The Ron Clark Challenge: A Follow-Up on Sorting into Houses

It has been a little over a year since my last visit to the Ron Clark Academy, and I have had two years of implementing his strategies. For more clarification on who Ron Clark is and how AMAZING the Ron Clark Academy experience is, read my old post – The Ron Clark Academy. I’ve tried to post about what I have incorporated in my classes such as Larger than Life Lessons and Creating Classroom Culture. By far, the post that gets the most views and questions is where described how I implemented the house system in my classroom. You can read the specifics of what I did in this post – Sorting Students into Houses.

After implementing the house system, I have learned a LOT about what to do and what not to do. It is a great idea, but it really does need to be implemented well for it to work. Therefore, I’ve taken a break from my series on The Best Worst School Year to do a follow-up post on how the house system actually worked in my classroom.

What Worked:

1. Team competition is a GREAT way to engage all students, but particularly boys. They were by far the most enthusiastic about the house idea, and I got a lot of participation from them.

2. Making the sorting day magical and fun was important. I played loud music and even ordered some fun costume props from Oriental Trading for kids to use when I took their picture after being sorted. This past year, I also purchased livestrong bracelets in their house colors and gave one bracelet to each kid. It was easy and cheap!

3. Working for a unique reward motivated my students (by unique, I mean something other than the typical pizza and ice cream party…).

4. Giving points for multiple reasons that extended beyond just academics engaged my students who somewhat struggled in school. It is important that EVERY student buys in to this idea.

5. Utilizing contests for kids to earn points really got them excited. For example, I had team dress-up day where they had to come dressed in their house color. I also had Twitter contests related to the content I was teaching. For each submission to the contest, I awarded a ticket to that student.

6. Assigning activities related to the houses gave students more buy-in. For example, each house had to work in teams to submit a proposal for what the winning reward should be. I also had each group write about what song should be their house theme song.

7. Random yet even sorting is key. I know Ron Clark allows his teams to be randomly selected but not evenly selected. It really is the luck of the spin at RCA. I find that this doesn’t work for my kids. If they see that they are outnumbered by other teams, they won’t try as hard.

8. Frequent score updates are very important because it keeps up momentum.

9. Individually praising students like Ron Clark does is also a great thing to do. In my classes, I put up pictures for the highest scorers. This can also be done via the morning announcements.

10. Ask for donations! I reached out to my parents to donate rewards such as technology or gift cards that I used for our reward party. I’m sure you might have some parents or even partners in education who will be happy to donate.

Cautions:

1. Rewards can be tricky. I live in an affluent area. For one reward, I was able to secure 40 FREE movie passes to see The Hobbit on opening night. I had a lot of kids show up, but I was SHOCKED at how many weren’t interested in a free movie. I put a lot of work into getting free tickets, but that wasn’t necessarily appreciated by all students.

2. Counting by hand is tedious. I am looking for new ways to award tickets. I found that it was really hard to keep up with counting them manually as often as I wanted to. I have been scouring the internet to find apps (such as Class Dojo) that might make this easier. Next year, I want to do tickets completely electronically.

3. Keeping up momentum can be hard. It was very hard to keep up with the momentum of the beginning of the year. If you are implementing this idea as a school or as a team, make sure that every teacher buys-in and works to keep the excitement going.

4. Make sure teams are even. As I mentioned earlier, if kids feel that they are automatically on the “losing” team because of numbers, they may not participate.

5. Large teams were difficult for me as a teacher just doing it in my classes. Next year, I am looking at making five teams so that they can work together in classes on assignments and contests. Four teams are probably good for a school-wide initiative.

Have any of you tried implementing houses at your school? I would really LOVE to hear from you! I also know that Ron Clark has a school implementation specialist, Adam Dovico who will come to your school to work with faculty on how incorporate the Ron Clark model.

Please let me know your thoughts and questions! Comment here or email me at Lindsay.bowley@cherokee.k12.ga.us.

The Best Worst School Year: Introduction

I haven’t written a post in over a year.

Do you ever feel like you have a school year that seems to knock the wind out of you? Perhaps a “punch in the gut” type of experience?  This has been the greatest year I have EVER had, yet it has also been the most difficult, the most humbling, the most foundation-shaking trial I’ve ever endured. 

