The "S" Word

This all started when a teacher on Twitter used it to describe some kids she went to school with.  Having been through school myself, and teaching high school, I did not even flinch at the word.  But someone challenged her use of it.  Saying it was inappropriate. It seems that we were no longer allowed to call kids "smart".

Do I believe all kids are smart?  Do I fall for the book smarts versus street smarts?  Do I believe every kid is a different kind of smart?  I started this blog post awhile ago, ready to stand up for all the kids who liked hearing that they were smart.  I mean, how many songs are there about telling woman and girls they are beautiful, no matter what?  How is describing beauty, in its different forms, surface-level or down deep (sometimes really deep) different than saying, "Wow!  You are so smart!"

But then I stopped.  And reflected.  For a long time. (Almost a year to be exact.)  And I finally came to this conclusion:

She is the reason I tell kids they are smart.

Bella, Age 5

Because there is not a number of times I can tell this princess that she is pretty and smart that will block out the doubt that will creep into her beautiful mind when someone, one day, inevitably, calls her stupid.  Or dumb.  Or ugly.  Or weird...

I do not believe kids are bad.  I never call a kid bad.  Decisions are bad.  I believe evil cannot be created and, like darkness is simply the absence of light, bad is simply the absence of good.  But I will not stop calling kids smart.  If bad words have such a great power to change someone for the worse, I will not hesitate to believe that positive words can change kids for the better.  So I will call them smart.  Because they are. Or they will be.  Lord willing.  And teachers teaching.

This Time I Really AM Sorry

It was my sixth period class.  Their names were Keisha and Danielle.  Lovely girls, but to save their lives or the lives of their loved ones, they could NEVER. STOP. TALKING.

Since then I have learned about the power of proximity control and a good offense being the best defense, but I have also learned, in another lesson from my car, that there are kids who are going to talk no matter what.  And I know this, because I am going to speed.  No Matter What.

It's not that I hold any disrespectful for the law or authority, and it's not that I don't think that speed limits are a good idea (and that they are meant to save lives), it's just that, in the words of Ricky Bobby, I just wanna go fast.

You can tell me to stop speeding.  I will listen.  At least at first.  This thing is, I don't mean to do it most of the time.  I don't speed because I'm late; I just get distracted.  Or excited.  Or bored.

You can punish me.  I will feel it.  I have been pulled over about 50 times.  Ok, more than 50, but only like 51.  And not just for speeding.  I get pulled over for other traffic violations.  None of them are angry and most of them aren't even on purpose.  And none of them stopped me from doing it again.

Did you know you can pay a fee and then NOT get pulled over for 6 months and they will erase the record of getting the ticket?  Actually, you can get pulled over during that 6 months, you just can't get a ticket.  I know that for sure because the first time I did the 6 month probation thing, I got pulled over before my 6 months were up.  Twice.  But I didn't get a ticket either time.  So I am on my second 6 months for another ticket (which you can't do more than once in a 2 year period... unless it's close, and then you can, and I know because mine were like 16 months apart. And I did.)

You know what does work? Gentle, constant reminding and proximity control. When I see a cop I think speed and I check mine.  Even if I am not speeding.  I have been conditioned to do this.  My bestie, who is the best at gentle reminders, will say, "watch your speed" as often as I need it.  Without judgement and without threats.  I don't know if it annoys her but it doesn't annoy me.  I know I need constant reminding. 

Students don't talk during your lesson because they hate you.  They talk because they are excited, bored, distracted--all the reasons I speed.  They know it's wrong, and yes, even dangerous (talking during a fire drill always gets the "What if... and you couldn't hear because you were talking" speech). Walk over to them, lay a hand on their chair, their desk, their back.  Remind them, as Harry Wong would say, of the procedures everyday if you have to, of where they are, of what they are (supposed to be) doing. Be their bestie. Remind them without judgement, without threats.  Those don't work.  You can threaten to take my license away but I know if that happened all I have to do is not get caught driving (which, in all honesty, would be a GREAT motivator...) And I don't say that as a dare.  I say that because it's the truth. People drive every day on suspended licenses (I may have... Twice.))

