See Me After Class Part 4

16.

Testing, Testing"High-stakes tests are a reality and, regardless of your personal sentiments on them, they are a hurdle your students must jump to graduate from high school. In that vein, do everything you can to help them pa.s.s. You have your college degree, and time to pontificate and debate the meaning and validity of standardized tests. Your students don't."Preparing for Standardized Tests ...

Since You Have ToFrom Day OneMost of your professional development will probably focus on combining test prep with meaningful instruction. I won't chip away at the iceberg of advice, except to say if testing is a big deal at your school, do not do not ignore it. Ask other teachers how they prepare. Use what you can from professional development. Teaching a tested subject is a constant challenge to creatively expose students to test-like questions. Luckily, you are not alone in this battle. The billion-dollar workbook industry is here to help you. ignore it. Ask other teachers how they prepare. Use what you can from professional development. Teaching a tested subject is a constant challenge to creatively expose students to test-like questions. Luckily, you are not alone in this battle. The billion-dollar workbook industry is here to help you.One Week Before the TestUse your last week to do some review and build your students' confidence. Kids already have most of the knowledge they'll be working with, so offer encouragement even if you feel unsure. Teach relaxation techniques, and remind students to take care of little details that can affect performance. Remind them to get a good night's sleep, eat a healthy, non-sugary breakfast, and wear layers of clothing in case the room is cold.Test DayThe best thing about test day is that the kids are usually perfectly behaved. Some teachers bring students good-luck presents like apples, water, mints, or lucky pencils. This is up to you. At this point you've done all you can, so wish your students good luck and tell them you believe in them. Now it's their turn to stress out.The Purpose Behind Standardized TestsMy freshman year in high school, I had algebra first period. Most days our teacher, Mrs. W., didn't arrive until the last five minutes of cla.s.s, leaving our cla.s.s alone with no subst.i.tute. Eventually I realized my first period was a joke and started coming to school later, and one day, as I was getting off the bus in the middle of first period, I saw Mrs. W. Apparently she wasn't late enough, though, because she crossed the street and went to Dunkin' Donuts. Don't get me wrong-I thought this was fabulous at the time. But later, instead of taking a more advanced math cla.s.s, I got stuck in remedial algebra.Luckily, I didn't have a teacher like Mrs. W. teaching me to read, but not every student is so lucky. One purpose of standardized tests is to light a fire under lazy teachers. Slackers rob students of their education and make the rest of us look bad, so why not? Most of us would agree that teachers should be held accountable for doing their jobs, princ.i.p.als should answer for the teachers they hire, and students should be held to certain standards of knowledge. On paper, testing seems to do all of the above.Weaknesses and Unintended Consequences of Standardized TestsWhether standardized tests live up to their intended purposes is already the controversial subject of many books, so it won't be the subject of this chapter. However, no one denies that, despite the intentions behind them, high-stakes tests have some built-in weaknesses and unintended consequences: 1. Some students are so much below grade level that tests don't show whether they've improved. It's hard to see progress on a grade-level test when kids are so far behind that their scores are similar to guessing. Even teaching to the test doesn't work when kids don't fully understand the questions and answer choices. It hurts to force students to take a test seriously when they don't have a good chance of pa.s.sing."When I graded my ESL kids' pretests, I wanted to curl up in the fetal position. The scores were so low I couldn't even use them for diagnostic purposes. One of my students was mentally r.e.t.a.r.ded-he understood that he had to fill in the answer-sheet circles, but didn't know they represented answers to questions. This student scored higher than almost a third of my cla.s.s. I ended up throwing out the tests. I wasn't ready for the obstacles I was facing."

2. Students who don't perform well on standardized tests constantly get the message they are stupid. We've learned about multiple intelligences. We know kids can be smart in ways that don't show up on tests, but try telling that to a teenager who may not graduate high school because he can't pa.s.s the state reading exam. Tell that to a third-grader who spends a whole year failing practice tests and is so nervous she throws up on test-day morning. The higher we raise the stakes, the more these tests take a psychological toll on the kids who don't pa.s.s."The most depressing day of my first year was when I had to give summer school notices to students who didn't pa.s.s the tests. I tried to break the news in the most private, upbeat way possible. In return, the kids tried not to look too heartbroken. One student, who got nervous on tests and had been in summer school every year since first grade, just grabbed the notice off my desk and said loudly 'Yeah, I know. I failed.'"

3. Students who can pa.s.s the test feel like they are superstars, which is not necessarily true. All the hype surrounding these tests makes us forget that they are only basic, subject-area skills tests. After hearing nonstop about their importance, students who pa.s.s can get c.o.c.ky, especially if they succeeded easily while cla.s.smates struggled. The implication that test-pa.s.sers are smart enough to slack off is a disservice to them and to their teachers. It also keeps standards just one level above test questions and leads to the disturbing att.i.tude that once "The Test" is over, learning is done for the year.