I was the county’s Teacher of the Year, and I was recognized by the Governor as an innovative teacher all in one school year; I have never felt more succesful, yet I have never felt like so much of a failure at the same time.   It has been an odd concoction of emotions.

So after a year of writing about fun ideas for the classroom, I needed a time of quiet, a time of realization that passion, excitement, and creativity don’t always cut it.  I needed recovery time.  I needed to heal.

I haven’t felt like I’ve been able to process all that happened during this school year until now.  The smoke of daily battle has finally cleared, and I am starting to bend down and pick up priceless pieces of wisdom strewn about the wasteland of my experience.  And I’m thankful. 

I will never be the same teacher again.

Over the summer, I want to share with you what I’ve learned not because I now have reached some sort of educational enlightenment but because I have a feeling that some of you are hurting too.  Some of you are still reeling from the jarring experience of a difficult school year. 

Walk with me through this journey of reflection.  Let’s have a conversation.  I will be real, open, and honest with you.  I want to humbly share with you mistakes that I hope to never repeat, and most of all, how I had to lean on my faith in Jesus Christ to survive.

I leave you for now with this:

James 1:2-4

^“Count it all joy, my brothers,when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”

The Best Worst School Year: An Introduction

I haven’t written a post in over a year.

Do you ever feel like you have a school year that seems to knock the wind out of you? Perhaps a “punch in the gut” type of experience? This has been the greatest year I have EVER had, yet it has also been the most difficult, the most humbling, the most foundation-shaking trial I’ve ever endured.

I was the county’s Teacher of the Year, and I was recognized by the Governor as an innovative teacher all in one school year; I have never felt more succesful, yet I have never felt like so much of a failure at the same time. It has been an odd concoction of emotions.

So after a year of writing about fun ideas for the classroom, I needed a time of quiet, a time of realization that passion, excitement, and creativity don’t always cut it. I needed recovery time. I needed to heal.

I haven’t felt like I’ve been able to process all that happened during this school year until now. The smoke of daily battle has finally cleared, and I am starting to bend down and pick up priceless pieces of wisdom strewn about the wasteland of my experience. And I’m thankful.

I will never be the same teacher again.

Over the summer, I want to share with you what I’ve learned not because I know have reached some sort of educational enlightenment but because I have a feeling that some of you are hurting too. Some of you are still reeling from the jarring experience of a difficult school year.

Walk with me through this journey of reflection. Let’s have a conversation. I will be real, open, and honest with you. I want to humbly share with you mistakes that I hope to never repeat, and most of all, how I had to lean on my faith in Jesus Christ to survive.

I leave you for now with this:

James 1:2-4

“Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”

Ron Clark Challenge: Larger Than Life Lessons

Last May, I had the great privilege of attending one of the most incredible professional development experiences of my life. I got to visit The Ron Clark Academy. I’ve written a post about my experience and have since vowed that my approach to teaching would never be the same!

This year, I decided that I would issue myself a Ron Clark Challenge in which I would chronicle how I’ve learned to implement some of the changes in my classroom. Earlier in the year, I posted about how I transformed the climate of my room towards a culture of positivity. You can read that post by clicking here. I also posted about how I sorted my students into houses as a way to improve classroom management and get my students engaged, which you can read by clicking here.

The third part of my challenge was learning how to make lessons larger than life. One of the most inspirational people I met at The Ron Clark Academy was a woman by the name of Kim Bearden. In a workshop session with her, she shared idea after idea of how she was able to take simple concepts and turn them into to something absolutely unforgettable. After seeing her pictures of students having fun while at the same time being engaged in their learning, I decided to try this out for myself. Two times during the school year, I attempted this and both proved to be a huge success. I definitely learned better ways to pull this off once the activity was over, but it was encouraging to see that even though I am working in a public school complete with large class sizes and its fair share of red tape, I was able to pull it off. And do you know what that means? You can too!

The first activity was my masquerade assignment. The one sentence summary of what we did is as follows: Students discussed the metaphorical masks that they wear; they develop their own mask and write a letter to themselves about why they should take their mask off and be who God created them to be.

