new student orientation and several hundred 9th graders showed up for their first day of high school. There was the usual stuff; finding homerooms, getting lockers, touring the building, and running though a mini-schedule. All of this was preceded by an assembly where the main speaker was the principal. This was the fourth time I have heard him give this opening and each year there is something new or I hear it in just a slightly different way. So what was new for this year? A rhetorical question "Why are you here" it is for one of three reasons (natural I boiled 20 minutes down to 3 lines):

1. Someone made you come today.
2. You have the goal to graduate high school.
3. You want to prepare yourself for your future.

Obviously choice three is the one that we hope all students make, and I am sure that most of them do. So the real challenge is how to change the number 1s and 2s into number 3s? When I come up with the plan that works then I can really retire, so until then I will just have to keep on trying to make a difference where ever I can. After all that is what teaching is all about. My principal has ended every 9th grade opening with the same three keys to success. His claim, do these three thing and you will be successful in preparing yourself for your future.

1. Show up and be on time every day, all 720 of them.
2. Treat everyone you meet, teachers, staff and fellow students, the way you would like to be treated.
3. You have to do your work, the only one on in the list that is actually difficult.

Well there you have it the simple way to help your students have a great year. I also just got a chance to watch the key note of Dalton Sherman at convocation of the Dallas Independent School District, if you have not seen it yet watch it. I have lots of great ideas for this year and I still need to get some post written from this summer, so my goal is to keep up with posts this year.

One for Us

I spent the last few days of June at the National Educational Computing Conference (NECC) in San Antonio TX. After that conference I traveled to Washington DC to attend the National Education Association Representative Assemble (NEA-RA). The NEA-RA is the largest democratically run meeting in the world with over 9,000 delegates debating, discussing and voting on the direction of the organization. The NEA represents 3.2 million teachers in all 50 states. It truly is democracy in action and I have a story to prove it.

At the RA any member can submit a New Business Item (NBI) that they would like to see the NEA take action on. One such item was proposed by a woman from New Jersey. NBI 67 "That NEA recommends the banning of all student personal electronic devices, especially cellphones, from the classroom". Well I immediately went into tech defender mode. I went a spoke to the woman to see if I could offer a friendly amendment to her NBI, that would remove the word banning. Her response was that they were already going to modify it to except education or medical uses (that would be just about everything in my view). Seeing she was not going to budge, I went to my delegation from PA and asked them to support my amending the motion to read "That NEA recommends the teaching of appropriate use of all student personal electronic devices, especially cellphones". The PA delegation agreed to let me try to amend the motion and speak on their behalf.

The time came for NBI 67 to be discussed and voted on. The maker of the motion asked to modify the motion to add the part about educational and medical, and then got a chance to give her rational. There were a few questions ask, but then came my turn. The Chair, President Reg Weaver said "Microphone 15 Lee Speers seeking to amend, mike 15". A spotlight comes on the red light on podium 15 turns on and there is my face on 4 big screens, and several smaller ones, in front of almost 10,000 people. "Yes President Weaver I would like to amend NBI 67 with the language I submitted." President Weaver asked for my amendment to be placed on the screen. For the first time the delegates at the NEA-RA see the proposal, the room grows eerily quiet and then a slight murmur. The leadership from all of the state delegations starts talking to see if they will recommend supporting the change. President Weaver asked the maker if she would accept the modification (I know what her answer is). After she says no, it is now my opportunity to speak to my amendment. Here is the text of my remarks:

Before traveling to DC I was in San Antonio TX attending the National Educational Computing Conference NECC with 20,000 other committed educators that use technology. While at NECC I attended many professional development session all using technology and many using cell phones.

A couple quick facts about cell phone use. There are currently 3.3 billion active cell phones world wide, that is one cell phone for every 2 people on the planet. There are currently 30 plus countries in the world that have 100% saturation (one cell phone for every man, woman and child), the US is not one of them. Presently in the US 16% of all households have only cell phone service and that number is growing rapidly. In the US there are more active cell phones than home computers. What does all this mean, there is no way to enforce a cell phone ban. So what is the alternative?