4. Teachers are encouraged to replace real teaching with test prep. When we focus full-time on testing, we suggest critical-thinking skills are a luxury most public schools can't afford to provide. Instead of working on students' reading skills, we teach tricks that might help them pa.s.s a reading test without being able to read. We also forget that every day spent on tests, benchmark tests, practice tests, practice-test review, and test-taking strategies or attending test "pep rallies" is a day not not spent preparing students for success in college or life. The pressure to look good on paper forces us to treat students like hot potatoes: as long as we can get them to pa.s.s our year's exams, we will never be blamed for their failure. We just hope that, when their lack of real skills catches up with them, they will be in someone else's hands. spent preparing students for success in college or life. The pressure to look good on paper forces us to treat students like hot potatoes: as long as we can get them to pa.s.s our year's exams, we will never be blamed for their failure. We just hope that, when their lack of real skills catches up with them, they will be in someone else's hands.

5. Test answers are sometimes ambiguous. Answers shouldn't be obvious to test-age kids, but they should seem straightforward to adults who specialize in the tested subject. Sometimes even teachers find themselves confused by poorly worded questions or answer choices."We reviewed using a released test from the previous year. One story was about a so-called typical American family, with a mother who told these really corny jokes. You could barely tell they were supposed to be funny. My students didn't laugh, and neither did I, but the correct answer on the test said the mother's character was 'playful and humorous.' Two of the questions related to this opinion. One of my students asked, 'Who writes these things, anyway?' I felt this test was actually biased against kids who had a good sense of humor."

6. Other factors affect test scores. High-stakes exams test a lot more than what students have learned. They test how much sleep kids got the night before, how well they perform under pressure, and whether other issues are distracting them. They also test whether a student takes the test seriously or rushes through and then falls asleep. Some tests count toward a school grade but are not graduation requirements for kids. In these cases, scores reflect which students skipped the test completely and went to the beach."One of my high school students kept failing a test that was a graduation requirement. I couldn't understand why, because she was a great student who read all the time. It turned out that because of the way rooms were a.s.signed she always ended up in the same freezing-cold room with a teacher who had a terrible smoker's cough. The temperature and noise combined with the pressure and threw off her concentration. Luckily, this girl knew her rights. On her last chance she insisted on switching rooms and was able to pa.s.s, but think of the other students still testing in that room .... ""As I was ripping open a plastic package of tests, my hand slipped and I punched myself in the jaw. I hit myself so hard it made a cracking sound like when someone gets. .h.i.t in the movies. Of course the entire cla.s.s burst out laughing. I don't know if this affected any of the scores, but it certainly made the overall mood less serious."

7. There is lots of cheating and pressure to cheat. Teachers are often left alone on test day and pressured to "get results." The following year's teacher gets a cla.s.s full of kids who pa.s.sed the test but don't have the skills to succeed in a new grade. On top of this, the kids believe teachers will always "help" them on the day of the test, so they aren't very motivated. Then, if the new teacher is honest, it looks like students went backward from the year before.

8. Test prep makes both students and teachers hate being at school. What lessons do you best remember from your own school days? Experiments? Performances? Projects? Answers may vary, but it's probably safe to say no one's fondest memories include strategies for eliminating incorrect answer choices. Many of us got into teaching hoping to share the fun, creative, and inspiring lessons we once enjoyed. Instead, the rumbling of the oncoming test keeps our schools in a constant state of emergency. Fun activities are pushed out of the curriculum because they're not the most efficient way to cover tested material. Teachers feel guilty because we're not giving kids the educational experience we'd hoped to. The kids, on the other hand, don't know exactly what they're missing. They just know school isn't much fun."The day before the test I felt like a plane that was not going fast enough to take off. Most of my students were still failing the practice exercises. I was going over some test-taking strategies on the overhead projector, desperately hoping this would get them where they needed to be. I looked around the cla.s.s and everyone looked completely s.p.a.ced out except one little girl who always followed my advice but failed anyway because she had dyslexia. I was so unhappy I could barely lift my arm."

9. Performance anxiety turns schools into the twilight zone. Test pressure interferes with the regularly scheduled program for at least a month before the actual test. The more your school panics about performance, the more it feels like you have entered another dimension."One month before the test my princ.i.p.al started sending the a.s.sistant princ.i.p.al to subtly hint that we should 'put extra focus' on the tested subjects. We already knew this because everything about the school pressured us to teach only the tested subjects. We should have known it wouldn't end there, because there was nothing subtle about our princ.i.p.al. She didn't believe other people understood things unless they were clearly stated and then repeated a million times. Three weeks before the test she started getting on the PA and reminding us to focus on tested subjects. Then she just gave up and started giving long speeches where she would say things like 'Third grade: that means you are only teaching reading. That's reading, third grade! Fourth grade, math and reading. Math. And. Reading! Fifth grade ... ' and so on. She did this every morning for two weeks while parents were in the school dropping off their kids. If I were a parent and heard some of these speeches, I would have pulled my kid out of that school.""Every year we have this disturbing 'beat the test' pep rally. We pull kids out of cla.s.s during their last chance to review so they can watch fourth-and fifth-graders in cheerleading outfits that show off their underwear. My boy students always look really happy, but I don't think it has much to do with the motivational cheers. At the end they call up the teachers and give us each a balloon. I try to act happy even though the whole thing kind of makes me want to cry."