Set-up: I first purchased paper masks from School Box as well as a host of pipe cleaners. Then, I talked to my cousin who helps to plan and decorate weddings and asked for both her and her husband’s resources and manpower. I then continued my search for supplies by talking to a woman I know who makes curtains- she let me use a bunch of beautiful fabric. I got staging curtains from a local church, and I also raided our school’s 8th grade dance supplies. In one long evening, a team of us rearranged my classroom to look like an 1840’s opera house. It had white lights, electrical candles, a large curtain canopy, and beautiful tablecloths with centerpieces which were decorated with fake flowers and beads. I truly was breathtaking.

The day of: I came to work dressed in all black with an elaborate Mardi Gras mask complete with Mardi Gras beads strung around my neck. The lights were turned off, and only the delicate glimmer of tea light electric candles and white lights showed in the room. I projected a picture of the masquerade dance scene from the movie Phantom of the Opera on my Smartboard, and I played opera music in the background. I had a velvet rope against the entrance of my room, and my students had to wait outside like they were about to walk straight into a fancy gala or theater. I kept the suspense buzzing around the school because I wouldn’t let a single student into my classroom until it was time for their class. Before each student entered, they received their own set of Mardi Gras beads.

The Lesson: This activity lasted for about three days. I started off the masquerade lesson by watching the scene of the song “Masquerade” from Phantom of the Opera. I then read the following quotes and poem to the class, and we discussed how they related to their own life:

“If you always worry about what your friends will think, then maybe they aren’t your friends at all.”- Louis Giglio

“We all wear masks, and the time comes when we cannot remove them without removing some of our own skin.”
― Andre Berthiaume

“MASKS
She had blue skin,
And so did he.
He kept it hid
And so did she.
They searched for blue
Their whole life through,
Then passed right by-
And never knew.”
― Shel Silverstein, Every Thing on I

I then shared with the students that many people wear the following masks to cover themselves up:

The “Chameleon” Mask – you change who you are depending on your situation.

The “Normal” Mask – you try to hide something about yourself because you are afraid of what others might say.

The “Everything’s Ok” mask – you might be hurting but instead of reaching out for help, you try to struggle through your pain on your own.

The students were then given the opportunity to write about which mask they often picked up and wear. I gave them the opportunity to share with one another, decorate and color a mask that reflected their own, and then they wrote letters to themselves about why why they should take down the mask.

This activity really brought the class together at the beginning of the year. What was so neat was that many of my less privileged students had never really seen such nice decorations in their life! You should have seen their faces! I received drawings from my kids about masks, and throughout the year, the topic was touched on again and again. It was truly powerful.

You can do something like this! You don’t have to have tons of resources to pull something off. I promise! All you have to do is learn how to ask for help! Stay tuned for the next blog post on another larger than life lesson in which I talk about how I turned my room into a real life hospital!

Want to talk more? Email me at Lindsay.bowley@gmail.com. Don’t miss the pictures below!

If Jesus Had My Job…

I haven’t written a post in a while.  Why?  Maybe I feel like my blog is almost having an identity crisis – What do I want this to be?  Who am I even talking to when I click “publish”?  Do I want to use this as a forum to vent? 

Perhaps I have a nobler aspiration in mind… Do I want this blog to change other teachers? to encourage them? challenge them?

When it comes down to the nitty gritty, and when I take a good long, hard look at what my small drop in the vast cyberspace ocean is becoming, I am starting to see that this blog is meant to change me.  This blog is my journey of self-discovery as a teacher.  Who am I?

So now new questions begin pouring from my fingers…  Why do I teach?  Why do I willingly allow myself to work beyond my required hours and to be so often stressed to the point of exhaustion? 

When I think long and hard about these soul-searching queries, I began to realize that my answer is the same as when I started teaching:  It’s because I know that for 55 minutes, five times a day, my classroom has the potential of being transformed into a place of refuge, a place of saftey, a place where my students can leave their reputations and past behaviors at the door. 

My 8th graders walk into my classroom with baggage from their broken homes and lives – yet there is no judgement here.  Everyone gets a fresh start.

As a teacher who is also a follower of Jesus Christ, sometimes I wonder…

How would Jesus teach my students? 