Every time I get pulled over I am sorry and I didn't mean to.  When kids say that, they are telling the truth.  Instead of punishing, teach.  Help them learn to self-regulate.  Pavlov didn't threaten or beat the dog.  Teach them to condition themselves.  Before they become adults and breaking the rules costs actual money.  And points on your license.  Whatever that means.  

Maks, 6 Speed Manual, Turbo, 268 HP

This is Me: #SorryNotSorry

The greatest compliment I have ever received came from a teacher the first day of this school year.

"Hutch!" She waved.  "Have you seen Inside Out? I saw it and I was like, that's Kathleen Hutchinson!  You are Joy!"

I was flattered, nay, I was honored.  I had never thought of myself that way.  It's funny how others see us.  But, this may come as a shock, not everyone appreciates my... enthusiasm.  I am Joy.  I am Pinkie Pie.  I am funny, honest and energetic. I am loud, unapologetic and upbeat. However, more times than I have been compared to a Disney character in my job, I have been told to slow down, take it easy, pull back, cool it and tone it down.  I have been warned of burnout more than once. I have been told I'm too much, that I intimidate people.

Well, ya know what?  I AM NOT SORRY.  I may come across as silly, over-the-top or even dumb.  Sometimes I am.  I am a horrible speller and, until recently, I didn't know Julius Caesar was a real person (still unsure this is true.  Like REAL-real?  Maybe I knew this but it fell out of my head because I have to store way cooler stuff in there like song lyrics and movie quotes and fun facts I read online.)

Here's an honest confession: I GET NERVOUS.  People ask me: "how did you get up there in front over 800 people and be so energetic and fun!  I could never do that," they say.  Don't get me wrong, I LOVE hearing myself talk.  It's my favorite sound in the world.  But I get so nervous in social situations that I just start talking, usually really quickly, and people mistake my awkwardness and inappropriateness for humor.  It's cool. Because the people that matter most know who and what I really am.

I am a teacher.  You might doubt my knowledge (I have like 5 college degrees) and you might doubt my skills (they are mad), but never doubt this: I care about kids. I will never back down, tone it down, slow down or simma' down (now) when it comes to students and their learning.  I ALWAYS want what is best for them.

If I don't fit your mold, that's fine.  I will find a mold one day.  Just like the Missing Piece.  And if not, I will, God willing, help students find their molds, what makes them happy, what makes them dance around, to shout and jump for joy.  Because, after all, isn't that what it's all about?

Cellphone Brain Disease: A Polite Disagreement

A fellow blogger wrote a wonderful and heartfelt post about students being addicted to cellphones and the trouble it causes.  I would like to politely and respectfully disagree (the original post can be accessed HERE.)

An addiction is defined by the government as a "brain disease".  I suppose our phones, or the absences of them, can affect our brains.  I know it affects my heart when I reach for my phone and can't find it.  But an addict?  An addict can also be defined as "an enthusiastic devotee of a specified thing or activity" by Google.

I accept.

I am addicted to my cell phone.  I take it to church; does that make me a bad person?  While my paper Bible is open, I am trolling my Bible app in search of more verses to study and am taking notes to look at later.  I have my phone when I am spending time with my family; does that make me a bad sister, daughter, auntie?  I catch the most adorable moments with my addiction (I put them at the bottom of this post.)

To tear a child's work up, literally, because he was looking at his phone makes me wonder two things:  What if my boss tore up my work? What does that teach? (Because kids will learn from our actions before they ever learn from our words.) And the other question is: why are we giving tests that can be Googled?  That's not testing skills.  That's testing content. The ability to regurgitate.  Which no one can do better than Google.  I wouldn't even try.

I have been in classes where cell phones weren't an issue.  How?  Because the teacher had taught them how valuable they can be in class.  I am right now writing from my laptop and my cellphone is next to me.  Need to spell a word? "Hey, Siri, how do you spell immunoelectrophoretically? Actually, I just asked her what the hardest word to spell was.  She gave me a list of the top 10.  She's so smart.

You know when I check my phone?  When I am bored.  Stop boring your students.