17.

Grading Work Without Hating Work"My son was already in high school when I started teaching. I had so many papers to grade I brought them everywhere, including to one of his important track meets. I finished my stack of quizzes and was feeling great when my son ran up to me, 'Did you see me, Mom?' I hadn't. I had been so busy grading that I missed his big moment."Why Grading Is So FrustratingToday you really are going to grade those papers. (If all your papers are already graded, you can skip this chapter. And I hate you.)You know it's important to keep up with grading, but lesson planning can't wait until tomorrow, faculty meetings leave you emotionally drained, and you don't want to break promises to call parents. You start saying you will grade at home, but there are distractions and you are tired. Your car has become the ungraded-paper express shuttle as you take home your constantly growing pile and bring it back untouched in your Office Depot "Star Teacher" tote bag or one of those rolling crates that seemed like such a good idea at the time. But today is the day. After all the delays and excuses, you are ready to get back on schedule. You take a deep breath and tell yourself it shouldn't be so hard, once you get started ....The first paper you read irritates you. Some of it is done correctly, but this student clearly didn't put in much effort. He needs to know that you know he is being lazy and can do better. However, you resent that your comment explaining this is probably taking longer than he spent on the whole a.s.signment.The next paper you pick up has so many mistakes you are not sure what to correct. You don't want to discourage this girl by covering the whole page with negative comments, so you try to find something positive to say to balance out each correction. ("Nice job indenting your paragraphs! Great adjective!") You are not sure if you should give a grade that honestly reflects the horrendous quality of the work or a grade that will show this girl her efforts mean something.Then you get something that is halfway decent as a piece of writing but has nothing to do with the directions. You start to cherry-pick the parts that do follow instructions so that you have something positive to say. After all, the kid should get credit for trying, but he also needs to know that directions are are important and important and will will affect his grade. The work could use a few other corrections, but you decide it is more important to focus this student's attention on following directions. affect his grade. The work could use a few other corrections, but you decide it is more important to focus this student's attention on following directions.Finally, you get a neat paper that shows understanding of the a.s.signment, directions, and concept. It is such a relief to your eyeb.a.l.l.s you want to just slap an A on it, but then you start to wonder, "Are my standards already so low from those first few papers that anything decent looks like A work? If I give this child an A, will he stop working as hard?"The next paper is a pretty clear B. There are a few corrections, but the work shows a basic understanding of what you taught. You are excited to see that most of this student's mistakes follow one simple pattern. The right comment from you could turn him into an A student .... Or her? There is no name on the paper! Hopefully he-or she?-will come ask you why he-or she?-didn't get the a.s.signment back. You write a note explaining that no-name papers automatically lose ten points. Then you put it in a separate pile to remind yourself the grade has not been recorded.Two papers later, you see the same paper, word for word, written by someone else.You already have a small headache. It gets worse as you move on to the next paper and try to decode handwriting you can only suspect covers up some type of intelligence. As you write "Please be neater!" at the top, you feel like one of those teachers who you thought were so picky about handwriting when you were in school. You always hated those teachers. You force yourself to squint through the a.s.signment and find something good to say, although you also add one more comment about sloppy writing. You give the paper a grade that seems fair, considering your headache ....Only 267 more to go.What Experienced Teachers Know About Grading"I had gotten so behind on grading, the oldest a.s.signments in my pile were over a month old. I felt I had to grade them before addressing newer work, but I knew there was no chance I would catch up. Overwhelmed, I explained my situation to a teacher in my department. His advice started, 'Now, see, you should never throw out student work in your cla.s.sroom garbage ... '"Grading is an important part of our job. It's also the part most likely to cover our kitchen tables, ruin our weekends, and never, ever be finished. Experienced teachers with up-to-date grade books will tell you the secret is to do it right away so you don't fall behind. Maybe they really follow this advice and are not just saying it to make you cry. Chances are, though, they also know these things: - [image]You don't have to write comments on everything you grade.

- [image]You don't have to grade every paper the kids turn in. Some a.s.signments are just for practice.

- [image]Usually, if no one gets a minor a.s.signment back, kids won't ask for it.

- [image]Students can help with grading.

- [image]Many grades are at least partly subjective, and students don't know if you had trouble deciding a grade.

- [image]One grade won't make a huge impact on a student's average. It's not worth your time to obsess over the difference between a B and a C+.

- [image]You can sometimes grade papers while students work independently.

