Week 2
The first day of the week usually begins with a PLC
(Professional Learning Communities).
Today was a school wide PLC that met in the auditorium. At the meeting, there were three
presentations. The Principal started
everything with a brief commentary on the heat.
He acknowledged that there would be a heat problem in the building as
some rooms on the third floor and in the basement might reach over 90
degrees. He told the teachers that there
were cooling centers where they could take their classes if needed. Those were the auditorium and the cafeteria,
which was 75% air conditioned. After his
introduction, Mr. DeJesus and Rebecca Allen presented the primary function of
the Student Support operations they were heading. They said that the purpose of the operation
was to identify students who failed Geometry and English during their sophomore
year. According to the presentation, the
data showed that most of the students who do not pass Geometry also do not
graduate. 87% of students who did not
graduate on time failed Geometry. The
Student Support operation was supposed to coordinate PBIS (Positive Behavior
Intervention and Support) and the RtI (Response to Intervention). This team would also manage academic
intervention efforts in English and Math, as well as identify troubled
students. The operation would plan to
support students who lacked specified skills and try to address attendance
issues. The team would do this by
creating and managing learning labs and asked for teachers to volunteer their
free periods or lunch to help.
At fourth period English class, the heat got to Jessica
again. I watched her struggle and tried to think of a possible point where she
might break. Before we entered the hot
room on the third floor, I told Jessica that if the heat is ever a problem she
should let me know and we could take a break.
I noticed in class how she tried to use a bottle of water to keep her
head cool by pressing the bottle to her brow.
It didn’t work. She struggled to
keep herself concentrated on doing the work that was given to her. If I was the teacher, I would have had a
different kind of assignment. The
students had to complete the 75 question diagnostic exam they started on Friday
– three days ago. When that was
complete, the students were assigned to read a packet, take notes on the
vocabulary, and answer the questions at the end of the packet. I sat
in my chair thinking to myself that I would have come up with something
different to do as a distraction from the heat.
A team building activity would have worked well since the seats were all
grouped together in clusters of four. I
wrote my Master’s Degree paper on cooperative learning. As such, I naturally look for particular
signs or behaviors when students are in groups.
One thing I learned is that if there is no group assignment or task,
then the mere clustering of chairs becomes a social event encouragement. Anyhow, the assignment was due September 5th. The present date was August 25th. More than two weeks, in my opinion, was too
much time for an English teacher to give to an honors class. The
packet was five pages front and back.
Four pages were from a short story.
Jessica, however, was
very distracted by the heat and unable to focus on the assignment. She started to close her eyes very tightly
and grit her teeth. I didn’t know if
this was the beginning of an autistic tantrum that I expected her to have. Eventually, she looked at me and asked if she
could take a break. I said yes and we
walked out into the hallway. Jessica was
irritable, complaining about a headache.
She said that she didn’t understand why we were not released early from
school. She thought that parents should
complain. Jessica assumed that those who
made decisions on whether or not the students should go home were sitting in an
air-conditioned room. She thought that
those “pencil pushers” on the school board should come to the school and see
how hot it was.
Fortunately, the sky became dark and rain followed bringing
a cool breeze through the windows. I took Jessica to the first floor where it
was cooler and we opened a door that led to the courtyard. She stood there and took in the breeze while
making an observation of the dirt at the threshold. She said the school was dirty and that the
janitors should clean the building. The
restrooms smelled badly and the toilets were never flushed. She hated to go into the restrooms because
they were so dirty. I did not give fuel
to her fire, instead I took an angle designed to give her insight at how
difficult the jobs are for many people.
Relating to the board members who “do not care about the students and
only care about money,” I said, “It must be tough for them. They don’t have enough money to buy supplies
to give teachers or pay for air conditioners.
Then people say we are cheap and broke.
So if they put their concentration on getting money, then people say
that they only care about money. That
must be tough for them.”
When I saw that she was cool and seemed less focused on
being hot, I suggested that she return to class and work on the
vocabulary. She thought that she could
regain focus and then we returned to class.
The seventh and last period class – Civics – was just as hot
as or even hotter than 4th period, but Jessica seemed immune to
it. She likes this class. The subject of rules and laws is very
appealing to her. She liked to give her opinion and raised her hand to share
with every question. The teacher’s class discussion strategy was simple. She asked the students to write on paper a
list of school rules and why they were needed.
Then the students were allowed to share.
Once, the teacher was interrupted when Rene tried to put on his headphones. She broke off from the conversation to tell
him to put them away. She asked the
students to write a second list of home rules and then society rules. She led the discussion and at times asked
students who did not join the discussion to share what they wrote. Most times, when Jessica and I left this
class (as we always did with 8 minutes remaining); she was so excited that she
continued the conversation with me. Due
to the fact that she tries to stay in this class as long as possible she is
often a few minutes late to catch her bus home.
It was about this time in the school year that I noticed something wrong with a few teachers. The English teacher in particular won my suspicions. I started to question her methods starting with the amount of time she gave honor students to do a simple assignment. In my experience, students are given honor classes without being given honors teachers. What I mean by this is that in this school district, I've heard teachers say that there is no different from honors classes and regular classes. The students in honors classes are just expected to do a little bit more work. When the administrators and the school board people talk about improving scores, I believe that it should start with the honors classes. A typical honors student should be a student who has demonstrated an ability to think at a higher level and match that higher level of thought with a higher work ethic. I saw on this day that the work ethic or the higher level of thought was not expected from the English Honors class. Furthermore, in terms of teaching strategies, I did not see any evidence of one. When I compare this teacher to the Civics teacher, I am convinced that the English teacher or the English department needed work.
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