What would Hs demeaner be like as He goes through the ins and outs of a typical school day?  

How would He respond to the middle schooler who is confused about his gender…or my student with so much pent up frustration that he argues at the drop of a hat…or the precious young girl who daily carries the weight of being raped by one of her own family members? 

In what manner would He approach the students who lost a parent…or the kid who got on his knees and begged for his dad to stay with his mom?  What about them?

Being  a Christ-follower doesn’t mean slapping a Christian fish on myh car, looking down on others, and being “better”.  It means getting my hands dirty – stepping into the mud and mire of the lives of my broken students and teaching them as Jesus would teach, loving them as Jesus would show them love.

On this blog post, I have no thoughtful advice to give, no clever lesson plans, or funny stories from my classroom.  I just have questions…

How would Jesus handle discipline issues?

…rowdy kids?

…the laziness that seems to permeate youth culture today?

It sounds cliche, but really…What WOULD Jesus do?

What would Jesus talk about at the lunch table of teachers? 

How would He handle the frustrations of beurocracy and paperwork so abundant in my job? 

What kinds of lines would He draw when it comes to bad-mouthing and negativity?

 

If God is love that means…

Jesus would always be kind to students.

Jesus would be patient in every situation.

Jesus would not be stuck up or proud when interacting with those He works with.

Jesus would not parade Himself to get attention.

Jesus would not be rude.

Jesus would think no evil of the middle schoolers in His sphere of influence.

Jesus would bear ALL things…high class sizes, helicopter parents, new standards.

Jesus would believe ALL things…believing in the students who have consistantly failed, believing the best about a child who seems to be a hopeless cause.

Jesus would endure ALL things…bad attitudes, frustrating kids, pendulum shifts in education.

Jesus would hope ALL things…having hope for the troublesome student, the student whose family life is a wreck.

Jesus would never fail.

More than ever I see that Christianity is not a political agenda, nor is it a weapon.  It is not a philosophy, nor is it a crutch for the weak.  Christianity is being the hands and feet of Jesus.

Here am I, Lord.  Send me.

I Pretended Not to Care

I pretended not to care when I would see people whispering…

I pretended not to care when I was wide open and no one would pass the ball…

I pretended not to care when my dad was stumbling to walk after leaving my step mom and having to walk him to bed…

I pretended not to care when no one said “Happy Birthday”…

I pretended not to care when my dad lost his mind and made my whole family crash to pieces…

I pretended not to care after my grandpa said,”I’m letting go.” and then fired the gun right in front of my glazed, teary eyes…

I pretended not to care when I finally realized what cancer was and that my sister has it…

I pretended not to care when I heard the words “Your brother is in jail.”…

I pretended not to care when my best friend committed suicide…

I asked my students to respond to a simple prompt. “Take seven minutes and write as many sentences you can think of that begin with I pretended not to care when….” I couldn’t believe it when my students stood to share their writing that so many of them were experiencing such deep, painful hurts. These kids come from seemingly average, middle class families in suburbia Cherokee County, yet the collective experiences expressed by these 13 and 14 year olds showed the type of pain and suffering that could possibly take years of counseling to overcome.

The students who shared the writing above all seemed to wear a mask when they come to school. Their masks made them seem like happy, carefree children, yet on the inside, their young life was already weathered with hurt and suffering. As someone who is in the position of being able to work with at least 160 teenagers every day, a writing prompt like this is a sobering reminder that God has placed me in the role of a teacher for a specific reason. Kids are walking around with the literal weight of the world on their shoulders, waiting for a caring adult to actually notice that they are hurting, even crying out for help.

In Mary Frances Bowley’s new book The White Umbrella, she describes the feeling these kids have by comparing it to someone who is standing in a rainstorm of confusion, issues, and life-paralyzing problems. Like the abuse victim mentioned in her book, so many teenagers today are waiting for an adult to stop their routine of busyness and actually notice that they are helplessly standing in this metaphorical rainstorm. Hurting teens need to see that adults are willing to lovingly cover them with an umbrella, helping them to gingerly navigate through the tempests of life.
How can we do this?