The True Purposes of GradesIn theory, grading lets both you and your students know whether they learned what you taught. Students get valuable feedback from your comments. Checking progress regularly lets you reteach and provide individual a.s.sistance. a.s.sessment informs instruction. That's why it's built into the five-step lesson plan you always follow ... right?In reality, many of us get behind on grading. We realize students are failing when it's almost report-card time. We find out weeks too late that no one understood our fraction-pizza lesson after all. We spend Sat.u.r.days feeling guilty, Sundays writing comments, and Mondays finding graded papers on our cla.s.sroom floors.To keep things in perspective, remember that even imperfect grading serves a purpose. This was true when we were students, and it's still true now.Grades provide a reward system for academic work. As much as we want kids to learn for the sake of knowledge, we know we'd better have a few outside incentives. The letter-grade system is already built into the system, so it's one wheel we don't have to invent ourselves.Grades are the simplest way of communicating with parents and future teachers. Signals can get crossed when communicating with parents, but nothing gets to the point faster than a simple letter grade. Likewise, teachers at a child's new school will look at his transcripts-not your comments on his last book report.Grades fill up your grade book. Most school districts require a minimum of two grades per week, per child, per subject. That's more than 100 grade-book columns each quarter that you won't want empty near report-card time.Making Grading Fast and Fair"My second year, I promised myself to stop taking papers home. I usually didn't touch them anyway and just ended up feeling guilty. Instead, I started grading at school until a specific time each day and leaving empty-handed. This cutoff point forced me to use my time at school more wisely and made me a more effective teacher in the end."Grading should reflect the quality of student work, but it should also be time-efficient for you. If you spend more time grading work than your students spend doing work, you are guaranteed to stay behind. Tricks for fast, fair grading vary by subject, but the following ideas should help as you find your own strategies.Shave Grading Time Off Each a.s.signment - [image]Grade only part of the a.s.signment. Tell students which parts you will grade only after they turn in their work.

- [image]Grade even or odd problems only. Many textbooks test each skill with two or more problems.

- [image]Wait until after essays are done, then pick from a bag of essay parts (introduction, first body paragraph, etc.). Grade only the paragraph you picked.

- [image]Focus on revising one section of a project. Then grade it for improvement.

- [image]Tell students to underline the details you're looking for: vocabulary words, transitions, order of operations, and so on. This will make your job easier and focus students on following directions.

- [image]Have students keep work in a folder you check weekly or a notebook you check every ten entries.

- [image]Squeeze more than one grade out of complicated a.s.signments (research grade, in-cla.s.s progress grade, final draft grade, presentation grade, etc.).

- [image]If you teach more than one subject to your cla.s.s, a.s.sign cross-curricular projects and count the grades for multiple subjects.

- [image]Make a.s.sessments 10, 20, or 25 questions so that you can calculate percentages quickly.

- [image]Use short-answer or multiple-choice questions for a.s.signments you need to grade quickly.

- [image]Ask another teacher if your school has a Scantron machine. Watching a machine grade 200 tests in 60 seconds is a beautiful feeling. Learning about this machine after you hand-grade 200 tests? Not so beautiful.

Save Time on Writing Comments - [image]For major a.s.signments, have rubrics or checklists with premade comments (e.g., "Quotations are cited correctly: 10 points"). Explain these thoroughly on the front end, then circle the numbers next to them as you grade. If you find yourself getting sidetracked and writing additional comments, grade with a highlighter.

- [image]Develop systems that let you a.s.sign grades by checking students' papers as they work. Students like getting immediate feedback, and you can make comments in person while they still have a chance to fix mistakes.

- [image]Buy stamps for comments you make often. Many teacher supply stores have stamps for handwriting, incomplete work, and no-name papers. As you collect work, you can sometimes stamp unacceptable papers and hand them back immediately.

- [image]Spend time in the beginning of the year teaching your students what you expect in their answers. After focusing on the process for a while, you can concentrate more of your feedback on whether answers are correct.

- [image]Review common mistake patterns as a cla.s.s instead of writing the same comment on 20 papers.

Make Some Grades "Instant"

- [image]Skim some a.s.signments for effort, completeness, and understanding. Then quickly a.s.sign a grade and move on. The official-sounding name for this is "holistic grading."

- [image]Occasionally give free grades to everyone who did an a.s.signment, especially for homework. This is also a built-in effort grade, so it will encourage struggling students to keep doing their work.

- [image]Keep extra copies of your seating chart or cla.s.s list. Sometimes you can walk around the cla.s.s with a clipboard, spot-check kids' work, and write their grades on the chart. This gives you a full column of grades without papers ever touching your desk.

- [image]Use your cla.s.s list to give a four-part daily grade. Students get 25 points for attendance (10 if they come late), 25 for preparation (and/or homework), 25 for partic.i.p.ation (including behavior), and 25 for completing cla.s.s work (which you can spot-check at the end of cla.s.s). Partial credit is possible for all categories, but should be either 10 or 25 points so that you can calculate grades quickly.

Plan Around Grading - [image]If you a.s.sign a major project on a novel and then watch the movie, make the project due before the movie. Movie time for your students can be grading time for you. The same applies to any activity that keeps kids busy and quiet for at least 20 minutes.

- [image]If you teach more than one subject, s.p.a.ce out the due dates of major a.s.signments.

- [image]If looking at a huge stack of ungraded work makes your stomach drop, divide papers into stacks often-finding time to grade ten essays is easier than finding time to grade 150.

- [image]If you know in advance that an a.s.signment is just for practice, place it in a separate file. Throw it away after one week if no one asks about it.

- [image]Make a schedule and set aside specific times to grade.

