Docent Doe

For what it's worth, I highly recommend other first year teachers take an extended road trip during the summer. It seems impossible for me to tell how much of my isolation is geographic versus job focused, but I hadn't realized how distant the rest of the world had become.

I'm currently in DC and am loving the opportunity to play tourist. Hitting museums right and left.

In Feburary, I saw this article and resolved to visit the American Art Museum and National Portrait Gallery. Seriously, I saved it to del.icio.us tagged to a friend in the area with the note, "Can I visit this whenever I make it out to visit you this summer?"

I did not visit with that friend, but with another friend. We arrived just before a docent tour of the portrait gallery started and decided that would be a good way to start off our day. The tour was wonderful. Our guide took a route where she stopped in every room that we walked into. She would tell us about a portrait, giving all sorts of fun facts. (Which president had a rubber jaw? And where was the secret surgery performed?) And she kept us moving. If there was something else in the room that you wanted to see (for instance when I saw a Lakota cradleboard), that was fine. She kept everyone else moving through. The style was so exciting that I wanted to keep up and find out what else was going on.

After that experience, we were eager for the next docent tour this time of the Art Museum side. Maybe our expectations were raised so they had farther to fall, but we were not impressed. When we were given the out (another docent tour starting now) we jumped for it. And were thrilled to find our first guide doing a different tour.

The thing is, the second docent did the things that good teachers are "supposed to" do. She started out telling us where she would take us. When we were touring she asked us questions about the paintings. She waited for us to stop looking at other pieces in the room before she started talking. She got out the special docent gloves and showed us things that most visitors won't get to see.

And I was BORED.

If I wanted to talk about the pictures I would go through with my friend. I was there to learn more. I wanted the action-packed excitement. And the docent gloves weren't it, no matter how much she liked them.

I keep thinking about how this applies to my classroom. I fear I'm too much of the second docent. Too much of the following the rules. Too much of being excited about myself. Not enough contagious excitement about the material.

I'm not always sure of what makes the excitement contagious, but I think having the deep knowledge of the material. Having the confidence to say, "I don't know the answer to that. Let's look it up." Having the knowledge to be comfortable asking what students want to learn. Where do you want to go from here?Being able to say, "Oh this museum is confusing. I came up a different direction than normal and now I'm lost. You enjoy in here while I go find the picture I really want you to see."

Hopefully I'll have a bit more of that confidence in year two.

And lesson for anyone visiting DC, on Docent tours at the Portrait Gallery, Library of Congress, and the other museum where she works, try to get Madonna as your guide.

Note to self past

It's interesting how I remember so much of each individual day from this time last year. Today, for instance, I sat with a new friend, who had agreed to be my housemate for the coming year, as she made the call to resign from TFA.

10 schooldays since I turned in my keys for the summer and I may be ready to reflect on the year.


Dear Me '07,

Congratulations! You've made it through the whirlwind of finals/induction/graduation/packing-up-and-saying-goodbye/putting-stuff-in-storage-and-meeting-everyone-new
/9-hour-drives/flights-galore! Doubtless you realize that the whirlwind is just beginning. Take a moment, however brief, to savor these moments. They will be the last ones you have for a year without the pressure of lesson planning, grading, or just thinking about students.

During the fall, a friend will ask you, "If you could go back a year ago, would you still do it? Would you still check the box signing up to teach?"
My answer? "I don't think I could have talked myself out of it."

Claim it for what it is. The confession that you wonder why you agreed to this despite the warnings. The acknowledgment seeing the achievement gap from the student side is a different story than seeing it from the teacher side. All the more so in a strange and foreign land.
This accompanied by the optimistic hope that you can help the education system in some small, albeit stopgap, way. The determination that what is happening is not right and that doing something is better than not. The faith that, at least for now, teaching is your calling.

Because no matter how much you hear the stories, you don't know it until you live it. And even after living it, yes, especially after living in it, you realize you still don't know it.

After two weeks visiting friends in cities I've realized that when I'm in one world, I can't really imagine the other one. On the reservation, the neighborhoods of the suburbs aren't even a dream. The stores of downtown might as well be on the moon. The fifth-graders on a scavenger hunt at a museum are a sight to take pictures of, never mind that I have no connection to them.