1. Stop – Take time out of your busy day to stop and pay attention to the teenagers who may be under your care. Many are crying for help from an adult, but their cries are often undetectable because they may be manifested as bad behavior, rebellion, or even apathy. It takes someone who is willing to take the time to look past these behaviors to discern the truth of what might really be going on.

2. Listen – When teenagers talk to you, take the time to listen beyond just the words coming out of their mouth. Don’t dismiss them as incompetent or silly. Pay attention to what they are telling you and take it seriously. The can see right through someone trying to patronize them. If you truly listen, you may be able to form a relationship with that hurting young woman or young man that might lead to some much needed healing.

3. Love – Be a safe place for that teenager. Don’t write them off because of bad behavior, but instead chose to love them even when they may seem unlovable. Middle schoolers and high schoolers are smart and perceptive; they are able easily read your motives. Chose to love them even when it might be hard.

Who has God placed in your path that might be hiding the wounds of hurt and pain? Stand with them through the stormy crisis in their life!

The Ron Clark Challenge: Sorting Students into Houses

If you have been keeping up with my blog, you know from my previous post that I have issued myself a Ron Clark Challenge this year, one that is inspired by my visit to the Ron Clark Academy last May. In my last post, I discussed creating a culture of positivity and praise. To read about methods that I used to cultivate this type of climate in my classroom, click here.

This week I want to talk about how I have tackled one of Ron Clark’s most creative ideas – the House System. At his school, his teaching team splits up the students into four houses, very similar to those in the Harry Potter series. The results are electric! All of his students have team camaraderie, and they welcome newcomers with joy and genuine excitement. The houses create team dances each week, and they earn points to get rewards that continue exceed anything the kids could dream up on their own.

He uses a huge, hand-crafted wheel, a large Panasonic TV, and a giant slide to sort his students into the houses. Although I would love to have access to all of those neat gadgets, I don’t. Should that stop any teacher? NO WAY! I have learned how to recreate the magic of the “sorting wheel” in my own “Mrs. Bowley” style.

On the first week of school, I created a buzz around my classroom that something special was going to happen in a few days. When the day finally came for my kids to be sorted into houses, there was a lot of energy in the classroom. I got an old Halloween trick-or-treat pumpkin and filled it up with laminated slips of colored paper. I played ACDC’s “Back in Black” and Kanye West’s “Love Lockdown” in the back ground and pulled out my drum to add a drumroll every time one of my students drew their house color. The kids erupted in applause after each person was sorted. I then took their picture and told them to give me their “this is the best day of my life” smile. There for four colors in the pumpkin, each representing a house.

I chose the following names for my houses:

SABIO – the BLUE house, a house of wisdom

VALEROSO – the PINK house, a house of courage

CREATIVO – the YELLOW house, a house of creativity

AMABLE – the GREEN house, a house of kindness and friendliness

To set this up, I told my students that the “sorting pumpkin” was magic. I said that somehow it knows something about each and every person that no one else sees, an inner quality that defines part of who they are. I was worried that the cheesiness of this wouldn’t go over well with 8^th graders, yet I was pleasantly surprised that they actually played along. A few of them even came up to me and told me how amazed they were that the pumpkin knew so much about them. They talked about how accurate the pumpkin was in describing a quality that no one else could see. Even 8^th graders still believe in a little bit of magic!

As I introduced the house system, I explained that throughout the school year, this would be their new family; it would be kind of like a sorority or fraternity. They would earn green tickets for getting excellent grades, exemplifying good character, staying on task, having their work, and many other things. Whenever a student earns a ticket, they write their name on it and put it in a jar with their house color. At the end of each quarter, I count which student has earned the most tickets for their house, and they get to each snacks and a drink in my class. The great thing about handing out tickets is that I can really positively reinforce good behavior with my students who often get in trouble or have issues turning in their work. What would be “ticket-worthy” to one student might be completely different with another student. It is my way of acknowledging that I see them and I’m paying attention to when they do something well.

At the end of each semester, I hope to have some kind of major reward. I am following in Ron Clark’s footsteps by seeing if I can possibly get something donated. I would love to take all my kids to the movies or cater a nice dinner for them – something that goes beyond the standard “pizza party”. I have learned that my parents are more than willing to help out with my hair-brained ideas, and this is something that I plan to do with a lot of their help.