- [image]Know what type of grader you are. Can you fill tiny s.p.a.ces of free time by grading two or three papers, or do you need uninterrupted silence? Do you need a deadline to motivate you? Can you grade during lunch? TV commercials? Faculty meetings? Be realistic and plan around your own capabilities.

Have Students Help - [image]Although peer-grading comes with its own set of issues, students can sometimes grade each other's work as you review answers. If you teach more than one cla.s.s of the same subject, give out papers from another cla.s.s.

- [image]Students can sometimes grade their own work, especially on multiple-choice a.s.signments. Have students circle their final answers in crayon so they can't erase answers as you review. Another possibility is for students to put all pencils away after a quiz then grade with a pen or marker. Students with a pencil on their desk during review time fail the quiz automatically.

Some Thoughts on Peer-GradingHaving students switch papers is a compromise-you are giving students more opportunity to cheat, and they are giving up some of their privacy. The payoff is less paperwork for you and faster feedback for them. Peer-grading saves time and can even be educational when done right, but let's be honest: there is no subst.i.tute for grading done by a college-educated teacher. It is up to you to find an appropriate balance between peer-reviewed work and work graded by you. The following are some things to keep in mind: - [image]Some written work is meant for your eyes only. Give students the option of grading their own work or handing it directly to you if answers are personal.

- [image]Peer-grading needs to be taught like anything else you want students to do well. Before turning kids loose on each other's work, grade a sample paper as a cla.s.s.

- [image]Tell students if they think a paper was graded unfairly they can write "Please recheck" at the top and put it in your in-box.

- [image]If students will be putting grades on their friends' work, there is a built-in incentive for them to b.u.mp up the score. It helps to start the year with an explanation of why it is important to be honest. Then add that, if a grader cheats to help a friend, both students fail. Two days after your first peer-graded quiz, say something like, "I'm not going to name names, but I had to tell two students they failed this quiz for dishonest grading. I hope this won't happen again." Look very disappointed.

What to Do with Graded WorkGet graded work off your desk and out of sight as soon as possible. Put it in a basket to file or hand out at the appropriate time. Students can help.Oh, S#*t! My First Set of Grades Is Due Tomorrow!Many teachers clearly remember a moment right before their first report-card day when they realized there should have been 2,700 grades in their grade books. Instead, many of us-I mean them them-had about ten recorded grades, seven crates of ungraded papers, and few options that would let them respect themselves in the morning. If you are in this situation, let me start by saying you can never, ever, ever ever let this happen again. Promise? Okay. There let this happen again. Promise? Okay. There are are some desperate measures you can take if grades are due tomorrow and there is no chance you will catch up. These are not recommended, but they are one step more ethical than making up random grades to keep your job: some desperate measures you can take if grades are due tomorrow and there is no chance you will catch up. These are not recommended, but they are one step more ethical than making up random grades to keep your job: 1. Double up legitimate a.s.signments under different t.i.tles. This will keep grades somewhat accurate.

2. Record any graded work you have not already added to your grade book.

3. Separate the crates of work into a.s.signment-related piles. Keep the piles that you think best represent your kids' work.

4. Eyeball the papers in each pile and put grades on them as quickly as possible. No comments.

5. If possible, have a friend read off grades while you enter them in the computer or grade book.

6. Skim final grades to see if any seem unfair, inaccurate, or unlikely. Adjust accordingly. (Hint: This is a good time to give students the benefit of the doubt, especially those who may challenge a grade.) This process will take several painful hours. Every few piles, you should take a moment to feel depressed, ashamed, and guilty. Promise yourself not to be such a horrible, irresponsible person in the future. Now go! What are you waiting for Your grades are due tomorrow!

18.