As I drive farther from the reservation, it becomes ever harder to describe. When asked about jobs in the community, should I avoid mentioning the 85 percent unemployment rates? As the force of the number is reflected in people's face, should I remind them that this is among the poorest places in the states. I feel guilty for falling back on the deficit model--there is a rich heritage, my favorite tradition is the morning flag song--but there is truth that in other, larger areas there is wealth nearby. That wealth symbolized by something more than trailer-park teacher housing. Meaning not only is it existent, it's visible.

Given that I fall short of describing the reality you'll face, offering wisdom of how to prepare for it is beyond me.

My general advice?
Take advantage of your ability to ask for help.
Be amazed at how much you can keep in touch with people when you really need to.
Retreat to the edublogosphere when you need to passively plan for the future (or just not plan for tomorrow quite yet).
Take a mental health day when necessary and hope for conveniently placed snowdays.
Get out of town to remind yourself of the different worlds when you need to.
Own the successes of each day as they happen (too many will still feel like failures at the end of the year).

And remember, you couldn't talk yourself out of it. There's something here you believe in. In the students. In the community. In yourself. You may not know what it is, but it was strong enough to get you to check the box. And for what it's worth, it's strong enough that you'll be back.

Love,

Me '08

Little bit of politics

President Clinton was in town campaigning this weekend.

Not my town. But the town where many of my students live. The town with the closest grocery store. Best gas prices in the area, because its large enough to have more than two pumps at one store. He was there. Where the tribal college is. That's actually where he spoke. On the steps to the museum. Drum group and tipi to the left*.

I found out less than 48 hours before the event. I wish I'd known sooner. School ended on Thursday. (And most students stopped coming before then.) I would have encouraged them to go. I don't want to promote one policital agenda before another, but I do want my students to feel empowered in national politics.

I saw my politically active student at the event. He's already clear on his candidate of choice. (More so than I am of mine.) He came to school about three weeks ago telling me about a rally he'd attended in a city 4 hours away. But he was the only one.

I hadn't attended political rallies before this year. At the campaign events I've attended this year, I've learned that I get snarky when listening to political schmooze. I'm not sure that they've really influenced my vote in the primary. Still, it's the type of live-it education that I want to offer my students. When it comes so close to us, is so accessible to us**, it's so frustrating that the school can't do anything with it.


* It was interesting to classify the people at the event as locals or coming from elsewhere for the event. Racial sterotyping? Oh yeah. I say this knowing that I look like an outsider. Then again, after only living here a year, I am an outsider.

**I arrived three minutes before start time and still got to shake hands before leaving. Totally different from waiting outside in the cold for three hours to see a speech in January.

Word Problems

I knew I wanted to do some sort of warm-up this year. Finding one that worked was a bit more of a challenge. I finally settled into doing word problems. The requirement is that you have to show your work, write a complete sentence answering the question, and ask another question that could be answered from the information we have.

They're all handwritten on chart paper. I went through and typed most of them up. See them here if you need some sort of inspiration. (Or in your feedreader. It took me a bit to figure out how to get it up with blogger.) Warning that the quality of the problems vary.

I'm leaving the last warm-up word problem on the board. It's a reminder to myself of the situation here.

This year’s graduating class is 1/3 the size of this fall’s freshmen class. If we had 45 freshmen this year and assume that the seniors entered SFIS with a similar class size, how many students are not graduating this year?

Edit: Hrumph. Link not working yet. I'm leaving for my summer travels in the morning and need to pack. I'll update when I figure this out...

I know it's not just about the grades, but at this point it is.

Can someone give me a good reason why students should come to school on Wednesday and Thursday when grades are due at closing bell on Tuesday? I didn't have a convincing one for my students today....

Departmental Differences

Yesterday, we skipped seventh period to hand out academic awards. The school left it entirely up to teachers to do their own awards, though they did provide stationary to use for certificates.

The math department gave a couple of students to the top students. (I gave awards for "Most Concepts Mastered" and "Most Persistent.") The English department spoke about how proud they were of everybody and made sure that every student in the school received something.

Nerves

It's final exam day for the algebra kids. I think I'm more nervous about it than they are. Too many have checked out (classes are half the size they're supposed to be). Too many have given up. Too many just don't care.

I'll take some of the responsibility for it. I have some plans of what I'd like to change next year, but at the moment I'm feeling afraid of my shortcomings.