My students have absolutely LOVED the house system! Every time I get a new student, I say to my class, “You know what to do!” They automatically surround the new student, and one of them explains the process of being placed into a house. The class cheers and gets excited after they draw their color. It is always a fun way to welcome newcomers!

Another activity I do with my houses is to have twitter contests. I will ask students to do things like tweeting song lyrics that are dependent clauses or tweeting images of them acting out vocabulary words. They always write a hashtag (#) with their house name after their tweet. With each contest, there is a competition to see which house has the most participants.

Are you interested in trying this in your classroom? Trust me – it is VERY do-able!!! I would love to talk to any teachers more about how incorporate ideas from Ron Clark’s The End of Molasses Classes into a regular classroom setting. As a matter of fact, the Ron Clark Academy has just started a new program where they send one of their teachers, Adam Dovico, to your school to give more one-on-one training. For more information on this program, check out www.ronclarkacademy.com.

Let’s keep the conversation going! Please email me at Lindsay.bowley@cherokee.k12.ga.us. Stay tuned for my next post – how to transform your classroom with larger-than-life theme days.

The Ron Clark Challenge: Creating Classroom Culture

Ever since I began reading the book The End of Molasses Classes, and after I got the incredible opportunity to visit the Ron Clark Academy, I have been a different teacher.  I am pumped up about my job, reinvigorated with new passion for my career.  However, with this new passion comes an overwhelming feeling that I will never be able to implement all that Ron Clark and his school’s co-founder, Kim Bearden, do in their academy.  Therefore, I have decided to make small, baby-step goals, to implement these innovative ideas a little at a time.  The next series of blog posts will be a detailed account of my hit-or-miss attempts at walking in the footsteps of those at the Ron Clark Academy that I am honored to follow. My first goal is to create a culture of praise and positivity. Below are some specific things I am doing in my room foster this type of atmosphere:

 Applause

Starting on day one, any time my students contributed to what we were talking about in class, I would encourage the entire group to applaud.  The philosophy behind this is to boost the confidence of my students by having their peers encourage them for participating.  In my writing classroom, my kids often are asked to share their work aloud.  Whenever we do this, a shower of clapping rewards them for their bravery and openness. We also applaud if a student contributes an idea or gives a correct answer.  The great thing about it is that my students are beginning to initiate the clapping, not just me!

 Drumming

One of the most innovative yet simple ideas I saw while touring the academy was every classroom teacher’s use of a djembe drum.  The drumming got the kids excited and added an almost stereo affect in the classroom. Since I do not teach in a private school setting like the Ron Clark Academy and work with older students, I was worried about how incorporating a drum in my daily classroom routine would go over with my 8th graders.  On the first week of school, I introduced the drum slowly.  I would play it to announce that it was almost time for them to finish up an activity.  Eventually, I spent a class period going over drum rules and procedures.  After explaining each rule, I allowed the kids to practice, giving  students the opportunity to play the drum.

 Appropriate times to play:

Play the drum when the class is clapping.

Play the drum to accentuate an important point in the lesson.

Play the drum to get the class to “encourage” another student who is having trouble getting an answer after being called on.

Play the drum if something is funny (ba-da-DUM).

 The plus side to drumming is that the students who are always fidgety or even easily distracted are suddenly glued to your every word because they want to play it as much as possible!

 Fast-Paced Classes

As a writing teacher, having a fast-placed class is not always the ideal way to run my room every day. Sometimes a calming, low-light atmosphere is what kids need to get their thoughts from their mind to their paper.  However, when we are not doing writer’s workshop, I think it is very important to keep my kids on their toes and excited about what might happen next. I create this type of classroom environment by doing the following:

 Never sitting down. I have made it a personal goal this year that my students will rarely, if ever, see me sitting at my desk working.  If I ask them to be on task, then I will be on task too – I’ll be walking around observing and giving feedback. 

 Change activities frequently.  My 8th graders often have a short attention span.  Therefore, changing what we are doing or how we are sitting, changing  between talking activities and quiet activites can keep kids always guessing about what will happen next. I prefer to change every 5-10 minutes.  I always see a difference in student engagment if they do the same thing all day long.