Moments We're Not Proud OfThe first year of teaching is like the first year of anything: we learn the lessons today that we needed yesterday, and we learn them the hard way. Few of us chose this career expecting an easy paycheck. None of us hoped to make students feel discouraged, disinterested, or disrespected. We never planned to fail. In fact, many of us pictured ourselves becoming outstanding teachers who would one day inspire a movie, hopefully starring someone hot (sorry, Edward James Olmos).We came to be the solution to what's wrong with education. Understandably, our worst days are those that make us feel like part of the problem.When I first started interviewing teachers, I asked, "Have you ever had a day that made you feel you were horrible at your job?" The answer was always the same: "One day? Please. I've had too many to count."Eventually, I changed the question: "Can you describe one one day that made you feel like a bad teacher?" The following are some of the answers I received: day that made you feel like a bad teacher?" The following are some of the answers I received:"I came back from being out and was still a little sick. My cla.s.sroom was a mess and the first thing students told me was that they missed the subst.i.tute.""Because of low student enrollment, I was transferred from my first teaching a.s.signment just when I was getting the hang of it. My new school had no discipline system in place, and the cla.s.s I took over was being managed by a behavior specialist because their first teacher had quit. Among other things, students would climb out my first-floor window and tell me they were sending themselves to the office because they didn't agree with my instructions. When they got there, the princ.i.p.al's secretary would hug them and give them candy.""Most male teachers don't teach kindergarten, but when school started, I found myself in a cla.s.sroom filled with five-year-olds. An art teacher had made me two beautiful, hand-painted bathroom pa.s.ses and one of my little charges lost one. I was furious and screamed at the boy for having been so careless. My voice must have been pretty loud, because the next day my princ.i.p.al casually mentioned that he had heard me all the way in the main office. If I could have dug a hole and jumped in at that very moment, I would have done so. That incident, thank G.o.d, was never mentioned again, but I learned an important lesson about controlling my anger.""I was teaching a high school media cla.s.s and jumped at the idea of involving my students in a cla.s.s project: developing casting, rehearsing, and filming a script. I should have worried when the kids created a story about a subst.i.tute who faces the cla.s.s from h.e.l.l. Need I say more? When the day of shooting arrived, someone suggested we all put on our coats and film outside. Then one student thought it would be cute to climb the flagpole. Without asking permission, he shimmied up the pole and yelled at me to start filming. Then I heard my princ.i.p.al screaming at my back, 'What is going on here!?' As I turned to explain, my cla.s.s clown started yelling at us from the top of the building, 'Hey get this shot!' I screamed at him that he was in big trouble, but it turned out he wasn't the only one. I never taught media again.""I put down a student in front of the cla.s.s. He made me so mad, I said some things I knew as a teacher I shouldn't have said. I apologized to him later.""Halfway through a parent conference I realized I was talking about the wrong child. By the time I figured it out, there wasn't much I could do to cover up the mistake. The good news is this woman's daughter was doing much better than the girl I was talking about at first. She was so relieved she forgot to be mad at me.""I had a student who spoke no English at all. He spent most of his time drawing and trying not to fall asleep. I knew he needed me to work with him individually, but with 33 other students, I often overlooked him. One day we wrote an essay as a cla.s.s. He copied the whole thing from the board, even though he didn't understand a word. Instead of complimenting him on writing his first page of English, I pointed out a mistake with his indentation. His eyes just dropped to his desk. I tried to backpedal and tell him I was proud of his work, but he wasn't buying it. The damage had been done. From that day on, I made more of an effort to pay attention to this child and praise his efforts. Over time he learned more English and I learned to choose my own language more carefully.""My school focused so much on the tested subjects that social studies were pretty much eliminated. I was struggling to keep my head above water, so I let it slide even though social studies had been one of my own favorite subjects. One day my students, who were mostly Mexican and Salvadoran, had a chance to partic.i.p.ate in a Hispanic heritage poster contest. They had two questions: 'What does Hispanic Hispanic mean?' and 'What does mean?' and 'What does heritage heritage mean?' That was definitely a day I felt I was failing as a teacher." mean?' That was definitely a day I felt I was failing as a teacher.""I lost a kid during a field trip. We had to page him at the museum and almost missed our bus searching for him. It turned out he had snuck back to the gift shop to buy a toy and then couldn't find the group. After my heart started beating again, I took the toy and made his mom come get it. I didn't say anything to the princ.i.p.al, though, and was glad no one else did, either.""One of my honors students turned in a poem that was absolutely brilliant. I suggested she submit it to our literary magazine, which I was in charge of. I also sent it to a district-wide poetry magazine, which subsequently published it. After I shared this magazine with my English department, a fellow teacher approached me and showed me the same poem in an anthology of Langston Hughes's lesser-known works. To say I was embarra.s.sed would have been an understatement. Luckily no one from the district said anything, and I began a more thorough study of Hughes.""I had worked out a system where my third-graders went directly to their seats after our bathroom break instead of lining up in the hallway. They were to immediately begin their reading pa.s.sages, so as not to waste any 'learning time.' I got a little c.o.c.ky. During one break I called over a more experienced teacher to show off my quietly working students. I rambled about my new system with growing confidence until we both heard a commotion in the boys' bathroom. The teacher excused himself and came back holding two of my boys, both covered in soap and water. Enough said.""I once dreamed of being a tattoo artist, but I worried I would mess up and someone would have to live with my mistake. Instead I became an art teacher. One day a second-grader muttered something rude under his breath while I was talking to him. I followed him outside the school at the end of the day and talked to his father, who slapped him so hard it would have made a bigger kid cry. The boy didn't even move. He just looked at the ground. His little sister was standing there and had been covering her eyes since I started talking, like she knew this was going to happen. I was the only one who didn't see it coming. On that day I wondered if I would have done less damage as a tattoo artist.""Not long after I finally got discipline under control, I mistakenly took my fourth-graders to lunch an hour early. They went into the cafeteria in a nice straight line, so I didn't follow them. My vice princ.i.p.al paged me about two minutes later, and I ran back to find my students sitting on the stage in a lunchroom full of kindergarteners. I let them laugh at me for about a minute. Then I said, 'Okay get over it' and tried to teach a normal lesson. Later I apologized to my a.s.sistant princ.i.p.al and mumbled some excuse involving daylight savings time.""I bought a Porsche my first year at an inner-city school in the early '70s. That turned out to be a bad idea. I was an overnight hero with everybody, and people began to question whether I was a drug smuggler. Rather than keep up the image, I sold it to a collector. I got me a shiny, new Ford pickup, and my Porsche days were over.""By January of my first year, I thought I knew my troublemakers. My seating chart limited interaction between feuding students, and I thought I had a good idea of what was going on at all times. However, nothing prepared me for the day I spent my planning period creating posters, only to have them splattered with blood. It seemed like a typical afternoon. I was helping a group of eighth-graders with their cla.s.s work when a commotion started in the back of the room. It was between two of my 'good' kids, but I could tell by their tone that neither young man was simply making threats. I looked in the hallway for a security officer. It was empty. By the time I turned back around, I saw blood. One student had stabbed the other with a broken pen, and the wound was so deep it needed st.i.tches. I quickly began handing out tasks: go find the dean, keep the boys separated, get the custodian and tell him to bring bleach and a mop, use desks to create a barrier around the splattered blood. Although I felt I had handled the crisis well, I couldn't understand how a fight between two studious children could have escalated so fast. I cried in the car on my way home and had to pull over to regain composure. To add insult to injury, the children completed their suspensions and administrators put them both back into my cla.s.sroom!""One fifth-grader who was supposed to be going to resource (special ed) during a portion of the day was actually hiding in the bathroom smoking. I had no clue. The resource teacher thought she was with me and I thought she was with the resource teacher. She did this for almost a month before someone finally caught her.""I started teaching in the 1940s as a home economics teacher. We collected food and made baskets for the soldiers' families during World War II. One day while I was teaching some girls in the back of the room ate the donated food. I was furious, but one of the baskets had a whole container of prunes in it, so the girls got what was coming to them in the end.""By the end of my first year I felt like the kids respected me, so I started acting and dressing more casually Summer was coming and the weather was getting hotter, and one day our air conditioner broke. This was a computer cla.s.s, and we had 30 computers heating up the room. The kids didn't want to do anything. I gave up on my lesson and tried to play a trivia game, but all they wanted to do was whine about the heat. Finally I just said, 'Quit b.i.t.c.hin' about the weather so we can get something done.' Since I had cursed, the kids took it as a green light to curse and started calling people b.i.t.c.hes. There was one girl in particular-the kids had been picking on her all year. She was big for her age-way bigger than anyone in the cla.s.s, including me. She had short hair, and one of the boys kept calling her a bald-headed b.i.t.c.h until she reached her breaking point. The last time she told him to stop it was clear that she wasn't playing. The kid stopped for a minute like he was thinking about it, and I held my breath hoping he would shut up. Then I heard, really softly, 'Bald-headed fat beeyotch.' This girl jumped up, pushed all the computers off one of the tables, and started running toward the boy. I tried to grab onto the back of her shirt, but she was bigger than me and I was wearing flip-flops. I ended up getting dragged behind her like a Superman cape as she chased this kid into the hallway. Of course the rest of the cla.s.s wanted to see a good fight, so they followed us, and other cla.s.ses started coming out to see the action. Luckily a large male teacher from next door had heard the commotion. He was able to restrain the girl as soon as she left the room. After everything calmed down, the princ.i.p.al came into the cla.s.s to find out what had happened. My students were all there, and I felt like I should take responsibility, so I admitted that I might have started the problem by using the word b.i.t.c.h. b.i.t.c.h. He said, 'What? Are you serious? It's not like you said He said, 'What? Are you serious? It's not like you said f.u.c.k!' f.u.c.k!' The kids just stared at him with their mouths hanging open. I loved that princ.i.p.al forever after that." The kids just stared at him with their mouths hanging open. I loved that princ.i.p.al forever after that."