Do and will students use cell phones improperly? Sure they do, but they use computers, pens, pencils and even crayons improperly too, and do we ban them? No instead we do what good educators do when students misbehave. We teach them how to use the equipment properly. We need to do the same thing with technology, not, run from it, fear it or ban it, but help our students understand it and use it properly. The International Society for Technology in Education ISTE has developed National Education Technology Standards NETS. These standards have not only been developed for students, but also teachers, administrators and technology leaders. All of these standards address good digital citizenship when using technology. And who better to teach students these standards than US, the members of the NEA? Please do not stick you head in the sand and support this amendment to NBI 67.

Much to my surprise and relief twice during my remarks I was interrupted by applause and again at the end got a nice round of congratulations from the delegates. The signals from state leadership began popping up throughout the room, most show a positive recommendation. Then came the vote, my amendment had passed and was now the main motion! Several people were called on to speak that were originally opposed to the NBI, but commented that with the amendment they were now in support of it. There was another amendment to the item, basically making more wordy, but in the end NBI 67 passed and the NEA was not recommending banning any technology from the classroom. So now the 3.2 million members of the NEA are not for banning technology in the classroom. Use that fact with your stubborn tech director next time. Who knows, maybe next year there will be an NBI about the use of web 2.0 applications.

The next step in the Movement

I found this on the ASCD blog

Students in S. Bronx Refuse to Take Test

Almost all of the eighth-graders at South Bronx's Intermediate School 318 chose to hand in blank exams at the end of a three-hour social studies practice test. Refusing to take the test, even a practice test, may mean dismissal for the student's teacher, whom some authorities blame for inciting the boycott, though the students claim otherwise.

Writer and former teacher Dan Brown says the reason we haven't seen more protests like this one is be cause "students have been intellectually and spiritually bludgeoned into submission."

Do you think this sort of civil disobedience is effective? Are kids better served to take the test or walk out in protest?

This is the next step in the movement. See my post from April 25. Steve Dembo took my original post a little farther and even wrote some words. Check his post out here. I am for students organizing themselves and taking a stand on an issue that directly effects them and their right to a quality education. Way to go guys!

30 Things Good Teachers do

Okay I read a post on LifeHack "50 things that successful people do". The post took all the self-help books and boiled them down to the 50 things you need to do to be successful. Well I read them over and took a look at them from and educational perspective. Some just did not fit and many needed to be tweaked. So here is my list of 30 things good teachers do.

Habits of good teachers….

1. They look for and find opportunities where others see nothing.
2. They find a lesson while others only see a problem and they focus on solutions.
3. They consciously and methodically create success for their students, while others hope students will find success.
4. They ask the right questions - the ones which put them in a productive, creative, positive mindset and emotional state.
5. They rarely complain (waste of energy). All complaining does is put the complainer in a negative and unproductive state.
6. They don’t blame (parents, students?). They take complete responsibility for their actions and outcomes (or lack thereof) of their students.
7. They are busy, productive and proactive. While most are laying on the couch, or in the teacher's lounge, they are out there getting the job done.
8. They align themselves with like-minded people. They understand the importance of being part of a team. They create win-win relationships.
9. They are ambitious; they want amazing for themselves and their students- and why shouldn’t they?
10. They have clarity and certainty about what they want (and don’t want) for their students .
11. They innovate rather than imitate.
12. They are life-long learners. They constantly work at educating themselves, either formally (academically), informally (watching, listening, asking, reading, student of life) or experientially (doing, trying)… or all three.
13. They are glass half full people - while still being practical and down-to-earth. They have an ability to find the good.
14. They consistently do what they need to do for their students, irrespective of how they are feeling on a given day. They don’t spend their life stopping and starting.
15. They deal with problems and challenges quickly and effectively, they don’t put their head in the sand. They face their challenges and use them to improve themselves.
16. While many people are reactive, they are proactive. They take action before they have to.
17. They are good communicators and they consciously work at it, with student, parents, administrators and peers.
18. Their desire to be exceptional means that they typically do things that most won’t. They are willing to take risk and realize that you learn as much if not more from failure.
19. They do what is best for their students and that is the first question they ask.
20. They understand the importance of discipline and self-control. They are strong. They are happy to take the road less travelled.
21. They are generous and kind. They take pleasure in helping all students achieve.
22. They are humble and they are happy to admit mistakes and to apologise. They are confident in their ability, but not arrogant. They are happy to learn from others. They are happy to make others look good rather than seek their own personal glory.
23. They are adaptable and embrace change, while the majority are creatures of comfort and habit. They are comfortable with, and embrace, the new and the unfamiliar.
24. They are resilient. When most would throw in the towel, they’re just warming up.
25. They are open to, and more likely to act upon, feedback, from administrators, peers and students.
26. They don’t invest time or emotional energy into things which they have no control of.
27. They are happy to swim against the tide, to do what most won’t. They are not people pleasers and they don’t need constant approval.
28. They don’t rationalise failure. While many are talking about the troubles of their students, they are finding a way to help them succeed despite all their challenges.
29. They are more interested in effective than they are in easy. While the majority look for the quickest, easiest way (the shortcut), they look for the course of action which will produce the best results for their students over the long term.
30. They practice what they preach. They don’t talk about the theory, they live the reality.