 Move! I have found it very helpful to take time to get my students moving around the classroom.  I like to do activities where they are writing on white boards and holding them up, walking around the room , or I’ll even randomly ask a student to get up out of their seat to teach a warm-up.

 I will never forget hearing Ron Clark encourage the teachers who toured his school by saying, “Don’t try to implement everything at once.  Start small with a few ideas at a time.” That is what I am trying to do this year – simply starting small.

 What changes have you made in your classroom? Even the littliest changes can make such a HUGE difference!

Stay tuned each week for more posts about my RON CLARK CHALLENGE.

Pushing the Right Buttons: Anita’s Story

Anita was at best apathetic in my class. Honestly, I never heard a peep out of her for the majority of the school year. When she did her assignments, none of them really stood out, and it seemed as if she did them begrudgingly with half-hearted effort. It wasn’t until a poetry project given at the end of the year that my attention was turned to her like never before. I asked my students to write a poem about an inner struggle that they had comparing that struggle to a metaphorical monster within them. As I scanned the room, watching my students diligently working, my eyes turned to Anita. To my stunned surprise, she was writing furiously, engaged in this one task more than she had been in any other the whole year.

When I peeped at her paper to see what “monster” caused her to write with such passion, the word MARIJUANA caught my eye. Sensing me looking over her shoulder, she turned to me and whispered, “I need help. I know my monster is supposed to be bad, but honestly I can only think of reasons why I like it.” My heart dropped to my stomach. Finally, she was beginning to do work for me, but she was revealing a major struggle that I knew I had to address.

The next day, Anita and I, with Dr. Peppers in hand, took a walk to the teacher’s lounge during class. After spending time talking through her writing, we eventually began to discuss the inevitable. Shyly, she told me about how it all started, who dealt it to her, how often she did it, and why. When I called home and spoke with her mother, more revelations about this young lady came to light.

Anita lived in a broken home. Her mother was at a complete loss as to what to do when told about this unearthed discovery. Being a young newlywed in my 20’s, I found myself in the awkward place of having to give this parent advice. “Yes, you should call and report the teenager distributing the pot.” “Under the circumstances, yes I do feel that you should probably set some clear boundaries and guidelines for your daughter.” As the words left my mouth, I began to see more clearly that Anita’s support system at home was weak at best.

Hoping that this phone conversation and my long talk with Anita would do some good, I was devastated when, a few weeks later, one of the worst scenarios possible happened. In a fleeting moment of stupidity, Anita and one of her friends decided to bring marijuana to school, planning to smoke it outside the art room during the week of CRCT testing. When it was discovered that this potent substance was in her possession, she was whisked away from the carefree world of middle school never to enter its doors again. Her all-too-subtle cry for help a few weeks ago was not heard as it should by her shocked parents. She spent the rest of the year sitting in an ISS cubby hole over at the high school campus.

Right before she left, I issued a new assignment – one in which my students had to write about their past as well as write about what is important to them. This was a multi-genre project, so students created narrative pieces, poetry, eulogies, thank-you notes and the like. About a week and a half into the project, well before the assignment was due, I received an email from Anita containing her writing – all in a language that artfully came to life. Her words painted beautiful pictures on the page; it was a masterful compilation. She wrote honestly, reflectively, and with the passion of someone who truly loved putting pen to paper. In her project reflection, she talked about how over the course of this year, writing has become almost a part of her, an essential, something that she can’t do without.

I tried to process what I was reading: here was this student, addicted to marijuana, expelled from school, in the eyes of so many around her – a hopeless cause. This girl was writing with the expertise and level of honesty that far exceeded many of her peers! It would have been easy to slap the label of “delinquent” on her, but if you looked past her obvious shortcomings, you would be able to see budding talent and creativity.

One day, I decided to take a leap of faith. Not knowing whether or not I would crash and burn, I walked over to the high school and met face to face with Anita. I told her she was a good writer and genuinely praised her for a job well done. Her eyes lit up, and she received my words as if positive compliments were a rarity to her ears. A few weeks prior to this, I had learned of a summer creative writing institute at a local university. I talked with her about the the program and told her earnestly that she should look into participating in it. Her talent was real, and it needed to be developed. As she expressed that she would like to participate, I began to understand that she was just looking for someone to believe in her.