I wanted to end this chapter with advice on how to avoid low points, but I can't. All teachers have bad days. Rookies have them more often and take them more personally. Longtime teachers, on the other hand, have stored enough good memories to rea.s.sure themselves and balance out a few disasters. In fact, the teachers who contributed to this section all chose to keep teaching, in spite of these incidents ... and if that's not an argument for the rewards of this profession, nothing is.

19.

Dos and Don'ts for Helping New Teachers in Your SchoolIt's like the old saying goes: Give a man a fish, and you'll feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, and you'll feed him for a lifetime. Tell a man fishing is easy and any idiot could do it, make fun of his fishing equipment and style without offering any help, eat the fish you caught in front of him and talk about how delicious it is, and you won't have to worry about whether the man starves. He will probably just jump off the boat.Yes, we've all been there, and new teachers have to pay their dues. Maybe we we learned the hard way and no one helped learned the hard way and no one helped us us. Maybe we did everything right from the beginning. Maybe we already told told the new teacher next door the new teacher next door exactly exactly what he needs to do and he didn't what he needs to do and he didn't listen listen to us. Hey, we're busy with our own cla.s.ses. to us. Hey, we're busy with our own cla.s.ses.There are plenty of great reasons why we don't offer our newest coworkers the support they need, but most teachers agree that nothing in our training prepared us for the sink-or-swim reality of the cla.s.sroom. Fifteen percent of new teachers don't make it to the second year, and a third quit within five years. If we don't look out for each other, no one else will look out for us.The job of a mentor teacher often feels like this: 1. Give new teachers advice you know is true.