I am sure that many teachers will read this list and say, hey that is me. Others will say that I must be nuts, no teacher can be like that (I not sure many of those will find this post). Do I care or even want to know? What do you think?

Another Voice Joins the Chorus

Well it seems like the flood gates have opened on the cell phone topic. I just came across this article in Technology News jumping on the "why are we banning cell phones" bandwagon. This one has some really good points and ideas. Hey maybe if we all just start forwarding all of this "data" to IT directors, principals, superintendents and school board members they will just give up and see the light.

Standing up

I read this article Teacher Suspended for Refusing to Give State Test and really started to think. The basic gist of the article was a middle school teacher in Washington state was suspended without pay for 2 weeks for refusing to give his students the state high-stakes test. Now that is what I call standing up for your convictions. As a union president I would never advise a member to be insubordinate, but I must respect his commitment and feel his frustration. What if a whole school, or district, or even state would do this. Who know maybe the next Arlo Guthrie would even write a song about it. Would Gandhi or Martin Luther King Jr. approve of such a protest?

I think most teachers will agree that a child is more than a test score, but how many of us would be will to put ourselves in that kind of peril just to show it. Maybe if we all did the effects of NCLB would not have been as devastating.

Never put Science Teachers in a Room Together

I watched Al Gore: New thinking on the climate crisis from TED the other day. So I sent it to some of my science colleagues and they loved it as well. After a PD today one of the teachers I sent it to told a teacher from another school he would show it in his room after our session. So he, I and three other science teachers watch the video. Do not get science teachers fired up about the climate crisis. Well in actuality we should all be fired up about it. After watching the video and getting ourselves calmed down and rational again I had a chance to talk with a teacher from the other building and we started discussing how Gore's talked fit in with the new "Flat World" of Friedman. Included in that the facilitator at our PD mentioned Pink and Right brain thinking. So now here are a couple of science teachers standing in the hallway linking Gore, Friedman and Pink and what it means for not only our own children but how we have to teach our students. We brought back one of the strategies from our PD called QAR. We all said that our students have a difficult time with the two in their head types of questions, and that is exactly what Pink says they will need to prosper in the Friedman Flat World. Now Gore puts into place being politically conscience and wow. And what are many teachers doing, getting students ready for mandated tests to show AYP. God (or some higher power) help us. This needs to be a discussion for a late night with group of committed educators who are ready to change the face of education in America. Anyone ready to join me?

The $50 SMARTBOARD

Sometimes getting up at 4 am on a Saturday is worth it. I came across this TED talk and just got myself a new project. Johnny Lee takes a Wii remote and turns it into an interactive white board (SMARTBOARD). I know my wife has a lot planned for me this weekend, but I may just have to find time to work on this. Looks like could be a late night.