I realize we cannot make it our sole purpose to entertain them every minute of every day, but you know what we could do?  Teach them the value of a moment.  Teach them when to capture a snapshot and when to put the phone down and simply take it all in.  Instead of teaching kids that cellphones are the devil and are rotting their brains and are not to be used in class, how about let's teach them the difference of a cellphone used at home and a cellphone used at school. Let's teach them the excitement of inquiry, the wonder of wondering, let's make it so they are so busy learning that the only thing they are snapchatting is the awesomeness of their own discovery.

They are growing up in a completely different world.  Instead of forcing our ideas on them, let's force them to come up with their own ideas.  I bet they will surprise you; they do me.

And now for adorable family moments caught with the use of my cellphone:

 

Would You Like a Spoon?

"I know you don't know how to do this because we have never done it before."

This was a teacher to her students during a math lesson.  I believe two things to be true: 1. a quarter of those students already knew how to do it and 2. another quarter could have figured it out if they had been given 5 minutes.

But they weren't.  Their spoons were taken and bite by bite they were fed the steps, the procedures and the lesson.

It's hard for teachers to let go of the "I Do" in gradual release.  Many believe this is where we must start because we are the holder of the knowledge.

But we are taking their spoons.

"Oh, they can't read cursive."

How do you know?  Have you ever give them a passage in cursive to see if they can figure it out?  My 6 year old nephew opened a birthday card that was written in cursive and read it aloud to everyone.  Why?

Because no one had ever told him that he couldn't read in cursive.

It's like the fable of the bumblebee; it flies because it doesn't know it can't.  My 10th graders used to cry: We can't read in cursive! Please, besides the F, B, Z and an occasional Q, the letters are easy to figure out.  And I write in prursive (print-cursive).  But they thought that because they were not taught to read in cursive, they could not read in cursive.

A bigger sin than refusing to hand over the spoon to let students tackle, solve, grow confidence, is taking their spoons when they offer them to you.

There's a class I work with regularly and they want to be told EVERY. SINGLE. STEP.

Take my spoon!  Feed me!  Take away my responsibilities, the chance I could be wrong, the chance of making a mess!

And we take the spoon.  Willingly, even eagerly, because we know we can do it better, faster, smarter and with a lot less mess.We take away their opportunity to problem solve, to create another wrinkle in the brain, to create new pathways of information and understanding.  To discover.

It's hard to watch kids struggle; it's hard to watch anyone struggle.  But that's how we learn.  It's how we grow.

They will stop offering you the spoon eventually.  Because they will have so much confidence, they will know they can do it themselves.  Let us provide not knowledge, but opportunity, because that is what truly separates the haves from the have-nots.

Transparency: Lessons from my Car

This is Maks:

Short for McKensie, she is a lot like me, loud, attracts attention, hard to ignore.  I love her because she is fast and helps me execute quickly made decisions.  Her big drawback, with her bright paint and orange wheels, is that she attracts the attention of other drivers (and the occasional law enforcement employee.)  So when I am driving... on the offense, I know that the other drivers will see me--and remember me.  Because of this, I am more generous and more forgiving than I would be driving a car that blends in with the rest.  She keeps me honest and in-check (although I do still make mistakes.  I accidentally ran a stop sign the other day.  I got out and apologized to the car behind me.  In my defense, I had just told myself a really funny joke.)

This is a lot like social media.  I hear teachers say they do not want to be "online".  They do not want their students or parents seeing what they do.  My question is, what are you doing that you don't want others to see?  A true leader is a model all the time, not just when he or she is at work.  It's true that it is scary.  I managed to skip Facebook, but I have Instagram, Twitter and Snapchat.  I am out there.  I am open and honest.  My mother would say (she just said it today) that perhaps I am too blunt and that not everyone deserves the honest truth.

But I imagine a world much like the one in The Invention of Lying where people say exactly what they mean.  It's not always welcomed or appreciated, but you always know where you stand.

Although an extreme is not necessary (and I think most people would agree I am extreme), the basis still applies: GET OUT THERE!  Show your students how to use social media. If you don't, from whom will they learn?  Have you SEEN what is out there?!?!  George Couros would say that it is our responsibility to spread positivity on social media, to outweigh and drowned out the negativity.  