2. Watch them act like they already knew it, and then do it wrong or not at all.

3. Help them clean up the mess they made without saying "I told you so."

4. Repeat as necessary until they learn everything you told them the hard way, just like you did.

5. Let them know they are doing a great job.

Helping rookies is frustrating sometimes. They can be c.o.c.ky, whiny, hardheaded, or all of the above-just like we were. New teachers may not admit it, or even know it, but they need us. It is often our support that keeps the great teachers of the future from quitting before they realize they will become great.The following table contains a few tips, straight from the rookies themselves, on how to help your newest coworkers.[image][image][image][image]Rookie Teacher Tips for AdministratorsSchools that don't provide for new staff become training grounds for other schools. Beginners stick around long enough to get certified, and then transfer or quit. It can be tough to identify problems sometimes, because only the most vocal or confident rookies speak up when they're unhappy. The following suggestions are really tips on how to treat all teachers, but they are extra important for making your school a rookie-friendly environment: - [image]Be honest about what resources your school can provide. Older teachers know you have to wait for supplies or permission. Rookies plan around your promises, so only offer what you can deliver soon. Older teachers know you have to wait for supplies or permission. Rookies plan around your promises, so only offer what you can deliver soon.

- [image]Let teachers know what, where, and who they will be teaching as soon as possible. Beginners need lots of prep time to start the year with confidence. They also need advanced warning to be ready for major changes. Beginners need lots of prep time to start the year with confidence. They also need advanced warning to be ready for major changes.

- [image]Discuss concerns in private. Criticizing new teachers in front of colleagues makes them targets of teachers'-lounge gossip. Reprimanding rookies in front of students is even worse-it makes them seem weak and sends them back to cla.s.s with destroyed credibility. Criticizing new teachers in front of colleagues makes them targets of teachers'-lounge gossip. Reprimanding rookies in front of students is even worse-it makes them seem weak and sends them back to cla.s.s with destroyed credibility.

- [image]Back up teachers' decisions whenever possible. New teachers face extra challenges from students, and they worry about parents questioning grades and consequences. Knowing they'll have your support during a conference gives them more confidence in the cla.s.sroom. New teachers face extra challenges from students, and they worry about parents questioning grades and consequences. Knowing they'll have your support during a conference gives them more confidence in the cla.s.sroom.

- [image]a.s.sign reliable mentors. Not all mentors are created equal. Do your best to choose hardworking, discreet, understanding teachers whose cla.s.ses are similar to those of their trainees. Not all mentors are created equal. Do your best to choose hardworking, discreet, understanding teachers whose cla.s.ses are similar to those of their trainees.

- [image]Let them know what you think they are doing well. Your opinion matters a lot to new teachers, whether they show it or not. Your opinion matters a lot to new teachers, whether they show it or not.

- [image]Have a fair system for distributing students with behavior problems. Under no circ.u.mstances should veteran teachers be allowed to switch students into a rookie's cla.s.s. Filling a new teacher's cla.s.s with their colleagues' unwanted students is unfair to everyone in the room. Under no circ.u.mstances should veteran teachers be allowed to switch students into a rookie's cla.s.s. Filling a new teacher's cla.s.s with their colleagues' unwanted students is unfair to everyone in the room.

- [image]Buy them this book. Before you give it to them, take a look at the chapter about princ.i.p.als ( Before you give it to them, take a look at the chapter about princ.i.p.als (Chapter 13).

20.

Making Next Year BetterEven after you've made it through your first year, you have some work to do. For one thing, you need to pull out that "Ideas for the Future" file. Summer is your time to review all the revelations that came one lesson too late. Another idea, if you think you can handle it, is to give your students anonymous surveys. After 36 weeks, no one knows what kind of teacher you were better than they do. Administrators visited your cla.s.s a few times. Your students were in there every day.Yes, I am using the term every day every day loosely here. Yes, a good number of surveys will come back with answers like "Let us watch movies and don't give homework." Still, most kids will be honest. Put the surveys in a folder. Tape it closed. Promise not to open it until school lets out and report cards are printed. A few answers may sting, but at least you won't repeat the same mistakes for years without noticing. loosely here. Yes, a good number of surveys will come back with answers like "Let us watch movies and don't give homework." Still, most kids will be honest. Put the surveys in a folder. Tape it closed. Promise not to open it until school lets out and report cards are printed. A few answers may sting, but at least you won't repeat the same mistakes for years without noticing.This survey is your chance to ask students the questions you've been asking yourself all year. The following are a few possibilities: - [image]What was your favorite/least favorite thing about this cla.s.s?

- [image]How did your behavior, attendance, and effort in this cla.s.s compare to what you did in other cla.s.ses?

- [image]Do you feel you were treated with respect? Please describe any incident where you felt disrespected.

- [image]Do you feel you were recognized when you worked hard or did something well?

- [image]What could your teacher have done to help you learn better?

- [image]What could your teacher have done to make sure all students learned better?

- [image]If you became a teacher, what would you do differently? What would you do the same way?

- [image]Did anything important happen this year that the teacher didn't notice?

- [image]What will you remember most about this cla.s.s?