Girls just like Anita sit in classrooms around the country. These are young women who have made wrong choices – for whatever reason – and choose to dwell in the crippling cycle of self-defeat. I have seen time and time again as teachers and caretakers look at girls like Anita and lower their bar of expectations much lower than what these girls can actually do simply because of lifestyle choices. What would happen if instead of focusing on their faults, we began capitalizing on their strengths? What if we truly looked for the diamond in the rough? What if we chose to believe more about those in our care that they ever dared to believe about themselves?

What Students Wish Their Teachers Knew Part 2

As I mentioned last week, I asked my students at the end of the year to take a few minutes to write down a few words of advice for teachers based on their previous experiences. I have to admit, the feedback I received from them was both shocking and humbling. What I thought they would care about was very different from what actually mattered to these middle school minds. The first nine words of advice were listed in last week’s blog. You can view them by clicking here. The rest of what they had to say is listed below:

1. Don’t be a hypocrite. Students can spot, from a mile away, hypocrisy. If you tell them not to gossip, but they see you gossiping, they will notice. If you ask them not to chew gum, but you chew gum yourself, they will notice. Students have a keen sense of fairness, and they lose respect for you if your actions don’t match your words.

2. Be willing to be wrong. When you goof up while grading or mistakenly accuse a child of doing something wrong when they are not, own up to it. Kids need to see that you are human, that you make blunders just like they do. If students catch on that you refuse to acknowledge making a mistake, you may lose respect and authority in their eyes.

3. Don’t pick favorites. As teachers, we all know that it is wrong to pick favorites in class. What we may not realize, however, is that it may come across to students that we have favorites when we actually don’t. Allowing only a certain few to answer questions or overlooking some kids’ faults while harping on others can come across as showing favoritism. This has the potential of communicating to students that you are not approachable.

4. Be confident. Middle schoolers can be especially crafty at making teachers feel bad. They can sometimes twist situations to make you lose confidence, giving the upper hand. My students shared with me that they value and respect teachers who maintain authority with confidence and professionalism despite the comments, attitudes, and actions of the other kids in the room.

5. Have a good attitude. This is pretty much self-explanatory. Kids want teachers who look at situations with positivity, not assuming the worst but assuming the best. Our attitude impacts their attitude. The moment we walk into work, we are setting the tone of the classroom.

6. Don’t take your bad mood out on the kids. Everyone has a rough day. Everyone has those horror class periods that never seem to end or that one student who gets on our last nerve. However, that does not give teachers the right to take their bad mood out on the students. When the class period changes, try to leave your emotions at the door. Start every day and every class with a clean emotional slate.

7. Discipline fairly. My students mentioned specifically that it bothered them when a teacher doesn’t discipline evenly. If a troublesome student does something wrong, we are quick to pay attention to it, but sometimes when kids who never get in trouble do the exact same thing, we may say nothing. Even though we know what we are doing, the kids see this as unfair and even as “targeting” certain students.

8. Stay out of students’ personal business. When I read this particular word of advice, I felt like I needed more clarification. After all, don’t students appreciate it when their teacher tries to get to know them? What they shared with me about this made a lot or sense. When students feel comfortable talking with their teachers about what is going on in their personal lives, there is a level of trust they are placing in their teacher. However, the problem arises in their eyes when teachers take that knowledge and treat them differently because of it. Students are looking for a place of safety where they feel comfortable being real.

9. Be happy. This statement, as simple as it sounds, is very important. The youngsters in our classrooms want to know that we enjoy waking up every morning and coming to work. They are looking to see if we are happy to see them and if we value what we do as a profession.

What seemed like a simple, easy activity turned into a great learning experience for me. As I have reread their list in order to prepare it for this blog post, I notice a clear theme in what they are saying: POSITIVITY. Who knew that a good attitude and a smile can go such a long way? The next time I am frustrated with the state of education or with unruly students, the best decision I make can is to let my inner Pollyanna come out. Students truly don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.

To see the first nine words of student advice that I posted last week, click here.