My husband hates it.  He avoids social media.  He also doesn't read my blog, so I get to say what I want.  I get his fears. He is scared of saying the wrong thing, having something taken the wrong way.  I say things that are not popular.  I overshare.  I admit I would not have wanted to grow up in the days of Facebook.  But I am open and honest and when you meet me in person, you will find I am exactly like my blog, my tweets, my pics.  I am passionate about learning, shoes and life.  I am funny, smart and empathetic.  I have high expectations of myself and those around me. And yes, I get disappointed.  And yes, I have haters (but they gonna hate.)

I do erase sentences I start and tweets I compose, but that's the great thing about social media: you can see it before it goes out!  If my brain to mouth connection worked like my fingertips to internet connection, I would get in a lot less trouble.  If I had a verbal filter like the one created when I can type out my messages ans see them before others do, maybe I wouldn't be so... blunt. 

Take the plunge.  Go for the risk.  Get out there and tell your story.  If you don't, someone will.

Jargon, Rigor or Fancy Talk?

I am a dreamer.  A believer.  I love to believe in people, ideas, visions.  I love to believe what I hear and what I read.  When I was a sophomore in high school, my teacher introduced an activity by telling us a dinosaur egg had been found and we had been commissioned to build packaging for it.  I was all like, NO WAY!  It only crossed my mind after I had embarrassed myself with excitement that if a dinosaur egg had indeed been found, they (whoever they were) would not ask children to build a package in which to ship it.  I am simply in love with possibilities.

So when I read the article "Don't Confuse Jargon with Rigor", I was ready to throw the baby out with the bathwater and start over (no babies were harmed in the writing of this blog post).  I pumped my fists in the air determined to use words my students understood.  Who cared if I called it a whats-a-ma-jig as long as my kids could complete the task or skill?

But then something happened to make me stop and think (and it was much less embarrassing than my classmates shouting, "It's not a REAL dinosaur egg, you moron!")

Actually three things happened.  I was teaching students in the 4th grade about genre and theme using Google Docs and the Chrome extension Note Anywhere.  We had read a story and some song lyrics and a poem.  When I was asking the students about the genres, one of them answer, "I think the story could be considered prose."

I froze.  "Uh, I think so?"  I realized I didn't even know what exactly made a writing prose.  The students, use to discovering things with me and not from me, went to the web to find out if indeed, the story (realistic fiction) could be counted as prose. (I won't spoil it for you.)

In that same school with a group of 5th graders, we were reading the same story.  We predicted using our text features and had read the first 2 paragraphs.  "But what do you think the conflict of the story will be?" I asked, wanting some deeper inferences.

"I think the conflict with be character and self." Beyond my expectations, but I was skeptical given that the author warned that what comes after regurgitating standard-talk is usually superficial or incorrect.

"Explain yourself, young one!" I demanded.

"Well, the character says that she has all of these ages bottled up inside of her.  I think she will struggle with turning eleven but feeling all of those other years."  The story we were studying was "Eleven", by Sandra Cisneros.

Hmmm...  The third thing that happened was in a kindergarten class.  We were using Plickers to review and expand our understanding of 3D shapes.  As the students were identifying shapes, I asked, how do you know?

"It's a cube!"

"How to do know?"

"Because it's like a square with 8 vertices."  That could have counted as regurgitation expect that when she tripped slightly over the word "vertices", she brought her two index fingers together to form a corner.

Wow.  I mean WOW.  It was like the third ghost visit in A Christmas Carol.

Using smart words helps me feel smart.  Are they smart words or are they better words?  Is it better to say decomposing instead of breaking it down? (Although if you use "breaking it down" you could also dance...)

A wise man (James Kimbell) once told me, while my class was studying that super fun list of words to say instead of "said", if "said" works, just say "said".  Don't search for fancy when plain will do.  He said it way better than that...

So, where does that leave us?  Do we expect students to use standard-talk?  Do we teach them the jargon?  Other than English teachers, professors and other like-professions, will they ever use the word "genre"?  Or are these tier three words?

In the end I am left with more questions than answers.  The baby is back in the bathwater.  And I am draining the tub...