What makes this great is that Mr. Lee gives the software and instruction for free. With the use of YouTube for advertising his interactive whiteboard software has been downloaded thousands of times and his "invention" is being use all over the world as a cheap reliable substitute for equipment that is financially out of reach for many districts. The only problem is going to be getting the Wii remote away from my son.

The best 18 minutes I have spent in a long time

I watch a TED Talk video and I am ready to get back and teach on Monday. Talk about putting your money where your mouth is. Take the time to watch this one, but put your mind in neutral and hang on for the ride.

Clifford Stoll: 18 minutes with an agile mind

Every Teacher Needs to Watch This

I forget where I saw this, it may have been on a Twitter. Anyway I watched it on YouTube, but since it is blocked at school I used Zamzar to convert it. But how the video got on my blog is not what this post is about. It's about the content of the video. If any teacher watches this and it does not impact the way they teach they are either teacher of the year or need to think about retiring. I think of my own son in kindergarten the class of 2020. What will he do when he grows up. It very may well be a job that has not even been thought of yet, and will he be prepared by the educators he encounters during the next 12 years? I hope so. After watching this I will redouble my efforts to help teachers that wants to learn and incorporate technology into their practice so they can help students like my son.

Cheating?

The following came to me via ASCD news brief. After reading the entire story I left the comment at the bottom of the post.

More students admit to cheating amid pressure to win better grades
As the college admissions process grows more competitive, two of three U.S. high school students admit to "serious" cheating and 90% say they cheat on homework, according to a Rutgers' Management Education Center national survey. "These kids are desensitized in a culture that values the bottom line," says Jason Stephens, an assistant professor of educational psychology at the University of Connecticut who recently won a $400,000 grant to study classroom ethics. ABC News

My comment:
The norms of society are changing. The idea of "coping in not cheating" is taught at the home, school and by peers. Here the point, look at you CD/music and DVD library. Are all the items in your collection originals, or do you have a few burned copies of something? Guess what, your cheating and most teachers even feel that using a "copy" of a DVD for class purposes is OK. I know as a teacher I see it all the time and when I question it boy do I hear it. So what are students to think, coping is OK for my parents, teachers and other adults, but no OK for me. We need to take a hard look in the mirror in this new digital age about this whole idea and what we "teach" to our children.

PETE&C Postconference

Wednesday after PETE&C, almost 2 weeks ago now, the PA-TIMs had a professional development session around leadership/coaching lead by Steve Sassaman from Performance Learning Systems. Steve has been with us before and has always enlightened us and given us things to ponder and use in our role as mentors. This session was no different. We started of with a discussion of the differences between presenting, teaching and facilitating. It was a very interesting discussion.

The definitions from Dictionary.com
Presenting: Teaching: Facilitating:

Here are my definitions
Presenting: A static "canned" delivering of information to a group, sometimes meant to persuade to take action.
Teaching: To cause information to be learned by a group.
Facilitating: To take an active role in the learning process, were both the "student" and "teacher" learn

If you stop and think about it facilitating requires the most work, but will produce the most learning. It is back to the old adage you get out what you put it, in programing terms it's GIGO. The other thing that really gets in the way sometimes, especially for secondary teachers is the plan. We boiled it down to this, "Plan the teaching, don't teach the plan". That and the Lumberjack story would have been enough, but there was still more.

Facilitation comes in three forms. Facilitate yourself, facilitate others, facilitate a group. Facilitating yourself is about self-awareness and using reflection as tool to better your teaching. As Lao Tsu said "Knowing others is wisdom. Knowing the self is enlightenment". When you facilitate yourself you make choices, either DO choices or BE choices. Making the positive DO and BE choices is the best way of facilitating yourself.

Once you have yourself on the path, then you can facilitate others. This is coaching. The one on one facilitation of others. Taking a person from where they are to where they want to be. I think this one is the easiest. I think facilitating yourself is the hardest, but coaching one-on-one provides a "safe" environment for both persons. It is easy to establish a relationship and trust in this arrangement, thus making it possible for both participants to learn from the interaction.

