I, Who Can't, . .

We Don't Send Our Children to Systems

joelklein051024_3_400, originally uploaded by The Earl of Steinway.

Small Schools and I

   Today I went to the fifth annual small school's conference. Another improvement over my last school, where Professional Development Days were the days we sat and listened to the Principal tell us what he had been told by the Region, and then hand it over to the Literacy Coach, who would explain what the Region expected us to do be doing by the time they visited next month (a visit which inevitable would be canceled, rescheduled, postponed and then forgotten about entirely). Today I was treated to a free breakfast, lots of chit-chat (I never realized how many teachers I knew- or have they all just graviatated towards these small schools? I even recognized, by name tag, some of the people who have commented on this very blog) and a speech by our Chancellor Joel Klein.
    Joel's speech was molded like a closing argument. Why should schools be reformed? How will we do it? I heard nothing to change my mind that, despite his rhetoric, this guy has very little interest in schools themselves. This is probably a good thing. I'm not sure if he was being provocative or just delivering a set speech when he began talking, to a roomful of teachers, about the need for Higher Teacher Quality. He claimed that, "You don't send your child to a system, you send them to a school." I felt like he was talking to me. I wrote recently that teachers are "blamed for what the system doesn't provide." But, as Klein argued, children don't go to systems, they go to schools.
    It sounds good, but for this to be true, schools would have to somehow NOT be systems and anyone who knows anything about how successful schools work, schools are in fact very complicated systems that must be designed with great effort and work properly every time they are used, or they fall apart. Joel's statement might sound neat, but it is like saying, "I'm not looking to buy engineering, I'm looking to buy a car."
       Klein is again moving the buck to the teacher's desk. I think he should continue to focus on doing what he has done best- breaking apart the useless, meddling, expensive regional offices. If he wants to focus on teachers he should focus not only a meddlesome minority, but on what most teachers do- quit. Rather than pressuring principals not to give teachers tenure, he should find ways to encourage teachers to serve their tenure.
    After Klein's speech I attended some worthwhile workshops- worthwhile because they were taught by real teachers, not the consultants that Joel was telling us will soon be beating down our doors and competing for school-based funds. I can only imagine how wasteful that will be. There is no greater laboratory for educational theories and practices than New York City. The collective knowledge of our teachers is far greater than anything in any library or university, and it must be tapped into. One day of workshops is great, but keep in mind this is the first time I attended a workshop like this in seven years. It was open only to teachers working in "Small Schools." Otherwise you probably wasted your day alone in your classroom, or listening to administrivia in the auditorium.

Nut Wallah, Empress Market

Nut Wallah, originally uploaded by The Earl of Steinway.

Afghan Boy Hauling Cardboard

Afghan Boy Hauling Cardboard, originally uploaded by The Earl of Steinway.

Empress Market

Empress Market, originally uploaded by The Earl of Steinway.

Here is the Empress Market today.

The Empress Market [Karachi]

The Empress Market [Karachi], originally uploaded by Sufi Sahab.

Here's a photo of Empress Market from the British Museum, via the blog mentioned below, via flickr.

19th c. Karachi

Here are some pictures from a Karachi-blog of the city in the nineteenth century.

I know this is easy, but . . .

    It's easy for a teacher to be amused. That's one of the perks. (It may in fact be the only perk, besides the sumer vacations.) Sometimes the teacher's lounge sounds like "Kids Say The Darndest Things" rated PG-13. But still. . . First let me tell you that the following piece of prose is not from one of my students, which only makes this more mean-spirited. In fact, it comes from a very successful and well regarded middle school located somewhere within the five boroughs. I myself did not find this, a fellow teacher did and brought it to my attention, knowing that I, like most teachers, like to laugh at children. If you happen to work in a school using a certain rigorous and popular reading and writing program may recognize the buzzwords that this student used.
    This is from a cover letter (kind of like a long reflection on how one is doing as a student, and how the work in the portfolio has developed) to a Middle School Humanities Portfolio. All the mistakes are his or her own.
    "A powerful writer do before they turn in drafts is looking over there before turning them in. Make sure that they have correct all there mistakes like punctuation, Capitalizing."
    Yes, it's all true. But you always knew your teachers were in the lounge laughing at you, didn't you?

The Gift of Regents' Week

    When I taught sixth grade I was jealous of the eighth grade teachers who had all those easy-going graduation days in June. I was in my classroom teaching up to the bitter, sweaty, last minute. I was also jealous of those teachers who were somehow allowed to attend workshops, or taken out to mark tests. True, I never would volunteer for these workshops and test-marking sessions, but I was never asked to attend a workshop. Just once I would have liked my principal to have said, "Tom, I need you to attend this workshop."
    This past week I've had the feeling that the middle school teachers are jealous of me. Thanks to "Regents Week" a week during which no classes, only exams, are scheduled for High School students, I was able to visit East Side Community School and participate in their portfolio review process. East Side has been running for ten years, and is now a very desirable school. The students of this school prepare and present portfolios of their work twice a year, to a small group that includes their teachers, their classmates, and even strangers (I fell into this category.) The process makes the kids nervous ("We have to talk to people who we don't even know!") both also prepares them for work outside of the school-cocoon-comfort zone.
     I returned to the Bronx with my head full of ideas for how the kids in our school will do portfolio work. I'd like to see something very similar to East Side, but getting strangers into the school might be more difficult for us. I also was made aware of some of the drawbacks of project-based work. Based on the work in their portfolios, and the discussions I had with the students. The first semester of 10th grade global covered three projects. "Facing History" which, and I'm not terribly familiar with this project, seems to be focused on issues of identity; World War One, focusing on nationalism; and World War Two, which was primarily a unit on the Holocaust. I was a little surprised that when I asked the same students who had just spoken eloquently about the treatment of Jews, Gypsies, The Handicapped, and Homosexuals under the Third Reich, how the war in Japan ended, they couldn't answer. I looked at the list of "Key Terms" that they should know, and asked, "What do Japan, Hiroshima, and Atomic Bomb have to do with World War Two?"
    They admitted to not knowing. The first step to wisdom. One boy said, "The atomic bomb is, like, a really big bomb."
    "Big like in size, or Big in explosion?"
    "Big in explosion, I think."
    Obviously I can't make a generalization based on these three, and the Global History Unit does focus on the European Front, but I do wonder if the habit of project-based learning to be a great way for a kid to learn a lot about one thing might have something to do with it. This also begs the question- How much should the kids know? What is acceptable? Is it possible to teach World War Two without the Holocaust? Can World War One be taught without reference to Militarism, Alliances, Imperialism or Nationalism? If not, why?

The truth about Erin Gruwell

The Times forwarded me an email from the parent of a kid who attended Woodrow Wilson High School during the time that Erin Gruwell taught there. She had a lot to say about the "truth" about this teacher.  First of all (and I had read this elsewhere) Woodrow Wilson High School is not in a poor section of Long Beach, it is across the street from multi-million dollar homes. The school is 70% hispanic but has an affluent population as large as their population of gang-bangers. The scene in Freedom Writers where a full-on riot breaks out seems based on a food fight that occured during Gruwell's four years at the school. Apparently she exaggerates the animosity of her co-workers as well. The letter quotes a teacher from an article published in the Long Beach Press Telegram questioning her inability to get books from the bookroom. Apparently all she had to do was sign them out, since the room was open to all teachers. I've had plenty of problems getting books out of bookrooms, but I never suspected it had anything to do with the low expectations of the custodians of these books. Usually it was a way for them to exercise the little power they had.