Facilitating a group is really knowing how to read them and know what they need. Is it time to think and reflect, guidance, motivation, a nudge, or just an okay to express themselves. This is done by establishing a culture in the classroom, one of respect and safety, where learners feel free to express thoughts and views. Where the true feeling is that the sum knowledge of all of us is better than any one of us. Sounds simple, but this is the art of teaching. This is when teaching becomes true facilitation and learning takes place at an astounding rate.

So what are the barriers to reaching this nirvana of teaching? Perception is part of the problem. We want teaching to be neat, orderly, sequential, quiet, managed, reproducible and controllable. Unfortunately learning is often messy, accidental, random, loud and complex. So what we truly want may not look, sound or feel like what we expect it be. Too often we would rather see or are "judged" on the expectation and not the desired outcome, one of the real crimes of teaching.

Einstine on Testing

I came across this article from Teacher Magazine and just had to pass it on. Go read the article and then finish reading the post, I'll wait.

It was the not until the last two bullet points that I really got interested. The comments about thinking on the grand scale and standardized testing being psychometrically week and causing feeling of mistrusted seem so true. People always talk about NCLB and multiple measures, and how the test does not really measure what it is suppose to, blah, blah, blah. But think about it in terms of an individual kid, picture him/her in your mind, one that you know is intelligent, articulate and engaged in their education, but is labeled as not proficient do to some PSSA score. Got that kid in your brain now. Okay answer the question, how can (insert name of child here) demonstrate, or what measure can I use, to erase the not proficient label and replace it with advanced. Got your answer, go do it, then repeat.

PETE&C Podcast

Well I compiled some interview from PETE&C this year and put together a podacst. My fellow TIM Dave Solon put on the finishing touches and posted it up on the Twenty Minutes For Tech podcast. Give it a listen and if you were at PETE&C let me know what you thought was the best session or thing you found most useful.

What we learned from MCPS

There is a lot of talk about closing the "achievement gap" well last week I had the opportunity along with a team from my district to hear from a district that is doing it. We heard from Jerry Weast and his team from Montgomery County Public School in Maryland. They have a truly district wide vision of every student graduating college ready. This vision is held by ever person that works in the district, from the superintendent to the cafeteria worker. All of the stakeholders are aligned and pulling on the same rope. This is a unique situation were the administration, teacher union, support staff and parents have all come together around there vision. This vision has several benchmark measurements that guide students along the road to graduation (none of which are AYP related). These benchmarks start at kindergarten and takes the students though graduation letting them, their parent and their teachers know where they stand during the journey. Our district patterned our work around the success of MCPS and have started to roll them out to administrators. Once we have fully "released" them I share them as well. Until then just know that we have started on our PATHS for all of our students.

The other inspiring person we heard from was LeDerick Horne, a student that was labeled special ed in third grade and his struggles with a system that told him he could not make. Luckily he had his mother as an advocate that would not the system fail him. As a result he is a successful well spoken entrepreneur, businessman, playwright and poet. Take a look at his bio, although it does not do him justice. It made me think how many LeDericks have passed though our school system without ever receiving the chance to succeed.

What a week

Wow, I just spent a week on the road, and I thought teaching was tough. I saw so much and had such great experiences, but for now I need to catch my breath. In the next few days I will be working on posts and podcasts around these events. These events were a Panasonic Foundation Leadership Apprentice Program around breaking the links between race, poverty and achievement. Next came PETE&C, just the keynotes were worth the price of admission. Finally our PA-TIMs post conference with Steve Sassaman. Well just had to get something out, more will be coming!

Wow

Just saw this on the Fishbowl, and it fit so well with my last post.
At the risk of giving Gary a heart attack, here's an interview of Thomas Friedman by Daniel Pink. It's part of the February issue of The School Administrator, which appears to have several articles relevant to our discussion of A Whole New Mind. I would suggest our students read both the interview and some of the other articles with Gary's criticisms in mind. (For those of you who haven't been following our AWNM project, you may want to read through the comments on this post and this post to see some of Gary's thought-provoking questions for our students - and their responses.)